when a 20 pound cat sits on your chest at 4am -- might as well go to work

[lagilman]

Have made an offer over on The Cosa Nostradamus on-line that might make your gift-giving a bit easier this season. Or not. Up to you to decide...

Did my bit for the publishing economy yesterday at B&N, including getting a membership card (I've already made back $5 of the $25 fee). Was somewhat dismayed to stand in front of the racks of books and realize that there were very few books I really wanted to buy... not because they weren't good, but because I'm burnt out on all my favorite genres. So I did what I always do in those situations -- I bought in different genres. In this case, hard SF and non-fiction.

If all goes well and chaos doesn't laugh, I'm going to use the last two weeks of the year to curl up and make a dent in my TBR cache. Mmmm. Pleasure-reading.

So, anyone want to suggest something Good that's not any flavor of fantasy? Just keep in mind that 'cozy' or 'cute' mysteries tend to make my teeth itch...


Cats have come out to join me at the desk, and the coffee's ready. Guess that means the day's begun.

Comments

[deire.livejournal.com]

Barbara Hambly's historic mysteries. Anything by Martin Gilbert on the World Wars. A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science, Atal Gawande. Animals in Translation, Temple Grandin. Marley and Me.

[lagilman]

the Hambly's I have, but remember being underwhelmed by. Can't remember why at this point so maybe it's time to haul one off the shelf and try again....

[agamisu.livejournal.com]

Actually quite enjoying Clarke's last with Pohl THE LAST THEOREM, though the Fred bits are glaringly there. THE BRASS VERDICT was a decent read, but I like my Connelly.

[lagilman]

If I could reach out and raid your shelves, I would have already.... (I picked up the Warren Hammond yesterday. Have you read it?)

[agamisu.livejournal.com]

No, haven't, though just ordered the first one after I looked at it. Wasn't even aware of it, but then my free plundering of Tor's bookshelves has been curtailed of late.

[agamisu.livejournal.com]

Oh, oh. Wolfe's AN EVIL GUEST. Really. It's all screwed up, but it's fun. Only Gene could get away with it.

[lagilman]

fanboy. /tease

(I actually looked over the shelf o' Wolfe, but nothing new called out to me.)

[agamisu.livejournal.com]

Actually, on that one, the packaging's quite misleading. Alien ambassadors, conspiracy, giant squids, government agents, starlets, it's all there.

[neadods.livejournal.com]

Merp. No advice because I'm kinda "between books" at the moment myself.

If you haven't read Pratchett's Nation, though, I'm urging everyone and their cat to read it ASAP.

[lagilman]

I have to admit, I'm in the small minority for whom Pratchett does nothing for... (and yes, I've tried. Several times. No-go.)

[neadods.livejournal.com]

Nation isn't his usual, which is why I'm pushing it even to people who don't normally look at him.

Other than that, I'm more in the position of telling you what not to read. And wondering if, considering the state of publishing at the moment, I should be pursuing the whole reviewing thing right now. RtE seems to be drying up - there is a website looking for Who reviewers; I'm trying to decide if I want to try for that or not. The per-month requirements to meet are lower but the word count is quadruple.

[controuble.livejournal.com]

If you want to dip into SF, have you tried Jack McDevitt? He has a couple of short series out and a few stand-alones that I loved. Try Ancient Shores for a stand-alone. I can't remember which book comes first in either of the series, but one series is the Hutch books including Engines of God and the other includes Polaris which I know is NOT the first.

[lagilman]

*laugh* I worked at Ace back when Engines of God came out... he wasn't one of 'mine' but I know his work, yeah. (ah, for the good old days when I could actually keep track of at least some of what was coming out...mainly because I did the scheduling!)

[nycdeb.livejournal.com]

Have we discussed The Autobiography of Henry VIII: With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers by Margaret George? I loved it. I read her other stuff as well but this one REALLY stands out for me as the best of the lot.

Foolscap by Michael Malone - in addition to being one of the funniest single books I've ever read, it is a lovely, merry chase through academia and literature. He also has a series of North Carolina-based mysteries the best of which is Uncivil Seasons

I've recently been casting around for new historical mysteries and just finished a few of David Dickinson's Lord Francis Powerscourt series. While not destined to be re-read or held dear to my heart as the Sayers and Stout are - were not bad and kept me busy during train rides and in front of roaring fires of Northwest Connecticut.

I took some a pile of cheesy "plucky widowed (or divorced) bookshop (or coffeehouse) owner finds dead employee (or customer) and in course of book falls into UST relationship with local law enforcement" on my vacation with me. They had been picked en masse to build up bulk - it was, after all, a long trip and to the extent that they'd been selected partially because I knew I wouldn't mind leaving them on planes, in airports and on the ship when I was done - they succeeded. I left them without a qualm and with the feeling that I'd read the same book over and over and over. I could write them in my sleep (and I suspect if I did the red herrings would be redder).

