Here are the books I read in April:

1. WORLD WITHOUT END by Sean Russell (606 p.) One of my absolute favorites. Taking place in a world similar to our 18th century, Tristam Flattery, a dedicated “empiricist” heads off for a voyage of scientific discovery, yet mysterious things keep happening . . . the author has said the idea behind this book was what if Darwin had gone exploring and discovered magic instead? An intriguing premise, but the best part is that he does this so, so well. I love the story, love the characters, love the writing…. Don’t just take my word for it–here’s what Roger Turner had to say: “Have you ever found a book that you don’t want to end?  Ever?  I’ve discovered a few
in almost forty years of reading science fiction and fantasy.  This is one.  I wish I could
explain why it held me in such thrall.  Characters?  Plot?  Prose?  Setting?  Yeah, I suppose
so but that’s not it.  I just remember each time I picked it up there was a languid ache knowing
that, with each page, I’d have less to read.  Finishing it was like the day I knew for
certain that it was time to leave school and go out into the world.  I could only sigh, look
back and remember.”

2. SEA WITHOUT A SHORE by Sean Russell (598 p.) The second book, which tells the end of Tristam’s voyage. They arrive at the south-pacific-type island of Varua and get sucked into a web of plots and taboos centering around the herb Tristam has been pledged to find . . . These are boring descriptions, really, but the books are wonderful. The writing is fabulous, the world is very distinct and real  . . . they are the first two of the books I’ve read by this author (who writes all too slowly for my taste), and they remain my favorites. As in, I’ve read the two of them twelve times now, and enjoy them just as much, ever single time.

3. KNITTING by Anne Bartlett (270 p.) An Australian book telling of two very different women who meet by accident and build a friendship based on knitting . . . the one woman is an emotionally-shaky master knitter, the other is an emotionally-shaky academic who focuses on fiber arts . . . A nice story of two women who have almost nothing in common . . . this is not a book about knitting, it’s about emotional healing.

4. SHATTERED SILK by Barbara Michaels (306 p.) An oldish, “fluff” kind of mystery-ish story . . . (nice and clear, huh?) Karen has just left her cheating husband and is staying with her aunt and uncle in Washington DC, where she gets swept up in plans to start her own vintage clothing store . . . but first, she has to deal with whomever keeps breaking into the house, attacking her, making threats . . . and, oh yes, there’s the old boyfriend to deal with . . . Fun.

5. WRAPT IN CRYSTAL by Sharon Shinn (324 p.) A very religious kind of sci-fi mystery. On Semay, someone is murdering priestesses from the two main religions–basically opposite sides of the same goddess–and Cowen Drake has been sent to figure out why. I’ve said many, many times how much I love Sharon Shinn’s writing, and this book is no exception. There’s a little more heartache than in some of her other books, but oh, there’s redemption, too, as Drake explores the two sects, trying to piece together the reason that anyone would be killing these women  . . .

6. HOUSEKEEPING by Marilynne Robinson (213 p.) A misty, dreamy kind of book with the clearest and most distinct descriptions . . . I do love a book with great, descriptive passages, and this book is wonderfully evocative, telling the story of the two orphaned sisters, Lorrette and Ruthie, being raised by their aunt Sylvie, a drifter at heart, but doing her best to stay put for the two girls . . .

7. MASQUE OF THE BLACK TULIP by Lauren Willig (425 p.) Another fluff kind of book, but also great fun–the sequel to the “Secret of the Pink Carnation,” it tells the story of the spies that followed the Scarlet Pimpernel, bracketed by the story of Eloise, the modern-day grad student studying the archives for her dissertation. Silly and fun, but highly readable.

8. THREE MEN IN A BOAT (TO SAY NOTHING ABOUT THE DOG) by Jerome K. Jerome (250 p.). Speaking of silly and fun . . . I’ve heard Jerome Jerome compared to PG Wodehouse (or, the other way around, really), but hadn’t realized why before . . . now I understand, having read this story of three friends taking a “relaxing” trip down the Thames as a way to recover from the stresses of their daily life . . . or, at least, that’s the idea. Taking place approximately 1888, obviously, these are the grandparents of Bertie Wooster and the others from the Drones Club . . . it explains a lot, actually . . .

10. EPITAPH FOR A PEACH by David Mas Masumoto (233 p.) This book was a gift. Beautiful. Elegiac. Poetic. Wistful. Evocative. Just . . . a beautiful read. In fact, I stretched this book out over a month, just to be able to savor it. It is a memoir of a year on the author’s farm as he struggles to save his heirloom peaches in a marketplace more interested in durability than in taste. Not only does he write beautiful prose, but I could almost taste those Sun Crest peaches. Absolutely wonderful memoir.

11. TO SAY NOTHING OF THE DOG by Connie Willis (493 p.) I love this wacky book. It’s got everything. A unique premise, time-travel, love, comedy, a dog . . . and quite a complicated little plot. The idea is that time-travel is possible and in the not-too-distant future, historians are busily travelling around for research–driven by Mrs. Schrapnell who is insisting on rebuilding Coventry Cathedral exactly as it was before being destroyed in WWII. So naturally, Ned Henry ends up in Victorian England, floating down the Thames. Makes no sense? That’s okay, poor Ned is so “time-lagged” at the beginning, it doesn’t make sense to him, either. And frankly, that’s part of the fun.

