Weekly Geeks – Historical Fiction

March 25, 2009 in Weekly Geeks | Tags: | 1 comment

im-a-weekly-geekThe Weekly Geeks topic is historical fiction, with an interesting choice of questions to consider. But the more I contemplated it,  the more I realised that it’s not quite as straightforward an issue to comment on as I had thought.

My relationship to historical fiction has changed over the years; in my teens I really enjoyed Jean Plaidy (especially her series on (surprise, surprise) Mary Queen of Scots and Catherine de Medici), but as I studied more history (that’s what my degree is, after all) I pulled away from reading fiction set in the period I was most interested in – the sixteenth century. And that’s because the little things, the niggly not quite right stuff, the playing about with the facts for dramatic purposes began to annoy me more and more.

So most of the historical fiction I read is in the crime genre, particularly the Victorian period and even more particularly anything vaguely reminiscent of Sherlock Holmes.

But if you asked me to pick the one historical novel that really impressed me and that I have gone back to more than once, then I would have to say Katherine by Anya Seton. A huge, sprawling, romantic blockbuster of a novel which had a huge impact, and I say that as someone who doesn’t do romance at all. I first read it when I was fifteen and fell in love then and there with John of Gaunt, and nothing I’ve learned about him since has changed my mind.

Blueberry Girl

March 25, 2009 in Challenges, Reviews | Tags: , , | 2 comments

blueberrygirlneilgaiman52269_f1I never know how best to review a picture book, especially one which is designed at least in part for children. They tend to be very short so it’s almost a cheat describing it as something that I’ve read, but they are always beautiful things that deserve to be celebrated, and that’s certainly the case here.

Blueberry Girl is a poem written by Neil Gaiman for his friend, the singer/songwriter Tori Amos when she was expecting her little girl. It’s a prayer wishing for all that’s good to be given to the child so that she grows up to fulfil her potential.

The poem itself is very moving, and is wonderfully supported by gloriously colourful illustrations by the great Charles Vess, filled with animals and flowers.

It’s a gorgeous book and one that I’m sure I’ll go back to; and it’s also my first read for The Dream King Challenge.

Halting State

March 25, 2009 in Challenges, Reviews | Tags: , | 3 comments

haltingstatecharlesstross52250_fHalting State is only my second Charles Stross novel but I think it’s already clear that he and I are going to have a long and productive relationship as I’ve thoroughly enjoyed both reads so far (see this review for my previous foray).

So we are in Edinburgh and Sergeant Sue Smith has been called to the office of Hayek Associates, a company which produces and supports online games. There has been  a robbery, but not one of your usual smash and grabs; this time the robbery has taken place inside a game, and has been carried out by a marauding but organised band of orcs, supported by a dragon.

Add to this mix Elaine Barnaby, a forensic accountant with practical skills in weilding very large swords in medieval role playing games, and Jack Reed, a games programmer who just happens to be unemployed at the right time and with the right skills set to assist in the investigation, and you have the three main characters in a tale of gaming, programming and international terrorism in a 21st century which is a bit of an advance on the one we recognise. And one of the questions is: when is a game not a game?

I loved this; I’ll admit it took me a day or two of typical reading-on-the-train commuter time to really get into the story but once I was housebound with the dreaded Head Cold 2: This Time It’s Personal, this book was exactly what I needed to escape from the depths of feeling sorry for myself. And what more can you ask?

I’ve never played World of Warcraft or any of its competitors but I can see the attraction it has, and although I’m sure you would get a lot of additional pleasure out of this story if you had a background in online gaming, I found I knew enough to make the story intelligible. The techy stuff was really interesting and was very happy with how the plot all worked out in the end. Another recommendation, and another read for the 42 Challenge.

Once Upon A Time III

March 21, 2009 in Challenges | Tags: , | 12 comments

out3banner6150It’s that time of year again and I have really been looking forward to Once Upon A Time, but as always it’s choosing exactly what to read that’s the problem.

I’m plumping for Quest the First (as I did last year) and will be reading five fantasy works from the following pool:

What colour is your rainbow?

March 20, 2009 in Stuff | Leave a comment

Your rainbow is strongly shaded violet.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

What is says about you: You are a creative person. You appreciate beauty and craftsmanship. You are patient and will keep trying to understand something until you’ve mastered it.

