Then it comes, a torchlight being shone into the front of our car. I start sitting up showing my hands as the door gets opened.
“What the fuck are you doing on my drive?” The voice asks from behind the phone torch that’s shone in my face. I keep my hands where he can see them.
From his shadow he’s a big lump and he must have company.
“We were just leaving.” I say as he lowers the torch. My eyes adjust, I smile at him.
“Give me the car keys or I’ll introduce you to my favourite hammer.” As if to emphasise the point he shows the claw hammer he’s brandishing in his shovel sized hand.
“You’re the boss, mate, now here’s the keys and lets not get stupid.”I move to get the keys and then I hear Nines.
“Why don’t you shift your fucking heap of shit motor mate and let us leave?” Nines’ pistol is aimed at the guy who hadn’t noticed him move due to his concentration on me.
The chamber we’re in isn’t vast by the standards of vast. It’s perhaps twice the length, height and width of that common room at Penwyllt, but it feels cathedral-like to me. Lofty and aerial.
I sit on a hunk of rock and wait for Lloyd (grinning) and Burnett (muttering) to appear. We congratulate each other. Learn to keep our torch beams angled slightly away from each other’s eyes, so we can see each other without dazzling ourselves.
Water pools in places on the floor, but is nowhere more than a few inches deep. Somewhere there’s a drip of water against rock. A faint draught.
Burnett sits next to me, mixing blasphemy and old-fashioned cursing in a way that is both dully conventional but also pleasingly heartfelt and direct.
Lloyd bounces round like a puppy. Splashes to the end of the chamber. Points out that the passage continues on from there. Pokes around a rubble of loose rock along the chamber’s right hand edge, muttering to himself.
When he’s done, he trots back.
‘OK? OK? You both all right? You’ve done well. That was a good crawl. Not as good as Ogof Daren Cilau, but still a good ’un. A really good ’un. Now, OK, take a break. Have a rest. I’ll get the sacks and we’ll set up base camp.’
I was tagged by Esther at Cozy with Books to tackle this Book Tag, which was awfully nice of her because this was a lot of fun to do. As far as I can tell, this tag originated over on the Booktube channel Tia and All the Books a few years ago.
Adaptation Snob: Do you always read the book before watching the film/TV show?
Almost always. Sometimes I watch a thing and then discover it’s an adaptation, which leads me to the source material—like Vagrant Queen or Justified. If there’s something I’m interested in, I’ll try to read the source material first, but I can’t always do that—I was able to with Stumptown and Dash & Lily’s Book of Dares. That’s actually what originally lead me to The Dresden Files, now that I think about it.
Occasionally, I’ll be interested in an upcoming adaptation and hold off on the source material, though. I knew Game of Thrones would have to tweak the source material—there’s just no way that it couldn’t. So I waited until after Season One to read any of it. I wanted the show to be able to exist in my mind aside from the book. I purposely didn’t want to be saying, “oh, that was different in the book” every few minutes. Then I was able to be able to put the books in a different mental category as I dove in. Basically, “Baelor” (Season 1, Episode 9) floored me.
That doesn’t happen often, though. Generally, I’m “book first” and maybe the other stuff later.
Format Snob: You can only choose 1 format in which to read books for the rest of your life. Which one do you choose: physical books, eBooks, or audiobooks?
The answer I want to give: Physical Books. There’s the history, the tradition, the paper, the smells, the weight of a book in your hands—the example of Samuel T. Cogley that got implanted in my brain at an early age…
Actual answer: If we’re talking the rest of my life, I’ve gotta go with eBooks. I only have so much space to store them (and I get hives thinking about downsizing what’s already there, as much as I should do that). But most importantly, my eyesight is getting worse and worse, and there’s only so much that medical science/my wallet can do for that. Eventually, reading a physical book is going to be more trouble than it’s worth. Resizing font size (and font) as needed is the best way to deal with that.
Ship Snob: Would you date or marry a non-reader?
I’d better not date a non-reader, my wife would not approve.
I guess the answer to this would depend on what you define as a reader. By the standards of book bloggers, I did not marry a reader (although she’s had a couple of atypical years where she did). By the standards of almost everyone else she and I know, I did.
