March's Mystical Musings Upon Mouth-Watering Manuscripts

[alchemist]

About a third into American Gods by Neil Gaiman. Not his best, by some accounts, but my first Gaiman. I'll reserve judgement for now.

 

[Mouse]

No dissing of the Gaiman allowed, I'm afraid. Tis the rules.

I'm still reading The Death Collector. Takes me about a year to read one flaming book now I reckon.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

I'm about halfway through American Gods, too. I'll keep going but it's not gripping me, I'm afraid. Main character isn't engaging, I find many bits of it confusing, more long-winded and, frankly, skippable and if it had been the first Gaiman I'd looked at, I wouldn't have looked at another.

So I'm glad I started with Ocean.

 

[JunkMonkey]

I'm currently assailing Wagner the Werewolf by George W M Reynolds 470+ pages of the Highest octane Victorian High Gothic melodrama - originally published in episodic form as a 'Penny Dreadful'. It's brilliantly dire! It doesn't exactly start 'It was a dark and stormy night....' but Reynolds certainly takes his cue from Bulwer-Lytton and then dollops on the purple by the trowelful:

PROLOGUE.
​

It was the month of January, 1516.

The night was dark and tempestuous; the thunder growled around; the lightning flashed at short intervals: and the wind swept furiously along in sudden and fitful gusts.

The streams of the great Black Forest of Germany babbled in playful melody no more, but rushed on with deafening din, mingling their torrent roar with the wild creaking of the huge oaks, the rustling of the firs, the howling of the affrighted wolves, and the hollow voices of the storm.

The dense black clouds were driving restlessly athwart the sky; and when the vivid lightning gleamed forth with rapid and eccentric glare, it seemed as if the dark jaws of some hideous monster, floating high above, opened to vomit flame.

Hideous, fire-vomiting monsters scaring the wolves? Now, that's the way to open a book!

Within the first fifty pages we've had fearful oaths, magic potions, promises of everlasting life, a lost daughter, a foreign count sweeping a peasant girl off to another country (and installing her as his mistress), a deaf mute - a broadbrushstroked evil noblewoman, mysterious deathbed instructions, a strange will, a locked room containing secrets documents and a DREADFUL THING which one character has seen but which the author is keeping discretely out of sight and in reserve for when things flag a bit later on. A mysterious, rather voluptuous, stranger bursting in on a funeral. A reconciliation between a strangely rejuvenated grandfather and the Granddaughter who abandoned him many years ago (see count/peasant girl above) and a wholloping great touch of the Bluebeards when she is sternly admonished NEVER to unveil the covered portrait at the end of the gallery... (and we all know where that's going to end up, don't we?) It's trash. It was trash at the time and it outsold Dickens by the bucketload. It's f*****g hilarious.

 

[j d worthington]

If you actually make it through this one, you will be the first person I've encountered (aside from a handful of writers writing about it) who has... aside from myself. And I've actually managed to read the darned thing twice! (Then again, I read the Malleus Maleficarum twice, too... glutton for punishment, that's me....) Very interested in what you think once all the shouting's over. (Oh, and my suggestion for a follow-up which is at least as successful? Eugene Sue's The Wandering Jew; only make sure you get one which is, if not the full text, not terribly abridged... which will make it about 1500pp. worth of serialized madness....)

Am currently reading Sarah Orne Jewett's The Country of the Pointed Firs and Other Stories -- the title piece, to be precise, which I should finish tonight. When I first began it, I wasn't sure how I'd react. The prose is certainly fine, but I rather doubted this would be a writer I'd return to all that often... then I ran into the first bit of what could be called fantastic writing in the book, "Captain Littlepage and the Waiting Place", followed by this passage:

"There, dear, I never showed nobody else but mother where to find this place; 'tis kind of sainted to me. Nathan, my husband, an' I used to love this place when we was courtin', and"--she hesitated, and then spoke softly--"when he was lost, 'twas just off shore tryin' to get in by the short channel out there between Squaw Islands, right in sight o' this headland where we'd set an' made our plans all summer long."

I had never heard her speak of her husband before, but I felt that we were friends now since she had brought me to this place.

"'Twas but a dream with us," Mrs. Todd said. "I knew it when he was gone. I knew it"--and she whispered as if she were at confession--"I knew it afore he started to go to sea. My heart was gone out o' my keepin' before I ever saw Nathan; but he loved me well, and he made me real happy, and he died before he ever knew what he'd had to know if we'd lived long together. 'Tis very strange about love. No, Nathan never found out, but my heart was troubled when I knew him first. There's more women likes to be loved than there is of those that loves. I spent some happy hours right here. I always liked Nathan, and he never knew. But this pennyr'yal always reminded me, as I'd sit and gather it and hear him talkin'--it always would remind me of--the other one."

She looked away from me, and presently rose and went on by herself. There was something lonely and solitary about her great determined shape. She might have been Antigone alone on the Theban plain. It is not often given in a noisy world to come to the places of great grief and silence. An absolute, archaic grief possessed this countrywoman; she seemed like a renewal of some historic soul, with her sorrows and the remoteness of a daily life busied with rustic simplicities and the scents of primeval herbs.
​

That line, "It is not often given...", and the description "An absolute, archaic grief..." are so simple, yet so very powerful in conveying the depth of such quiet, internal suffering, and the way this has remained true since our earliest ancestors -- it almost literally took my breath away. It did bring me very close to tears.

Oh, yes. Jewett is definitely a writer I'll be visiting now and again, with the greatest of pleasure....

