I'll admit I was a bit wary when I picked up Djinn Falls In Love: tempted by authors such as K.J. Parker and Claire North, I worried that the collectiI'll admit I was a bit wary when I picked up Djinn Falls In Love: tempted by authors such as K.J. Parker and Claire North, I worried that the collection itself might suffer from repetition. I needn't have worried. The collection demonstrates a truly staggering variety of perspectives on the concept of djinn, as well as mixing prose and poetry, vignettes and plot twists. As is mentioned in the foreword, the unifying theme of the collection is the humanization of the Other. The collection begins with the poem that gave it its title by an author who goes by "Hermes," then quickly delves into the very traditional, very folkloresque-feeling story, "The Congregation," by Kamila Shamsie, which also contained one of my favourite quotes in the whole collection:
"There is no evil here, only love. God save us from a world that can't tell the difference."
The rest of the collection varied widely in the mood, setting, and in the vision of the djinn themselves.
My down-and-out favourite, and enough to make the collection a five-star all on its own, was "A Tale of Ash and Seven Birds" by Amal El-Mohtar. It is a rich, gorgeous allegory of immigration, where djinn refugees to the land of the wizard-nation repeatedly change themselves in their efforts to survive. An excerpt:
"Great Horned Owl You are an apex predator. Nothing can hurt you now. You have embraced silence. [...] Sparrows though. Crows. Cormorants. All these will fill your belly now, and it's their own fault. All their own fault for not choosing a shape the wizard-nation cannot hurt, their own fault for being small or loud or trying to build communities of which the wizard-nation disapproved. You have learned the wizard-nation's way, and you will be able to stay, now, forever."
This was not the only story to explore the theme of djinn as immigrant. "Somewhere in America" by Neil Gaiman is actually excerpted from American Gods, which I admit I wasn't thrilled about, but certainly fits the theme. Comically bitter and rather gruesome, it tells the tale of a disillusioned visitor who runs into a particularly peculiar taxi driver. "The Jinn Hunter's Apprentice" by E.J. Swift is an imaginative scifi story that takes place on a busy spaceport on Mars. A bunch of angry djinn, tired of having their once-peaceful world invaded, have invaded a ship and the captain calls in a djinn-hunter. In "The Spite House" by Kirsty Logan, djinns were made corporeal, badgered and threatened out of their homes by violent protesters bearing signs such as "NO SNAKES IN OUR NEIGHBOURHOOD", and forced to live on scraps in the outskirts of society.
Other stories use the djinn as the ultimate outside observers. "Bring Your Own Spoon" by Saad Z. Hossain, which was perhaps my second favourite story, takes place in a dystopian future in a ruined world made habitable only by the constant efforts of nanobots. A destitute human and djinn living on the outskirts of society decide to act upon their crazy idea of starting a restaurant for other forgotten members of society. The story is gorgeous and poignant and thoughtful. One of my favourite quotes:
"People always assume that poor people are dangerous. They wouldn't be here, if they were."
"Emperors of Jinn" by Usman T. Malik is a brutal tale about a group of children and a magic book that mixes casual cruelty with human possession. "Authenticity" by Monica Byrne uses a film student's desire to get a romantic encounter between djinn and human on film to very directly plays with the theme of observers and voyeurism--not for me, and I'm not entirely sure I understood the story's goal. "The Glass Lights" by J.Y. Yang is a wistful vignette about a girl who sees herself as a passive observer, constantly pulled by the needs and desires of others and her own compulsion to reshape the world as her djinn ancestors once did. She feels out of place in the world, not because she is secretly part djinn but because she is Muslim:
"You don't giggle with a girl in a headscarf, who can't watch any of the Channel 8 K-dramas you follow because she doesn't speak Mandarin."
