Books

Bear on Brasyl

~ Cheryl ~ 6 Comments

Elizabeth Bear has an excellent technical explanation as to why many people have been saying that Ian McDonald’s Brasyl is “too difficult”.

I, of course, love “difficult” books. I’m a Gene Wolfe fan. But not everyone likes to have to work hard when they are reading, and each author has to make a decision as to what sort of books they want to write. Typically a “difficult” book will get you critical acclaim but lower sales. A “difficult” book is more likely to win a juried award than a popular vote award. And so on.

But you know, the world would be boring if everyone wrote like Gene Wolfe, or everyone wrote like Naomi Novik.

At Borderlands

~ Cheryl ~ 6 Comments

So, having done the Lush thing, I headed out to Valencia Street and picked up a whole pile of books I wanted to buy: Little Brother, Lavinia, The Hidden World – you know the sort of stuff. But I had entirely forgotten that there was a reading due that afternoon. And that is how I made the acquaintance of Jeff Carlson. Now I’ve seen a fair few readings in my time, but I think this is the first time I have ever seen a writer on a signing tour just stand up and talking about writing and publishing for an hour or so, and be thoroughly entertaining. Jeff has a motormouth to rival that of Mr. Scalzi (though his blog is not yet in the same class). What’s more he lives in Walnut Creek. I pointed out to him that he ought to pop along to BASFA once in a while. I think he’d be very popular.

While I was in the shop I happened to notice a movie novelization and put two and two together. The forthcoming film, Babylon AD, is actually based on Babylon Babies by Maurice Dantec. Why is this important? Well, for two reasons. Firstly because the arch-cynic of movie reviewing, Lucius Shepard, thinks that the film has promise, despite the fact that it stars Vin Diesel. And secondly because the film is out this month, which makes it Hugo-eligible in Montreal. And M. Dantec makes his home in Canada these days because (apparently) he has had a falling out with France. Indeed, if the film is true to the book then much of the action will take place in Canada. Interesting.

Also while there I hooked up with the newly arrived Nick Mamatas (who is apparently in the Bay Area to do awesome things with some Japanese folks) and Alethea Kontis, and after the reading we headed off to SF in SF. Time for another post.

Victory of Eagles

~ Cheryl

Temeraire books don’t take long to read. However, the fact that the prose is straightforward and the plot relentless doesn’t mean that they are lacking in intelligence. Sure they are brain candy, but I frequently find myself stopping to admire how clever Naomi Novik is at writing brain candy. That sort of writing doesn’t happen by accident.

Anyway, book 5 is more of the same, which I’m sure is what the fans want. The basic plot is that Napoleon invades England and the dragons save the day (no, that is NOT a spoiler). I’m not entirely convinced about Novik’s grasp of UK geography, and I still think that Marshall Ney and General Picton would make great additions to the cast. But really, I can’t complain, especially as it is clear that there will be more books.

Next stop Australia, where, coincidentally, the new Karen Traviss Wess’har novel is also set. That, I think, will exercise my brain cells rather more.

VanderMeer on Huffington Post

~ Cheryl

The hard-working Jeff VanderMeer has a new column on The Huffington Post. While the column is notionally about “political fiction” you can bet that large quantities of it will be about SF, simply because SF is a genre that lends itself particularly well to political discussion. Go ye and give it eyeballs, folks. This is another route into mainstream culture and Jeff needs our support.

Essential Books Commentary

~ Cheryl

The post about the 20 Essential Books panel has garnered a fair amount of interest around the blogosphere. In particular Niall Harrison and Karen Burnham have been busy doing data mining.

I’m sure this is all very interesting, and I’ve been guilty of some of it myself, but I can’t help get the feeling that this is missing the point somewhat. That panel was not particularly diverse (and in part I picked it that way). We all know each other quite well, and to some extent we have similar tastes. We would have got a very different result if we had a panel composed of, say, Timmi Duchamp, Dave Truesdale, Jeff VanderMeer, Tempest Bradford and Jerry Pournelle. And that panel would not have produced a definitive list any more than we did.

And yes, even though the panel all knew each other, we don’t all read the same books. Each of my fellow panelists managed to pick at least one book that I hadn’t read. I’m mostly far more interested in those than in middling overlap between our lists.

Lord Tophet

~ Cheryl ~ 2 Comments

I picked up a few new books while I was in Denver (mainly to say thank you to Tattered Cover for sponsoring the goodie bags) and because I was bored (and exasperated) with Steel Beach I started reading Lord Tophet on the plane. I haven’t been able to put it down since, and I may well end up writing an actual review. I can see that some people won’t like it, because not everything is explained at the end. However, it has one of my all time favorite last lines for a novel (which of course I can’t tell you because it would be a spoiler).

World Fantasy Weirdness

~ Cheryl ~ 3 Comments

I didn’t have many brain cells to devote to this at Worldcon, but my initial reaction on seeing the novel shortlist for the World Fantasy Awards was a profound WTF??? I was expecting Ysabel to win, but the rest of the short list looks very odd. I’ve heard good things about Territory, but it is apparently only half a novel, having suffered the dreaded Publisher Chop. The others I have hardly heard of at all. Maybe the judges know something that I don’t, but I was very much expecting to see A Secret History of Moscow and The New Moon’s Arms on that list. And The Name of the Wind, even though it wasn’t one of my favorites. Jeff VanderMeer is also bemused.

