Clam Shares Books & Cheese ❂ 2024 ~ Part IV ❂

This was my second time experiencing The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy. This time around I did the audio as read by Alan Rickman *sigh.* I did not enjoy it quite as much this time, but I appreciated the setting, the writing and the descriptions of the heath much more than I remember doing the first time. Then again I had forgotten quite a bit of this, since much of the ending came as a surprise to me. Hardy was very big on punishing his characters for their flaws and missteps. Sometimes they are simply in the wrong place at the wrong time or they make bad choices, and sometimes they are actually despicable. Alan Rickman is practically perfect, but at one point when one of the characters is pontificating I could have sworn he was doing an imitation of one of the characters from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. :o)

I am not sure what I am listening to next. Perhaps the latest in the Bobiverse series.

Happy new thread.

Happy new thread! Looking forward to more cheese and reading reports!

Joining in with the general wishes for lots of good reading throughout the next couple of months. Happy new thread!

Happy new thread! Sounds like Rickman was trying to bring some levity to that novel.

Happy new thread! Wishing you many good books :)

Happy new thread!

Happy new thread, Clam!

>2 pgmcc:, >3 Sakerfalcon:, >4 jillmwo:, >5 Karlstar:, >6 Alexandra_book_life:, >7 curioussquared: & >8 haydninvienna: Thank you!

I finished The Riddle-Master of Hed in the wee hours this morning, and I'm hoping to write about tomorrow.

>9 clamairy: I'm looking forward to your thoughts.

Happy New Thread!

>11 hfglen: Thank you.

>10 Karlstar: I did enjoy it, and I will definitely finish the series. I just have to figure out how to word my brief review.

Where do I start with The Riddle-Master of Hed? I did enjoy it quite a bit. It was not quite up the the level of the other books of hers that I have read, but she is a master (no pun intended) of creating an atmosphere. There were some stunning glimpses of McKillip's genius.

The darkness and the red, panting embers whirled around him until the darkness rose about his face like a tide, and the fire seemed tiny, far away. In the well of night he saw Hed drifting like a broken ship in the sea; he heard the vine leaves whispering drily, felt in his veins the rivers slowing, thickening, draining dry, their beds cracking to the harpist’s weave.

I love Morgon. He keeps shying away from his destiny, and then barreling right into it. I am a bit confused about the three stars above his brow, though. At first I thought they were reddish birthmarks, but then at one point I thought they were described as jewel-like. My main quibble is that everything he puts his mind to he rather quickly masters. I liked his side-kick Deth, though after the mind-blowing reveal at the end of the book I am no longer sure how to feel about him.

I just randomly picked a cover I liked, because I actually own the omnibus edition, which makes it impossible to rate the three books individually. (And I think they should be.)

I have to read Even to a Jellyfish for a local author talk & book signing, but I plan to finish this trilogy before the end of the year.

>13 clamairy: That's a great quote. I'm glad you enjoyed it. I like that series for the depth of the characters, but I think she developed a more light, poetic prose in her later books.

>14 Karlstar: Even if I had not looked it up I think I would have figured out that she wrote this one early in her career. Great stuff, though. Did you read this one soon after it was published?

>13 clamairy: I am happy to see that you enjoyed Riddle-Master of Hed :) This trilogy is the only thing by McKillip I've read so far. I liked it! Hopefully, I will read more.

>16 Alexandra_book_life: Oh, oh! You must! :o) Perhaps you might like Winter Rose? It's a Tam Lin based story.

Okay, I feel like an idiot. I just looked up Tam Lin to make sure I was spelling it correctly and found this:

"It is a compound name, formed from ``Tam,'' a diminutive of Thomas, and ``Lin,'' which can mean ``lake'' or ``pool'' in Gaelic."

Having read Ann Patchett's Tom Lake few months ago I feel that I need to completely rethink the themes in that book!

>15 clamairy: Yes, I read it for the first time when they were published in paperback (were there hardcovers?), not sure when I bought them but my copies of the first two are 1978 first editions. $1.95!

Ed: someday I'll get references right.

>18 Karlstar: So you were a youngling then? I don't remember even hearing of McKillip until I joined LibraryThing.

>16 Alexandra_book_life: and >18 Karlstar: and >19 clamairy: Yes, there were in fact hardcover editions of the three individual volumes. At one point, I think I owned them, but Riddle-master wasn't my favorite of hers, so I passed them along to a family member, along with all three volumes of Guy Gavriel Kay's Fionavar Tapestry. At any rate, the first time I encountered McKillip was in my twenties and the book was The Forgotten Beasts of Eld. Hit me like a ton of bricks. (Still does. It's a wonderful, wonderful book.) You read it, you weep over it and then you shelve it again for another decade because you just can't bear to go through that again too soon.

>19 clamairy: I think that was the stage where I bought 50% of the fantasy paperbacks available at my local Walden Books, with what little spare change I had from my grocery store job. I've been glad I did ever since! I think in the last 20 years or so, with her books not appearing on bookshelves as consistently, I got behind on some of her books. I'm still trying to get to the ones I'm missing.

>20 jillmwo: I looked it up after I commented and I see that the image in >13 clamairy: is from the hardcover. I might have to pick one up, but they are a little pricey. There's also a Easton Press edition.

I agree, The Forgotten Beasts of Eld is great.

>21 Karlstar: I remember Walden Books very fondly, also B. Dalton's and Borders. There was one brick and mortar store near me when I was in high school, and the fantasy section was sparse to say the least. I got almost all of my books used at the local library used book sale until I went away to college.

>20 jillmwo: &>21 Karlstar: I'm glad you found her when you were young. I think once I got out of college I spent all my money on literary fiction and classics. I really did not start reading fantasy much again until I was in my early '40s.

Happy new thread! Did you end up starting the new Bob book?

>23 Narilka: Thank you! I did and I am loving it!!!

>17 clamairy: I would be very interested in a Tam Lin story, yes! :)

I've been meaning to read Tom Lake as well. Hmm...

