A review of one of the books shortlisted in the GLBTQ category of the Indie Lit Awards.
'Will Grayson, Will Grayson' – John Green & David Levithan
In two different cities live two different teenage boys called Will Grayson. The first Will Grayson the reader meets is straight and has a really good best friend. The second Will Grayson the reader meets is gay and has a best friend he isn’t really on friendly terms with. They are a study in contrasts, no? Superficially yes, but this is a Green, Levithan collaboration and if I know anything from my limited reading of both authors it’s that one of the big threads that connects them as writers is an interest in human connection. So, readers are first introduced to the differences between the two characters, then to things that show they’re not so different. Then the two Will Graysons go back and forth between being within touching distance of both positions, which sounds kind of impossible - am I creating a false third category? I guess the closest I can get to explaining is that 'Will Grayson, Will Grayson' shows how you can be different while being similar and similar while being different, but also both at the same time and the sum of your differences and similarities are not what ultimately determine your ability to make a human connection with someone else.
And that’s all I’m going to tell you, because this is one of those books where I merrily ignored the spoiler warnings on peoples reviews, thinking ‘oh it is only romantic spoilers, I am never bothered by knowing how the romance unwinds’. Then, when it came to some of the big plot points (readers of ‘Will Grayson, Will Grayson’ I am sure you know what I am thinking of particularly) I didn’t feel the gut punch a lot of people have described feeling. I’ll never really know now whether that’s because the book doesn’t deliver that emotional bang for me in those moments, or because I already knew what was going to happen. So, I’m going to leave you to discover the rest of the plot for yourselves.
One thing I liked
The humour. ‘Will Grayson, Will Grayson’ is a really funny book, but one which doesn’t take funny, embarrasing situations into humiliatingly cruel territory for the characters. It retains a sympathetic niceness towards the characters, even as it shows how funny their bad situation is and it never laughs at the real emotional pain of a character.
One thing I didn’t like
Although I love what Gideon’s (a character who comes into second Will Grayson’s life later in the book) inclusion in the book seems to promise for the future of second Will Grayson, I didn’t think he was a filled out character by the end of the book. He has good things to say and do, but essentially his personality is ‘Will’s friend who helps him out’.
Extra note: I’m now planning to read all of John Green’s and David Levithan’s books (including collaborations) and attempt to write some kind of epic post about collaborations involving these authors and recurring elements, using ‘Will Grayson, Will Grayson’ as the grounding link, at some point in the future. Watching what I already know about Green and Levithan’s writerly preoccupations surface in this book evolve, or not change at all and then join with the preoccupations of their collaboration partner was just fascinating. I feel almost like ‘Will Grayson, Will Grayson’ is a symbol for their own collaboration project, like they are exploring their own writing relationship by creating this book and filling it with related themes. Theories, I have them and I have started taking notes! So that’s two Green books to go and many Levithan books and collaborations.
Any opinion mentioned here is my opinion and not the opinion of the whole panel, or the organisers of the Indie Lit Awards.
And that's the last book from the shortlist. Decisions will now be made and all the categories should be announcing their winners on 3rd February.
Monday, 31 January 2011
Sunday, 30 January 2011
'Annabel' - Kathleen Winter
A review of one of the books shortlisted in the GLBTQ category of the Indie Lit Awards.
‘Annabel’ – Kathleen Winter
'Annabel’ is a family saga about Jacinta, Treadway and their son Wayne who live on the remote Canadian island of Labrador. It’s also a bildungsroman novel of Wayne’s life and growth.
Jacinta and Treadway live a typical Labrador life, where Treadway spends many months of his life away from their home on his trap line catching game and Jacinta lives alone. Treadway is a quiet man who prefers to be in the wilderness, rather than home with his wife. At the same time he is a kind man who works hard to provide as much as he can of what his wife needs emotionally when he is home. Jacinta belongs to the female community of the island who spend time 'longing for the intimacy they imagined would exist when their husbands came home, all the while knowing the intimacy would always be imaginary' and secretly wishing their husbands would leave when they do come home, because they women have gotten used to living alone. However Jacinta is a little more happy to have her husband home than her friends, because Treadway tries so hard to adapt to her lifestyle, despite his own interests.
Their child is born a hermaphrodite (or intersex), but his father decides a decision needs to be made about which sex his child will be so they have the child’s vagina sewn up, put him on hormones and raise him as a boy. They decide not to tell Wayne anything as he grows up. The novel then follows Wayne through life as he struggles to work out his place in the world and why his parents seem so oddly disconnected from him sometimes. Later he finds out that he is a hermaphrodite, grows up, loses a good friend, moves away and tries to decide if he wants to choose a gender to live as.
The story of Jacinta and Treadway's marriage continues without Wayne and two female characters also have seperate storylines (that description is a bit wham bam, but it's hard to describe everything this novel contains without writing a plot outline of the whole book).
One thing I liked
Someone else on the panel mentioned that they liked the examination of gender construction in this novel and I agree. ‘Annabel’ is set in a hyper-masculine community, but Winter makes sure to show how much softness there can be amongst the male community and how much traditional femininity has been assimilated by some of the trapper men into what they think of as masculinity. Pitting a person who themselves has a non-traditional gender construct (Treadway) against the existence of intersexuality gives the book depth. The author moves through different ideas on gender construction in a logical way, showing different opinions that intersex people might come to about their own gender and how their thinking might change over time. She also manages to make many of the points incorporate a universal take on how gender is constructed for and by everyone. Winter’s guiding analytical line is subtle and flexible, allowing readers to think for themselves while always being clear what the novel was trying to say at a certain time.
One thing I didn’t like
There are some jarring scene jumps in the book. Wayne can be busy doing something and then on the next page, set out as if the text just continues with no indication that it’s about to switch perspective or place, Treadway starts doing something. It didn’t happen a lot, but when it did happen it threw me out of the story so much.
Question
Have you read any novels about intersex people?
Any opinion mentioned here is my opinion and not the opinion of the whole panel, or the organisers of the Indie Lit Awards.
‘Annabel’ – Kathleen Winter
'Annabel’ is a family saga about Jacinta, Treadway and their son Wayne who live on the remote Canadian island of Labrador. It’s also a bildungsroman novel of Wayne’s life and growth.
Jacinta and Treadway live a typical Labrador life, where Treadway spends many months of his life away from their home on his trap line catching game and Jacinta lives alone. Treadway is a quiet man who prefers to be in the wilderness, rather than home with his wife. At the same time he is a kind man who works hard to provide as much as he can of what his wife needs emotionally when he is home. Jacinta belongs to the female community of the island who spend time 'longing for the intimacy they imagined would exist when their husbands came home, all the while knowing the intimacy would always be imaginary' and secretly wishing their husbands would leave when they do come home, because they women have gotten used to living alone. However Jacinta is a little more happy to have her husband home than her friends, because Treadway tries so hard to adapt to her lifestyle, despite his own interests.
Their child is born a hermaphrodite (or intersex), but his father decides a decision needs to be made about which sex his child will be so they have the child’s vagina sewn up, put him on hormones and raise him as a boy. They decide not to tell Wayne anything as he grows up. The novel then follows Wayne through life as he struggles to work out his place in the world and why his parents seem so oddly disconnected from him sometimes. Later he finds out that he is a hermaphrodite, grows up, loses a good friend, moves away and tries to decide if he wants to choose a gender to live as.
The story of Jacinta and Treadway's marriage continues without Wayne and two female characters also have seperate storylines (that description is a bit wham bam, but it's hard to describe everything this novel contains without writing a plot outline of the whole book).
One thing I liked
Someone else on the panel mentioned that they liked the examination of gender construction in this novel and I agree. ‘Annabel’ is set in a hyper-masculine community, but Winter makes sure to show how much softness there can be amongst the male community and how much traditional femininity has been assimilated by some of the trapper men into what they think of as masculinity. Pitting a person who themselves has a non-traditional gender construct (Treadway) against the existence of intersexuality gives the book depth. The author moves through different ideas on gender construction in a logical way, showing different opinions that intersex people might come to about their own gender and how their thinking might change over time. She also manages to make many of the points incorporate a universal take on how gender is constructed for and by everyone. Winter’s guiding analytical line is subtle and flexible, allowing readers to think for themselves while always being clear what the novel was trying to say at a certain time.
One thing I didn’t like
There are some jarring scene jumps in the book. Wayne can be busy doing something and then on the next page, set out as if the text just continues with no indication that it’s about to switch perspective or place, Treadway starts doing something. It didn’t happen a lot, but when it did happen it threw me out of the story so much.
Question
Have you read any novels about intersex people?
Any opinion mentioned here is my opinion and not the opinion of the whole panel, or the organisers of the Indie Lit Awards.
Saturday, 29 January 2011
'Krakow Melt' - Daniel Allen Cox
A review of one of the books shortlisted in the GLBTQ category of the Indie Lit Awards.
‘Krakow Melt’ - Daniel Allen Cox
Radeck is a gay man and artist who lives in Poland. He plans pieces of activist art which are centred around fire. While setting a popsicle model of Chicago on fire at a gallery he meets Dorota, a student, a political activist and artist (although as far as we know she doesn’t make art outside of her activist exploits with Radeck). Together they set fires for activism and explore life, all in the midst of tumultuous political and artistic times.
One thing I liked
The diversity of self-contained stories in this one novel is really interesting. There are regular chapters that describe YouTube videos, which appear as contained short narratives separate from Radeck’s first person narrative story. The narrative voice transfers twice to Dr Krzystof Mazurkiewicz (who is also gay) working in surgery and at least one of these (when he finds himself working on the Pope) feels fully separated from Radeck’s storyline. It’s an intriguing way of emphasising the political aspects of the culture that Radeck’s personal story exists in (the homophobic culture in Poland, the social suppression the Pope’s authority keeps in place) and making sure that the wider political aspects don’t get swallowed up by the readers interest in Radeck’s specific personal storyline.
Also worked into Radeck’s first person narrative is a retelling of a significant event form his past, which again sits like a separate short story that utterly transports the reader away from a story being retold to a story that feels like it is happening right then.
One thing I didn’t like
I can’t believe I’m going to say this for a bunch of reasons, the chapter about Nino the elephant (an elephant who has been used as a gay symbol because he seems to prefer male elephants) having sex with a female elephant. Elephants having sex is too much for me. I have been writing here for a while now so maybe you know that I like to read books with sex in them. I might also add that sometimes I like a high level of sexual detail. Such a high level of detail was probably needed in the chapter where the elephants had sex to push an artistic point home, but this level of detail on this one occasion, where there was sex between elephants, left me feeling personally squicked out .
Question
Radeck and Dorota attend a march for gay rights, which ends up using arguments like ‘God made me this way’. Radeck does not approve as he says:
'I had long refused to be part of any Divine Plan, and I don't see the point in borrowing and redressing arguments the church has devised. Subversion as cowardly that way. Sure, Ninio could help the gay cause, but his silkscreened image could do little for transphobia. And it was an anathema to atheists.'
Do you think Radeck is unnecessarily seperating himself from other members of the march as his friend Tomek suggests, or do you sympathise with his argument?
Any opinion mentioned here is my opinion and not the opinion of the whole panel, or the organisers of the Indie Lit Awards.
