Beyond the Roundels

What I've finished reading

I finished The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold, and enjoyed it very much indeed. I hope to get to Paladin of Souls sometime soon - it does actually seem to be in the library system, so hopefully next month maybe when I may be able to visit that library (but if not I could be a spendthrift and request it).

I also finally finished The Skeleton in the Clock by Carter Dickson (aka John Dickson Carr), which I was given as a Christmas present and started around then, but unfortunately, despite it being actually pretty fun and interesting (although not quite as much fun as And So to Murder, but probably more interesting in some ways), I got put off it by how stressed and ill I was. (There was this business with psychic activity in the condemned cell and execution shed in a former prison, and it didn't help at the time.) Anyway, I feel better, and I was able to finish it off and enjoy it, although probably not as much as if I'd not tried to read it when I was too ill. I still can't make my mind up about H.M. as a detective, even though there was much more of him in this one. Is he entertaining or do I want to join the queue of characters who'd quite happily murder him? It's a toss up. (His method seems to be to solve the mystery half way through, refuse to tell anyone, and then plant a funfair in someone's garden in the meantime.)

And then I read a later Daisy, Anthem for Doomed Youth, in which Alec was digging up bodies in Epping Forest while Daisy went to their daughter's sports day and the PE teacher turned up dead.


What I'm reading now

The free book shop had a Daisy for me, which I was very pleased by, so now I am reading The Case of the Murdered Muckraker. Daisy is in New York and tried to go to lunch with her editor only to have another journalist fall down a lift shaft in front of her. The FBI are keeping tabs on her because they have heard of her fatal attraction to murder. (Alec is in Washington DC and put out that she couldn't go a few days without him without stumbling into more murder.)

For family history note-taking, I am reading (or sometimes skimming through), Thomas Dormandy's book on TB, The White Death, which is very useful and interesting. (It's a fair mix of medical and social and even literary history, given the topic.)


What I'm reading next

Who knows? (I don't know why I do this bit of the meme, but why not, I suppose.) Although I was just starting a more recent Daisy book that someone had lent me when the free book shop came up trumps with an earlier one, so I'm sure I shall return to that presently.

I also am probably going to do some note-taking/reading of The Time Traveller's Guide to Restoration Britain after I get through the TB one. (The White Death is lengthy, but it's soon going to get less relevant for my purposes once it gets more into the 20th C.)

(I'm still not doing anything for fandom_stocking. Luckily it should open soon and then I can relax and do something else! I forget, of course, that 'better' when you've been bad is a relative term.

Also I seem to have given the impression to everyone that Manhunt is rubbish and it really isn't; it was just a bit up and down and sexist to begin with & I get very little out of protracted 'action' sequences. It's now reached an impressively consistent high standard. Vincent, Nina, and Jimmy, though, remain the most rubbish. Strangely, everyone was a lot more interested in watching it despite this, much more so than anybody is when I tell them old TV is good. Reverse psychology??)

Anyway, look at me, this makes it twice in a year (not calendar year) at least this time. I probably won't read enough to make it every Wednesday, but hopefully more often. I am optimistic!

What I've Just Finished Reading

And So To Murder by Carter Dickson, which I finished up quite quickly after I posted the other day. It was good fun and I enjoyed it. I still don't know whether to praise the BBC for giving me lovely mental casting (the three characters who were the most fun were played by Suzanne Neve, William Russell, and Stephanie Bidmead) or curse them for burninating it, but it did add to the book, so I suppose I'd better at least be a tiny bit grateful.

As I said, Monica Stanton (aka Suzanne Neve) is a vicar's daughter who writes a steamy Romance novel in 1939; her aunt, distressed, wonders why she couldn't write a nice detective novel, like those by Bill Cartwright (Wm Russell):

Now Monica Stanton, to begin with, had no real grievance against that inoffensive form of entertainment known as the detective-story. She neither liked nor disliked it. She had read a few, which struck her as being rather far-fetched and slightly silly, although doubtless tolerable enough if you liked that sort of thing. But, by the time her aunt had finished, Monica was in such a state that she had come to curse the day Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was born. It was a wordless, mindless passion of hatred. As for Mr William Cartwright... Monica felt that she would like to poison Mr Cartwright with curare, and dance on his grave.

( Read more... )

Before Christmas, I can now say that I was for obvious reasons, re-reading a lot of Miss Marple as well as reading Dracula for the first time (my reactions are in my Yuletide reveals post).

I also finished Venetia by Georgette Heyer, a re-read, although it was one of the books I rashly gave away a while ago, so it had been a long time. Very enjoyable, of course, and I am very happy to have a copy again. It is very sad that after a year of reading Regency Romances, I still haven't found anyone even a tiny bit like Georgette Heyer. I wish there would be, somewhere, in some period or other.


What I'm Reading Now

I'm a bit between things, but I continue with the very excellent The Victorian City by Judith Flanders in NF. (I am even taking notes for family history, which is a very exciting development as of the last few weeks and months. It's taken a bit of patient building up, but I'm able to do it a little again.)


What I'm Reading Next

That is the question. I was looking at my TBR (when spoons) pile and seeing whether any of them clicked easily, but I haven't decided which one to try next or whether just to re-read something to build up a little more stress-free stamina first before I risk reading a new-to-me book that might get killed by CFS. (I'd rather wait and be fair in my first reading). We shall see!