keep track of every book i read this year

gah. New boyfriend = no reading. Well, he’s gotten me into comic books, so i’ll count the TPB i read.

Neverwhere (Neil Gaiman) A-
Aloft (Chang Rae Lee) B+
Psion (Joan D Vinge) B+
High Fidelity (Nick Hornby) A-

TPB:

Whiteout – A

The Ghost Map – Stephen Johnson – A. Surprisingly not dry, despite its subject matter: Cholera outbreak in 1800’s London. I bought it thinking oddly enough it was about the spread of plague throughout Europe, but despite my mistake, it was still informative and interesting.

The Companions – Sheri S Tepper – A.

A book with a decent message, that does not bash you about the head and neck to get it’s point across. Well, it’s still pretty over the top, but the dystopia protrayed is fairly realistic and not totally unlikely. One can see a clear path from now until the, whereas some of her dystopias have a major break with current histroy that she does not bother to fill in. This one gains points for not having to rely on that trick. Also, slightly weaker characters than usual, with a few shining exceptions. Scramble being one of them.

99/106

Another slow month.

The Other Boleyn Girl (Phillipa Gregory): A. Factually very incorrect, but a good tale with excellent characterization.

Queen Isabella: Treachery, Adulter, and Murder in Medieval England (Alison Weir): A-. She writes great stuff, but i was a little bored in the middle.

Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister (Gregory Maguire): A- Not as solid as Wicked, although the characters were all great. The story was not as well flashed out, and the print was huge! Very strange.

97/104

Not in order:

Ship of Magic
Mad Ship
Ship of Destiny (all Robin Hobb) = A

The Third Chimpanzee – B
Collapse (both Jared Diamond) – A

The Other Boleyn Girl (Phillipa Gregory) – A-

Use of Weapons (Iain M Banks) = A

Hawai’i (James Michener – a vacation read, i swear!) = B

So Cold A Sky (Carl Bohnak) = A for first half, B- for second half

The Girl Who Played Go (Shan Sa) = A+ Insanely good.

94 books in about 100 weeks.

Been a while. @set me = bad

Not in order:

Peter F Hamilton’s Pandora Star, and Judas Unleashed. A- Not nearly as good as the Reality Dysfunction, but a little more accessible. I finally got my wish for a book that took a long time to read though! And enjoyed every last minute. It only lost points for being a bit meandering at times.

Sheri S Tepper Singer from the Sea. A One of her best, IMHO. Excellent world creation, great characters.
Sheri S Tepper Six Moon Dance. B Not up to her usual standards. Just a bit dull. The premise was great, and many of the characters were excellent. I just didn’t love it.

Chuck Palahniuk Lullaby. A. Weird as ever. I love him.

I know i’m missing some, but i’ll tally anyway:
84 books in 91 weeks. My god! I’m getting worse!

Stone of Farewell (A-)
To Green Angel Tower Parts I and II (A) – Tad Williams

Gibbons Decline and Fall (A) Sheri S Tepper

The Kite Runner (A) Khaled Hosseini

The last 3 Sunrunner books, (Melanie Rawn):

The Dragon Token
Stronghold
Skybowl

All A’s. I just can’t say enough about her extremely real characters, and the incredibly complicated world she created. Horrible things happen to people, they make bad choices and do silly or foolish things. No 2 dimensional puppets, and things don’t all fold neatly back on themselves. People’s lives are disrupted or ruined.

Then:

Song of Kali (Dan Simmons) – A.

Sooooo sad. Beyond tragic.

Ilium (A+)
Olympos (A)

The first one rocked. The second one wasn’t quite as tight but Simmons’ imagination is just phenominal. The concurrance of events he can picture coming together…..he’s insanely gifted.

The Dragonbone Chair (Tad Williams) – B.

I wasn’t enjoying the book for a long time. I wanted something as good as Otherworld, and it wasn’t. It reminded me too much of Assasin’s Apprentise in many ways, and seemed derivative of other poeple’s work. Which shocked me coming from Tad Williams. But then, suddenly, in the last few chapters of the book, i started to care about the characters and the plot. Dang it! But i’m still taking a break before reading the next 2.

The True Game (Sherri S Tepper) – A-.

She looses points for a common devise regarding the secret parentage of an apparant orphan, but it was her first novel so i forgive her. Otherwise, wonderful book, great characters, rare for her to write first person from the POV of a male. It makes the book feel very non-Tepper like, but not in a bad way. Its just different.

Upcoming: 2nd two True Games followed by 2nd two Sorrow, Thorn and Memory (Tad Williams).

Total count = 75 books in 16 months or about 65 weeks.

The Dragon Prince
The Star Scroll
Sunrunner’s Fire
(Melanie Rawn)

All A.

At first i was disappointed in the first book, since when i read them in undergrad i was so overwhelmed with how good they were. But the pacing and fast progression of time had me worried. I felt like it just rushed along and that my memory of how good they were was flawed. But finally i realised that although i still think she could have made the first book alone into a trilogy, they are still wonderful and well written. I realise now that i never did read the second trilogy, either. I see now they hadn’t been written when i was reading the first trilogy, so that explains a lot.

At any rate, they were a sound investment and i hope to read her other works when i’m done.

(67 since feb 2005)

Guns Germs and Steel – A

A re-read, but its been years and years. Plus i taped the PBS special and wanted to read the book again before i watched it. Unfortunately now i keep comparing all the other anthropology type shows and their opinions to Jared Diamond’s.

Raising the Stones – Sheri S Tepper – A

As per usual for her, quite politically, religiously, and culturally charged, but this one gets done what she set out to do with a lot less…...difficulty than usual. I love her writing, don’t get me wrong, but sometimes she really has to try a little too hard in order to accomplish her goals. This time the plot flowed nicely (although the lives of the people involved didn’t always turn out great in the end) and the resolution was smooth and satisfying.

Next: Maybe the Melanie Rawn Dragon Prince series?

Obviously i will have forgotten some, and these are not in order:

Mists of Avalon – A
Lady of Avalon – A-
Fall of Atlantis – C
Firebrand – A
Priestess of Avalon – B-
The Forest House – B+
(All Marion Zimmer Bradley)

Labyrinth of Dreams – B
Shadow Dancers – B
(Jack Chalker)

Plague of Angels (Sheri S Tepper) – A

Game of Thrones – A
Clash of Kings – A
Storm of Swords – A
Feast of Crows – A
(George RR Martin)

Battle Royale – A
Minority Report (Phillip K Dick ) – A
Narnia Chronicles (i should list them separately, to be more impressive ;) – Collectively, A

Wicked – A
Farnhams Freehold (Heinlein) – C

That’s all that’s on my kill shelf, although i know i took some off and forgot :(

That’s 17 more (unless you count the Narnia as separate, which i don’t think i can) for a total of 62 in 58 weeks. My average has gone down down down to 1.12.

Unless you count Narnia separately, then: 68 in 58 for 1.17 per week. Blah.