12. MR. DARCY’S DIARY by Amanda Grange (329 p.) The story of Pride & Prejudice as told from Mr. Darcy’s diary . . . It was okay, but no comparison to Pamela Aidan’s trilogy (which, while not perfect, was much better). Still, this had it’s moments and it wasn’t awful, and I do love the story, so . . . this was okay.

13. NINETEEN MINUTES by Jodi Picoult (455 p.) Considering the events in Virginia on the 16th, it probably seems strange that I would pick now to read a novel about school shootings–which is what this is. Picoult’s latest explores the causes and after-effects of a high school massacre, telling it from the points of view of the shooter, a girl who was his best friend before she became one of the “cool” kids, and her mother, who becomes judge on the case. She did a great job putting the pieces together, although I wasn’t impressed with her patented surprise twist at the end. (Do any of her books end without a twist at the last minute??) I thought the ending was actually kind of lame, but it’s hard to imagine a way she could have ended it that would have been more satisfying. Or at least, nothing I can say here without spoiling it for anyone. (Like, “Why couldn’t so-and-so- have kept his/her job?” “Why did the author have to make so-and-so basically an accomplice after the fact?” Stuff like that.)

(But still–the reason I chose to read this book now? Sometimes reading a fictional account that’s a variation on something real and tragic that’s all over the airwaves helps cut the agony a little. The week after Katrina hit, I read “Isaac’s Storm” about the 1900 Galveston hurricane–reading the tragedy of all those long-lost lives helped take the edge off the real, current suffering of all the people along the Gulf coast. On the first anniversary of 9/11, I read “The Day the World Came to Town”–which was about as inspiring and happy a story of that day as you can manage, yet still met my own, internal need to honor the anniversary. It’s like the hair of the dog to address a hangover. Or squinting through your fingers during a horror movie. It doesn’t make what’s really happening any less horrific, but dilutes it just enough to be bearable. For me, anyway.)

14. LIADEN UNIVERSE COMPANION #1 by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller (300 p.) 12 short stories about the Liaden world. While not usually a fan of short stories, I enjoyed these. Mostly because I’m happy for any “fix” for these characters and this story. I like these authors!

15. TRUTH MACHINE by James Halperin (378 p.) A reread. This book was written around 1995, and tells the story of the near-future, when a 100%-accurate truth machine is invented, and changes everything . . . I do love a good “what if” story, and this is a good one . .. although the author was perhaps a little optimistic about how far along we’d be by now in terms of things like curing cancer and such . . . And the little too-clever asides from the narrator (like, “Back then, most people still ate three meals a day before it was discovered that grazing was healthier….”) got a little distracting. But those are minor quibbles–all in all, an entertaining look into what the world could be….

16. TEACH YOURSELF VISUALLY: HANDSPINNING by Judith MacKenzie McCuin (202 p.) Yes, as expected, a thoroughly excellent guide to handspinning. Great pictures to demonstrate all the techniques–which, of course, you’d expect in this book.

17. CONSUELO AND ALVA VANDERBILT by Amanda MacKenzie Stuart (509 p.) Biography on a seriously unhappy mother and daughter. Alva, married to Cornelius Vanderbilt’s grandson, has serious plans to marry her daugher Consuelo to a British Duke. And to achieve women’s suffrage. And, basically, have everything her own way . . . A decent biography, well-researched, even if a trifle “breathless” in its tone from time to time. Both women had happiness in their lives, but also so much sadness, stuck in roles defined by their money.

18. LORD VALENTINE’S CASTLE by Robert Silverberg (447 p.) Classic sci-fi. Valentine becomes a juggler on the huge world of Majipoor, but is haunted by strange dreams, until he comes to realize that he is, in fact Lord Valentine, one of the planet’s rulers, displaced by some strange power . . . huge, detailed, epic kind of a story. And, really, how can you not be enticed by a book that begins with the words “And then….”

19. BLINK by Malcolm Gladwell (276 p.) A look at how our minds make instantaneous decisions, based on subconscious, “thin-slices” of information. Fascinating to read. Really interesting points, and very readable.

20. JENNA STARBORN by Sharon Shinn (381 p.) A sci-fi rendition of the story of Jane Eyre. Better than that description sounds (grin). Jenna was born from a “gen tank” but unloved by the woman who had wanted her. She ends up at a charity school, studying to be a nuclear technician. After graduating, she takes a job on a small, terraformed world called Fieldstar . . . basically, you know the story already, but told from a fresh point of view, and with dazzling imagery. There’s a reason that Sharon Shinn is one of my favorite authors.

21. CRYSTAL SOLDIER by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller. (321 p.) The pre-history of the Liaden series, this book (first of a two-part series) tells the story of M. Jela Granthor’s Guard and Cantra yos Phelium–the precursers to the Korval clan. It’s a far different world these two live in, tha the one the Liaden series inhabits. Frankly, I don’t find it nearly as readable, but that’s because the world is SO alien to our own–and, rather than being a reflection on the authors’ skills, I think it actually says a lot FOR them, that they’ve created a world so very different . . . and then, since I love knowing the “beginnings” of stories, it’s a treat to know the source of the famous “I Dare” creed….

22. WATER: TALES OF ELEMENTAL SPIRITS by Robin McKinley and Peter Dickinson (266 p) A fantasy book of short stories, all with a magical-water element. Merpeople, for example, appear in several. Perfectly nice stories, but still . . . as always . . . short stories never quite satisfy me. I always want more! At least they were decent short stories….

• Tags: Monthly Reading List, Reading • Permalink:Reading List from April //