Find the colors of your rainbow at spacefem.com.

Thursday Thunks on Friday

March 20, 2009 in Thunks | 1 comment

thursdaythunksOff work suffering from a really bad cold again which serves me right for thinking that Spring had arrived and not wrapping up warmly enough…

So here we go:

  1. The last flight of stairs you walked up/down – were they carpetted? – Oh yes, living in a town house my life is all stairs and they definitely have carpets.
  2. Green or purple grapes? – Both, whichever is sweeter at the time.
  3. Do you like Peeps? – I’m Scottish, I don’t think I know what they are so will have to investigate…..
  4. The smell of Vicks – like it? It’s one of the few things keeping me going at the moment, so a definite yes
  5. Do you put decorative cling-ons on your windows for different holidays? Absolutely not.
  6. Finish the sentence – I spent too much money on _______? My handbag collection
  7. Which celebrity should be flown into outer space or placed on a desert island? I don’t think I care enough to choose – besides, who am I to judge – I can be fairly annoying myself
  8. Would you support schools changing the “open” time? Such as 10am – 5pm for example? Don’t have children so no opinion on this one
  9. Do you go fishing? No, I try to stay away from anything that wriggles as I suspect a fish on a hook would
  10. What question should we ask next week? Spring – is it here yet??

Flora Symbolica

March 16, 2009 in Challenges, Reviews | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

flora-symbolica_-flowers-in-pr180_fSo I’ve been watching Jeremy Paxman’s series on Victorian painting on the BBC, and obviously the pre-Raphaelites feature quite a bit, and I haven’t started any of my reading for the Art History challenge, and the Book God asked me a question about flowers (I think, may have imagined that) so I toodled off and picked this up from the bookshelf. Just to dip into you understand…..

Some time later I had read it from cover to cover; not a huge book but a lovely selection of Pre-Raphaelite paintings featuring flowers and a page on each one explaining what the various plants actually mean.

Interesting diversion into the language of flowers; there wasn’t just one dictionary of meanings apparently, and many a young man had to cope with the tears that ensued from a different interpretation of the bouquet he’d just presented.

The reproductions are lovely and the text interesting. And in case you are wondering, the cover is Rossetti’s “La Ghirlandata”, painted in the 1870s, and the flowers it includes are honeysuckle (affectionate devotion though Rossetti saw it as a symbol of sexual attraction); pink roses (the sexual attraction thing again as they are at their full bloom) and surprisingly monkshood (approach of a dangerous foe) – though William Rossetti thought his brother meant to paint larkspur (an emblem of lightness and levity). So even great artists get it wrong sometimes too.

This is my first read for the Art History Reading Challenge.

Thursday Thunks on a Sunday

March 15, 2009 in Thunks | Tags: | Leave a comment

thursdaythunksThey pick a subject and I interpret it how I want. So this week…

  1. You are walking down the road and you look down. There is a bug. Do you step on it? – No, absolutely not, bad karma.
  2. What is one fantasy that you want to come true more than any other? – No, you aren’t going to get me to admit that, not in polite company anyway….
  3. Someone knocks on your door. Do you look out the window to see who it is before you open it? Do you open it regardless of who it is? – Well our door is at the side of our town house and the accessible windows are at the front, so I either entirely ignore the doorbell and have a sneaky look as they’re walking away, or I go downstairs to open what is a glass door, so by that time they’ve seen me too and I can’t get away with anything other than opening it. But mostly I just hide in an antisocial way.
  4. Have you ever eaten Play Doh? – No but my brother has (he’s 41 now so I can say these things without fear of retribution)
  5. What was your favourite Saturday morning cartoon as a child and why? – Tom and Jerry, closely followed by Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck; I liked the absurdity.
  6. Are you a “people watcher”? – Oh yes….. and I have the restraining orders to prove it.
  7. I have a bowl of fruit. There are apples, oranges and pears. You help yourself to one – which one do you choose? – Apples every single time. Pears at a pinch. Never oranges; I don’t like the texture.
  8. What is your pet peeve in the blogging world? – All the shorthand stuff – YMMV, for example, but mostly LOL – yes definitely LOL. I’m the kind of person who writes text messages in full sentences with proper punctuation.
  9. What is one religion that you could just never see yourself joining? Any of them.
  10. What word do you use far too often? – Cool
  11. How long do you spend in the shower? – Depends on how slow and tired I am but probably 15 minutes; it’s a good place to think about work.
  12. If you were to write a personal ad about yourself what would it say? – A variation on the profile in my sidebar (presumably without the happily married bit) but honestly I can’t see myself doing it at all.
  13. Your favourite flavoured soup is – carrot & butterbean, closely followed by pea & ham – Baxters, obviously.
  14. You are sitting on a bench in the park and a bug walks in front of your feet …. do you squash him? – In the unlikely even that I noticed him at all (because I’d probably have my nose in a book) I would let him be – see the bad karma thing mentioned above.