Sorry - seem to have devolved into a reviewy rant. Never mind. :-)

In addition to the ones mentioned above, I always seem to fall back on Sayers and Stout for fireside, curling-up purposes.

[fiction-theory.livejournal.com]

Have you ever read "Memoirs of a Geisha"? Way better than the movie. Gorgeously written, compelling. It's a darn near perfect book if you ask me.

Also "The Island of Lost Maps" by Miles Harvey. It's a good non-fiction book about maps and thieves who steal maps and it explains a lot of things about libraries and history that I didn't realize before. I'm determined one day to use some of what I learned in his book in a novel of mine.

Also, "Queen Isabella" by Alison Weir (good historical author all around) is fascinating and changed a lot of how I thought of a historical figure I thought I knew, and taught me a lot about historical figures that I didn't!

"Curious Incidents of the Dog In the Night-Time" is really wonderful and unique. It is basically a murder mystery with a 15-year-old autistic boy as the detective in question. Of course, the victim is actually his dog, but the story is just wonderful and it's a brilliant book and I definitely would recommend this to just about anyone.

I think most of these books can be found readily, or at least readily on Amazon.com.

I hope they're helpful. Happy reading!

[lagilman]

Started and got distracted, no, no and yes. :-)

[ex-fashioni.livejournal.com]

I just bought the Rose Labyrinth (http://www.amazon.com/Rose-Labyrinth-Titania-Hardie/dp/1416584609/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1228397386&sr=1-1). Yes, I admit it, I'm a sucker for beautiful packaging and the story idea sounds very intriguing. PW didn't much care for it, but I'm willing to take that risk. I'll let you know if it's worth it.

[girasole.livejournal.com]

Have you read Patrick O'Brian's Aubry/Maturin seafaring series? Quite, quite wonderful.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum mysteries, which my whole family finds LOL funny, except for TheInfomancer who does not get it.

[lagilman]

Afraid I'm with the Infomancer on Evanovich, although probably for a different reason -- I didn't enjoy those books for the same reason I stopped watching The Sopranos. Been there, babysat for that, not really entertainment for me (when I read nonfiction I want it to admit to being nonfiction, and yeah, I know it's not the same but it was all still too weirdly familiar).

[nick-kaufmann.livejournal.com]

When I burn out on my favorite genres, which happens two or three times a year, I turn to non-fiction. Reading one or two non-fic books both feeds and rests my brain between novels.

Reading Suggestion

[tlc22.livejournal.com]

I recommend you check out Wicked Gentlemen, this year's winner of the Spectrum Awards for novels.

OOOO DEFINITELY!

[corvidophile.livejournal.com]

Hard Scifi:

Deadstock and Blue War (http://corvidophile.livejournal.com/356829.html) by Jeffrey Thomas
Red Thunder series (http://corvidophile.livejournal.com/361568.html) by John Varley
other favourites here (http://corvidophile.livejournal.com/271115.html)

[katfeete.livejournal.com]

Mysteries -- I can't imagine you haven't read Ellis Peters's Cadfael books, but if you haven't, do. Or for a really fun one try the Jennifer Cruisie / Bob Mayer collaboration [i]Agnes and the Hitman[/i]. This is a (very good) romance writer and an action writer working together, and it is fast and funny as hell. Also you might like Richard Hawke's stuff. And I don't say that just because the author was best man at my parents' wedding. :)

SF -- I read Adam Troy Castro's [i]Emmisaries of the Dead[/i] earlier this year and liked it -- bit over-gritty, but a good sf/mystery crossover. I also really liked Czerneda's Species Imperative trilogy; some of her best stuff, I think. And then there's Robert Charles Wilson's [i]Spin[/i]. I have the followup sitting on my desk... I'm not sure I like his, um, aggressively monotonous attitude towards religion, but the books are fascinating and big and well-done.

[katfeete.livejournal.com]

You know, I post on too many message boards. Bad kat! LJ does not use bbcode!

[lagilman]

I even have a signed copy of Dead Man's Ransom.

(amusing side note: back in The Day, I was Peter Tremayne's editor [Sister Fidelma mysteries]. Lovely man. But his real name? Peter Ellis. If he'd used that, everyone would have assumed it was a pseud, to 'hitch' onto Ellis Peters.)

[vcmw]

Of the non-fiction I've read this year, some standouts for me:

The Taste of Conquest - a sort of well done combination of spice trading history and travelogue to three cities whose fortunes were made in the spice trade (Venice, Lisbon, Amsterdam).