Some of the stories stretched the idea of the djinn to represent sentient magic, supernatural beings, or even just as a metaphor for untapped and dangerous potential. I find K.J. Parker's short stories to be, without fail, utterly fantastic, and "Message in a Bottle was no exception. A scholar, pursuing forbidden research in the effort to save his country, is faced with the choice of whether or not to open a bottle that could either cure the deadly plague or cause an even worse one. As always, the story is fabulously fun and funny with a darkly ironic edge. Jamal Mahjoub's "Duende 2077" takes place in a future where capitalism has imploded and "The Caliphate flooded into the power void.". The main character is a jaded detective who begins investigating an apparently political crime and finds himself tracing the strands of a rebel plot. Vivid and gritty, it also takes the time to try to explore the motives of martyrs for a cause. "History" by Nnedi Okarafor is an interesting story about a singer who harnesses magic--including a djinn-- to improve her song, and also about the odd quirks of history and the ways in which our actions have unforeseen effects on others. "Queen of Sheba" by Catherine Faris King expands the djinn to other cultures in the context of a very sweet childhood story about growing up. "The Sand in the Glass is Right" by James Smythe uses the djinn as a mechanism to redoing a life over and over. I saw "Reap" by Sami Shah as a classic ghost-revenge story transcribed onto a slightly different space: that of members of the military spying on potential terrorists. It felt to me like a very traditional child-based horror movie, and I found the violence sick and pointless. "Black Powder" by Maria Dahvana Headley is a wild, gruesome, exceedingly American story about a magical gun whose bullets have the potential to grant wishes. Full of archetypal characters and twisted darkness, it reminded me strongly of Catherynne Valente. The writing is gorgeously vivid; for example:
"Each person is a projectile filled with sharp voice and broken volume, blasts of maybe. The hands outstretch, the hearts explode. The chamber is the world and all the bodies on earth press close around each bullet, holding it steady until, with a rotating spin, it flies."
I also appreciated the more traditional takes on the djinn seen in stories such as "Manjun" by Helen Wecker, where a djinn, once the favourite of Lady Aisha Qandisha, becomes a Muslim and exorcises his kind from the humans they torment. It's a bittersweet story about the sense of loss and isolation from loved ones that the newly converted sometimes experience. "How We Remember You" by Kuzhali Manickavel is an odd and creepy story told to a djinn companion lost in childhood. "The Righteous Guide of Arabsat" by Sophia Al-Maria is a cynical and disturbing take on an inexperienced and gullible "mama's boy" who begins to believe his new wife is possessed by a djinn--after all, how else could she be sexually experienced? It's a telling exploration of morality, norms, and the dangers of combining dogmatic ignorance with credulous believers. Claire North's "Hurrem and the Djinn" is an enjoyable alternate history of Sultana Hurrem. Although it starts as a traditional fairy tale, I thoroughly appreciated the ironic relish and flair of North's dialogue, as well as the final sting about a proper woman's place.
The Djinn Falls in Love gets a high rating from me not just because of the wide variety of stories but also because of a few memorable tales mixed in. As with all anthologies, not every story will appeal to every person, but I believe there are enough spectacular tales in here that the collection is well worth a look.
~~I received this book through Netgalley from the publisher, Rebellion Solaris, in exchange for my honest review. Quotes were taken from an advanced reader copy and while they may not reflect the final phrasing, I believe they speak to the spirit of the stories.~~
Ninefox Gambit was one of the best books I read in 2016. Raven Stratagem might be even better. This whole series is utterly, gloriously, astoundinNinefox Gambit was one of the best books I read in 2016. Raven Stratagem might be even better. This whole series is utterly, gloriously, astoundingly brilliant.
Welcome to the world of the hexarchate, where total participation in rigid ritual not only keeps control of the population; it also warps the topology of reality to create "exotic effects" that keeps the hexarchate in power. The hexarchate is ruled by six factions: the Rahal, who make the rules; the Vidona, who enforce them with torture; the Andan, who control the culture; the Nirai, who provide mathematical and scientific technology; the Shuos, who act as spies, assassins, and bureaucrats; and the Kel, who are the military wing of the hexarchate. All but the Shuos depend upon an exotic effect to remain in power, from Rahal scrying and mindreading to the Nirai spacefaring mothdrive to the overwhelmingly powerful Kel military formations. Heretics are therefore a tangible, literal threat: not only do they threaten to disrupt the loyalty of the populus; they also weaken the hexarchate's exotic effects that drive the hexarchate's technology, military, and society.