>25 Alexandra_book_life: I can see the Tam Lin storyline in Tom Lake now in retrospect. I don't think it would have changed my enjoyment of the story knowing it ahead of time. But I almost want to reread it now.

Oh, I love a Tam Lin story and this made me want to read Tom Lake more than I already did. Thanks for the tip!

You might like Tam Lin by Pamela Dean.

I couldn't get to sleep last night and as I was tossing and turning I kept thinking over the Tam Lin/Tom Lake conundrum. I'm not sure there really is a connection, and I don't have time to spend on it right now. I tried Google multiple times and can't find anyone else who has even suggested there might be a link. :o(

>29 clamairy: Feel free to invent it and be the first!

>24 clamairy: YAY!!

I swiped this photo from Reddit, but I just bought this cheese at Costco last week and it is very tasty. Imported from Holland, with just a hint of apple and cinnamon.

>32 clamairy: Sounds delicious! A hint of apple and cinnamon sounds like the right amount.

We bought some of this cheese recently (twice) to have with pears. This person said it better than I could, so here's a link to a blog post about Cypress Grove's Midnight Moon hard goat cheese.

http://saycheesereview.blogspot.com/2017/12/midnight-moon.html

>33 Karlstar: Oh yes, I've had that! It's delightful.:o) Thanks for the reminder to keep an eye out for it.

>34 clamairy: Oh good! It is super expensive but fantastic.

>32 clamairy: It sounds delicious! I don't think I've ever tried cheese with a hint of apple and cinnamon before. Interesting!

Looks like I am the only one here on LT with a copy of this book, and I expect it will stay that way for a while at least. I did enjoy reading Even to a Jellyfish. This is another book set locally written by a gentleman who lives in my town.* It's mostly about the joys and sorrows of aging. There is quite a bit a humor, and the running punchline is that after seeing all the ads on TV for Prevagen (an alleged memory booster made with jellyfish) the main character in this book starts popping one small moon jelly** in his mouth every morning. I see they can be quite large, but the local ones are usually no more than an inch or two in diameter.

I am not sure if I enjoyed this more because of all the local references, or because the narrator and I are of an age, or if it's because I grew up with six older brothers and so have a more twisted/juvenile sense of humor than most women.

I read the eBook, but I enjoyed it enough to buy a paper copy for one of my brother-in-laws to read.

*It's actually a hamlet, but it sounds weird to say he lives in my hamlet.

**https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aurelia_aurita

I am giving Not Till We Are Lost and extra half of a star just because I was so happy to be back in the Bobiverse again. Ray Porter does such an amazing job reading Dennis E. Taylor's books. What a fun SciFi series.

>38 clamairy: I don't do audiobooks so I'm going to have to wait for the ebook to come out. Glad you're continuing to enjoy the series.

>39 AHS-Wolfy: They are so enjoyable!

I forgot to mention that I am currently listening to Going Postal by Terry Pratchett and reading What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher.

I thought folks might be interested in taking a look at these very cool objects for sale, that katylit posted in the Green Dragon group on Facebook.

Several of us were discussing how we could display them because it looks like they need to be driven into wood.

https://metalbird.ca/pages/lord-of-the-rings?

>40 clamairy: A friend gave us one of those, but I've been afraid to put it up--would it hurt the tree?

>41 Marissa_Doyle: I guess if it was a big enough tree it probably wouldn't, but I don't want to do that either. I was thinking of putting it into good sized piece of driftwood, and then mounting that somewhere.

>41 Marissa_Doyle: >42 clamairy: My brother gave us one too, but we weren't willing to drive it into tree, so it just hangs on a nail in the kitchen. I like the driftwood idea.

>41 Marissa_Doyle: & >43 Karlstar: I do not think The Professor would approve of us impaling a live tree.

A retelling of The Fall of the House of Usher written by T. Kingfisher? Count me in! What Moves the Dead is just perfect for October. In fact I gave myself a great big dose of the willies reading in bed last night and had a little trouble sleeping. There is so much humor in this book that I was somewhat tricked into letting my guard down.

When I was nineteen and had seen a few battles and thought myself very hardened and worldly, I myself slept with my sidearm under my pillow. This lasted until the night that the damn thing discharged under my ear. If I’d been sleeping with my head on the other half of the pillow, I would probably not be telling you this story now, but I escaped unharmed. The pillow exploded into a blizzard of feathers and the bullet took out the lamp and buried itself in the closet door. I had just enough presence of mind to grab my luggage before I was thrown out into the street by the proprietress, who screamed at me for five minutes straight. Unfortunately for her, I was completely deafened and so missed the nuance of her diatribe, but the hand gestures were very clear.

This is the first in a series called Sworn Soldier and I will be borrowing the second one soon.

I have already started Creation Lake but isn't grabbing me yet. I have been busy getting ready for a visit from my daughter. We will be attending the Oyster Fest in Greenport tomorrow.

>45 clamairy: I am really looking forward to What Moves the Dead. It's just the problem of choosing from my book queue...

>45 clamairy: Fascinating cover!

Sorry I haven't been on much. As some of you saw in the weekend thread, 'stuff happened.' And then my daughter had a bad cold and stayed with me a few extra days. There must have been some good juju flowing my way because I did not catch her cold.



Anyhow, I finished listening to Going Postal and it is now tied for 1st place with Wyrd Sisters as my favorite Pratchett. I plan to read it at some point, because it's both hilarious and brilliant. I know I've run into Moist during my previous visits to Discworld before, because I recognized the name, but I can't figure out which book I've read where he was mentioned.

A few choice tidbits:

There is a saying ‘You can’t fool an honest man,’ which is much quoted by people who make a profitable living by fooling honest men.

The smell of sausages is always better than the actual sausage.

He liked the kind of business where you could actually speak to the man whose name was over the door; it meant it probably wasn’t run by crooks.

I've already started listening to something creepy for Halloween, The Haunting of Maddy Clare, and so far it's just right. Not so scary I can't sleep, but enough to keep the hairs on my neck fashionably risen.

>48 clamairy: I haven't read Going Postal yet. It's going to be fun, though!