‘Krakow Melt’ - Daniel Allen Cox
Radeck is a gay man and artist who lives in Poland. He plans pieces of activist art which are centred around fire. While setting a popsicle model of Chicago on fire at a gallery he meets Dorota, a student, a political activist and artist (although as far as we know she doesn’t make art outside of her activist exploits with Radeck). Together they set fires for activism and explore life, all in the midst of tumultuous political and artistic times.
One thing I liked
The diversity of self-contained stories in this one novel is really interesting. There are regular chapters that describe YouTube videos, which appear as contained short narratives separate from Radeck’s first person narrative story. The narrative voice transfers twice to Dr Krzystof Mazurkiewicz (who is also gay) working in surgery and at least one of these (when he finds himself working on the Pope) feels fully separated from Radeck’s storyline. It’s an intriguing way of emphasising the political aspects of the culture that Radeck’s personal story exists in (the homophobic culture in Poland, the social suppression the Pope’s authority keeps in place) and making sure that the wider political aspects don’t get swallowed up by the readers interest in Radeck’s specific personal storyline.
Also worked into Radeck’s first person narrative is a retelling of a significant event form his past, which again sits like a separate short story that utterly transports the reader away from a story being retold to a story that feels like it is happening right then.
One thing I didn’t like
I can’t believe I’m going to say this for a bunch of reasons, the chapter about Nino the elephant (an elephant who has been used as a gay symbol because he seems to prefer male elephants) having sex with a female elephant. Elephants having sex is too much for me. I have been writing here for a while now so maybe you know that I like to read books with sex in them. I might also add that sometimes I like a high level of sexual detail. Such a high level of detail was probably needed in the chapter where the elephants had sex to push an artistic point home, but this level of detail on this one occasion, where there was sex between elephants, left me feeling personally squicked out .
Question
Radeck and Dorota attend a march for gay rights, which ends up using arguments like ‘God made me this way’. Radeck does not approve as he says:
'I had long refused to be part of any Divine Plan, and I don't see the point in borrowing and redressing arguments the church has devised. Subversion as cowardly that way. Sure, Ninio could help the gay cause, but his silkscreened image could do little for transphobia. And it was an anathema to atheists.'
Do you think Radeck is unnecessarily seperating himself from other members of the march as his friend Tomek suggests, or do you sympathise with his argument?
Any opinion mentioned here is my opinion and not the opinion of the whole panel, or the organisers of the Indie Lit Awards.
Friday, 28 January 2011
'Jumpstart the World' - Catherine Ryan Hyde
A review of one of the books shortlisted in the GLBTQ category of the Indie Lit Awards.
'Jumpstart the World' - Catherine Ryan Hyde
Elle’s mother forces Elle to move out of her house and gets her an apartment. Elle is sixteen, her mother talks about this move as if it’s a great adventure, but Elle knows she has to move out because her mother’s new boyfriend doesn’t want her around. The only comfort she has is that she’s not moving in alone, she’s moving in with her new cat Toto. Unfortunately Toto is the most emotionally disturbed cat in the world and Elle can’t help but envy the simple, friendly cats her neighbours have.
Elle bonds with her next door neighbours Frank and Molly, as they seem to care about her. She soon feels attracted to Frank. At the same time she begins to make friends with a group of teenagers, most of whom are gay or lesbian. When her school friends meet Frank they tell Elle that he’s a trans-man, which Elle doesn’t really understand, but when she does she refuses to believe her friends. As her awareness grows she initially shuts out Frank, but when a terrible accident occurs Elle finds her prejudice corrected by affection.
One thing I liked
The style of Elle’s first person narrative voice is just to my taste. Elle strikes this uneasy balance between being incredibly self-aware, but emotionally inexpressive, so she analyses why she does things but she expresses that analysis to the reader (and I guess we’re supposed to assume, to herself as this is a first person narrative with no framing device for why it’s being provided to us) in simple, unsure language, like she has to work out what she means as she goes along and she wants to be really careful to use the right wording but it doesn’t come easily to her. I always think of that as a pretty realistic way to represent how a lot of us think and speak, although this kind of thought and speech can sound highly stylised when it’s written down.
One thing I didn’t like
There are a few under used characters that seem to be in the book for little reason. Two of Elle’s new friends, Annabel and Shane pop up and disappear. The fact that they’re not consistently present means that their personalities never get developed, so they don’t really exist as people.
Instead of a discussion question I’d like to highlight the fact that Catherine Ryan Hyde is biologically related to Leslie Feinberg, someone who Bonjour Cass (who knows way more about this than me) describes as a very big deal in the trans community. Feinberg has posted explaining that ze is extremely upset about Hyde’s book.
Any opinion mentioned here is my opinion and not the opinion of the whole panel, or the organisers of the Indie Lit Awards.
'Jumpstart the World' - Catherine Ryan Hyde
Elle’s mother forces Elle to move out of her house and gets her an apartment. Elle is sixteen, her mother talks about this move as if it’s a great adventure, but Elle knows she has to move out because her mother’s new boyfriend doesn’t want her around. The only comfort she has is that she’s not moving in alone, she’s moving in with her new cat Toto. Unfortunately Toto is the most emotionally disturbed cat in the world and Elle can’t help but envy the simple, friendly cats her neighbours have.
Elle bonds with her next door neighbours Frank and Molly, as they seem to care about her. She soon feels attracted to Frank. At the same time she begins to make friends with a group of teenagers, most of whom are gay or lesbian. When her school friends meet Frank they tell Elle that he’s a trans-man, which Elle doesn’t really understand, but when she does she refuses to believe her friends. As her awareness grows she initially shuts out Frank, but when a terrible accident occurs Elle finds her prejudice corrected by affection.
One thing I liked
The style of Elle’s first person narrative voice is just to my taste. Elle strikes this uneasy balance between being incredibly self-aware, but emotionally inexpressive, so she analyses why she does things but she expresses that analysis to the reader (and I guess we’re supposed to assume, to herself as this is a first person narrative with no framing device for why it’s being provided to us) in simple, unsure language, like she has to work out what she means as she goes along and she wants to be really careful to use the right wording but it doesn’t come easily to her. I always think of that as a pretty realistic way to represent how a lot of us think and speak, although this kind of thought and speech can sound highly stylised when it’s written down.
One thing I didn’t like
There are a few under used characters that seem to be in the book for little reason. Two of Elle’s new friends, Annabel and Shane pop up and disappear. The fact that they’re not consistently present means that their personalities never get developed, so they don’t really exist as people.
Instead of a discussion question I’d like to highlight the fact that Catherine Ryan Hyde is biologically related to Leslie Feinberg, someone who Bonjour Cass (who knows way more about this than me) describes as a very big deal in the trans community. Feinberg has posted explaining that ze is extremely upset about Hyde’s book.
Any opinion mentioned here is my opinion and not the opinion of the whole panel, or the organisers of the Indie Lit Awards.
The Indie Lit Awards & 'Scars' - Cheryl Rainfield
Ok so I’m going to do something a little different for reviews of books I read for the Indie Lit Awards GLBTQ category. As much as I talk about writing balanced reviews (and I really do think I try hard to highlight the things that I found negative and positive about a book) I think it’s usually obvious whether I had a good time reading a book, or not. I’m also still struggling with how to make people understand the difference between what villanegativa called my critical good fairy and truly negative points of dislike (I have an idea, but haven’t put it into practise yet). I don’t want to make it too obvious which of the shortlist books I’m personally keen or not keen on, but I do still want to talk a little about these books.
So I’m going to do mini posts, which will include a plot synopsis, just one specific thing that I liked about each book and one that I didn’t and a discussion question (I never do this, let me know if you like it). Hopefully this will give everyone a bit of a flavour of the books without giving away too much about how I’m ranking the books in my judging brain. There are some books where I wish I could talk more about them, but I’ll try to hold myself in check.
First for this treatment is ‘Scars’ by Cheryl Rainfield.
‘Scars’ – Cheryl Rainfield
Kendra attends therapy to try to help her through memories of being sexually abused when she was very young. While therapy helps immensely and gives Kendra a figure she can turn to in Caroline her therapist, Kendra needs to use other tactics to cope when she’s not at a session. She paints and draws, but she also cuts and she hides both coping mechanism from those around her.
Kendra meets a girl called Meghan at school and they begin to become friends, then become a couple. Kendra receives a lot of positive validation from Meghan, Caroline and her neighbour and his boyfriend. However, other people like Kendra’s mother seem unable to grasp that she needs support and Kendra’s rapist has begun sending her signs telling her he’ll kill her if she reveals his identity. Kendra doesn’t remember who raped her and she doesn’t want to access the memories, but as her life become more uncontrollable and volatile she’s drawn towards more and more memories.
One thing I liked
I thought the clues to who Kendra’s rapist was were scattered through the book in a really consistent, but subtle way. Rainfeld leaves readers with a chance to guess his identity if they know basic things about real sexual abuse, but she doesn’t overload her readers with sharp pokes and suggestive winks.
One thing I didn't like
The dialogue in this book is often clichéd and feels unconnected from any real emotion. I could go into a lot of interconnecting stuff leading off from the dialogue, but I’m going to stick to my own rules and just mention that one thing.
Question
During an art therapy session Kendra thinks 'How a painting looks is what communicates the feeling' when her art therapy teacher tells her to concentrate on expressing herself rather than creating something 'artistically pleasing'. What do you think communicates the feeling in art - form and technique, raw emotion in the piece, a bit of both, or something else?
Any opinion mentioned here is my opinion and not the opinion of the whole panel, or the organisers of the Indie Lit Awards.
So I’m going to do mini posts, which will include a plot synopsis, just one specific thing that I liked about each book and one that I didn’t and a discussion question (I never do this, let me know if you like it). Hopefully this will give everyone a bit of a flavour of the books without giving away too much about how I’m ranking the books in my judging brain. There are some books where I wish I could talk more about them, but I’ll try to hold myself in check.
First for this treatment is ‘Scars’ by Cheryl Rainfield.
‘Scars’ – Cheryl Rainfield
Kendra attends therapy to try to help her through memories of being sexually abused when she was very young. While therapy helps immensely and gives Kendra a figure she can turn to in Caroline her therapist, Kendra needs to use other tactics to cope when she’s not at a session. She paints and draws, but she also cuts and she hides both coping mechanism from those around her.
Kendra meets a girl called Meghan at school and they begin to become friends, then become a couple. Kendra receives a lot of positive validation from Meghan, Caroline and her neighbour and his boyfriend. However, other people like Kendra’s mother seem unable to grasp that she needs support and Kendra’s rapist has begun sending her signs telling her he’ll kill her if she reveals his identity. Kendra doesn’t remember who raped her and she doesn’t want to access the memories, but as her life become more uncontrollable and volatile she’s drawn towards more and more memories.
One thing I liked
I thought the clues to who Kendra’s rapist was were scattered through the book in a really consistent, but subtle way. Rainfeld leaves readers with a chance to guess his identity if they know basic things about real sexual abuse, but she doesn’t overload her readers with sharp pokes and suggestive winks.
One thing I didn't like
The dialogue in this book is often clichéd and feels unconnected from any real emotion. I could go into a lot of interconnecting stuff leading off from the dialogue, but I’m going to stick to my own rules and just mention that one thing.