I read a whole swath of food history and food economics related titles this year. My next favorite was probably Taste: the story of Britain through its cooking.

The Stories of English was a really good book on the history of the English language, from a "there isn't only one right flavor of language" perspective. The author, David Crystal, also maintains an interesting Q&A blog on the topic.

My favorite non-fiction writer is probably Jennifer Michael Hecht, who wrote both Doubt and The Happiness Myth, along with two volumes of poetry I really enjoyed.

Other than that I've mostly been reading paranormal romance and soft sf or fantasy, so nothing helpful there.

[anisosynchronic.livejournal.com]

I think it was Brutal by Kevin Weeks, who was one of James Bulger's long-time-loyal minions, that I got about halfway through and had to stop reading. "This is fiction," I had to keep reminding myself--the people the book was about, not only Bulger, but especially Weeks, and essentially all their associates, were/are vile and despicable--utterly vile and despicable, in most cases. Bulger's got a kind spot in what's supposed to pass for a heart in him, for four-footed dogs. For people.... wolverines are more civilized.

As for Weeks, his reasons for the book appear to include money and revenge on Bulger. He's no repentent contrite fellow, with a sense of moral right and wrong, he's ticked at being sold out by Bulger to the FBI. Weeks believed in the code of the criminal and never cooperate with law enforcement--at the same time that Bulger was saying never cooperate, Bulger was playing the FBI from apparently the top down (the don't-insult-ducks-by-calling-him-a-lame-duck with the upcoming end date of his sojourn in D.C., gave one of his multitude of Presidential personal ukases/Presidential Directives squelching Congressional inquiry into what the FBI records have on James Bulger and blockign access) and collecting money in a relative of one of his protection rackets as an alleged FBI informant.... he and his buddy Stephen Flemmi made chumps out of the FBI and in effect had a license to murder... and murder they did, gleefully, and with Kevin Weeks at the minimum an accessory to their homicidal maniac habits (he I think was the one who literally buried various of the bodies).

What aggrieved Weeks wasn't the vileness of his actions and of the other criminals, it was Bulger hypocritically telling Weeks and others to comply with a romantic code of the criminal value system of criminals supporting and banded together, immune to offers from law enforcement for perks and avoid-jail-time and turning evidence in on others, while Bulger and Flemmi were ratting out on their associates, through associates and subordinates to the FBI in return for the FBI making sure that there were impervious coatings of Teflon protecting Bulger's hide and Flemmi's hide from any charges of criminal activity sticking.

[greatsword.livejournal.com]

Two recommendations:

Hard SF: Blind Waves by Steven Gould. An older book, but one of my favorites.

Not SF at all: In a Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson. Bryson is one of my out of genre addictions, and I think that one is among his best.

I avoided the B&N card for some time - I was in denial about the number of books I buy. But as a bit of trivia - the first thing I bought with the random discount coupons they send out was your first Retrievers novel. I use those coupons on books I'm less sure about, and have found a couple of good reads from them.

[lagilman]

:-D

[pbray.livejournal.com]

Anne Perry's WWI era mystery/thriller series, starting with NO GRAVES AS YET made a nice change of pace when I discovered them.

I'll also recommend Gillian Bradshaw's historical novels. Availability can be sketchy but The Beacon at Alexandria and Island of Ghosts remain two of my favorite books in any genre, period.

[burger-eater.livejournal.com]

Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett.

[lagilman]

I probably should have specified "new" or at least "recent" books... *grin*

[burger-eater.livejournal.com]

Oh, well, in *that* case...

Um...

I got nuthin'.

[martianmooncrab.livejournal.com]

at B&N you should cruise throught the remaindered area, there are some good books there that might tempt you (now that you have their membership card)

[lagilman]

I can't help it, I get depressed looking at the remainders table. Also: paranoid. "Is that my book? That looked like my cover! eee..." Hasn't happened yet but it will, some day.

[martianmooncrab.livejournal.com]

its like going to the pound, you wonder why they werent picked the first time... or if they were returned what was wrong with them? I find books that I might like and am willing to try.

[treize64.livejournal.com]

Clockers - Richard Price

A Perfect Spy - John Le Carre

The Long Goodbye - Raymond Chandler

It's funny, but the final book, which was the earliest published, was the most recent one I read. I highly recommend all of them with the caveat that Le Carre's pace is absolutely glacial at times. Other than that, every one of these books has been an experience for me in the best way possible.

[handworn.livejournal.com]

Have you read Richard Russo? How 'bout Sarah Dunant? They kind of defy genre, and they write so well that they're easy to read. (By which I don't mean unchallenging, though they're both funny at times.)