Wednesday went for a walk in the rain

[oursin]

What I read

Finished Love at All Ages - think I said most of what I felt moved to say last week, but there was also a certain amount of Mrs Morland whingeing and bitching about the Burdens of Being a Popular Writer (when she wasn't being Amazingly Dotty), whoa, Ange, biting the hand or what?

Sarah Brooks, The Cautious Traveller's Guide to the Wastelands (2024), which I picked up some while ago on promotion and then I think I saw someone writing something about it. I liked the idea but somehow wasn't overwhelmingly enthused?

Read the latest Literary Review.

Since there is a forthcoming online discussion, dug out my 1974 mass market paperback edition of Joanna Russ, The Female Man - I think this was even before excursions to Dark They Were and Golden-Eyed, somehow I had learnt of Fantast, a mailorder operation with duplicated catalogues every few months that purveyed an odd selection of US books. It's quite hard to recall the original impact. Possibly I now prefer her essays?

Carol Atherton, Reading Lessons: The Books We Read at School, the Conversations They Spark, and Why They Matter (2024) - EngLit teacher meditates over books that she had taught, her own reading of them, their impact in the classroom, general issues around teaching Lit, etc - this came up in my Recommended for You in Kobo + on promotion. Quite interesting but how the teaching of EngLit has changed since My Day....

Lee Child, The Hard Way (Jack Reacher, #10) (2006) - every so often I read an interview with or something about Lee Child who sounds very much a Good Guy so I thought I might try one of these and this one was currently on promotion. It's less action and more twisty following intricate plot than I anticipated with lots of sudden reversal, and lots and lots of details. I don't think I'm going to go away and devour all the Reacher books but I can think of circumstances where they might be a preferable option given limited reading materials available.

On the go

I literally just finished that so there is nothing on the go, except one or two things I suppose I am technically still reading.

Up next

Dunno.

Comments

[replyhazy]

I got very stuck on the Cautious Traveler's Guide. Got on the train, had the characters described... and I pulled the emergency stop. Maybe I'll go back sometime, maybe not.

[kore]

Since there is a forthcoming online discussion, dug out my 1974 mass market paperback edition of Joanna Russ, The Female Man

Oooh....

[qian]

Have you read Reacher Said Nothing by Andy Martin? Martin is an academic and Reacher fan who basically observes Lee Child while he's writing a Reacher novel. It's very funny and as someone who has never read a Reacher novel, I found it very interesting as a depiction of the writing process.

[oursin]

That sounds fascinating! I imagine a workroom with lots of maps on the wall and timetables and reference books, and charts plotting out the story, and maybe going out and walking from A to B to make sure it takes just that long.

[heleninwales]

Thanks for mentioning the Lee Child Jack Reacher book. It sounds like the sort of thing we listen to as audiobooks at mealtimes. I've just looked and, as I expected, the library have lots of them. My husband won't watch or listen to SF or fantasy or historical novels. We're after light entertainment, so anything literary is out so I'm always looking for new (to me) authors.

[oursin]

There's a certain amount of violence but rather less rough-and-tumble than I expected and rather more little grey cell work.

[heleninwales]

That sounds just the thing. A bit of violence is fine, as long as it doesn't linger too long over gory details.

[antisoppist]

I was enjoying the Cautious Traveller's Guide to the Wastelands but then it all seemed to go from separate individuals not talking to each other to working together rather too suddenly and not believably enough for the characters we'd been shown. I liked the train though.

[oursin]

There was a bit of a sense of Having To Have Plot Happen.