What have you read lately?

[mamselle]

I think I read everything of hers I could find, as well as the Bland/Nesbitt books, as well as a couple of the other "Magic has rules" club of writers' works.

I would probably recall them as soon as I saw them but don't remember any right this moment.

Definitely time for a re-read.

M.

[FishProf]

"A Marvelous LIfe" by Danny Fingeroth about the life of Marvel's Stan Lee.    I had expected more about the development of the characters (Wolverine was mentioned exactly once, in passing) but the behind the curtains look at the comics industry was very interesting.  It is hard to remember how close many of the big names came to folding - we are (ok, I am) biased by the recent huge success of the Marvel DCU.

If you like comics and pop culture history - I would recommend.  If not, you will probably find it boring and too lacking in detail if you can't supply the context.

[ergative]

Saint Death's Daughter by C. S. E. Cooney: The aesthetic of Gideon the Ninth meets the depth of worldbuilding (and footnotes) of Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell meets the heart and sweet faith in kindness of A Closed and Common Orbit meets the cuddly undead rodents of Discworld, with a linguistic charm and inventiveness that is all its own. Really magnificent, I thought.

[Hegemony]

I think I read everything of hers I could find, as well as the Bland/Nesbitt books, as well as a couple of the other "Magic has rules" club of writers' works.

I would probably recall them as soon as I saw them but don't remember any right this moment.

Definitely time for a re-read.

Edward Eager is fabulous too.

[Larimar]

Starting to reread The Martian by Andy Weir. I think it's smart, just this side of plausible, and hilarious. Mark Watney is a well drawn character.

[mamselle]

I think I read everything of hers I could find, as well as the Bland/Nesbitt books, as well as a couple of the other "Magic has rules" club of writers' works.

I would probably recall them as soon as I saw them but don't remember any right this moment.

Definitely time for a re-read.

Edward Eager is fabulous too.

Yes, he was on of the ones I was thinking of in "The Club."

M.

[apl68]

The Last Days of the Dinosaurs:  An Asteroid, Extinction, and the Beginning of Our World, by Riley Black.  In the decades since it was established that the dinosaurs were wiped out by a massive asteroid strike, scientists have worked at understanding exactly how the mass extinction event and the subsequent recovery of life on Earth played out.  Black's work takes the form of chapters that each give a snapshot of a particular period.  First there's a chapter on what the world was like on the eve of the event.  Then chapters on the actual impact, the first hours and day, then eventually for one year, a hundred years, a thousand years, a hundred thousand years, and finally a million years after the impact.

Each chapter puts part of its focus on an imagined day in the life of a particular species that was characteristic of that time.  Of course it talks about lots of other species and lineages as well, of all sorts--mammals, reptiles, non-avian dinosaurs, birds, sea life, and vegetation.  Most of the focus is on the fossil-rich Hell Creek site in Montana, with asides on what was going on in the rest of the world.  Among other things, I was interested to learn just how diverse mammals has already become while dinosaurs ruled the Earth.  They weren't all just tiny insectivores.

Another impressive synthesis of a vast body of current research, like the Otherlands book above.  We know an awful lot more about dinosaurs and other prehistoric life forms than we did when I first read about this stuff as a kid.  Much of what we thought we knew then is now considered mistaken.  Makes me wonder how much of what I've read in these two books will be greatly revised in the years to come.  The study of prehistory involves an awful lot of revisionists and revisionism.  Kind of like the study of human history.  It keeps things interesting.

[hmaria1609]

From the library: Index, A History of the by Dennis Duncan (NF)
How the index developed over history.

[Parasaurolophus]

The Last Days of the Dinosaurs:  An Asteroid, Extinction, and the Beginning of Our World, by Riley Black.  In the decades since it was established that the dinosaurs were wiped out by a massive asteroid strike, scientists have worked at understanding exactly how the mass extinction event and the subsequent recovery of life on Earth played out.  Black's work takes the form of chapters that each give a snapshot of a particular period.  First there's a chapter on what the world was like on the eve of the event.  Then chapters on the actual impact, the first hours and day, then eventually for one year, a hundred years, a thousand years, a hundred thousand years, and finally a million years after the impact.

Each chapter puts part of its focus on an imagined day in the life of a particular species that was characteristic of that time.  Of course it talks about lots of other species and lineages as well, of all sorts--mammals, reptiles, non-avian dinosaurs, birds, sea life, and vegetation.  Most of the focus is on the fossil-rich Hell Creek site in Montana, with asides on what was going on in the rest of the world.  Among other things, I was interested to learn just how diverse mammals has already become while dinosaurs ruled the Earth.  They weren't all just tiny insectivores.

Another impressive synthesis of a vast body of current research, like the Otherlands book above.  We know an awful lot more about dinosaurs and other prehistoric life forms than we did when I first read about this stuff as a kid.  Much of what we thought we knew then is now considered mistaken.  Makes me wonder how much of what I've read in these two books will be greatly revised in the years to come.  The study of prehistory involves an awful lot of revisionists and revisionism.  Kind of like the study of human history.  It keeps things interesting.

