January 4, 2007 at 5:45 pm · Filed under Book Reviews, Children's Literature, Favourite Books, Fiction and Literature, Mystery and Suspense, Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror
So, I had a pretty good Christmas. I got to see many of my aunts, uncles, and cousins for New Year’s, and I got great gifts from my family (and gave some pretty good ones myself, I think.)
My aunts and I watched Million Dollar Baby on New Year’s Eve, and I absolutely loved it. I didn’t think I would, because boxing is ahead of only wrestling in the list of sports I find too awful to watch. Some of the scenes were too violent for me, but there weren’t many of them, and the rest of the movie more than made it worthwhile. Hilary Swank really deserved that Oscar, as did Morgan Freeman, who is one of my favourite actors. Clint Eastwood was also fabulous.
I’ve also read a surprising number of books lately, some of them very good. The past few years, I haven’t had as much time for personal reading as I used to, and when I have read purely for pleasure, it’s generally been very undemanding genre fiction, by authors I already know and enjoy. Not that those books have all been of low quality, but they haven’t been earth-shattering, for the most part.
So here’s what I’ve been reading (without spoilers, for the most part):
Arthur Golden, Memoirs of a Geisha
Despite a few problems I had with the story, this novel had the most important thing I look for in my recreational reading: pure readability. I enjoyed every minute I spent reading it, and I was never bored or tempted to put it down. I have to admit that my choice of reading is generally escapist; I’m more interested in the quality of the journey than with the destination. It’s nice if a novel can teach me something, about the world or about myself, but first and foremost, it has to entertain me. Probably why I like fanfic so much.
I’ve come to realize that I love stories about other cultures. The descriptions of early 20th century Japan were probably the biggest reason I loved this book. I’ve heard that the movie isn’t very good, but I’d be interested to see it anyway. At least the costumes and sets are probably good enough to be worth paying $5 to rent it.
Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner
Amir grows up in Kabul, Afghanistan, and for most of his childhood his friend and personal servant is a boy his own age, Hassan. Amir watched Hassan being raped and does nothing to stop it, and his guilt and shame over his cowardice and his failure to help his friend leads him to drive Hassan away. It isn’t until many years later that he gets the chance to atone for his actions.
Okay, this is definitely the best book I’ve read lately. No wonder it’s a best-seller. The narrator, Amir, is entirely believable, and a convincingly flawed human being, while still be sympathetic and likable. Again, the portrait of Afghanistan is fascinating, although not as much as the relationship between Amir and Hassan. I was surprised at some of the turns in the plot, although once they happened it was easy to see that the evidence was there all along.
And boy, did those kites sound like tremendous fun.
Guy Gavriel Kay, The Fionavar Tapestry
GGK is pretty much my favourite fantasy writer, perhaps because he mostly writes historical fantasies which are more history than fantasy. I started The Summer Tree twice, and gave up both times within about 50 pages. The same thing happened with The Lord of the Rings; it took seeing The Fellowship of the Ring in the theatre, and being desperate to know what happened next, that made me finally read the trilogy. High fantasy just isn’t my thing, I guess, but it was very disappointing to find that GGK might have written books I didn’t like.
You can imagine how excited I was when I picked up The Summer Tree in late December and found myself caught up in it, so much so that I stayed up all night to read The Wandering Fire and The Darkest Road as well. I still don’t think they’re nearly as good as his other books. You can definitely see how his writing has improved over the years, as well as how he’s moved farther and farther away from fantasy. Tigana still has a very high-fantasy feel to it, in A Song for Arbonne the feeling is noticeably less but still present, and it is pretty much lost by the time you get to The Lions of Al-Rassan and Sailing to Sarantium/Lord of Emperors. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that his later novels are my favourites (with the exception of The Last Light of the Sun, but that has more to do with its being more simplistic than his other novels, with almost a YA feel to it, which may stem from many of the main POV characters being teenagers.)
Slightly stupid side note, but it was nice to read a book (partly) set in Toronto, and right at U of T, too. It’s somewhat surprising how much of a difference it makes when some of the action takes place in places you actually know. Yay for GGK being a fellow Torontonian!
George R.R. Martin, A Game of Thrones (abandoned unfinished)
I read this because I read so many raves of GRRM’s work that compared it to GRK’s; a lot of the latter’s fans seem to love GRRM’s A Song of Fire and Ice series. Having now read about half of A Game of Thrones, and abandoned it, almost certainly for good, I can see why people make the comparison, although I think their work is similar only on a very superficial level. Essentially, A Game of Thrones is an epic political drama. Like GRK’s books, it has a large ensemble cast, with a number of POV characters. Unlike Kay, Martin seems to make his characters subservient to his political intrigue, which takes away any interest I might have felt in the plot. I find Martin’s characters mostly either so unlikeable, stupid, or boring that I couldn’t care less what happens to them, or so likely to die that I don’t want to get attached to them. There are a few exceptions, Daenerys Targaryen in particular, but there’s not enough focus on them to make slogging through the rest worthwhile. I agreed with a lot of the things Russ Allbery says in his review, although my opinion of the book is much worse than his.