I did like the film, have you seen it?

>49 Alexandra_book_life: I have not. In fact I didn't even realize it existed until yesterday.

>50 clamairy: Well, I hope you will enjoy if you see it :)

>51 Alexandra_book_life: Thank you. Right now my To Watch list is enormous. Also, I will probably wait until I have forgotten the details to avoid screaming "That's not how it is in the book!" at my screen.

Many thanks to Sakerfalcon, curioussquared, ludmillalotaria and, I believe, LibraryPerilous for this one. Vespertine is a roller-coaster ride of a book, and was a perfect choice for the Halloween season. There must be a dozen or more different kind of ghosties in this book, and most of them are deadly. Of course our heroine ends up 'inhabited' by a revenant, the most dangerous kind of all. I loved this. My daughter also put in a plug for the book when I said I was thinking of reading it next. Wonderful stuff, scary and thoughtful in places, and no gooey romance, either.

I've already started What Feasts at Night to keep the Halloween chills coming.

You're just wallowing in the murky darkness of Halloween, aren't you?

>54 jillmwo: I am! It's mostly distracting me from the news... :o)

*chortling* I'm reading a bunch of non-fiction as if being wedded to facts will somehow or other keep me grounded and sensible rather than blithering and flailing my arms...

Oooh, I meant to tell you that a friend of mine was there at the Oyster fest this past weekend. I gather parking is challenging in that little town.

>56 jillmwo: I do much flailing, and there is a steady stream of profanity when I read the NY Times and the Washington Post on my phone in the morning. After that I try desperately not to look much.

Oh! Yes. One needs to be somewhat familiar with the side streets. Also, that was as packed as I have ever seen it, and this was my 3rd time there.

I've turned off the television until the afternoon "oldies" come on. Perry Mason can be very soothing.

>57 clamairy: I only stream entertainment these days. I haven't put on the news for weeks.

I missed your Oyster Fest comment the first time around, BTW. How did your friends end up out here?

>59 clamairy: Food network and football are good for avoiding news!

>59 clamairy: Bill -- think Floyd on the Muppets -- lives somewhere on Long Island. He follows his brother's band around on weekends and his brother had a gig in a local bar. (Please don't ask me the name of the band. I couldn't tell you.)

>60 Karlstar: I wish there was a Cheese Network.

>62 clamairy: I'm surprised they don't have a cheese-themed show, at least.

The Cheese Continuum.

Any network execs listening, you are welcome to the name.

>64 MrAndrew:
…for a small consideration.

...paid in cheese.

>64 MrAndrew: & >65 pgmcc: I would definitely work for cheese. (Not Velveeta.)

Fished another audiobook. The Haunting of Maddy Clare by Simone St. James was quasi-scary, and would have gotten a higher rating from me if there hadn't been a big fat "does he really like me?" romance in the middle of it. I moved right on to another of hers, also set in the aftermath of WWI England. I'm working outside right now, planting stuff to Winter over, and I need most of my wits about me, so I can't listen to anything requiring much thought.

I also finished What Feasts at Night, by T. Kingfisher. This one was a bit scary, but not as much as What Moves the Dead. It includes many of the same characters, and once again there is much humor. She has become one of my favorites.

If this was a fairy tale, it was the kind where everyone gets eaten as a cautionary tale about straying into the woods, not the sentimental kind that ends with a wedding...

I think I am starting The Canterville Ghost tonight. I have never read it, and I have never seen any of the film versions.

>26 clamairy:
I am currently reading Karla's Choice. A new character has been introduced. His name is Tom Lake. I will be watching to see what happens to him and whether or not there is a link to Tam Lin. I have not read Patchett's book yet, but this might push me towards it.

Nick Harkaway is highly intelligent, he does extensive research and has encyclopaedic knowledge in his head. While the appearance of Tom Lake may be a highly improbable happenstance it is not beyond the possibility that Nick has included this as some sort of Easter egg, or there is some link to the Tam Lin story, or he has done this as some sort of nod or joke between himself and Ann Patchett. I cannot believe he is not aware of Patchett's book title, and I would not be surprised by his knowing the Tam Lin story.

We shall see.

>70 pgmcc: Fascinating! I can't wait to find out if there is a link. Nothing would surprise me.

I am editing this to add that in the Patchett book Tom Lake is not a person, it is a place.

I may have read The Canterville Ghost when I was a yoot, because parts of it seemed familiar. This was a charming humorous tale from Oscar Wilde. I'm pretty sure it was considered YA or a children's story when written. (Although some of the murders and death described are a tad gruesome.) I thought I got the illustrated edition, because that is how it is described, but I could not find the illustrations. I ended up finding them all on project Gutenberg.

I've already started reading Edith Holler, thanks to Jill and Marissa.

>72 clamairy: The two what?

>73 Karlstar: Yoots!

>74 clamairy:
Did you say "Yoots"?

>76 clamairy: :) Great movie.

>77 Karlstar: One of my all-time favorites.

I finished listening to Silence for the Dead by Simone St. James, ready by Billie Fulford-Brown. I liked this audio production better than the previous one. She read all the dialogue with a bit of dialect, but did not try to lower her voice to do the males. (Some narrators can mimic other genders' voices beautifully, and others sound ridiculous.) I enjoyed this more than The Haunting of Maddy Clare. It's set in a similar time period, right after WWI, and there are multiple soilders with PTSD at a hospital, which just happens to be haunted. Now I am trying to decide if I should try to squeeze in one more scary book before the 31st, of if I should just finish that Great Courses book I was working on.

I tend to either read or listen to The Legend of Sleepy Hollow this time of year, and I almost forgot! One of my favorites.

Finished listening to The October Country by Ray Bradbury, narrated by David Aaron Baker right before Halloween. I enjoyed being part of that group read very much. We need more of those.

I also finished The Seventh Bride which is a retelling of the Bluebeard tale. Well done, but not quite as good as the two I finished by Kingfisher earlier this month.

I am too depressed to read something as dark as Edith Holler, so I put that down and picked up The Naturalist Society. So far it's decent.

