Vive le France!

 January is over alas. I have finished three books for my Mt TBR list and started several on my Classics Club list. "Persuasion" is still lagging somewhat, so I didn't complete the Unputdownables read-a-long but I hope to tackle finishing it soon. So with the calendar changing to February, I need to find my non-existent passport and say "Bon Voyage" and say a hearty "Bonjour!" to the Classic Club's French February. Initially I hesitated coming so soon after the "Persuasion" read-a-long, but Choderlos de Laclos' "Les Liaisons Dangereuses" is already on my list and I happen to adore epistolary novels. The choice of books fits nicely into the Month of Letters challenge for February.

Vintage SF: Randall Garrett's Murder and Magic

In 1199, Richard the Lionhearted died from a crossbow wound at the Seige of Chaluz, leaving his neglected English throne in the hands of his brother Prince John.

At least that's one way the story goes. But what if history had gone a little differently?

In the world of Randall Garrett's Lord Darcy, Richard the Lionhearted recovered from his wounds and settled down to the running of England and France. Without heirs of his own, Richard entrusted the kingdom over to Arthur, the capable son of his dead brother Geoffrey. Arthur made a brilliant marriage and expanded the kingdom until the Plantagenet Empire was the most powerful on the planet. 

But this is also a world where the laws of magic were codified and treated as a science. Those with the Talent are trained to be sorcerers or healers, fully licensed and sanctioned by the Church. Healers perform their work through the laying on of hands, allowing people to live longer. But superstition and distrust hasn't disappeared completely from this world, creating an underworld of hedge wizards and "black magic" users that feed off the general populace's fears. These fears are also encouraged by agents abroad.

The Chief Criminal Investigator to Richard, Duke of Normandy, Lord Darcy must solve the unsolvable, while aided by Master Sean O Lochlainn. Lord Darcy is the master detective of this universe, lacking any Talent of his own, except his remarkable mind and powers of observation. Master Sean O Lochlainn is a master sorcerer with a particular interest in forensics. Lord Darcy and Master Sean work as an able team, confident in each other's special abilities.

The first Lord Darcy collection, Murder and Magic, was published in 1979, but all four stories were published earlier. Each story is what would be called "fair play" murder mysteries as all the clues are provided. Master Sean provides the bulk of the magical evidence, quick to lecture on the various magical laws and how they relate to a particular situation. Lord Darcy does his own investigating and draws his own conclusions. Very often he just needs Sean to back up his suspicions.

Rereading these stories, I was struck by several things. A reviewer commented on the religious overtones of the series and it's quite true. The Church is a strong component of everyday life in this universe.  Priests and clerics appear as characters throughout the series. Only "The Muddle of the Woad" shows a glimpse of how they regard challenges to traditional Christian life with the Society of Albion with its claims to Druidic paganism. No Reformation is mentioned, but compared to say Keith Roberts' Pavane, there's also no reference to the Pope or Vatican in this first collection. All the same I could see how the religious references might feel overwhelming.

What irked me throughout the collection were the women or lack thereof, although to his credit, there were no female murder victims. But there are also no female magic users and with the Church so heavily involved, one wonders if they're even allowed to wield magic. In "Stretch of Imagination", Damoselle Barbara allows as she has "above average" Talent, but no one asks why she is never trained, so one could see her perspective cast aside as feminine intuition, nothing more. None of the stories pass the Bechdel test either; even there are multiple female characters, they don't interact with each other.

Garrett is also quite repetitive as a writer. Presumably Garrett was trying to make the stories to standalone, so he had to repeat his world's history. That meant reading about Richard's survival multiple times and he didn't vary the story all that much. He also used the same pet phrases when describing certain characters, like Lord Darcy speaking Anglo-French with an English accent or describing Master Sean as the tubby Irish sorcerer. As separate stories, it probably wasn't so bad, but taken together in one volume, the combined effect could get rather tiresome.

In his lifetime, Randall Garrett published two Lord Darcy short story collections (Murder & Magic and Lord Darcy Investigates) and one novel (Too Many Magicians). All of these stories, plus several uncollected stories, were published in one volume Lord Darcy by Baen Books in 2002. Michael Kurland also published a pair of Lord Darcy books continuing the series with Ten Little Wizards and A Study in Sorcery.

All told I still enjoyed this first collection. Lord Darcy has a certain undeniable charm and I love his interactions with Master Sean. Since it's the first series of stories, I'm willing to allow a certain leeway to see if Randall Garrett develops the universe further.  This series both fascinates and frustrates me as a reader. I love the world and how it melds so well with the mystery genre. I intend to continue my Lord Darcy reading with the rest of the series, so we'll see if my misgivings are assuaged.

