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Citrus: A History, by Pierre Laszlo
This is a very academic but not a very academically-structured little book... I mean, you can tell the author is a chemist (even if he didn't point it out from time to time) but the book rambles all over the place. It doesn't make any pretensions that it ISN'T doing this, and I quite enjoyed reading it, but don't go in looking for SRS BZNS or compelling narrative. Delightful, nonetheless.
(133/275)
Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade, by Diana Gabaldon
Lord John and the Hand of Devils, by Diana Gabaldon
I think I slightly prefer the Lord John books to the main series, as much as I like Claire Fraser & her adventures ... these books make incredibly good brain candy for me - like a cross between Georgette Heyer and Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe series, maybe (she says, not having actually read either of those yet) - and they're short and zippy in a way doorstops just can't be. I liked Brotherhood of the Blade best of these two, I think because the short stories in Hand of Devils were a smidge too short for my taste. Not that stopped me from staying up late to finish the last of them.
(134,135/275)
A Brutal Telling, by Louise Penny (ARC)
Most of the things I want to say about this particular volume are spoileriffic and the book doesn't come out until October. It's another not-really-cosy-at-all village mystery set in the small bilingual-but-more-Anglo-than-not Three Pines, Eastern Townships, Quebec, much like the other 4 in the series only the emotional stakes (well, and honestly, the need to trust the author) get higher with each book. I'm mulling over whether I liked this one less than the last one, or whether it's just still sinking in ... but I can say that the writing in every volume in the series is brilliant, so if you like character-heavy mysteries with a walloping dose of wonder in them, you should go read the first of these, Still Life, right now.
(136/275)
This is a very academic but not a very academically-structured little book... I mean, you can tell the author is a chemist (even if he didn't point it out from time to time) but the book rambles all over the place. It doesn't make any pretensions that it ISN'T doing this, and I quite enjoyed reading it, but don't go in looking for SRS BZNS or compelling narrative. Delightful, nonetheless.
(133/275)
Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade, by Diana Gabaldon
Lord John and the Hand of Devils, by Diana Gabaldon
I think I slightly prefer the Lord John books to the main series, as much as I like Claire Fraser & her adventures ... these books make incredibly good brain candy for me - like a cross between Georgette Heyer and Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe series, maybe (she says, not having actually read either of those yet) - and they're short and zippy in a way doorstops just can't be. I liked Brotherhood of the Blade best of these two, I think because the short stories in Hand of Devils were a smidge too short for my taste. Not that stopped me from staying up late to finish the last of them.
(134,135/275)
A Brutal Telling, by Louise Penny (ARC)
Most of the things I want to say about this particular volume are spoileriffic and the book doesn't come out until October. It's another not-really-cosy-at-all village mystery set in the small bilingual-but-more-Anglo-than-not Three Pines, Eastern Townships, Quebec, much like the other 4 in the series only the emotional stakes (well, and honestly, the need to trust the author) get higher with each book. I'm mulling over whether I liked this one less than the last one, or whether it's just still sinking in ... but I can say that the writing in every volume in the series is brilliant, so if you like character-heavy mysteries with a walloping dose of wonder in them, you should go read the first of these, Still Life, right now.
(136/275)
