fajrdrako: ([Books])




The last of the 30 Day Book Meme questions. I'm going to miss these.

30 Day Book Meme: – Day 30 – What book are you reading right now?

Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins. It was on my 'to be read' list a few days ago.

Also a huge pile of comics: Wolverine, Wolverine: Origins, Dark Avengers and Dark Wolverine.

Deaths...

Sep. 27th, 2010 05:28 am
fajrdrako: ([Books])




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 29 - Saddest character death OR best/most satisfying character death (or both!)

This answer seriously needs a cut tag for spoilers for the Dunnett novels, the Bujold novels, and A Song of Ice and Fire, and others... Memorable Deaths... )

fajrdrako: (Default)




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 28 – First favorite book or series obsession

First? ...The works of A.A. Milne, I suppose. Beatrix Potter, too, but Milne was more of a favourite because he was funny.

At twelve or so: Perry Mason.

fajrdrako: (Default)




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 27 - If a book contains ______, you will always read it (and a book or books that contain it)!

Words?

Aside from that, there's no such item.

Or I could say: "books that make me laugh, or make me cry, or both," but since I don't know what will make me do that in advance, it doesn't work. I don't know what good writing is till I read it. I don't know whether I will fall in love with a character, or be riveted with suspense, or be given new insights, or... whatever.

There are things I look for, though. And though I don't read all books with these attributes, they will incline me to pick them up and give them a try:
  1. First person narrative, especially with mysteries
  2. Recommendations from my friends
  3. A good first paragraph
  4. An interesting historical setting
  5. Something that makes it look unusual or unique
  6. An author I already love and trust
  7. Something that reminds me of an author I already love and trust


fajrdrako: (Default)




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 26 – OMG WTF? OR most irritating/awful/annoying book ending

    There was a novel whose ending offended and horrified me, but my story lacks punch because I don't recall the title or authors. It was a fantasy by two women - possibly Melissa Scott was one. The story contained fae or fairies, and the villain was a pedophile who abused and molested childen. When apprehended at the end, the fae forced him to undergo the same rapes to which he had subjected children. This horrified me on so many levels I swore to never read anything by those authors again, and as far as I know, I haven't.

fajrdrako: ([Books])




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 25 - Any five books from your "to be read" stack

  1. Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
  2. Under Heaven by Guy Gavriel Kay
  3. The Element of Fire by Martha Wells
  4. Wolverine Origins: Savior by Daniel Way and Steve Dillon
  5. DK Eyewitnerss Travel: Paris by Allan Tillier


fajrdrako: (Default)




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 24 - Best quote from a novel

From Lois McMaster Bujold's Memory: The one thing you can't trade for your heart's desire is your heart.

Bujold is one of the most delightfully quotable novelists ever. So is Dorothy Dunnett; so is Terry Pratchett.

fajrdrako: (Default)




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 23 - Most annoying character ever


  1. Susan Silverman in the Spenser novels by Robert B. Parker. Now, I love Spenser himself very much, and Hawk as well. But Spenser's girlfriend Susan? She has her moments, but she never has a hair out of place, she wears high heels at all times, she shops for fun, and she eats by nibbling on lettuce leaves. I can't relate to a woman like that!

  2. Harry Dresden, in the novels by Jim Butcher. He's a loser.

  3. In Marvel Comics: I'm starting to find Deadpool annoying textually as well as metatextually. For a long time, he was fun. He was funny. But the more stories there are, the higher the percentage that aren't really funny, and I'm starting to flinch when he comes around.
fajrdrako: ([Lord of the Rings])




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 22 – Favorite non-sexual relationship

Foremost and favourite: Miles Vorkosigan's relationship with his father in the Lois McMaster Bujold novels, especially in The Warrior's Apprentice and The Vor Game. They are a delight; and some of the scenes in which they are together just break my heart. We never see Miles from Aral's point of view, but we never really have to. I love the image of Aral, as Regent of Barrayar, making time each day to play on the floor with his fragile four year old, who can't want. The scene in The Vor Game, for instance, when Miles meets Aral after his harrowing adventures with Gregor:
    They entered officers' country. Lieutenant Yegorov led them through an antechamber and into a spartanly-appointed flag office twice the size of anything Miles had seen on a Barrayaran ship before. Admiral Count Aral Vorkosigan looked up from his comconsole desk as the doors slid silently back.

