books read, early November

[mrissa]

Christopher Benfey, The Great Wave: Gilded Age Misfits, Japanese Eccentrics, and the Opening of Old Japan. This was supposed to be about the intersection of cultures between New England and Japan in the late 19th century. The balance tipped a great deal more towards New England than I would have preferred, but it was still interesting, a fresh look at cultural figures I knew and a few I'd never heard of.

A.S. Byatt, The Children's Book. There were a few things that got under my skin about this book but mostly I did not care, because it was so immersive for me. And it hit so many of my personal buttons: Arts and Crafts movement! 19th century anarchists! World War I! I think I liked it, even. I'm pretty sure I liked it. But mostly it was the sort of book I appreciated so much that it didn't even matter whether it summed to liking. Wanted more of nearly everybody.

Rumer Godden, Breakfast with the Nikolides. I find it very difficult to talk about this book without major spoilers at the moment. Suffice it to say that it was very well done, and that there was a piece of the subject matter (not the piece you will be able to predict from the first page) that was particularly difficult at this moment in my life.

Reginald Hill, Arms and the Women. wshaffer said these could be read out of order, so I grabbed one from the library. I suspect this is not the absolute best place to start, but I come out of it really eager for more. I liked Dalziel, and I liked Wieldy, and I liked the other members of the Pascoe family well enough that I suspect I will like Pascoe himself when I have more of him by himself or at work. After the first short bit, the voice and the characters had me absolutely hooked, committed to several more books in this series sight unseen. And delighted, so delighted.

Stephen Hunt, The Court of the Air. There is a character in this book who is a steamman (robot) who is an abomination, a composite of other previous steammen's souls. The text does not share the social view of the steamman society that this creature should not exist. Which is a good thing, because if you look at it too hard, that's exactly what this book is doing, and if it considered itself an abomination, well, that would be unfortunate. Entertaining enough steampunk, although a bit too long for itself and sometimes plotted a bit on autopilot.

Scott McCloud, Understanding Comics. I am tone-deaf to comics. I recognize that there are all sorts of cool things happening in this art form, but they do not appear to be my cool things. I read this in hopes of fixing some of that and instead came away with the perception that there is a darn good reason why. I remain very much not a visual person, and some of the mode switching stuff McCloud was talking about just does not happen for me. (I am also very skeptical that it happens as he describes for very many people. I think he overstated his case a lot. But I wasn't coming into it with the idea that comics could not possibly be an art form--in fact, I've been pretty sure it is one--so in that sense I was not the target for many of his arguments.)

Bill Streever, Cold: Adventures in the World's Frozen Places. Not as immersive as I was hoping for in this unseasonably warm November, but still had interesting bits, particularly when he moved away from talking about humans doing stupid things and got more into flora and fauna and humans doing non-stupid things.

Comments

[zalena.livejournal.com]

The Byatt book was so well written and hit so many buttons and, well, devastated me. I didn't like it, because it really upset me, but it was such a well-crafted book I was torn between my upset and my awe.

Currently reading Understanding Comics. I haven't gotten far enough to comment.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Oh, there were definitely upsetting bits. There were times when I had to shut the book and go away and make bread for awhile, and there was a character who just made my scalp crawl.

[zalena.livejournal.com]

There seemed to be a larger more condemning message about narrative abuse. This is something I've been thinking about a lot this year. Not just how stories heal people, which is where people always want to seem to go with this kind of things, but about how stories can harm people.

Unfortunately, I'm not able to be much more articulate than that, which is one of those reasons I keep wanting other people to read the book, so THEY can tell me what I mean to say. (Or at least help define it.)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Oh yes. Definitely yes. Writers--and this is not unique to writers, it applies to filmmakers and game designers and comedians and musicians/lyricists and all sorts of other people who make things--want to be able to take the good side and not the bad. We want to hear, "Oh, this book changed my life! This story gave me a way out of a bad situation, even if it was only in my mind; this narrative was such a force for good for me." But power never goes in only one direction, and nobody wants to hear about the other way. Any attempts to discuss negative power in any kind of art form seems to slip into a discussion of censorship--as if there was no difference between, "I wish you wouldn't and here's why," and, "I will get external forces to stop you for no reason."

[oursin.livejournal.com]

You know that thing about censorious/censoring types who read or watch something and just know it will corrupt other people, but they are unsullied? There was an I think it might have been an archbishop? in the early 70s who stated that he felt that he, personally, had been corrupted by the work in question (might have been Last Exit to Brooklyn) currently on trial in the UK. At least he copped to it not just been about those impressionable Others, Out There.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

That is, at least, consistent. Good.

[ckd]

the intersection of cultures between New England and Japan in the late 19th century

I'd love to take you to the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem sometime; it has a lot of interesting things from the China and Japan trade, as well as a complete Qing Dynasty house that was reassembled on site.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I would go to that. Anyone I can think of who might be traveling with me to Massachusetts would probably go to that, too.

[ckd]

I would take them there, too.

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

The one part of Understanding Comics that sticks with me, and will forever, is the cartoon where the main character borrows money from the panel below him.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

This may be a very succinct version of why comics don't work well for me--because I remember the bit you mean now that you mention it, but I didn't find it particularly memorable or illuminating.

The Children's Book

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

I'm in the middle of it right now, and very much enjoying it.

B

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

After the first short bit, the voice and the characters had me absolutely hooked

Ah. After your squee before, I looked at the book on Amazon, and did not see much to love, but it seems that is because of the first short bit, which . . . no. Taking another look, though, I find that it changes style shortly thereafter, and what follows looks more promising.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yes, two things got me past the veryvery beginning: wshaffer's recommendation and the fact that I was in the doctor's office and couldn't just get something else to read. I might have made it past the opening bit anyway, but I'm glad we don't have to find out, because I liked the rest substantially better.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Heh. You just made me recall my first attempt to read the Silmarillion -- note that I say "attempt." Trying to get through its first section at seven-thirty a.m. while waiting at the doctor's office to get my wisdom teeth removed? CRASH AND BURN. Even though I had nothing else to read. I did better when I came back to it some time later, more awake and bearing my mythology-reading filters rather than my fiction-reading ones.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

I hope Ista is OK.

OK, that's probably not the bit in [i]Breakfast with the Nikolides[/i] that's a problem, but it was the first thing I thought of.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Heh. That's what I meant by the piece you can predict from the first page. And no, Ista is fine. It was the quality of the maternal behavior--and my mother is fine, it's someone else's mother who made it hard. Lots of backstory. I can e-mail you to discuss further if you like.