The better question to ask is: would I marry someone who doesn’t support and indulge my reading/book hoarding and isn’t willing to put up with me talking about books and what I’m currently reading. And that would be a hard no. Thankfully, the love of my life isn’t that kind of person—in fact, she encourages and enables my addiction. It probably keeps me out of her hair.
Genre Snob: You have to ditch one genre – never to be read again for the rest of your life. Which one do you ditch?
That’s a no-brainer. Over the course of my life, I’ve only dabbled in Horror. I’ve appreciated most of those, but even the best of those haven’t made me say, “You know what? I need to read things like that.” Given a lot of what I read, that might seem odd to some people (and occasionally does to me, too), I can only shrug.
Uber Genre Snob: You can only choose to read from one genre for the rest of your life. Which genre do you choose?
I’m sure any reader of this blog for more than 2 weeks can sing along with this answer: Mystery/Detective/Crime Fiction. Every month and/or year, when I look at my stats, this genre accounts for at least a third of what I read. And that’s only because I ignore a lot of titles/authors*.
* I ignore a lot of titles/authors in other genres, too, due to time constraints.
I have to admit, it’s kind of a cheat to say that, though. A half-way decent (never mind really good) Crime Fiction Novelist can use any genre to produce their work—I’ve read Humorous Crime (Dave Barry’s stuff, or Ken Levine, or Duncan McMaster); Ghosts in Crime (Jo Perry’s Charlie and Rose books); Zombies in Crime (The King of Crows); Westerns (William DeAndra’s Lobo Blacke/Quinn Booker mysteries, Hockensmith’s Holmes on the Range books); SF Crime (The Stainless Steel Rat, The Caves of Steel); Crime in Fantasy Worlds (Dragon Precinct, Eddie LaCrosse books); YA Crime (Robert B. Parker wrote a couple; the Digby & Zoey books); the romance between Spenser and Susan, Kenzie and Gennarro, Elvis Cole and Lucy Chenier, and even the “when will they just admit what we’ve known since halfway through The Cuckoo’s Calling” of Cormoran and Robin beats just about every Romance novel I’ve ever read (Digby & Zoey, too, now that I’m thinking about it).
Community Snob: Which genre do you think receives the most snobbery from the bookish community?
There’s part of me that wants to say anything that diverges from a progressive social worldview, no matter the motivation behind it. Buuuuut that’s a little too serious for this kind of thing.
I guess the snobbery would be directed to Romance (I might have unintentionally brushed against it above). At least in the circles that I find myself in. There’s talk about/appreciation for SF, Fantasy, Crime, Urban Fantasy—and YA versions of all of those. People will nod to classics and talk about some commercial literary fiction, and so on. Steampunk, Westerns, Non-Fiction of all sorts, too, make the occasional rounds. But almost nothing about Romance.
But I’m willing to bet that in Romance-heavy bookish communities, there’s a snobbery about other genres—and I’m betting the numbers in those Romance-leaning communities are pretty significant, so their snobbery is nothing to shrug off.
I took a writing class a few years ago from one of the more commercially/critically successful local authors, who all but said that SF/Fantasy/Crime Fiction were wastes of time and not worthy of his attention. He said this after I’d submitted one assignment that was SF (but before he read my piece). He gave begrudging compliments about it and even managed to give a suggestion or two that helped it.
Basically, if you look for snobbery somewhere you’re likely to find it. People are garbage.
Snobbery Recipient: Have you ever been snubbed for something that you have been reading or for reading in general?
(Curiously, most of the blog versions I’ve seen of this Tag don’t have this prompt, but it was part of the original, and I thought it’d be fun to think about)
First, this question reminded me of a bit from the late Bill Hicks. You’ve got to watch the first two minutes of this:
If you’re not in the mood to take 2 minutes of your time to watch that, here’s a version of it that I lifted from JR’S Free Thought Pages. But you should watch the original instead of reading—it’s far superior. His timing and his expressions are chef’s kiss worthy).
I was in Fyffe, Alabama last year. After the show, I went to a Waffle House. I’m not proud of it, I was hungry. And I’m eating, I’m alone and I’m reading a book, right? Waiter walks over to me:
“Hey, what you readin’ for?”
