Carl's bookshelf: all en-US Sat, 27 Jan 2024 10:54:00 -0800 60 Carl's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Edda 887139
Over a period of twenty years Snorri Sturluson, scholar, courtier and poet, compiled the prose Edda as a textbook for young poets who wished to praise kings. His work surveys the content, style and metres of traditional Viking poetry and includes a lengthy poem of Snorrie's own, honoring the king of Norway. Ironically, Snorri was killed in his cellar in Iceland in 1241 on the instigation of the king of Norway, as a result of political intrigue.

The Edda contains the most extensive account of Norse myths and legends that have survived from the Middle Ages as well as the famous stories of Odin winning back the mead of poetic inspiration and Thor fishing for the Midgard serpent.]]> 260 Snorri Sturluson 0460876163 Carl 5
An excellent translation of Snorri's Edda, or the Prose Edda. I hear Jesse Byock has a translation out as well which I'll have to check out, but I see no reason for the beginner to try anything other than Faulkes'-- at the very least, I believe his academic work has had him more involved in research on Edda than Byock's, but I could be wrong. Of course, I know Byock's been doing some work on oral history that could be considered relevant to Edda, but as far as that whole topic goes I recommend Gisli Sigurdsson instead.
I believe Faulkes takes the majority or all of his translation from the Codex Regius manuscript, which is the primary one. As another review has said, Faulkes is one of the few translators to include Skaldskaparmal, which contains many of the most important stories. Well, some older translations include the interesting bits but leave out the rest. But with Faulkes you get the whole thing, and it serves as a reminder that Edda was not written as a handbook on mythology, but as a Poetics-- in fact, I believe Faulkes subscribes (as I do) to the idea that "Edda" (the book is named this in the Uppsala codex-- the name for Poetic or Elder Edda was applied to that MSS in the 1600s) is derived from the Latin verb for "compose", "edo" (based on a comparison to the Old Norse adaptation of the word "credo" to "kredda").
I think it was Magnus Olsen who first suggested that the book was originally written in reverse order. As we have it, it begins with a prologue (which may or may not have been written by Snorri) in which we are given a euhemeristic explanation for the gods, claiming that they are magicians who left Troy after the Trojan war and came to Sweden because their leader Odin prophecied that they would thrive there-- after arrival they convince the inhabitants they are gods (though I could be confusing a bit of this account with that in Ynglinga saga, or even Gylfaginning), which leads us to the next section, Gylfaginning (=The Deluding of Gylfi), which frames a summary of the mythology (especially the creation, Ragnarok, the main gods and some representative stories, basically along the lines of Voluspa/Seeress' Prophecy, which he constantly quotes) with a dialogue between the Swedish King Gylfi and the immigrant, magical Aesir from Asia Minor. After that we have Skaldskaparmal (=Poetic Diction), which begins with but doesn't sustain a frame narrative in which Aegir (in some places a "sea king", in some a giant or sea god) is at a feast with the Aesir (this could be the feast that the Aesir force the giant Aegir to host in Hymir's poem and Loki's quarrel in Poetic Edda) and questions Bragi, the god of poetry (apparently derived from the supposed court poet Bragi from around 850 who composed the first known skaldic poems, or drottkvaett stanzas-- the sort of poetry Snorri is teaching here) on the art of poetry, mainly kennings in this case, which are ornate circumlocutions used in drottkvaett (and to a lesser degree of ornateness in all Germanic alliterative verse). Most of these kennings are based on mythological stories, so Bragi explains many of these kennings by telling these stories. Eventually Skaldskaparmal turns into a bunch of lists of "heiti", which aren't kennings proper but just other ways of referring to things. ]]> 4.07 1220 Edda
author: Snorri Sturluson
name: Carl
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1220
rating: 5
read at: 2002/01/01
date added: 2024/01/27
shelves: mythology, middleages, oldnorsestudies, heroicliterature
review:
Naturally my review has turned out to be too long, so I'll post what I can and then post the rest as comments. And if anyone in a position of power at goodreads sees this, please give us more room to write!

An excellent translation of Snorri's Edda, or the Prose Edda. I hear Jesse Byock has a translation out as well which I'll have to check out, but I see no reason for the beginner to try anything other than Faulkes'-- at the very least, I believe his academic work has had him more involved in research on Edda than Byock's, but I could be wrong. Of course, I know Byock's been doing some work on oral history that could be considered relevant to Edda, but as far as that whole topic goes I recommend Gisli Sigurdsson instead.
I believe Faulkes takes the majority or all of his translation from the Codex Regius manuscript, which is the primary one. As another review has said, Faulkes is one of the few translators to include Skaldskaparmal, which contains many of the most important stories. Well, some older translations include the interesting bits but leave out the rest. But with Faulkes you get the whole thing, and it serves as a reminder that Edda was not written as a handbook on mythology, but as a Poetics-- in fact, I believe Faulkes subscribes (as I do) to the idea that "Edda" (the book is named this in the Uppsala codex-- the name for Poetic or Elder Edda was applied to that MSS in the 1600s) is derived from the Latin verb for "compose", "edo" (based on a comparison to the Old Norse adaptation of the word "credo" to "kredda").
I think it was Magnus Olsen who first suggested that the book was originally written in reverse order. As we have it, it begins with a prologue (which may or may not have been written by Snorri) in which we are given a euhemeristic explanation for the gods, claiming that they are magicians who left Troy after the Trojan war and came to Sweden because their leader Odin prophecied that they would thrive there-- after arrival they convince the inhabitants they are gods (though I could be confusing a bit of this account with that in Ynglinga saga, or even Gylfaginning), which leads us to the next section, Gylfaginning (=The Deluding of Gylfi), which frames a summary of the mythology (especially the creation, Ragnarok, the main gods and some representative stories, basically along the lines of Voluspa/Seeress' Prophecy, which he constantly quotes) with a dialogue between the Swedish King Gylfi and the immigrant, magical Aesir from Asia Minor. After that we have Skaldskaparmal (=Poetic Diction), which begins with but doesn't sustain a frame narrative in which Aegir (in some places a "sea king", in some a giant or sea god) is at a feast with the Aesir (this could be the feast that the Aesir force the giant Aegir to host in Hymir's poem and Loki's quarrel in Poetic Edda) and questions Bragi, the god of poetry (apparently derived from the supposed court poet Bragi from around 850 who composed the first known skaldic poems, or drottkvaett stanzas-- the sort of poetry Snorri is teaching here) on the art of poetry, mainly kennings in this case, which are ornate circumlocutions used in drottkvaett (and to a lesser degree of ornateness in all Germanic alliterative verse). Most of these kennings are based on mythological stories, so Bragi explains many of these kennings by telling these stories. Eventually Skaldskaparmal turns into a bunch of lists of "heiti", which aren't kennings proper but just other ways of referring to things.
]]> The Four Profound Weaves 49189310 The Four Profound Weaves is the anti-authoritarian, queer-mystical fairy tale we need right now.�
-Annalee Newitz, author of The Future of Another Timeline

[STARRED REVIEW] “A beautiful, heartfelt story of change, family, identity, and courage.�
-Library Journal

Wind: To match one's body with one's heart
Sand: To take the bearer where they wish
Song: In praise of the goddess Bird
Bone: To move unheard in the night

The Surun' do not speak of the master weaver, Benesret, who creates the cloth of bone for assassins in the Great Burri Desert. But Uiziya now seeks her aunt Benesret in order to learn the final weave, although the price for knowledge may be far too dear to pay.

Among the Khana, women travel in caravans to trade, while men remain in the inner quarter as scholars. A nameless man struggles to embody Khana masculinity, after many years of performing the life of a woman, trader, wife, and grandmother.

As the past catches up to the nameless man, he must choose between the life he dreamed of and Uiziya, and Uiziya must discover how to challenge a tyrant, and weave from deaths that matter.

Set in R. B. Lemberg's beloved Birdverse, The Four Profound Weaves hearkens to Ursula Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness. In this breathtaking debut, Lemberg offers a timeless chronicle of claiming one's identity in a hostile world.]]> 193 R.B. Lemberg Carl 5 3.90 2020 The Four Profound Weaves
author: R.B. Lemberg
name: Carl
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2020/11/08
date added: 2020/11/08
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Tea Master and the Detective]]> 39093158
Welcome to the Scattered Pearls Belt, a collection of ring habitats and orbitals ruled by exiled human scholars and powerful families, and held together by living mindships who carry people and freight between the stars. In this fluid society, human and mindship avatars mingle in corridors and in function rooms, and physical and virtual realities overlap, the appareance of environments easily modified and adapted to interlocutors or current mood.

A transport ship discharged from military service after a traumatic injury, The Shadow's Child now ekes out a precarious living as a brewer of mind-altering drugs for the comfort of space-travellers. Meanwhile, abrasive and eccentric scholar Long Chau wants to find a corpse for a scientific study. When Long Chau walks into her office, The Shadow's Child expects an unpleasant but easy assignment. When the corpse turns out to have been murdered, Long Chau feels compelled to investigate, dragging The Shadow's Child with her.

As they dig deep into the victim's past, The Shadow's Child realises that the investigation points to Long Chau's own murky past--and, ultimately, to the dark and unbearable void that lies between the stars...]]> 96 Aliette de Bodard 1596068655 Carl 5 4.06 2018 The Tea Master and the Detective
author: Aliette de Bodard
name: Carl
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at: 2020/02/24
date added: 2020/02/24
shelves:
review:

]]> My Cat Yugoslavia 34875448 A love story set in two countries in two radically different moments in time, bringing together a young man, his mother, a boa constrictor, and one capricious cat.

In 1980s Yugoslavia, a young Muslim girl is married off to a man she hardly knows, but what was meant to be a happy match goes quickly wrong. Soon thereafter her country is torn apart by war and she and her family flee. Years later, her son, Bekim, grows up a social outcast in present-day Finland, not just an immigrant in a country suspicious of foreigners, but a gay man in an unaccepting society. Aside from casual hookups, his only friend is a boa constrictor whom, improbably—he is terrified of snakes—he lets roam his apartment. Then, during a visit to a gay bar, Bekim meets a talking cat who moves in with him and his snake. It is this witty, charming, manipulative creature who starts Bekim on a journey back to Kosovo to confront his demons and make sense of the magical, cruel, incredible history of his family. And it is this that, in turn, enables him finally, to open himself to true love—which he will find in the most unexpected place.]]> 272 Pajtim Statovci 1101871830 Carl 5 3.76 2014 My Cat Yugoslavia
author: Pajtim Statovci
name: Carl
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2014
rating: 5
read at: 2018/02/03
date added: 2018/02/03
shelves:
review:

]]> Ms Ice Sandwich 36355584
But the boy's friend hears about this hesitant adoration, and suddenly everything changes. His visits to Ms Ice Sandwich stop, and with them the last hopes of his childhood.

A moving and surprisingly funny tale of growing up and learning how to lose, Ms Ice Sandwich is Mieko Kawakami at her very best.]]> 97 Mieko Kawakami Carl 5 3.84 2013 Ms Ice Sandwich
author: Mieko Kawakami
name: Carl
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2013
rating: 5
read at: 2018/02/03
date added: 2018/02/03
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The More Known World (The Oddfits Series #2)]]> 28483910 297 Tiffany Tsao 1503990990 Carl 0 to-read 4.14 The More Known World (The Oddfits Series #2)
author: Tiffany Tsao
name: Carl
average rating: 4.14
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2017/11/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Song of Fire 1865832 448 Joseph Bentz 0785278826 Carl 5 fantasysci-fi ]]> 4.15 1995 Song of Fire
author: Joseph Bentz
name: Carl
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1995
rating: 5
read at: 1998/01/01
date added: 2015/08/04
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
Been way too long since reading this, so the five stars is a guess (and possibly influenced by Professor Bentz's befriending of me at the Mt Hermon Writers conference). I hope to reread it again at some point and will post a more thorough review then.

]]> <![CDATA[Philosophy of Mathematics: An Introduction to a World of Proofs and Pictures (Philosophical Issues in Science)]]> 469677 * the mathematical image
* platonism
* picture-proofs
* applied mathematics
* Hilbert and Godel
* knots and nations
* definitions
* picture-proofs and Wittgenstein
* computation, proof and conjecture.
The book is ideal for courses on philosophy of mathematics and logic.]]> 232 James Robert Brown 0415122759 Carl 0 to-read, philosophy 4.33 1999 Philosophy of Mathematics: An Introduction to a World of Proofs and Pictures (Philosophical Issues in Science)
author: James Robert Brown
name: Carl
average rating: 4.33
book published: 1999
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2015/02/05
shelves: to-read, philosophy
review:

]]> Winter's Tale 386298
Though he thinks the house is empty, the daughter of the house is home. Thus begins the love between Peter Lake, a middle-aged Irish burglar, and Beverly Penn, a young girl, who is dying.

Peter Lake, a simple, uneducated man, because of a love that, at first he does not fully understand, is driven to stop time and bring back the dead. His great struggle, in a city ever alight with its own energy and besieged by unprecedented winters, is one of the most beautiful and extraordinary stories of American literature.]]> 673 Mark Helprin 0151972036 Carl 5 literaryandhardtoclassify 3.85 1983 Winter's Tale
author: Mark Helprin
name: Carl
average rating: 3.85
book published: 1983
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2014/11/03
shelves: literaryandhardtoclassify
review:
It's been years since I've read this, but I loved it-- gorgeous prose, a surreal alternate New York, and an engaging vision of the City. I'll have to write more when I get around to rereading it, but definitely one of my favorites.
]]> International Folkloristics 402815 272 Alan Dundes 084769514X Carl 4 folklore In any case, I may be a bit biased as a former student of Dundes (RIP) but this is a nice collection of key texts in the development of the field of international folkloristics, and is a great resource for instructors looking for short but meaty selections for a course reader. Dundes includes a thorough introduction to each selection, which is helpful (though my students had trouble telling where the introduction ended and the text began). Some of the selections can be a bit hard to understand, as they are, after all, only excerpts, not the entire work, but for the most part I thought this was an excellent introductory book on the subject. ]]> 4.00 1999 International Folkloristics
author: Alan Dundes
name: Carl
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1999
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2014/04/05
shelves: folklore
review:
I didn't think this book existed on Good Reads! I could swear I search for it.
In any case, I may be a bit biased as a former student of Dundes (RIP) but this is a nice collection of key texts in the development of the field of international folkloristics, and is a great resource for instructors looking for short but meaty selections for a course reader. Dundes includes a thorough introduction to each selection, which is helpful (though my students had trouble telling where the introduction ended and the text began). Some of the selections can be a bit hard to understand, as they are, after all, only excerpts, not the entire work, but for the most part I thought this was an excellent introductory book on the subject.
]]> The Stone and the Flute 248603 864 Hans Bemmann 0140074457 Carl 5 4.07 1983 The Stone and the Flute
author: Hans Bemmann
name: Carl
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1983
rating: 5
read at: 2002/01/01
date added: 2014/01/06
shelves: fantasysci-fi, literaryandhardtoclassify
review:
Translated from German, this book just looked too tempting with its 800 pages. Took me a while to get around to reading it, but what a ride once you get on! For those more interested in action-adventure type fiction, this might not be for you-- it has the feel of a quest book, but the quest is largely internal and relational, and the plot is biographical, following the life, travels and adventures of Listener. It's been over 5 or 6 years and I still haven't worked up the energy to get through it again. Finishing the book is like finishing a life, and I recommend giving yourself a free two or three days when you get near the end so that you can recuperate and learn to deal with your own life again! I believe this was written near the end of Hans Bemman's life (from the little I remember from the bio), and it certainly feels as though a lifetimes worth of experience has gone into this book.
]]> The Word for World Is Forest 7672380 also appears in the anthology Again, Dangerous Visions (1972) and the collection The Eye of the Heron / The Word for World Is Forest (1991)

When the inhabitants of a peaceful world are conquered by the bloodthirsty yumens, their existence is irrevocably altered. Forced into servitude, the Athsheans find themselves at the mercy of their brutal masters.

Desperation causes the Athsheans, led by Selver, to retaliate against their captors, abandoning their strictures against violence. But in defending their lives, they have endangered the very foundations of their society. For every blow against the invaders is a blow to the humanity of the Athsheans. And once the killing starts, there is no turning back.

]]> 189 Ursula K. Le Guin 0765324644 Carl 5 fantasysci-fi


Really enjoying this short book so far. The shorter novels of this period (New Wave sci-fi) may sometimes feel like they don't have room to really draw out a plot like we expect to be done, but I have to admit, I wish people were writing more short stuff like this nowadays. Still a bit beyond the reach of a novella in a journal, but shorter than the 4-500 + page monsters that seem mandatory in the field now. I like long books too-- just wish we had the shorter option as well.

In many ways it feels like LeGuin is hitting us over the head with a postcolonial club in this book, but hey, it's sci-fi, and the genre has a long tradition of exaggeration and black and white conflict between the clearly good and the clearly evil. The influence of Vietnam is clear, from the military tech used to the atrocities and the construction of the natives as a not human, but human enough to villainize on the part of the main villain (ironically enough). I also just found a reference to D-day by way of justifying the genocidal war against the natives-- which I take to be a reference to the use of the patriotic narrative of WWII to justify other wars, such as Vietnam.

The culture/society of the the natives is fascinating, and LeGuin's family history in anthropology shines through. I've never run across a more intriguing attempt to portray a society living at the intersection of the "real world" and the timeless world of myth-- possibly exaggerated a bit much (this is an alien culture, after all), but clearly drawn from knowledge of the role of myth, archetypes, etc, in anthropology. I think there is a bit of Jungian influence-- more than I'd like-- but I think it's possible to read it without that. No, I don't like Jung, I admit, but maybe I just have not delved into his work enough. In any case, I hazard the term "archetypes" partly because of what seems to be a Jungian connection, but I don't think we need to be hard-core Jungian to use that term. Or perhaps we could evade the Jungian connotations with a reference to "mythic prototypes". Whatever-- I find it a fascinating and productive stretching of our perceptions of religion, gods, etc-- "anthropological" sci-fi at it's best, taking the term to = creating a new culture and investigating the problems of interacting with/understanding it (and ignoring the misuse of "anthro-"). It could be said to go too far, taking our image of the "primitive" and exaggerating it to make it ever more the exotic Other-- but I don't think that is a fair criticism, since the book is very aware of the problem of Otherness and attacks it very skillfully. In particular, the chapter I just read shows the main villain (of the oafish sort, but very despicably evil nevertheless) getting trapped by his conflicting excuses-- the natives are not human and therefore may be enslaved and treated horribly, but he rapes their women, so he must consider them human or he would be committing bestiality. Shortly thereafter he stops sleeping with them and goes on with his genocide.

