novel

Confederacy of Dunces

Book Notes Instead of being asleep at 21:53 on 1 December 2016, kitt created this:

I've had this book forever. This is one of those books that one is "supposed" to read because, hey, it has this tragic story around it: the author writes the book, the author can't find a publisher, the author commits suicide, the author's mother walks the book from publisher to publisher, the author's mother finds a publisher, the book is published, the book becomes a hit.

Okay, so this book has some reason for becoming a hit, right?

Right.

I did not like this book. I understand the whole story around the book. I laughed a number of times while reading the book. I can understand why the book was published, it's not a bad book, but, eh, I really did not like this book.

I didn't like it for one reason: the main character, Ignatius J. Reilly.

The basic plot is "Ignatius J. Reilly is an educated but slothful 30-year-old man living with his mother in the Uptown neighborhood of early-1960s New Orleans. Reilly, in his quest for employment, has various adventures with colorful French Quarter characters." Yeah. And "Ignatius Jacques Reilly is something of a modern Don Quixote—eccentric, idealistic, and creative, sometimes to the point of delusion." WHICH IS COMPLETELY INACCURATE.

Ignatius J. Reilly is an ass, pure and simple. He's a jerk, He's lazy. He hides in his bedroom instead of working, forcing his mother to support him. He blames others for his actions. He denies responsibility for his own actions. He is a destructive force in a relatively normal world. He steals from his employers. He causes some seriously bad events to happen, letting an old lady take the blame for a relatively bad misdeed.

Even his mother knows the guy is an ass, eventually deciding to throw him head first into life by kicking him out of the house.

Tilt-A-Whirl

Book Notes Written with a loving hand by kitt some time around 17:38 on 20 November 2016

I have had this book in my to-read pile for-ev-var. And a day. I think it might have been one of the first books that Mom put on my list, actually.

The book is the first of a series of (currently) eight books about John Ceepak, a war veteran turned cop / detective in a small seaside town, and the murder of a local billionaire. I've had the book long enough that only the first two Ceepak books are listed in the book.

In this book, the local billionaire murder was witnessed by his thirteen year old daughter. The two of them were on the local amusement park Tilt-A-Whirl, hence the title, with the crazy, local, beach bum, stoned guy being the clear suspect.

Except this Ceepak guy has a code, and that's no lying and don't tolerate those who do lie. And so, as Ceepak works with Danny Boyle, the local just-out-of-school, part-time cop, he works through the clues and hints of the murder.

The book has enough twists to be interesting. The Ceepak Code means all of Ceepak's statements are the truth, but the truth has many viewpoints when you can't see all the details. I enjoyed the book. Unsure if I'm going to read the rest of the Ceepak books, but this one was cute.

Night School

Book Notes Instead of being asleep at 17:39 on 18 November 2016, kitt created this:

Reacha!

Okay, the latest in the Jack Reacher series, this one is a throw back to the mid-nineties, a filler story in the Reacher history. A great thing about this book is that we learn about Reacher, but we also learn about Neagley, which is also a great thing.

The basic plot of the book is that the various intelligence agencies hear about a $100,000,000 deal, want to know what it is, and, realistically, stop it as anything that big being done in secret is going to be bad news. Not knowing the item for sale makes tracking the deal difficult.

What I like about the book is that Reacher doesn't follow a straight path. He misses the bad guy left and right, walking right by, seeing and not seeing him. Of course, Reacher gets the girl. I know, shock.

What I didn't like about the book is this complete and utter bunk "science" that Child tries to pass off:

And best of all, the linear measurement between the bruises on the victim’s buttocks and on her elbows was self-evidently the precise distance between the sharp base of the assailant’s pelvic girdle and his kneecaps. Which after standard deductions for the joints in question gave the precise length of his femur. And the length of the femur was considered an infallible guide to a person’s height.

"And the length of the femur was considered an infallible guide to a person’s height." What a bunch of bullshit. I have a femur right here that you can't tell my height from. Hell, if you use that femur, I am 5' tall, and you'd be off by a lot.

Counter balancing this horrible "science" fiction was Child's commentary about patriotism:

Oryx and Crake

Book Notes Written with a loving hand by kitt some time around 22:50 on 9 November 2016

I have had this book for at least a decade. Said book has been unread by me for that said decade plus. Heather read it and liked it and recommended it. Kris read it and liked it and recommended it. So, it had two thumbs up from people who know my tastes in books. It would seem I should have read it, say, a decade ago. I hadn't.

