Books 2011: I have tried in my way to be free

Books 2011: 98-102


98. Jon Courtenay Grimwood, The Fallen Blade.

1407. An alternate Venice filled with tense, brooding darkness; a boy with strange abilities and stranger hungers; secrets, politics, and blood. A very good book, and a longer review of it (by me) should be forthcoming from Tor.com by the end of September.


99. Karen Healey, Guardian of the Dead.

Contemporary YA fantasy debut from a New Zealand author, using a lot of interesting Maori mythology. Excellent book.


100. David Liss, A Conspiracy of Paper.

Historical mystery set in 18th-century London, featuring former boxer Benjamin Weaver, the so-called Lion of Judah, the Bank of England, and the East India Trading Company. Interesting and enjoyable reading.


101. Charles Stross, Rule 34.

You enjoyed Halting State and you think the second person narration is a cool trick. You think pulling it off for several distinct personalities is taking the stunt a bit far, but you find Rule 34 to be fast and interesting and diverse, and since second person is by no means the only cool trick in store, you don't really mind. You really quite enjoy it, actually.

And you resolve in future not to let second person narration creep into your reviews.


102. Ellen Kushner, Thomas the Rhymer.

Lush, patient, measured, stunning: these are some words which apply. They are by no means the only words which apply, but Kushner takes the medieval Thomas the Rhymer ballad tradition and does something exquisite with it.

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More books will be reported upon soon. I have to catch up with my neglect in short spurts. :P

Books 2011: reaching for the sky just to surrender

Books 103-107

nonfiction

103. Adomnán of Iona, Life of St Columba. Penguin Classics, London, 1995. Translated with an introduction by Richard Sharpe.

An interesting saintly life of one of the more famous saints of the early Christian church of these islands. The introduction is sufficient for a book in itself, being one hundred pages long and more than adequate to its aims. The Life itself is concerned primarily with the proofs of Columba's sainthood, not with a linear narrative, but is nonetheless fascinatingly revelatory in its preoccupations.


104. Euripides, Bacchae and Other Plays. Oxford World's Classics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1999. Translated by James Morwood, with an introduction by Edith Hall.

Comprising Iphigenia among the Taurians, Bacchae, Iphigenia at Aulis, and (generally accepted to be by an unknown 'pseudo-Euripides') Rhesus. These are striking pieces of literature, given a fluent and readable translation. The two Iphigenias are the most moving of the plays; Rhesus is by far the weakest. The introduction is short but solid, and the plays - well, very much of their time: Classical Athens for the definitely Euripidean offerings, probably Hellenistic for Rhesus, which features a (sort of) braggart soldier of the kind seen in Latin comedy.

Interesting. For me, definitely worth reading.


105. Plato, Protagoras. Oxford World's Classics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1996. Translated with an introduction by C.C.W.Taylor.

What is excellence, and can it be taught? These are the questions which Protagoras asks, and on which Plato offers an interesting perspective. The translation is brisk and readable, the introduction brief, the notes reasonably extensive. A short and enjoyable piece of philosophy.


106. Plato, Phaedo. Oxford World's Classics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1996. Translated with an introduction by David Gallop.

An account of the death of Socrates, encompassing a philosophical dialogue on the nature of the soul. Definitely interesting.


107. Bertrand Russell, Why I am not a Christian: and other essays on religion and related subjects. Routledge Classics, Routledge, Oxford, 2004. First published 1957.

Russell is a remarkably readable and clear-sighted philosopher, whose chatty tone belies an intellect made of razors. I disagree with him as much as I agree with him, but I never find him less than thought-provoking. Why I am not a Christian is a frank look at Russell's views on religion - Christianity, the religion of his milieu - and other such things as freedom of thought and speech in universities, morality, and the existence of god.

Despite the fact that the book is over fifty years old, and many of the individual essays are even older, a great number of his views are still not only relevant but radical.

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Even more books soon to come. By the by, is anyone else impressed with David Yates' directorial choices on the final Harry Potter film? Because the Hogwarts scenes have some brilliant use of colour and light.

The whole grey-sere broody thing. Seriously. Make me more films with this tonal quality. And Alan Rickman.