I do not have time to catch up on anyone else's threads right now. I have to assemble a small lightweight gazebo to go over my grill and pizza oven while it is still warm & light out. Wish me luck. I hope to be back this evening.

I agree that now might not be the ideal time to read Edith Holler. Good luck with the gazebo. That said, I feel confident that your construction skills are up to the challenge.

That gazebo sounds lovely. It'll be a nice outdoor space when done.

>82 clamairy: Luck to you! Going it's done by now. I will keep your thoughts in mind when I get to The Seventh Bride.

>82 clamairy:
Good luck with the construction. I hope you really enjoy the grilling and pizza oven evenings.

>82 clamairy: I hope it went well.

>83 jillmwo: >84 catzteach: >85 MrsLee: >86 pgmcc: & >87 Karlstar: I did it! The instructions said it was a two-person job, but I managed it on my own. It did get a little tricky, but I propped a corner up on table at one point. It went a lot more smoothly than I expected it to, though it did take a couple of hours. This is not the kind of gazebo that goes out on a lawn for summer tea. This is purely functional protection for an Oomi pizza oven that is not supposed to get very wet. I can't fit the grill under there and still have room to maneuver easily. So I will be putting my giant bird seed container under there instead.

I found this great piece (sharing as a gift, so no paywall) about this trend in Asian comfort reads on the New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/07/books/healing-fiction-japan-korea-before-the-... I've never heard of Kawaguchi or any of these other authors before, but I will definitely be seeking them out now!

>88 clamairy:
I think your masterful construction project requires a photograph to be displayed. We want to see the edifice over the pizza oven.

Well done on putting it up. There is an expression here when someone does some amazing work:

You're some woman for one woman.

Your putting it together by yourself when it required two people certainly makes this the appropriate saying for this moment.

...

>88 clamairy: I have several of those Japanese books on my kindle. I liked the couple I've read so far. Light and comforting.

>89 pgmcc: LOL Thank you. I will try to remember to post a photo at some point. Right now I'm more concerned with attaching it to the side of the house securely so if we get a bad storm it stays put.

>91 Sakerfalcon: So glad to hear this!

>88 clamairy: Good work! What kind of pizza oven do you have? I've been wondering about those gadgets.

>93 Karlstar: It's a propane fired Ooni. My niece gave it to me, and I've only used it once so far. I doubt I'll be using it in the Winter, I just wanted to keep it protected. The pizza is delicious, but it cooks soooo quickly!

We have an Ooni, too, but we only use it with wood. Hubby is the cook so he manages it all. Great little thing. We use it in winter sometimes, but mostly it's a summer thing.

>92 clamairy: I want a photo as well. Do you eat pizza that often? Or can it be used for baking other kinds of things? I've never heard of an Ooni pizza oven so speaking from absolute ignorance at this end.

>94 clamairy: >95 Bookmarque: Two votes for an Ooni, I'll look into it.

Here's ours on the deck. We got the table separately - it has a stainless steel top which I highly recommend since it gets to about 900 DF. We keep wood and other stuff underneath.



And here it is heating up -



And of course the fruits of his labor -





He makes his own dough and sauce.

I make my own dough year round and my own sauce in the summer. I hadn't been making pizza in the summer because I didn't want to put my oven on. I have a stainless steel table that came separately as well. And yes I was spelling it incorrectly because I dictated my post. 😂 I'm sure Jill's husband will have something to say about that.

>98 Bookmarque: Mine look very similar, but there's at least twice as much cheese on mine... 😁

I'm at 93 books read/listened to for 2024 so far. For over a decade I have been dutifully keeping a log on my LT wiki. That way I can just copy and paste it into my old style .txt document I have been keeping since I got my first word processor in 1990. Before that I had been writing book titles on my calendar as I completed them. My creaky old document has my "books read" list dating back to 1986! I know I missed a few, especially during my child rearing years. And some years when I was working I was lucky if I got through a dozen books in twelve months. (Sometimes I was putting in 90+ hours a week.) So I am close to hitting the 1500 books 'consumed' mark. Not bad for 39 years of reading record keeping.

>98 Bookmarque: Thanks! The pizza looks awesome.

>101 clamairy: Congrats, that is a lot, both this year and the 1500 mark.

>101 clamairy: You have managed quite a lot in 2024. I am definitely behind you in the number of titles completed and doubt I could catch up to you in the weeks remaining. I stand in bumfuzzled awe. And that you've tracked most of that reading since starting in 1986...

>104 jillmwo: You're very kind. At least one third of this year's books were audio. I have terrible trouble making myself do anything mindless (cleaning, laundry, weeding) unless I'm distracting myself with an audiobook. My house isn't actually clean, but it's cleaner than it would be! I don't listen to books while I'm walking on the beach. That is something I want to wallow in.

I bought the hardcover of Beren and Lúthien soon after it was published, but I kept putting off reading it. I recently snagged it on Audible, after reading The Fall of Arthur and realizing I wanted someone to read Tolkien's lyrical poetry to me. This book is narrated by a father and son team, with the older gentleman reading the parts written by Christopher Tolkien, who was already in his 90s when this was published. The son reads all of the parts J.R.R. wrote himself, some of which is prose and some of which is not. I loved the poetry the best. In fact I plan to listen to many of those parts again at some point. Definitely one of the highlights of my reading/listening year so far.

I have been having issues settling on my next listen. I tried The Time Traveler's Guide to Elizabethan England but he started talking about drawing and quartering people and I wasn't in the mood for that. I have downloaded Swan Song and I hope I can stick with it.

I met a friend of mine who is visiting from Virginia for a walk at a new preserve that's only two miles from my house. Sadly half of the trails are closed because it's hunting season, so we walked the other ones twice. Anyway this sturdy fellow was crossing the trail at one point. It's an Eastern Box Turtle.

>107 clamairy: Such vibrant colors. Cool turtle.

>106 clamairy: Glad you enjoyed Beren and Luthien. I really enjoyed it, along with Children of Hurin and The Fall of Gondolin.

>107 clamairy: Wow, that's a lovely turtle. Great colours.

