So, What Are You Reading These Days? (besides comics)

[Alan M.]

Just bringing this discussion over to ning...

What books are you reading right now that don't have a narrative driven by images as well as words?

[Doctor Hmmm?]

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by some Scottish guy.

[Luke Blanchard]

Go here to see how a recent reprint of The Valley of Fear was packaged.

[doc photo]

Last winter I picked up volume one of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and whenever the mood strikes I pull it off the shelf and read a story or two. There is something special about sitting on the couch on a cold winter's evening with just a single light on reading a Holmes adventure.

[Alan M.]

I don't think I've responded to this in a while, in part because my non-comics reading has been kind of anemic lately. But what I have from the library right now is:

Stories: All New Tales, an anthology of short fiction compiled by Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio. Despite a really impressive selection of authors — Gaiman, Joyce Carol Oates, Joe R. Lansdale, Richard Adams, Jodi Picoult, Peter Straub, Lawrence Block, Chuck Palahniuk, Gene Wolfe, Michael Moorcock, Elizabeth Hand, Joe Hill, and 15 more — it keeps slipping off of my attention. It's not that I forget I have it out, just...something else always seems easier to pick up.

Earth (The Book) by Jon Stewart et al.. I kind of have the same problem with this that I had with America (The Book): reading it cover-to-cover feels like too linear an approach to it, but picking it up and looking at random pages doesn't pack as much humorous punch.

Finishing the Hat: Collected Lyrics (1954-1981) with Attendant Comments, Principles, Heresies, Grudges, Whines and Anecdotes by Stephen Sondheim does exactly what it says; it collects the lyrics that Sondheim wrote over the first 25 years of his career, and he includes often lengthy annotations that wander off into reflections on the stage musical industry, the cultural influences at the time of the songs' creations, & etc. Mainly, this book is serving to make me realize that I'm much less familiar with Sondheim's work than I'd like.

I also picked up a novel called Our Tragic Universe by Scarlett Thomas, but I don't really know anything about it yet other than that Very Short List recommended it back in August, and that it has a very striking binding. Honestly, I'll be surprised if I wind up reading this one.

And then, as always, I've got an audiobook going for when I'm at the gym. Presently, it's The Bourne Identity by Robert Ludlum, about which I have not a lot to say beyond that I'm enjoying it.

[Doctor Hmmm?]

Luke Blanchard said:

Go here to see how a recent reprint of The Valley of Fear was packaged.

Somebody at Hard Case has an awesome sense of humor.

[The Baron]

That's awesome.

[Mark Sullivan (Vertiginous Mod)]

I finished Joe Hill's Heart-Shaped Box, which I really enjoyed. It's a very creative ghost story, which builds suspense like crazy. Started Kathy Reichs' second Tempe Brennan novel, Death Du Jour. My wife loves this series, so I thought I'd give it another shot. I'm still not crazy about it so far, but it's enjoyable enough. I've concluded I'm not very interested in the forensic details--just slows down the story for me--but that's one of the things that appeals to my wife. Go figure. It's worth noting that the Temperance Brennan character is completely different from the TV show, apart from her name and profession. In the book she's divorced, has a grown daughter, and is reasonably socially adept. I've come to enjoy the show, but it's a completely different animal. This book starts in Montreal, but is going to move to Charlotte soon, which will be interesting.

[Chris Fluit]

I started Robert Massie's biography of Tsar Nicholas and Alexandra (the last Emperor of Russia). I read Massie's biography of Peter the Great years ago and have fond memories of it.

[Jeff of Earth-J]

Four recent issues of Rolling Stone magazine;

Two (not recent) Dark Shadows paperbacks;

God is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens.

[The Baron]

The Cambridge Companion to Modern Japanese Culture, edited by Yoshio Sugimoto.

[Doctor Hmmm?]

Tacitus' Annals of Imperial Rome (Michael Grant trans.)

[Mark Sullivan (Vertiginous Mod)]

Continuing with Atticus Kodiak, I started Critical Space. This one really gets off to a slow start, running through everything that happened off-screen since the previous novel. Not that I wasn't interested, but at 80 pages in I think we're just getting to the core story.