In fact, I found that I disliked A Game of Thrones for much the same reason I dislike soap operas: too many unpleasant people, and a neverending story that bores me to tears. It’s a shame, because Guy Gavriel Kay is one of the few authors I know who’s never had even a mediocre book, much less a bad one, and it would be nice to find an author to match him. Sadly, George R.R. Martin is obviously not going to be that author for me.
I am confirmed in my opinion that no one handles a large ensemble cast and shifting POV with the mastery that Guy Gavriel Kay so consistently displays.
Andrew Greeley, The Priestly Sins
Like pretty much all of Greeley’s books, I found this readable without being particularly memorable. The most significant thing about it is that Greeley himself is a priest, which makes the portrayal of Catholic church hierarchy interesting, to say the least. Although all it takes is five minutes listening to the Pope to realize that the Catholic church, in its higher echelons, can be wildly disconnected from the experiences of ordinary North Americans…
Laurie R. King, The Art of Detection
The new Kate Martinelli novel, and definitely my favourite so far in this series about a lesbian police detective in San Francisco. The parallels to Locked Rooms were many, the Sherlock Holmes theme was a delight, and I found the story-within-a-story just as compelling as the characters did, which made the whole novel just that much better. Pure entertainment for mystery fans, and despite my interest in the recent event in San Francisco, I really didn’t see the ending coming. My only complaint is that there could have been more about Kate and Lee’s relationship, and I definitely felt a lack of interaction between Kate and Al - it felt like Kate was practically flying solo on this one. The mentions of Jon and Sione’s relationship were a nice touch, one I was looking forward to and which I would have been disappointed to miss.
Mary Renault, The Friendly Young Ladies
Extremely disappointing. I really like The Charioteer, despite the fact that I generally avoid reading any of the scenes with Andrew in them because I dislike him so much. This book definitely didn’t match up. I didn’t connect with any of the characters, and there was only one scene that even vaguely had the brilliant touch that makes the party scene in The Charioteer so amazing (I’m thinking of the conversation between the older sister and the doctor, which is pretty funny, but which certainly can’t carry the whole book.) Also, not having lived through the period Renault wrote about, or anything like it, I often find her ideas about homosexuality impenetrable, more so in this book than in The Charioteer.
Terry Pratchett, A Hat Full of Sky
Not as good as the main Discworld novels, which isn’t surprising, since the Tiffany books are more oriented toward children. I also didn’t find it as good as its prequel, The Wee Free Men, but it wasn’t a disappointment. Worth reading if you like the Discworld series, and definitely not the place to start if you’ve never read them.
Terry Pratchett, Mort
Wasn’t very impressed. Mildly entertaining, but does nothing to change my opinion that the City Watch books (including The Truth and Going Postal, which sort of are but not really, and Small Gods, which isn’t at all) are Pratchett’s only truly brilliant Discworld novels. Oh, for more of Vimes, Vetinari, or Moist von Lipwig! Although I do admit that Granny Weatherax and Nanny Ogg have their charms, as well…
Edeet Ravel, Ten Thousand Lovers
A somewhat pointless story, entertainingly and informatively told. The background about Israel and Hebrew is fascinating; the main characters and the plot, not so much. Basically a girl-meets-boy story; the fact that the boy interrogates suspected Palestinian terrorists for a living (in a state where interrogation often equals torture) turns out not to be very important to the plot, which ends up being about nothing very much. Despite how that makes it sound, this isn’t at all a pro-Israel novel, nor is it anti-Palestinian. Like I said, interesting for its view of Israeli society, and for its linguistic analysis of Hebrew vocabulary, but deficient as a whole. Still, worth reading if you have a few spare hours.
Lois McMaster Bujold, The Sharing Knife vol. 1: Beguilement
The first volume of a duology, and so much inferior to her other books, even The Hallowed Hunt, which was itself a disappointment. The world-building didn’t interest me much, and the climax of the action came less than 60 pages into the 355-page novel. The rest is a fairly mediocre romance, and the couple dealing with objections from her family. The second volume promises to deal with…objections from his family. I’m curious enough (and enough of an LMB fan) to read the second book, but not enough to look forward to it. This story was apparently split in two by the publisher for economic, rather than literary, reasons, and I think it was highly unnecessary.
So, yeah. Not so much boring as unexciting, and pretty pointless.
Laurell K. Hamilton, Mistral’s Kiss
LKH, why do you keep writing this pointless, stupid crap? And more importantly, why do I keep reading it?
I really, really need to just never read any of her books again. But I know I will, because I can’t kill the faint hope that one day she’ll regain some remnant of the talent she once had.
On a less book-related note, my dad, who is a contractor and woodworker, just brought my roommate and I an elliptical machine that ones of his clients was getting rid of. It’s fairly small and light, and so much easier than going to the gym. It looks like I’m going to have to make some New Year’s Resolutions.
Currently reading: Azar Nafisi’s Reading Lolita in Tehran; Margaret Atwood’s Alias Grace. Neither is doing much for me so far, unfortunately.
Tags: Andrew Greeley, Arthur Golden, Discworld, Edeet Ravel, George R.R. Martin, Guy Gavriel Kay, Kate Martinelli, Khaled Hosseini, Laurell K. Hamilton, Laurie R. King, Lois McMaster Bujold, Mary Renault, Merry Gentry, Terry Pratchett, Tiffany Aching, Wide Green World