Question
During an art therapy session Kendra thinks 'How a painting looks is what communicates the feeling' when her art therapy teacher tells her to concentrate on expressing herself rather than creating something 'artistically pleasing'. What do you think communicates the feeling in art - form and technique, raw emotion in the piece, a bit of both, or something else?
Any opinion mentioned here is my opinion and not the opinion of the whole panel, or the organisers of the Indie Lit Awards.
Diverse Projects
The internet is all the different projects brings into being and supports such a range of new projects every month that the mind boggles, with the amount of coolness people can devise and the internet can hold. I thought I’d show you some of my very favourite new ideas from other people (oh alright and one is partly from me) this month, as there’s something fresh about January projects that rejuvenates and removes any jaded project overload we might all feel around November.
Ari, Doret and Edi are holding an African American read in, in February, as part of action suggested by the (US) National Council of Teachers of English for Black History month. They’re encouraging everyone to read ‘Bleeding Violet’ by Dia Reeves (chosen by blogger vote) in time to chat about it on 20th February. Remember when I said ‘Bleeding Violet’ was very cool? Maybe now is the time to judge for yourself. I am thinking of making room for Reeves follow up novel in February, as I’ve already read ‘Bleeding Violet’.
Diversity in YA is a book tour across the US being run by authors Cindy Pon and Malinda Lo. I can not tell you how jealous I am of people across the pond right now. There are some interesting features popping up at the website for the tour, like a monthly compilation of the YA books being released that feature diversity.
Did I ever mention Sarwat Chadda’s new Kiss Me Kill Me tour? Yes, one of the violence devoted Chainsaw Gang is exploring young adult paranormal romance and has authors from the genre dropping by to chat (I never really enjoy author interviews, but I read the first one with Maggie Steifvater and even though I read her blog I felt like this interview brought me something new). So far I think he’s talked with Maggie Siefvater (The Wolves of Mercy Falls trilogy), Cindy Pon ('Silver Phoenix', yay who is excited for the sequel this year?) and Rachel Hawkins ('Hex Hall' again is your sequel on pre-order?).
Threadbared, one of my favourite sites about fashion is involved in creating a new fashion exhibition, ‘one that explores not only the fashion histories of women of color but also the curatorial and critical neglect of these histories.’. There’s a post about the process of creating the exhibition and the announcement that a digital archive has been created to show some of the images collected. Of Another Fashion is full of some interesting, pretty images and comes with tidbits of threadbared’s usual thoughtful commentary.
And finally my own project. The Nerds Heart YA tournament is returning for a third time in 2011, continuing to look for books that just aren’t receiving as much blog publicity as the big hitters and focusing again on fiction that seeks to represent the diversity our world in some way.
This year I’ll be working on the project with My Friend Amy – yay we are excited. We’ll be asking for book nominations mid February, but right now we’re asking for applications for anyone who wants to judge a bracket this year. You can read about the specifics of how the tournament runs here, but essentially it follows a bracket style structure where books compete against each other. Each judge reads two books (which they must obtain themselves), before deciding which book should progress to the next round. Along the way we all learn more about these books, encounter new things to try and eventually see which book wins the tournament.
If you think that sounds like something you want to be actively involved in then pop over and fill in the application form.
I realise I am opening the gates to the hordes of personal project overload, but are there any cool projects you’re excited about this month?
Ari, Doret and Edi are holding an African American read in, in February, as part of action suggested by the (US) National Council of Teachers of English for Black History month. They’re encouraging everyone to read ‘Bleeding Violet’ by Dia Reeves (chosen by blogger vote) in time to chat about it on 20th February. Remember when I said ‘Bleeding Violet’ was very cool? Maybe now is the time to judge for yourself. I am thinking of making room for Reeves follow up novel in February, as I’ve already read ‘Bleeding Violet’.
Diversity in YA is a book tour across the US being run by authors Cindy Pon and Malinda Lo. I can not tell you how jealous I am of people across the pond right now. There are some interesting features popping up at the website for the tour, like a monthly compilation of the YA books being released that feature diversity.
Did I ever mention Sarwat Chadda’s new Kiss Me Kill Me tour? Yes, one of the violence devoted Chainsaw Gang is exploring young adult paranormal romance and has authors from the genre dropping by to chat (I never really enjoy author interviews, but I read the first one with Maggie Steifvater and even though I read her blog I felt like this interview brought me something new). So far I think he’s talked with Maggie Siefvater (The Wolves of Mercy Falls trilogy), Cindy Pon ('Silver Phoenix', yay who is excited for the sequel this year?) and Rachel Hawkins ('Hex Hall' again is your sequel on pre-order?).
Threadbared, one of my favourite sites about fashion is involved in creating a new fashion exhibition, ‘one that explores not only the fashion histories of women of color but also the curatorial and critical neglect of these histories.’. There’s a post about the process of creating the exhibition and the announcement that a digital archive has been created to show some of the images collected. Of Another Fashion is full of some interesting, pretty images and comes with tidbits of threadbared’s usual thoughtful commentary.
And finally my own project. The Nerds Heart YA tournament is returning for a third time in 2011, continuing to look for books that just aren’t receiving as much blog publicity as the big hitters and focusing again on fiction that seeks to represent the diversity our world in some way.
This year I’ll be working on the project with My Friend Amy – yay we are excited. We’ll be asking for book nominations mid February, but right now we’re asking for applications for anyone who wants to judge a bracket this year. You can read about the specifics of how the tournament runs here, but essentially it follows a bracket style structure where books compete against each other. Each judge reads two books (which they must obtain themselves), before deciding which book should progress to the next round. Along the way we all learn more about these books, encounter new things to try and eventually see which book wins the tournament.
If you think that sounds like something you want to be actively involved in then pop over and fill in the application form.
I realise I am opening the gates to the hordes of personal project overload, but are there any cool projects you’re excited about this month?
Tuesday, 25 January 2011
The Splurge to End It All
Times of austerity have now come to Bookgazing. I’m not allowing myself to make any more dvd, cd, or book purchases and am going to attempt to keep form buying anything luxury (except tickets to events) for three months, beginning from 13th Jan. I can buy presents for others, otherwise nothing. After the three months are up although I plan to be more permissive with myself, I’d like to keep my spending reduced. No huge splurges, just single books. I pair of shoes, instead of three at a go. No unreasonable goals.
I did say that before I stopped buying I was going to use a surprise Christmas bonus to have one last spending hurrah. And I went for it in a pretty big way, never say I can’t commit to an idea. I got shoes (you can see one pair in the background of that one post), a few dvd box sets and a cd. I also got (what else) books by the barrel. I’ll leave this marker here, with a list of the books I bought and what I received for Christmas and birthday presents. When my purse starts to come out in a book shop I’ll just remember what a big pile of books are still waiting for me at home:
Christmas
‘The Dispossessed’ – Ursula Le Guin: February’s Women of Sci-fi pick. I’m hoping this will be the book that brings me round to Le Guin, as I’ve been told it’s not fair to judge her on the Earthsea books.
‘Rebels and Traitors’ – Lindsey Davis: Not a Falco mystery, but a standalone historical romance set during the English Civil War. I’m not sure how this could be more my sort of thing.
‘Black Powder War’ – Naomi Novick: The third Temeraire book and I’m going to enjoy it so hard (I hope) as I begin to approach the very possibly dodgy part of this series. *Clings to joy*. This time we’re off to India, but Temeraire’s nemesis, the female dragon Lien is determined to get her revenge.
‘Tooth and Claw’ – Jo Walton: Nymeth put this on my radar and when it turned up as part of the Women of Fantasy group I wanted to make sure I’d be able to take part in the discussion. Victorian social behaviour transposed on to dragons sounds just so far out and fun.
‘Now Panic and Freak Out’: A twist on the classic saying, with quotes about panicking : ) Sometimes you need someone to say it’s ok to freak a little bit.
‘A Simples Life’ – Aleksandr Orlov: Yep I’m part of the culture that is bringing the literary world to its knees. I got someone to buy the biography from a fictional meerkat, who came to fame because of car insurance adverts. I am being manipulated by advertising, but as I don’t have a car to get insured I don’t think it’s that big a problem. I have been to the fake website people, I find it adorables. My parents also sponsored a meerkat at our zoo for me – see we help too.
Birthday
‘Prospero Lost’ – L Jagi Lamplighter: A futuristic continuation of the story of the characters of The Tempest. I honestly can’t get enough of revisionist/adaptations/inspired by Shakespeare stories and The Booksmugglers recommend it, so that’s another choice made for my Women in Fantasy participation.
‘The Agency: The Body at the Tower’ – Y S Lee: I am so excited for the second instalment of this Victorian mystery series. There has been a murder at the soon to be completed Big Ben! Mary must pose as a boy working the construction job (I grew up with stories of girls dressing as boys for adventuring so I am well excited to see this trope appear more and more). James is back. All good things.
‘The Nightwatch’ – Sarah Waters: I read ‘The Little Stranger’ last year and now I want more. I know everyone raves about ‘Fingersmith’ but the WWII setting sounded irresistible.
‘Next World Novella’ – Matthias Politycki: My parents got me the 2011 Peirene subscription, which means I get all three of their 2011 novellas delivered when they’re published, beginning with this one. More literature in translation to further that 2011 goal.
Which just leaves ‘Dust’ by Elizabeth Bear spinning in orbit somewhere. It was in stock when my parents ordered it, now not so much. Will it appear in time for the Women of Sci-fi discussion?
Work’s Secret Santa Present
‘Full Dark, No Stars’ – Stephen King: It is a miracle that I got a book for my present from work! One year I got £10 in an old PDA box (we work with PDAs). Most of the time the one other woman in our office buys my secret Santa gift for whichever bloke has got me (not that I didn’t appreciate my pot of irises, my solar powered desk toy and my chocolates). This year was a bit of a splendid surprise, present bought by person who actually got me as SS, present a book I am looking forward to.
Another fantasy adventure begins
This section I blame almost entirely on The Booksmugglers : ) Exactly how many fantasy series am I in the middle of (many). How many first books in fantasy series do I need to buy (none). And yet…
‘The Poison Throne’ – Celine Kiernan: This is absolutely their fault ; ) I hadn’t even heard of this series as far as I recall before seeing it mentioned at their site AND THEN they did a big post on the entire series. It sounded wonderful. *Sobs* money runs through fingers.
‘White Cat’ – Holly Black: Jeanne’s review encouraged me to start this series, with hints that all is not as it seems. I will let The Booksmugglers off the hook on this one (even though they mentioned it a lot last year).
‘The Knife of Never Letting Go’ – Patrick Ness: The big series of the last few years and I’ve been so good at avoiding all spoilers, all posts on it and the temptation to buy, but seeing it on the smugglers top of the year post meant it flipped its way into the basket.
‘The Thief’ – Meghan Whalen Turner: The smugglers pick the best covers and this series has some of my fav cover artwork. It’s just so old fantasy feel, but somehow also very sharp and…relevant looking? Also beautiful colours. I’m also interested in the story, of course! But sometimes it’s nice to stop and admire the pretty.
‘The Hunger Games’ – Suzanne Collins: You knew I couldn’t resist in the end didn’t you? I held out until the series was finished at least.
Books for Review
‘Jazz in Love’ – Neesha Meminger: Very kindly sent to me by the author after I requested it. I know some adults don’t like contemporary YA, even though they like other YA. Contemporary and humour were a big part of what book raised me when I was growing up, so when I came back to YA it seemed natural to go back to reading some contemporary YA alongside the fantasy.