I've been reading a small pile of dino-related books, and have a small pile left to go. I should post an update soon.

(That one was suggested to me recently. I was tempted by the cover; thanks for the overview!)

[FishProf]

Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov.  I'd never read it.  I listened to the audiobook performed by Jeremy Irons.  It was equal parts creepy (the basic idea), mesmerizing (the beautiful writing), and suspenseful tantalizing (how's he gonna go down?), all at the same time.

And yes, at times I imagined it was Scar from the Lion King doing the reading.

[apl68]

The Last Days of the Dinosaurs:  An Asteroid, Extinction, and the Beginning of Our World, by Riley Black.  In the decades since it was established that the dinosaurs were wiped out by a massive asteroid strike, scientists have worked at understanding exactly how the mass extinction event and the subsequent recovery of life on Earth played out.  Black's work takes the form of chapters that each give a snapshot of a particular period.  First there's a chapter on what the world was like on the eve of the event.  Then chapters on the actual impact, the first hours and day, then eventually for one year, a hundred years, a thousand years, a hundred thousand years, and finally a million years after the impact.

Each chapter puts part of its focus on an imagined day in the life of a particular species that was characteristic of that time.  Of course it talks about lots of other species and lineages as well, of all sorts--mammals, reptiles, non-avian dinosaurs, birds, sea life, and vegetation.  Most of the focus is on the fossil-rich Hell Creek site in Montana, with asides on what was going on in the rest of the world.  Among other things, I was interested to learn just how diverse mammals has already become while dinosaurs ruled the Earth.  They weren't all just tiny insectivores.

Another impressive synthesis of a vast body of current research, like the Otherlands book above.  We know an awful lot more about dinosaurs and other prehistoric life forms than we did when I first read about this stuff as a kid.  Much of what we thought we knew then is now considered mistaken.  Makes me wonder how much of what I've read in these two books will be greatly revised in the years to come.  The study of prehistory involves an awful lot of revisionists and revisionism.  Kind of like the study of human history.  It keeps things interesting.

I've been reading a small pile of dino-related books, and have a small pile left to go. I should post an update soon.

(That one was suggested to me recently. I was tempted by the cover; thanks for the overview!)

You're welcome!

So Parasaurolophus is a dinosaur fan?  Who would've thought....

[Parasaurolophus]

April and May combined:

Caitlin Donahue Wylie: Preparing Dinosaurs: The Work Behind the Scenes - As far as I can tell, this is pretty much the only comprehensive account of the work of fossil preparators out there. I expected Wylie to just repackage the work she's already published in article form, but she didn't at all. This was a super informative read on a subject I knew nothing at all about. The ethnographic style was a little strange, since I was expecting something more squarely in the history and philosophy of science, and it made her commentary stick out a little more than it otherwise would. I highly recommend this one to the dinosaur fans among us, though!

Elizabeth D. Jones: Ancient DNA: The Making of a Celebrity Science - A history of the search for ancient DNA and biomolecules. I didn't know anything about it at all, so it was super interesting and very informative, especially since it's a history that doesn't go back very far (to the 1980s). I was particularly fascinated by the role contamination concerns came to play in the development of the field, especially given how oblivious early efforts (and early players) were to it.

Lukas Rieppel: Assembling the Dinosaur: Fossil Hunters, Tycoons, and the Making of a Spectacle - Essentially a history of the early efforts to mount dinosaurs. As with Wylie, above, I expected it to rehash Rieppel's articles, but it doesn't at all. The history is really cool, although I mostly could have done without the extended contextualization in Gilded Age economic development. It's an understandable and even necessary decision, but I would have been happy with even more extended discussion of the mounting, especially in comparison to modern-day mounting techniques. I wonder where I'd go to learn more about those? Do any of you know?

Adrian Tchaikovsky: The Expert System's Brother - Insect-heavy space colony gone awry. An excellent, compelling novella, which felt somewhat limited by its length. It could easily have been much longer, its time frame less compressed, without losing the reader. I see there's some sort of sequel, however, which I'll definitely hunt down.

Adrian Tchaikovsky: Walking to Aldebaran - A space maze novella! One of the very best I've read, right up there with Alastair Reynolds's Diamond Dogs. I just wanted it to go on and on and on. The story itself is a bit of a maze, and that aspect is really well executed.

Adrian Tchaikovsky: Made Things - A lightly steampunky fantasy centred on a girl and her pickpocket puppets. I'm not usually much for this kind of genre mashup, but it was fun and well executed.

Adrian Tchaikovsky: Firewalkers - Distant future CliFi with a dose of insects. Compelling, and starkly real on the climate front.

Adrian Tchaikovsky: Cage of Souls - Low-tech distant future space prison story set on a dying Earth, with lots of local wildlife. It was a captivating read, especially the prison parts. It's a long novel, but I wouldn't have minded more. Especially more of the prison.

[mamselle]

From the library: Index, A History of the by Dennis Duncan (NF)
How the index developed over history.

A good indexer is hard to find.

I know two.

So many indices are almost useless, and the automated ones are particularly horrible.

Glad to see someone's paying attention!

M.

