A year in books

Book 35- Holidays are Hell. This seems to me to be second in a ‘series’ of short story collections (the first one was book #13 of this year Dates from Hell). I think I’m further justified in calling this a series because Lynsay Sands story in Holidays are Hell is clearly a sequel to her story in Dates from Hell). I borrowed the book from the library because of the first story- which was written by Kim Harrison (just like I borrowed the first book in the ‘series’ because of her)… and I loved Kim’s story about Rachel Morgan. And again to mirror Dates… Rachel’s story starts before the first book in Kim Harrison’s series about Rachel.
I should mention that while I didn’t like Lynsay’s story, I liked the other two writers in this book better then I liked the other stories in Dates from Hell. In fact I went so far as to check on line for Marjorie Liu’s other work… but after seeing that it was labeled “paranormal romance” I’ve decided to pass. While I’m willing to have a bit of romance in my paranormal… I fear that it would be more of romance then paranormal- or at least more romance than I can deal with.

Book 36- The Centaur by John Updike. This is the third book that I re-read this year. I first read it ages ago in High School and though I barely remember reading it the first time, I think I came to it from a totally different direction. It’s ‘based’ on the story of Chiron and Prometheus. The first time I read it, I was big into Greek mythology. There is an index in the back of my copy of The Centaur to clue you into who is who in the book- i.e.- Principal Zimerman=Zeus… and I know when I first read it- I was flipping back and forth with the index so that I could make sure I ‘got’ the reference.
I still like Greek myths but I don’t remember the last time I read a book about mythology. So this time, I read it straight through… not as a ‘retelling’ of a Greek myth but as a story of a ‘working class’ teacher who’s trying to teach his students and raise his kid.
I thought it was a bit ‘weird’ as it mixed Greek mythology with American history. Not in a melding like Gaiman does in his books but in juxtaposition. For example there is a scene at the beginning of the book where Chiron=Caldwell is talking to Vera=Venus and he mentions both his mythological origin and how he grew up in New Jersey.
Very glad I re-read this book, especially as I’ve been meaning to re-read it for YEARS. Odds are I’ll end up borrowing the first of Updike’s Rabbit series from the library this year- as I liked this book and have never read his Rabbit series.

Book 37- The intersection of Law and Desire by J.M. Redmann. This is the 3rd book in the Misty Knight Quadrilogy. I say Quadrilogy as there are 4 books in the series. I sort of hope Redmann writes more but considering the 4th book was written in 1999 and the second and third books I bought were reprints( where Redmann apologizes for the changes in technology and how Mickey doesn’t have a cell phone nor do most of the other characters). This book took a bit longer then it should’ve to finish. On the one hand, I’ve been mismanaging my days since I quit my job (big surprise there as I’m very bad with time management); but on the other hand I was worried about the choices Mickey was making, and so I often paused. While I thought she was ‘in character’ never the less, I still worried about her- and I think that’s why I love Redmann as an author, she has created a damaged heroine that I really CARE for, and want to have a happy ending.
So I’m on the fence about getting the 4th book in the series- as that’s the last book she’s written thus far, and once I’m done with that- I’ll be done with Mickey.

Book 38- Golden Compass by Philip Pullman. Well I have to say I liked this series BETTER then I did the Potter series. To put it concisely- I felt that Pullman is a better writer. I often had a problem with Rowlings as I felt in a 7 book series- it would be nice if she reminded us once in a while what had gone on before and gave more descriptions about the world she was creating. While Rowlings had a lot of action- she didn’t have a lot of character description.
Now I’m not sure how well Pullman will remind us in the second book what happened in the first- but his world seemed more alive. He created a world and characters that I felt were colorful and interesting. I was glad that when I asked my niece, and I still think it’s a little odd that last year I gained an 11 year old niece, she agreed with me that the Golden Compass was a better read then the potter series- but like me she’s just read the first book.
For people who are thinking of seeing the movie and/or reading the book… See the movie first. I and a friend saw the movie- he hasn’t read the book and I did it AFTER I read the book. He enjoyed the movie more then I did… I checked this fact with my niece and she agreed with me- she didn’t like some of the changes of the movie. The change SHE hated the most was the fact that they didn’t have the cliffhanger ending. I knew that they had cut the ending, to make it more ‘marketable’ but I still didn’t like they way they cut corners in the story telling.
I also want to mention that I thought it was interesting the classism in the book. At the beginning of the book, it points out that the daemons of the SERVENT class are all dogs. The dog imagine is reinforced when we see the Tartars (think Cossacks) in the north and they all have vicious attack DOGS. This made me wonder what wage slave retail daemons would be… but then I remembered that in Golden Compass your daemon ‘picks a shape’ at about puberty- and as I wouldn’t know at 13 that I would be a retail wage slave- that wouldn’t factor into things.
But I still wonder what sorta daemon I would have. Any guesses? On MY daemon or YOURS?

So that’s it for my book count for ’07. I did start another book BUT I didn’t finish it in ’07 so I’m counting it as the first book of ’08.
Before that however… I think I did pretty good with my goal- while the contest was ’50 books’ I set my sights a bit lower for 40 books as more realistic goal--- as I figured with my video game systems, job, job search, TV, Netflix and other assorted distractions 40 would be a good goal… And I did come CLOSE to 40 with my 38. Several books were over 400 pages( like Harry, Panther in the Sky and the Walter Jon Williams trilogy that I started the year with) but I was going for BOOKS not PAGE COUNTS- as I felt it would be hard to compare pages what with some books being hardcovers and some paperbacks and all sorts of margins( heck because of margins I threw a book out as the margins were just too darn small). So we’ll see if ’08, I’ll read as much as ’07, not sure as not having the job might help or hinder my reading time. Also a minus to my book time is I asked, and received, a subscription to the New Yorker for Hannuka which I started getting in the mail last week.
However, what I’m more proud of then hitting 38- is I have a record of the books I read in ’07. I told my dad I was very happy with keeping a diary of my reading. I didn’t tell him I was BLOGGING them, as I don’t want him to know I blog… Merely that I’ve tried to keep a record of a couple of paragraphs about what I read, who wrote it and how I liked it. When I told him I was keeping a diary of my books- he figured I was writing a page or two… but I think the record I’ve kept is good enough. Perhaps my entries MIGHT have been a bit longer if I didn’t blog them- as I made a point NOT to spoil any book… but I doubt it, as I’m sorta lazy and really I just want a general record of what I read and whether I liked it or didn’t like it.

Book 1- Many Bloody Returns- edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L.P. Kelner.
This is another ‘supernatural’ short story collection. The ‘hook’ to this collection is NOT romance (though there is some of that) but BIRTHDAYS, as the editors thought it would be interesting to combine the celebration of LIFE with DEATH- i.e. vampires.
To me the most memorable stories are the two I borrowed the book for- Charlaine Harris’ story of Sookie- her heroine, and Jim Butcher’s story with Harry Dresden. Tanya Huff’s story was ok- but I feel I liked Vicky from the Blood series better then Tony from her Smoke series (and Tony’s the one in this collection). One of my favorite short stories was the last one by Toni L.P. Kelner- it has a Vampire taking her whelp to visit her grave on her birthday. However considering it had a good amount of ROMANCE and she seems best known for the ROMANCE (it lists several of her romance awards before her story), I doubt I’ll borrow any of her books from the library.
Oh and I was amused that they dedicated the book to Joss Whedon-“ who may never read it, and to his enthusiastic fans known as the Buffybuds, who will”. Didn’t know I was a Buffybud.