Books read in February 2019

[nou]

As previously, by default I’m just stating whether I’d recommend the book (yes/maybe/no), whether I decided not to finish it (DNF), whether it’s a re-read, and whether I can remember there being any content that needs to be warned for (cw).

I’m wondering though whether it would be better (as in, more interesting to those of you reading this, and more likely to inspire comments) if I stopped doing the content warnings and instead wrote a sentence or two about what I thought about the book. (I don’t have the energy to do both.) What do you think?

Poll #21488

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 31

View Respondents

I think...

View Answers

Yes — write opinions instead of content warnings
13 (41.9%)

No — stick with the content warnings
9 (29.0%)

I have a more complicated opinion which I will state in a comment
1 (3.2%)

I have no opinion that I wish to express on this matter
3 (9.7%)

Hello Kake!
21 (67.7%)

I like ticking boxes
18 (58.1%)

I hate ticking boxes
1 (3.2%)

I'm going to tell you to do whatever you want even though you're asking in order to gather data and a response such as this adds no useful data
8 (25.8%)

Definitely recommend:

• Ann Leckie, The Raven Tower (cw: suicide, murder)

Maybe recommend:

• Once Upon A River, Diane Setterfield (DNF) (cw: suicide)
• The Breath Of The Sun, Rachel Fellman (cw: miscarriage, descriptions of dead bodies, reanimated dead bodies)
• The Rig, Roger Levy (DNF)
• The Overstory, Richard Powers (DNF) (cw: domestic violence)
• Shades Of Grey, Jasper fforde
• Murder At The Vicarage, The Body In The Library, The Moving Finger, A Murder Is Announced, They Do It With Mirrors, A Pocket Full Of Rye, 4:50 From Paddington, A Caribbean Mystery, At Bertram’s Hotel (all re-reads) (cw: racism, classism, ablism, homophobia, fatphobia, murder)
• The Edge, Dick Francis (cw: suicide, animal death/mutilation, violence)
• To The Hilt, Dick Francis (cw: violence, kink-shaming)

Wouldn’t recommend:

• The Synapse Sequence, Daniel Godfrey (DNF) (cw: vomiting)
• Origamy, Rachel Armstrong (DNF)
• Icefall, Stephanie Gunn (DNF)
• The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle (cw: “really intense fatphobia that the author definitely agrees with”, child death, murder, violence, torture, rape, suicide)
• Concrete Faery, Elizabeth Priest (cw: cultural appropriation, dubious consent)

Comments

[naraht]

Personally I would far, far prefer your opinions as content warnings don’t tell me anything about whether a book is worth reading or not.

[nou]

Thanks! Yes, I was thinking that too. Looking back at these posts, some of my favourite books have tons of warnings on them. And content warnings don’t generally differentiate between e.g. “this book describes a world in which some people are homophobic” and “this book gives me a strong vibe that the author disapproves of queerness”.

(Also: oh, I thought you hadn’t posted for ages, but I see now that I didn’t transfer my subscription to you over when I swapped from kake to nou. Oops. Now remedied.)

[naraht]

And content warnings don’t generally differentiate between e.g. “this book describes a world in which some people are homophobic” and “this book gives me a strong vibe that the author disapproves of queerness”.

Yes, that's really something that bothers me personally.

[fluffymormegil]

Under the stated metric of betterness, and my own tastes, opinions seem clearly superior to me.

Admittedly, I have the good fortune to not be a person who feels the need for content warnings.

[mrs_leroy_brown]

TBH all the content warnings make me think "that sounds fucking horrible" and puts me off them, but perhaps with context I'd feel differently.

[nou]

Oh dear! That’s not the intention at all. As I say above, some of my favourite books have loads of content warnings. It doesn’t mean a book’s not worth reading, it’s just meant to prepare you for what’s in it.

[selki]

The recommend/maybe/wouldn't grouping plus content warnings work for me, but as you wish!

Christies: I have pretty much the same reaction, yes CWs but I still reread sometimes (some of those, anyway).

Francises: I kept both of those (out of the dozen+ I've read) and re-read them sometimes. I now remember the kink-shaming but it took me a bit. Balanced by the open-ness to cross-dressing (albeit for a job)? But I also remember some mild down-on-kink (fetish wear, anyway) from one of his later books I didn't keep. Still, progressive in some ways.

[nou]

Some Christies are worse than others like that — I’ll never re-read Nemesis again now I have an explicit note of how bad it is.

It was this post on kate_nepveu’s journal that prompted me to read Dick Francis. I’m sure I’ve read some of his before, but it would have been decades ago. His authorial voice comes across to me as someone who probably didn’t know very many actual queers but who had nothing against us and wanted to make that clear. (I could be entirely mistaken in this! But e.g. the cross-dresser you mention apparently had absolutely no worries about “passing”, which seems a little unrealistic to me.)

[selki]

I have a similar read on his voice/experience.
I went off and read the competence fiction journal entry and others it points to -- I love that review of The Edge! Sadly others in my family think The Edge is over the top or something, but I enjoy it very much.

[emmy_mallow]

I actually appreciate the content warnings.

There have been quite a few books on your lists that carry the warning 'child death' so I have made a point of avoiding them, for example.

[nou]

I find content warnings useful too, but it does feel a bit like duplicated effort having them on individual blogs and reviews. Really they should be centralised, so anyone can go and look up a book/film/whatever and see what the warnings are. There’s Does The Dog Die, but I emailed them to ask for extra warning categories and they never replied.

[emmy_mallow]

You're right, of course. I could go and look stuff up on blogs and reviews but yours are personal and don't give anything about the plot away.

Why not try out your other thing for a month and see how you feel? Test all things, hold fast what is good etc?

[nou]

Mm, I don’t think there really is a good place to look up content warnings at the moment though. I’m envisaging a website where you could look up a book and see all the warnings that people have added for it, without spoilers.

I think I will try out doing it the other way for a month or two, yes, thanks!