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Mar. 4th, 2012 09:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cyphomandraI gather this was for World Book Day on March 1st, but why not. From alecaustin
These questions do tend to make some basic assumptions. In hard copy, I’m reading The Company of Swans, by Eva Ibbotson, The Archer’s Heart, by Astrid Amara, Hollywood Left and Right, by Steven J Ross, Feed, by MT Anderson, A Bitter Taste of Sweet Oblivion, by Jordan Castillo Price, and In Great Waters, by Kit Whitfield. There are almost certainly others, but my recent move means things have tended to end up in boxes and out of my short-term memory. Fortunately I have now found all the library books.
For ereads (all on my phone), Shattered Glass, by Dani Alexander, The Rifter, by Ginn Hale, Special Forces: Soldiers, by Aleksandr Voinov, Cut and Run, by Abigail Roux, and while I don’t normally list fanfic I have epub versions of Resmiranda’s Tales from the House of the Moon (~325 000 words) as a first read and am re-reading Viridian5’s Glass Houses (in progress at ~870 000 words) in order to catch up with the last 20-odd new-to-me chapters, both of which seem sizeable enough to mention.
I’m discounting books where I’ve decided to give up or where I’ve read a small enough amount that when I pick them up again I’ll start over. I’m still considering John Le Carre’s Single and Single, which I picked up because it was the only Le Carre I could find in the house (I think I own at least one of the Smiley books) and I wanted to read one after watching Tinker Tailor; not sure yet, though, whether I’ll continue past chapter 3 or try to find a different book.
Books I'm writing:
My writing process is to spend absolutely ages trying to find a way into the story (research, plotting, scraps of dialogue etc) and then write the whole thing fairly fast (and then revise at a medium pace). I am stuck on the finding my way in part on two projects – a children’s contemporary world fantasy and an adult sf, both of which have working titles that I am not prepared to own up to.
The book I love the most:
Oh, come on. Hmm. I just re-read the last volume of Hikaru no Go, and remembered how much I love the whole series; that can stand in for hundreds of others. It also emphasises that I can end up liking but not loving many, many other stories that do not (unlike HnG) pull off the ending.
The last book I received as a gift:
4 m/m novels from a friend as a cheer-up after a fairly crap day, of which I’m currently reading Shattered Glass, above.
The last book I gave as a gift:
Edmund de Waal, The Pot Book, for my brother-in-law, who makes pots. His book The Hare with Amber Eyes was my favourite book for last year (and thanks torushthatspeaks, whose review made me pick it up), and one day when I stop lending out my copy to everyone I may actually write it up. This one is a gorgeous collection of pots from across the world and back through the centuries, ordered alphabetically in two page spreads; pot(s) on one page, and explanation and context on the other. B-i-l has already made one pot inspired by it.
The nearest book:
Diana Wynne Jones’ Drowned Ammet. Excluding ebooks, as my phone (and, obviously, the laptop on which I am typing this) are physically closer.
The book I would like someone to write/recommend for me:
I’m starting to avoid the YA shelves in bookstores the same way I avoid the fantasy ones, and for similar reasons – too many books with high concepts but no follow-through, the same irritating tropes again and again (in fantasy, prophecies and inherent nobility, and in YA the romance, and in both the best-ever specially powered protagonist), and a lack of successful plot and structure, particularly with regards to endings. I’d like someone to point me in the direction of something that counteracts that (for either genre!).
alecaustinThese questions do tend to make some basic assumptions. In hard copy, I’m reading The Company of Swans, by Eva Ibbotson, The Archer’s Heart, by Astrid Amara, Hollywood Left and Right, by Steven J Ross, Feed, by MT Anderson, A Bitter Taste of Sweet Oblivion, by Jordan Castillo Price, and In Great Waters, by Kit Whitfield. There are almost certainly others, but my recent move means things have tended to end up in boxes and out of my short-term memory. Fortunately I have now found all the library books.
For ereads (all on my phone), Shattered Glass, by Dani Alexander, The Rifter, by Ginn Hale, Special Forces: Soldiers, by Aleksandr Voinov, Cut and Run, by Abigail Roux, and while I don’t normally list fanfic I have epub versions of Resmiranda’s Tales from the House of the Moon (~325 000 words) as a first read and am re-reading Viridian5’s Glass Houses (in progress at ~870 000 words) in order to catch up with the last 20-odd new-to-me chapters, both of which seem sizeable enough to mention.
I’m discounting books where I’ve decided to give up or where I’ve read a small enough amount that when I pick them up again I’ll start over. I’m still considering John Le Carre’s Single and Single, which I picked up because it was the only Le Carre I could find in the house (I think I own at least one of the Smiley books) and I wanted to read one after watching Tinker Tailor; not sure yet, though, whether I’ll continue past chapter 3 or try to find a different book.
Books I'm writing:
My writing process is to spend absolutely ages trying to find a way into the story (research, plotting, scraps of dialogue etc) and then write the whole thing fairly fast (and then revise at a medium pace). I am stuck on the finding my way in part on two projects – a children’s contemporary world fantasy and an adult sf, both of which have working titles that I am not prepared to own up to.
The book I love the most:
Oh, come on. Hmm. I just re-read the last volume of Hikaru no Go, and remembered how much I love the whole series; that can stand in for hundreds of others. It also emphasises that I can end up liking but not loving many, many other stories that do not (unlike HnG) pull off the ending.
The last book I received as a gift:
4 m/m novels from a friend as a cheer-up after a fairly crap day, of which I’m currently reading Shattered Glass, above.
The last book I gave as a gift:
Edmund de Waal, The Pot Book, for my brother-in-law, who makes pots. His book The Hare with Amber Eyes was my favourite book for last year (and thanks to
rushthatspeaks, whose review made me pick it up), and one day when I stop lending out my copy to everyone I may actually write it up. This one is a gorgeous collection of pots from across the world and back through the centuries, ordered alphabetically in two page spreads; pot(s) on one page, and explanation and context on the other. B-i-l has already made one pot inspired by it.The nearest book:
Diana Wynne Jones’ Drowned Ammet. Excluding ebooks, as my phone (and, obviously, the laptop on which I am typing this) are physically closer.
The book I would like someone to write/recommend for me:
I’m starting to avoid the YA shelves in bookstores the same way I avoid the fantasy ones, and for similar reasons – too many books with high concepts but no follow-through, the same irritating tropes again and again (in fantasy, prophecies and inherent nobility, and in YA the romance, and in both the best-ever specially powered protagonist), and a lack of successful plot and structure, particularly with regards to endings. I’d like someone to point me in the direction of something that counteracts that (for either genre!).
