Books 2012: honourable uses?
Feb. 25th, 2012 12:15 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hawkwing_lbBooks 2012: 26-27
nonfiction
26. Miri Rubin, The Hollow Crown: A History of Britain in the Late Middle Ages. Penguin, London & New York, 2006. First published 2005.
Part of the excellent Penguin History of Britain series,* Rubin's The Hollow Crown takes us from the reign of Richard II to the accession of Henry VII Tudor, with discussion of law, society, agriculture, war and religion along the way. A lucid and engaging overview of the period.
fiction
27. Gail Carriger, Timeless. Orbit, 2012.
With a bit of luck, a proper review of this will appear in Vector at some point. In the meantime, the fifth and final Parasol Protectorate novel is hectic and amusing, without being completely made of win.
*This makes the third volume in the series I've read, and they've all been very well-done.
Reviewing books at length is interesting. In many ways, it's teaching me to engage more deeply and more critically with what I've been reading: to see what's there, what's not, what a book sets out to do, how it succeeds, how it fails. To look at why.
Getting editorial feedback from Strange Horizons has been absolutely brilliant for this. Sometimes you're so involved in what you're doing you can't see where you're going wrong.
I'm about to engage in something I find rather awkward. Please bear with me. Okay, so I have noticed a very large rise in the obvious number of people on the streets in Dublin in the last few years. The Dublin Simon Community are one of the major charities who work to alleviate long and short term homelessness. So what I'm wondering is, is there anyone reading this who would be interested/willing to sponsor me for a book-review-a-thon? I.e., you name the book, donate to the Simon Community (or your equivalent local homeless charity, because for damn sure this isn't just a Dublin/Ireland issue), send me proof of donation, and I will then read and review the damn thing? The larger the donation, the longer the review, up to 1K words?
This is not something that would happen immediately, but if I asked this question again in, say, June or July, is there anyone who would be interested?
(Or you could donate to me. But that would not be charity, but corruption.)
nonfiction
26. Miri Rubin, The Hollow Crown: A History of Britain in the Late Middle Ages. Penguin, London & New York, 2006. First published 2005.
Part of the excellent Penguin History of Britain series,* Rubin's The Hollow Crown takes us from the reign of Richard II to the accession of Henry VII Tudor, with discussion of law, society, agriculture, war and religion along the way. A lucid and engaging overview of the period.
fiction
27. Gail Carriger, Timeless. Orbit, 2012.
With a bit of luck, a proper review of this will appear in Vector at some point. In the meantime, the fifth and final Parasol Protectorate novel is hectic and amusing, without being completely made of win.
*This makes the third volume in the series I've read, and they've all been very well-done.
Reviewing books at length is interesting. In many ways, it's teaching me to engage more deeply and more critically with what I've been reading: to see what's there, what's not, what a book sets out to do, how it succeeds, how it fails. To look at why.
Getting editorial feedback from Strange Horizons has been absolutely brilliant for this. Sometimes you're so involved in what you're doing you can't see where you're going wrong.
I'm about to engage in something I find rather awkward. Please bear with me. Okay, so I have noticed a very large rise in the obvious number of people on the streets in Dublin in the last few years. The Dublin Simon Community are one of the major charities who work to alleviate long and short term homelessness. So what I'm wondering is, is there anyone reading this who would be interested/willing to sponsor me for a book-review-a-thon? I.e., you name the book, donate to the Simon Community (or your equivalent local homeless charity, because for damn sure this isn't just a Dublin/Ireland issue), send me proof of donation, and I will then read and review the damn thing? The larger the donation, the longer the review, up to 1K words?
This is not something that would happen immediately, but if I asked this question again in, say, June or July, is there anyone who would be interested?
(Or you could donate to me. But that would not be charity, but corruption.)
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no subject
Date: 2012-02-25 05:51 am (UTC)There's at least one book lately that I've disliked without quite knowing why, and I'd love somebody with a brain to review it for me...
no subject
Date: 2012-02-25 01:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-25 05:22 pm (UTC)If you've already reviewed it somewhere and I missed it, then you could just post a link when I make the donation.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-25 06:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-25 05:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-25 06:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-26 10:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-26 10:22 pm (UTC)