What I read -- July 2021

You can't see what I'm reading in this pic, alas. It's over on the floor.

LHC #127: "The Bonjour Effect" by Julie Barlow & Jean-Benoit Nadeau. This probably wound up on the list because one of my main characters in Persephone speaks French and not English, and I spend a lot of time on Duolingo. I didn't really enjoy this book. It made me feel icky. I think it was the whole "we" thing and then the authors referring to one or the other of them in third-person, which sort of reminded me of "The New Basics Cookbook" from the 80s.

There's also the problem of the inclusive vs. exclusive We (which I read about on Lingthusiasm a little while ago).

LHC #128: "The Screaming Staircase" by Jonathan Stroud. Hard copy. I loved the Bartimaeus books. It took me about a day to read, very fun.

LHC #129: "The Little White Horse" by Elizabeth Goudge. Hard copy. Maybe because of Terri Windling? It was sort of ridiculous, in a 1940's way.

LHC #130: "A Conspiracy of Truths" by Alexandra Rowland. eBook. She had a controversy last year, and when I heard about it I was amused to see that this was already on my list. The voice didn't totally work for me and it seemed to go on and on. I wanted to know more about the interauthor.

"The Karate Way" by Dave Lowry. It's karate grading season! When I was trying to figure out if I'd read this one before, I discovered I'd read a different one twice, several months apart, without realizing, and thought it was a little bit "the same." Oh dear. I could find no evidence that I've read this one before, but it sure felt like I had.

Best TW feedback ever

Over at the dayjob, SMEs are feverishly trying to get documents back to me all marked up, in preparation for the release that's supposed to happen the week I'm back from VP. Today's best comment: Unfortunately not true. SMEs, they're so cute.

What I read: January 2024

"Morgan is my name" by Sophie Keech. Office book club selection. It gets exhausting to read about plucky young heroines who are terrible at needlework all the time. I should probably read some Jo Walton. I mean, you can be good at needlework and other things too! I didn't find this book very surprising. The first half was kind of boring, but it got better towards the end. LHC #233: "The Shifter" by Janice Hardy. I read her writing advice website regularly, so I thought I should maybe read an actual book to find out if she was worth it. Oh my, the voice of this book grabbed me immediately. The worldbuilding seemed shady but the voice was solid. It wasn't very subtle, but I might not be the target audience. LHC #234: "Ragnarok: The End of the Gods" by A. S. Byatt. At this point with my library account, I'm just guessing. I know there was something by Byatt there? I suspect there was. I did not know what to make of this book. Strange, but it w

What I read: March 2024

LHC #240: "Vita Nostra" by Maryna and Serhiy Dyachenko. Translated by Julia Meitov Hersey. All I knew going in was dark academia. This was a neat thing to read after A Deadly Education last month. The students can leave this school at summer and winter break, but maybe they shouldn't. Also, interesting education method, providing Sasha with a CD player and punishing her if she leaves it in the mode where it plays all the tracks in sequence. "Norse Mythology" by Neil Gaiman. When I finished Ragnarok by AS Byatt (last month? January?) I was thinking it might have made more sense if I had any knowledge of the subject matter. The boy had left this lying around, and it was not a tough read. LHC #241: "Science on a mission: How Military funding shaped what we do and don't know about the ocean" by Naomi Oreskes. I deferred this once because it was so long. History of science is challenging for me to read, because of the need to get a grasp on dispr

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