Whatcha readin now? (book, books, reading, read) (1 Viewer)

[kupcho1]

Next up: The Collected Stories of Jean Stafford, the 1970 winner. I'm not going to tell you who the author is, I'll let you work that out for yourself.

We've reached the point of your project where I've at least heard of most of the books and their authors but Stafford was someone I'm completely unfamiliar with.

I read a couple of short Internet bios. She led an interesting and rather tragic life including a brief and unhappy marriage to poet Robert Lowell. She quit fiction late and life and wrote children's books and non-fiction. Her short biography of Lee Harvey Oswald's mother was described by Time in 1966 as "the most abrasively unpleasant book in recent years”.

I may have to put that mama Oswald biography on my to be read list.

 

[Eephus]

I may have to put that mama Oswald biography on my to be read list.

It's in the Internet Archive. I found this excerpt more enjoyable when I read it in the voice of Ed Grimley

I had come to Texas to see Mrs. Oswald because she is, as she was frequently to tell me, ‘‘a mother in history,” and while she remains peripheral to the immediate events of the Dallas killings, she is inherent to the evolution of the reasons for them. She is inherent, that is, if we accept (as I do) the premise that her son had something to do with the assassination and accept the further premise that the child is father of the man: we need to know the influences and accidents and loves and antipathies and idiosyncrasies that were the ingredients making up the final compound. I hoped that Mrs. Oswald would be able to tell me what these had been.

Good luck with her short stories.

 

[Sand]

Reading Jade City. It's about gangsters with magic in a 1950s city like Hong Kong. Fascinating setting. Darn good book - highly recommended.

 

[Hastur]

Splitting my reading between Atomic Habits by James Clear and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s court by Mark Twain.

Just started Atomic Habits. 3 chapters in, and I like what I'm reading so far.

 

[beer 30]

Been reading some heavier stuff lately so started a post apocalyptic series called the Catalyst Series by JK Franks, first book Downward Cycle. As pseudo prepper, it appeals to my dark side.

 

[TheBaylorKid]

Finished the original 3 Dragon Lance novels this month, Dragons of Autumn Twilight, Winter Night, and Spring Dawning. It was a good walk down memory lane for me, but I don't plan on reading anymore. The mage Raistlin still holds up as a character you want to know more about, but lots of "this character dies" but "oh here is a magical healing spell to bring you back", flimsy origins, and weak dialogue. I kind of like the mysterious Fizban character where the rules don't apply to him, he just shows up when he wants, supplies information or guidance, and then drops of the face of the planet to only reappear again unexpectedly. Reminds me of Enoch Root in Neal Stephenson's novels or even Melchizedek from the Bible.

Up next, waiting on Midnight In Moscow: a memoir from the front lines of Russia's war against the West, to become available at the library.

 

[kupcho1]

Finished The Collected Stories of Jean Stafford by Jean Stafford, the 1970 Pulitzer Prize winner.
The short stories were very well written, but almost without exception, they left me cold. The stories were uniformly depressing, the characters were almost always without hope. I don't think there is another book on earth (medical books excepted) with as many references to tuberculosis.
I did like how she broke the stories into 4 groupings (2 of which were references to Mark Twain and Henry James works):

• The Innocents Abroad - stories about ex-pats
• The Bostonians, and other Manifestations of the American Scene - stories set in Boston
• Cowboys and Indians and Magic Mountains - stories set in the West (primarily Colorado); only 1 involves Indians Native Americans (you'll be horrified to know that casual racism is very much a thing at this point in our history)
• Manhattan Island - stories about the Manhattan cocktail. Just kidding; stories set in Manhattan

So, 2/3 of the way there (at least until the Pulitzer is announced; I don't think I can finish before then)
66 done / 33 to go
Next up: Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner the 1972 winner (there was no prize awarded in 1971)

 

[Hastur]

Finished the original 3 Dragon Lance novels this month, Dragons of Autumn Twilight, Winter Night, and Spring Dawning. It was a good walk down memory lane for me, but I don't plan on reading anymore. The mage Raistlin still holds up as a character you want to know more about, but lots of "this character dies" but "oh here is a magical healing spell to bring you back", flimsy origins, and weak dialogue. I kind of like the mysterious Fizban character where the rules don't apply to him, he just shows up when he wants, supplies information or guidance, and then drops of the face of the planet to only reappear again unexpectedly. Reminds me of Enoch Root in Neal Stephenson's novels or even Melchizedek from the Bible.

Up next, waiting on Midnight In Moscow: a memoir from the front lines of Russia's war against the West, to become available at the library.

Tsk tsk...you didn't even mention the comedy relief that is Tasslehoff!