There is a not-so-subtle juxtaposition of a feminist critique with this postcolonial critique. Right from the start we see that Earth men use Earth women as broodmares and whores-- they are even shipped from the home planet to placate the men working on the colonial planet. So far the connection has not been made explicit, but it is an expected comparison of the plight of two sorts of "subaltern"-- commodified/objectified women and the bestialized, castrated, monstrous Other of the native. There is actually a defined contrast between male and female roles in the native population as well, but in that situation both positions are arguably positions of power and respect-- not so with the Earth women, as portrayed so far.]]> 4.05 1972 The Word for World Is Forest
author: Ursula K. Le Guin
name: Carl
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1972
rating: 5
read at: 2010/09/01
date added: 2013/09/11
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
My original review is left below, since I don't have time to write a full review right now. Gave it 5 stars, though apparently even the author didn't like how much of an evil strawman the antagonist is. I liked it anyway-- probably just enjoyed hating the villain too much, I suppose. Anyway, great short novel, and an interesting take on planetary romance-- leaning more towards what I think of as anthropological sci-fi, though that is a problematic label (but actually very interesting in its problematicness).



Really enjoying this short book so far. The shorter novels of this period (New Wave sci-fi) may sometimes feel like they don't have room to really draw out a plot like we expect to be done, but I have to admit, I wish people were writing more short stuff like this nowadays. Still a bit beyond the reach of a novella in a journal, but shorter than the 4-500 + page monsters that seem mandatory in the field now. I like long books too-- just wish we had the shorter option as well.

In many ways it feels like LeGuin is hitting us over the head with a postcolonial club in this book, but hey, it's sci-fi, and the genre has a long tradition of exaggeration and black and white conflict between the clearly good and the clearly evil. The influence of Vietnam is clear, from the military tech used to the atrocities and the construction of the natives as a not human, but human enough to villainize on the part of the main villain (ironically enough). I also just found a reference to D-day by way of justifying the genocidal war against the natives-- which I take to be a reference to the use of the patriotic narrative of WWII to justify other wars, such as Vietnam.

The culture/society of the the natives is fascinating, and LeGuin's family history in anthropology shines through. I've never run across a more intriguing attempt to portray a society living at the intersection of the "real world" and the timeless world of myth-- possibly exaggerated a bit much (this is an alien culture, after all), but clearly drawn from knowledge of the role of myth, archetypes, etc, in anthropology. I think there is a bit of Jungian influence-- more than I'd like-- but I think it's possible to read it without that. No, I don't like Jung, I admit, but maybe I just have not delved into his work enough. In any case, I hazard the term "archetypes" partly because of what seems to be a Jungian connection, but I don't think we need to be hard-core Jungian to use that term. Or perhaps we could evade the Jungian connotations with a reference to "mythic prototypes". Whatever-- I find it a fascinating and productive stretching of our perceptions of religion, gods, etc-- "anthropological" sci-fi at it's best, taking the term to = creating a new culture and investigating the problems of interacting with/understanding it (and ignoring the misuse of "anthro-"). It could be said to go too far, taking our image of the "primitive" and exaggerating it to make it ever more the exotic Other-- but I don't think that is a fair criticism, since the book is very aware of the problem of Otherness and attacks it very skillfully. In particular, the chapter I just read shows the main villain (of the oafish sort, but very despicably evil nevertheless) getting trapped by his conflicting excuses-- the natives are not human and therefore may be enslaved and treated horribly, but he rapes their women, so he must consider them human or he would be committing bestiality. Shortly thereafter he stops sleeping with them and goes on with his genocide.

There is a not-so-subtle juxtaposition of a feminist critique with this postcolonial critique. Right from the start we see that Earth men use Earth women as broodmares and whores-- they are even shipped from the home planet to placate the men working on the colonial planet. So far the connection has not been made explicit, but it is an expected comparison of the plight of two sorts of "subaltern"-- commodified/objectified women and the bestialized, castrated, monstrous Other of the native. There is actually a defined contrast between male and female roles in the native population as well, but in that situation both positions are arguably positions of power and respect-- not so with the Earth women, as portrayed so far.
]]> <![CDATA[Becoming Evil: How Ordinary People Commit Genocide and Mass Killing]]> 1036084 Greg Stanton, vice-president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, and a devastating postscript that addresses current outbreaks of genocide and mass killing, this new edition demonstrates that genocide is a problem whose time has not yet passed, but Waller's clear vision gives hope that at least we can begin to understand how ordinary people are recruited into the process of destruction.]]> 351 James Waller 0195314565 Carl 0 to-read 4.12 2002 Becoming Evil: How Ordinary People Commit Genocide and Mass Killing
author: James Waller
name: Carl
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2002
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2013/08/14
shelves: to-read
review:
Looks interesting. Also, seems like a good balance to "Becoming Good", which I also have on my list. Check that, which I want to put on my list but cannot find listed on goodreads at the moment. Becoming Good is by David Gill.
]]> <![CDATA[Cultural Memory, Resistance, Faith & Identity]]> 2007148

Sangre llama a sangre. (Blood cries out to blood.)

—Latin American aphorism

The common "blood" of a people—that imperceptible flow that binds neighbor to neighbor and generation to generation—derives much of its strength from cultural memory. Cultural memories are those transformative historical experiences that define a culture, even as time passes and it adapts to new influences. For oppressed peoples, cultural memory engenders the spirit of resistance; not surprisingly, some of its most powerful incarnations are rooted in religion. In this interdisciplinary examination, Jeanette Rodriguez and Ted Fortier explore how four such forms of cultural memory have preserved the spirit of a particular people.

Cultural Memory is not a comparative work, but it is a multicultural one, with four distinct case studies: the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe and the devotion it inspires among Mexican Americans; the role of secrecy and ceremony among the Yaqui Indians of Arizona; the evolving narrative of Archbishop Oscar Romero of San Salvador as transmitted through the church of the poor and the martyrs; and the syncretism of Catholic Tzeltal Mayans of Chiapas, Mexico. In each case, the authors' religious credentials eased the resistance encountered by social scientists and other researchers. The result is a landmark work in cultural studies, a conversation between a liberation theologian and a cultural anthropologist on the religious nature of cultural memory and the power it brings to those who wield it.

]]> Jeanette Rodríguez Carl 4 4.00 2007 Cultural Memory, Resistance, Faith & Identity
author: Jeanette Rodríguez
name: Carl
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at: 2010/01/01
date added: 2013/06/25
shelves: literarytheory, history, culturecriticism, anthropology, oralityliteracy
review:
Loved this book- and my very detailed review got erased last time I tried to do this, so I'll just settle for saying I loved it, and while it wasn't the most theory-heavy book I've looked at, it had some very interesting case studies. I learned a lot about Latino and Native American cultural history-- something I tend to be pretty ignorant about. A very valuable experience.
]]> Troll: A Love Story 100485
Angel begins researching frantically. Angel searches the Internet, folklore, nature journals, and newspaper clippings, but his research doesn't tell him that trolls exude pheromones that have a profound aphrodisiac effect on all those around him. As Angel's life changes beyond recognition, it becomes clear that the troll is familiar with the man's most forbidden feelings, and that it may take him across lines he never thought he'd cross. A novel of sparkling originality, Troll is a wry, peculiar, and beguiling story of nature and man's relationship to wild things, and of the dark power of the wildness in ourselves.]]> 278 Johanna Sinisalo 0802141293 Carl 5 ]]> 3.52 2000 Troll: A Love Story
author: Johanna Sinisalo
name: Carl
average rating: 3.52
book published: 2000
rating: 5
read at: 2013/05/05
date added: 2013/05/11
shelves:
review:
We just had this author as a guest at Gustavus Adolphus College, so I finally got around to reading this book! Already wrote a review on my blog, so you can check out my discussion of her visit as well as my review of the book here:

]]> Beowulf. A Prose Translation 52359 Beowulf by the author of The Mere Wife.

Nearly twenty years after Seamus Heaney’s translation of Beowulf � and fifty years after the translation that continues to torment high-school students around the world � there is a radical new verse translation of the epic poem by Maria Dahvana Headley, which brings to light elements never before translated into English.

A man seeks to prove himself as a hero. A monster seeks silence in his territory. A warrior seeks to avenge her murdered son. A dragon ends it all. These familiar components of the epic poem are seen with a novelist’s eye toward gender, genre, and history. Beowulf has always been a tale of entitlement and encroachment � of powerful men seeking to become more powerful and one woman seeking justice for her child � but this version brings new context to an old story. While crafting her contemporary adaptation, Headley unearthed significant shifts lost over centuries of translation; her Beowulf is one for the twenty-first century.]]> 224 E. Talbot Donaldson 0393974065 Carl 5 3.64 1000 Beowulf. A Prose Translation
author: E. Talbot Donaldson
name: Carl
average rating: 3.64
book published: 1000
rating: 5
read at: 2003/01/01
date added: 2013/03/08
shelves: middleages, anglosaxonstudies, heroicliterature
review:
I'm dating this review based on the first time I read this translation (I THINK it was sometime 2003), not the first time I read Beowulf. The poem itself is one of my favorites, but there is nothing like reading it in the original-- even if you aren't a Medieval studies major, if you like this, I say take a course in Old English, then another where you go through Beowulf with the help of the professor. I've done that twice with two different professors (Carol Pasternack as an undergrad, Nick Howe, the editor of this translation, as a grad). This translation is Donaldson's and is in prose, which loses some of the effect, but preserves a lot of the phrases more faithfully than, say, Seamus Heaney's translation. You may not get the effect of the alliteration, but the appositive style is more faithful to the original (and there is an essay on the importance of appositive style in Beowulf included in the book). The last half of the book is a series of articles on the poem, one introductory and the others critical. Some may be harder to understand, but any college student should be able to find several which are accessible enough for them. My favorites are John Niles' and Roberta Frank's.
]]> <![CDATA[A Fire Upon the Deep (Zones of Thought, #1)]]> 77711 Alternate Cover Edition can be found here.

A Fire upon the Deep is the big, breakout book that fulfills the promise of Vinge's career to date: a gripping tale of galactic war told on a cosmic scale.

Thousands of years hence, many races inhabit a universe where a mind's potential is determined by its location in space, from superintelligent entities in the Transcend, to the limited minds of the Unthinking Depths, where only simple creatures and technology can function. Nobody knows what strange force partitioned space into these "regions of thought," but when the warring Straumli realm use an ancient Transcendent artifact as a weapon, they unwittingly unleash an awesome power that destroys thousands of worlds and enslaves all natural and artificial intelligence.

Fleeing the threat, a family of scientists, including two children, are taken captive by the Tines, an alien race with a harsh medieval culture, and used as pawns in a ruthless power struggle. A rescue mission, not entirely composed of humans, must rescue the children-and a secret that may save the rest of interstellar civilization.]]> 613 Vernor Vinge 0812515285 Carl 5 4.14 1992 A Fire Upon the Deep (Zones of Thought, #1)
author: Vernor Vinge
name: Carl
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1992
rating: 5
read at: 2012/01/01
date added: 2012/12/23
shelves:
review:
I enjoyed this very much, both as "New Space Opera" and "New Planetary Romance" (though I don't think anyone has used the latter term...) No time for a thorough review right now, but I left some more comments on my blog:
]]> The Quiet Girl 528918 424 Peter Høeg 0374263698 Carl 4
Will hopefully come back to this w/ a more thorough review or blog post one of these days. ]]> 3.24 2006 The Quiet Girl
author: Peter Høeg
name: Carl
average rating: 3.24
book published: 2006
rating: 4
read at: 2012/10/01
date added: 2012/12/23
shelves:
review:
Really liked this--well, the ending was a bit weird, but I found it quite gripping in any case, and am willing to return to it one day to try to reconsider the ending. More comments on my blog:

Will hopefully come back to this w/ a more thorough review or blog post one of these days.
]]> <![CDATA[The Quantum Thief (Jean le Flambeur, #1)]]> 7562764
Indeed, in his many lives, the entity called Jean le Flambeur has been a thief, a confidence artist, a posthuman mind-burgler, and more. His origins are shrouded in mystery, but his deeds are known throughout the Heterarchy, from breaking into the vast Zeusbrains of the Inner System to stealing rare Earth antiques from the aristocrats of Mars. In his last exploit, he managed the supreme feat of hiding the truth about himself from the one person in the solar system hardest to hide from: himself. Now he has the chance to regain himself in all his power—in exchange for finishing the one heist he never quite managed.

The Quantum Thief is a breathtaking joyride through the solar system several centuries hence, a world of marching cities, ubiquitous public-key encryption, people who communicate via shared memory, and a race of hyper-advanced humans who originated as an MMORPG guild. But for all its wonders, The Quantum Thief is also a story powered by very human motives of betrayal, jealousy, and revenge.]]> 336 Hannu Rajaniemi 0575088877 Carl 5 currently-reading
Will hopefully be able to do a more thorough review eventually, but have been a bit busy...]]> 3.84 2010 The Quantum Thief (Jean le Flambeur, #1)
author: Hannu Rajaniemi
name: Carl
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/12/23
shelves: currently-reading
review:
Still working through this, but enjoying it immensely. Did a quick mini-review along a few other books for my blog:

Will hopefully be able to do a more thorough review eventually, but have been a bit busy...
]]> Selected Poems 65349 Selected Poems adds twenty poems to the hundred in the original edition, broadening its focus to better reflect the enormous wealth of form, rhetoric, tone and content in Auden’s work. Newly included are such favorites as “Funeral Blues� and other works that represent Auden’s lighter, comic side, giving a fuller picture of the range of his genius. Also new are brief notes explaining references that may have become obscure to younger generations of readers and a revised introduction that draws on recent additions to knowledge about Auden.

As in the original edition, the new Selected Poems makes available the preferred original versions of some thirty poems that Auden revised later in life, making it the best source for enjoying the many facets of Auden’s art in one volume.]]> 352 W.H. Auden 0679724834 Carl 4 poetry 4.20 1972 Selected Poems
author: W.H. Auden
name: Carl
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1972
rating: 4
read at: 2007/01/01
date added: 2012/08/11
shelves: poetry
review:
Have read probably about a third of the poems in here. Good stuff, though I don't think I'm as blown away by Auden as others are-- but maybe that's my own lack of sophistication and taste. I like formalist poetry, and appreciate Auden's experimentation with formal meters in a world of free verse, but sometimes it feels a little too blatantly formal for me-- rhymes are nice, but sometimes it gets to be a bit much.
]]> Babel-17/Empire Star 145356 Alternate cover edition can be found here.

Author of the bestselling Dhalgren and winner of four Nebulas and one Hugo, Samuel R. Delany is one of the most acclaimed writers of speculative fiction.

Babel-17, winner of the Nebula Award for best novel of the year, is a fascinating tale of a famous poet bent on deciphering a secret language that is the key to the enemy’s deadly force, a task that requires she travel with a splendidly improbable crew to the site of the next attack. For the first time, Babel-17 is published as the author intended with the short novel Empire Star, the tale of Comet Jo, a simple-minded teen thrust into a complex galaxy when he’s entrusted to carry a vital message to a distant world. Spellbinding and smart, both novels are testimony to Delany’s vast and singular talent.]]> 311 Samuel R. Delany 0375706690 Carl 4 fantasysci-fi

Fascinating book so far! I don't have the new edition with the short story included, but will hopefully buy that soon. Haven't finished this, but it's really intriguing-- "linguistic/anthropological sci fi" or whatever you want to call it. Looking forward to finishing it!

Have finished it now-- amazing book, but for the time being I will give it only 4 stars-- feels like the idea was too big, and Delany had trouble clothing it in story. Actually, it feels like an early work by someone with a genius for sci-fi, and I think if it were 100 pages longer, and a couple more years had gone into writing it, it would be amazing. But still, a classic, and one I would love to teach one day. Will hopefully have time to discuss it more later.]]> 3.92 1966 Babel-17/Empire Star
author: Samuel R. Delany
name: Carl
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1966
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2012/05/02
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
Finally have the new edition with Empire Star included. Not sure whether to reread it now, or wait till I can convince my book group to read it- but we are "booked" through early summer, so I guess I will have to get into it now.


Fascinating book so far! I don't have the new edition with the short story included, but will hopefully buy that soon. Haven't finished this, but it's really intriguing-- "linguistic/anthropological sci fi" or whatever you want to call it. Looking forward to finishing it!

Have finished it now-- amazing book, but for the time being I will give it only 4 stars-- feels like the idea was too big, and Delany had trouble clothing it in story. Actually, it feels like an early work by someone with a genius for sci-fi, and I think if it were 100 pages longer, and a couple more years had gone into writing it, it would be amazing. But still, a classic, and one I would love to teach one day. Will hopefully have time to discuss it more later.
]]> Oxygen (Oxygen, #1) 768947
Bob Kaganovski, the ship's mechanic, is paid to be paranoid -- and he's good at it. After a teeth-rattling launch, Bob realizes that his paranoia hasn't prepared him for this trip. He can deal with a banged-up ship, but how's he going to survive the next five months with HER just a flimsy partition away?

Halfway to the Red Planet, an explosion leaves the crew with only enough oxygen for one. All evidence points to sabotage -- and Valkerie and Bob are the obvious suspects.

Oxygen is a witty, multi-award-winning roller coaster ride, with a plot that moves at the speed of light.

The authors had hoped to work in some cool controversy on science, faith, the meaning of life, the existence of God, and possibly even the Coke versus Pepsi debate, but they were having so much fun writing the story that they forgot to offend anyone.