Books for group discussion
‘The Summer Book’ – Tove Jansson: For the Slaves of Golconda January read.
‘Rider’s of the Purple Sage’ – Zane Grey: For Amanda’s informal classics readalong (which I missed by miles, but I'll still be reading this).
‘Total Oblivion, More or Less’ – Alan Deniro : Jeanne and I will be reading this together in May and spending quite a bit of time discussing it.
‘Annabel’ – Kathleen Winter
‘Scars’ – Cheryl Rainfield
‘Will Grayson, Will Grayson’ – David Levithan & John Green
‘Krakow Melt’ – Daniel Allen Cox
I did say that before I stopped buying I was going to use a surprise Christmas bonus to have one last spending hurrah. And I went for it in a pretty big way, never say I can’t commit to an idea. I got shoes (you can see one pair in the background of that one post), a few dvd box sets and a cd. I also got (what else) books by the barrel. I’ll leave this marker here, with a list of the books I bought and what I received for Christmas and birthday presents. When my purse starts to come out in a book shop I’ll just remember what a big pile of books are still waiting for me at home:
Christmas
‘The Dispossessed’ – Ursula Le Guin: February’s Women of Sci-fi pick. I’m hoping this will be the book that brings me round to Le Guin, as I’ve been told it’s not fair to judge her on the Earthsea books.
‘Rebels and Traitors’ – Lindsey Davis: Not a Falco mystery, but a standalone historical romance set during the English Civil War. I’m not sure how this could be more my sort of thing.
‘Black Powder War’ – Naomi Novick: The third Temeraire book and I’m going to enjoy it so hard (I hope) as I begin to approach the very possibly dodgy part of this series. *Clings to joy*. This time we’re off to India, but Temeraire’s nemesis, the female dragon Lien is determined to get her revenge.
‘Tooth and Claw’ – Jo Walton: Nymeth put this on my radar and when it turned up as part of the Women of Fantasy group I wanted to make sure I’d be able to take part in the discussion. Victorian social behaviour transposed on to dragons sounds just so far out and fun.
‘Now Panic and Freak Out’: A twist on the classic saying, with quotes about panicking : ) Sometimes you need someone to say it’s ok to freak a little bit.
‘A Simples Life’ – Aleksandr Orlov: Yep I’m part of the culture that is bringing the literary world to its knees. I got someone to buy the biography from a fictional meerkat, who came to fame because of car insurance adverts. I am being manipulated by advertising, but as I don’t have a car to get insured I don’t think it’s that big a problem. I have been to the fake website people, I find it adorables. My parents also sponsored a meerkat at our zoo for me – see we help too.
Birthday
‘Prospero Lost’ – L Jagi Lamplighter: A futuristic continuation of the story of the characters of The Tempest. I honestly can’t get enough of revisionist/adaptations/inspired by Shakespeare stories and The Booksmugglers recommend it, so that’s another choice made for my Women in Fantasy participation.
‘The Agency: The Body at the Tower’ – Y S Lee: I am so excited for the second instalment of this Victorian mystery series. There has been a murder at the soon to be completed Big Ben! Mary must pose as a boy working the construction job (I grew up with stories of girls dressing as boys for adventuring so I am well excited to see this trope appear more and more). James is back. All good things.
‘The Nightwatch’ – Sarah Waters: I read ‘The Little Stranger’ last year and now I want more. I know everyone raves about ‘Fingersmith’ but the WWII setting sounded irresistible.
‘Next World Novella’ – Matthias Politycki: My parents got me the 2011 Peirene subscription, which means I get all three of their 2011 novellas delivered when they’re published, beginning with this one. More literature in translation to further that 2011 goal.
Which just leaves ‘Dust’ by Elizabeth Bear spinning in orbit somewhere. It was in stock when my parents ordered it, now not so much. Will it appear in time for the Women of Sci-fi discussion?
Work’s Secret Santa Present
‘Full Dark, No Stars’ – Stephen King: It is a miracle that I got a book for my present from work! One year I got £10 in an old PDA box (we work with PDAs). Most of the time the one other woman in our office buys my secret Santa gift for whichever bloke has got me (not that I didn’t appreciate my pot of irises, my solar powered desk toy and my chocolates). This year was a bit of a splendid surprise, present bought by person who actually got me as SS, present a book I am looking forward to.
Another fantasy adventure begins
This section I blame almost entirely on The Booksmugglers : ) Exactly how many fantasy series am I in the middle of (many). How many first books in fantasy series do I need to buy (none). And yet…
‘The Poison Throne’ – Celine Kiernan: This is absolutely their fault ; ) I hadn’t even heard of this series as far as I recall before seeing it mentioned at their site AND THEN they did a big post on the entire series. It sounded wonderful. *Sobs* money runs through fingers.
‘White Cat’ – Holly Black: Jeanne’s review encouraged me to start this series, with hints that all is not as it seems. I will let The Booksmugglers off the hook on this one (even though they mentioned it a lot last year).
‘The Knife of Never Letting Go’ – Patrick Ness: The big series of the last few years and I’ve been so good at avoiding all spoilers, all posts on it and the temptation to buy, but seeing it on the smugglers top of the year post meant it flipped its way into the basket.
‘The Thief’ – Meghan Whalen Turner: The smugglers pick the best covers and this series has some of my fav cover artwork. It’s just so old fantasy feel, but somehow also very sharp and…relevant looking? Also beautiful colours. I’m also interested in the story, of course! But sometimes it’s nice to stop and admire the pretty.
‘The Hunger Games’ – Suzanne Collins: You knew I couldn’t resist in the end didn’t you? I held out until the series was finished at least.
Books for Review
‘Jazz in Love’ – Neesha Meminger: Very kindly sent to me by the author after I requested it. I know some adults don’t like contemporary YA, even though they like other YA. Contemporary and humour were a big part of what book raised me when I was growing up, so when I came back to YA it seemed natural to go back to reading some contemporary YA alongside the fantasy.
Books for group discussion
‘The Summer Book’ – Tove Jansson: For the Slaves of Golconda January read.
‘Rider’s of the Purple Sage’ – Zane Grey: For Amanda’s informal classics readalong (which I missed by miles, but I'll still be reading this).
‘Total Oblivion, More or Less’ – Alan Deniro : Jeanne and I will be reading this together in May and spending quite a bit of time discussing it.
‘Annabel’ – Kathleen Winter
‘Scars’ – Cheryl Rainfield
‘Will Grayson, Will Grayson’ – David Levithan & John Green
‘Krakow Melt’ – Daniel Allen Cox
Those four are titles on the shortlist for the indie literature awards. Only one and a bit to go until I’ve read them all.
Following Up
I wanted to spend some time this year reading more from authors I like who have sizeable backlists. So I bought further works by a few adult authors:
‘The Locusts Have No King’ – Dawn Powell: This will be my third novel by Dawn Powell, having previously read ‘The Happy Island’ and ‘Dance Night’.
‘Time will Darken it’ – William Maxwell: My second book by William Powell, the first being ‘The Folded Leaf’.
‘Journey into the Past’ – Stefan Zweig: My second by Stefan Zweig, the first being the book that brought him back to mainstream notice ‘The Post Office Girl’ (it is wonderful in the saddest way, it really explained the world to me).
‘The Garden of Earthly Delights’ – Joyce Carol Oates: Ooo let’s see this will be my seventh novel by Joyce Carol Oates if I’m counting right and you’ll know that that barely scratches the surface of her published work. I just love her novels. Blonde will be a film soon and we can all go and see it.
‘Parrot and Oliver in America’ – Peter Carey: I think this is my fourth novel by Carey. Sounds like a romp and if any literary author can do a plot based story that then turns round and makes you explode with feeling it is Carey.
YA – Y not?
‘Wildthorn’ – Jane Eagland: A girl locked away for deviating from her Victorian parents ideas is another trope I favour. I also hear this is a historical with a lesbian main character, although the blurb doesn’t mention it.
‘Skunk Girl’ – Sheba Karim: I’ve been wanting this for ages and I’m so excited to finally have it. Skunk Girl was Nerds Heart YA nomination last year and I can’t wait to meet the central character.
‘The Latte Rebellion’ –Sarah Jamila Stevenson : Ari spotted this book and I instantly craved it. An idea developed to make two teens some cash spins out of control.
‘Slice of Cherry’ – Dia Reeves: The pre-order surprise that made my day. This novel is set in the same universe as ‘Bleeding Violet’, but follows different characters (serial killer sisters).
‘Shipbreaker’ – Paulo Bacigallupi: You know I was very won over by ‘The Windup Girl’ so how could I resist the book everyone is touting as much better than that? I am hoping that with Shipbreaker being YA there will be less awful sex toy rape, because those were some squicky scenes to read whatever their value to the story.
‘Behemoth’ – Scott Westerfeld: I must know what is in those eggs that were so mysteriously mentioned in ‘Leviathan’. In the sequel our hero and heroine in disguise are off to the Ottoman Empire with their bowler hated lady boffin.
Serious non-fiction
‘50 Literary Ideas You Need to Know’ – John Sutherland: I saw John Sutherland talking about literary conversation in The Times a few weeks ago and thought ‘Oh that sounds just like the ideas litlove is always trying to explore’. Although I’ve got a good handle on the thought processes behind lots of literary theory (areas Sutherland puts under a heading ‘New Ideas’) I want to educate myself a bit more on literary technical terms. I’m excited about this one, because Sutherland is so smart, this series of ’50...ideas’ is very accessible and at the end of contents table there’s a section called ‘The future of literature’ which includes chapters on e-books and fanfiction.
Impulse Buy
‘Coconut Unlimited’ – Nikesh Shukla: I do much less impulse buying online, but sometimes something just jumps out of those related recommendations boxes. This book is about racial identities that don’t fit easily into categories and friendships solidified by starting a band. I like books where bands are started and this sounds like a bit of a crossover adult/YA book, which is also a favourite thing of mine.
Following Up
I wanted to spend some time this year reading more from authors I like who have sizeable backlists. So I bought further works by a few adult authors:
‘The Locusts Have No King’ – Dawn Powell: This will be my third novel by Dawn Powell, having previously read ‘The Happy Island’ and ‘Dance Night’.
‘Time will Darken it’ – William Maxwell: My second book by William Powell, the first being ‘The Folded Leaf’.
‘Journey into the Past’ – Stefan Zweig: My second by Stefan Zweig, the first being the book that brought him back to mainstream notice ‘The Post Office Girl’ (it is wonderful in the saddest way, it really explained the world to me).
‘The Garden of Earthly Delights’ – Joyce Carol Oates: Ooo let’s see this will be my seventh novel by Joyce Carol Oates if I’m counting right and you’ll know that that barely scratches the surface of her published work. I just love her novels. Blonde will be a film soon and we can all go and see it.
‘Parrot and Oliver in America’ – Peter Carey: I think this is my fourth novel by Carey. Sounds like a romp and if any literary author can do a plot based story that then turns round and makes you explode with feeling it is Carey.
YA – Y not?
‘Wildthorn’ – Jane Eagland: A girl locked away for deviating from her Victorian parents ideas is another trope I favour. I also hear this is a historical with a lesbian main character, although the blurb doesn’t mention it.