Is that like the weirdest $#!% question you’ve ever heard? Not what am I reading, but what am I reading … for.
“Well, $#!% damn it, you stumped me. Why do I read? Hmm … I guess I read for a lot of reasons, and the main one is … so I don’t end up being a $#!% waffle waiter.”
But then, this trucker in the next booth gets up, stands over me and goes:
“Well, looks like we got ourselves a reader.”
What the $#!% going on here? It’s not like I walked into a Klan rally in a Boy George outfit, $#!% damn it. It’s a book!
I remember in Middle School/High School, getting a little flack for non-required reading (especially when I was supposed to be doing homework)—but generally, that quickly switched to a compliment from whoever gave the flack. But in college and after? Yeah, either from reading “popular fiction” (okay, I remember one would-be intellectual in high school who did that), fiction in general, religious books, and so on. But generally, I tune that out and turn the page (literally). But occasionally, it still gets under my skin.
I remember Felicia Day saying somewhere that’s the best thing about an e-Reader, no one knows what you’re really reading—and if you’re reading trash, you can just fib and say you’re chewing through Proust or whatever. Maybe that counts as another vote for the eBook question earlier.
Conversely, reading something specifically or in general is a great way to invite the right kind of people to talk to you. As that meme says, it’s like having a book recommend people to you.
wow…I got carried away there, didn’t I?
As usual, I’m not tagging anyone in this—but I’d like to see what you all have to come up with. Although I will tag Esther to add that last prompt, “Snobbery Recipient,” to her post, I’m curious how she’d respond.
Michelle is in her swimsuit; a pair of goggles hang around he, neck, “Can we go in the pool?” she asks. Before Blair can answer Kenny enters. He’s wearing his swimsuit, too, but it’s on backward and his goggles are wrapped upside down around his forehead “We gotta go in the pool!”
“At least somebody came to party,” says Cat.
Martin takes a theatrical sip of his awful drink. “I’m on it,” he says. “Hon, hang with your friends. Michelle, Kenny, it’s cannonball time.” Michelle and Kenny cheer… Martin leaves to change into his suit while Cat throws grapes in the air from a giant fruit bowl for the twins to try to catch in their mouths.
“That’s kind of a choking hazard, Cat,” says Blair. “Oh, honey, don’t eat floor grapes.”
“Is your mommy always like this?” Cat asks the twins. She throws a grape up for herself, and it bounces off her nose.
‘We seem to be the funeral squad at the moment, and bearing in mind I’d never been to one before working with you, I’m starting to worry, especially as we’ve now done two recently,’ said Janie, taking in the scene.
‘Valuable intelligence sources, Constable. Next stop weddings, christenings and bar mitzvahs.’
‘I may ask for a transfer; it’s getting bloody depressing.’
“You had a chance, Chester,” TJ said. “You stole my momma’s money. Money she only had ‘cause she’d stolen it off me. You tried to threaten me, sending the police out knocking on my door like I did something wrong.”
“Get out of here,” he said. “I’ll call the sheriff.”
“Do it,” TJ said. She reached down on the glass table littered with an empty bag of chips, an overflowing ashtray, and the silver insulated cup of booze. She snatched up his cell phone and tossed it right in his lap. “Call 911. I damn well dare you. Call Sheriff Colson and let him know some seventeen-year-old girl is gonna shoot you. Because you’d be right. But then at least we might can get straight on all the trouble you caused me and my family. You’re sitting here drinking whiskey and eating Golden Flake chips while my little brother can’t even get breakfast.”
(for context, I think it helps if you know that the first speaker is the Chief Medical Examiner)
“So what brings you and Tubby McGlutton’—-he nodded to Danbury-—“to my Little Den of Decomp?”
“Eleanor Paget’s body,” Danbury said. “And don’t be calli’ me no ‘Tubby McGlutton,’ nay-gro.”
“Oh, please, Ray,” Bobby scolded. “You’re twenty pounds overweight. You smoke two cigars a day. And I’m sure, like every other over-forty black man who just has to show how successful he is in Detroit, you probably have three Courvoisier and Cokes three times a week at the Pontch. Oh yeah, son, I got a cold storage drawer with your name on it.” After eviscerating Danbury and taking a breath, Bobby said “Paget’s pretty straight-up stuff: GSW to the right temple.”
