catchup book post

[maribou]

Welcome to Lizard Motel, by Barbara Feinberg
Hm. In theory (and according to the introduction), this is a book about how depressing award-winning kid's lit has become. I'm not sure how statistically accurate that is, but it doesn't matter, because really it's more a book about the importance of cherishing the positive uses of imagination, and about the necessity of imaginative freedom, particularly in children. As such, I loved it. As a personal story, also loved it.
(72/200)

The Final Solution, by Michael Chabon
A Sherlock Holmes tribute novel, elegiac and carefully written. I quite liked it; I wish he would write another big thick thumping adventure of a novel though.
(73/200)

Half the Day Is Night, by Maureen McHugh
This is rather good. The characters' complexity reveals itself slowly and one ends up not wanting to put the book down. I didn't find it particularly original, but it did what it was doing extremely well.
(74/200)

Winter Oak, by James Hetley
Apparently a number of other reviewers didn't like this because it was ever so much more dark and depressing and hopeless than The Summer Country. I am baffled because I thought it was ever so much less harsh and depressing than The Summer Country, in a fitting balances-the-first-book sort of way. (Note: this is a relative statement and I do not mean to imply fluffy unicorns and rainbows.) At any rate, I really liked it and really recommend it to lovers of modern Celtic fantasy and will probably be reading anything Mr. Hetley writes for the foreseeable future. So there?
(75/200)

The Devil Wears Prada, by Lauren Weisberger
I read this book because I had cramps and I didn't want to read anything I had been planning to read when I wasn't in pain - whatever I read would probably be better in a non-ache-filled state. That said, I enjoyed this more than I expected to - it was funnier, smarter, and more sympathetic than I had misanticipated.
(76/200)

Swinging on the Garden Gate, by Elizabeth Andrew
I was entranced by this book. I want to be friends with the author, in the vague and nonstalkerish way that I sometimes have that impulse. I think her writing is glorious, and I must find more of it in the next few months. It made my brain burst with little fireworks of related thoughts, sometimes entire reveries of them.
(77/200)

Attitude!: Eight Young Dancers Come of Age at the Ailey School
, by Katherine Davis Fishman
For a sociologist/psychologist, this author certainly has a handle on 'show, don't tell'. Very lucid and engaging exploration of her subject matter. I really enjoy dance books by dancers, and it was interesting to read a more 'outsider' perspective for a change.
(78/200)

In Service to the Horse, by Susan Nusser
Interesting look at grooms, mostly, along with other horsey topics. I think I read horse books to get back to the frame of mind I had when I was 7,8,9,10 and devouring Walter Farley and Marguerite Henry over and over again. This book very much put me into that headspace, so I am quite fond of it. I think it's a good book generally, also - its earthy perspective is balanced by a good deal of history and discussion of various expert opinions - but what I liked were the stories about people and horses.
(79/200)

The Return of the King, by J. R. R. Tolkien (unabridged audiobook) (reread)
Not much to say about these that hasn't already been said. I really think the recordings do the books justice - I was particularly impressed this time around by what a good job the narrator did with the various appendices.
(80/200)

Stroke of Midnight, Laurell K Hamilton
Whee, next installment of My Platonic Smut. Strangely, as the Anita Blake books get more about the sex and less about the plot/worldbuilding, these ones get more about the plot/worldbuilding and less about the sex. Still a lot of sex though.
(81/200)