‘Skunk Girl’ – Sheba Karim: I’ve been wanting this for ages and I’m so excited to finally have it. Skunk Girl was Nerds Heart YA nomination last year and I can’t wait to meet the central character.
‘The Latte Rebellion’ –Sarah Jamila Stevenson : Ari spotted this book and I instantly craved it. An idea developed to make two teens some cash spins out of control.
‘Slice of Cherry’ – Dia Reeves: The pre-order surprise that made my day. This novel is set in the same universe as ‘Bleeding Violet’, but follows different characters (serial killer sisters).
‘Shipbreaker’ – Paulo Bacigallupi: You know I was very won over by ‘The Windup Girl’ so how could I resist the book everyone is touting as much better than that? I am hoping that with Shipbreaker being YA there will be less awful sex toy rape, because those were some squicky scenes to read whatever their value to the story.
‘Behemoth’ – Scott Westerfeld: I must know what is in those eggs that were so mysteriously mentioned in ‘Leviathan’. In the sequel our hero and heroine in disguise are off to the Ottoman Empire with their bowler hated lady boffin.
Serious non-fiction
‘50 Literary Ideas You Need to Know’ – John Sutherland: I saw John Sutherland talking about literary conversation in The Times a few weeks ago and thought ‘Oh that sounds just like the ideas litlove is always trying to explore’. Although I’ve got a good handle on the thought processes behind lots of literary theory (areas Sutherland puts under a heading ‘New Ideas’) I want to educate myself a bit more on literary technical terms. I’m excited about this one, because Sutherland is so smart, this series of ’50...ideas’ is very accessible and at the end of contents table there’s a section called ‘The future of literature’ which includes chapters on e-books and fanfiction.
Impulse Buy
‘Coconut Unlimited’ – Nikesh Shukla: I do much less impulse buying online, but sometimes something just jumps out of those related recommendations boxes. This book is about racial identities that don’t fit easily into categories and friendships solidified by starting a band. I like books where bands are started and this sounds like a bit of a crossover adult/YA book, which is also a favourite thing of mine.
Friday, 21 January 2011
Experiment Part Two: 'The Replacement - Brenna Yovanoff
‘In the story, Emma’s four years old. She gets out of bed and pads across the floor in her footie pajamas. When she reaches her hand between the bars, the thing in the crib moves closer. It tries to bite her and she takes her hand out again but doesn’t back away. They spend all night looking at each other in the dark. In the morning, the thing is still crouched on the lamb-and-duckling mattress pad, staring at her. It isn’t her brother.
It’s me.’
For a short plot synopsis of ‘The Replacement’ please see yesterdays post. This is the second chattier post I promised which explores the three elements of this novel that I thought were really well created.
‘The Replacement’ is really successful in three areas:
World building and atmosphere
This is my favourite thing about the whole book and there are two elements that make it so.
The atmospheric tone created by the books descriptions is creepy and everything about Yovanoff’s choices in this book enhances its creepiness, from subtle things like her setting (Gentry is an old, industrial town) to her descriptions of the fey. Here’s an excerpt of the creepy tone:
‘He held it to Carlina’s cigarette and she breathed in, making the flame waver and gutter. She started to pace back and forth and the lead guitarist followed her, playing a solo that made me think of cracked glass and scrambled wires. He was wearing a black top hat and the shadow of the brim made his face look hard and hungry.’
And here’s a descriptions of part of her fey world under the slag heap:
‘I was standing in a kind of lobby, with a stone floor and a high ceiling. Torches burned in rows along the wall and the smoke had a black, oily smell like kerosene. The handles were mismatched, made from dead branches and baseball bats and one that looked like the handle of a garden shovel or an ax.’
I think the feeling of fear she conjures up has a lot to do with the way she co-opts the normal and twists it to fit into an abnormal situation. It’s the details stolen from a familiar human world, like the baseball bat which is often associated with innocent pleasure and how strange it feels to see them fitted into the fey world that add to the reader’s feeling of unease, like watching a film about a serial killer who dresses as a bride.
Brenna Yovanoff got her book into my reading list with that US cover. The composition and the contrast between violence and innocence that is depicted makes it instantly stunning. It clearly indicates that Yovanoff is interested in some of the old traditions surrounding the fairies/faerys/elves or whatever you want to call them, like their vulnerability to iron. I love the way that Yovanoff builds her story on the old stuff of scary fey legends. She doesn’t just reference the legends, she takes the references and twists them into something with a feeling of newness and then builds her book out of that stuff. So the alternative name for fairies becomes the town’s name, the hill the fey traditionally live under becomes an industrial steel slag heap. Those who know a little about fey folklore get that gleeful feeling that comes with reference spotting and those who don’t, get a contemporary tour through fairy/evish legend without feeling like traditional legend is being unnaturally glued onto a new story. There were characters I knew came from legend (The Lady, replacements) and characters where I wasn’t familiar with from legend, who may or may not have come from Yovanoff’s head (The Cutter, The Morrigan).
Characterisation
I wasn’t expecting to like a book told from the first person perspective of one of the replacements, Mackie, just because, eh it’s a fairy, fairies should be evil, but he’s all...talking, making us sympathise with him...sometimes I do not want my monsters monstrosity deconstructed! ‘The Replacement’ was a reminder that of course I do in fact want all traditional supernatural monsters to be de and re constructed, as long as we can still have those other books where supernatural monsters are traditionally evil and cunning. And duh how did I forget that I love books written from the supernatural characters direct point of view – Sam the werewolf is he main reason I’m going to read the rest of the Mercy Falls trilogy. Mackie’s character is the reason why I think so many people are going to fall for ‘The Replacement’ because he’s so vulnerable, real and interesting. Despite being paranormal he’s not a super hero, but he’s still so far from any approximation of normal that he’s not just some coded device for teenagerhood and its awkwardness. He’s a character readers can relate to, but he’s not the same as readers. That makes him both exciting and sympathetic. Crucially in a post vamp world he is not unnecessarily emo, instead he has reasons for lying in bed all day and being less than personable.
I have to talk about Roswell, Mackie’s best friend, too. I love that boy, not only for his devotion to Mackie, but for his fully developed character. Roswell may be a participant in Mackie’s story, who will drop everything to help his friend, but he’s also a person with interests and romantic ambitions. I think what I personally like about him so much is that he’s not your standard underdog secondary male character – he’s not a Ron Weasley. As much as I love me some Ron, or some Edmund ‘If only I were the hero’ supporting characters it’s refreshing to meet a secondary male character who is the cool one, the one with all the powers that matter (despite not being the supernatural character in this book he is the one who can talk to girls and surely that’s the most important power when you’re a straight, teenage boy).
And Tate, eh Tate. The way she pushes Mackie until he cracks and helps her is so dedicated and great, her for punching someone out also great and a little bit verging on cool psychotic. The way that she gives herself over to her dark feelings (because Gentry is so determined to make people hide and change their feelings) is fantastic, but I’m not sure that she feels real to me at times. Her relationship with Mackie feels odd, ethereal and somehow unconnected from natural human reaction. And there is probably lots of digging I will be doing in my head into this book (so perhaps I’ll talk about that at a later time) and what seems like Mackie’s strange irresistibleness to the opposite sex, but mostly when I think about who is the heroine of this book I keep coming back to Emma, Mackie’s sister rather than Tate, the female romantic lead. Maybe if I’d been given more access inside Tate’s head I’d have been able to connect more with her choices (like taking up with a guy who is part of the community that stole her sister) but as it was, sometimes Tate felt more like a character created around a dark literary feeling, rather than a person.
Strangely Yovanoff manages to keep the dark, artistic tone of her book from overwhelming her fey secondary characters better than she keeps it from dominating Tate’s character. Characters like the Morrigan, Emma’s lab partner Janice, the fey musicians Luther and Caralina and even the villains the Lady and the Cutter (who is just creeptastic, you are going to love to fear him) feel like characters rather than embodiments of a gothic tone, although their inclusion also contributes to deepening the dark descriptive aesthetic. Their actions make sense for them and they each feel like they have their own stories outside of Mackie’s tale, due to hinting descriptions like this one about the Cutter:
‘ “What is he?”
She looked at me over the lacy edge of her handkerchief and her answer was muffled. “A sadist and a masochist. He endures tremendous suffering because it pleases him to see the suffering of others.” '.
I guess because they’re paranormal creatures they get more leeway in what can be considered realistic actions, but still they feel right – individual and like they’re all operating on their own contextually realistic rules.
I could talk about characters all day though. If you’ve read the book, do you have a favourite?
I’m not quite sure what to say about these relationships, except that they feel really full of depth. Feelings, this book has them. I think I fell almost harder for the relationships between characters than I did for individual characters (and probably the point of making Mackie the focal point of so many warm relationships is to humanise him). So much warmth and friendship in such a desperately unhappy world. I mean who doesn’t want that?
So the experiment is over. Did you enjoy the double post? If you did not all the books I read will get multiple posts, how exhausting would that be, but some of them will. How did you find my chatter?
It’s me.’
For a short plot synopsis of ‘The Replacement’ please see yesterdays post. This is the second chattier post I promised which explores the three elements of this novel that I thought were really well created.
‘The Replacement’ is really successful in three areas:
World building and atmosphere
This is my favourite thing about the whole book and there are two elements that make it so.
The atmospheric tone created by the books descriptions is creepy and everything about Yovanoff’s choices in this book enhances its creepiness, from subtle things like her setting (Gentry is an old, industrial town) to her descriptions of the fey. Here’s an excerpt of the creepy tone:
‘He held it to Carlina’s cigarette and she breathed in, making the flame waver and gutter. She started to pace back and forth and the lead guitarist followed her, playing a solo that made me think of cracked glass and scrambled wires. He was wearing a black top hat and the shadow of the brim made his face look hard and hungry.’
And here’s a descriptions of part of her fey world under the slag heap:
‘I was standing in a kind of lobby, with a stone floor and a high ceiling. Torches burned in rows along the wall and the smoke had a black, oily smell like kerosene. The handles were mismatched, made from dead branches and baseball bats and one that looked like the handle of a garden shovel or an ax.’
I think the feeling of fear she conjures up has a lot to do with the way she co-opts the normal and twists it to fit into an abnormal situation. It’s the details stolen from a familiar human world, like the baseball bat which is often associated with innocent pleasure and how strange it feels to see them fitted into the fey world that add to the reader’s feeling of unease, like watching a film about a serial killer who dresses as a bride.
Brenna Yovanoff got her book into my reading list with that US cover. The composition and the contrast between violence and innocence that is depicted makes it instantly stunning. It clearly indicates that Yovanoff is interested in some of the old traditions surrounding the fairies/faerys/elves or whatever you want to call them, like their vulnerability to iron. I love the way that Yovanoff builds her story on the old stuff of scary fey legends. She doesn’t just reference the legends, she takes the references and twists them into something with a feeling of newness and then builds her book out of that stuff. So the alternative name for fairies becomes the town’s name, the hill the fey traditionally live under becomes an industrial steel slag heap. Those who know a little about fey folklore get that gleeful feeling that comes with reference spotting and those who don’t, get a contemporary tour through fairy/evish legend without feeling like traditional legend is being unnaturally glued onto a new story. There were characters I knew came from legend (The Lady, replacements) and characters where I wasn’t familiar with from legend, who may or may not have come from Yovanoff’s head (The Cutter, The Morrigan).