Raven Stratagem starts where Ninefox Gambit leaves off. It introduces a cast of highly empathetic characters and explores the perspectives of several of the antagonists of the previous book. The story also expands its powerful exploration of gender fluidity. While the last book was told almost entirely from the Kel perspective, Raven Stratagem provides quite a bit more of the Shuos and even the Nirai perspectives. Our previous Shuos experience was almost entirely limited to the crazy undead mass-murdering General Shuos Jedao, who is occasionally let out of his immortal unrest in the Black Cradle to possess a Kel "volunteer" and use his scheming brain to win their wars. I adore the Shuos; it turns out they're not just assassins and spies; they're also the bureaucrats and administrators because
"A properly guided bureaucracy is deadlier than any bomb."
The Shuos are renowned for turning everything into a game and are charmingly unexpected; for instance, the leader of the Shuos faction has a tendency of knitting during scheming sessions.
As with Ninefox Gambit, one of the main themes of the novel was agency. Kel are imbued with "formation instinct" that irresistibly compels them to unquestioningly obey their superiors. The few "crashhawks" for whom the programming has failed are constantly under suspicion by their superiors because they can choose not to obey. The hexarchs are increasingly out of touch, off planning new sadistic "remembrances" and chasing immortality even as their people are being invaded by the savage Hafn. As one character thinks:
"At some point you had to ask yourself how much legitimacy any government had that feared dissension within more than invasion without."
The world of the hexarchate is brutal and unfeeling, the people kept under martial law and in constant fear of the Vidona. But overthrowing the hexarch also means destroying all of the technology built upon its exotic effects, and what if it is replaced with something even worse? As one character says:
"You know what? It is a shitty system. We have a whole faction devoted to torturing people so the rest of us can pretend we're not involved. Too bad every other system of government out there is even worse. [...] If you have some working alternative for the world we're stuck in, by all means show it to us without spelling it in corpses."
There are a lot of thought-provoking themes in Raven Stratagem, but they don't get in the way of the character development or the action. I was utterly captivated by the story's twists and turns, and I'm only a little ashamed to admit that I fell for one of them. (view spoiler)[Initially, I'd assumed that Cheris was in charge and playing Jedao, bolstered by their obvious care for the servitors, but as the story proceeded and they did things like enslave the Kel and let the Mwennan die without blinking and use a program for simple mathematical calculations, I began to wonder if the Jedao part had eaten the Cheris part. At some point, I lost sight of the title--"Raven" Stratagem clearly points to a scheming Cheris. I'm impressed that the book got me to lose faith while still making the big reveal feel utterly natural. Bravo! (hide spoiler)] If you were a bit overwhelmed by Ninefox, then you'll be relieved to hear that Raven is much less math-heavy, focusing more on characters and worldbuilding. We get a view of the inner workings of the hexarch from Shuos Mikodez, we finally get a glimpse of the mysterious and somewhat horrifying Hafn, and the ending is utterly satisfying while leaving me desperate for more. I absolutely cannot wait to get back to the world of the hexarchate.
Yours in calendrical heresy, Carly
~~I received this ebook through Netgalley from the publisher, Rebellion/Solaris, in exchange for my honest review. Thank you! Quotes were taken from an advanced reader copy and while they may not reflect the final phrasing, I believe they speak to the spirit of the novel as a whole.~~
This is one of those books for which five stars simply isn't enough. Once upon a time, a girl with skin as white as snow and hair as fair as gold slepThis is one of those books for which five stars simply isn't enough. Once upon a time, a girl with skin as white as snow and hair as fair as gold slept in a stone room and dreamed of a world outside. Each day, Melanie wakes up in her cell and is strapped into a wheelchair and taken to class, where she learns kings and queens of England and the populations of cities and fairy tales and Greek myths. She knows that the Breakdown has altered the world; she knows that beyond the barricades, the cities have fallen and the hungries wait mindlessly for human prey, but she still imagines someday leaving the confines of her cell and her corridor, of, as she thinks,
“Like Pandora, opening the great big box of the world and not being afraid, not even caring whether what's inside is good or bad. Because it's both. Everything is always both. But you have to open it to find out."
