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kitewithfishWhat I’ve Read:
The Fellowship of the Ring – JRR Tolkien - Audiobook with Rob Inglis -
Finishing this book marks a major accomplishment for me, as I have been intending to read the Lord of the Rings *someday* for a couple of decades at least. I have picked it up and put it down more than once (Tom Bombadil broke me, I'm sorry hardcore fans, I was not enchanted).
The time was right for this attempt because in the last few years I have been absorbing more background fiction about the First World War. So all the time in the Shire building up the relationships of the Hobbits to their community and to each other, they all just felt like the childhood idyll of a soldier's memoir - The Before that you have to understand before you get to The After. Even the Tom Bombadil section felt like it made more sense in light of Gawain and the Green Knight, which I saw in a musical adaptation more than once in the last few years. (But still a weird interlude.)
Also, this is a fantastic road trip audiobook - because I have been traveling four days out of the last seven and this narrative is so completely composed of Trudging Places, Awe at New Locations, and Longing for the Comfort of Home.
This narrator, Rob Inglis, deserves specific praise: he does competent voices for a large crew of people and SINGS in them, including several Elvish songs, and lands a solid performance for the whole book. (I will concede that his Gimli and Gandalf and Aragorn sound too similar to easily tell apart for short phrases, but usually are fine for longer sentences.)
What I’m Reading:
Leviathan Wakes – (The Expanse #1)- James SA Corey (Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck) narrator Jefferson Mays - Really good mystery story, with some good world building. Rather more limited than the TV show, I would say, which breaks out of the POV of Holden and Miller regularly in order provide interesting context when something cool is happening off screen. I watched.... three or four episodes of the show, and the political elements of the show are much more fleshed out earlier than the books.
Finding out that the authors are both linked to George RR Martin made me realize what the flavor of the book reminded me of - this is very much a white guy book. It's not bad! It's just... the POV is very white, and very male, and uninterested in queerness, and other cultures are added for flavor but not really delved into... There are Asian women around as quests or love interests, but, well, they feel like the Dame of a detective novel.
I would love a rec to a deep dive about TV series vs the books, if anyone has one?
The Spear Cuts Through Water – hugos and xing book club, 50% - no movement but a great and dreamlike books that I am interested in getting back to
Mo Dao Zu Shi - Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation – Mo Xiang Tong Xiu – Part 5 – 23% - No movement
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York– Robert Caro – 31% (aka 9%of audiobook #2)- back to reading this a bit
What I’ll Read Next:
Some Desperate Glory - Crossing
Space Between Worlds – Neocromancer’s Book Club
Fugitive Telemetry
Hugo Nominees:
Bea Wolf Saga, Vol. 11 Translation State Starter Villain The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi “Introduction to 2181 Overture, Second Edition” “Ivy, Angelica, Bay” “On the Fox Roads” “One Man’s Treasure” “The Year Without Sunshine” I AM AI Rose/House “Life Does Not Allow Us to Meet” The Mimicking of Known Successes Mammoths at the Gates “Seeds of Mercury” The Culture: The Drawings A City on Mars A Traveller in Time: The Critical Practice of Maureen Kincaid Speller, All These Worlds: Reviews & Essays “Better Living Through Algorithms” by Naomi Kritzer (Clarkesworld May 2023) “Answerless Journey” / 没有答案的航程, 韩松, “The Sound of Children Screaming” “How to Raise a Kraken in Your Bathtub” “The Mausoleum’s Children”
The Fellowship of the Ring – JRR Tolkien - Audiobook with Rob Inglis -
Finishing this book marks a major accomplishment for me, as I have been intending to read the Lord of the Rings *someday* for a couple of decades at least. I have picked it up and put it down more than once (Tom Bombadil broke me, I'm sorry hardcore fans, I was not enchanted).
The time was right for this attempt because in the last few years I have been absorbing more background fiction about the First World War. So all the time in the Shire building up the relationships of the Hobbits to their community and to each other, they all just felt like the childhood idyll of a soldier's memoir - The Before that you have to understand before you get to The After. Even the Tom Bombadil section felt like it made more sense in light of Gawain and the Green Knight, which I saw in a musical adaptation more than once in the last few years. (But still a weird interlude.)
Also, this is a fantastic road trip audiobook - because I have been traveling four days out of the last seven and this narrative is so completely composed of Trudging Places, Awe at New Locations, and Longing for the Comfort of Home.
This narrator, Rob Inglis, deserves specific praise: he does competent voices for a large crew of people and SINGS in them, including several Elvish songs, and lands a solid performance for the whole book. (I will concede that his Gimli and Gandalf and Aragorn sound too similar to easily tell apart for short phrases, but usually are fine for longer sentences.)
What I’m Reading:
Leviathan Wakes – (The Expanse #1)- James SA Corey (Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck) narrator Jefferson Mays - Really good mystery story, with some good world building. Rather more limited than the TV show, I would say, which breaks out of the POV of Holden and Miller regularly in order provide interesting context when something cool is happening off screen. I watched.... three or four episodes of the show, and the political elements of the show are much more fleshed out earlier than the books.
Finding out that the authors are both linked to George RR Martin made me realize what the flavor of the book reminded me of - this is very much a white guy book. It's not bad! It's just... the POV is very white, and very male, and uninterested in queerness, and other cultures are added for flavor but not really delved into... There are Asian women around as quests or love interests, but, well, they feel like the Dame of a detective novel.
I would love a rec to a deep dive about TV series vs the books, if anyone has one?
The Spear Cuts Through Water – hugos and xing book club, 50% - no movement but a great and dreamlike books that I am interested in getting back to
Mo Dao Zu Shi - Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation – Mo Xiang Tong Xiu – Part 5 – 23% - No movement
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York– Robert Caro – 31% (aka 9%of audiobook #2)- back to reading this a bit
What I’ll Read Next:
Some Desperate Glory - Crossing
Space Between Worlds – Neocromancer’s Book Club
Fugitive Telemetry
Hugo Nominees:
Bea Wolf Saga, Vol. 11 Translation State Starter Villain The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi “Introduction to 2181 Overture, Second Edition” “Ivy, Angelica, Bay” “On the Fox Roads” “One Man’s Treasure” “The Year Without Sunshine” I AM AI Rose/House “Life Does Not Allow Us to Meet” The Mimicking of Known Successes Mammoths at the Gates “Seeds of Mercury” The Culture: The Drawings A City on Mars A Traveller in Time: The Critical Practice of Maureen Kincaid Speller, All These Worlds: Reviews & Essays “Better Living Through Algorithms” by Naomi Kritzer (Clarkesworld May 2023) “Answerless Journey” / 没有答案的航程, 韩松, “The Sound of Children Screaming” “How to Raise a Kraken in Your Bathtub” “The Mausoleum’s Children”