This is the first edition of Oxygen, released in May, 2001. There is a second edition (the "Writer's Journey Edition) released in September, 2011 with several appendices for writers.]]> 368 Randall Ingermanson 0764224425 Carl 5 fantasysci-fi
This is my friend John's first published book, so I suppose I'm a tad biased, but I really enjoyed this book. In fact, I started reading (stupidly) when I was supposed to be studying for finals back in my undergrad days, and ended up reading it all the way through ina bit under two day-- didn't get much studying done then!
It's unfortunate that the book went out of print, as this is a enjoyable and impressive blending of hard sci-fi, thriller, mystery, and even romance (I may have heard that it would be coming out again, hopefully in time to benefit from John's new book Fossil Hunter, but that may have been wishful thinking). The mission to Mars, along with an Apollo 13 style threat to the crew's survival provide the backbone of the plot, the question of sabatoge provides the mystery, crew conflict comes out of both that mystery as well as differences in world-view compounded by an outbreak of opposition to the mission by religious fundamentalists, those same differences in world-view provide a platform for an exploration of the human condition, man's relationship to other, God, etc, and tightly woven into all these issues is the beautifully awkward romance between the two leads, Valkyrie and Bob (even their names are a delicious contrast). This novel is a solid contribution to the genre (which I suppose is best defined as "techno-thriller") and at the same time transcends the limitations of that genre-- I think it even won an award from a Romance website! John and Randy engage the issues of the Christian market which they write in, and do so with an openness and aversion to easy answers that is unfortunately missing in so many other writers in the Christian market. That the novel was written for the Christian market (a uniquely US phenomenon) is pretty clear, but the book is accessible and thought provoking to those outside that market, regardless of world-view.
This is John's first published work, and Randy's third or fourth (I believe). It may not be poetry, but it is clear and well thought out prose, and quite mature for so early in their careers. I recommend John's other books as well, Fifth Man (sequel to Oxygen) and Adreneline. Fossil Hunter will be coming out sometime in the next year, I believe. John
s style keeps getting better, and I'm enjoying watching his work develop. I'm afraid I haven't read much more of Randy's yet, but I'll hopefully get a review of more of his work up some day. ]]> 3.98 2001 Oxygen (Oxygen, #1)
author: Randall Ingermanson
name: Carl
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/02/18
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
[Edit--now available as an e-book! See my blog: ]

This is my friend John's first published book, so I suppose I'm a tad biased, but I really enjoyed this book. In fact, I started reading (stupidly) when I was supposed to be studying for finals back in my undergrad days, and ended up reading it all the way through ina bit under two day-- didn't get much studying done then!
It's unfortunate that the book went out of print, as this is a enjoyable and impressive blending of hard sci-fi, thriller, mystery, and even romance (I may have heard that it would be coming out again, hopefully in time to benefit from John's new book Fossil Hunter, but that may have been wishful thinking). The mission to Mars, along with an Apollo 13 style threat to the crew's survival provide the backbone of the plot, the question of sabatoge provides the mystery, crew conflict comes out of both that mystery as well as differences in world-view compounded by an outbreak of opposition to the mission by religious fundamentalists, those same differences in world-view provide a platform for an exploration of the human condition, man's relationship to other, God, etc, and tightly woven into all these issues is the beautifully awkward romance between the two leads, Valkyrie and Bob (even their names are a delicious contrast). This novel is a solid contribution to the genre (which I suppose is best defined as "techno-thriller") and at the same time transcends the limitations of that genre-- I think it even won an award from a Romance website! John and Randy engage the issues of the Christian market which they write in, and do so with an openness and aversion to easy answers that is unfortunately missing in so many other writers in the Christian market. That the novel was written for the Christian market (a uniquely US phenomenon) is pretty clear, but the book is accessible and thought provoking to those outside that market, regardless of world-view.
This is John's first published work, and Randy's third or fourth (I believe). It may not be poetry, but it is clear and well thought out prose, and quite mature for so early in their careers. I recommend John's other books as well, Fifth Man (sequel to Oxygen) and Adreneline. Fossil Hunter will be coming out sometime in the next year, I believe. John
s style keeps getting better, and I'm enjoying watching his work develop. I'm afraid I haven't read much more of Randy's yet, but I'll hopefully get a review of more of his work up some day.
]]> <![CDATA[The Restorer (The Sword of Lyric #1)]]> 768950 477 Sharon Hinck 1600061311 Carl 5

I got to read a rough draft of this novel years ago and loved it, and look forward to reading it now that it's finally in print-- Sharon is a great writer and a wonderful person! May her pen never run dry! Or her inkjet, or laser printer, whatever she uses, and if it does, may it be replaced ASAP by a generous benefactor.
Have just restarted the book, after finally buying a copy, and am enjoying it thoroughly. As a "real person sent to a fantasy world with a mission to accomplish" it obviously has a lot in common with certain fantasies out in the secular market (eg, Stephen Donaldson's work), but is more along the lines of Joseph Bentz's Song of Fire, both in the general feel and in the Christian undertones (though sometimes fairly explicit). That said, this work is very original and fun in it's own right, and I'm getting all wrapped up in it again, just like I was when studying Swedish in Uppsala five summers ago. ]]> 4.15 2007 The Restorer (The Sword of Lyric #1)
author: Sharon Hinck
name: Carl
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2007
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/02/18
shelves: fantasysci-fi, currently-reading
review:
Edit--the book has been expanded and rereleased!


I got to read a rough draft of this novel years ago and loved it, and look forward to reading it now that it's finally in print-- Sharon is a great writer and a wonderful person! May her pen never run dry! Or her inkjet, or laser printer, whatever she uses, and if it does, may it be replaced ASAP by a generous benefactor.
Have just restarted the book, after finally buying a copy, and am enjoying it thoroughly. As a "real person sent to a fantasy world with a mission to accomplish" it obviously has a lot in common with certain fantasies out in the secular market (eg, Stephen Donaldson's work), but is more along the lines of Joseph Bentz's Song of Fire, both in the general feel and in the Christian undertones (though sometimes fairly explicit). That said, this work is very original and fun in it's own right, and I'm getting all wrapped up in it again, just like I was when studying Swedish in Uppsala five summers ago.
]]> The Fifth Man (Oxygen, #2) 417988
Days before a giant dust storm is projected to strike their camp, Valkerie is attacked by an unseen assailant.

Fortunately, there are only three suspects.

Unfortunately, all three of them . . . are innocent.]]> 368 John B. Olson 0764227327 Carl 5 3.97 2001 The Fifth Man (Oxygen, #2)
author: John B. Olson
name: Carl
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/02/18
shelves:
review:
The first book in this series (Oxygen) is now available as an e-book:
]]> Fusion Fire (Firebird, #2) 192267 A new life for Lady Firebird

Lady Firebird didn't fully understand her former enemy, the Sentinel Brennen Caldwell. That might take a lifetime. But she knew enough, loved enough, to embrace his mysteries--and his certainty--and to step out on the frightening path of pair bonding.

Exiled from her royal heritage, she had escaped the terrible fate of her birth as an expendable wastling. She fought heroically to save her adopted world from destruction. Bonded to Brennen, though, she finds herself the unexpected bearer of an ancient messianic prophecy.

While her royal family seeks to seal her doom, Firebird and Brennan face two implacable enemies--one from his past...and one from deep in her soul.]]> 317 Kathy Tyers 0764222155 Carl 4
Edit: The new Annotated Firebird is out. More on my blog:





]]> 4.17 1988 Fusion Fire (Firebird, #2)
author: Kathy Tyers
name: Carl
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1988
rating: 4
read at: 1997/01/01
date added: 2012/02/18
shelves:
review:
Read my review of the first book (though I actually read this book first--- it was the first one I found a copy of, I believe).

Edit: The new Annotated Firebird is out. More on my blog:






]]> Firebird (Firebird, #1) 335067 Her death was expected but something more powerful kept her alive.

Lady Firebird was born a princess of the royal family of Naetai. Because of her birthplace in the family, however, her life is expendable. Honorable suicide is the highest calling she could hope to attain. When she is chosen to lead an attack on the neighboring planet of VeeRon her death is expected. She is taken prisoner during the battle and is held by the enemy.

With her own people seeking her sacrifice, Firebird must choose between two worlds before she can carve out her new destiny. This is the story of Princess Firebird's personal spiritual battle and the eternal consequences it has not only for herself but for everyone around her and especially the man who loves her.]]> 288 Kathy Tyers 0764222147 Carl 4 fantasysci-fi




Original review:

I first read this in used paper back form (I guessed '97, but it may have been earlier) and enjoyed them as young-adult sci-fi in the vein of Star Wars (very much in that vein). I had the pleasure of meeting Kathy at the Mt Hermon writers conference one year (got to drink root beer with her while watching John Fischer sing at the Mt Hermon soda fountain!), and she's a really cool person who loves the read the sorts of things she writes. I have to admit, though, of those books she has rewritten for the Christian market, I typically enjoy the original versions better-- there is just something about the flavor of the prose that changes, though I noticed it most with Shivering World (my favorite of her books). Still, with this new version of the series she was able to expand the story line and add a concluding book, which is a good thing-- though to be honest, when I got to the third I lost steam and haven't been able to finish it (though that has also happened with books I'm a big fan of-- sometimes life derails my reading and I can't get back on the track again). I hope to reread the new version of the trilogy again soon, and may be able to post a more thorough review then. ]]> 4.17 1987 Firebird (Firebird, #1)
author: Kathy Tyers
name: Carl
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1987
rating: 4
read at: 1997/01/01
date added: 2012/02/18
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
Edit: The new Annotated Firebird is out. More on my blog:





Original review:

I first read this in used paper back form (I guessed '97, but it may have been earlier) and enjoyed them as young-adult sci-fi in the vein of Star Wars (very much in that vein). I had the pleasure of meeting Kathy at the Mt Hermon writers conference one year (got to drink root beer with her while watching John Fischer sing at the Mt Hermon soda fountain!), and she's a really cool person who loves the read the sorts of things she writes. I have to admit, though, of those books she has rewritten for the Christian market, I typically enjoy the original versions better-- there is just something about the flavor of the prose that changes, though I noticed it most with Shivering World (my favorite of her books). Still, with this new version of the series she was able to expand the story line and add a concluding book, which is a good thing-- though to be honest, when I got to the third I lost steam and haven't been able to finish it (though that has also happened with books I'm a big fan of-- sometimes life derails my reading and I can't get back on the track again). I hope to reread the new version of the trilogy again soon, and may be able to post a more thorough review then.
]]> Shivering World 335062 304 Kathy Tyers 0764226762 Carl 5 fantasysci-fi All that aside-- this is a great book, and certainly worth a Nebula award. Lots of interesting issues with the "Other", only in this case the Other is humanity's children, illegally genetically engineered humans-- and there is also the planetary Other, which is also being engineered (terraformed), and then there is the Mother-Daughter relationship at the heart of the book which all these instances of "Otherness", ownership and control are interwoven with. The whole mother-daughter issue comes up in nearly all Tyers' work (maybe all, if we expand it to parent-child), something I'd love to write about some day (along with the issue of the Other)-- not to turn it into an analysis of Kathy Tyers herself, of course, but it certainly seems to be a rich strand in her work.


I've mentioned this book several times on my blog. Will probably write a more thorough discussion one of these days, but for now here are the links:





]]> 3.78 1991 Shivering World
author: Kathy Tyers
name: Carl
average rating: 3.78
book published: 1991
rating: 5
read at: 1997/01/01
date added: 2012/02/18
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
To be honest, the five star rating is for the original version of the book-- the rewrite for the Christian market was still good, but as I've commented on her Firebird series, the prose is somehow changed with the rewrite. I had read the general market version first, which was on the preliminary list for the Nebula Awards or something like that. Beautiful hard science fiction, yet with a strong focus on characters and a lot of gene-tech and biological science (in other words, not just nuts'n'bolts), and as early as 1991 (I don't think that side of sci-fi had caught on all that much at that time-- but maybe I just hadn't read enough from the 80s). But as soon as I read the first paragraph in the new version I knew something was wrong. I don't know exactly how to explain it-- maybe if I went over the syntax and word choice in more detail (it's been a few years since I've looked at it) I would be able to characterize the changes, but the first version feels like it speaks the "language" of sci-fi (in terms of prose stylistics, I suppose), while the second feels like it speaks the language of contemporary Christian fiction-- which maybe isn't so weird, because I remember Kathy saying that she wanted to branch out into more contempory romance (it might have been prarie romance), but it was disappointing for me, and was also a really interesting moment-- before I hadn't really been aware of how important the subtleties of the prose are. And of course, I'm all for an original style and voice, but in this case I prefered the first version.
All that aside-- this is a great book, and certainly worth a Nebula award. Lots of interesting issues with the "Other", only in this case the Other is humanity's children, illegally genetically engineered humans-- and there is also the planetary Other, which is also being engineered (terraformed), and then there is the Mother-Daughter relationship at the heart of the book which all these instances of "Otherness", ownership and control are interwoven with. The whole mother-daughter issue comes up in nearly all Tyers' work (maybe all, if we expand it to parent-child), something I'd love to write about some day (along with the issue of the Other)-- not to turn it into an analysis of Kathy Tyers herself, of course, but it certainly seems to be a rich strand in her work.


I've mentioned this book several times on my blog. Will probably write a more thorough discussion one of these days, but for now here are the links:






]]> Shivering World 1927330 432 Kathy Tyers 0553290517 Carl 5 fantasysci-fi
Also, I've mentioned this book several times on my blog. Will probably write a more thorough discussion one of these days, but for now here are the links:





]]> 3.27 1991 Shivering World
author: Kathy Tyers
name: Carl
average rating: 3.27
book published: 1991
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/02/18
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
Ah! Here is the edition of this book which I actually liked. My review is under the other edition. May have to change that at some point...

Also, I've mentioned this book several times on my blog. Will probably write a more thorough discussion one of these days, but for now here are the links:






]]> Pirate Freedom 8104530 320 Gene Wolfe 0765318792 Carl 5 fantasysci-fi, adventure
Actually finished this over a month ago, along with a few other books, but with illness and teaching and other things I just haven't been able to get things posted on goodreads lately. Not much time now, but I will say that this book feels very similar to the Wizard-Knight duology. It is very difficult not to conflate the perceived innocent naïveté of the narrator with the author- or rather, the book just feels "clean" and straightforward b/c it is so easy to perceive the narrator in that way. Never mind that he confesses to many things that a not exactly shining examples of virtue, though I will also say that we seem to be invited to learn, with the narrator, to tolerate the sins and failings of others through our acceptance of our own fallenness. The plot is... Hard to describe. Straightforward first person pirate story, except in this wonderful voice , again comparable to that of the Wizard Knight, and except for the twist at the end which may be a bit abrupt for some people (like the end of a Miyazaki film), but which is also, in retrospect, that which undergirds the entire narration and so "fits" despite the abruptness of the revelation. Well, hope I articulated that alright. Hard to do this in a hurry. Overall, feels simple on one level, but open to various levels of reading and rereading. This and Wizard Knight are so different from the other Wolfe books I've read- well, there are strong points of contact, but Fifth Head of Cerberus is certainly a little more daunting from start to finish, however complex the deeper levels of each of these works.

Original review below.


Got this book for my pirate loving little sister, and decided to buy a copy for myself too (I almost kept her present, actually). I won't guarantee everyone will like it, but I'm a fan of Gene Wolfe and really wanted to read this. I haven't read too much of his-- most of the Book of the New Sun, the Wizard Knight duology, Fifth Head of Cerberus, and some of his short fiction. Out of all these, I feel like Wizard Knight has most in common with Pirate Freedom-- both have a first person narrator with a very plain, naive-feeling voice (not sure naive is the best way to put it-- and in any case, it at times feels like a duplicitous plainness, though maybe that's me being suspicious b/c of what I've heard about Wolfe's writing), writing a letter to explain what has happened to them to someone else. Wolfe is known for using unreliable narrators-- in these books, that seems to manifest itself in how things are told and what is told, rather than any far reaching duplicity-- at least that's in my reading so far, and I do feel like I'm probably missing something (Fifth Head of Cerberus has a much more extreme bit of duplicity, where one narrator is apparently a shapechanger who believes he is the human whose shape he has taken). Certain things which would take up a lot of room as action-oriented scenes are glossed over in this book, and the narrator often insists that he can't remember certain bits, but other bits are very clear-- whether these count as "unreliable narration" I don't know, but they certainly bring the perspective of the narrator, with all its limitations and biases, to the forefront, rather than taking the idea of the narrator as a barely acknowledged conceit to justify our access to the story-- in other words, the narrator is understood as a real character in the frame narrative. That said, the story doesn't drown in a reflexive focus on the one telling the story, and, with Wizard Knight, this is the Gene Wolfe book I would most recommend to more casual or escapist sci-fi/fantasy readers. Well, you may not like it still-- I think "good" or "productive" books (or "transformative") tend to subvert our escapist tendencies to some degree (see CS Lewis' -Experiment in Criticism- for one take on this phenomenon)-- but still, I think most people will enjoy this, even if Wolfe's books tend to take multiple readings to drain every last drop out of them.

One note about the title-- early in the book the narrator equates Freedom with Money/Gold, so that the title might be interpreted "Pirate Gold"-- a much more standard, swashbuckling title. Considering Wolfe's reputation as a subtle and thoughtful writer, I'm inclined to take this as intentional. At the very least, "Pirate Freedom" is a bit of an odd title, and I'm assuming that the topic/problem of "freedom" will be very pertinent in understanding the book.

I've got to say, this book feels like a perfect one to teach in a Reading and Composition course-- it is a good length, it is fairly accessible, but there is a lot going on and it provides a great opportunity to discuss narratological levels (at the very least the distinction author/narrator/character) etc. I'm always stuck teaching Medieval lit, b/c, oddly enough, it seems easier for the students to figure out what the conditions for an adequate thesis are when they are exploring multiple texts within a relatively alien culture. But if I were to teach the A level again, with no research requirement, I would be tempted to teach a broader range of texts, including this one-- maybe with the overall topic of "Adventure Stories", which would let me cover some sagas, maybe Bernard Foye's Third Castling, and some things by Astrid Lindgren, to cover the Scandinavian side of things, plus some non-Scandi books like... Pirate Freedom. And others-- maybe Treasure Island, to give an earlier pirate story (and of course, any saga that has a lot of Vikings would technically be about Pirates too). The Hobbit would fit this category too.

[Note-- this last part below is a bit of an unfair rant, due to some issues I was dealing with in the Reading and Comp class I was teaching-- if someone doesn't like how a narratological conceit is executed, then they have a perfect right to dislike a book. Ah well.]