I'm unsure why I picked it up, other than I'm in a "wrap everything up" place. That includes reading books that I want to read, but don't really want to cart around. This one falls into that category.

The book is about Snowman and his world. His world happens to be a post-apocalyptic world where he's taking care of these Crākers (the long A on there for the correct pronunciation), who seem to be simpletons. Turns out, well, because they are.

But it's more complicated than that. We also have Oryx, who is Snowman's love in his previous world as Jimmy. And Crake, well, there's a reason there are the Crākers.

Snowman's world is that of gene manipulation, and the apocalypse is, well, exactly what happens when markets no longer have products.

It's an interesting puzzle, Snowman's history, revealed unsurprisingly well by Atwood. The book is the first of three books, which I realized only after finishing the book. Of course, a decade ago when I bought the book, there was only one book, so maybe that I didn't realize it was part of a trilogy is also unsurprising. Unsure if I'll read the other two books in the series, but I'm glad I've finally read this one.

Grave Peril

Book Notes Instead of being asleep at 21:03 on 2 November 2016, kitt created this:

The Dresden Files, book 3

I remember when I first read this book being very surprised at the abrupt introduction of Michael Carpenter into the Dresden Files series. He shows up on the first page of this book, yet is already Harry's best friend. He's also a Knight of the Cross, having been one for the previous twenty years. The man had killed a dragon and knows a lot of lore that Harry doesn't know.

There are a number of other series characters introduced, what with Thomas showing up, Charity having incredibly stilted speaking patterns, and Lea revealing more of Harry's past.

I recall thinking while reading, that the book felt choppy. The plot rather goes along nominally linearly, but references a lot of events that had happened a couple months before. It also has a few jumps from location to location, and starts a lot of unfinished threads.

This is, however, the first book in the Dresden series where Butcher catches his stride. Harry is Harry, and starting to come into his own. The world is fleshed out a bit more, with the lore starting to solidify. If I could direct an author's hand (which I can't, and wouldn't even with the chance), I'd rework the first two books to be more like this one and later books: being Dresden and less Dresden-becoming.

That said, yep, Harry, love the series. Recommended.

The Terracotta Bride

Book Notes Instead of being asleep at 19:23 on 31 October 2016, kitt created this:

I don't recall where I picked up this book. Likely from Book Riot, since it isn't a Mom-book (I know, shock). It is a short and beautiful in a sad way.

The book blurb says:

A tale of first love, bad theology and robot reincarnation in the Chinese afterlife.

In the tenth court of hell, spirits wealthy enough to bribe the bureaucrats of the underworld can avoid both the torments of hell and the irreversible change of reincarnation. It's a comfortable undeath … even for Siew Tsin. She didn't choose to be married to the richest man in hell, but she's reconciled. Until her husband brings home a new bride.

Yonghua is an artificial woman crafted from terracotta. What she is may change hell for good. Who she is will transform Siew Tsin. And as they grow closer, the mystery of Yonghua's creation will draw Siew Tsin into a conspiracy where the stakes are eternal life – or a very final death.

Which is to say, it's the story of a died-too-young girl who doesn't have enough life experience to understand intrigue, but does have enough life experience to love. The good parts of the story are the parts not explicitly described, the parts where the reader understands through actions and moments.

It's a quick read, the book being 51 pages long and all. I enjoyed it.

Escape Clause

Book Notes Posted by kitt at 20:47 on 30 October 2016

Virgil Flowers, Book 9

Okay, book nine in the Virgil Flowers series. This one did not actually have beagles in it. It did, however have rare tigers in it. Does that count?

The two sentence summary is "Two rare Amur tigers are catnapped, and f---in' Flowers is assigned to the case. In true Virgil Flowers fashion, other things happen, though the case is resolved in a crazy mess." I crack me up.

Once again, the plot is shallow. In this one, however, Flowers seems more human: he doesn't have everything figured out in the first 43% of the book (unlike in the previous book). He catches a number of lucky breaks to move forward in the case, otherwise he's bored (though, Sandford doesn't do a great job at expressing the weight of boredom and waiting, summarizing them in a sentence here and there as "He was bored"). The bad guy is just plain weird. I have to admit not understanding said bad guy's mental state, but nothing's new about that.

The banter wasn't as quick in the book as in previous books. I laughed out loud only once in the book. And there were a lot of references to Prey books, which, hey, might sell more books for Sandford or develop the Flowers universe more. Maybe. In reality, it made me feel I was reading a filler book instead of its own stand-alone book.