Characterisation
I wasn’t expecting to like a book told from the first person perspective of one of the replacements, Mackie, just because, eh it’s a fairy, fairies should be evil, but he’s all...talking, making us sympathise with him...sometimes I do not want my monsters monstrosity deconstructed! ‘The Replacement’ was a reminder that of course I do in fact want all traditional supernatural monsters to be de and re constructed, as long as we can still have those other books where supernatural monsters are traditionally evil and cunning. And duh how did I forget that I love books written from the supernatural characters direct point of view – Sam the werewolf is he main reason I’m going to read the rest of the Mercy Falls trilogy. Mackie’s character is the reason why I think so many people are going to fall for ‘The Replacement’ because he’s so vulnerable, real and interesting. Despite being paranormal he’s not a super hero, but he’s still so far from any approximation of normal that he’s not just some coded device for teenagerhood and its awkwardness. He’s a character readers can relate to, but he’s not the same as readers. That makes him both exciting and sympathetic. Crucially in a post vamp world he is not unnecessarily emo, instead he has reasons for lying in bed all day and being less than personable.
I have to talk about Roswell, Mackie’s best friend, too. I love that boy, not only for his devotion to Mackie, but for his fully developed character. Roswell may be a participant in Mackie’s story, who will drop everything to help his friend, but he’s also a person with interests and romantic ambitions. I think what I personally like about him so much is that he’s not your standard underdog secondary male character – he’s not a Ron Weasley. As much as I love me some Ron, or some Edmund ‘If only I were the hero’ supporting characters it’s refreshing to meet a secondary male character who is the cool one, the one with all the powers that matter (despite not being the supernatural character in this book he is the one who can talk to girls and surely that’s the most important power when you’re a straight, teenage boy).
And Tate, eh Tate. The way she pushes Mackie until he cracks and helps her is so dedicated and great, her for punching someone out also great and a little bit verging on cool psychotic. The way that she gives herself over to her dark feelings (because Gentry is so determined to make people hide and change their feelings) is fantastic, but I’m not sure that she feels real to me at times. Her relationship with Mackie feels odd, ethereal and somehow unconnected from natural human reaction. And there is probably lots of digging I will be doing in my head into this book (so perhaps I’ll talk about that at a later time) and what seems like Mackie’s strange irresistibleness to the opposite sex, but mostly when I think about who is the heroine of this book I keep coming back to Emma, Mackie’s sister rather than Tate, the female romantic lead. Maybe if I’d been given more access inside Tate’s head I’d have been able to connect more with her choices (like taking up with a guy who is part of the community that stole her sister) but as it was, sometimes Tate felt more like a character created around a dark literary feeling, rather than a person.
Strangely Yovanoff manages to keep the dark, artistic tone of her book from overwhelming her fey secondary characters better than she keeps it from dominating Tate’s character. Characters like the Morrigan, Emma’s lab partner Janice, the fey musicians Luther and Caralina and even the villains the Lady and the Cutter (who is just creeptastic, you are going to love to fear him) feel like characters rather than embodiments of a gothic tone, although their inclusion also contributes to deepening the dark descriptive aesthetic. Their actions make sense for them and they each feel like they have their own stories outside of Mackie’s tale, due to hinting descriptions like this one about the Cutter:
‘ “What is he?”
She looked at me over the lacy edge of her handkerchief and her answer was muffled. “A sadist and a masochist. He endures tremendous suffering because it pleases him to see the suffering of others.” '.
I guess because they’re paranormal creatures they get more leeway in what can be considered realistic actions, but still they feel right – individual and like they’re all operating on their own contextually realistic rules.
I could talk about characters all day though. If you’ve read the book, do you have a favourite?
Relationships
Mackie is involved in several deep, caring relationships: a sibling relationship with his sister Emma, a friendship with his best friend Roswell, a parent/child relationship with his father. In these three relationships the affection goes two ways. Although due to the book’s set up (where Mackie is a supernatural creature struggling to survive in a hostile world) the text concentrates on the support Mackie receives from people, there are hints at how deeply Mackie feels for all three of these characters throughout the book and his tone towards them is generally one of love.
Then there are the relationships which go deep, but are more conflicted, such as Mackie’s relationship with his mother. This relationship is sketched in briefly and only fleshed out more once Mackie’s mother is required to provide both a big plot hit and a big emotional hit to the book. Mackie’s romantic relationship with Tate is also conflicted as he fights what she wants him to do and she locks him out when he doesn’t behave in the noble way she seems to expect him to.I’m not quite sure what to say about these relationships, except that they feel really full of depth. Feelings, this book has them. I think I fell almost harder for the relationships between characters than I did for individual characters (and probably the point of making Mackie the focal point of so many warm relationships is to humanise him). So much warmth and friendship in such a desperately unhappy world. I mean who doesn’t want that?
So the experiment is over. Did you enjoy the double post? If you did not all the books I read will get multiple posts, how exhausting would that be, but some of them will. How did you find my chatter?
Wednesday, 19 January 2011
Experiment: 'The Replacement' - Brenna Yovanoff
This is a bit of an experimental two part discussion on Brenna Yovanoff’s 'The Replacement’.Today’s post consists of an essay type post that begins with a plot synopsis, then goes on to look at an idea present in the book and follows my thoughts surrounding this idea. Then at the end there’s a bit of evaluation on how well the book deals with this and other ideas.
Tomorrow’s post will be a chatty type post which assumes a bit more knowledge of the book, looking at what I think are the most best aspects of ‘The Replacement’. It won’t use an essay structure and it will be more freeform.
Please let me know how you find this experiment. I’m really trying to find a way to reconcile my critical monster, which is all about picking things apart and going ‘Oooo is that how that works?’ and my love of many books.
‘In the story, Emma’s four years old. She gets out of bed and pads across the floor in her footie pajamas. When she reaches her hand between the bars, the thing in the crib moves closer. It tries to bite her and she takes her hand out again but doesn’t back away. They spend all night looking at each other in the dark. In the morning, the thing is still crouched on the lamb-and-duckling mattress pad, staring at her. It isn’t her brother.
It’s me.’
It’s me.’
Mackie is a replacement. The real Malcolm Doyle was stolen when he was a baby by the fey creatures that live under the slag heap in the steel town of Gentry. Mackie was left in his crib to grow up as a normal child with the Doyle family, but he’ll never be human. Usually replacements die at an early age as they’re intolerant to the iron in the human world (replacements being Brenna Yovanoff’s version of fairy/elvish changeling babies), but Mackie survives thanks to the family’s care, especially the love shown by his sister Emma. It’s not easy to be a replacement, masquerading as a human, but Mackie does his best to fit in and make human friends while avoiding contact with the world under the slag heap.
Then Mackie comes to the attention of Tate, a girl at his school whose sister has just died. Tate insists that whatever they buried wasn’t her sister. She thinks he sister has died elsewhere, snatched and killed by the same things that brought Mackie. She asks of Mackie is that he acknowledge the truth of replacements, but admitting what he is to an outsider goes against everything Mackie has been taught so he refuses.
Meanwhile Mackie is becoming more intolerant to the iron in the world, which pushes Emma, his devoted older sister, to make contact with the world under the slag heap to get him a potion to help him survive. Both Tate’s contact with him and Emma’s contact with the fey propel Mackie into the world of The Morrigan and The Lady, the two fey sisters who run different factions of the fey community in Gentry (although The Lady ultimately controls the whole lot). When he finds that Tate’s sister may not be dead yet Mackie has to decide how involved he can safely get in the world of the fey.
The people of Gentry deliberately avoid seeing what Mackie is and what is going on around them. People are aware that children are occasionally replaced, but they choose not to engage with the reality of the folk under the hill unless forced to, because in exchange for their children Gentry remains prosperous as other industrial towns collapse. The idea of a town grown prosperous through such an inauspicious relationship was I think, vague and under developed, but I found the idea of being willingly deceived an interesting theme. I’m used to seeing fantasy novels address the idea that everyone contributes to their own deception; it’s a classic idea that can produces a lot of mental satisfaction in my readerly brain because of the twisty angles it can push plots. What intrigues me about Brenna Yovanoff’s examination of willing deception is how many layers she puts into this idea by showing Mackie, the ‘monster’ character being co-opted into the deception by ordinary people, rather than being the originator of the deception.
The people of Gentry need to make Mackie take part in their deception if they’re going to be able to deceive themselves that nothing is wrong in their town. Mackie is required to publically conceal what he is if the townspeople are going to plausibly deny the presence of child stealing monsters to themselves. If they are forced to admit they know what Mackie is they would have to take action against the child stealing, or face their lack of action honestly. So, the towns people covertly, subconsciously help Mackie to maintain his deception of them so that they don’t have to deal with the truth. By hiding from the obvious knowledge that Mackie is like the fey creatures, they indicate to Mackie how he is expected to act. Crowd persuasion can play an important part in convincing anyone that a certain way of living is normal and Mackie sees how others deny the truth of Gentry and him and works at fitting in with other people’s version of normal living (a kind of living that turns on lies and self-deception) by hiding his heritage. He is also terrified that if he deviates from what the town has set up as normal life he will be punished, especially as there is precedent of a fey creature who revealed himself being killed.
The precarious mental state that the people of Gentry maintain, balanced between an awareness of what Mackie is, as well as what his existence means and a determined repression of that knowledge, makes Mackie’s time among them terrifyingly uncertain, as someone could decide to notice what he is at any time and punish him for any kind of misfortune that hits Gentry. To avoid spending all his time rocking in a corner waiting for Gentry to recognise him and hang him as a dangerous monster, Mackie is required to uphold an internal pretence that his deception of others is successful and that his safety depends on continuing to lie. His father’s repetition of a story about Kellan Caury who was hung when children started to disappear initially sounds like the morbid warning of an overly protective parent, but can also be seen as an attempt to reassure Mackie and his father that they have some control over Mackie’s safety:
‘The moral of the story is, don’t attract attention. Don’t have deformed fingers. Don’t let anyone know how amazing you are at tuning string by ear. Don’t show anyone the true, honest heart of yourself, or else when something goes wrong, you might wind up rotting in a tree.’
This story (that we’re told is repeated often to Mackie) of who reveals himself and dies, provides Mackie’s dad with a reassuring myth of control in the same way that burying replacements as their kids without making a fuss reassures the people of Gentry that monsters do not exist. As long as they hide Mackie’s fey traits like his talent with instruments and his aversion to iron they can keep Mackie safe. It was Kellan Caury’s visibility that got him lynched. There is action they can take to keep Mackie safe. In reality Mackie’s lies only works as long as the town agrees to be deceived. His heritage is visibly obvious to anyone who decides not to participate in the collaborative performance. His father’s pretence of control, covers up fact that Mackie’s safety is something that he cannot control without the willing involvement of other liars, like the townspeople.