They're pretty in the Fall. Until the shells finally drop off, that is.

Then... avert your eyes.

>109 Karlstar: I found The Children of Húrin very depressing. I still have to read The Fall of Gondolin, but that also sounds a bit grim. I just acquired that and The Fall of Númenor as Audible books, so I hope to get to them in the coming year.

>108 Narilka: & >110 Alexandra_book_life: Thank you. His eyes were a crazy shade of red.

>111 MrAndrew: Ha!

>107 clamairy: What a beauty! I've only seen Painted Turtles, would love to see one of these guys.

>107 clamairy: For a lot of your post I thought you were saying that the turtle was your friend from Virginia. I was thinking that was a long way for a turtle to travel; even for a good friend.

>112 clamairy: True, neither of those are happy stories, as one way or another, they are all bound up in the curse/oath of the Noldor, but they are great stories.

>116 Karlstar: Yes in this case his writing more than makes up for the tears I shed.

I have bailed on listening to Swan Song. It's moving slowly and it's so depressing and dreary. Definitely not what I want right now. I have started listening to Haroun and the Sea of Stories and I am enjoying it very much so far. I did not know Rushdie had a sense of humor!

Oh I'm with you on Swan Song. My very short and negative review starts off like this - Ugh. Tedious. Intensely negative. Violent. Cruel. Predictable. And I don't really care much about any of the people in the vignettes.

>118 clamairy: For a fun work that might help lift the spirits a bit, have you read The Hearing Trumpet? Or, how about Travel Light?

I really enjoyed McCammon's Boy's Life but had to DNF The Wolf's Hour when I tried it earlier this year. I read Swan Song back in the 1980s and recall nothing about it now, only that I liked it at the time. I'm not sure I'm the same reader today though so I don't plan to revisit McCammon - especially after the sheer stupidity of The Wolf's Hour. Thank goodness I didn't already buy the sequel to that one!

>119 Bookmarque: Yes, and the NY city street scenes seems like they were lifted from a low-budget 1980s cop show. Plus the narration wasn't helping.

>120 ScoLgo: I will keep those in mind for after I finish listening to the Rushdie. The only other book of his I have read was Speaks the Nightbird and I thought it was quite good. I will take a hard pass on The Wolf's Hour. Pretty sure I own Boy's Life. I'll have to check.

>53 clamairy: I think I read somewhere that the author has scrapped a Vespertine sequel for the time being.

>88 clamairy: re: cozy Asian fiction, I've enjoyed The Dallergut Dream Department Store, the Kamogawa Food Detectives series and The Lantern of Lost Memories. I've read a couple of others that were enjoyable but not as good.

>122 libraryperilous: I liked the way Vespertine ended, so no sequel is okay.
Thanks for the recommendations.

Well, The Naturalist Society by Carrie Vaughn had a very intriguing magical system, driven by naturalists and other scientists, and with powers gained by identifying different species of fauna and flora. Mostly this involves men killing animals to gain a bit more magical ability. Enter a woman with more power than most men, but who must keep it under wraps. I could have done with a lot less of the romances, and a bit more fleshing out of the actual magic system. Still an entertaining read, especially since it was a freebie from Amazon last month. Not sure I could recommend this to that many people, though.

I have started The Adventures of Tom Bombadil while I wait for an OverDrive hold to come through.

>124 clamairy: Ugh, I picked this one as a freebie last month, but I wondered about the romance(s).

>125 libraryperilous: Give it a try. I felt the rest of the story made up for that bit.

>124 clamairy: Love that cover. The magic system sounds intriguing. I am thinking of the works of Amy Stewart, like The Drunken Botanist and Wicked Plants and all the fun things there are to know about plant lore. Too bad about the romance. I will probably skip that one. Sounds like it doesn't deliver as well as it could on the plant stuff.

>127 MrsLee: I did love the cover. There is not much humor in this one though. I got the whole analogy that many scientists, ornithologists in particular, were killing the things that they wanted to learn about, while this brilliant woman was learning as much by simply observing. In this case they aren't just learning, they are gaining arcane powers.

I have started The Spellshop which was a book bullet from tardis.

>124 clamairy: Oh, I'm sorry to hear about the romance side of things. I have little interest and less patience in it when it gets in the way of the story.

>124 clamairy: I can’t remember if that’s the one I picked up last month or not. I don’t mind a bit of romance, but I don’t like books that are ALL romance.

And your pizza oven looks fun! I have friends that would love one. :)

>129 majkia: Don't be afraid to give it a shot. It might just be the foul mood I'm in.

>130 catzteach: It wasn't all romance. Right now my tolerance for such things is at an all-time low.

Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Salman Rushdie got off to a bit of a slow start, but improved greatly as I got more involved. It was quite humorous. It reminded me of a Discworld book at times. I suspect this won't be my last book by Mr. Rushdie.

I have already started listening to The Fall of Númenor.

Thank you, tardis for The Spellshop, which was just the warm hug of a book I needed. As the author states in her acknowledgements at the end of the book:

This book is my gift to anyone who wants to escape and sink into a world filled with kindness and enchantment.

Here are a few more notable tidbits.

It wasn’t that she didn’t like people. It was only that she liked books more. They didn’t fuss or judge or mock or reject. They invited you in, fluffed up the pillows on the couch, offered you tea and toast, and shared their hearts with no expectation that you’d do anything more than absorb what they had to give.

“You could have been struck by lightning, swept out to sea, crushed by a tree—I’d half written your eulogy. I said very nice things.”
Kiela laughed. “Thank you, I think?”
“It was in iambic pentameter.”
“That’s amazing.”
“I had to create different versions, to match the different ways you died.”

This reminded me quite a bit of the Legends & Lattes series. Thankfully Sarah Beth Durst is going to continue the series, with the next book titled The Enchanted Greenhouse, which should be published next Summer. Turns out this author is local to The Isle of Long! I shall be checking to see if she does any signings or readings.

Not sure what's up next. I have The Booklover's Library on hold, but it might be another few days.

