12. The Left Hand of Darkness

by Ursula LeGuin (283 pp.)

In the process of writing up the previous book I found out that the New Yorker book club is reading The Left Hand Of Darkness this month in honor of its 40th year since publication. I only read this book once and I think it was about twenty years ago. It's fantastic. I've been having a lot of trouble getting into books lately and this is a brainy read but I could hardly put it down. It's about an envoy from a group of planets who travels to this technologically undeveloped world to try to bring them into their group. Things don't go easily for him. The planet is cold such that the cold is like another character in the story. Plus there are themes of gender, power, friendship. Highly recommended.

11. Gifts

by Ursula Le Guin (274 pp.)

Ursula Le Guin has a new YA trilogy and the third one, Powers, won a Nebula award. I thought I'd check the series out. This is the first one and it is a really good book, but tough. No rainbows and unicorns in this story. It took me a little bit to get into it because there's some complicated culture/world-building. The story is about a boy who is voluntarily blinded because he believes he can't control his gift, the gift of unmaking, and might harm someone. That probably doesn't make it sound very good but it's worth it. I've got to track down the next two books.

10. The Yiddish Policemen's Union (411 pp) by Michael Chabon (July 4)

Yeah! I finished a book. I'm on track for 20 books in the year 2009. Pitiful. I'm going to kinda anti-ditto myself in this brief review but here goes:

I thought this was a really cool book, fantastic idea, great characters, interesting setting. But I had a tough time getting through it. I read the first 50 pp. over several bus commutes and as I have said before, I don't have very good concentration. So for something to work on the bus it has to grab my attention and/or be easy to follow. This book introduced a dozen characters and I got bogged down in a blur. Then the book sat on the nightstand while I avoided it and read the back up on my digests (photo below). I finally got it back out, re-read the first 50 pages and started a notecard with a brief reminder who the characters were. Then I got into it and flew through the book up until the last 50 pages or so, that seemed to stretch on forever. When I finished I read the plot summary on wikipedia and to be honest, I'm still not 100% sure what happened.

It's an alternate history where there is a Jewish settlement in Sitka Alaska. The protagonist is Meyer Landsman who's a detective investigating a murder. Even though I had a tough time, I recommend.

What Have I Been Reading?

Since I still haven't managed to finish a book I thought I'd post a partial pile of some of the stuff I've read since January. That pile isn't counting all my classmate's stories and the stories I read online.

I'm going away this weekend and optimistically taking two books. (ha!)

0. Un Lun Dun

by China Miéville

I'm always complaining about how much I have to read and I have repeatedly vowed to myself that I would not finish things I don't like. But that hardly ever happens. I feel like I owe it to the writer/publisher to give the story/book a chance and I slog along unhappily. I bought this book during CW last summer and I was really looking forward to it. I had a major public transportation day yesterday and thought it would be the perfect opportunity to dig into this book. Another disappointment. It's a YA. I got to page 90 (out of 471) and I can't tell you one thing about the protagonist(s). The world they went into was amazing and there were pages and pages of details about it. But I have the same complaint a I had about The Lightening Thief: instead of a story, it felt like someone was thinking of a bunch of stuff that could happen. Near as I could tell the girls fell into Neverwhere and needed to find the wizard.

9. Little Brother

by Cory Doctorow (365 pp.)

I didn't enjoy this book as much as I wanted to. In its defense, I'm not the target audience. It's about a computer-techie kid who lives in San Francisco. After a terrorist attack on the city he takes action against the government because of the loss of civil liberties in the name of keeping the city safe. The book is aimed at a YA audience and it makes a lot of great points that I think young people should be thinking about. However, Cory has talked about how quickly he wrote this book and it felt like it was written quickly. Some of the story developments were awfully convenient. Recommended with reservations.

7. and 8. Maus I: My Father Bleeds Hisotry and Maus II: And Here My Troubles Began

by Art Spiegelman

I knew these were going to be really good. They've been on the nightstand forever. I've been waiting until I was ready and honestly, the real reason I chose them was because they are short and I knew I'd read them fast. I feel like I've been getting bogged down in every book I've picked up this year.