    Miles stepped through, his belly suddenly shaking inside. To conceal and control his emotion he tossed off, "Hey, you Imperial snails are going to go all fat and soft, lolling around in this kind of luxury, y'know?"

    "Ha!" Admiral Vorkosigan stumbled out of his chair and banged around the corner of his desk in his haste. Well, no wonder, how can he see with all that water standing in his eyes? He enfolded Miles in a hard embrace. Miles grinned and blinked and swallowed, face smashed against that cool green sleeve, and almost had control of his features again when Count Vorkosigan held him out at arm's length for an anxious, searching inspection. "You all right, boy?"

    "Just fine. How'd you like your wormhole jump?"


Other choices:
  • Lymond's friendship with Kate Somerville in the Dunnett novels
  • Lymond's friendship with Will Scott
  • Lymond's fraught relationship with his mother
  • The relationship between Wolverine and his son Daken in Marvel comics
  • The relationship between Wolverine and Jubilee in Marvel comics
  • The friendship between Ben Grimm and Johnny Storm in Fantastic Four
  • Cairo Azarcon and his son Ryan in the Karin Lowachee novels, particularly Burndive
  • Batman and Nightwing in DC comics; or for that matter, Dick Grayson and Damian. To my surprise and joy, they are delightful together.
  • The relationships between Andrej Koscuisko and just about anyone in the Jurisdiction Universe novels by Susan R. Matthews
  • Aragorn and Legolas in The Lord of the Rings



fajrdrako: ([Books])




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 21 – Favorite romantic/sexual relationship (including asexual romantic relationships)

I'm not clear what an asexual romantic relationship is. Platonic love, or unrequited, or unconsummated? Could someone explain?

Anyway... favourite romantic relationships:

Lymond and Philippa, in the Lymond novels. At first I'd wanted Lymond's romance to be with Kate. I still love Kate more than Philippa. But his romance with Philippa is magnificent.

Eugenides' romance in the Megan Whalen Turner novels is wonderful, too. I'm avoiding names so as to avoid spoilers.

Jane and Mr. Rochester, in Jane Eyre

Emma Frost and Scott Summers, in X-Men

Kitty Pryde and Pete Wisdom, in Excalibur



fajrdrako: ([Books])




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 20 – Favorite kiss

1. Shards of Honour by Lois McMaster Bujold:
    “...I don’t need anything special. All we really need is to go home. No--come to think of it, I do want a favor.”
    “Name it,” he said eagerly.
    “Lieutenant Rosemont’s grave. It was never marked. I may never get back here. While it’s still possible to find the remains of our camp, could you have your people mark it? I have all his numbers and dates. I handled his personnel forms often enough, I still have them memorized.”
    “I’ll see to it personally.”
    “Wait.” He paused, and she held out a hand to him. His thick fingers engulfed her tapering ones; his skin was warm and dry, and scorched her. “Before we go pick up poor Lieutenant Illyan again...”
    He took her in his arms, and they kissed, for the first time, for a long time.
    “Oh,” she muttered after. “Perhaps that was a mistake. It hurts so much when you stop.”
    “Well, let me...” His hand stroked her hair gently, then desperately wrapped itself in a shimmering coil; they kissed again.
    “Uh, sir?” Lieutenant Illyan, coming up the path, cleared his throat noisily. “Had you forgotten the Staff conference?”
    Vorkosigan put her from him with a sigh. “No, Lieutenant. I haven’t forgotten.”


2. Jane Eyre - the kiss under the oak tree.

3. Lymond's kiss at the very end of the chess game in Pawn in Frankincense.

fajrdrako: ([Books])




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 19 – Favorite book cover (bonus points for posting an image!)

The image:



Though, really, all the Thief novels have magnificent covers.

I love the covers of the Vintage edition of the Lymond novels, which as far as I know have never been available in Canada.

