Books read in February 2020

[nou]

This is going to be the last time (for now, at least) that I post about the books I’ve read. I need to decrease the number of small recurring tasks on my schedule, because they add up to a lot of time that I’d rather spend on larger tasks.

(Also, the below might seem super-negative, but that’s partly because I’ve recently been trying out lots of books I was dubious about in order to get them off my “I should see if I like this Kindle sample enough to buy the full thing” list.)

Definitely recommend

• Nightingale Wood, Stella Gibbons. I wasn’t quite sure about putting this in “Definitely recommend” because I Really Do Not Like what the author did to Hetty, and the only gender-non-conforming character is a terrible person, but overall I think it’s well worth reading. And if you liked the dry humour of Cold Comfort Farm, you’ll find some of it here too.
• The Clockwork Rocket, The Eternal Flame, and The Arrows Of Time, Greg Egan (all re-reads). After much disappointment with recent Greg Egan, I retreated to the classics. He is of course perfectly entitled to change his mind about the sort of books he likes writing, but I wish there had been someone else to take over from him when he stopped writing about universes with different fundamental laws, and what it means to be a person instantiated in different media, and how science works when people really care about it. These three also possibly shouldn’t be in “Definitely recommend” because they certainly include discussion of some very distressing things, and if you’re going to read them then you need to be prepared for (a) many diagrams and (b) physics that will likely in part go over your head. But it’s OK to skim the parts you don’t understand, and every time you re-read them you’ll understand more. (A hint: if you’re struggling to understand how something works in 1 time + 3 space dimensions, try visualising it in 1 time + 2 space.)

Maybe recommend

• The Pleasant Profession of Robert A Heinlein, Farah Mendelson (DNF). This was well-researched and well-written; I'm just not interested enough in Heinlein to have kept reading.

Wouldn’t recommend

• Paladin’s Grace, T Kingfisher (DNF). This was... OK I suppose. I wasn’t a fan of the “jealous man with violent thoughts” parts, and there was nothing about the story that made me want to keep reading.
• The Long Earth, Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter (DNF). Gave up at 20% through because I wasn't finding it interesting.
• Cold Magic, Kate Elliott (re-read, DNF). I think my main issue with this is the writing, which is focused so heavily on a particular style that it both gets in the way of comprehensibility and occasionally ties itself in knots that it never quite gets out of. I think I’ve previously read the whole trilogy? But this time I just couldn't face any more of those over-elaborate clauses.
• Behind The Throne, K B Wagers (DNF). Again I thought the writing got in the way of itself — in this case there were just too many forced metaphors. Also I felt the book perhaps started in not quite the right place — there was a bit too much backstory exposition being squeezed in between the action.
• Engineering Infinity, edited by Jonathan Strahan (DNF). A collection of short SF. I got halfway through and had either DNFed or not enjoyed every story so far, so stopped.
• The Throne Of The Five Winds, S C Emmett (DNF). I didn't get past the second page of this, by which point I'd already encountered three footnotes, a misused semicolon, and descriptions of things the viewpoint character couldn’t possibly have seen. (To be clear, those weren’t the only reasons I stopped reading, but they didn’t exactly incline me to continue. I like footnotes but I feel they should provide extra, optional information, rather than worldbuilding that would be better placed in the actual story.)
• At Bertram’s Hotel, Agatha Christie (re-read). There are things I like about this — the descriptions of the hotel and its procedures — but I don’t like the overall moral that the author wants to get across. This is hilarious though: “Miss Marple awoke early because she always woke early. [...] glanced at her clock, half-past seven”. Oh for the leisured life of the middle classes.

Comments

[ludy]

Much empathy on the needing to cut down on small recurring tasks - and Go You! for prioritising your needs.
I do like reading your posts about books so i'm a bit hoping you'll still write about reading occasionally but very much not at the expense of your spoons.

[nou]

Thanks! It’s not really about a lack of spoons, but more about wanting to do other things that need long periods of focus. I have plentiful spoons these days (which is a situation I’m still often quite surprised to be in).

[bob]

"The Pleasant Profession of Robert A Heinlein" I really should actually read the next chapter. I thoroughly enjoyed the chapter I have read.

[bob]

im currently stuck between 5 books to finish reading and instead just read more star wars graphic novels.

[nou]

Yes, you should.

[nou]

bob informs me from across the living room that he is in fact doing exactly this.

[selki]

Pretty much with you on *At Bertram's Hotel*.

[nou]

It’s so annoying, because I love the opening scene of people sitting in a comfortable place and eating exactly what they want to eat for tea. I would like to read an entire book about people sitting in comfortable places and talking to their friends and eating exactly the things they want to eat.

[selki]

That does sound good.

[sqbr]

I haven't read any Greg Egan since Shild's Ladder, since I felt like he was getting too self indulgently rambly and preferred the tighter plots of his earlier books. But your description is reminding me of how much I used to enjoy his books, even if being a trilogy doesn't inspire much confidence in it being less rambly.

[nou]

I wasn’t a huge fan of Schild’s Ladder, nor of Zendegi, but I did like Incandescence, which came in between them (though you might find it a bit rambly).

I don’t think the trilogy is rambly. There’s a lot of words, but also a lot happening.

[sqbr]

That's good to know, thanks!

[nou]

Oh, and I forgot to say that I think the first one works as a standalone.

[sqbr]

Ooh that is very good to know, thank you!

[vatine]

The Long Earth, I finished this once, the tried to re-read it and not getting more than maybe 40 pages in.

The Cold Magic, I have definitely finished this, at least once in paperback and at least once as an ebook. I I seem to recall that recall I like it (well, the series), but I couldn't tell you if I would, were I to re-read it right now. I have this nagging feeling that I have a sliver of a memory saying that there as something with the book that feels like it would be a "you might in principle like whats happening in the book but something might also just put you off" (like Stross' use of second-person narrative in his Scottish police procedural books).

[fred_mouse]

Sympathies on the cutting down of cyclic tasks. I am also cutting down a set of those, particularly the daily 'on the computer' ones, which seemed to have taken my life over briefly. Am now getting more reading done! Although not yet back to the crafting I want to prioritise.

[nou]

I’ve cut down a lot already, but unfortunately I think soon I’ll be down to the ones that I can’t cut because they’re important for health or household organisation.

[fred_mouse]

Ditto. I've kept 'back up computer' on the list, but most of the rest of the electronic ones are already gone (other than 'look at email', because otherwise I'll avoid that forever)