>133 clamairy:
“It was in iambic pentameter.”
“That’s amazing.”
“I had to create different versions, to match the different ways you died.”

LOL!

>133 clamairy: I just added that one to my wishlist as something for my sons to consider as a potential Christmas gift. Frankly, I could use something like this, that is a book "with kindness and enchantment" to read.

>135 jillmwo: It does get a little overly-sweet in a couple places, but right now that's fine with me.

>134 pgmcc: I guffawed at that bit. The added humor is that the speaker is a sentient spider plant.

>133 clamairy: I've been eyeing this one. Looks like I should add it to my wish list :)

pew pew pew aaaack ded.

>133 clamairy: I have this on Kindle. Bumping it up the TBR pile.

>137 Narilka: I hope it suits your tastes.

>139 Sakerfalcon: I do hope you enjoy it. There isn't much substance, but I didn't care.

>138 MrAndrew: :o)

Relight My Fire, part 4 of The Stranger Times was good fun. Maybe I didn't love quite as much as part 3, but that's small potatoes. There was much guffawing on my part.

A former close associate of billionaire and champion of certain types of free speech Elon Musk has shocked the world by announcing that Musk does not exist and is, in fact, an online entity entirely generated by artificial intelligence.

‘It was an experiment to see what AI could do,’ Drake explained. ‘We input a bunch of tech magazines, sixteen pages of Atlas Shrugged and a 1994 edition of Hustler, and Elon was what popped out. He has since run amok, building up a fortune while claiming responsibility for other people’s work and telling everyone how the world should be run.

Maybe I'm laughing and crying...

I'm back at The Adventures of Tom Bombadil and I'm almost finished listening to The Fall of Númenor, which has been a bit more eye-opening than I expected it to be.

I bought myself a Kindle copy of James. I rarely pay full price for ebooks, but this one has been getting such praise, I figured it would be well worth it. I might be saving this for after the holidays, though.

>141 clamairy: I am looking forward to reading book 4 of The Stranger Times! The first three were so much fun.

>142 Alexandra_book_life: I am sure you will enjoy it. Now I have to wait for book 5. Although I guess I could go back to reading the Dublin trilogy.

I started and bailed on The Booklover's Library. I believe it might have been a LibraryThing algorithm recommendation, because no one I know owns it or has recommended it. The writing style was pedestrian, and I'm not a Spring chicken, so I'm not wasting precious reading time on it. Moving on to Colored Television which was highly praised by the NY Times.

>144 clamairy: I've read a couple of Martin's books and liked them. I DNFed this one. She writes what I'd call historical chick lit, and it's very formulaic.

>145 libraryperilous: Formulaic, that's the perfect word for it. I felt like I could see what was coming and was not all that interested. I can see some of her other books have high ratings, so I'm not giving up on her completely.

Well, The Fall of Númenor: And Other Tales from the Second Age of Middle-Earth was a bit of an eye-opener for me. Quite a few of the Númenoreans in the book weren't pleasant people. In many ways this book shines a bright light on these folk the same way The Simarillion did with the elves, and much of it is not pretty. Fascinating stuff, though. Particularly the different versions of the same tale. I appreciated much of the detail surrounding Sauron, since I have been watching The Rings of Power. I know they aren't supposed to be using books like these for their source material, but I believe they much be sneaking in bits of it. I especially enjoyed learning that Sauron did indeed try to turn over a new leaf, as it were, after the defeat of Morgoth. I'm not sure how hard he tried, but try he did. Great stuff. I listened to the Audible version, but checked my hardcover for the lovely illustrations.

I have already started listening to Remnant Population. So far so good!

>147 clamairy: I was thinking I didn't need that one, but now...

>148 Karlstar: You might not. It is all pieces from other books, just put together chronologically. I haven't read any of the Unfinished Tales or The Lost Tales. I'm guessing there is serious overlap between this book and Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-Earth.

Great article about Martha Wells and her amazing up and down career. It should be free to read. Watch out that you don't click on the ubiquitous ads.

https://www.wired.com/story/murderbot-she-wrote-martha-wells/

>150 clamairy: I read that! So glad she's doing well, now. Hope she continues for as long as she wants to !

>151 tardis: Right? She seems like such a normal (I'm using the word very loosely here) human being. I hope she continues to write great things for us for many decades to come.

I've bailed on another book. This time it was Colored Television, which is on the NY Times 100 best books of the year list. I just couldn't get past an intelligent woman doing something incredibly stupid and seemingly out of character. After I decided to bail I came in here and read the few reviews. I believe I made the right choice. What do they call it when you become exceedingly uncomfortable /embarrassed for a fictional character? I know I'm having a bad reading experience when I look for other things to do besides pick up my Kindle. I think I'm only going to read 'fun stuff' until after the holidays.

Totally with you. I bet the Germans have a word for that. They seem to have a word for everything.

>154 Bookmarque: They might! I start to worry that I'm getting old and rigid if I cannot enjoy reading a book outside of my comfort zone. In my defense there's something very unsettling when a character you like starts behaving in cruel selfish ways. I don't believe there's any personal growth to be had by forcing myself to keep going. They'll probably make a movie out of this anyway, and I'll watch that instead.

Meanwhile I've started Paladin's Strength as I'm only looking to be entertained and not enlightened right now.

>153 clamairy:. I went and read the reviews of Colored Television and I agree that you likely made the right decision by giving up on it. Stick with some light-hearted stuff for a while.

Making the 100 Best Books list of even the New York Times means far less than it used to. Maybe it's just me being stuck in "retirement age molasses" but there wasn't much on their list that I found intriguing.

>156 jillmwo: I did check the rating in here before I put it on hold, and a couple of months ago that rating was higher than it is now, interestingly enough. I agree about the NY Times 100 Best list, but The Washington Post just released their Ten Best Books of the year list, only five of which are Fiction, and Colored Television made that list.

>153 clamairy:

Good call!

>155 clamairy:
Enjoying reading something that is outside your comfort zone sounds a bit internally contradictory.

>159 pgmcc: Ha! True. But sometimes one want to push one's limits at least a little bit.