Classics Club Readathon: Getting Started

The Classics Club has started the year with its inuaugural 24-hour read-athon. I will not be able to participate in the entire event as I have a social engagement in the evening, but I can still read during the day. I've been up since 9am and have already read two chapters of Persuasion before breakfast.

Name and Blog: My name is Julia and I blog at the Right Broad

Snacks and Beverages of Choice: Sunkist and Oreos

Where are you reading from today? The cushy loveseat mostly

What are your goals for the Readathon?

My main goal to catch up on the Persuasion read-a-long, but I'd like to work on some other books on my list.

What book(s) are you planning on reading? 

Persuasion by Jane Austen: I'm reading this for the Unputdownables read-a-long. I was behind by a few chapters by our first checkpoint so I wanted to get up to date

Idylls of the King by Alfred Lord Tennyson: I've owned this for awhile, but I've not read as much of it as I'd like. They are some long poems, but I can easily break them down into sections during the day.

Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde: Over the Christmas break I listened to Big Finish's wonderful audio drama, Confessions of Dorian Gray, about the further adventures of Oscar Wilde's most infamous character. So I was curious about the original. I think I had to read it once for class, but wasn't too impressed with it.

Are you excited?

YES! Very excited.

Emperor's Soul

Brandon Sanderson's The Emperor's Soul is a slim but engrossing fantasy novella keyed on a unique magic system involving stamps. Forgers can rewrite an object's past, transforming a simple vase into an ornate one instead.  Resealers can heal the body to its former health, while Bloodsealers can track people through their blood. 

Shai is a Forger, a con artist and thief. When Shai is caught in the act, she is offered an opportunity, instead of execution. Emperor Ashravan has been assassinated. While the resealers can heal his physical body, they cannot recover his mind. Shai is charged with the impossible task of Forging a new soul for the Emperor. Confined in a small room, Shai works against the clock to create the unthinkable all the while challenged and bribed by advisers that want to maintain their political status.

 If one was gifted with artistic talent, why would one choose the life of art of forgery and crime instead?  What is the nature of the soul and do all objects have them? Is the best way to fool someone through honesty? Those are some of the questions raised by Emperor's Soul. 

Since it's a short novella, we don't delve too heavily into Shai's backstory. For a female character, it's a relief to have such an uncomplicated story. No one forced Shai into this life. She willingly sought out of the rigorous Forgery apprenticeship. She is calculating and quick to size up an opportunity. She's a thief and an unrepentant one. She loves the thrill of the life. But that she's created the ultimate out for herself in the form of that "normal" Essence Mark suggests she has considered another quieter life. Could she ever go through with it? Forgery and magic seem ingrained in her soul and psyche. Once in that life, it'd be hard to leave.

Gaotona is an Arbiter, a loyal advisor to Emperor Ashravan. He is presented as the disapproving grandfather type, both to Ashravan and Shai. He expects better of people.  He sees true talent and artistry in what Shai does. He cannot understand why she wastes that as a Forgery. But his other role provides a stronger counterpoint to Shai. Forgery is seen as a kind of blasphemy and abomination. Gaotona's struggle to understand how Forgery works allows Sanderson to show readers the intricacies of his magic system, how it works and how it can't. His fellow arbiter Frava doesn't want to understand how it works; she's quite willing to eliminate Shai at the first opportunity if she can still achieve her ends.

Showing how Forgery works also allows the more intriguing questions about the soul. The work to rebuild Ashravan's soul is long and arduous, fraught with decisions. Why does someone like a certain color? Why would someone want to be an Emperor? But it's not just people. Even inanimate objects receive attention, providing some of the liveliest debates. Do objects have souls? How do they regard themselves? While locked in her room, Shai Forges her surroundings into more comfortable ones. She isn't changing their nature as much as allowing them to shine. Instead of being allowed to crumble, an object is Forged to be found and cared for properly. Her jailers see it as frivolous waste of precious time, but it also points out the differences in Shai's attitudes compared to them. They'd never considered the potential in these artifacts until she's Forged them. 

In a way, Emperor's Soul reads very much like a bottle episode, because the majority of the novella takes place in the confines of Shai's room. People come and go, but Shai is stuck inside. Shai still shows how she can still manipulate people. She uncovers their weaknesses and secrets, even how to ultimately win over Gaotona in her escape. 

Sanderson talks about the writing of the novella in the Writing Excuses podcast. The podcast includes some mild spoilers on some plot points. The biggest question mark for me was the scene near the end where Shai uses the Essence Marks to escape. That action scene felt very strange after pages of this scholarly and thoughtful fantasy story. What annoyed me a little was the stereotypical "every Asian character is a martial artist" issue. But I agreed in principle with Sanderson that with his setup, her escape could not be an easy one. I do wish Shai could have managed it in some other way, but it's a minor quibble.