The Girl with all the Gifts is a truly outstanding story, a captivating premise, an imaginative yet believable future, poignant, abruptly shifting from heartwarming to heartrending. The story is narrated in third person from several characters' points of view, and although it is told in third person, each voice is distinct, with its own cadence and viewpoint. Some have a charming, self-deprecating, darkly humorous edge; for example:
"This man came to Wainwright House with something trivial like bursitis and -- as many people do -- experienced complications while he was being treated. In this case, the complications were that the hungries feasted on his flesh and made him one of them."
The most glorious and gut-wrenching moments are from the perspective of Melanie. The writing style is in the present tense, simple but articulate, charged with all of the wonder and innocence and faith that only a child’s voice can contain. The contrast between the world that Melanie glories in and the dystopia that the reader absorbs through her eyes makes the story even more vivid and poignant and bittersweet. The reader sees a hopeless, post-apocalyptic world of zombies and blood and fear, of cruelty and slim hope for a future. Melanie knows about what the world was and what it is now, yet she still sees wonder and beauty and possibility everywhere; in a flower, in the sky, in the proof of infinite primes. The book is studded with lovely little moments of childish insight, articulated with an elegant simplicity:
"When your dreams come true, your true has moved. You've already stopped being the person who had the dreams, so it feels more like a weird echo of something that already happened to you a long time ago."
Melanie’s very innocence adds another layer of uncertainty; is she the frail hope to be rescued from the depths of the box of all evils, or a mixed blessing, holding in her hands both tremendous danger yet burgeoning hope for a darkening world? Or is she Pandora herself, destined to open the box and release humanity’s fate upon the world? There are so many complex underpinnings, so much symbolism, that the book is still haunting me.
The nature of the book makes it impossible to summarize without spoilers, so I’ll simply add that whatever you imagine the book to be, I think that it will defy and surpass your expectations.
**NOTE: Quotations are taken from an uncorrected digital galley and are therefore provisional. Quotes will be corrected when the book is released.**
~~I received this ebook through NetGalley from the publisher, Hachette Book Group (Orbit), in exchange for my honest review. Thank you! ~~
If you're interested but uncertain, there's an extended preview available on Amazon, Goodreads, Google Play, and elsewhere that will give you a great taste of the book....more
**edit 11/26/13 Born in the war-torn, misogynistic country of Borogravia, Polly Perks has grown up with the folksong echoing in the back of her mind. P**edit 11/26/13 Born in the war-torn, misogynistic country of Borogravia, Polly Perks has grown up with the folksong echoing in the back of her mind. Perhaps, then, it is only natural that when her brother goes missing in action, Polly decides to use the song's example to find her brother. She cuts her hair, practices her swagger, and, equipped with a strategically-placed pair of socks, sets off to enlist. Of course, after countless years of war, Borogravia recruitment is scraping the bottom of the barrel. It isn't long before Polly discovers that she has joined in with a motley crew of trolls, vampires, Igors, and misfits--a truly monstrous regiment. "Oliver" Perks will fit right in.
When Mark Vorkosigan looks in a mirror, he doesn't quite know what stares back. Mark was created a clone, trained as an assassin, int**edited 11/28/13
When Mark Vorkosigan looks in a mirror, he doesn't quite know what stares back. Mark was created a clone, trained as an assassin, intended to replace his progenitor, Miles Vorkosigan, as part of an attack against the infamous Lord Vorkosigan of Barrayar. But Mark failed spectacularly in carrying out his task, partially because of the discovery that Miles himself has constructed an artificial identity as Admiral Miles Naismith of the Dendarii Free Mercenaries. Now Mark again plans to step out of the mirror to assume the identity of his clone brother, this time as his Naismith persona. For Mark to regain his sense of self, he wants to go back to his birthplace, the ruthless and ruleless Jackson's Whole, to rescue the other clones from their dismal fates. But Mark is merely a doppelganger; he lacks Miles' addiction to adrenaline and furious thinking in the face of adversity. When that desperate moment comes, can Mark carry out Miles' dance in his place?