>160 clamairy:
I understand that, and when one does that they feel good about having endured through the experience and may well feel they have benefited from doing so. However, would they say the enjoyed it?

>161 pgmcc: I guess that would depend, at least partially, on how much one felt they got out of the experience. Learning isn't always pleasurable, is it?

>162 clamairy:
Unless it is mathematics. I loved mathematics.

I heard about Remnant Population by Elizabeth Moon over in the bargains thread. Many thanks ScoLgo! There were a few slow bits, but there was so much gardening that I was in my happy place. (Even if it was on another planet and there were alien insects after Ofelia's tomatoes.) What an interesting take on a First Contact scenario. I love the idea of an older woman being the perfect accidental envoy to meet with a new intelligent species.

I'm not sure what I'm listening to next. I was overwhelmed by the Audible sale when I dropped in to check it out briefly this morning. It lasts for the week so I will be going back.

>164 clamairy: I'm happy to hear that you liked Remnant Population, Clare!

>164 clamairy:. Glad that this read was something you enjoyed spending time on!

>164 clamairy: I like all of her novels, I'll have to give this one a try.

>165 ScoLgo: & >166 jillmwo: Thank you!

>167 Karlstar: I have never read anything by her before, so I have nothing to compare it to. I do hope you enjoy it. Would you be kind enough to recommend your favorite of the ones you have read?

>164 clamairy: It's nice to hear that you enjoyed Remnant Population! My book club read it a couple of years ago and we all liked it. You don't see older women as main characters in sci-fi very often, and I loved that.

>168 clamairy: How is that possible!? She has one stand-alone The Speed of Dark that is more fiction than anything else, but really excellent. There is also her classic fantasy series The Deed of Paksenarrion, about a young lady turned paladin. This series is the source of the 'slogging through the mud', but despite that, is still great.

>170 Karlstar: I second The Speed of Dark. One of my favorite books with an autistic protagonist, inspired by Moon's own son.

>164 clamairy: This sounds good, and perhaps similar to Janet Kagan's Mirabile, albeit weightier. Was it depressing? I'm never in the mood for that, lol.

>169 Alexandra_book_life: I loved that she was pushing 80. I hated how she was treated by her son and his wife. No wonder she hid when it was time to board the shuttle.

>170 Karlstar: There are just so many books to read, and I am just one rather small person.

>171 ScoLgo: Thanks for the seconding.

>172 libraryperilous: No, not depressing at all! It does get a bit slow in spots, but that was my only complaint.

Paladin's Strength is the second book in The Saint of Steel series. I enjoyed this one a bit more than the first, like several other people in here who have read both books. Once again I must prattle on about just how much I love Kingfisher's sense of humor. It's not quite as evident as it is in her Sworn Soldier books, but it's close. A solid four stars from me. I would give an extra ¼th of a star if I were able to.

Paladins were famous for resisting temptation, but life was a lot easier when temptation kept at least ten feet away and only offered easy things, like wealth and vengeance and earthly dominion.

Up next is The Man in Black: And Other Stories by Elly Griffiths.

>174 clamairy: You can do quarter stars on Storygraph, and it is so satisfying. I wish LT would implement that here.

>174 clamairy: Yay! Kingfisher does humour so well :)

The third book is really nice too...

>175 libraryperilous: I really wish they would, but the ½ stars are a huge plus over Goodreads.

>176 Alexandra_book_life: I'm glad to hear this. I'm saving it for when I'm in need of a "known setting/ content" read.

>177 clamairy: Storygraph uses drop down boxes for the ratings. I'd imagine it would be hard to code into LT's click-based system Or, jyst too annoying for users to make those extra clicks.

>178 libraryperilous: Drop down boxes can be a little annoying, but it might be quicker than tapping.

>179 clamairy: Yes, agree. I'm not sure how easy it would be to change LT's system to that, and I imagine a number of longtime users would protest. If they kept the clicks but allowed quarter stars, you'd end up tapping quite a bit.

tl;dr: I doubt we're getting quarter stars on LT, but they're fun and helpful for me to use on Storygraph. :)

Elly Griffiths The Man in Black was a book bullet from foggidawn, and is a collection of short stories, many of which had a Christmas/Yule theme, so the timing was excellent. I enjoyed this quite a bit, and I am now primed to dive into some of her newer series in 2025. I hadn't read anything but the Ruth Galloway books. Ruth is a forensic archaeologist who captured my imagination, and she featured in several of these stories. One of the stories is quite dark and would fit well in a Halloween collection, and one is a homage to Death on the Nile.

I plan to finally finish Connie Willis' A Lot Like Christmas, which is another collection of stories. I read some of it in December of 2022, and more in December of 2023. I am 90% of the way through so I should finish in the next day or so.

This is a great collection of holiday themed SciFi stories that are mostly humorous. My favorites were the first and the last, oddly. Great fun. There was one that was a bit too frenetic for my tastes, but otherwise a solid 4 star read for the season. (Even though it took me parts of three Decembers to get through it!)

The cover of this book reminded me that I have added a small (it said 4 feet on the box, but it's really not) Yule tree in my library, and I am calling it The Nerd Tree and putting all my SciFi and movie themed ornaments on it. I will try to remember to get a photo at some point. Right now it's just got a few Star Trek, some LoTR things, a couple of aliens and the robot from Forbidden Planet on it.

Up next is A Christmas Memory by Truman Capote. I think I might have read this already, but I have no memory of it.

I forgot to mention that one of the stories in the Elly Griffiths book takes place in the town of Southwold. That is the place where many of the founders of the hamlet that I live in came from back in 1639. Somehow the spelling was changed to Southold over the years.

But here, in Southwold, you could never forget the sea. It crashed against the beach all day, retreating in great sighing waves.

Apparently this place reminded them of home. It is very difficult to forget the presence of the water here. This strip of the North Fork is only about 2½ miles wide.

>133 clamairy: ooh. Just what I crave too. Ordered it.

>164 clamairy: I’ve had this on a wishlist and never pursued it. Hmm. So many books!