I'm looking over other people's reviews of this book-- it seems like the bad reviews are upset over the "writing", meaning, the voice of the narrator-- I think the point would be that the awkward way in which the narrator narrates, or represents himself, is PART of the story. The narrator has his own agenda, and it is because of THAT that all the women are the same character (one person calls the book misogynist)-- b/c for him, they ARE. In other words, it feels like the critiques of the writing are conflating "real author" with "narrator" and blaming Gene Wolfe for what his character says. And I have to admit, this is the sort of problem students have in my R&C courses a lot-- for some reason I just could NOT get some of my students to understand that they were supposed to write about the characters in the story as representations of people, not as REAL people-- you don't treat Beowulf on his own terms as a real person, dammit, you treat him as part of a text with an agenda of its own. One student even talked about Beowulf as the author of the poem. Blegh. >:[]]> 3.66 2007 Pirate Freedom
author: Gene Wolfe
name: Carl
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2007
rating: 5
read at: 2011/02/01
date added: 2012/02/18
shelves: fantasysci-fi, adventure
review:
[Edit: You might want to check out my blog post about Gene Wolfe's Wizard-Knight duology. I mention this book there, and got some good comments about this book and the others from another fan. ]

Actually finished this over a month ago, along with a few other books, but with illness and teaching and other things I just haven't been able to get things posted on goodreads lately. Not much time now, but I will say that this book feels very similar to the Wizard-Knight duology. It is very difficult not to conflate the perceived innocent naïveté of the narrator with the author- or rather, the book just feels "clean" and straightforward b/c it is so easy to perceive the narrator in that way. Never mind that he confesses to many things that a not exactly shining examples of virtue, though I will also say that we seem to be invited to learn, with the narrator, to tolerate the sins and failings of others through our acceptance of our own fallenness. The plot is... Hard to describe. Straightforward first person pirate story, except in this wonderful voice , again comparable to that of the Wizard Knight, and except for the twist at the end which may be a bit abrupt for some people (like the end of a Miyazaki film), but which is also, in retrospect, that which undergirds the entire narration and so "fits" despite the abruptness of the revelation. Well, hope I articulated that alright. Hard to do this in a hurry. Overall, feels simple on one level, but open to various levels of reading and rereading. This and Wizard Knight are so different from the other Wolfe books I've read- well, there are strong points of contact, but Fifth Head of Cerberus is certainly a little more daunting from start to finish, however complex the deeper levels of each of these works.

Original review below.


Got this book for my pirate loving little sister, and decided to buy a copy for myself too (I almost kept her present, actually). I won't guarantee everyone will like it, but I'm a fan of Gene Wolfe and really wanted to read this. I haven't read too much of his-- most of the Book of the New Sun, the Wizard Knight duology, Fifth Head of Cerberus, and some of his short fiction. Out of all these, I feel like Wizard Knight has most in common with Pirate Freedom-- both have a first person narrator with a very plain, naive-feeling voice (not sure naive is the best way to put it-- and in any case, it at times feels like a duplicitous plainness, though maybe that's me being suspicious b/c of what I've heard about Wolfe's writing), writing a letter to explain what has happened to them to someone else. Wolfe is known for using unreliable narrators-- in these books, that seems to manifest itself in how things are told and what is told, rather than any far reaching duplicity-- at least that's in my reading so far, and I do feel like I'm probably missing something (Fifth Head of Cerberus has a much more extreme bit of duplicity, where one narrator is apparently a shapechanger who believes he is the human whose shape he has taken). Certain things which would take up a lot of room as action-oriented scenes are glossed over in this book, and the narrator often insists that he can't remember certain bits, but other bits are very clear-- whether these count as "unreliable narration" I don't know, but they certainly bring the perspective of the narrator, with all its limitations and biases, to the forefront, rather than taking the idea of the narrator as a barely acknowledged conceit to justify our access to the story-- in other words, the narrator is understood as a real character in the frame narrative. That said, the story doesn't drown in a reflexive focus on the one telling the story, and, with Wizard Knight, this is the Gene Wolfe book I would most recommend to more casual or escapist sci-fi/fantasy readers. Well, you may not like it still-- I think "good" or "productive" books (or "transformative") tend to subvert our escapist tendencies to some degree (see CS Lewis' -Experiment in Criticism- for one take on this phenomenon)-- but still, I think most people will enjoy this, even if Wolfe's books tend to take multiple readings to drain every last drop out of them.

One note about the title-- early in the book the narrator equates Freedom with Money/Gold, so that the title might be interpreted "Pirate Gold"-- a much more standard, swashbuckling title. Considering Wolfe's reputation as a subtle and thoughtful writer, I'm inclined to take this as intentional. At the very least, "Pirate Freedom" is a bit of an odd title, and I'm assuming that the topic/problem of "freedom" will be very pertinent in understanding the book.

I've got to say, this book feels like a perfect one to teach in a Reading and Composition course-- it is a good length, it is fairly accessible, but there is a lot going on and it provides a great opportunity to discuss narratological levels (at the very least the distinction author/narrator/character) etc. I'm always stuck teaching Medieval lit, b/c, oddly enough, it seems easier for the students to figure out what the conditions for an adequate thesis are when they are exploring multiple texts within a relatively alien culture. But if I were to teach the A level again, with no research requirement, I would be tempted to teach a broader range of texts, including this one-- maybe with the overall topic of "Adventure Stories", which would let me cover some sagas, maybe Bernard Foye's Third Castling, and some things by Astrid Lindgren, to cover the Scandinavian side of things, plus some non-Scandi books like... Pirate Freedom. And others-- maybe Treasure Island, to give an earlier pirate story (and of course, any saga that has a lot of Vikings would technically be about Pirates too). The Hobbit would fit this category too.

[Note-- this last part below is a bit of an unfair rant, due to some issues I was dealing with in the Reading and Comp class I was teaching-- if someone doesn't like how a narratological conceit is executed, then they have a perfect right to dislike a book. Ah well.]

I'm looking over other people's reviews of this book-- it seems like the bad reviews are upset over the "writing", meaning, the voice of the narrator-- I think the point would be that the awkward way in which the narrator narrates, or represents himself, is PART of the story. The narrator has his own agenda, and it is because of THAT that all the women are the same character (one person calls the book misogynist)-- b/c for him, they ARE. In other words, it feels like the critiques of the writing are conflating "real author" with "narrator" and blaming Gene Wolfe for what his character says. And I have to admit, this is the sort of problem students have in my R&C courses a lot-- for some reason I just could NOT get some of my students to understand that they were supposed to write about the characters in the story as representations of people, not as REAL people-- you don't treat Beowulf on his own terms as a real person, dammit, you treat him as part of a text with an agenda of its own. One student even talked about Beowulf as the author of the poem. Blegh. >:[
]]> Halo: Cryptum 7975411 352 Greg Bear 0765323966 Carl 5 to-read


Ok, I don't have an x-box, and haven't read any of the books, but if Greg Bear, one of the big names in sci fi since the 80s, is going to add to the saga , then I will plan on reading it. While to a degree it is "just" a first person shooter series, it is also a pretty major point in the development of narrative in video gaming (and it has a few nice allusions to sic-fi classics- Ringworld is the one that first springs to mind.). I'd like to buy an x-box and play through the series too, but I've got way too much going on right now...]]> 3.86 2011 Halo: Cryptum
author: Greg Bear
name: Carl
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at: 2011/10/01
date added: 2012/02/18
shelves: to-read
review:
Finished this a while back, and just a few weeks ago finished the sequel. This is a cool series! I'm giving it the full 5 stars, though I admit that may be partly b/c I'm just impressed that an "expanded universe franchise" book is this cool. More later-- hopefully I'll be doing a blog post on these books sometime. Original review is below.



Ok, I don't have an x-box, and haven't read any of the books, but if Greg Bear, one of the big names in sci fi since the 80s, is going to add to the saga , then I will plan on reading it. While to a degree it is "just" a first person shooter series, it is also a pretty major point in the development of narrative in video gaming (and it has a few nice allusions to sic-fi classics- Ringworld is the one that first springs to mind.). I'd like to buy an x-box and play through the series too, but I've got way too much going on right now...
]]> The Annotated Firebird 11175757 she must forge a bold new destiny.

Lady Firebird Angelo departs her home world expecting death in space combat. Captured instead, she finds a startling destiny among an ancient telepathic family—and a new kind of battle against implacable enemies.

Fusion Firebird discovers both evil and uncontrollable power at the depths of her own spirit, and when her sister commits unspeakable treachery, she must draw on that power to save the man she loves from certain death.

Crown of Firebird returns to her home world, where some consider her a hero—but those in power have labeled her a traitor. Facing death once again, she discovers the cost of pride and the true meaning of sacrifice.

In a single volume with newly created maps and annotations, here are the first three volumes of the beloved Firebird series.]]> 0 Kathy Tyers Carl 4
I've posted my review on my blog, so I'll link to it rather than repeat everything:

Also, I did a bit of Firebird fan art here:

]]> 4.67 2011 The Annotated Firebird
author: Kathy Tyers
name: Carl
average rating: 4.67
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2012/02/18
shelves: currently-reading, fantasysci-fi, christianity
review:
For those who follow Christian science-fiction, Kathy Tyer's Firebird series is out again, and will be followed up with a couple new books. I've been slowly rereading the whole thing (pretty busy these days, so not done yet!!), so maybe more to come about this.

I've posted my review on my blog, so I'll link to it rather than repeat everything:

Also, I did a bit of Firebird fan art here:


]]> Grettir's Saga 556514 226 Denton Fox 0802061656 Carl 5 I could write for ages on Grettla-- it was the first saga I taught, and I've taught it maybe 8+ semesters now-- but I'll let it be for the moment (I've got real work to do!). I recieved an offer to submit to a publication on Icelandic outlaws a while back-- if that's still open, I may get around to sending something in, and then you'll get an earful (or eyeful)). ]]> 3.84 Grettir's Saga
author: Denton Fox
name: Carl
average rating: 3.84
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2002/01/01
date added: 2012/02/16
shelves: historicalfiction, middleages, sagas, oldnorsestudies
review:
Many don't like this saga, as it is somewhat atypical for a "Classical Family saga"-- much more episodic, full of monsters and other supernatural creatures, and capped by a short Tristan and Isult inspired conclusion-- but it is one of my favorites. It is not as tightly structured as Gisla saga, but the supernatural is, in a sense, more natural here than in, say, Njals saga, where everything feels perfectly "normal" until a ghost suddenly shows up for a chapter or two-- and then disappears for the rest of the book. In Grettla, however, the supernatural continually crops up as part of the theme of the passing away of the old, reminiscent, perhaps, of the folktales in which the giants or trolls that inhabited Scandinavia are said to have left for other lands with the coming of Christianity-- similarly Grettir, a hero in terms of physical strength, poetic wit, and his victories over monstrous threats to human society, is, in this later day (his saga takes place shortly after the adoption of Christianity in Iceland), is an outcast, eventually dying in exile because there was no room for someone of his stature in the present.
I could write for ages on Grettla-- it was the first saga I taught, and I've taught it maybe 8+ semesters now-- but I'll let it be for the moment (I've got real work to do!). I recieved an offer to submit to a publication on Icelandic outlaws a while back-- if that's still open, I may get around to sending something in, and then you'll get an earful (or eyeful)).
]]> <![CDATA[The Belgariad, Vol. 1: Pawn of Prophecy / Queen of Sorcery / Magician's Gambit (The Belgariad, #1-3)]]> 18878
It all begins with the theft of the Orb that for so long protected the West from an evil god. As long as the Orb was at Riva, the prophecy went, its people would be safe from this corrupting power. Garion, a simple farm boy, is familiar with the legend of the Orb, but skeptical in matters of magic. Until, through a twist of fate, he learns not only that the story of the Orb is true, but that he must set out on a quest of unparalleled magic and danger to help recover it. For Garion is a child of destiny, and fate itself is leading him far from his home, sweeping him irrevocably toward a distant tower—and a cataclysmic confrontation with a master of the darkest magic.]]> 644 David Eddings 0345456327 Carl 4
In the introduction David Eddings refers to his work as fantasy with the flavor of realism-- which seems rather odd, since this is about as high fantasy as you can get, and occasionally feels a bit contrived too (though in such a way that it seems appropriate to the sort of book it is). Still, I think I know what he means-- by way of example, both Polgara and Belgarath embody both the high fantasy "immortals" with all their attendant weight and romance, and the practical, perhaps even cynical sensibilities one would expect from people who had spent thousands of years dealing with other people and all their problems, mundane or otherwise.

Eddings' world feels strangely closed to me-- it's like a board set for one single game, rather than a ground for a variety of games which may or may not relate to each other. I suppose it takes the "cosmic struggle" of high fantasy and pushes it to the extreme, in a way-- there is really nothing at all of consequence in these stories outside of the two prophecies and Torak. We get this in Tolkien as well, of course, but Tolkien's world seems a bit more diverse and open ended, even though he certainly pulled it all together around a grand narrative of conflict with a Dark Lord, first Melkor then Sauron. I think some people would disagree and find Tolkien's work a bit more oppressively "closed" (as I'm putting it) than Eddings', but this is how it feels to me.

I have to admit that Eddings' world also potentially encourages a rather excessive "us vs them" attitude-- not that other groups' perspectives are not sympathetically considered, but the whole emphasis on the merchants of the Murgos as undercover spies throughout the rest of the world, the fact that trusting them is a grave mistake because as a race they are inherently opposed to the goals of the "West" (gack!), is obviously problematic in the post 9-11 world (or even in the context of immigration in the US-- or Europe). Most likely the situation in Eddings' book stems from the semantics of the Cold War, conscious or unconscious. In any case, I don't think Eddings was really proposing such a world view-- it seems to me that he was just taking some of the stereotypes of the high fantasy genre and pushing them to their limits, with some twists. One I get past the (overt?) oversimplification of the "real world", I think it's an interesting way, especially in something for younger readers, to explore political/anthropological themes (taken broadly)-- in other words, it deals with differences between communities in a way both blunt and subtle. Hm, not sure I'm explaining that well.

But that said, the whole East vs West thing is just a bit too much at times, at least once you're out of the story and can be objective again-- I mean, they even get their RUGS from Mallorea! Just a touch too much Orientalism. I suppose there could be some element of satire to all this, but I don't think I really see that here. ]]> 4.29 1982 The Belgariad, Vol. 1: Pawn of Prophecy / Queen of Sorcery / Magician's Gambit (The Belgariad, #1-3)
author: David Eddings
name: Carl
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1982
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2012/02/01
shelves:
review:
Just finished rereading the entire series recently. Very enjoyable, though it's really hard to shake the feeling (despite quite a bit of "adult" stuff in here, both in terms of gore and sex) that this is a young adult fantasy-- in fact, even the aforementioned "adult" parts feel like they are written for jr hi or high schoolers, as though Garion's coming of age in the book were paralleled by the reader's experience with the book.

In the introduction David Eddings refers to his work as fantasy with the flavor of realism-- which seems rather odd, since this is about as high fantasy as you can get, and occasionally feels a bit contrived too (though in such a way that it seems appropriate to the sort of book it is). Still, I think I know what he means-- by way of example, both Polgara and Belgarath embody both the high fantasy "immortals" with all their attendant weight and romance, and the practical, perhaps even cynical sensibilities one would expect from people who had spent thousands of years dealing with other people and all their problems, mundane or otherwise.

Eddings' world feels strangely closed to me-- it's like a board set for one single game, rather than a ground for a variety of games which may or may not relate to each other. I suppose it takes the "cosmic struggle" of high fantasy and pushes it to the extreme, in a way-- there is really nothing at all of consequence in these stories outside of the two prophecies and Torak. We get this in Tolkien as well, of course, but Tolkien's world seems a bit more diverse and open ended, even though he certainly pulled it all together around a grand narrative of conflict with a Dark Lord, first Melkor then Sauron. I think some people would disagree and find Tolkien's work a bit more oppressively "closed" (as I'm putting it) than Eddings', but this is how it feels to me.

I have to admit that Eddings' world also potentially encourages a rather excessive "us vs them" attitude-- not that other groups' perspectives are not sympathetically considered, but the whole emphasis on the merchants of the Murgos as undercover spies throughout the rest of the world, the fact that trusting them is a grave mistake because as a race they are inherently opposed to the goals of the "West" (gack!), is obviously problematic in the post 9-11 world (or even in the context of immigration in the US-- or Europe). Most likely the situation in Eddings' book stems from the semantics of the Cold War, conscious or unconscious. In any case, I don't think Eddings was really proposing such a world view-- it seems to me that he was just taking some of the stereotypes of the high fantasy genre and pushing them to their limits, with some twists. One I get past the (overt?) oversimplification of the "real world", I think it's an interesting way, especially in something for younger readers, to explore political/anthropological themes (taken broadly)-- in other words, it deals with differences between communities in a way both blunt and subtle. Hm, not sure I'm explaining that well.

But that said, the whole East vs West thing is just a bit too much at times, at least once you're out of the story and can be objective again-- I mean, they even get their RUGS from Mallorea! Just a touch too much Orientalism. I suppose there could be some element of satire to all this, but I don't think I really see that here.
]]> Bernard Foy's Third Castling 6169672 260 Lars Gustafsson 0811217752 Carl 0 literaryandhardtoclassify 3.63 1986 Bernard Foy's Third Castling
author: Lars Gustafsson
name: Carl
average rating: 3.63
book published: 1986
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/01/29
shelves: literaryandhardtoclassify
review:
Mycket intressant, men jag blir kanske aldrig klar med det.
]]> <![CDATA[Old and Middle English: An Anthology (Blackwell Anthologies)]]> 2021198 622 Elaine M. Treharne 0631204660 Carl 4 4.25 2000 Old and Middle English: An Anthology (Blackwell Anthologies)
author: Elaine M. Treharne
name: Carl
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2000
rating: 4
read at: 2002/01/01
date added: 2011/10/24
shelves: anglosaxonstudies, heroicliterature, middleages
review:
Have gone back to this book a few times since buying it in Sweden seven years ago or so. Pretty nice collection of a variety of readings in Old and Middle English, with facing page translations of the older stuff. Serves a dual purpose for me, as a place to practice my own OE reading with a convenient "crib" right there, as well as a source of translations for my students in my reading and composition courses. Not what I would necessarily use if I were doing research on a poem, but a handy collection to have.
]]> Fledgling 60925 Fledgling, Octavia Butler's new novel after a seven year break, is the story of an apparently young, amnesiac girl whose alarmingly inhuman needs and abilities lead her to a startling conclusion: She is in fact a genetically modified, 53-year-old vampire. Forced to discover what she can about her stolen former life, she must at the same time learn who wanted - and still wants - to destroy her and those she cares for and how she can save herself. Fledgling is a captivating novel that tests the limits of "otherness" and questions what it means to be truly human.]]> 310 Octavia E. Butler 0446696161 Carl 0 3.80 2005 Fledgling
author: Octavia E. Butler
name: Carl
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2005
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2011/08/20
shelves: currently-reading, fantasysci-fi, culturecriticism
review:
A vampire novel which explore race and gender, by one of the great "literary" sci-fi writers. The last of her novels, sadly-- she died shortly after this was published. Very interesting so far. I love books that don't read like every other book in the genre (hard to find in sci-fi and fantasy).
]]> Triton 85894
Within this strange climate of complete utopia and certain doom, Bron Helstrom seeks passion and purpose in a gypsy woman whose wisdom and power will forever reverse his life.