Overall I enjoyed Brandon Sanderson's Emperor's Soul. I liked the unusual magic system and the questions it raised about art and the soul. Shai was a likeable character and I was rooting for her throughout. I'm still plowing through Elantris, so this was the first of Sanderson's works I've finished.

(Emperor's Soul is available as a trade paperback from Tachyon Publications and also as an ebook or Audible audiobook.)

New Year, New Book Challenges

So 2012 is nearly over and it's time to reflect on the year. I've really enjoyed having these challenges/read-a-longs to nudge me into reading things I wouldn't ordinarily read. Or maybe get around to that pile. I set out to read a bit more and surprised myself by doing just that. I signed up for Goodreads' Reading Challenge to read 30 books and managed to read 42! I also successfully climbed Pike's Peak for the 2012 Mt TBR Reading Challenge but couldn't quite move on to Mt Vancouver. So of course for this year's challenge I signed up for the Mt Blanc level of 24 books, just to challenge myself further. I don't have a list for that... yet.

I also vowed to spread my reading wings out a little and read some classics. The Classics Club challenge is perfect for that, because you can set up a list to tackle, but you have five years to finish. I spent some time thinking about these. Some are ones I've always meant to read and some I've always felt bad about not reading... it'll be interesting to see how far I get into this challenge. I'm already signed up for Unputdownables' Persuasion Read-a-long to start me off.

So here is my list:

1    Bram Stoker - Dracula
2    Henry James - Portrait of a Lady
3    Edith Wharton - House of Mirth
4    Edith Wharton - Age of Innocence
5    Edith Wharton - The Buccaneers
6    Charlotte Brontë - Jane Eyre
7    Charlotte Brontë - Villette
8    Edmund Spenser - The Faerie Queene
9    Virgil - Aeneid
10    Homer - The Iliad
11    Homer - The Odyssey
12    Emily Brontë - Wuthering Heights
13    Pierre Choderlos de Laclos - Les Liaisons Dangereuses
14    Jules Verne - Around the World in Eighty Days
15    Charles Dickens - Bleak House
16    Mary Shelley - Frankenstein
17    Wilkie Collins - The Moonstone
18    Wilkie Collins - The Woman in White
19    Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice
20    Jane Austen - Mansfield Park
21    Jane Austen - Northanger Abbey
22    Jane Austen - Persuasion
23    Sir Arthur Conan Doyle - Complete Sherlock Holmes
24    Sir Thomas Malory - Morte D’Arthur
25    JRR Tolkien - The Hobbit
26    Elizabeth Gaskell - Wives and Daughters
27    Elizabeth Gaskell - North and South
28    Daphne Du Maurier - Rebecca
29    L. Frank Baum - Wonderful Wizard of Oz
30    Lewis Carroll - Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
31    Lewis Carroll - Through the Looking Glass
32    TH White - Sword in the Stone
33    Flappers and Philosophers - F Scott Fitzgerald
34    William Butler Yeats - Complete Poems
35    Alfred Lord Tennyson - Idylls of the King
36    Chretien de Troyes - Arthurian Romances
37    Leo Tolstoy - War and Peace
38    Leo Tolstoy - Anna Karenina
39    Thomas Hardy - Return of the Native
40    HG Wells - Invisible Man
41    John Milton - Paradise Lost
42    Arabian Nights
43    Oscar Wilde – The Picture of Dorian Gray
44    Herodotus - Histories
45    Thucydides - History of the Peloponnesian War
46    Hesiod – Works and Days and Theogeny
47    Emily Dickinson - Complete Poems
48    Edgar Rice Burroughs - John Carter of Mars
49    Anthony Hope - The Prisoner of Zenda
50    Anthony Hope - Rupert of Hentzau
51    Niccolo Machiavelli - The Prince
52    Charles Dickens - A Christmas Carol

Goal for completion date: January 2018

Bolded books have been finished.

One More Page & Alma Katsu

I love bookstores. Whenever I go on trips, I am quick to check to see if there are any bookstores in town worth checking out. So I was delighted when I heard a new independent bookstore had opened locally, One More Page Books. The bookstore hosts a number of author events and reading groups; they also carry a unique array of chocolate and wine.

The six block walk from the Metro is accurate but it's a winding trip through some of Arlington/Falls Church's residential streets. Fortunately there are also bus routes that run fairly very close. That proved useful tonight. The June weather was hot and humid beyond belief, so walking was out of the question.

So I went to Alma Katsu's book launch for The Reckoning, the second book in her Taker Trilogy. I'd heard about the books from following the bookstore owner's twitter feed. The beautiful covers intrigued me enough to learn more about the books. I think I was one of the few at the signing that had not read the first one already though.