[ergative]

Parasaurolophus's round-up reminded me that I haven't done one in a while. These are things I've found noteworthy since March or so; there are others that were forgettable and I couldn't be bothered to type about them.)

The Kingston Trilogy, by C. L. Polk, comprising Witchmark, Stormsong, and Soulstar. The first one was fine; the second was really quite good, the third was too infused with range and angst and grief to suit me, and its solution seemed aspirational and infeasible. In a nutshell, we have Edwardian-era-flavoured city undergoing social and political upheaval in the wake of a bad war and some fairies get involved. Lots of political shenanigans in book 2, which is why I liked it so much. Also, outstanding covers. I read Witchmark because of this animated cover.

The Murder of Mr Wickham, by Claudia Gray. All the Austen characters from the Big Six gather in a house party, Mr Wickham shows up and turns out to have been a scoundrel to all of them, then he shows up dead, whodunnit? Really lovely character work, directly addressing things that never sat right with me (e.g., Fanny and Edward are so tiresome, and Marianne couldn't possible love Colonel Brandon). An absolute delight if you like Austen, full of subtle comments and references to the various books, and a narrative style with some witty turns of phrase that do resemble something she might have written herself.

She Who Became The Sun, by Shelly Parker-Chan. Fabulous genderbent Chinese historical fantasy, retelling the rise to power of Zhu Chongba's founding of the Ming Dynasty, with ghosts and subtle magic that is mostly symbolic rather than plot-relevant. I was captivated. Superb work.

Lessons in Chemistry, by Bonnie Garmus. 1950s chemist can't get a job in research because sexism, so instead starts a cooking show that is a feminist masterpiece of empowerment. The book itself was delightful and gripping, but in the end it left a sour taste in my mouth because of all the fucking sexism in the 1950s, which is portrayed unflinchingly, and which indeed drives the plot. I do try to avoid that in my fiction, but, if you have a higher tolerance for that kind of thing in your fiction, I highly recommend it. There is an excellent character who is a dog.

Johannes Cabal series, by Jonathan L Howard. I actually started this quite a while ago, with Johannes Cabal, Necromancer, and then some years later read the sequel, Johannes Cabal, Detective, and then just recently continued with The Fear Institute and The Brothers Cabal. Howard has a wonderful narrative voice, which sort of teases and mocks the characters and the readers, snarking at the world because Cabal is an arrogant, obnoxious toad who is incredibly fun to go on adventures with.

A Natural History of Dragons series by Marie Brennan, and then the follow-up book Turning Darkness into Light. The first five books are about a lady dragon naturalist in a Victorian-inspired fantasy Europe, going on adventures to learn about all the different types of dragons that inhabit the world. Great adventure travel costume drama. The follow-up is about her granddaughter, who is asked to translate some tablets written by the old Draconians, a lost culture rather like the Sumerians in our world: lots of relics, lots of texts, but it's hard work to translate them and understand what they meant. Really, really fun all around.

Saint Death's Daughter by C. S. E. Cooney. A wildly inventive combination of the vibes of Tamsyn Muir, the exquisite depth of worldbuilding and footnoting of Susanna Clarke, the tender heart of Becky Chambers, and a linguistic playfulness that is all Cooney's own. Cuddly necromancy.

Rendezvous with Rama, by Arthur C Clarke. My god, this was foul. Boring narrative, wildly sexist (women shouldn't be allowed in space because bobbing breasts in zero gravity are too distracting), and not even a terribly interesting SFF idea in the first place; Big dumb thing in space approaches the solar system, some people go up to look at it, then big dumb thing goes away and people return home none the wiser about what it is, where it came from, or why it's here. I heard that Denis Villeneuve is making a TV adaptation of it, and he did magic with Arrival, so I thought there might be something there--I discovered Ted Chiang's brilliance through Arrival, after all--but nope. Nothing there. There's so much good SF to adapt, Denis. Why this?


I've also been reading a variety of romance books, in part because I'm so fascinated by the industry as a whole that I've decided I should actually read the damn books, and in part because I've been so stressed with house-hunting that I can't focus on much else. I've sampled from the big names of historical Romance (Courtney Milan, Tessa Dare, Lisa Kleypas, Beverly Jenkins, Cat Sebastian), and decided that I rather like Cat Sebastian's gay regency romances and will look for more of them. Courtney Milan is fine but kind of all samey (but I do appreciate her attention to historical detail), and I don't really feel any need for Tessa Dare or Lisa Kleypas or Beverly Jenkins.

[Parasaurolophus]

The Murder of Mr Wickham, by Claudia Gray. All the Austen characters from the Big Six gather in a house party, Mr Wickham shows up and turns out to have been a scoundrel to all of them, then he shows up dead, whodunnit? Really lovely character work, directly addressing things that never sat right with me (e.g., Fanny and Edward are so tiresome, and Marianne couldn't possible love Colonel Brandon). An absolute delight if you like Austen, full of subtle comments and references to the various books, and a narrative style with some witty turns of phrase that do resemble something she might have written herself.

Oh! A perfect gift for my resident Maiasaur, thank you!