All Bayou Dances
Aug. 14th, 2010 05:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
maribouAll She Was Worth, by Miyuki Miyabe
In some ways, this was just a typical crime novel - for one thing, the info dumping about the credit industry was clumsy and gave WAY more information than I found necessary. However, this story is haunting, delicate, thoughtful, and restrained in ways that only the best crime novels manage to be. I would love to read more of her work - and I'm fascinated to discover that among her long list of titles are a series of kids' fantasy books. Huh. If her touch with those are as deft as her touch with this, I will be in for a treat!
(123/200)
War Dances, by Sherman Alexie
Some parts of this were really great. I wish I had more appreciation for his poetry, but I don't. Still like novels better than short stories, too. I think the best parts of this book were the quasi-non-fiction ones - "Catechism," a series of questions with oblique answers, was probably my favorite piece.
(124/200)
Bayou volume 1, by Jeremy Love and Patrick Morgan
Lee Wagstaff is my new favorite child-heroine. But unless your kids have a high tolerance for scary stuff, this book is probably not for them (yet). For grown-ups, it is delightfully told, delightfully drawn and colored (the colors are so amazing I'm giving the colorist equal billing with the writer/illustrator), and chilling in the way good fairy stories tend to be. Beyond the great story and gorgeous art, it is also good to see someone reclaiming the Uncle Remus stories and referencing those folktales from the African-American perspective instead of a paternalistic white-dude one. I am on tenterhooks until volume 2 comes out in November.
(125/200)
In some ways, this was just a typical crime novel - for one thing, the info dumping about the credit industry was clumsy and gave WAY more information than I found necessary. However, this story is haunting, delicate, thoughtful, and restrained in ways that only the best crime novels manage to be. I would love to read more of her work - and I'm fascinated to discover that among her long list of titles are a series of kids' fantasy books. Huh. If her touch with those are as deft as her touch with this, I will be in for a treat!
(123/200)
War Dances, by Sherman Alexie
Some parts of this were really great. I wish I had more appreciation for his poetry, but I don't. Still like novels better than short stories, too. I think the best parts of this book were the quasi-non-fiction ones - "Catechism," a series of questions with oblique answers, was probably my favorite piece.
(124/200)
Bayou volume 1, by Jeremy Love and Patrick Morgan
Lee Wagstaff is my new favorite child-heroine. But unless your kids have a high tolerance for scary stuff, this book is probably not for them (yet). For grown-ups, it is delightfully told, delightfully drawn and colored (the colors are so amazing I'm giving the colorist equal billing with the writer/illustrator), and chilling in the way good fairy stories tend to be. Beyond the great story and gorgeous art, it is also good to see someone reclaiming the Uncle Remus stories and referencing those folktales from the African-American perspective instead of a paternalistic white-dude one. I am on tenterhooks until volume 2 comes out in November.
(125/200)
