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Amazing lightening storms last night gave way to a consistently overcast, oft rainy day: my absolute favorite weather.
The Book of Atrix Wolfe ・ The Book of Spells ・ Breathe ・ Burnt Sugar ・ The Colour of Magic ・ Experience the Mystery of Tarot ・Girl, Wash Your Face ・ Gold Diggers ・ The Light Fantastic ・ How to Build a Girl ・ How to Make a Bird ・ The Inspired Houseplant ・ The Kingdoms ・ The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet ・ Magic for Liars ・ The Silver Bough vol. 2 ・ Thick as Thieves ・ A Thousand Ships ・ The Westing Game ・ The Witness for the Dead ・ Yearning for the Sea
What I Finished Reading This Week
Children of Blood and Bone – Tomi Adeyemi
After undergoing the sledgehammer to the psyche that was the experience of reading The Changeling, I needed the literary equivalent of empty calories. I’m happy to say that ( Children of Blood and Bone is a bag of Doritos )
The Magian Tarok – Stephen E. Flowers
I’ll write more about this one on a Tarot Tuesday. Here I will say only that this book is in keeping with the long tradition of Tarot scholarship, in that it presents a cohesive but factually spurious rediscovery of the cards' "true" historical origins and meanings.
Mythos – Stephen Fry
I needed something that paid attention to the craft of writing after Children of Blood and Bone, but still wasn’t ready for a novel-length narrative after The Changeling, and this fit the bill perfectly. In Mythos, Fry attempts to retell the Greek myths from the creation of the universe up to the age of heroes in something like a unified timeline, and largely succeeds. His love of the subject matter is obvious, and he treats the stories with respect, but also a healthy dose of humor (and I loved the footnotes illustrating how the stories continue to influence arts, science, and culture in the present day). None of the individual stories Fry retells is longer than five or six pages (of albeit size 6 font), broken into subsections of a page or so. These retellings aren’t entirely without fault; I found myself wishing Fry had hewed a little less closely to the original cultural attitudes that equate female goodness with “beauty,” lack of ambition, and “shutting the fuck up,” and sexual predation with, well, joviality. But such are the inherent shortfalls of the subject matter. Mythos is a beautifully illustrated, engaging retelling of the myths, probably my favorite handling of such in short story form.
The Changeling – Joy Williams
Oh my god, this is a good book. The writing is stellar. The tension is incredible. Williams can make a sun-drenched summer afternoon foreboding. The plot kept me double- and triple-guessing everything I thought was going on. I inhaled this in a day and a half, and spent twice as many recovering. ( Cut for thematic spoilers. )
It's very much the literary progenitor of Sue Rainsford’s excellent Follow Me To Ground, every bit as creepy and thought provoking, and definitely something I will read again.
蟲師 6 – 漆原 友紀 (Mushishi vol. 6 – Urushihara Yuki)
Excellent rainy day reading.
What I Finished Reading At Some Point In The Past Four Months
Magic for Liars – Sarah Gailey
Magic for Liars opens with alcoholic, down-on-her-luck PI Ivy Gamble being offered a job she can’t refuse: conduct an independent investigation of a murder at a school for magical teenagers. Oh, and the magical sister Ivy’s resented since childhood is now a professor there.
Some parts of the book worked very well for me, but others fell flat. ( cut )
What I Am Currently Reading
Selin Ascends – Josiah Bancroft
Making a push to finish this one.
Lady of the Beasts – Buffie Johnson
Early days.
Politics in China – William Joseph (ed.)
Early days.
Outlawed – Anna North
Well written when I pick it up, but this novel feels like something I should read on a hot, relentlessly sunny summer day.
What I’m Reading Next
This week I picked up a copy of Politics in China.
これで以上です。
What I Finished Reading This Week
Children of Blood and Bone – Tomi Adeyemi
After undergoing the sledgehammer to the psyche that was the experience of reading The Changeling, I needed the literary equivalent of empty calories. I’m happy to say that ( Children of Blood and Bone is a bag of Doritos )
The Magian Tarok – Stephen E. Flowers
I’ll write more about this one on a Tarot Tuesday. Here I will say only that this book is in keeping with the long tradition of Tarot scholarship, in that it presents a cohesive but factually spurious rediscovery of the cards' "true" historical origins and meanings.
Mythos – Stephen Fry
I needed something that paid attention to the craft of writing after Children of Blood and Bone, but still wasn’t ready for a novel-length narrative after The Changeling, and this fit the bill perfectly. In Mythos, Fry attempts to retell the Greek myths from the creation of the universe up to the age of heroes in something like a unified timeline, and largely succeeds. His love of the subject matter is obvious, and he treats the stories with respect, but also a healthy dose of humor (and I loved the footnotes illustrating how the stories continue to influence arts, science, and culture in the present day). None of the individual stories Fry retells is longer than five or six pages (of albeit size 6 font), broken into subsections of a page or so. These retellings aren’t entirely without fault; I found myself wishing Fry had hewed a little less closely to the original cultural attitudes that equate female goodness with “beauty,” lack of ambition, and “shutting the fuck up,” and sexual predation with, well, joviality. But such are the inherent shortfalls of the subject matter. Mythos is a beautifully illustrated, engaging retelling of the myths, probably my favorite handling of such in short story form.
The Changeling – Joy Williams
Oh my god, this is a good book. The writing is stellar. The tension is incredible. Williams can make a sun-drenched summer afternoon foreboding. The plot kept me double- and triple-guessing everything I thought was going on. I inhaled this in a day and a half, and spent twice as many recovering. ( Cut for thematic spoilers. )
It's very much the literary progenitor of Sue Rainsford’s excellent Follow Me To Ground, every bit as creepy and thought provoking, and definitely something I will read again.
蟲師 6 – 漆原 友紀 (Mushishi vol. 6 – Urushihara Yuki)
Excellent rainy day reading.
What I Finished Reading At Some Point In The Past Four Months
Magic for Liars – Sarah Gailey
Magic for Liars opens with alcoholic, down-on-her-luck PI Ivy Gamble being offered a job she can’t refuse: conduct an independent investigation of a murder at a school for magical teenagers. Oh, and the magical sister Ivy’s resented since childhood is now a professor there.
Some parts of the book worked very well for me, but others fell flat. ( cut )
What I Am Currently Reading
Selin Ascends – Josiah Bancroft
Making a push to finish this one.
Lady of the Beasts – Buffie Johnson
Early days.
Politics in China – William Joseph (ed.)
Early days.
Outlawed – Anna North
Well written when I pick it up, but this novel feels like something I should read on a hot, relentlessly sunny summer day.
What I’m Reading Next
This week I picked up a copy of Politics in China.
これで以上です。