Mirror Dance is one of my favourite books in the Vorkosigan Saga. Sure, it's a rip-roaring adventure involving at least three heists--I rather lost count--but it also touches upon the profound.
Sometimes, resurrection isn't all it's cracked up to be. Even if you come back from the dead, you may not be able to regain your past**edited 12/15/13
Sometimes, resurrection isn't all it's cracked up to be. Even if you come back from the dead, you may not be able to regain your past life. After his previous adventures in mortality (Mirror Dance), Miles Vorkosigan is trying to get back into his routine. This is, naturally, complicated by the fact that he spends most of his time in his alternate persona, the aggressive, intelligent, and daring Admiral Naismith of the Dendarii Free Mercenaries. Unfortunately, his adventures did not leave him unscathed: he has developed an unnerving tendency to go into epileptic convulsions at the worst possible moment. In this case, the worst possible moment happens to be right in the middle of a daring rescue mission while holding a plasma gun. After his crew picks up the (rather too literal) pieces, Miles realizes that his condition will inevitably lead to his real commander, Captain Illyan of the Barrayaran Imperial Security, taking his Naismith identity away from him. Terrified at the prospect of the loss of this integral facet of his personality, Miles makes an incredibly stupid decision: to lie to Illyan. The consequences are more drastic than he could possibly have imagined. But Miles has little time to mope: the Emperor of Barrayar has fallen desperately in love, Illyan himself has developed a frightening illness, ImpSec is in chaos, and Miles has forced himself right into the centre of all of it.
***WARNING: a main theme of this book is self-harm (specifically cutting) It isn't fetishised or romanticised, but Carey's writing is quite visceral a***WARNING: a main theme of this book is self-harm (specifically cutting) It isn't fetishised or romanticised, but Carey's writing is quite visceral and my review has quotes, so beware of triggers...***
It all starts with a jailbreak. Felix "Fix" Castor, aided by the succubus Juliet, daringly swipe Fix's demon-possessed friend out from under the noses of the sadistic doctor who wants to take him apart to study him. Fix is just beginning to catch his breath when the police arrive on his doorstep. To his surprise, however, Fix isn't carted off to jail for kidnapping; instead, he is taken to the scene of a near-fatal assault. Much to his chagrin, the police didn't ask him over for his supernatural senses--they just want him to explain why "F Castor" is scrawled across the car window in blood. When Fix learns that the victim of the attack was a childhood enemy, his quest to discover the meaning behind the message leads him back into his murky past and into a darkening future.
This book left me breathless--and not just because I read it at the gym. It wasn't just the atmosphere and characters, or the scenes that ripped my heart into shreds, or the plot that kept me guessing into the second half of the book, or even the flawless worldbuilding; it was the visceral, visual nature of the scenes Carey painted and the way he used the template and tropes of pulp to delve into the duality and hypocrisy of human nature. Throughout the series, one of my favourite aspects has been Carey's use of the supernatural conflict as a metaphor for the story's more human tragedies-- a ghost's speech is stolen from her in the same way that her life as an illegal immigrant and prostitute left her without a voice, or spirits that physically steal men's bodies in much the same way that their entrepreneurial ruthlessness has trampled others. (Yep, I like my metaphors blatant.) This book explores a new theme: self-harm in all of is manifestations, from the supernatural to the mundane.
The location, too, the Salisbury estate, is one of Carey's best: Fix describes it as
"One step closer to Heaven....streets eighty feet of the ground...a city in the air...leave your worries on the ground, take to the skies and live clean. Only it turned out that you left a lot of other stuff on the ground, too... closer to Heaven, maybe, but you bring your weather with you."