THE SPIKE: The woman he loves � a wandering playwright from Ganymede.

SAM: The man he admires � the handsome, astute chief foreign officer crippled by the responsibility of vast power.

LAWRENCE: His confessor � the master of strategic games.

CHARO and WINDY: The players � cosmic minstrels of the far future.

]]> 369 Samuel R. Delany 0553025678 Carl 3 fantasysci-fi
There is a more thorough set of reviews for the more recent version of this novel, "Trouble with Triton".]]> 3.62 1976 Triton
author: Samuel R. Delany
name: Carl
average rating: 3.62
book published: 1976
rating: 3
read at: 2006/01/01
date added: 2011/08/20
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
This probably deserves more than 3 stars, but I had trouble getting into it. I think I wanted more space ships and exploration, and this book was a bit too heavy for me at the moment-- but that's the fault of my mood when reading it, and the novel will definitely reward the diligent reader. The protagonist is a bit of an anti-hero-- if I remember correctly, he is pretty detestable in some ways, but at the same time it is all too easy to recognize one's self in him, and so to be all the more troubled by his quest for the woman he desires-- but maybe that's just me and my earlier tendency towards unrequited crushes (which I'd like to think I'm over now). Kind of an angst-ridden novel, if I remember correctly. I felt more comfortable with Nova (which was more of a space-opera), but excessive comfort isn't necessarily the greatest thing when it comes to literature.

There is a more thorough set of reviews for the more recent version of this novel, "Trouble with Triton".
]]> <![CDATA[The Knight (The Wizard Knight #1)]]> 60212
Inside, however, Able remains a boy, and he must grow in every sense to survive the dangers and delights that lie ahead in encounters with giants, elves, wizards, and dragons. His adventure will conclude in the second volume of The Wizard Knight, The Wizard.

With this new series, Wolfe not only surpasses all the most popular genre writers of the last three decades, he takes on the legends of the past century, in a work that will be favorably compared with the best of J. R. R. Tolkien, E. R. Eddison, Mervyn Peake, and T. H. White. This is a book---and a series---for the ages, from perhaps the greatest living writer in (or outside) the fantasy genre.]]> 544 Gene Wolfe 0765347016 Carl 5 fantasysci-fi
Original review blow.

This and the latter half of the duology (The Wizard) make up what is now one of my favorite fantasy series. I hadn't read much Gene Wolfe before, and I realize some of his other work can be difficult or disturbing to some people (not that there isn't some of that going on here), but the writing was just beautiful (a very nice rendering of the viewpoint character's voice, sort of an earnest all-american boy lost in a strange new world) and the plot and world felt at once very real and very unique. An odd mixture of Norse Mythology, Folklore, and Christianity, but Gene pulled it off (though as a mythologist myself I had to bracket off my own knowledge occasionally). ]]> 3.77 2004 The Knight (The Wizard Knight #1)
author: Gene Wolfe
name: Carl
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2004
rating: 5
read at: 2006/07/01
date added: 2011/08/17
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
This was one of the first books I posted on ŷ when I joined-- recently reread it and now have a blog post about it:

Original review blow.

This and the latter half of the duology (The Wizard) make up what is now one of my favorite fantasy series. I hadn't read much Gene Wolfe before, and I realize some of his other work can be difficult or disturbing to some people (not that there isn't some of that going on here), but the writing was just beautiful (a very nice rendering of the viewpoint character's voice, sort of an earnest all-american boy lost in a strange new world) and the plot and world felt at once very real and very unique. An odd mixture of Norse Mythology, Folklore, and Christianity, but Gene pulled it off (though as a mythologist myself I had to bracket off my own knowledge occasionally).
]]> <![CDATA[The Elder Edda: A Book of Viking Lore]]> 1388192
Andy Orchard's new translation faithfully conveys the spare, unadorned style of the original metre and language. The glossed text is accompanied by four additional poems, a chronology, further reading, an index of names, a note on pronunciation, and an introduction discussing the poems in detail, the history of The Elder Edda and its influence on writers from Tennyson to Tolkien.]]> 432 Unknown 0140435859 Carl 0 4.04 1270 The Elder Edda: A Book of Viking Lore
author: Unknown
name: Carl
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1270
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2011/08/12
shelves: currently-reading, heroicliterature, middleages, mythology, oldnorsestudies
review:
Still working through this, but it looks interesting so far. I've got my preliminary review up on my blog:
]]> <![CDATA[Consider Phlebas (Culture, #1)]]> 8935689
Within the cosmic conflict, an individual crusade. Deep within a fabled labyrinth on a barren world, a Planet of the Dead proscribed to mortals, lay a fugitive Mind. Both the Culture and the Idirans sought it. It was the fate of Horza, the Changer, and his motley crew of unpredictable mercenaries, human and machine, actually to find it, and with it their own destruction.]]> 467 Iain M. Banks 1857231384 Carl 3 fantasysci-fi
But if you can handle that, and you're into space opera, it's probably worth. I do want to work my way through the rest of the Culture novels-- not the greatest books, but original enough while still fairly "opera-y" to be fun, and sometimes they really hook me.]]> 3.86 1987 Consider Phlebas (Culture, #1)
author: Iain M. Banks
name: Carl
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1987
rating: 3
read at: 2008/11/01
date added: 2011/06/25
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
The first of Banks' Culture Novels. Good, but I just couldn't enjoy it as much as the other two I've read-- and to be honest, a lot of it was b/c of how extreme a lot of the violence was. Plus, it was very much an anti-hero story, and it takes a lot for me to get into that. But really, just the whole detailed description (VERY detailed) of a man being eaten alive by someone with filed teeth who weighs around 700 pounds is what ruined it for me.

But if you can handle that, and you're into space opera, it's probably worth. I do want to work my way through the rest of the Culture novels-- not the greatest books, but original enough while still fairly "opera-y" to be fun, and sometimes they really hook me.
]]> Meaning 838513
Establishing that science is an inherently normative form of knowledge and that society gives meaning to science instead of being given the "truth" by science, Polanyi contends here that the foundation of meaning is the creative imagination. Largely through metaphorical expression in poetry, art, myth, and religion, the imagination is used to synthesize the otherwise chaotic and disparate elements of life. To Polanyi these integrations stand with those of science as equally valid modes of knowledge. He hopes this view of the foundation of meaning will restore validity to the traditional ideas that were undercut by modern science. Polanyi also outlines the general conditions of a free society that encourage varied approaches to truth, and includes an illuminating discussion of how to restore, to modern minds, the possibility for the acceptance of religion.]]> 260 Michael Polanyi 0226672956 Carl 0 currently-reading, philosophy
From what I understand, one of Polanyi's signature "moves" is to emphasize the role of "authority" in any sort of knowledge, as a necessary part of what "human knowing" is, against the Enlightenment philosophers, who, for good reason at the time, insisted that knowledge had to be dealt with independent of "Authority." I'm wondering if this book with perhaps look at ethical behavior not in terms of the logical explanations given by the practitioners, but instead looking at ethical behavior as simply something we already "do" and are therefore competent in, deriving an explanation from the implict logic of praxis-- much as Ricoeur claims to do when he looks at "what historians do" when developing an epistemological justification of historical knowledge, rather than creating ideal criteria apart from practice and then imposing them on historical praxis.

I should also note that, while Polanyi has been latched onto in certain Christian intellectual circles (i.e. Mars Hill Audio), his book is not in any way a justification of, say, American Christianity or any religion, as far as I can tell so far-- I imagine that Polanyi's work is as relevant for critiquing christian epistemology and praxis as well as post-Enlightenment epistemology and praxis. I should also note that this book is from 1975, and Polanyi was active earlier (the book is posthumous), so that he really does belong to the very start of Postmodernism, and his criticisms will be of Modern thought-- reading him now may seem a bit out of date, if you take his criticisms personally and have already been through the "postmodern turn".

And finally-- I figure I'll enjoy this book because of the variety of author's cited in the notes whom I find very interesting, yet underrepresented: Merleau Ponty (though he is getting more popular the last decade or two), C.S. Lewis (don't know yet how critically P&P will engage with Lewis, but I find it exciting anyway-- I mostly encounter Lewis' thought in naive and out-of-date Christian evangelical thought), Owen Barfield (the forgotten, yet most philosophically minded Inkling, whose book Poetic Diction has some really interesting linguistic-philosophical speculation going on), and then anthropologists/historians of religion like Levi-Strauss and Mircea Eliade who touch on my own field as a mythologist. Anyway, I'm pretty excited to see someone engage with Lewis and Barfield at the academic level-- I've been wanting to start connecting the dots with them and contemporary scholarly discourse for a while, since the Inklings served as my "archetype" for "scholarly figures" when I was first discovering I wanted to go into academics. I may be "firmly rooted" in poststructuralism myself now, but I'm still very interested in their thought.

BRIEF UPDATE-- so far it looks like he is just giving his own version of a Heideggerian or Merleau-Pontian epistemology, though he doesn't cite Heidegger at all, despite using one or two of H's examples very blatantly. I also just saw that Polanyi as ALSO a professor of Chemistry, so I'm enjoying getting a perspective on scientific and other types of knowing from someone with experience in BOTH the sciences and philosophy-- I think people like that are really important, otherwise we end up looking at the other camp and thinking "well, THEY don't know what they're talking about." I think science and continental philosophy go together better than people tend to realize-- for example, Kuhn's idea of scientific revolutions and paradigm shifts was derived from his encounter with Foucault and others, I think when he was an undergrad maybe-- I haven't read his book yet, but from what I've heard it is basically a scientist appropriating continental philosophy-- so maybe a bit naive from the POV of continental phil., but very informed from the perspective of the sciences. I'm not sure, could be wrong. Polanyi, however, is thoroughly informed in both worlds, even if his prime was 1/2 a century ago now. Still very relevant, just as Heidegger and MP are, but again, this perspective is more of a given in the humanities now, rather than groundbreaking.

Another brief update: Trying to start this again (will hopefully finish it this time)-- the main chapter, though seems to be the second one, where he introduces his concept of tacit knowledge. Again, it is very similar to Heidegger or Merleau-Ponty (though he criticizes Merleau-Ponty at one point)-- the idea is that we have tacit knowledge which we are not focused on while we are perceiving/manipulating/investigating something else. One analogy he uses is using a probe to explore a cavity--while the sensation of holding the probe, as well as the sensations of increased or decreased resistance in the hand holding the probe, is all essential for the project, you are not conscious of or focused on the holding--your focal awareness is on the cavity. Once your focus shifts to the probe itself, that aspect of the project becomes focal-- it is no longer tacit. The idea is you need glasses to see, but you cannot see your glasses through your glasses.

All this is tied in to his project of establishing that the humanities, arts, sciences, every brand of human knowledge can be covered under a basic human epistemology-- there is no radical difference, there is no privileged position. All modes of knowing or investigating the world involve skilled activity based on explicit or implicit theories which function a the tacit knowledge, the "lenses" through which we see/understand things, and that the boundary between tacit awareness and focal awareness is always in flux. He also uses this to deal with the mind-body problem and other things, but I have not recently read up on all that, and think I will pass that issue by for the moment.

Anyway, so far it is easy to read-- unusual for postmodernish theory. I would like to think even my scientist friends would like this, but so far the only scientist I've talked to who knows of Polanyi is John Lennox...]]> 4.25 1975 Meaning
author: Michael Polanyi
name: Carl
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1975
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2011/04/06
shelves: currently-reading, philosophy
review:
I've been meaning to read Polanyi for a while, since hearing about him on an audio show (Mars Hill Audio). One of the lesser known "architects" of postmodern thought, and, I think, a fairly accessible and positive example of postmodern thought. Despite the title "Meaning," he and Harry Prosche (his co-author) claim, in the first chapter, that their real topic is "intellectual freedom", which post-Enlightenment thought (or really, thought since the Reformation) has failed to justify according to its logic, despite being founded on the premise of intellectual freedom. This crisis was felt most strongly in Europe, where the advent of Enlightenment philosophy (and its natural conclusions which proved so bloody) was contemporaneous with the dissolution of the church as an effective entity-- whereas this was not as extremely the case in Anglophone countries (or so I gather from P & P's introduction), where there was a sort of "freeze" on logic, so that the natural, nihilistic conclusions of Enlightenment & post-Enlightenment philosophy were not recognized and Anglophone countries (America seems specially singled out) went on providing aid and living according to their values, believing they were logically derived but in fact were traditionally derived. I'm surprised there is not more explicit reference to the dominance of church in America, but maybe that's b/c I was raised in an Evangelical setting and have been told since childhood that things like our intervention in WWII were ethically motivated and part and parcel of our faith in God and Country.

From what I understand, one of Polanyi's signature "moves" is to emphasize the role of "authority" in any sort of knowledge, as a necessary part of what "human knowing" is, against the Enlightenment philosophers, who, for good reason at the time, insisted that knowledge had to be dealt with independent of "Authority." I'm wondering if this book with perhaps look at ethical behavior not in terms of the logical explanations given by the practitioners, but instead looking at ethical behavior as simply something we already "do" and are therefore competent in, deriving an explanation from the implict logic of praxis-- much as Ricoeur claims to do when he looks at "what historians do" when developing an epistemological justification of historical knowledge, rather than creating ideal criteria apart from practice and then imposing them on historical praxis.

I should also note that, while Polanyi has been latched onto in certain Christian intellectual circles (i.e. Mars Hill Audio), his book is not in any way a justification of, say, American Christianity or any religion, as far as I can tell so far-- I imagine that Polanyi's work is as relevant for critiquing christian epistemology and praxis as well as post-Enlightenment epistemology and praxis. I should also note that this book is from 1975, and Polanyi was active earlier (the book is posthumous), so that he really does belong to the very start of Postmodernism, and his criticisms will be of Modern thought-- reading him now may seem a bit out of date, if you take his criticisms personally and have already been through the "postmodern turn".

And finally-- I figure I'll enjoy this book because of the variety of author's cited in the notes whom I find very interesting, yet underrepresented: Merleau Ponty (though he is getting more popular the last decade or two), C.S. Lewis (don't know yet how critically P&P will engage with Lewis, but I find it exciting anyway-- I mostly encounter Lewis' thought in naive and out-of-date Christian evangelical thought), Owen Barfield (the forgotten, yet most philosophically minded Inkling, whose book Poetic Diction has some really interesting linguistic-philosophical speculation going on), and then anthropologists/historians of religion like Levi-Strauss and Mircea Eliade who touch on my own field as a mythologist. Anyway, I'm pretty excited to see someone engage with Lewis and Barfield at the academic level-- I've been wanting to start connecting the dots with them and contemporary scholarly discourse for a while, since the Inklings served as my "archetype" for "scholarly figures" when I was first discovering I wanted to go into academics. I may be "firmly rooted" in poststructuralism myself now, but I'm still very interested in their thought.

BRIEF UPDATE-- so far it looks like he is just giving his own version of a Heideggerian or Merleau-Pontian epistemology, though he doesn't cite Heidegger at all, despite using one or two of H's examples very blatantly. I also just saw that Polanyi as ALSO a professor of Chemistry, so I'm enjoying getting a perspective on scientific and other types of knowing from someone with experience in BOTH the sciences and philosophy-- I think people like that are really important, otherwise we end up looking at the other camp and thinking "well, THEY don't know what they're talking about." I think science and continental philosophy go together better than people tend to realize-- for example, Kuhn's idea of scientific revolutions and paradigm shifts was derived from his encounter with Foucault and others, I think when he was an undergrad maybe-- I haven't read his book yet, but from what I've heard it is basically a scientist appropriating continental philosophy-- so maybe a bit naive from the POV of continental phil., but very informed from the perspective of the sciences. I'm not sure, could be wrong. Polanyi, however, is thoroughly informed in both worlds, even if his prime was 1/2 a century ago now. Still very relevant, just as Heidegger and MP are, but again, this perspective is more of a given in the humanities now, rather than groundbreaking.

Another brief update: Trying to start this again (will hopefully finish it this time)-- the main chapter, though seems to be the second one, where he introduces his concept of tacit knowledge. Again, it is very similar to Heidegger or Merleau-Ponty (though he criticizes Merleau-Ponty at one point)-- the idea is that we have tacit knowledge which we are not focused on while we are perceiving/manipulating/investigating something else. One analogy he uses is using a probe to explore a cavity--while the sensation of holding the probe, as well as the sensations of increased or decreased resistance in the hand holding the probe, is all essential for the project, you are not conscious of or focused on the holding--your focal awareness is on the cavity. Once your focus shifts to the probe itself, that aspect of the project becomes focal-- it is no longer tacit. The idea is you need glasses to see, but you cannot see your glasses through your glasses.

All this is tied in to his project of establishing that the humanities, arts, sciences, every brand of human knowledge can be covered under a basic human epistemology-- there is no radical difference, there is no privileged position. All modes of knowing or investigating the world involve skilled activity based on explicit or implicit theories which function a the tacit knowledge, the "lenses" through which we see/understand things, and that the boundary between tacit awareness and focal awareness is always in flux. He also uses this to deal with the mind-body problem and other things, but I have not recently read up on all that, and think I will pass that issue by for the moment.

Anyway, so far it is easy to read-- unusual for postmodernish theory. I would like to think even my scientist friends would like this, but so far the only scientist I've talked to who knows of Polanyi is John Lennox...
]]> <![CDATA[Perdido Street Station (New Crobuzon, #1)]]> 68494 710 China Miéville 0345459407 Carl 4
Original post below.


This is on the list for January for my sci-fi group-- really looking forward to it. Mieville sounds really interesting, and I'm expecting this book to be a really interesting combo of steam-punk, fantasy, and the idea of the City (which has been hip in lit crit for a while now-- alas, I have not read much of it...)

Also makes me want to revisit Mark Helprin's -A Winter's Tale-, which is also very much about the city, and pretty steam-punkish in its take on an alternate history of New York (though I thought of it as more of a magic-realism or very surreal alternate history when I first read it). ]]> 3.98 2000 Perdido Street Station (New Crobuzon, #1)
author: China Miéville
name: Carl
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2000
rating: 4
read at: 2011/03/23
date added: 2011/03/23
shelves:
review:
Gosh, can't believe I hadn't reviewed this yet- we finished this several months ago for my sci-fi group. The general consensus was that it was ambitious and interesting, but awkward in the way it switched from a meditation of the simultaneous beauty and horror of the City to a supernatural thriller. Well, I think the whole book can still be taken together to communicate a sense of the complicity of ALL of the populace in this beauty/horror, but I can understand people's disappointment. Still, I am interested in eventually returning to this, and in reading more if Mieville's work.