There is no way to convey how fabulous these books are. They are graphic novels about the comic's father's experience in the holocaust. The first one is easier than the second one but they are both really grim. There was a part that was so sad I had to pause. Bob came in the room right then and I said, "This book is really sad."

"Yeah," he said, "But it's great."

I won't say anything else except the narrative structure is genius. My highest recommendation.

6. Watchmen

by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

I don't know what to tell you. It was interesting. I'm not a big comic book person to begin with. I can understand the acclaim but wasn't for me.

Black Powder War: Temeraire Book 3

by Naomi Novik (365 pp)

Ug, my book reading is SO pitiful. And my huge stack of magazines and digests that I managed to go through over xmas is completely built up again. I wish I could take a day off just for reading. But if I take a day off it's going to be for writing.

I read book 1 (#1) and book 2 (#12). I loved the first one. I thought the second one was okay. This one was also okay. I'm not sure I'd read another one. The series is an alternate history of the Napoleonic wars only with dragons. What I loved about the first one is that there was a lot going on. Temeraire hatches out of an egg and is brand new in this world. The protagonist, Will Laurence, has his entire life set on a wildly different course due to his contact with this dragon. That was fun and interesting. Now Temeraire is stuck on equal rights for dragons, not just beasts of burden, and it's not so cute after awhile. The battle was more interesting. Recommended for fans of the series.

4. Flora Segunda: Being the Magickal Mishaps of a Girl of Spirit, her Glass-Gazing Sidekick, Two Ominous Butlers (One Blue), a House with Eleven Thousand Rooms, and a Red Dog.

by Ysabeau S. Wilce (431 pp.) I am endlessly frustrated with my inability to read more than 5 pages a day. This is the kind of book that should be gobbled up in a weekend. Yesterday afternoon I got cozy and vowed not to move until it was done. But then it was dinner time so I didn't finish it until I went to bed.

I'd heard this book was fabulous a bunch of times and finally got my hands on it and it is just as advertised. It's about thirteen-year old Flora Fyrdraaca who is born into a military family that's on the decline. There's magic and creatures and weirdness and humor. Flora gets herself into all kinds of trouble. Here's a quote: "That's the problem with guns: they pretend to be the solution to every problem." Recommended.

3. The Daily Coyote (287 pp) by Shreve Stockton (Feb 15 09). I used to share the Daily Coyote with a friend at the old office. She got the book and told me she would loan it to me. "It will only take you an afternoon," she said. She was close. I actually read about 75 pages while I was still working on Wuthering Heights. I finished it this morning. You have to give the author credit, she managed to wring something resembling a story out of almost nothing. I'd be surprised to hear that someone wasn't trying to develop this into a feature for some plucky young actress. Women love stories about women who run away to some exotic other life. Other examples: Eat Pray Love, that one where Diane Lane buys the house in Italy and fixes it up. This one is about a woman who impulsively moves to Wyoming after driving through on a cross-country trip. She gets a coyote puppy after its parents and siblings are killed and the story is about Wyoming and dealing with the coyote. It's not an earth-shattering piece of literature but perfect entertainment for a few hours.

2. Wuthering Heights (334 pp.) by Emily Brontë (Feb 13 09). Alert the media. I FINALLY finished another book. This is pitiful. Also, I am just now noticing that the formating on this page is bunged up especially if you click on the comments. Doodoo. Oh well. If I don't have time to read then I certainly don't have time to fix my CSS.

I have been on the verge of finishing this book for two weekends. I decided I would not go to bed or read one more thing until I finished this damn thing and I gamely slogged through until the end.

My first question, is where is volume III? The title page says this novel has three volumes. I count only I and II. I guess I shouldn't complain since it took me forever to read what I had. I'm just curious. I guess volume III would be the tales of the next generation and poor Nelly in her crone years. This story is like the Flowers in the Attic of the 1800's. Or I guess the bulk of the story is set in the 1700's so take your pick.

I didn't hate the book. I found Heathcliff an intriguing character and I loved the setting. After the first 20 pages I was on Flickr looking for moors photos. But every character in the book has a scene of unrepentant cruelty. What a bunch of meanies. The second part went on way too long which is probably why it took me a month to read it. I kept starting other books and then setting them aside and trying to woo myself back to the moors of the meanies. Recommended with reservations.