So readers can see that Mackie’s mental state is just as precarious as the townspeople of Gentry. Caught between wanting to believe his own lies, wanting to be himself and just wanting to be normal. The difference between Mackie and the townspeople is that Mackie can never lapse into the passive fantasy of a normal life, like the human characters. There’s too much painful evidence that keeps him from pretending to be normal, for example he can’t walk on consecrated ground (tricky as his dad is the town’s minister). While Mackie never quite accepts that he can control his own safety, because he’s so aware of himself and how obviously he stands out, lies and avoidance are the only coping mechanisms he has. When human character Tate decides to stop being passively deceived, because her sister has been stolen, Mackie holds on to the idea that he can still hide in plain sight without the co-operation of the person he’s hiding things from. Here he becomes the deceiver, but Tate’s insistence that she knows he can help her sister proves that he can’t sustain the illusion of normal without help from others. The townspeople have to collaborate in creating normality for Gentry to seem normal and with their determination to project normality they doom themselves to lies and oppression.
As Mackie is the character given a first person narrative the reader is given ready access into the conflicts of the ‘monster’ side of this mental conflict. Mackie is the character that we see struggling most immediately with the difficulty of believing in the power of his lies when he really knows that they are ineffective safeguards. The tussle between lies and truth is less immediately apparent in the human characters, who do not reveal their inner thoughts through direct narratives. In contrast with the access readers have into Mackie’s troubled thoughts, this lack of access into the townspeople’s thoughts makes the people of Gentry feel contented in their deception and almost cruel, as if they are the ones who force the deception on Mackie, rather than being the victims of the people living under the hill. The townspeople’s more complex mental conflict creeps through as readers are introduced to characters like Tate, Jenna, or Mackie’s mother and later when readers are introduced to the villain of the book the people’s victimhood becomes obvious, but for the first half of the book Mackie is the one readers will be concerned about, rather than the families who get their kids snatched. Do the people of Gentry appear as Mackie’s oppressors, more than victims? Divided opinion in my head – maybe the creepiness of the general tone of the book got under my skin and I started viewing everyone (outside Mackie’s immediate circle of friends) as having a bit of a cruel streak, so framed the town as an oppressor...in fact that’s probably it, because there are lots of people in Gentry who do care about Mackie and try to help him even if it means acknowledging the truth of what he is. I think there’s little textual evidence to say that the townspeople are deliberately cruel in their desire to keep Mackie from being able to be himself, but there is an aura of casual cruelty that attaches itself in my mind to the whole town and not just its fey population. Maybe it’s Alice, the mean girl character Mackie has a crush on that makes me feel that way. She seemed strangely knowing to me, as well as being horrible.
Like I said I was going to, I’ve given a lot of space to the idea of one idea in ‘The Replacement’ (how deceit is created by characters, as much as it is forced on them – hopefully it all made some sense). Although I think ‘The Replacement’ has great potential for being a book full of big, deep ideas, I think it often resists giving a coherent shape to its ideas within the text. The exploration of how people deceive themselves is the one idea that is fully explored within the text. Readers have to do a lot of extrapolating and personal reading to get to other ideas and to form a shape that means something more than the literal meaning of a few pieces of text. Yovanof introduces lots of little important concepts, for example Mackie’s sister Emma puts forward her conflicted feelings about nurturing a brother who then exceeds her in beauty, but still remains extremely vulnerable, but these ideas feel scattered and unresolved within the text. I mean they don’t follow a linear progress of problem, thoughts, circle back to reinforce idea/possible concrete position on ideas... so readers might feel lost as to where the author wants to direct their thoughts. The ideas, often drawn from the inclusion of an element of fey legend, feel incomplete, cast off as soon as they’re mentioned and I think that attempts to return to these ideas later in the book sometimes force the plot to move to new areas before it’s ready. The result is some powerful static scenes, like Mackie’s moment on stage with a fey band and his father’s church setting on fire, that make the book jerk around jarringly (I know, so technical, imagine a sudden cutaway in the middle of a film mostly about a road trip or something).
Whether my feelings that the different ideas are scattered, too many and compete with each other indicate a structural flaw in the book, or my inability to concentrate on this kind of different idea dispersal I couldn’t tell you. I do think Yovanoff comes close to pulling of another complete idea in later parts of the book when she has The Morrigan and the Lady represent different perspectives on how gods lose their power and can be sustained through worship.
I do think that ‘The Replacement’ resists being read directly as a metaphorical text where the lessons from Mackie’s life as a replacement can be transferred on to general human concerns. There’s subtext that can be pulled out (personally I’m seeing a little bit of GLBT subtext) and related to ordinary life, but I don’t think the subtext was designed to be specific. While many paranormal stories are keen to make specific links between paranormal situations and real life (I’m thinking of Pratchett and conflict between trolls and dwarfs standing for racial tension, but there are hundreds of other examples) readers of ‘The Replacement’ will need to configure what real life issue they think the subtext relates to. I suppose what I’m saying is it’s not clear that the author was writing with anything but Mackie’s immediate reality in mind. Ultimately I think ‘The Replacement’ strives to be a piece of intricate storytelling, with strong plot, characterisation and world creation, rather than a novel of storytelling and big ideas (although I know I am now in the dodgy area of author intent) and that it is mostly a wonderful package of those things.
Check my thoughts tomorrow on all those areas.
Wednesday, 12 January 2011
Where Have You Been, And What Have You Been Doing?!
I am still not quite back in the blogging swing as you might have noticed.
I should mention that the reason I hadn’t been commenting or reading at many blogs until yesterday was because I was in the process of deciding whether to move from the saved version of bloglines to ‘I exported my feeds to Googlereader a month ago so some are missing’. In the end Googlereader won, I’ve started creating folders to help me tidy up and I’ve decided to move everyone I read regularly from my favourites tab to a reader. That means old, regularly read friends go in the feedreader, along with author blogs, a couple of fashion blogs, new book blogs I hadn’t migrated to the reader and at least one blog about how to be a responsible, informed charity giver (I link to that one because I think it is so practically useful in a world where it can be very difficult to work out if your charity contributions make a difference).
Anyway I am in the process of sorting it out and I am returned to blog reading. Not reading certain blogs has actually left me feeling a little off kilter. I've been reading some blogs regularly for four, or five years and it's weird not to have those voices around and really it's no weirder not to be listening to voices I feel I've connected with in the past two years. It has felt odd you lot and it's reminded me that even when I'm not reviewing at my blog I always want to be reading whatever you've got at your blogs. Tv overload just does not compare to hearing you all express yourself.
I have some book posts written up and I also have a post about bad gals and guys mostly written, but a.) it is about tv and b.) it is a lot of lusting and I think I should do a ‘proper’ post before shoving my screen crushes on you. Instead I thought I’d pop up a post about what I’m reading/will be reading this month, while I go off an fill in the quotes on my posts actually about book content. January is a busy reading month for me, although hopefully I haven’t overcommitted to projects. Since I am involved in some monthly reading groups this year I might do a regular update at the beginning of the month saying which of the groups I’m taking part in that month, so other people involved can come by and discuss the books as we read them. January’s post follows:
This month I’m working as part of the reading panel for the GLBTQ category of the Indie Literary Awards. Here’s the shortlist I’ll be reading through this month:
'Annabel' - Kathleen Winter
'Jumpstart the World'- Catherine Ryan Hyde
'Krakow Melt' - Daniel Allen Cox
'Will Grayson, Will Grayson' - David Levithan and John Green
'Scars' - Cheryl Rainfield
I’ve finished Jumpstart the World, which I’ll talk about a bit later in the month (I hope that makes me seem like a mysterious judge, playing my cards close to my chest, not a lazy one). I think ‘Will Grayson, Will Grayson’ will be the next book I read (I have a fondness for collaborative projects featuring David Levithan), followed by Annabel (which is huge it turns out).
I’m currently reading ‘The Summer Book’ by Tove Janson for The Slaves of Golconda January read. I’m about fifty pages from the end and it is lovely. I anticipate lots of fun discussion and some happiness over this book at the end of the month.
I plan to read ‘Dust’ by Elizabeth Bear for the Women of Sci-fi reading group (this is coming as a birthday present – yes everyone, my birthday is tomorrow and in my continuing tradition of having multiple celebrations I will be taking the day off to celebrate with my mum, going for a meal this weekend with both my parents and enjoying a celebration with two other birthday girls and friends the weekend after at my favourite cocktail bar, hurray for birthdays).
I’m also hoping to read ‘Riders of the Purple Sage’, even though I’m late for Amanda’s informal online extension of her offline classics book club but I’m unsure whether I will be able to fit that in. Eight books in a month is a pretty big total for me, but I hope I will as I’ve only made plans to join that group for three books, one of which is a reread and I would like to read all of them.
As to other books I’ve been reading, my first book of the year was a piece of translated fiction called ‘Journey by Moonlight’. That’s two pieces of translated fiction so far in 2011 – 2010 can suck it. While it’s a book I found easy to admire, I didn’t have a great reading experience with it. I hadn’t read much all over the Christmas holidays and I started trying to make myself read when really I should have just been popping in the second film of the afternoon. Then I put it down for a long time and by the end of it I was having trouble following its ideas and remembering character names because I wasn’t concentrating.
I guess I was in a mini book slump and sometimes it’s best not to try and read yourself out of those because you just end up feeling a bit antagonistic to the book when you’re not reading it. I remember having a similar experience trying to read ‘Daniel Deronda’ in January (except that I genuinely hated that book, while I feel pretty fond of this one and its characters). Maybe I’ll write about it, but use the comments from the translator at the back as a frame to keep me on track and not attempt to write about the big ideas of the text. I do think some of you would like it (taking a punt I’d say Jeanne, because it’s quite wry) but I personally should have read it faster, going with the flowing rhythm of the scenes which beg for the book to be read in big chunks to keep my interest (and my comprehension) up.
Hope to be around more from now on! Speak soon.
I should mention that the reason I hadn’t been commenting or reading at many blogs until yesterday was because I was in the process of deciding whether to move from the saved version of bloglines to ‘I exported my feeds to Googlereader a month ago so some are missing’. In the end Googlereader won, I’ve started creating folders to help me tidy up and I’ve decided to move everyone I read regularly from my favourites tab to a reader. That means old, regularly read friends go in the feedreader, along with author blogs, a couple of fashion blogs, new book blogs I hadn’t migrated to the reader and at least one blog about how to be a responsible, informed charity giver (I link to that one because I think it is so practically useful in a world where it can be very difficult to work out if your charity contributions make a difference).
Anyway I am in the process of sorting it out and I am returned to blog reading. Not reading certain blogs has actually left me feeling a little off kilter. I've been reading some blogs regularly for four, or five years and it's weird not to have those voices around and really it's no weirder not to be listening to voices I feel I've connected with in the past two years. It has felt odd you lot and it's reminded me that even when I'm not reviewing at my blog I always want to be reading whatever you've got at your blogs. Tv overload just does not compare to hearing you all express yourself.
I have some book posts written up and I also have a post about bad gals and guys mostly written, but a.) it is about tv and b.) it is a lot of lusting and I think I should do a ‘proper’ post before shoving my screen crushes on you. Instead I thought I’d pop up a post about what I’m reading/will be reading this month, while I go off an fill in the quotes on my posts actually about book content. January is a busy reading month for me, although hopefully I haven’t overcommitted to projects. Since I am involved in some monthly reading groups this year I might do a regular update at the beginning of the month saying which of the groups I’m taking part in that month, so other people involved can come by and discuss the books as we read them. January’s post follows:
This month I’m working as part of the reading panel for the GLBTQ category of the Indie Literary Awards. Here’s the shortlist I’ll be reading through this month:
'Annabel' - Kathleen Winter
'Jumpstart the World'- Catherine Ryan Hyde
'Krakow Melt' - Daniel Allen Cox
'Will Grayson, Will Grayson' - David Levithan and John Green
'Scars' - Cheryl Rainfield
I’ve finished Jumpstart the World, which I’ll talk about a bit later in the month (I hope that makes me seem like a mysterious judge, playing my cards close to my chest, not a lazy one). I think ‘Will Grayson, Will Grayson’ will be the next book I read (I have a fondness for collaborative projects featuring David Levithan), followed by Annabel (which is huge it turns out).