I third recommend The Speed of Dark!😁

Another first contact story with a different slant is A Half-Built Garden. The human is a nursing mother; and that turns out important to the aliens.

>182 clamairy: "A Christmas Memory" is just lovely. I reread it every few years.

>182 clamairy: I loved Willis' recent Christmas novella, Take a Look at the Five and Ten. This collection looks fun!

>182 clamairy: These are such nice Christmas stories!

I think my favourite is the story about the choirs :)

>182 clamairy: Looking forward to the photo of your Nerd tree. :)

>182 clamairy: Do you have a Romulan Warbird or Klingon Bird of Prey on your tree?

>187 libraryperilous: I will keep an eye out for that.

>188 Alexandra_book_life: I loved how she managed to discuss so many different holiday movies. I was surprised and very happy to find those lists at the end with all of her favorite Christmas movies and books.

>189 MrsLee: I will try to remember!

>190 Karlstar: I have two interactive ornaments, one is a phaser and the other is the transporter. No ships, sadly. I do have a lovely stainless steel Enterprise pizza cutter, but that's a little too heavy for the tree.

>191 clamairy: and >188 Alexandra_book_life: I liked the inclusion of her lists in that book as well.

And I am absurdly jealous that you have a stainless steel Enterprise pizza cutter.

>192 jillmwo: It has been used once. Now it is purely for decoration. The gooey cheese got in all the wrong places and it was very hard to clean. I keep it sitting next to my stainless steel rocket ship cocktail shaker. 🚀

>193 clamairy:
I suppose it was difficult to remove the cling-ons from the Enterprise.

>194 pgmcc: 🤣👏

>194 pgmcc: Well done! And yes, it was!
:o)

>196 clamairy:
You now I can never resist the obvious gag. :-) Thank you for setting it up.

>194 pgmcc: Well played sir!

Here is the transporter ornament in action. If you click on the pic it will take you to the Flickr video.

>191 clamairy: >193 clamairy: >199 clamairy: Very cool! I do not have those, just some ships, the old Hallmark ornaments.

>199 clamairy: So cool! Now I want one of those ;)

>199 clamairy: awww. It doesn't kill them.

>199 clamairy: Jiminy! I can think of one son-in-law who would geek out over that! That’s a true collectible

>200 Karlstar:, This is also a Hallmark ornament.
>202 MrAndrew: And no one's face gets melted off, either.
>201 Alexandra_book_life: & >203 2wonderY: You can probably find one on eBay.
Found some: https://www.ebay.com/itm/267094482883?_skw=star+trek+ornament&itmmeta=01JF7V...

https://www.ebay.com/itm/326298426042?_trkparms=amclksrc%3DITM%26aid%3D1110006%2...

>204 clamairy: Nice! Thanks for the links :)

I read two of the three stories in this collection, A Christmas Memory and One Christmas. The first one was wonderful, and I had read it before. It all came back to me while I was reading it. The second one was depressing, and I had also read it before. I decided to stop right there, and actually wished I had skipped it.

I've started Dickens The Chimes which has the somewhat mediocre rating in here of 3.1. I may end up bailing.

I am still listening to The Dragonbone Chair and I am enjoying it, but I find myself wondering where all the real female characters are. Only Rachel has been given any depth so far.

From the LT Year in Review:

You wrote 1,511 Talk posts in 2024 (consisting of 60,306 words) and contributed to 135 Talk topics in 13 Groups. You even started 15 topics!

>207 clamairy: Statistics like that always make me wonder whether one might have otherwise written the Great American Novel in those 60,000+ words in the same allotted time frame!!

I feel particularly guilty about my own use of time, looking at my year-end stats: I wrote 93,406 words across 102 threads...

>208 jillmwo: I suspect you could write The Great American novel. I know I don't have it in me. :o)

<209 I dunno about that. You recognize good prose and genuine artistry when you read it. That kind of thing tends to rub off on the reader and her use of language. (I've just been tainted by the Victorians.)

>210 jillmwo: You have me laughing. I look back at some of my much older posts and realize how much shorter and less complex mine have gotten. It worries me a bit, but I blame it at least partially on the fact that I feel like I don't have as much time to spend in here as I used to.

>210 jillmwo: “ tainted by the Victorians”!!

Yes! Me too. And I’ve seen it in one well known author as well, Alix Harrow.

>212 2wonderY: >210 jillmwo: And I believe I was tainted by TimSpalding's now infamous one word review. :o)

>209 clamairy: & >208 jillmwo:

Who was it who said:
"Every one has a book in them. In most cases it should stay there."?

>214 pgmcc: Well, I would agree with whomever-it-was who made that comment that it helps if the author of the book has a point to communicate to the audience.

>215 jillmwo:
I just did a bit of Googling* and found:

Christopher Hitchens, an American journalist, is quoted as saying this during a conversation with colleagues. Hitchens was known for his sardonic wit. The whole quote (or something similar) is “Everyone has a book inside them, which is exactly where it should, I think, in most cases, remain.”

* That sounds quite obscene.

>216 pgmcc: Ha! I actually did not realize that Hitchens became an American citizen. I truly admired the man, despite our different political views.

The Christmas Guest was another book bullet from foggidawn, and it gave me something to think about beside all of the things I still had to do. ( I am getting close. All of the presents are wrapped, but I am still cleaning.) This was scary enough, with a twist. I had my suspicions early on that there was something very fishy about the invite to the proverbial rural English manor house for Christmas. 3½ stars from me. I wanted to give it 3¾ stars.



Christmas Presents was a LibraryThing recommendation, based on the previous book. This was a decent enough mystery, but no real surprises. Another 3½ stars.

Oddly enough both of these books featured killers in Santa masks. Is that a thing?

I am almost halfway though The Dark is Rising. Thank you to libraryperilous for the recommendation. I had forgotten so much of this. Apparently there are quite a few people who read this every holiday season, and read it over a 12 day period. This piece is from last year, but Google must know what I'm reading because it recently popped up in my feed: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/12/18/book-you-can-read-each-day-before-ch...