It is a Babel whose towers were built to rival Heaven and is thus inevitably doomed to failure. Within this fallen city of all-to-human gods, we have a young boy who forsook his innocence of youth and apparently jumped from the airy balconies. (view spoiler)[I loved the imagery of the boy's death; his fall--his fall from grace--leads to the creation of a demon. I think Fix's references to Milton and Paradise Lost aren't coincidental. (hide spoiler)] Throughout the series, the atrocities that Castor faces are, by and large, man-made. Every aspect of the world speaks of man's inhumanity to man; even the supernatural beings are, at their core, people. Ghosts, loup-garou, and zombies are people who have been refined by death into something both more and less human, and even the actions of demons are inexorably shaped by the humans who summon them into the mortal plane. (view spoiler)[The reveal about the true nature of demons was stunning; it came as a shock to me, yet was such a natural fit for the world that Carey had built that it had all the satisfaction of a last puzzle piece fitting into place. We have the contrasting paths of Juliet and Mark; Juliet seeks to understand/remember what it is to be human, while Mark strips away all self other than pain and fury. (hide spoiler)]
Through Castor, Carey deconstructs the hero. Throughout, we see a man who is willing to shoulder the responsibilities of others, to throw himself into the fray for friends and strangers. One little oddity stuck out to me: both his mother and brother call him "Felix," so Fix must have bestowed his nickname, with all of its semantic baggage, on himself. To protect and rescue--to fix, in fact--is the role of the hero, yet over and over, Carey has shown us the consequence of choice and the arrogance and unbearable guilt that underlie this apparent selflessness. As one character tells Fix, "'You persist in thinking that...the whole world is full of the waste products of other people's mistakes? That your role in life is to clean them up, and to take the thanks for it?(view spoiler)[...and thus the inevitable tragedy. (hide spoiler)] Castor's tendency to involve himself stems from both his own desire for absolution and an innate arrogance, for why does he believe he has the right, the strength, to make decisions that impact so many? Yet Fix is only one example of this hypocrisy; this duality of saviour and destroyer within the novel. (view spoiler)[Anita first saves the child Fix from a fall to protect the brother of the man she loves, then later pushes him off a bridge to protect her son; his injuries, especially the punctured lung, echo Kevin's, and the words she whispers to Fix as she throws him off--that it will be all right--are the words unsaid when she saved him before. Matty, the literal father figure, can offer grace and forgiveness to his children in God, yet cannot save his own son from sinking into despair. Anita indirectly comments on the ultimate irony of Father Matthew's profession when she finally decides to submit to Kevin: "I don't deserve any better...look at me, Richie. Look how I'm living. He'll put a roof over our heads. He'll be a father to Mark. Fuck knows, somebody's got to be." Even Kevin "saves" Anita even as he destroys her, just as Fix, in a different way, "saves" Rafi from the ministrations of Jenna-Jane only to trigger the dissolution of his soul. (hide spoiler)]
Carey's exploration of self-harm is equally complex and multi-layered. Self-harm is itself a paradox; it is a way to act out on one's self-hatred; a way of keeping silence while voicelessly screaming for help, for redemption. It is a form of self-punishment, of hatred and disgust so deep that only disfiguring the vessel can relieve the pressure. Yet while it provides a temporary sense of absolution, it is not constructive, and one quickly becomes addicted to that wire in the blood, that ecstatic moment of release. One of the characters, Mark, speaks to this paradoxical sense of transformation:
"If I could talk, I'd talk. It's the easy choice. But I can't, so my knife must be my voice... I take the blade and it just needs one stroke. It comes out, but changes as it flows. Water becomes wine. My wound becomes a rose."
Through another character who "[carves] out his indignation on his wrists and forearms", Carey captures how this form of silent self-expression, ostensibly a release of anger against the self, may truly target the world. Self-harm is, at its core, a selfish act, for it is an absolute, egoistical focus on the self even in the annihilation of self. Throughout, Carey provides perspectives and consequences, but neither fetishizes nor condemns. I think he truly sought to understand; in the dedication, he thanks an anonymous "A" for conversations and the basis for the poem. As is typical, Fix is more straightforward and sees the cutting as an ecstatic, sexually-tinged escape, yet his typical lack of subtlety and self-knowledge itself adds another layer to Carey's portrayal. For Fix himself is self-destructive: he goes out of his way to damage his potential relationships before they have a chance to bloom; in his thoughts, he tortures himself with endless slashes to his psyche by going over and over his own guilt without ever thoroughly analysing and altering his behaviour. It is the same vicious cycle of self-hatred and self-destruction, and the scars it leaves are just as deep.