 

[Perpetual Man]

I have now finished The Empress Graves by Chronicles member E J Tett

Review Here

Next up is: Simon and the Wardrobe of Destiny by Ellis Jackson

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

I'm about halfway through American Gods, too. I'll keep going but it's not gripping me, I'm afraid. Main character isn't engaging, I find many bits of it confusing, more long-winded and, frankly, skippable and if it had been the first Gaiman I'd looked at, I wouldn't have looked at another.

So I'm glad I started with Ocean.

I was not a fan of American Gods either, so much so that I couldn't finish it. The only other Gaiman book I have read is Stardust, which I enjoyed. I would like to pick up another of his books, but I'm just not sure which. Apparently The Ocean at the End of the Lane is good?

 

[Jo Zebedee]

I was not a fan of American Gods either, so much so that I couldn't finish it. The only other Gaiman book I have read is Stardust, which I enjoyed. I would like to pick up another of his books, but I'm just not sure which. Apparently The Ocean at the End of the Lane is good?

Ocean at the End of The Lane was excellent, one of the best books I've read in ages and one I'll go back to. I'll maybe try Stardust, cheers.

 

[Mouse]

Stardust is tragic! (But ace).

 

[JunkMonkey]

If you actually make it through this one, you will be the first person I've encountered (aside from a handful of writers writing about it) who has... aside from myself. And I've actually managed to read the darned thing twice! (Then again, I read the Malleus Maleficarum twice, too... glutton for punishment, that's me....) Very interested in what you think once all the shouting's over. (Oh, and my suggestion for a follow-up which is at least as successful? Eugene Sue's The Wandering Jew; only make sure you get one which is, if not the full text, not terribly abridged... which will make it about 1500pp. worth of serialized madness....)

I'll certainly report back but at the moment I'm enjoying every preposterous page of it and am laughing out loud at least once a chapter at the incredible writing. It really is a hoot.

The lamp had burned throughout the day in his dungeon; for the light of heaven could not penetrate that horrible subterranean cell--and it was only by the payment of gold that he had induced the jailer to permit him the indulgence of the artificial substitute for the rays of the glorious sun.
"Oh! wretched being that I am!" he thought within himself, as he paced the stone floor of his prison-house; "the destiny of the accursed is mine!"

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

Ocean at the End of The Lane was excellent, one of the best books I've read in ages and one I'll go back to. I'll maybe try Stardust, cheers.

Glad to hear it! Added it to my Books I Want To Read List.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Ripley's Giant Believe It Or Not! -- 1985 reprint of a 1976 collection of the famous newspaper series. Great fun, and far superior to the modern, flashy, childish books that use the "Believe It Or Not!" title.

 

[antiloquax]

After reading about the film, I read Michel Faber's Under the Skin. I enjoyed it, but I didn't think it was as great as all that. And, by the look of the clips, Jonathan Glazer has got this book mixed up with C. L. Moore's "Black Thirst".

Other than that ... finished The Goldfinch at the weekend. Wonderful Donna Tartt! Now reading Imaginary Friends by Alison Lurie.

 

[Harpo]

I've just acquired free copies of Asimov's Foundation and Second Foundation. Having failed to read them many years ago, I'll give them another try. If I like 'em, there are more. If I don't, I will at least have tried.

 

[Bick]

I've just acquired free copies of Asimov's Foundation and Second Foundation. Having failed to read them many years ago, I'll give them another try. If I like 'em, there are more. If I don't, I will at least have tried.

You know those are the first and third books in the original trilogy? The second book is Foundation and Empire.

 

[kythe]

I'm on "Foundation and Empire" now. I think the story flows more smoothly than "Foundation", the first in the series, since it generally follows the same characters with a more in-depth story. "Foundation" is big on theme, but a bit harder to follow since it spans a greater time period as well as different places. The "Foundation" series is a little different than most books since it spans several centuries of human civilization.

 

[Bick]

That's interesting you think that kythe. The original trilogy were made up of a series of shorts he published in Astounding of course, and the very first one he wrote as a standalone story. Campbell so like it he asked for more in the same future history, so Asimov wrote a couple more in the same vein, but still as standalone stories really. It was only later when he came to write the last stories that made up Foundation, and then F&E, that he had decided to string lots of stories into more of a cohesive story arc. This is probably why you got that impression of them.

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

I finished The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. The more I think about it, the more I like it. It's been awhile since I read a book that kept me saying 'Just one more chapter", but this one certainly did. I loved the atmosphere of the book, and of course its ode to books and reading. Fermin quickly became my favorite character, and I believe Julian was a close second. There was really only one thing I thought a big overdone, but it certainly didn't ruin the novel by any means. I would definitely recommend it.


Now I'm doing a little non-fiction reading and picking up From Dust to Life: The Origin and Evolution of Our Solar System by John Chambers.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17847850-from-dust-to-life

 

[Ogma]

I finished Inverted World by Christopher Priest which was enjoyable. Starting into Childhood by A.C. Clarke.

 

[Toby Frost]

So far: Dog Soldiers by Robert Stone: a rather depressing thriller about the fallout from the Vietnam War and the end of 1960s idealism. It's probably an accurate snapshot of a certain time, but lacks sympathetic characters and has a jumble of an ending. The writing is quite good but rather dated in style: there are quite a few jumps in point of view.

And now I'm on Use of Weapons by Iain M Banks. So far, so good. It's an interesting and well-constructed story in a credible setting with good characters. The only thing I don't like are the comedy bits, which fall a bit flat. I do sometimes feel that I'm the only person in space who doesn't find all the stuff with the spaceships and their long names screamingly funny.