And Guy Gavriel Kay has had some great cover art, especially with Tigana:

fajrdrako: ([Books])




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 18 - Favorite beginning scene in a book

I love "Opening Gambit: Threat to a Castle" in The Game of Kings; if you look at the scene at Mungo Tennant's place, that has to be my favourite opening scene ever.

The funeral scene in the first chapter of It Had to be You by Susan Elizabeth Phillips also comes to mind.

The opening scene of Wintersmith by Terry Pratchett was wonderful and heartbreaking.

I like the first scene of Jane Eyre, where Jane is reading in the window-seat.

Then there's the famous, "To me, my X-Men!" from X-Men #1.

fajrdrako: (Default)




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 17 - Favorite story or collection of stories (short stories, novellas, novelettes, etc.

I don't much like prose short stories or collections of short stories, but there have been a few exceptions. Angels and Visitations by Neil Gaiman is probably my first choice here: it has some wonderful stories in it, like "Troll-Bridge" and "Chivalry".

fajrdrako: (Default)




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 16 - Favorite poem or collection of poetry

Four Quartets by T.T. Eliot. It's beautiful and mystical and all about how time is wibbly-wobbly, and yet profoundly beautiful and full of meaning.
Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.


fajrdrako: ([Louise Brooks])




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 15 - Your "comfort" book

It will come as no surprise to anyone to hear that The Game of Kings is my favourite comfort book.

Other comfort books - well, favourite and familiar authors: Robert B. Parker, Tolkien, Dickens, Bujold Charlotte Bronte, X-Men or Daredevil comics. Things like that. Megan Whalen Turner and Karin Lowachee are newcomers to that list.

fajrdrako: ([Lymond])




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 14 - Favorite character in a book (of any sex or gender)

Again, too easy: Dorothy Dunnett's hero Francis Crawford of Lymond, "a drunken amateur who makes music and love comme une ange." - That's Leone Strozzi's assessment of him in Pawn in Frankincense. Or, conversely, "a man whose mind was and always had been as far above theirs as the stars over their heads." I think that's Philippa thought. His mother says, "My son is not very complicated... though the artifice glitters."

Lymond has been my favourite hero since I was fifteen. He appears to those around him to be something different - less - than he appears. He has all the characteristics I love: he's painfully intelligent, insightful to the point of oversensitivity, utterly heroic, theatrical, imaginative, tolerant, nonconformist, reckless, courageous, private, witty, bisexual, devious, idealistic, erudite, complex, driven, and funny.

Some readers are annoyed by his troubles, which he keeps to himself till they become explosive. (Lots of mother issues.) Some readers find him intimidating; I am fascinated by his many levels.

fajrdrako: (Default)




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 13 - Favorite childhood book OR current favorite YA book (or both!)

  • At the age of four: Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne
  • At the age of nine: Sir Francis Drake, and Adventure Comics with the Legion of Super-Heroes
  • At the age of ten: The Phoenix and the Carpet by E. Nesbit, and Fantastic Four
  • At the age of twelve: Perry Mason, X-Men, and Jane Eyre

I suppose I could add the Lymond chronicles by Dorothy Dunnett here, just to keep up the policy of mentioning them whenever applicable: I read them in my teens.

fajrdrako: (Default)




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 12 – A book or series of books you’ve read more than five times

  1. Dorothy Dunnett's Lymond Chronicles
  2. The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
  3. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
  4. Shards of Honour by Lois McMaster Bujold
  5. Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne
  6. The Lion in Winter by James Goldman
fajrdrako: ([Game of Thrones])




30 Day Book Meme: – Day 11 – A book that disappointed you

A Feast for Crows by George R.R. Martin. Really, I loved the first three volumes of A Song of Ice and Fire, but A Feast for Crows introduced new characters I didn't find as interesting as the previous set, failed to carry on with themes that interested me, and made some of the characters I already liked less interesting than they were. Arya, for example. And it didn't deal with my very favourite characters at all.

I'd worry about what will be in A Dance for Dragons, but I'm not sure we'll ever see it - and if Martin has lost interest in his series, it's maybe just as well.

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