I’m currently reading ‘The Summer Book’ by Tove Janson for The Slaves of Golconda January read. I’m about fifty pages from the end and it is lovely. I anticipate lots of fun discussion and some happiness over this book at the end of the month.
I plan to read ‘Dust’ by Elizabeth Bear for the Women of Sci-fi reading group (this is coming as a birthday present – yes everyone, my birthday is tomorrow and in my continuing tradition of having multiple celebrations I will be taking the day off to celebrate with my mum, going for a meal this weekend with both my parents and enjoying a celebration with two other birthday girls and friends the weekend after at my favourite cocktail bar, hurray for birthdays).
I’m also hoping to read ‘Riders of the Purple Sage’, even though I’m late for Amanda’s informal online extension of her offline classics book club but I’m unsure whether I will be able to fit that in. Eight books in a month is a pretty big total for me, but I hope I will as I’ve only made plans to join that group for three books, one of which is a reread and I would like to read all of them.
As to other books I’ve been reading, my first book of the year was a piece of translated fiction called ‘Journey by Moonlight’. That’s two pieces of translated fiction so far in 2011 – 2010 can suck it. While it’s a book I found easy to admire, I didn’t have a great reading experience with it. I hadn’t read much all over the Christmas holidays and I started trying to make myself read when really I should have just been popping in the second film of the afternoon. Then I put it down for a long time and by the end of it I was having trouble following its ideas and remembering character names because I wasn’t concentrating.
I guess I was in a mini book slump and sometimes it’s best not to try and read yourself out of those because you just end up feeling a bit antagonistic to the book when you’re not reading it. I remember having a similar experience trying to read ‘Daniel Deronda’ in January (except that I genuinely hated that book, while I feel pretty fond of this one and its characters). Maybe I’ll write about it, but use the comments from the translator at the back as a frame to keep me on track and not attempt to write about the big ideas of the text. I do think some of you would like it (taking a punt I’d say Jeanne, because it’s quite wry) but I personally should have read it faster, going with the flowing rhythm of the scenes which beg for the book to be read in big chunks to keep my interest (and my comprehension) up.
Hope to be around more from now on! Speak soon.
Wednesday, 5 January 2011
Resolutions 2011
Quickly just congratulations to irisonbooks for winning my 2nd bloggiversary contest! I'll be in touch by email tomorrow about where to send your prize :)
So it’s 2011 – time for reading resolutions. I already mentioned that one of my resolutions is to increase the racial diversity of the selection of authors I read and I’ve joined a few challenges to help me fill specific gaps in my reading, but apart from that I want to:
Even out my male/female author book ratio: I’d like to be reading equal amounts of books by men and women. Last year I read a lot more books by female authors. Since I’m engaged in 3 challenges about reading books by women and I might fancy reading some of the Orange prize list again I’m not sure how that will go, but I think I should make an effort.
Buy less books: I know! This is the sad resolution that none of us like, but I need to buy my own living space and that will not happen unless I save. After my birthday (8 days away) I can’t buy any more books until the end of April. I’m also cutting back on spending on much at all (which you can do when you still live with your parents) and concentrating on banking as much money as possible. That does mean that I’m rather spendy right now, getting all the good things I want in before the cut off point. Existing pre-orders are exempt, so although I can’t make any new pre-orders until after April, I don’t have to cancel any pre-orders that I’ve already made if the books will arrive before the end of April (I think this is just Slice of the Cherry, Demonglass and an EM Forster biography).
Read more literature in translation: In this case more is defined as more than the two books in translation I read last year, so this should be the easiest resolution to complete ever! I’ve already almost finished one book in translation (Journey in Moonlight) and I know the next three Periene books are coming for my birthday.
Read more non-fiction: I’d like to read 12 non-fiction books this year. One book of non-fiction for every month of the year seems like a reasonable target, even if I am terrible at reading non-fiction. It is ridiculous how much long term, unread non-fiction lives in our house and its spread must be stopped.
Read more literary fiction: I LIKE lit-fic everyone, but somewhere along the way I got sucked into the ‘the only lit-fic is this stuff over here about men who want to make everything about their penis’ whirlpool and forgot that serious literary fiction does not have to be like that. How did I go from ‘Omg Wolf Hall, The Little Stranger, The Still Point – lurve’ to ‘Sigh literary fiction exhausts me, please stop waving that in my face’? (This was originally followed by a little rant about what I don’t want to see in lit-fic and what I enjoy in lit—fic, but I decided to remove it because I’d started using phrases like ‘lit-fic must not’ as if I were the lit-fic secret police, which scared me a little bit. Instead I will just say I know what kind of lit-fic books I want to read this year and which kind I think I will try to avoid.).
The last one is not exactly a reading resolution but important for improving my mental health/ tendency to use anger to procrastinate. I will not stalk arguments like ‘The Orange prize is a feminist propaganda exercise’, ‘Girls, please do not get your romance germs in our sci-fi’ or ‘Genre writers destroy honest wordsmiths, says serious author’. I will not click through to Guardian articles that I have been told are inflammatory and I will NOT read the comments on any online pieces from newspapers. I will not obsess about James Frey being allowed to be within five metres of a book (I read that he will have a new book out in 2011, the paper described him as literature’s ‘bad boy’ – head, all over the walls).
I have some bloggy resolution stuff I’d like to do too, like organise the blog and make useful tabs. I’m also having thoughts about reviewing. I’d kind of like to turn more to discussing sort of technical elements/content that interests me, even if I am not bowled over by the book. I’m not totally sure what that will look like though. I still want to be able to say ‘I lurved it’ or ‘Die book, die’ but I don’t necessarily want that to shape my posts entirely. If I read a book that I’m a bit meh about as a reading experience I’d like to still talk about how well I thought this one part was crafted, or how intense this one idea was without giving people reading the false impression that I enjoyed reading the book for fun. Vice versa, I want to be able to say ‘Look at how the mechanics of this book seem to work and to not work’ about a book I liked a whole lot without seeming like I had no fun with a book at all. This might mean multiple posts, or less essay structured posts, more chatty bits on different aspects that don’t join up in a linear structure...I’m not quite sure yet, so suggestions gleefully accepted – will this kind of thing make the blog lack personality do you think?
I’m seeing lots of great resolutions this year (so far exceptionally impressed with Amanda’s set and feel like I’m most copying Victoria from Eve’s Alexandria). I feel like there was a wide spread book blogger hatred of 2010 by the end of the year and now there’s a consensus that 2011 IS going to be different even if we have to trick its good things into a trap using our leftover holiday chocolate at bait. Let’s all achieve things in 2011 shall we?
So it’s 2011 – time for reading resolutions. I already mentioned that one of my resolutions is to increase the racial diversity of the selection of authors I read and I’ve joined a few challenges to help me fill specific gaps in my reading, but apart from that I want to:
Even out my male/female author book ratio: I’d like to be reading equal amounts of books by men and women. Last year I read a lot more books by female authors. Since I’m engaged in 3 challenges about reading books by women and I might fancy reading some of the Orange prize list again I’m not sure how that will go, but I think I should make an effort.
Buy less books: I know! This is the sad resolution that none of us like, but I need to buy my own living space and that will not happen unless I save. After my birthday (8 days away) I can’t buy any more books until the end of April. I’m also cutting back on spending on much at all (which you can do when you still live with your parents) and concentrating on banking as much money as possible. That does mean that I’m rather spendy right now, getting all the good things I want in before the cut off point. Existing pre-orders are exempt, so although I can’t make any new pre-orders until after April, I don’t have to cancel any pre-orders that I’ve already made if the books will arrive before the end of April (I think this is just Slice of the Cherry, Demonglass and an EM Forster biography).
Read more literature in translation: In this case more is defined as more than the two books in translation I read last year, so this should be the easiest resolution to complete ever! I’ve already almost finished one book in translation (Journey in Moonlight) and I know the next three Periene books are coming for my birthday.
Read more non-fiction: I’d like to read 12 non-fiction books this year. One book of non-fiction for every month of the year seems like a reasonable target, even if I am terrible at reading non-fiction. It is ridiculous how much long term, unread non-fiction lives in our house and its spread must be stopped.
Read more literary fiction: I LIKE lit-fic everyone, but somewhere along the way I got sucked into the ‘the only lit-fic is this stuff over here about men who want to make everything about their penis’ whirlpool and forgot that serious literary fiction does not have to be like that. How did I go from ‘Omg Wolf Hall, The Little Stranger, The Still Point – lurve’ to ‘Sigh literary fiction exhausts me, please stop waving that in my face’? (This was originally followed by a little rant about what I don’t want to see in lit-fic and what I enjoy in lit—fic, but I decided to remove it because I’d started using phrases like ‘lit-fic must not’ as if I were the lit-fic secret police, which scared me a little bit. Instead I will just say I know what kind of lit-fic books I want to read this year and which kind I think I will try to avoid.).
The last one is not exactly a reading resolution but important for improving my mental health/ tendency to use anger to procrastinate. I will not stalk arguments like ‘The Orange prize is a feminist propaganda exercise’, ‘Girls, please do not get your romance germs in our sci-fi’ or ‘Genre writers destroy honest wordsmiths, says serious author’. I will not click through to Guardian articles that I have been told are inflammatory and I will NOT read the comments on any online pieces from newspapers. I will not obsess about James Frey being allowed to be within five metres of a book (I read that he will have a new book out in 2011, the paper described him as literature’s ‘bad boy’ – head, all over the walls).
I have some bloggy resolution stuff I’d like to do too, like organise the blog and make useful tabs. I’m also having thoughts about reviewing. I’d kind of like to turn more to discussing sort of technical elements/content that interests me, even if I am not bowled over by the book. I’m not totally sure what that will look like though. I still want to be able to say ‘I lurved it’ or ‘Die book, die’ but I don’t necessarily want that to shape my posts entirely. If I read a book that I’m a bit meh about as a reading experience I’d like to still talk about how well I thought this one part was crafted, or how intense this one idea was without giving people reading the false impression that I enjoyed reading the book for fun. Vice versa, I want to be able to say ‘Look at how the mechanics of this book seem to work and to not work’ about a book I liked a whole lot without seeming like I had no fun with a book at all. This might mean multiple posts, or less essay structured posts, more chatty bits on different aspects that don’t join up in a linear structure...I’m not quite sure yet, so suggestions gleefully accepted – will this kind of thing make the blog lack personality do you think?
I’m seeing lots of great resolutions this year (so far exceptionally impressed with Amanda’s set and feel like I’m most copying Victoria from Eve’s Alexandria). I feel like there was a wide spread book blogger hatred of 2010 by the end of the year and now there’s a consensus that 2011 IS going to be different even if we have to trick its good things into a trap using our leftover holiday chocolate at bait. Let’s all achieve things in 2011 shall we?
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