Alma Katsu was a delight, though. A petite woman, she worked in intelligence for thirty years before making the break to a full time writer. Rather than doing a reading, Katsu told us what the last year has been like since her first book came out. Her third book is actually due at the same time her second one is being released, so I can only imagine the planning and coordination involved. Some of it sounded like a cautionary tale to go with the old "So you wanna be a writer?" question. She made the comparison of feelings towards a first book as similar to a first child; for the first, you have great plans, everything will be coordinated and planned. By the time the second one has rolled around, you’re just ready to get on with it and you have no delusions whatsoever.

One thing Alma Katsu talked about that surprised me was quitting the day job. Most writers I know caution against that idea completely. Her publisher/editor reacted to that decision with "Uh, okay, right, hope it works for you." Honestly I would be a little nervous about that prospect, too. But she had good reasons why it made sense. As she pointed out, working for the Alphabets (i.e. CIA, NSA, etc) includes a lot of very strict non-disclosure statements and rules about interacting with the media. That doesn't translate very well for publishing purposes, especially for interviews. But she also added it took some adjusting to life outside those confines. Her schedule now is a far cry from a normal eight hour day, sometimes coming up for air in the middle of the day, before working late into the evening.

The funniest story came from a book trip overseas. Katsu has been fortunate to have her books already translated into several languages already, including Spanish, Polish, and Italian. Her Italian publishers brought her over for a few days. She’d thought it’d be the usual "meet and greet" when it was a steady block of interviews, including having her picture taken by several paparazzi. (That they could have gotten photos from her website apparently hadn’t occurred to anyone.) So she had these photo shoots with these typical older Italian photographers that didn’t speak English very well and mostly suggested poses with gestures and such. Katsu demonstrated some of them and they were the silliest of silly. What was funnier was when she received the links for the photos later and saw they’d done photos for most of the major authors that went through from Salmon Rushdie to Isabel Allende – all making the exact same quirky set of poses.

The One More Page’s owner was celebrating her birthday, so there was cake! Both a small ice cream cake before the signing and a large sheet cake with the Reckoning cover on it for afterwards. They also had a choice of Spanish sparkling wine and a Zinfandel/Shiraz blend.

The signing line was growing longer and longer as I was leaving. I was delighted to meet Alma Katsu and get my books signed, but also needed to head for home. I will caution people, if they want to browse at length, check their schedule on the website to make sure there isn’t an event. It is a smallish shop, so they have to move some shelving and block other sections to make enough space, so some places are hard to access. The store does offer a free frequent buyer program and will special order/ preorder books for you.

Honestly I love the bookstore. It’s a great alternate option to have available, even if I can’t get to it regularly.

Halfway up Pike's Peak

I've stalled a bit on my TBR challenge to be honest. I'd blame those dratted library books, because they’re so distracting. I seem to be stuck midway through several likely suspects. So I'm huddled in a nice section of the mountain, taking a break before tackling the next round. I am pleased, though, that I discovered the Goodreads' Mt TBR Reading Group for sharing our experiences/war stories/book discoveries.

The current list:
Strong Poison
In the Garden of Iden
Staying Dead
Dagger Magic
Blue Bloods
Affinity Bridge
Masquerade

1. Tell us how many miles you've made it up your mountain (# of books read).

I've finished seven books in my TBR Challenge, only three since the last update. To try my hand at the weird math, Pike's Peak is 14,115 feet. I've completed 7/12 books or 58% of my goal. That means that I'm 5,928 feet up currently. (Did I do that right? I'm lousy at math.) Oh, I do hope I brought enough supplies...

2. Compose a poem using the titles from your list (lower case words are what I added):

In the Garden of Iden
Staying Dead
is a
Blue Bloods
Masquerade


B. Who has been your favorite character so far and why?

I could be obvious and say Lord Peter Wimsey, but to choose from the last three books I read, I'd say Lawrence van Alen in the Blue Bloods series. He first appears in Masquerade and I liked how De La Cruz played with the usual expectations of vampire lore and changed it around a little with Lawrence's abilities. Lawrence is old and frankly set in his habits. He has certain expectations of how people should act that are rather contrary to the current crop. He makes for a different kind of contrast. I would have loved to have seen Lawrence in his prime, rather than as a fairly broken spirit.

C. Have any of the books surprised you -- if so in what way? (not as good as anticipated? unexpected ending? Best thing you've read all year?)

Dagger Magic surprised me in a bad way. I reread the earlier Adept books leading up to that one and they weren't stellar but they were good for they were. At Dagger Magic, all the charm and energy seemed to have disappeared, along with the copyediting. It wound up being a slough to get through. I still have Death of an Adept left in my TBR shelf and I'm not all that keen to get to it.

D. Bonus question: What am I reading now from the TBR pile?

I did manage to read a few chapters of Seanan McGuire’s An Artificial Night today. I’m hoping that will spur me on to finish that for book #8.