Original post below.


This is on the list for January for my sci-fi group-- really looking forward to it. Mieville sounds really interesting, and I'm expecting this book to be a really interesting combo of steam-punk, fantasy, and the idea of the City (which has been hip in lit crit for a while now-- alas, I have not read much of it...)

Also makes me want to revisit Mark Helprin's -A Winter's Tale-, which is also very much about the city, and pretty steam-punkish in its take on an alternate history of New York (though I thought of it as more of a magic-realism or very surreal alternate history when I first read it).
]]> <![CDATA[An Unsettling God: The Heart of the Hebrew Bible]]> 6619062 192 Walter Brueggemann 0800663632 Carl 0
OK, anyway, looking forward to this book. :)]]> 4.17 2009 An Unsettling God: The Heart of the Hebrew Bible
author: Walter Brueggemann
name: Carl
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2011/03/16
shelves: currently-reading, christianity
review:
I'm really looking forward to finally reading something by Breuggemann again-- he seems to be a quality scholar, at the same time that he is passionate about his subject. While he and NT Wright seem to disagree on some particular points at least, I find them to be very complementary-- I think my own theological thought (not that I'm ever very systematic about it-- but then again, I don't think either of them would be considered a systematic theologian) these days is largely the product of the bits and pieces I've gotten from these two scholars. Having gone to a Christian high school and grown up in a church and having done confirmation, I've got the basics of systematic theology-- I definitely prefer Wright and Breuggemann, though, or anything that is more about encountering a text and trying to deal with it on its own terms, rather than trying to build a final, perfect box that everything will fit in. Haha, well, not to turn this into an all out criticism of systematic theology-- fans of Wright and Breuggemann may be tempted to do so, but we all build boxes as part of our engagement with the world. It's more a matter of not elevating the boxes to something foundational.

OK, anyway, looking forward to this book. :)
]]> Genesis 271909
Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching is a distinctive resource for those who interpret the Bible in the church. Planned and written specifically for teaching and preaching needs, this critically acclaimed biblical commentary is a major contribution to scholarship and ministry.]]> 384 Walter Brueggemann 080423101X Carl 0 to-read, christianity 4.23 1982 Genesis
author: Walter Brueggemann
name: Carl
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1982
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2011/03/16
shelves: to-read, christianity
review:
I've been looking for commentaries or other books on specific books of the Bible by scholars whom I respect (hard to know who fits that, when you have the high standards of a "professional" but in a different field)-- got NT Wright's on Colossians, and now I have Breuggemann on Genesis. Really interested to see what he has to say, though I just picked up another book by him which I think I will read first...
]]> The Prophetic Imagination 97827 151 Walter Brueggemann 0800632877 Carl 5 christianity
Anyway, obviously I recommend this for other Christian readers, but I believe it would hold up as a "reading" of the prophetic thread throughout Biblical literature for anyone interested. Wish I could comment on how it relates to contemporary Biblical crit., though-- I can see connections to NT Wright's work (though I should note that they apparently differ quite dramatically in their stance on homosexuality, at least-- don't know about other things). I have heard a PhD in Near Eastern lit. argue that there are two poles in the Old Testament, the Prophetic pole and the Apocalyptic pole-- I would like to read her dissertation now to catch up on the latter, but it might be too specialist for me...]]> 4.33 1978 The Prophetic Imagination
author: Walter Brueggemann
name: Carl
average rating: 4.33
book published: 1978
rating: 5
read at: 2009/04/01
date added: 2011/03/16
shelves: christianity
review:
I can't believe I haven't written a review for this-- took a couple years to finish it, but I had a lot of fun working through the second half during my off-hours in Iceland (I'm guessing I was through with it by April-- last memory of it was reading it in the section of Hjomalind dedicated to Marxist books, haha). Don't have time for anything in depth right now, b/c I would have to go back over it to refresh my memory, but I really liked his deconstruction of the "Royal Consciousness" and his analysis of the role of the "Prophetic Imagination", including the work of hope and the work of mourning, in the Old Testament as well as the Gospels. Not everyone will feel comfortable with this book-- it takes a critical view of the temple, for example (as opposed to the tabernacle)-- but I think it works. But that's probably a very big discussion right there, and you would have to read the book first. I also will not say whether I agree with all of Breuggemann's theology outside this book (also another discussion), but I will say that I am inclined to respect his opinion b/c he shows himself to be a very competent scholar-- and I appreciate how this book holds up much better than most Biblical criticism in the world of post structuralist theory, even though (if I remember correctly) he laments in his introduction that he wrote this book before he became fully aware of the post structuralist turn in Biblical studies. Well, anyway, fascinating book, whether or not you like all the parts. Apparently an early articulation of Breuggemann's theme of a "unsettling God", a God who escapes and even undermines our ideological constructions. Particularly relevant for understanding Moses, the Prophets (esp. Isaiah and Jeremiah, if I remember correctly) and Jesus (from the Christian perspective, obviously, as a sort of culmination of the "Prophetic Imagination"-- Moses again, and for good this time.

Anyway, obviously I recommend this for other Christian readers, but I believe it would hold up as a "reading" of the prophetic thread throughout Biblical literature for anyone interested. Wish I could comment on how it relates to contemporary Biblical crit., though-- I can see connections to NT Wright's work (though I should note that they apparently differ quite dramatically in their stance on homosexuality, at least-- don't know about other things). I have heard a PhD in Near Eastern lit. argue that there are two poles in the Old Testament, the Prophetic pole and the Apocalyptic pole-- I would like to read her dissertation now to catch up on the latter, but it might be too specialist for me...
]]> <![CDATA[Extreme Metal: Music and Culture on the Edge]]> 91312 208 Keith Kahn-Harris 1845203992 Carl 0 to-read 3.90 2010 Extreme Metal: Music and Culture on the Edge
author: Keith Kahn-Harris
name: Carl
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2011/03/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Foundation (Foundation, #1) 29579 The first novel in Isaac Asimov's classic science-fiction masterpiece, the Foundation series

For twelve thousand years the Galactic Empire has ruled supreme. Now it is dying. But only Hari Seldon, creator of the revolutionary science of psychohistory, can see into the future--to a dark age of ignorance, barbarism, and warfare that will last thirty thousand years. To preserve knowledge and save humankind, Seldon gathers the best minds in the Empire--both scientists and scholars--and brings them to a bleak planet at the edge of the galaxy to serve as a beacon of hope for future generations. He calls his sanctuary the Foundation.]]> 244 Isaac Asimov 0553803719 Carl 5
Very positivist in it's conception of history/psychology (which tend to get conflated, with "psychology" standing in for "future history"), something I find both frustrating and endearing in a retro way-- not hard to believe it was published in '51 (and I believe originally came out in serial form earlier than that). I am told Asimov wrote this after reading "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire", which I will have to read now, b/c I'm curious just what historiographical assumptions were behind that history. I think it is relatively well accepted now that "history" is narrative applied to events to render them meaningful and remember-able-- it is an attempt to understand, true, but very few would consider it a "science" (in the sense of psychohistory) or capable of prediction (as opposed to explanation-- which may seem like they are the same, but aren't). Asimov's "novum", however, consists of an appeal to "science" or "math", with the epistemological capitol of those fields transferred to "history" and "psychology" in a hazy, behind the curtain reification of "historical forces" into off-screen mathematical terms. I think a similar attempt to "scientize" things outside the bounds of the "natural sciences" can be seen in Hardin's use of "symbolic logic" (signed off on by a scientist, with the proper authority) to analyze the letters, treaties and conversations he'd been given. I don't know if this "symbolic logic" is supposed to be the same thing as what we call symbolic logic now (I believe this is first-order logic? I really know nothing about it, but ought to learn...), but the fact that they retreat to this, instead of just doing a close reading (which should give all the same information-- I assume using symbolic logic is just a variety of close reading, in this instance), is interesting-- in the story it is a way of getting the attention of the scientists by "speaking their language", but it also plays the game of Golden Age sci-fi in it's appeal to the ability of "Science" (whether math or otherwise) to reduce everything to such terms.

Other interesting things-- Nuclear power is the real "foundation" here-- it is almost like a magic or religious power in the way it is the key to every futuristic technology. Well, this is just what sci-fi was back then, but it's kinda funny. Reading this now almost makes this variety of sci-fi seems as magico-religious in nature as the "religion of science" which is set up in the book to subjugate the neighboring barbarians-- maybe we could say the book deconstructs itself in that way, or at the very least gives us an opportunity to read it against itself, or as a play on the adolescent positivism which was in full flower in the genre at the time. Though I think it always comes back to that sort of wishfulfillment, the genius nerds somehow succeeding over the big bruisers in the rest of the galaxy, and becoming bullies themselves (see Hardin and Mallow). Hm, and the continual triumph of the new over the old with each successive generation may be intended as a reference to the problem of stagnation (ala Decline of the Roman Empire), but it also opens itself to an Oedipal reading-- the "Fathers" are split into Good and Bad, as the founder of each new movement (Mayors, Spiritualists, Traders) gets to be a viewpoint character in his section, and well thought of, while those who refuse to change and cling to the old way of doing things (even if it's what Hardin originally did, etc...) are properly villainized and overthrown. And of course Seldon remains the daddy in the sky behind it all, unassailable. I feel like it's a Bloomian Anxiety of Influence in the political/economic world, where being true to the spirit of the patriarchal predecessor means misreading or apparently rebelling against the tried-and-true formulae attributed to that spiritual predecessor.

OK, enough notes for now, I've got work to do. Hoping to have my science fiction group read this.]]> 4.18 1951 Foundation (Foundation, #1)
author: Isaac Asimov
name: Carl
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1951
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2010/12/13
shelves:
review:
Just reread this for the first time in maybe over a decade. Won't say it's perfect, but it's easy to see why it's such a classic.

Very positivist in it's conception of history/psychology (which tend to get conflated, with "psychology" standing in for "future history"), something I find both frustrating and endearing in a retro way-- not hard to believe it was published in '51 (and I believe originally came out in serial form earlier than that). I am told Asimov wrote this after reading "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire", which I will have to read now, b/c I'm curious just what historiographical assumptions were behind that history. I think it is relatively well accepted now that "history" is narrative applied to events to render them meaningful and remember-able-- it is an attempt to understand, true, but very few would consider it a "science" (in the sense of psychohistory) or capable of prediction (as opposed to explanation-- which may seem like they are the same, but aren't). Asimov's "novum", however, consists of an appeal to "science" or "math", with the epistemological capitol of those fields transferred to "history" and "psychology" in a hazy, behind the curtain reification of "historical forces" into off-screen mathematical terms. I think a similar attempt to "scientize" things outside the bounds of the "natural sciences" can be seen in Hardin's use of "symbolic logic" (signed off on by a scientist, with the proper authority) to analyze the letters, treaties and conversations he'd been given. I don't know if this "symbolic logic" is supposed to be the same thing as what we call symbolic logic now (I believe this is first-order logic? I really know nothing about it, but ought to learn...), but the fact that they retreat to this, instead of just doing a close reading (which should give all the same information-- I assume using symbolic logic is just a variety of close reading, in this instance), is interesting-- in the story it is a way of getting the attention of the scientists by "speaking their language", but it also plays the game of Golden Age sci-fi in it's appeal to the ability of "Science" (whether math or otherwise) to reduce everything to such terms.

Other interesting things-- Nuclear power is the real "foundation" here-- it is almost like a magic or religious power in the way it is the key to every futuristic technology. Well, this is just what sci-fi was back then, but it's kinda funny. Reading this now almost makes this variety of sci-fi seems as magico-religious in nature as the "religion of science" which is set up in the book to subjugate the neighboring barbarians-- maybe we could say the book deconstructs itself in that way, or at the very least gives us an opportunity to read it against itself, or as a play on the adolescent positivism which was in full flower in the genre at the time. Though I think it always comes back to that sort of wishfulfillment, the genius nerds somehow succeeding over the big bruisers in the rest of the galaxy, and becoming bullies themselves (see Hardin and Mallow). Hm, and the continual triumph of the new over the old with each successive generation may be intended as a reference to the problem of stagnation (ala Decline of the Roman Empire), but it also opens itself to an Oedipal reading-- the "Fathers" are split into Good and Bad, as the founder of each new movement (Mayors, Spiritualists, Traders) gets to be a viewpoint character in his section, and well thought of, while those who refuse to change and cling to the old way of doing things (even if it's what Hardin originally did, etc...) are properly villainized and overthrown. And of course Seldon remains the daddy in the sky behind it all, unassailable. I feel like it's a Bloomian Anxiety of Influence in the political/economic world, where being true to the spirit of the patriarchal predecessor means misreading or apparently rebelling against the tried-and-true formulae attributed to that spiritual predecessor.

OK, enough notes for now, I've got work to do. Hoping to have my science fiction group read this.
]]> Stjärnvägar: En bok om kosmos 2227270 Swedish 237 Peter Nilson 911964602X Carl 5
The final portion of the book is traditional sci-fi-- as in fictional and speculative-- but also serves as an appropriate final chapter of this book (for my original review and the description of the rest of the book, see below). Continues the theme of putting the human perspective into a cosmic perspective, but here by postulating a post-human distant future, where the universe has chilled to a point where it can't sustain biological life, but where all we know of the history of universe only proves to be the prelude to something else. But I have to complain that Nilson seems preoccupied with "reality" as being a Platonic realm of pure mathematics-- I may not be qualified to comment on this, not being a mathematician myself, but from the sorts of philosophy I am familiar with (incl. phenomenology, which starts with a treatise on arithmetic and the nature of numbers-- but I'll admit, I haven't read enough of this stuff to judge...), I wonder if it is more "true" to see math as a particularly refined mode of engagement with the world-- well, I still haven't finished with Heidegger and others, but I suppose one could also just say that what you consider the "foundation" depends on the problem you pose. And the experience of discovery and the weeding out of imperfect theorems is so foundational (there's that word again) to the "act" of science (=the physical sciences) that I don't think you (meaning someone engaged in that project) can avoid understanding that act as the uncovering of "reality"-- but should that be reified as another "world" behind our own? That doesn't feel quite right to me, but again, I'm not a scientist myself. At any rate, a very mind-bending book, maybe very typical of SF literature, but of the best of that literature.

Original review follows:

I bought this in a volume of three of Nilson's books (also incl. Solvindar and Rymdljus) nearly a decade ago after having it recommended as Swedish science fiction-- so far this first book is not science fiction, but rather a very poetic essay on the universe, our place in it, and Mankind's attempts to understand that universe, much in line with what I would expect from Carl Sagan or perhaps the more poetic of the New Atheists (except that Nilson does not seem to have a religion-bashing agenda-- he is perfectly happy to celebrate all attempts to understand our place in the cosmos, throughout history). In any case, I find it compelling, beautiful, and the voice of the narrator is humble at the same time that he leads us through the grand mysteries of space and time. I can think of at least one friend who would really enjoy this book-- alas, I don't think there are any translations available. The Swedish here is pretty straightforward, so I'm actually thinking of turning this into a translation project-- there is a lot of Swedish sci-fi that is inaccessible to non-Scandinavian speakers, and that being a special interest of mine, well, I may have found my non-Medieval niche in Scandinavian Studies.

Since I came to this book expecting sci-fi, I think it is interesting to approach it as such-- scientific exploration of our world as narrative, science "fiction", or rather science-narrative, in which the plot consists of the progressive unraveling and knitting together of life, the universe and everything. Very much the sort of personal reflection I would expect from any of the other physicists and astronomers who write science fiction, though I'm not convinced that many of them would be capable of bringing all these various threads together so beautifully. Nilson is very broadly read, and I'm enjoying going along on this intellectual journey with his narrator!]]> 4.02 1991 Stjärnvägar: En bok om kosmos
author: Peter Nilson
name: Carl
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1991
rating: 5
read at: 2010/11/23
date added: 2010/12/07
shelves: svenska, cosmology, history, philosophy
review:
Wah!!! You know it's a good book when you get to the end and you start laughing-- not at something funny, but at the disappointment which you knew was coming, because the book was obviously promising a revelation beyond the ability of a human to give, and yet you were so sucked in that you couldn't help hoping that the revelation would come! I think the final chapter also succeeds very well in conflating Narrator with Author-- despite the author's warnings that the final section would be fictional, I lost that distinction as I was drawn into the final portion, and the laughter at the end is at least in part due to the breaking of that spell, as the experience abruptly and prematurely ends and we are suddenly dumped into a very "real" postscript thanking those who contributed to this book, and listing the previous places these chapters had been published.

The final portion of the book is traditional sci-fi-- as in fictional and speculative-- but also serves as an appropriate final chapter of this book (for my original review and the description of the rest of the book, see below). Continues the theme of putting the human perspective into a cosmic perspective, but here by postulating a post-human distant future, where the universe has chilled to a point where it can't sustain biological life, but where all we know of the history of universe only proves to be the prelude to something else. But I have to complain that Nilson seems preoccupied with "reality" as being a Platonic realm of pure mathematics-- I may not be qualified to comment on this, not being a mathematician myself, but from the sorts of philosophy I am familiar with (incl. phenomenology, which starts with a treatise on arithmetic and the nature of numbers-- but I'll admit, I haven't read enough of this stuff to judge...), I wonder if it is more "true" to see math as a particularly refined mode of engagement with the world-- well, I still haven't finished with Heidegger and others, but I suppose one could also just say that what you consider the "foundation" depends on the problem you pose. And the experience of discovery and the weeding out of imperfect theorems is so foundational (there's that word again) to the "act" of science (=the physical sciences) that I don't think you (meaning someone engaged in that project) can avoid understanding that act as the uncovering of "reality"-- but should that be reified as another "world" behind our own? That doesn't feel quite right to me, but again, I'm not a scientist myself. At any rate, a very mind-bending book, maybe very typical of SF literature, but of the best of that literature.

Original review follows:

I bought this in a volume of three of Nilson's books (also incl. Solvindar and Rymdljus) nearly a decade ago after having it recommended as Swedish science fiction-- so far this first book is not science fiction, but rather a very poetic essay on the universe, our place in it, and Mankind's attempts to understand that universe, much in line with what I would expect from Carl Sagan or perhaps the more poetic of the New Atheists (except that Nilson does not seem to have a religion-bashing agenda-- he is perfectly happy to celebrate all attempts to understand our place in the cosmos, throughout history). In any case, I find it compelling, beautiful, and the voice of the narrator is humble at the same time that he leads us through the grand mysteries of space and time. I can think of at least one friend who would really enjoy this book-- alas, I don't think there are any translations available. The Swedish here is pretty straightforward, so I'm actually thinking of turning this into a translation project-- there is a lot of Swedish sci-fi that is inaccessible to non-Scandinavian speakers, and that being a special interest of mine, well, I may have found my non-Medieval niche in Scandinavian Studies.

