The weather outside is frightful, to quote the holiday song. Snow, followed by freezing rain. The hill is iced in, though it should be okay to drive on by this afternoon, we hope.
I went back to a post I put up last October 13, [you can find it here] on series and other books I wanted to catch up on, and decided to get going on one of those, Ten Years Beyond Baker Street, by Cay Van Ash. I’ve been intending to read it for more than a decade. I’m about 40 pages in and enjoying it.
Other than that, I’ve read just a few short stories. I haven’t had a lot of reading energy, and have been watching football (go, Seahawks!) and listening to music.
Barbara was reading The Great Swindle by Pierre Lemaître, a stand-alone by the author of the Murder Squad books that she’s been enjoying very much. Not this one. It’s rare for her to not finish any book she starts, but this goes back to the library unfinished.
Now she’s just a few pages into Hades by Candice Fox, a book she saw in a Mystery Scene review. She says that so far, it’s very dark, but it’s too early to say more.
So how about you?
What have you been reading?
Tip the Wink 
I will get back to you when we get home from lunch. The streets are pretty clear now but it is still really cold. Tomorrow – and Wednesday especially – should be a lot better.
I read LAST YEAR by Robert Charles Wilson, the first of his I’d read. Also John Scalzi’s collection of his very short stories, MINIATURES. Most were quite amusing. I bought the ebook. The Wilson was a library book, as is my current read, Lawrence Block’s SINNER MAN.
So that Wilson wasn’t the one who wrote the three astroid about to destroy earth books? I wish the library would get the ebook of that Scalzi.
I find I’m relying more and more on the library, as is Barbara. We haven’t bought anything – other than a couple of books for Christmas presents – in a while now. I’ve got a book waiting there for me now, when I can get to get it. The library is closed today due to weather.
The 3 asteroids about to destroy earth doesn’t sound like anything Robert Charles Wilson has written. He is best known for the Axis trilogy, the first of which Spin won the Hugo, and The Chronoliths.
I like Scalzi but don’t care for short shorts and probably won’t read this.
Not read much this week. Incensed by Ed Lin, a follow up to Ghost Month. A humorous crime novel taking place in Taiwan and where you will learn a lot about Joy Division.
The Lost City of the Monkey God, a non fiction book by Douglas Preston and a reread of one of my favorite space operas Take Back Plenty by Colin Greenland.
Just started Eon by Greg Bear.
Ah, Winters, Wilson, my old brain struggles sometimes…
I can’t remember if I’ve read that Greg Bear, Steve, but I know I haven’t read Take Back Plenty. Thanks for the tip.
No. That was Ben H Winters, starting with THE LAST POLICEMAN. He wrote UNDERGROUND AIRLINES last year.
I did also read Ray Garton’s horror (mostly) collection, METHODS OF MADNESS, which was one of the free downloads a few weeks back. I didn’t love it. I found most of the stories too long for the plot, if you know what I mean, though some weren’t bad. “Shock Radio” was pretty on target for our current times.
I have borrowed two library books via Kindle. We’ll see if I read them. One is a short story collection by Jennifer Egan. The other is a mystery set in New Orleans that the review made sound interesting – THE DEVIL IN HER WAY by Bill Loehfelm. I’ll let you know.
I’m reading Big Fat Books and watching movies. I have Take Back Plenty by Colin Greenland and now I want to read it after what Steve said. Diane just finished HOW THE LIGHT GETS IN by Louise Penny. We’re looking forward to meeting Louise Penny in Toronto at BOUCHERCON in October.
Nice to be retired, ay, George? We thought HOW THE LIGHT GETS IN was one of Louise Penny’s weaker books of late, but it certainly had it’s moments. Barbara and I had breakfast with her, and her now late husband, during the SF Bouchercon. Just a delightful person. I always look forward to her books.
School is back and I’ve also signed up to do a 100 readings in 100-days Bible study at my church, so I don’t expect to get quite so much (non-Biblical) reading done as I did during the Christmas break. I just started Helen Dunmore’s A SPELL OF WINTER, a gothic about siblings, abandoned by their parents, living in an isolated home in rural England. It’s a rather dark tale so far, although the writing is beautiful even when describing something rather unpleasant (such as the accidental shooting of a hare).
I’m not sure how much reading is involved in a “reading”, but it sounds like you’ll be busy. I hope you’ll continue to drop in here on Mondays and fill us in on your reading and goings-on.
Cold here, but Florida is the one state that avoided the recent winter snow storms. Some rain water that got caught in a fold of a plastic trash bag froze two nights ago and made the four-year-old grandson excited to see “Florida ice!” (I’ll be excited just to see warmer weather coming through later this week.)
I read the van Ash when it first came out and enjoyed it .
This week I Finished BRADBURY SPEAKS: TOO SOON FROM THE CAVE, TOO FAR FROM THE STARS. As I mentioned last week, Bradbury’s enthusiasm is contagious despite the repetitiveness in some of the essays. I also read two more Roald Dahl juveniles: JAMES AND THE GIANT PEACH and MATILDA. I liked both very much, but JAMES was Dahl’s first juvenile novel since 1943’s THE GREMLINS and it shows — the delightfully perverse humor of Dahl’s later juveniles is not present. MATILDA, on the other hand, starts off with “It’s a funny thing about mothers and fathers. Even when their own child is the most disgusting blister you could ever imagine, they still think he or she is wonderful.” It chugs along merrily from there.
Also read this week was SURVIVAL…ZERO, a 1970 Mike Hammer novel by Mickey Spillane (and my FFB this week). It had all the elements of a good Hammer mystery but the parts just did not gel. Robert Parker’s SIXKILL was the last Spenser novel Parker had completed before his death. As usual, not much plot, lots of big type and white space with very short sentences and a lot of very short chapters (in this case, 63). I kick myself every time I enjoy a Spenser novel, but I just can’t help it.
My graphic novel this week was JSA: PRINCES OF DARKNESS. Just about every DC superhero since World War II shows up here and it was hard to tell who was who without a scorecard. Luckily, the publisher provided a scorecard. Unluckily, it was not a complete and comprehensive one. The GN had a bunch of smash-bang explosions.
If the ice does not melt from your hill by June, we’ll send out a rescue party. Till then, stay safe and warm. And make a lot of chili.
We just saw the Broadway adaptation of MATILDA THE MUSICAL. It starts in the same way.
Jerry, I read that Bradbury a long time ago, but if memory serves, I enjoyed it. For reasons unknown, I have never read James and the Giant Peach, but Matilda I have read, and liked. Re: Jeff’s comment, I didn’t know there was a play made of it. I’ve read what I consider the two essential Hammer novels, and that’s probably enough. Seems like most GNs have lots of smash-bang stuff. Nature of the beast.
Richard, I recently read a big book on the history of typewriters in India, and currently, I’m reading PAST TENSE, a Joel Williams mystery by Margot Kinberg.
That will make Margot happy, Prashant. History of typewriters, eh? Has the potential to be boring.
Lucky you! A breakfast with Louise Penny and her late husband! Diane is very impressed. Louise Penny has a new book coming out in August 2017…just before BOUCHERCON. So far, Retirement seems like a long vacation.
Yes, it was great. Her books usually come out in August or September.
I remember that feeling of being on vacation, it took a month or more to realize the difference in my subconscious. Since you’ve had longer time away with summer break and such, it may take even longer.
Been reading a lot of David Gemmell. Finishing the last book in a series now and will then go to something else. I have a biography of Sebastian Bach I’ll probably read next