“My point is that we don’t know what we’re dealing with, and until we do, I suggest we limit possible exposure.”
“My boys have been in here for almost an hour,” Callahan said.
“And they’re probably fine, but let’s move everyone out of this room until I can run some tests.”
“All right,” Callahan agreed, then he shouted for everyone to stop what they were doing and go. “Don’t be too long, Doc,” he said once his men were gone. “I’m sure the Chief has heard about this by now and he’s going to want a report…soon.”
“We’ll be as fast as we can,” Iggy said and Callahan withdrew.
“You said you didn’t think it’s contagious,” Alex said once Callahan was out of earshot.
“I just wanted him and his men away from this room,” Iggy said. “It’s going to be hard enough to figure out what happened here without the police stomping all over everything.”
I’ve seen this on various blogs, but can’t seem to find the creator, so I can’t credit them. I’d like to, if anyone knows who did it. I lost a couple of links somewhere in the ether, but I did enjoy the posts I saw on Westveil Publishing, Reader Voracious, and The Orangutan Librarian
I tried, I really tried, not to mention certain books/authors over and over and over. But so many of these categories overlapped, I just didn’t know how not to.
1. The best book you’ve read so far this year?
Oh man…This is how we start? It’s just so hard. One? It’s a tie between:
I resisted this because of recency bias, but I think I’m going to have to go with Till Morning is Nigh by Rob Parker(my post about it). I thought the first two sequels to A Wanted Man were entertaining enough, but they didn’t live up to it—or what it promised. Till Morning is Nigh more than delivered on both fronts.
The Winslow book might get pushed back because I’m intimidated by size and scope, I’m going to get to Gated Prey and The Man Who Died Twice as quickly as I can, I might put off Risen for a few days due to what I think is going to happen. But I know that I’m going to drop everything for the Toby Daye book.
5. Biggest disappointment.
Red Widow by Alma Katsu(my post about it) there was some pretty good buzz around this espionage thriller by a former CIA Agent/bestselling author, and it was just….meh.
6. Biggest Surprise.
Moonlighting: An Oral History by Scott Ryan(my post about it). As long as Ryan didn’t spend half the book talking about how it didn’t reflect 2021 social values, like so many TV books I’ve read lately tend to do, I figured I’d enjoy this. But, I’m still suprised how much fun this book was. I really want to give it another read.
7. Favorite new to you, or debut, author.
Nadine Matheson or S. A. Cosby. They both blew me away—I knew within 20 pages of each book that they’d be new favorites.
I don’t think I’ve watched many this year. I’m trying to remember when I watched the pretty decent C.B. Strike series—but I think that was in December. I guess it would have to be Amazon’s Invincible. I feel bad since it was the only one I think I watched this year, so it’d the default answer. But it was so good, it’d have to be in the running no matter what.
13. Favorite post/review you have done this year?
(I’ve seen the prompt both ways). I really don’t like to think of my posts about books as reviews, they’re too casual and brief, but I think my favorite post about one particular book is The Jigsaw Man by Nadine Matheson: A Jaw-Dropping Debut.
My favorite non-review(ish) posts was These Dog Days Aren’t Over, a listing of books where the dog(s) live at the end, for those who are tired of all the dying dog books out there (it’s been revised and updated once this year, and will have at least one more coming), but a close second would be How Has Book Blogging Changed the Way I Read?, my musing’s from the 8th Anniversary of this thing.
14. Most beautiful book you have bought this year?
5. What books do you need to read by the end of the year?
So, so, so many. I want to catch up on on the the Firefly novels from Titan Books, The Border by Winslow, Galbraith’s Toubled Blood, Blight of Blackwings, all the 20 Books of Summer books, AMORALMAN: A True Story and Other Lies by Derek DelGaudio…yeah, I’ve got too much to put here.
As usual, I’m not tagging anyone in this—but I’d like to see what you all have to come up with.
This is a weekly bloghop hosted by Freda’s Voice.
Grab a book, any book.