Another One To Buy

~ Cheryl ~ 2 Comments

While I was at Worldcon I noticed that Gary Wolfe was reading a book called The Gone-Away World by Nick Harkaway. Then I noticed that this very same book was the subject of John Clute’s latest review column on scifi.com. I stopped reading John’s review about half way through because the book sounded so interesting that I wanted to go out and buy it. Too many books…

Shopping

~ Cheryl ~ 2 Comments

Central Denver is lovely. Despite the wide roads and grid layout, it is a proper town center with lots of good restaurants and shops, and excellent pubic transit (there’s a free bus going up and down the 16th Street mall). Tattered Cover, who sponsored the goodie bags for the con, turned out to have a beautiful bookstore – photos to follow. I did also try to photograph Coors Field, but my camera, being a loyal Giants fan, promptly ran out of batteries.

Anyway, there was a further reductions sale in Anne Taylor Loft, and the local store, Cira, whose window I had been salivating over all week, turned out to have things that fitted me. I am poorer, but very happy. Gotta rush now. The airport beckons.

An Essential Book

~ Cheryl ~ 6 Comments

I’ve just finished the panel on “20 Essential Books of the Last Twenty Years”, with Charles Brown, Gary K Wolfe, Graham Sleight and Karen Burnham. The panel went very well and I will be posting everyone’s lists on this site soon (probably next week). However, I did want to note the fact that only one book appeared on the lists of all five panelists. That book was River of Gods by Ian McDonald. It is a fabulous book, and I heartily recommend it.

Shopping

~ Cheryl

I have finally got up the energy to drag myself to the bank and stock up on cash for the Denver trip. This was aided in no small part by getting a 40% off voucher from Borders in my morning email. I confess to being deeply disappointed by the quality of the selection on offer, but the coupon was only good for a single book and I did manage to bag myself a copy of Victory of Eagles. I was then able to satisfy my Jamba Juice craving as well and sit in the warm California sun drinking mango smoothie and reading my favorite brain candy. If only I wasn’t so darn tired.

The Reef

~ Cheryl

Here’s another one I’m going to have to mark down as promising but not quite there yet. Newton clearly has talent and ambition, and in particular is determined to write interesting, character-driven SF, but I’m not sure that this book was quite ready for publication. I may be being rather harsh because I’m not fond of books in which the male characters spend much of their time obsessing over whether they are “man enough”. Nice ending, though. Definitely promise for the future.

Sam Does Heinlein

~ Cheryl ~ 1 Comment

At The Guardian’s book blog Sam Jordison’s exploration of part Hugo winners has reached Starship Troopers. As with most non-Americans, Sam was rather non-plused by the book:

Worse still, great chunks of the book are given over to terrifically dull lectures about the need to limit the franchise to veterans and joys of combat. These come courtesy of a handful of other characters equally as one-dimensional as the narrator, who seem to exist only to spout philosophy.

But his view of the book is by no means entirely negative. Read on.

Stephenson Takes the Long View

~ Cheryl ~ 5 Comments

I’ve heard various mutterings about Neal Stephenson’s new book from people who get advance copies. One person reckons that Stephenson has jumped the shark with Anathem, but the folks at The Long View have a rather rosier view of it, as least in part because they apparently helped inspire the book.

Anyway, it seems that there will be a launch party for Anathem at the Long View Foundation’s offices in San Francisco on September 9th. Stephenson will be there. I’ll see what I can do (though I believe Kevin and I are away for a long weekend, so I may be a bit tired on the Tuesday).

Iron Angel

~ Cheryl ~ 2 Comments

Over the past year or so I seem to have seen a lot of people complaining that book 2 of whatever fabulous new fantasy series is a let-down after the glories of book 1. There can be many reasons for this. It could be that book 1 was lovingly crafted over many years whereas 2 and 3 have to be written to publisher deadlines. It could be that SF&F fans read mainly for new ideas, and if book 2 contains no new world building but simply advances the plot then it will fail to satisfy. Or it could be something to do with the nature of celebrity: a new author might get more than 15 minutes of fame, but she can’t hope for more than one book’s worth. Whatever the reason, Alan Campbell’s follow-up to Scar Night seemed to be to be a step forward.

Not that Scar Night was a bad book (see my review), but Iron Angel gave me the impression of someone slowly growing into his craft. Campbell writes like a man who, having seen the paintings of Hieronymous Bosch and found them wanting in both horror and humor, has determined to do better. Sometimes he succeeds. I particularly liked his vision of Hell, with its Soul Middens and Wailing Ships. The book also has an unspoken assumption that, no matter how awful the denizens of the netherworld might be, in terms of pure nastiness they don’t hold a candle to the English upper classes. Gods, after all, are cruel and capricious by nature, but humans are that way by choice.

Book Shopping

~ Cheryl ~ 4 Comments

I forgot to mention in the previous post that my trip to Taunton also netted a copy of Mark Newton’s debut novel, The Reef. It has an enthusiastic blurb from Jeff VanderMeer on the cover, and one from Jeffrey Thomas on the back. So far, so promising.

Principles of Angels

~ Cheryl

Principles of Angels is a debut novel by British writer, Jaine Fenn. (One of Jo Fletcher’s discoveries, I believe.) I don’t think it is one of those debuts that is going to have everyone talking about the New Best Thing, but it is a solid start and shows a lot of promise. It is not hard SF – it has a hero called Taro and a species of alien called Sidhe – and it probably has girl cooties on the grounds that macho guys will be uncomfortable with a book whose hero is a rent boy, but it tells a good story and doesn’t shirk from uncomfortable stuff where necessary. Most of all, however, I am delighted to see another woman writing SF. So many women these days are going into fantasy, YA and paranormal romance because these are seen as “women’s areas”. Many congratulations to Jaine and Jo for bucking the trend.