It’s Wednesday. Might as well do this, eh?
This meme was formerly hosted by MizB at A Daily Rhythm and revived on Taking on a World of Words—and shown to me by Aurore-Anne-Chehoke at Diary-of-a-black-city-girl.
The Three Ws are:
What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?
Seems easy enough, right? Let’s take a peek at this week’s answers:
What are you currently reading?
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| Ghost Stations by M.D. Presley |
Grave Peril by Jim Butcher, read by James Marsters |
I really dug Rites of Passage, so it took me maybe 30 seconds to decide I wanted to jump when Presley offered me this follow up, his website says, “Think if Buffy and her Scooby gang went up against the Barksdale Corp from The Wire.” And even if I hadn’t been waiting for the second book in the series, that comparison alone would’ve got me.
Grave Peril is one of those Butcher books I feel bad about forgetting the details of–I keep coming across scenes, characters, events and think they belong to another book. And one of my all-time favorite Butcher lines is in this (and I’d have guessed it was from a later book). But none of that matters, because right now, I’m having a blast–even though I know what the last chapters contain and all the fallout that will ensue from them. (seriously, I’m already flashing forward to Changes)
What did you recently finish reading?
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| The Killer’s Christmas List by Chris Frost |
What You Are Looking for Is in the Library by Michiko Aoyama, read by Hanako Footman, Susan Momoko Hingley, Kenichiro Thomson, Winson Ting, and Shiro Kawai |
Chris Frost’s debut under that penname was a rollicking read. I hope a sequel is forthcoming. if not, I’ll be ready for whatever Frost/McDonald has in store. More to come on this.
What You Are Looking for Is in the Library was utterly okay. There were some pleasant characters, some sweet moments, and the book as a whole is a nice tribute to the power of books and how the right one can trigger a needed change in someone’s life.
What do you think you’ll read next?
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| Adrift in Currents Clean and Clear by Seanan McGuire |
Whispers Under Ground by Ben Aaronovitch, read by Kobna Holdbrook-Smith |
Seanan McGuire. Wayward Children.Not sure there’s much else to say.
I have a similar problem with the third Rivers of London novel as I do with the third Dresden Files novel. I can remember a couple of scenes, a couple of characters that are introduced…and not much else. Am looking forward to the reminders.
Do you have something special grabbing your attention?
allysonyj
You’ve been posting the weekly WWW in the evening, after I’ve stopped checking email, but I figure I’d better catch up with this or I’ll be WAY behind.
I’m currently reading “Bucking the Sun” by Ivan Doig. So far it is my least favorite of his books – I’ve considered DNF’ing it. Too many characters, too many plotlines, and all mixed in with building the world’s largest dirt-fill dam – not a subject which inherently grabs my interest. But I am tenacious – will probably stick with it to the end (gotta find out who those two naked people in the truck in the lake turn out to be).
Also continuing with Paul Theroux’s essay collection “Sunrise with Sea Monsters” as my bedside book.
Now, what have I finished since the last post? I found a copy of Trollope’s “The Small House at Allington” on the library book cart and grabbed it, as Trollope is one of my standard go-to’s. This one is uncharacteristic in that almost none of the characters who love ill-advisedly end up with a Happy Ever After. Usually Trollope arranges a benevolent relative who either dies with an unexpected bequest or provides unexpected funding. Seems like after 600+ pages the reader should get some positive reward!
I also read the current best-seller by Percival Everett,”James” the re-imagining of Mark Twain’s “Huckleberry Finn” told from the pt of view of the slave Jim. I resent modern writers who appropriate classic characters from the public domain and use them as a scaffold to graft their stories onto. It feels like plagiarism to me, though Jane Austen, the Bronte sisters, and Shakespeare are long dead. Re-read Twain instead – (also no waiting list at the library) I did start to enjoy “James” once Huck and Jim are separated and Everett began to develop his own situations and characters. But the ending is so outrageously divergent I almost threw the book across the room.
You have to hand it to Walter Moseley – not content with having written one of the best detective series ever (Easy Rawlins) he explores all sorts of other genres – science fiction, some just-for-fun pornography, an excellent book on how to write a novel,and many others. (“Walking the Dog” is one of my all-time favorites). His latest, “Touched” combines a touch of science fiction, some super-hero stuff, a whiff of fantasy, a strong dose of fable. It’s a quick read that feels like skateboarding through an obstacle course, and leaves you thinking. Is the creation of life really a fatal cosmic error?
I started, but DNF’d “The Husky and his White Cat Shizun”, which looked like an interesting Japanese manga but turned out to be 1) about homosexual relationships) 2) 600+ pages of Vol 1 with 2 volumes to go 3) very poorly translated. (It was another experiment from the book cart – great-looking cover!)
Next I will, I promise, read something from my TBR shelf. I will, I will I will