Since I came to this book expecting sci-fi, I think it is interesting to approach it as such-- scientific exploration of our world as narrative, science "fiction", or rather science-narrative, in which the plot consists of the progressive unraveling and knitting together of life, the universe and everything. Very much the sort of personal reflection I would expect from any of the other physicists and astronomers who write science fiction, though I'm not convinced that many of them would be capable of bringing all these various threads together so beautifully. Nilson is very broadly read, and I'm enjoying going along on this intellectual journey with his narrator!
]]> <![CDATA[Det sällsamma djuret från norr och andra science fiction-berättelser]]> 1712668 193 Lars Gustafsson Carl 5 svenska, fantasysci-fi Bernard Foyes Tredje Rockad, men jag är inte säkert-- men både har den samma surrealistiska smaken blandat med stora, konstiga händelser och äventyr. ]]> 4.07 1989 Det sällsamma djuret från norr och andra science fiction-berättelser
author: Lars Gustafsson
name: Carl
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1989
rating: 5
read at: 2005/01/01
date added: 2010/12/05
shelves: svenska, fantasysci-fi
review:
Jätte intressant-- ojojoj, kanske min favorit samling av science-fiction berättelser, även om jag brukar läsa science-fiction på engelska. Jag tror att det skrevs av densamma Lars Gustafsson som skrev Bernard Foyes Tredje Rockad, men jag är inte säkert-- men både har den samma surrealistiska smaken blandat med stora, konstiga händelser och äventyr.
]]> Urminnes tecken 7499366 Med Kerstin Ekmans hjälp får vi komma dessa varelser inpå livet. Alla de stora saker som händer nere i mossan och inne i grandunklet blir till berättelse. En berättelse om hur Skymt grips av kärlek, hur han ändrar världens gång genom att prata, om krig och sång och om det gömda och glömda urminnet långt inne i bergets mörker.
Urminnes tecken utspelar sig i utkanten av människornas verklighet, i en skog där minne och språk lockar fram varelser ur dimman. Där finns det underliga tecknet och där hörs sången som måste vara Urminnes.]]> 204 Kerstin Ekman 9101000055 Carl 0 currently-reading, svenska 4.00 2000 Urminnes tecken
author: Kerstin Ekman
name: Carl
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2000
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/12/03
shelves: currently-reading, svenska
review:
Bought a copy of this a few years back, but have never gotten around to reading it. Actually... I'm not sure I've read anything of hers yet. This is a very fun and interesting little book so far-- I think we would call this Magical Realism, if the point of MR is that there seems to be a magical element, but you aren't completely certain whether there really is anything magical going on. Been a while since I've heard a definition tho, so whatever. Just my kind of book, in any case-- otherworldly and lots of nature, plus just plain unusual and interesting. I'm enjoying the prose.
]]> Solaris 95558
When Kris Kelvin arrives at the planet Solaris to study the ocean that covers its surface, he finds a painful, hitherto unconscious memory embodied in the living physical likeness of a long-dead lover. Others examining the planet, Kelvin learns, are plagued with their own repressed and newly corporeal memories. The Solaris ocean may be a massive brain that creates these incarnate memories, though its purpose in doing so is unknown, forcing the scientists to shift the focus of their quest and wonder if they can truly understand the universe without first understanding what lies within their hearts.]]> 204 Stanisław Lem Carl 5 fantasysci-fi 4.00 1961 Solaris
author: Stanisław Lem
name: Carl
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1961
rating: 5
read at: 2010/11/01
date added: 2010/11/23
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
Short but good. A fascinating "thought experiment" involving a truly alien "alien", and one of the most interesting explorations of the way in which we understand things by projecting ourselves or that which we are already familiar with onto that Other. Lacan would have a field day with this-- Derrida too, I think, and certainly there is a lot of lit crit written about this book, though I haven't dug into it so much yet. If no one has done a Lacanian reading of this book, then I want to do that-- but will have to wait till I have a better grasp of Lacan, and hopefully also of his Marxist and Feminist reinterpreters. I think Ricoeur's take on Otherness and translation would also be relevant here, but again, I've hardly scratched the surface of that literature...
]]> <![CDATA[Reception Theory (New Accents)]]> 4049340 196 Robert C. Holub 0415045967 Carl 5
No time for a longer review now, sorry!]]> 3.63 1984 Reception Theory (New Accents)
author: Robert C. Holub
name: Carl
average rating: 3.63
book published: 1984
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2010/11/14
shelves:
review:
Been ages since I've read this, but a great book! Whether you are way into reception theory or just want to find out what it is about, this is your book. Though I will admit that it can be hard reading for those not familiar with academic lit in the humanities.

No time for a longer review now, sorry!
]]> <![CDATA[The Cambridge Companion to Science Fiction]]> 696166 323 Edward James 0521016576 Carl 0 currently-reading 3.97 2003 The Cambridge Companion to Science Fiction
author: Edward James
name: Carl
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2003
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/11/11
shelves: currently-reading
review:
Slowly working my way through this, but enjoying it immensely. The first section has several chapters outlining the history of science fiction, and each chapter seems to succeed fairly well at both covering the essentials and providing a nuanced and sophisticated theoretical treatment. Now I'm working through the sections on theory-- have read on Marxism in Sci Fi and Feminism in sci fi so far-- both fairly short, easy to read, and pretty decent scholarship (for such a brief overview). If I ever have an opportunity to teach a course on the subject, I will certainly use this book.
]]> <![CDATA[Expressive Processing: Digital Fictions, Computer Games, and Software Studies]]> 6413417 482 Noah Wardrip-Fruin 0262013436 Carl 0 to-read 4.25 2009 Expressive Processing: Digital Fictions, Computer Games, and Software Studies
author: Noah Wardrip-Fruin
name: Carl
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/10/29
shelves: to-read
review:
Recommended by a friend who researches narrative and artificial intelligence. Or something like that. I suppose I will most likely never do any work in this field, but I can't really be in the humanities in the 21st century without at least trying to be aware of digital media.
]]> The Sparrow (The Sparrow, #1) 334176 419 Mary Doria Russell 0449912558 Carl 4 4.13 1996 The Sparrow (The Sparrow, #1)
author: Mary Doria Russell
name: Carl
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1996
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2010/10/28
shelves:
review:
OK, finished rereading it-- sticking to 4 stars, though in many ways it goes beyond the usual sci fi novel. The two timelines are nice of course, and a lot less common in "pulp" lit like sci fi. There are things that bother me-- it's just a bit too easy to travel to another star, too convenient that another civilization at approx. the same stage of development as ours is at the NEAREST star, and the tragic portions, while explicitly foreshadowed for the whole book are very suddenly gone through (as though the author could not bear to look at them, after playing them up for so long) after preliminaries that go on quite long-- but over all it felt very original, it deals very well with Religion, Agnosticism and Atheism in a way which is sympathetic to all three, with their particular problems (one theme maybe being that whether or not you believe in God, you cannot help but have to deal with the idea of God-- so really, no one escapes "God", an understandably frustrating problem for atheists-- but hey, you can't be "a-" something without the positive term), and the author's experience in anthropology shows through beautifully, without being overbearing. The "novum" at the heart of this sci-fi novel, to borrow Darko Suvin's terminology, is an anthropological one rather than a scientific one, and I confess that that endears the story to me. The same goes for Orson Scott Card's -Speaker for the Dead, and for Ursula LeGuin's -The Word for World is Forest-. Of course the term "anthropological" is problematic here, except for the fact that humans are involved, making it an "anthropo" matter, as well as an alien one.
]]> Studies in Words (Canto) 79903 343 C.S. Lewis 0521398312 Carl 0 to-read
]]> 4.18 1967 Studies in Words (Canto)
author: C.S. Lewis
name: Carl
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1967
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/10/28
shelves: to-read
review:
Have not read this yet-- but will hopefully get my hands on it sometime soon. The only other work of scholarship I've read by Lewis is Experiment in Criticism-- otherwise I'm only familiar with Lewis' Fiction and Apologetics. I'd be interested to see how Tolkien would attack a topic like this, being a bit closer to the professional center of the discipline of words-- actually, I'd like to put together a reading list of those of the Inklings who dealt with language and semantics-- this work by Lewis, something by Tolkien and something by Barfield (his -Poetic Diction- certainly, but that was an early work of his). I don't expect them to be up to date, obviously, but with all of them there have been times when I've found some really interesting takes on problems which occupy Critical Theory or Linguistics now-- for example, in some ways Lewis' -Experiment in Criticism- has similar concerns to Reception or Reader-Response Theory, Tolkien's -On Fairy Stories- seems to reflect more recent interest in the centrality of narrative in human thought (cf Ricoeur), and Barfield (whom Tolkien followed, according to Verlyn Flieger) has some interesting things to say about metaphor which remind me of the current interest in Conceptual Metaphor, even if he wasn't saying the same thing.


]]> Smilla's Sense of Snow 124509
It happened in the Copenhagen snow. A six-year-old boy, a Greenlander like Smilla, fell to his death from the top of his apartment building. While the boy's body is still warm, the police pronounce his death an accident. But Smilla knows her young neighbor didn't fall from the roof on his own. Soon she is following a path of clues as clear to her as footsteps in the snow. For her dead neighbor, and for herself, she must embark on a harrowing journey of lies, revelation and violence that will take her back to the world of ice and snow from which she comes, where an explosive secret waits beneath the ice....]]> 480 Peter Høeg 0385315147 Carl 0 currently-reading 3.77 1992 Smilla's Sense of Snow
author: Peter Høeg
name: Carl
average rating: 3.77
book published: 1992
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/10/27
shelves: currently-reading
review:
I was surprised to find this book named in a list of Danish science-fiction books, or at least books which touch on the genre-- though I guess the closest it gets to that only comes in a revelation at the end (don't know what that is yet). In any case, it looks interesting so far!
]]> <![CDATA[Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative]]> 864726 256 Mieke Bal 0802078060 Carl 0 3.68 1978 Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative
author: Mieke Bal
name: Carl
average rating: 3.68
book published: 1978
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/10/17
shelves:
review:
I read (most of) this book for a course in narratology which I audited years ago. Am thinking of rereading it now, having run into someone who works on the incredibly awesome topic of Narrative AIs for video games. Not sure this is exactly the topic which most parallels that concern in the humanities, but hey, I should reread this anyway.
]]> <![CDATA[Boneshaker (The Clockwork Century, #1)]]> 1137215
But on its first test run the Boneshaker went terribly awry, destroying several blocks of downtown Seattle and unearthing a subterranean vein of blight gas that turned anyone who breathed it into the living dead.

Now it is sixteen years later, and a wall has been built to enclose the devastated and toxic city. Just beyond it lives Blue’s widow, Briar Wilkes. Life is hard with a ruined reputation and a teenaged boy to support, but she and Ezekiel are managing. Until Ezekiel undertakes a secret crusade to rewrite history.

His quest will take him under the wall and into a city teeming with ravenous undead, air pirates, criminal overlords, and heavily armed refugees. And only Briar can bring him out alive.]]> 416 Cherie Priest 0765318415 Carl 0 to-read, fantasysci-fi
Still, I'm interesting in digging into the whole "steam punk" genre. The various "punks" seem to at least aspire to some degree of literary quality, or to put it another way, seem to exhibit some degree of the self-consciousness or reflexivity which is the most standard way of making an otherwise escapist pulp more than mere escapism... gosh, I'm sounding like a read snob now. Oh well. Let's just say that, even though I've always tended to be a "traditionalist" in terms of sci-fi and fantasy (though by far the most interested in the more intelligent and subversive expressions of those traditional interests), I'm increasingly interested in exploring these new subdivisions, whether "punks" or not-- I realize that the "-punk" names all feel a bit derivative, but you know, I think I see the sense in them. Well, let's say it starts with Cyberpunk, whatever "-punk" might mean to those who coined the phrase (not something I've looked into)-- then look at how the word is applied ever since, and the sense seems to be "take a particular twist or angle on traditional SF/Fantasy and wring every little interesting idea out of it"-- so Steampunk takes the inherently dated nature of sci-fi (techno-speculation as determined by the time imagining it, rather than the time in which a technology actually becomes real or reaches fruition) and applies it to outdated speculations-- which are really fantastic speculations one what might have been speculated, or something like that-- and works through all the possible worlds (we might say practically infinite-- or even theoretically infinite, actually...) that could come out of that one angle-- Mythpunk (which I have not read any of, except a bit of Mythago Wood, which is supposedly a forerunner), I believe, takes the vectors of the Supernatural (Myth, legend, etc) and of "Reality" (yes, also a construct, seeing as we live in a socio-cultural-linguistic world) and explores the infinity of worlds that meet in that single point of intersection. Hm, and my ŷ friend Keely once coined the term "Mannerpunk" for the Gormenghast novels by Mervyn Peake (at least I think Keely was the first to use it...)-- I suppose we might say that it is the intersection of Manners and the Grotesque exploited beyond all measure (or rather, Manners taken to Grotesgue extremes and projected onto the surrounding world?)-- but as there are (to my knowledge) no other books within the genre, it is difficult to apply my generic definition of the -punks to it.

OK, that was a long ramble on genre and -punkology due to the fact that I don't actually have much to say about this book. Am interested though, for the reasons given above-- the punks can be taken as gimmicks, but I'm hoping to take them as interesting and cutting-edge doorways to new worlds. I'm worried that this particular novel may be getting towards the later degradation of the genre into flat and sensationalist (ha, bet you didn't think I'd combine those!) corn for the sci-fi money mill, but I think the genre may still be young enough to be intriguing in most of it's output-- hm, but then again, hasn't it been like a decade since Will Smith turned Steampunk into a Hollywood sell-out with Wild Wild West? Or did that movie actually invent the genre, I actually don't know!

Oh, and the girl on the cover of this book seems kinda cute, even if her eyes are covered with goggles (which reflect a bit of this steampunk world)-- hm, I feel like there are some interesting theoretical points to make here, but I was planning on relaxing tonight...]]> 3.53 2009 Boneshaker (The Clockwork Century, #1)
author: Cherie Priest
name: Carl
average rating: 3.53
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/10/04
shelves: to-read, fantasysci-fi
review:
Honestly, I bought this on a whim (had a $50 gift card, and then put another $40 into my purchase... hey, I hadn't bought any books for a while!), and am a bit uncertain whether it was worth it-- have only a read a bit, but am trying to figure out whether this is genuine cutting edge, interstitial Steampunk, or just a cheap gimmick to get readers. Well, maybe I'm just being uncharitable b/c it is a "Sci-Fi Essential Book" (or are they the SyFy network now? Or have they maybe gone back again???) and I don't trust that network to give me good reading advice (not that I've even watched that channel for over 5 years, but hey, screened sci-fi, small or big, has a not amazing history, according to my records).

Still, I'm interesting in digging into the whole "steam punk" genre. The various "punks" seem to at least aspire to some degree of literary quality, or to put it another way, seem to exhibit some degree of the self-consciousness or reflexivity which is the most standard way of making an otherwise escapist pulp more than mere escapism... gosh, I'm sounding like a read snob now. Oh well. Let's just say that, even though I've always tended to be a "traditionalist" in terms of sci-fi and fantasy (though by far the most interested in the more intelligent and subversive expressions of those traditional interests), I'm increasingly interested in exploring these new subdivisions, whether "punks" or not-- I realize that the "-punk" names all feel a bit derivative, but you know, I think I see the sense in them. Well, let's say it starts with Cyberpunk, whatever "-punk" might mean to those who coined the phrase (not something I've looked into)-- then look at how the word is applied ever since, and the sense seems to be "take a particular twist or angle on traditional SF/Fantasy and wring every little interesting idea out of it"-- so Steampunk takes the inherently dated nature of sci-fi (techno-speculation as determined by the time imagining it, rather than the time in which a technology actually becomes real or reaches fruition) and applies it to outdated speculations-- which are really fantastic speculations one what might have been speculated, or something like that-- and works through all the possible worlds (we might say practically infinite-- or even theoretically infinite, actually...) that could come out of that one angle-- Mythpunk (which I have not read any of, except a bit of Mythago Wood, which is supposedly a forerunner), I believe, takes the vectors of the Supernatural (Myth, legend, etc) and of "Reality" (yes, also a construct, seeing as we live in a socio-cultural-linguistic world) and explores the infinity of worlds that meet in that single point of intersection. Hm, and my ŷ friend Keely once coined the term "Mannerpunk" for the Gormenghast novels by Mervyn Peake (at least I think Keely was the first to use it...)-- I suppose we might say that it is the intersection of Manners and the Grotesque exploited beyond all measure (or rather, Manners taken to Grotesgue extremes and projected onto the surrounding world?)-- but as there are (to my knowledge) no other books within the genre, it is difficult to apply my generic definition of the -punks to it.

OK, that was a long ramble on genre and -punkology due to the fact that I don't actually have much to say about this book. Am interested though, for the reasons given above-- the punks can be taken as gimmicks, but I'm hoping to take them as interesting and cutting-edge doorways to new worlds. I'm worried that this particular novel may be getting towards the later degradation of the genre into flat and sensationalist (ha, bet you didn't think I'd combine those!) corn for the sci-fi money mill, but I think the genre may still be young enough to be intriguing in most of it's output-- hm, but then again, hasn't it been like a decade since Will Smith turned Steampunk into a Hollywood sell-out with Wild Wild West? Or did that movie actually invent the genre, I actually don't know!