The book is indeed a fast-paced thriller with a satisfying mystery and tight worldbuilding, but also something more. Fix's description of a news archive of past tragedies perfectly captured my emotions:
"And in that typographic ocean, dark shapes moved of their own volition, against the sluggish tides. People hurt and killed each other, or themselves; broke against pavements, were impaled on railings, swallowed razor blades, carved gnomic messages on their own flesh or the flesh of their loved ones. There was blood, and there was pain. It drew me in, until I couldn't see the land any more."
*****WARNING: MY READING PROGRESS UPDATES ARE SPOILERY.*********...more
In general, my reading tastes are pulp-press-simple. I can neither appreciate, nor enjoy, nor, I admit, even understand, poetry. But **edited 01/29/14
In general, my reading tastes are pulp-press-simple. I can neither appreciate, nor enjoy, nor, I admit, even understand, poetry. But Eliot is different, and I don't know why. I have very little understanding of what is going on in the poems themselves, but the lines that are so seeped in meaning and imagery and are so tangible that I can taste them as I read.
I remember having to analyse the first part of "The Waste Land" in high school, and, for once, hating the ponderous application of reason and logic and inference and analysis to something that, to me, stands outside and in some ways beyond meaning. So I don't really analyse the poems. I just read them for those evocative lines.
A few of my favourites:
~~~~~~~ "The Hollow Men" ~~~~~~~ (Probably my favorite poem, incidentally, possibly because it is both haunting and interpretable.)
'This is the way the world ends Not with a bang but a whimper.'
'Remember us--if at all--not as lost violent souls, but only as the hollow men'
'Shape without form, shade without colour Paralysed force, gesture without motion'
'Eyes I dare not meet in dreams'
'in that final meeting In the twilight kingdom'
'The supplication of a dead man's hand Under the twinkle of a fading star'
'Lips that would kiss Form prayers to broken stone'
'In this valley of dying stars In this hollow valley'
'The hope only Of empty men'
'Between the essence And the descent Falls the shadow'
**edit 11/27/13 Two years after bleeding to death in an unfriendly alley, Matthew Swift wakes up in his old apartment, blinking open eyes that have tra**edit 11/27/13 Two years after bleeding to death in an unfriendly alley, Matthew Swift wakes up in his old apartment, blinking open eyes that have transformed from muddy brown to electric blue. He-- and the entities who possess him--have only one thought in his/their mind: revenge against those who killed him and brought them back.
Madness of Angels captures the essence why I keep coming back to urban fantasy. When I read UF, I want to enter a world both alien and familiar, where the mundane touches the sublime, where the everyday rules and patterns and flow of life take on new meaning and shape. For me, Griffin's London exemplifies this delicate balance of wonder and absurdity. It is a world where the ebb and flow of the trains beneath the city creates a rhythmic heartbeat of magic, where familiarity and belief create genius loci: deities of bag ladies and beggars, trains and towers. And then there is the life blood of the city itself, the power from which light and noise and movement and life are born. ... Due to my disapproval of GR's new and rather subjective review deletion policy, the rest of my (rather verbose) review is posted over at Booklikes.
*********WARNING: PROGRESS UPDATES MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS**********...more
Wow, this book is a wild ride. Space pirates, royal princes, political intrigue...it's all here. Better yet, for me at least, the sto**edited 12/08/13
Wow, this book is a wild ride. Space pirates, royal princes, political intrigue...it's all here. Better yet, for me at least, the story is full of enjoyable, funny and essentially off-the-wall-crazy characters. The main character is Miles Naismith Vorkosigan, the son of the Prime Minister who was exposed to a chemical agent at birth that left him a fragile 5-foot midget in a world where imperfections are reviled. Miles has the disadvantages and Machiavellian brains of Tavi from Jim Butcher's Codex Alera, the self-restraint and mentality of Aang from Avatar: The Last Airbender, and the general demeanor of someone who just drank a quadruple espresso, and he spends his time clumsily rampaging after answers like a toddler on a sugar high.
