booknook | RIP (Read In Progress) Wednesday

Aurora Australis readalong 3 / 10, Trials of a Messman, post for comment, reaction, discussion, fanworks, links, and whatever obliquely related matters your heart desires. You can join the readalong at any time or skip sections or go back to earlier posts. It's all good. :-)

Reaction post 3 / 10: https://spiralsheep.dreamwidth.org/665850.html

Text: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Aurora_Australis/Trials_of_a_Messman

Readalong intro: https://spiralsheep.dreamwidth.org/662515.html
Reaction post 1 / 10: https://spiralsheep.dreamwidth.org/663652.html
Reaction post 2 / 10: https://spiralsheep.dreamwidth.org/665029.html

Reminder for next week: A Pony Watch, by George Marston, an account of looking after the expedition's ponies on board ship in rough seas:
https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Aurora_Australis/A_Pony_Watch

I'm in a contemporary poetry mood at the moment. But I've run out of new books so might have to reread Wisława Szymborska or go to the library for ??? :D

Since last Wed I read:
48. Unincorporated Persons in the Late Honda Dynasty, by Tony Hoagland, 2010, poetry, 4/5, and
50. Silence, by Gillian Clarke, 2024, poetry, 4/5 also

49. revisited the 90s via a sequential art time machine. Andi Watson has made much better comics but he was funny from the first. Quasiquotes:
~ Pay your chops, hone your dues, and curve your learning. ~
~ World's Biggest Mini Golf Course! ~

Currently reading
51. Forest of Noise, by Mosab Abu Toha, 2024, which centres around his life in Gaza in recent years. I thought Abu Toha's previous collection Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear was excellent and this new book is living up to my hopes so far. Token quote:

When it rains, farmers think the sky loves them.
They are wrong. It rains either because
the clouds cannot carry the sacks of water too long,
or because a sparrow has said a prayer
when it heard the thirsty roots beg.

That's a lovely quote!

There's a reason why Mosab Abu Toha is a popular poet: he's good! :-)
I've finished Forest of Noise now and it has a different emotional feel and verbal texture from Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear but they're both excellent. Highly recommended (warning for the author living in a war zone, obviously).

Finished reading Conclave by Robert Harris, an excellent book though I admit I like the movie more. I enjoyed the movie's particular focus on faith, while the book's themes are a bit more spread out than that, though I appreciated the insight in Lawrence/Lomeli's character.

Also finished rereading The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett, before starting A Drop of Corruption today. I was taken by surprise by the subtle romance subplot the first time, but it's been fun catching the signs this time. I'm hoping for more of Din/Strovi in the second book, seeing how Din lets down his guard around Strovi and his very clear attraction is adorable.

After a reading break (for no reason, just other things occupying my time) I started "six crimson cranes" yesterday, but I'm not sure I'll finish it.

Just started the English translation of Valid by Chris Bergeron. I'm not far enough in to have a sense of it yet.

Before that I read The Dance by Christopher Pike - found in a little free library and I'm revisiting my childhood... the book did not hold up well.

When the Moon Hits Your Eye by John Scalzi starts with the moon unexplicably turning into cheese - you expect silly with Scalzi - but the strength of the book, really, is the exploration of the different ways people react to sudden drastic changes in their life. I liked it more than any Scalzi I've read in a while.

It's been a long time since I read anything by Sofia Samatar and I really liked her novella The Practice, The Horizon, and the Chain. She explores generation ships in what felt like a really different approach, from the POV of a boy from the lowest enslaved class.

The Brides of High Hill takes place in Nghi Vo's Singing Hill series. While not my favorite in the series, I still really liked it.

Just started Glorious Exploits! Haven’t formed an opinion yet really, but it’s a strong engaging start.

Just finished How the World Ran Out of Everything. As a deep dive into the details of supply chain infrastructure and the fixes it needs, it's great. As far as predictions for how things would go in the next few years, it has already aged poorly.

Since last time I've read A Hangman for Ghosts by Andrei Baltakmens, a murder mystery set in colonial Australia, with a main character who's made a new life for himself in the colony in a rather more definite sense than is usual.

Currently reading Things Unborn by Eugene Byrne, a police procedural set in a world where some mysterious force has started bringing random people from past ages back from the dead and society has adapted around it. He's a former slave from the 17th century! He's just been revived after being shot down in World War II! They're cops!