A Beautiful Blue Death

March 7, 2009 in Reviews | Tags: , , | 5 comments

abeautifulbluedeathcharle52232_fI’m not sure where I came across the name of Charles Finch – it may have been mentioned on someone’s blog, or I may have simply have been seduced by the cover somewhere, but I’m glad  I decided to put this on my Christmas list, and grateful to the Book God for buying it for me (I suspect that he wants to read it too)

The hero of A Beautiful Blue Death is Charles Lenox, a Victorian gentleman of leisure with a love for ancient history and travel, and a man who has clearly dabbled in amateur investigations in the past with some measure of success. It is winter in 1860’s London, and although he would prefer to be reading by a fire in his study, he gives in to the request of his childhood friend, and current neighbour, Lady Jane to look into the circumstances surrounding the death of a former maid from her household, who has been found at her new position apparently having committed suicide.

Of course the novel would be over fairly quickly if that were the case, and it becomes clear that the girl was poisoned, and Charles must find out why and by whom, both to satisfy himself and to keep his promise to Lady Jane.

This was a very enjoyable read, to the extent that I stayed up well past my normal bedtime so that I could finish the story. Lenox is a really attractive leading man, his relationship with Lady Jane is nicely drawn, and there is a wonderful cast of supporting characters, particularly his brother Sir Edmund, who is a distinguished Parliamentarian but nevertheless wants to help with the investigation. The denouement was very satisfying, and I will be looking out for the sequel when it becomes available later this year.

Eater

March 7, 2009 in Reviews | Tags: , | Leave a comment

eatergregorybenfordgrego20218_fGregory Benford’s Eater is, according to the cover at any rate, an “explosive new science fiction thriller” set in the fun-packed world of astrophysics. I have some acquaintance with this world, given that the Book God’s predecessor was a Natural Philosopher with an interest in such things. That’s probably where my interest in factual science comes from – I refuse to give him all the credit for my interest in science fiction – I lay that at the door of my English teacher in junior secondary school who had us reading Arthur C Clarke’s A Fall of Moondust.

Anyhow, we are in Hawaii with the astronomers and astrophysicists and there is an anomaly in the heavens, moving the way such things should not. Turns out to be a sentient black hole heading Earthwards – I’m not giving anything away here, a casual glance at the blurb on the back of the edition I have gives away this key plot point. But what does it want and what is the world going to do about it?

This was a bit of a guilty pleasure – I quite enjoyed it while feeling all the way through that I shouldn’t. I think this is because it read very much like it was aiming for the screen, probably as a Sci-Fi Channel mini-series with all the things you would expect. Is there a crumpled deskbound hero scientist who would love to do real work again? Is there a wonderfully intelligent woman suffering from a terminal disease but working through her pain? Is there a rival of long-standing who turns out to be an ally as they all work towards a common goal? Is there tragedy, betrayal and a noble sacrifice? You bet.

I don’t mean to make fun because I did actually enjoy reading this, it was quite pacy and there was a lot of hard science which is one of the things I really enjoy. But in the back of my mind I was casting the movie, and that’s always a bit distracting.

Bride of the Book God

Follow brideofthebook on Twitter

Scottish, in my fifties, love books but not always able to find the time to read them as much as I would like. I’m based in London and happily married to the Book God.

I also blog at Bride of the Screen God (all about movies and TV) and The Dowager Bride, if you are interested in ramblings about stuff of little consequence

If you would like to get in touch you can contact me at brideofthebookgod (at) btinternet (dot) com.

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