Richard is an ordinary man with an ordinary past and an ordinary life, a man who takes comfort in the mundane and is content to be or**edited 12/04/13
Richard is an ordinary man with an ordinary past and an ordinary life, a man who takes comfort in the mundane and is content to be ordered about by his domineering fiancée. But when a terrified and injured girl stumbles into his path, Richard makes what might be his first independent decision, his first resistance against the ordinary flow of his life: he makes the choice to rescue and protect this unknown girl. Immediately, his reality begins to shatter, and in the cracks between the mundanity of his past life, he begins to discover the peculiar world of London Below. Catapulted into strangeness, Richard begins a quest into the magical and often grotesque environs of London Below to find the girl who shattered his peace and to regain his old life.
Neverwhere is an exploration of the fantastic, an adventure, an escape into the creative and bizarre and dangerous, and, perhaps above all, the story of a man discovering himself.
Hands-down, this is my favorite book in the series. Maybe it's because the monster of the week is the Billy Goats Gruff. Maybe it's b**edited 01/18/14
Hands-down, this is my favorite book in the series. Maybe it's because the monster of the week is the Billy Goats Gruff. Maybe it's because catnip and a donut end up playing pivotal roles in the plot. Maybe it's because the cast of characters is diverse and rounded. Maybe it's because, with (view spoiler)[Lash (hide spoiler)] finally out of his head, Dresden is no longer prone to intense and sickening bouts of malicious violence. Maybe it's because the writing is captivating--Butcher is quite good at striking the balance between showing and telling, and he "shows" with all five senses. Describing the smells and textures of a scene do a tremendous amount to bring it to life. Maybe it's just because this book was my intro to the series.
But mostly it's because Small Favor captures a great balance of humanity, humor, and pathos. In each book, Butcher has become a better writer: the characters are more rounded, the writing is more graceful, and the plots are more intricate without losing the overall flow and pace. However, with each book (excepting #3, where it was hard to become attached to the characters who bite the dust), it seems like the books get darker and the endings sadder.
Small Favor is the optimal point: the writing is great, the characters are strong, and the book is not yet so dark that the humor feels out of place.
Dead Beat is one of my favorite books in the series. Besides having a title that is not just a pun, but a double pun (groan), it is a**edited 12/15/13
Dead Beat is one of my favorite books in the series. Besides having a title that is not just a pun, but a double pun (groan), it is a return to the series' action-packed, adrenaline-filled noir roots. With Butcher's improved skills in characterization, I think Dead Beat is a great book to read if you just want to try a single book from the series; it is is exuberant, fast-paced, satisfying, and with just enough cynicism to keep it in the genre.
It's nearly Halloween, and as always, that means Chicago is about to get spooky. Harry is still recovering from the changes engendered in the last few books: he's now got his oft-unemployed, half-vampire brother as a roommate, a huge dog who seems unwilling to stop growing, a (literal) handicap, and a brand new set of worries and concerns. In the last book, Harry practically melted his hand off during an attack on a scourge of vampires. Although crippled and depressed about it, that isn't Harry's biggest concern. Inside the burned flesh of his palm, there is a tiny unburned patch in the shape of the sigil of the fallen angel that Harry encountered in a previous book. Combined with his inadvertent use of hellfire, Harry finally(!) realizes that the fallen angel might be exerting influence over him. (The reader, of course, realized this rather sooner, since Harry's bouts of fury took on a disturbing amount of malicious enjoyment right after his encounter with the fallen.) But most troubling of all, Harry has discovered he has feelings for Lt. Karrin Murphy--just in time to say goodbye to her as she heads out on a vacation to Hawaii with another man. Oops.
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