(Also, after some disagreements regarding which of the so-far-revived former monarchs had the best claim to the throne left vacant when the House of Windsor was wiped out in the catastrophe that preceded the first revivals, Richard III is king again. It's mentioned in passing that the Royal Shakespeare Company's warrant was revoked and it's now just the National Shakespeare Company.)

Very amused at that Shakespeare detail, but having read their 'Richard III'...

I am reading Standing in Another Mann's Grave Inspector Rebus by Ian Rankin and enjoying the fact that my Poor life choices are NOTHING compared to Rebus's.

trying to get through Spinning Silver

Third attempt at Gideon the Ninth. This time I'm making a name-and-relationship chart of all the cavaliers and necromancers so hopefully I don't run into the problem of mixing up secondary-character details as much, which has been my downfall with this one before.

I'm slow at books, so I'll be at this for a while.

Intruder by Louis Charbonneau. Picked it up in a pulp 70s scifi lot. It's atrocious. Every section begins with a variation of "[First Name Last Name] is with [Other First Name Last Name] at [Entire Place Name]." The sexism is insane. The characters are cardboard cutouts except for the women, which are cardboard cutouts with legs to the gotdamn moon, even The One Girl Who Is "Surprisingly" Smart. But the glimpse of early reactions to technology -- it's about a computer system taking over a town -- is interesting. It's a popcorn book.

Another Country by James Baldwin. From the library. It's incredible (and probably the only reason I'm getting through Intruder tbh), it's complex, it's dark, it's upsetting, it's empathetic, it's one of those books that as I read it I think you are experiencing this for the first time and that truly only happens once, so maybe slow down a little. I've been combing through his entire catalogue since falling in love with Giovanni's Room.

James Baldwin was one of the best writers the USA has ever produced, I think.

And, considering his opinions on the country and on white Western societies in general, they should be ashamed too.

Edited (Posted too soon) 2025-05-08 22:47 (UTC)

On I wanna say... Issue #32 of Spawn? It's getting to a point where it's expecting readers to have read certain sode stories to know what's going on so I have that cut out for me. They brought back a villain I enjoy so I'm excited to see whatever action goes down!

Read a bunch of philosophy related material which I enjoyed for my own self improvement/better understand of myself (life gets so much better if you have some philosophy to read at times).

Otherwise, not much! I've been taking a bit of a break from reading so I can POST about what I've been reading and my observations about things in 'em.

Edited (hit send too fast) 2025-05-08 18:45 (UTC)

Picked up 'Gangsta.' vol 6 by Kohske, years after finishing vol 5. I was planning to finish the volumes released so far and sell my collection; now I'm planning to re-read them all. A very dark manga set in an Italian style city; two 'Handymen' (hitmen) for hire, one of whom is considered subhuman by wider society for various reasons, find a sex worker who joins their little group. Meanwhile, the mafia and the cops have complex interactions and there's a ton of blood and murder, including of children. I appreciate the various types of rep - one of the main leads is d/Deaf and uses sign language to communicate, while there are various brown or Black characters who aren't drawn or portrayed as racial stereotypes.

Currently half way through 'Gangsta.' volume 7; I'll be sad when I've caught up with what there is, the series went on hiatus after volume 9 several years ago.

My pre-order of 'Somadina', the latest YA by Akwaeke Emezi, arrived yesterday and I read it to the end last night and this morning. Stunning and intense, like all Emezi's work I've read so far. It's a fantasy inspired by the author's own Igbo culture and spirituality, with a pair of twins given unusual magical powers.

And I read 'A Bad Spell for the Worst Witch' by Jill Murphy (third in the Worst Witch kidlit series about a witch at a boarding school, both older than HP and meant for a younger audience.) This was mostly for nostalgia but it was fun and sweet overall! I was kinda eh on her ending up kidnapping a girl and hiding her in her own room at the end for a short while, even if it was so she could fulfill a promise. The art by Jill Murphy is also very good.

Started on Mary Stewart's romantic suspense books. So far, Madam, Will You Talk? and Nine Coaches Waiting. Very compelling and high tension, kept me guessing till the end. (And people weren't kidding when they raved about the car chase!)

RIP (Read In Progress) Wednesday

Aurora Australis readalong 3 / 10, Trials of a Messman

Personal reading

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