Not one of Sandford's best Flowers books, it's also not bad enough to say this is book one of the two bad in a row that will cause me to stop reading a series. If you're reading the Flowers books, continue.

Children of Earth and Sky

Book Notes Yeah, kitt finished writing this at 06:40 on 24 October 2016

Recommended.

I'm tempted to leave the entire book review as that single word. Recommended. Clearly I didn't, because I'm still typing, but I'm definitely tempted.

I had "started" this book a few months ago, and by "started," I mean, "read the first page." The timing wasn't good, so I didn't keep going, because Kay's books aren't put-downable. Yes, a real word that, "put-downable." This book wasn't. And what better day to read the book than jet-lagged and sick, and in need of comfort? Said jet-lag may have enabled me to stay up until 6:30 am to read this book. Or maybe not. It's like a migraine that way, maybe the caffeine causes it, maybe the caffeine didn't.

So, this book. It's "historical fiction with a twist of fantasy," as Kay describes others describing his works. I would say that description was true of his earlier books, but not really this one. While there is an itty bitty part that requires suspension of disbelief, the rest of it is pretty much a fictionalized story of the fall of the Ottoman Empire from a merchant's, an artist's, and soldier's points of view. But, ssssssssh, it's not really called the Ottoman Empire.

Kay moves back to his earlier style of writing in this book, in that in his earlier books, he wasn't explicit about the thoughts behind the characters actions, leaving the reader to piece things together and fill in the gaps. Subsequent books, he drifted to explaining everything, which lost some of the magic of his writing style. He has it coming back here, which makes me like this book so much more.

If you like his style, this book is recommended. If you haven't read Kay's books before, read A Song for Arbonne or The Lions of Al-Rassan first instead.

Fool Moon

Book Notes kitt decided around 12:18 on 22 October 2016 to publish this:

The Dresden Files, book 2

Okay, continuing in the "re-read the Dresden books because, well, why not (okay, really, because I want a brain rest)" trend, I started in immediate on Fool Moon after Storm Front. And again, I'm surprised at the animosity between Murphy and Dresden, along with the total suspicion from Murphy on everything. Have something you can't explain away, blame the crazy person even though you've seen him do crazy stuff.

That said, this book seems to be the turning point in the relationship, with Murphy deciding to trust Dresden, even as Dresden becomes more and more paranoid and suspicious of everyone around him, trying to figure out the clue of the wolf attacks.

I recalled who the ultimate bad guys were in this book, from previous readings. I didn't recall the details, though. I'm amused that some parts that are BIG in my memory of the book are actually small in the actual book.

I also wonder if this is the last book of Harry Dresden as vulnerable. Dresden keeps becoming more and more powerful as the series goes on, to the point that even after he dies, he is still more powerful than most but a handful of wizards around him. I will, of course, have to read them all to figure this out.

So, right, this book.

Werewolves. In the Dresden universe, the multitude of (mythologically existing) types of werewolves are all present. We have the loup garrou, the hexenwolves, the lycanthropes, the theriomorphs (er, shapeshifters), and your standard werewolves. They're all different flavours of the same thing: a human in wolf form who do a lot of damage. People die. Harry exhausts himself and survive by thinking. Totally great.

Storm Front (Harry Dresden)

Book Notes kitt decided around 12:12 on 15 October 2016 to publish this:

The Dresden Files, book 1

Okay, yes, I might have read this book before. And yes, I might have read it a number of times before. Okay, yes, a large number of times before. Sometimes, however, you just want to sit back, relax, and read something you're familiar with. Again.

What I found interesting about this reading of Storm Front is the reminder of how rough Butcher had fleshed out Dresden's world. There are a lot details like how a soul gaze works, and why electronics self-destruct around wizards, that Butcher doesn't have quite worked out. And, of course, this is unsurprising, since this is the first Dresden book, and Butcher was just getting started. The Dresden banter, however, was there, and, oh boy, was entertaining.

And yet, even with the first book, Butcher manages to plant clues that are referenced and revealed ten, twelve books later. Love it.

Another thing I didn't recall about this book just how much Dresden and Murphy were at odds. Their relationship evolves into a better friendship with significant trust, but in this book, the trust hasn't been established.

I will likely keep not reading this book as frequently as the other Dresden books, many which I like more anyway. Still fun as an establishment of the Dresden world.

Of course I recommend the Dresden series. I don't recommend reading this first one more than once, though, unless it's been, say, four or five years since you read it last. Then, yes, reread.

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