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thisbluespirit) wrote2018-01-31 05:51 pm
thisbluespirit) wrote2018-01-31 05:51 pm
Entry tags:
What I'm Reading Wednesday
What I've Finished Reading
Since last time, another Daisy Dalrymple book, Die Laughing (the other library came up trumps). Daisy had toothache and tried to go to the dentist, only to discover her dentist dead in the chair. Scotland Yard (aka her husband Alec) was, as ever, much put upon by this.
I finished off two comparatively short social history books that I was taking notes from for family history, Early Victorian Britain by J F C Harrison and Mid-Victorian Britain by Geoffrey Best. I also managed to finally skim to the end of my hopelessly-in-need-of-editing bio of Jasper Tudor by Terry Breverton. I'm keeping it, though. With it, I may never need another book about the Wars of the Roses, but it's hard to find the bits that are just on Jasper... (Plus, he is slightly biased in favour of Jasper and Henry because they were WELSH, shall we say that again several times? The bards sang, yay. To be honest, this did amuse me quite a lot.) There is another book on Jasper. I might have to get it some time, because this one is pretty unreliable.
What I'm Reading Now
The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold. I wanted to try the Vorkosigan saga, but it's not that easy to come by where I am (at least not cheaply or freely), but this was, and I'm nearly halfway through now, so it seems to be okay for me, and I'm enjoying it a lot so far, especially now the plot has suddenly picked up in the last few chapters. And, actually, it's much better to have picked one that's a duology rather than an epic series, really. (I gather there are more, but most of those seem to be a sort of separate sub-series or something? At least, I hope so as two books seems do-able!)
I am note-taking from Voices from Dickens' London now. It is not exactly scholarly, but I'll take contemporary quotes where I can find them. I am rewarded by this one alone: a Captain Shaw, visiting London wrote of a visit to Seven Dials: "The walk through the Dials after dark was an act none but a lunatic would have attempted, and the betting that he ever emerged with his shirt was 1,000 to 60. A swaggering ass named Corrigan... once undertook for a wager to walk the entire length of Great Andrew Street at midnight, and if molested to annihilate his assailants. The half-dozen doubters who awaited his advent in the Broadway were surprised about 1 a.m. to see him running as fast as he could put legs to the ground, with only the remnant of a shirt on him... (My ancestors lived in Great (St) Andrew Street for at least 20 years. Ha.)
What I'm Reading Next
I don't know. It'll take me a while to finish those, I should think. Although if I find another Daisy in the meantime, that, because it's an easy-reading series that seems to suit me perfectly just now.
For note-taking, I have lined up a history of Tuberculosis, since it was such a common cause of death in the past, and many of my ancestors died due to it. Morbid, but useful, I hope!
Since last time, another Daisy Dalrymple book, Die Laughing (the other library came up trumps). Daisy had toothache and tried to go to the dentist, only to discover her dentist dead in the chair. Scotland Yard (aka her husband Alec) was, as ever, much put upon by this.
I finished off two comparatively short social history books that I was taking notes from for family history, Early Victorian Britain by J F C Harrison and Mid-Victorian Britain by Geoffrey Best. I also managed to finally skim to the end of my hopelessly-in-need-of-editing bio of Jasper Tudor by Terry Breverton. I'm keeping it, though. With it, I may never need another book about the Wars of the Roses, but it's hard to find the bits that are just on Jasper... (Plus, he is slightly biased in favour of Jasper and Henry because they were WELSH, shall we say that again several times? The bards sang, yay. To be honest, this did amuse me quite a lot.) There is another book on Jasper. I might have to get it some time, because this one is pretty unreliable.
What I'm Reading Now
The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold. I wanted to try the Vorkosigan saga, but it's not that easy to come by where I am (at least not cheaply or freely), but this was, and I'm nearly halfway through now, so it seems to be okay for me, and I'm enjoying it a lot so far, especially now the plot has suddenly picked up in the last few chapters. And, actually, it's much better to have picked one that's a duology rather than an epic series, really. (I gather there are more, but most of those seem to be a sort of separate sub-series or something? At least, I hope so as two books seems do-able!)
I am note-taking from Voices from Dickens' London now. It is not exactly scholarly, but I'll take contemporary quotes where I can find them. I am rewarded by this one alone: a Captain Shaw, visiting London wrote of a visit to Seven Dials: "The walk through the Dials after dark was an act none but a lunatic would have attempted, and the betting that he ever emerged with his shirt was 1,000 to 60. A swaggering ass named Corrigan... once undertook for a wager to walk the entire length of Great Andrew Street at midnight, and if molested to annihilate his assailants. The half-dozen doubters who awaited his advent in the Broadway were surprised about 1 a.m. to see him running as fast as he could put legs to the ground, with only the remnant of a shirt on him... (My ancestors lived in Great (St) Andrew Street for at least 20 years. Ha.)
What I'm Reading Next
I don't know. It'll take me a while to finish those, I should think. Although if I find another Daisy in the meantime, that, because it's an easy-reading series that seems to suit me perfectly just now.
For note-taking, I have lined up a history of Tuberculosis, since it was such a common cause of death in the past, and many of my ancestors died due to it. Morbid, but useful, I hope!
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Yes :) There are a bunch all set in the same world, but in three different timeframes with no character overlap (besides the Gods :)
- Curse of Chalion + Paladin of Souls is one time setting (I think the sequel is even better than 'Curse')
- Hallowed Hunt (which is the one I like least) is off on its own
- And the Penric novellas (which are up to 6 at this point, I think? I'm several behind) are again separate (and at ~100 pages apiece are fun, easy reads)
Tracking down Vorkosigans is complicated by the way they're omnibused together (at least in the US editions), so the easiest/cheapest way to source a book may not be under its actual title. But, yeah, it's rather a long series, and if you'd rather not get into it at the moment, Chalion-verse may be a better bet. (Although Shards of Honor and Barrayar (omnibused as Cordelia's Honor) can be read on their own without continuing on with the rest, since there's a protagonist switch at that point.)
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But when I am stronger, I shall get onto the Vorkosigan saga and just put them on my b'day list, so thanks for the tip. Someone before told me just to try and start with Shards of Honour anyway, so I have that listed. But probably shorter series first is a good motto for now! I'm still trying to work through all the Patrick O'Brian sea stories.
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Please tell me she finds another dentist who isn't dead! The idea of trying to solve a murder mystery with a toothache sounds miserable.
(My ancestors lived in Great (St) Andrew Street for at least 20 years. Ha.)
Have you read Margery Allingham's The China Governess (1963)? The history of a fictional but famously disreputable part of London is key to the plot, and this anecdote reminded me of it.
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No, even better - her toothache was miraculously cured by the murder! It never twinged again. The shock cure, very effective, but hard on dentists, so rarely attempted.
I stopped before I got into the later Campion books - I think that was when I was getting ill - but that would be a hundred years too late for me. :-)
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I hope you get more Daisy books. They sound a lot of fun.
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I am set on hunting down more Daisy books. They seem to exactly suit my current brain level and despite the nonsense, I got rapidly quite fond of Alec & Daisy.
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Do you have a Kindle? Because a lot of the early books in the series were made available for free via Baen, the publisher's website.
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Like you, I want to try the Vorkosigans, but it wasn't until I read your comment upthread that I realised they might be hard to find over here. Oxfordshire libraries have some, but not as extensive a collection as they do by other authors, and literally nothing electronically, which is just odd. It's clearly very geographically specific!
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It's sort of both - mostly general interest, but also for mild research as I got into the period by watching the BBC 1972 serial Shadow of the Tower, which covers the reign of Henry VII (or most of it) and then writing fic for it and sometimes for 15th C requests for Yuletide as a result. So I have collected a few others now as well as the Jasper book. I was keen to get more on Jasper, as he's very interesting in lots of ways, but this one was not so much original research and the author had not edited anything down! (I quite enjoyed the amusingly unashamed YAY WELSH bias though. Not one for Ricardians!) I haven't heard of those plays, though - they sound interesting. When did they come out?
Like you, I want to try the Vorkosigans, but it wasn't until I read your comment upthread that I realised they might be hard to find over here.
I'm not sure if they're very hard to find, or if it just depends where you live. I should imagine places with large student populations like Oxford might well have more SFF floating about the second hand bookshops and libraries. Our library service is tiny, though, and not well equipped with anything these days, let alone SFF.
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Wikipedia tells me that the plays came out in 2010-12, which feels about right, as that was the height of my Radio 4 addiction ;D He went on to do the Stuarts as well, which was another fabulous series. Honestly, I just automatically listen to anything he writes, the same as Bert Coules. They're guaranteed to be good!
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"Swaggering ass" is such a lovely turn of phrase. I think we should all try to use it more often. :)
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"Swaggering ass" is such a lovely turn of phrase. I think we should all try to use it more often.
But not be it!
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Both Shards of Honour and Barryar are available at that price from Abe books
https://www.abebooks.co.uk/servlet/SearchResults?kn=shards+of+Honour&sts=t
https://www.abebooks.co.uk/servlet/SearchResults?sts=t&an=&tn=&kn=Barrayar&isbn=
I'd recommend Shards as a first read too before you delve into the Miles Vorkosigan sagas.
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"What I'm Reading Next"
You know what I'm going to suggest. :)
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I suppose you mean the graphic novel you sent? I haven't forgotten, but I am very peculiar with my reading and I have to just let things wait for the magic right moment, or else it doesn't go well. And it is not the moment for that yet. (I do feel bad, I probably shouldn't have agreed to let you send me it, as it probably will take a while to get to it - I've looked at it and while it does seem like a labour of love on the part of the author/artist, indeed, but also quite dark in the way that many graphic novels are and I am not always up to that. It very much depends. But i'll hang onto it till I am and can give it a fair shot!)
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Yes, it's pretty dark in places, but no more so than many of the adaptations in that "Tales of Mystery and Imagination" TV series.
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Now I'm very cut off as the local library is small and ebooks are ridiculously expensive when by well known authors. There's no way they should cost what paper books do.
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Now I'm very cut off as the local library is small and ebooks are ridiculously expensive when by well known authors. There's no way they should cost what paper books do.
Do the local library not also loan ebooks? Ours doesn't, but that's for reasons of crisis budget cuts that got rid of the man't team, who were the people who would have got it in place, but almost every other library service I know of these days does & I always hear the NZ is particularly good for libraries. (As far as I can gather, where they do have it, you borrow it all electronically and the book just vanishes at the end of the loan period unless you renew it.)
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