Oh, and the girl on the cover of this book seems kinda cute, even if her eyes are covered with goggles (which reflect a bit of this steampunk world)-- hm, I feel like there are some interesting theoretical points to make here, but I was planning on relaxing tonight...
]]> <![CDATA[The Handmaid’s Tale (The Handmaid's Tale, #1)]]> 38447
Funny, unexpected, horrifying, and altogether convincing, The Handmaid's Tale is at once scathing satire, dire warning, and tour de force.]]> 311 Margaret Atwood 038549081X Carl 0 to-read 4.15 1985 The Handmaid’s Tale (The Handmaid's Tale, #1)
author: Margaret Atwood
name: Carl
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1985
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/10/04
shelves: to-read
review:
Had heard the title before, but never read it. Maybe something to recommend for my sci-fi reading group! We could do a section on dystopias (which this seems to be about).
]]> <![CDATA[World Spectators (Cultural Memory in the Present)]]> 174315 191 Kaja Silverman 0804738327 Carl 5 4.07 2000 World Spectators (Cultural Memory in the Present)
author: Kaja Silverman
name: Carl
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2000
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2010/09/28
shelves: currently-reading, literarytheory, culturecriticism, philosophy, psychologypsychoanalysis
review:
Really really enjoying this book! She seems to be doing everything that I'd like to do, as far as bringing Critical Theory, Phenomenology and Psychoanalysis together into a fairly positive and constructive philosophy of human be-ing. Right now am enjoying her synthesis of Heidegger and Lacan, two thinkers I am particularly interested in.
]]> <![CDATA[The Gap Into Conflict: The Real Story (The Gap Cycle #1)]]> 427353
But one person in Mallorys Bar wasn't intimidated. Nick Succorso had his own reputation as a bold pirate and he had a sleek frigate fitted for deep space. Everyone knew that Thermopyle and Succorso were on a collision course. What nobody expected was how quickly it would be over - or how devastating victory would be. It was common enough example of rivalry and revenge - or so everyone thought. The REAL story was something entirely different.]]> 241 Stephen R. Donaldson 0553295098 Carl 5 fantasysci-fi
Wish I had time to write a longer review-- I'm giving it 5 stars, though I didn't always feel like it was worth that-- but I really really like how different the story is and how Donaldson is trying to do something unique in the field of space opera.

He has a section at the end where he explains the genesis of the story and the connection to Wagner's Ring cycle. I'd heard of this series as his take on Volsunga saga, but seeing it as inspired by Wagner (and dealing with similar themes) makes more sense.

I have to admit it is really hard to read through a story which centers so much around a psychopath breaking a woman through violence and rape, but in his favor Donaldson does not linger on details in a pornographic way (actually, he does a good job keeping the horror somewhat off camera, without letting us think that rape is any less horrible than it is), and I think I would say that he does accomplish his goal (sorry, spoiler here!) of switching the structural roles of the triangle of characters-- villain becomes victim, victim becomes rescuer, hero becomes villain. Actually, just the fact that this is clearly a structural switch (and very dependent on the perspective through which the configuration is viewed), rather than a change in some inherent characteristic in each of them, is a fairly powerful statement, imho, esp. in the world of space opera which has had its share of evil strawmen. The central character is still very despicable (at first you think he is too extreme a villain, but by the end I saw him as a plausible psychopath-- after all, people have done such horrible things before-- but I'm no psychologist, and don't know if the description of his internal mental life, motives, etc, is realistic or not), but it's a great author who can show a reversal like this without excusing the despicable things which were done. Of course, the act of mercy on the part of the former victim (while it doesn't actually resolve anything-- really, just delays resolution till future books, I assume) feels a bit tarnished, too clearly a case of Stockholm Syndrome-- well, except for the fact that she still wants to escape and does. But hey, let's let mercy be mercy.

This book feels very unusual, and the brief look I've taken at the next book tells me that "The Real Story" is set apart even within it's own series-- it feels like a prologue (and the connection Donaldson gives to the Ring cycle seems to corroborate this), a very concentrated, reduced narrative which is setting the stage for everything else. In what way, I don't know yet, but I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the series! Also need to get around to watching the whole ring cycle-- anyone have 15-20 hours to spare? ]]> 3.72 1990 The Gap Into Conflict: The Real Story (The Gap Cycle #1)
author: Stephen R. Donaldson
name: Carl
average rating: 3.72
book published: 1990
rating: 5
read at: 2010/08/01
date added: 2010/09/28
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
Having written this (and having had it actually turn into a longer review), I should warn you-- this contains spoilers! Even if not very explicit ones.

Wish I had time to write a longer review-- I'm giving it 5 stars, though I didn't always feel like it was worth that-- but I really really like how different the story is and how Donaldson is trying to do something unique in the field of space opera.

He has a section at the end where he explains the genesis of the story and the connection to Wagner's Ring cycle. I'd heard of this series as his take on Volsunga saga, but seeing it as inspired by Wagner (and dealing with similar themes) makes more sense.

I have to admit it is really hard to read through a story which centers so much around a psychopath breaking a woman through violence and rape, but in his favor Donaldson does not linger on details in a pornographic way (actually, he does a good job keeping the horror somewhat off camera, without letting us think that rape is any less horrible than it is), and I think I would say that he does accomplish his goal (sorry, spoiler here!) of switching the structural roles of the triangle of characters-- villain becomes victim, victim becomes rescuer, hero becomes villain. Actually, just the fact that this is clearly a structural switch (and very dependent on the perspective through which the configuration is viewed), rather than a change in some inherent characteristic in each of them, is a fairly powerful statement, imho, esp. in the world of space opera which has had its share of evil strawmen. The central character is still very despicable (at first you think he is too extreme a villain, but by the end I saw him as a plausible psychopath-- after all, people have done such horrible things before-- but I'm no psychologist, and don't know if the description of his internal mental life, motives, etc, is realistic or not), but it's a great author who can show a reversal like this without excusing the despicable things which were done. Of course, the act of mercy on the part of the former victim (while it doesn't actually resolve anything-- really, just delays resolution till future books, I assume) feels a bit tarnished, too clearly a case of Stockholm Syndrome-- well, except for the fact that she still wants to escape and does. But hey, let's let mercy be mercy.

This book feels very unusual, and the brief look I've taken at the next book tells me that "The Real Story" is set apart even within it's own series-- it feels like a prologue (and the connection Donaldson gives to the Ring cycle seems to corroborate this), a very concentrated, reduced narrative which is setting the stage for everything else. In what way, I don't know yet, but I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the series! Also need to get around to watching the whole ring cycle-- anyone have 15-20 hours to spare?
]]> <![CDATA[The Dawkins Delusion? Atheist Fundamentalism and the Denial of the Divine]]> 621288 118 Alister E. McGrath 083083446X Carl 4 christianity, philosophy
Finally finished! A great book. Short, sure, but the last two chapters in particular really dug into the meat of the issues, and the final chapter even got into binary oppositions, deconstruction, and all that other epistemologically and ontologically savvy goodness that Dawkins lacks. Also check out Terry Eagleton's review here:
[]
My original review before finishing the book is below.

Here is another link I came across recently, though I haven't had a chance to read it yet-- Willard's critique of Dawkin's The Blind Watchmaker: []

Looks good so far, though definitely feels as though written for a popular audience (meaning, it feels at times as though there could be more meat-- though every time I think that I come across something that really satisfies). I really need to actually get around to reading Dawkins' book. I also really liked Terry Eagleton's review of The God Delusion (which can be found online somewhere-- I'll try to find the link and paste it here). From what I understand, Dawkins jumps into several different fields he is inadequately prepared to discuss, let alone criticize (Christian theology and worldview, philosophy, epistemology, etc), and McGrath and Eagleton are well suited to take him to task for those particular failings. Eagleton, of course, is not a scientist (actually, I don't even know if he is a Christian, but that is beside the point-- I'm more interested in the fact that his background in criticism and philosophy give him the epistemological sophistication and humility which Dawkins lacks), but McGrath is a very appropriate choice for a response, as he not only has degrees in both a science (I believe it was one of the biological sciences) and in theology (at least I think he had a degree-- he may have just studied on his own), but also converted to Christianity from Atheism after pursuing both fields of knowledge.
Again, I really need to read Dawkins' book-- I suspect, from these reviews, that my post-modern-academic heart will scream with outrage at every other word of Dawkins' clumsy logical-positivism, but if I'm going to be outraged anyway, I may as well make sure that I'm outraged at the real thing, and not just some idea. ]]> 3.38 2007 The Dawkins Delusion? Atheist Fundamentalism and the Denial of the Divine
author: Alister E. McGrath
name: Carl
average rating: 3.38
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at: 2007/08/01
date added: 2010/09/21
shelves: christianity, philosophy
review:
So, for some reason this book is coming up pretty high on my ŷ list, even though it's been a while since I've read it. My review seems a bit like trash talk to me now, esp. seeing as I still haven't actually read Dawkins' book. To be honest, I saw an uncut debate between these two on youtube a while back, and have to admit Dawkins came out on top. Well, it's been a while-- and I just don't trust debates anyway, I think written, relatively sympathetic communication is the best way to work through things. Well, there is a lot more I'd like to dig into re: the thought of both of these thinkers, so I think I will just say that I'm not so sure I stand wholeheartedly behind my review anymore, though I will need to return to this later to be sure. Gosh, I need to not get onto this stuff past midnight when I can't sleep...

Finally finished! A great book. Short, sure, but the last two chapters in particular really dug into the meat of the issues, and the final chapter even got into binary oppositions, deconstruction, and all that other epistemologically and ontologically savvy goodness that Dawkins lacks. Also check out Terry Eagleton's review here:
[]
My original review before finishing the book is below.

Here is another link I came across recently, though I haven't had a chance to read it yet-- Willard's critique of Dawkin's The Blind Watchmaker: []

Looks good so far, though definitely feels as though written for a popular audience (meaning, it feels at times as though there could be more meat-- though every time I think that I come across something that really satisfies). I really need to actually get around to reading Dawkins' book. I also really liked Terry Eagleton's review of The God Delusion (which can be found online somewhere-- I'll try to find the link and paste it here). From what I understand, Dawkins jumps into several different fields he is inadequately prepared to discuss, let alone criticize (Christian theology and worldview, philosophy, epistemology, etc), and McGrath and Eagleton are well suited to take him to task for those particular failings. Eagleton, of course, is not a scientist (actually, I don't even know if he is a Christian, but that is beside the point-- I'm more interested in the fact that his background in criticism and philosophy give him the epistemological sophistication and humility which Dawkins lacks), but McGrath is a very appropriate choice for a response, as he not only has degrees in both a science (I believe it was one of the biological sciences) and in theology (at least I think he had a degree-- he may have just studied on his own), but also converted to Christianity from Atheism after pursuing both fields of knowledge.
Again, I really need to read Dawkins' book-- I suspect, from these reviews, that my post-modern-academic heart will scream with outrage at every other word of Dawkins' clumsy logical-positivism, but if I'm going to be outraged anyway, I may as well make sure that I'm outraged at the real thing, and not just some idea.
]]> Polaris (Alex Benedict, #2) 337019 384 Jack McDevitt 0441012027 Carl 4 fantasysci-fi 3.86 2004 Polaris (Alex Benedict, #2)
author: Jack McDevitt
name: Carl
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2004
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2010/09/21
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
Finally finished this-- no time for a review now (should be asleep, but it wasn't taking so I'm up...), but an enjoyable combination of mystery and sci-fi! People seem to be taking him for "the logical heir to Asimov and Clarke" or something like that, and that works-- not the experimental edginess of New Wave or the various "punks" out there, just good quality, straight-ahead universe building SF with thoughtful themes that don't get in the way of the nicely balanced plot. That said, I do like a bit more "New Waviness" in my lit, but this sort of book I'm more likely to pick up when I just need to disappear for a while.
]]> <![CDATA[Innocents Aboard: New Fantasy Stories]]> 344946
Innocents Aboard gathers fantasy and horror stories from the last decade that have never before been in a Wolfe collection. Highlights from the twenty-two stories include "The Tree is my Hat," adventure and horror in the South Seas, "The Night Chough," a Long Sun story, "The Walking Sticks," a darkly humorous tale of a supernatural inheritance, and "Houston, 1943," lurid adventures in a dream that has no end. This is fantastic fiction at its best.]]> 304 Gene Wolfe 076530791X Carl 5 fantasysci-fi
I've read more than 1/2 of the stories in here I believe, so I'll just list it as "read". I love Wolfe-- he gets a lot of hype, but it's hype from the greatest living authors in sci-fi and fantasy, and it's worth it IMHO. Just recently reread "The Legend of Xi Cygnus" and "The Sailor Who Sailed After the Sun". Beautiful, original and interesting. Working through the final story, "The Lost Pilgrim", right now. I love how interesting and unique these stories are. Usually takes a while to figure out what he's doing, and sometimes it takes several reads, but it's always worth it, and it's always different than what others have done. Fine but not flashy prose, high caliber even at the "level of the sentence", which one of the authors in "The Cambridge Companion to Science Fiction" finds lacking in most sci-fi (excepting Wolfe and many New Wave writers). I think I agree with John Clute in the same volume that Wolfe may not be a game changer in sci-fi (ie, he is not "important", despite being the "greatest", in the opinion of so many), but he is the one who does it best (though I shouldn't label him just as a sci-fi author-- he does so much!). To quote Clute (p. 69): "Between 1980 and 2000 there is only one writer whose creative grasp and imprint and prolificacy-- and what might be called parental density, that density of creative being which generates the anxiety of influence in literary children, who may only be able to wrestle and come to terms with the parent after many years-- are so unmistakably manifest that one may plausibly use the word 'great' in describing his work. That writer is Gene Wolfe. He may be, as a creator of autonomous works of art, the greatest writer of sf in a century which saw many hundreds of writers do their work with high ambition and remarkable craft; he is, however, far from the most important sf writer of the century, and is by no means a writer of great significance in determining the nature of flow of his chosen genre during the years of his prime, which extend throughout the period under discussion."

Well, but maybe that's enough of my fan-boy-ness. Great collection of short stories, if you like short stories, and even if you don't, you'll probably enjoy a few of these. For the Christian readers out there, his "Legend..." and "Sailor..." short stories seem to me on my last reading to be the most beautiful, lyrical and unpreachy explorations of certain aspects of the Christian faith since Lewis and Tolkien. They probably only seem that way if you read them with an awareness of Wolfe's catholicism, and they are certainly not "Christian" works in the way we mean that today (both are actually fairly pagan-- but so is Lewis' "Til We Have Faces", in a similar way). Well, it's in the reading, of course (yay Reception Theory), but I think it's a valid reading. I enjoy finding authors who can explore their faith apart from the zealous, naive and unsubtle clunkiness of most of the "Christian Market" (CBA). Well, maybe that was a bit harsh, esp. as I know many people in that market personally (and think very well of them). ]]> 3.90 2004 Innocents Aboard: New Fantasy Stories
author: Gene Wolfe
name: Carl
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2004
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2010/09/19
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
Just adding a brief note-- I see most reviewers on ŷ have not enjoyed this collection as much, even if Wolfe is one of their favorite authors. I'll admit that I only have 3 stories fresh in my mind at the moment, and they are certainly not particularly accessible (but I think that could go for a lot of his work), but I still enjoyed them very much. He "does" things with his stories, in a way I find pleasurable. Suppose I'll leave it at that (having already written the monster review below...)

I've read more than 1/2 of the stories in here I believe, so I'll just list it as "read". I love Wolfe-- he gets a lot of hype, but it's hype from the greatest living authors in sci-fi and fantasy, and it's worth it IMHO. Just recently reread "The Legend of Xi Cygnus" and "The Sailor Who Sailed After the Sun". Beautiful, original and interesting. Working through the final story, "The Lost Pilgrim", right now. I love how interesting and unique these stories are. Usually takes a while to figure out what he's doing, and sometimes it takes several reads, but it's always worth it, and it's always different than what others have done. Fine but not flashy prose, high caliber even at the "level of the sentence", which one of the authors in "The Cambridge Companion to Science Fiction" finds lacking in most sci-fi (excepting Wolfe and many New Wave writers). I think I agree with John Clute in the same volume that Wolfe may not be a game changer in sci-fi (ie, he is not "important", despite being the "greatest", in the opinion of so many), but he is the one who does it best (though I shouldn't label him just as a sci-fi author-- he does so much!). To quote Clute (p. 69): "Between 1980 and 2000 there is only one writer whose creative grasp and imprint and prolificacy-- and what might be called parental density, that density of creative being which generates the anxiety of influence in literary children, who may only be able to wrestle and come to terms with the parent after many years-- are so unmistakably manifest that one may plausibly use the word 'great' in describing his work. That writer is Gene Wolfe. He may be, as a creator of autonomous works of art, the greatest writer of sf in a century which saw many hundreds of writers do their work with high ambition and remarkable craft; he is, however, far from the most important sf writer of the century, and is by no means a writer of great significance in determining the nature of flow of his chosen genre during the years of his prime, which extend throughout the period under discussion."

Well, but maybe that's enough of my fan-boy-ness. Great collection of short stories, if you like short stories, and even if you don't, you'll probably enjoy a few of these. For the Christian readers out there, his "Legend..." and "Sailor..." short stories seem to me on my last reading to be the most beautiful, lyrical and unpreachy explorations of certain aspects of the Christian faith since Lewis and Tolkien. They probably only seem that way if you read them with an awareness of Wolfe's catholicism, and they are certainly not "Christian" works in the way we mean that today (both are actually fairly pagan-- but so is Lewis' "Til We Have Faces", in a similar way). Well, it's in the reading, of course (yay Reception Theory), but I think it's a valid reading. I enjoy finding authors who can explore their faith apart from the zealous, naive and unsubtle clunkiness of most of the "Christian Market" (CBA). Well, maybe that was a bit harsh, esp. as I know many people in that market personally (and think very well of them).
]]> <![CDATA[The Jesus Creed: Loving God, Loving Others]]> 283436
This is what Scot McKnight calls the 'Jesus Creed'. He has written this book for all Christians who want to find out how it can transform their lives - and the lives of those around them.]]> 335 Scot McKnight 056704033X Carl 4 to-read, christianity 4.08 2004 The Jesus Creed: Loving God, Loving Others
author: Scot McKnight
name: Carl
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2004
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2010/08/27
shelves: to-read, christianity
review:
Been meaning to read this for a while. One of many books I'd like to read in which the meaning of Jesus' key statements/beliefs is explored in light of his cultural and religious context as a first century Jew. I've heard Scott speak about this book before, so I have a general idea of what it's about: apparently Jesus' famous summary of the two most important commandments (to love God and to love others) is actually a reformulation and affirmation of the "shemah" (sp?) of the Jewish faith (I think that's the part that begins "Hear O Israel, the Lord your God is one...) I'll have to say more once I finally get around to reading it.
]]> The Rule of Metaphor 217552 464 Paul Ricœur 0415312809 Carl 5
Nov 2008 update-- have read the first chapter and part of the next and am enjoying it so far! He spends a lot of time on Aristotle, as with his Time and Narrative volume 1. I think those two works, plus the short Interpretation Theory, share many of the same concerns, and they were all written roughly in the same period of his career (well, over the course of maybe 15 years, but all coming in the period after he took the linguistic turn himself and started bringing structuralism and post-structuralism into his hermeneutics). Rule of Metaphor also has a good review of his career up to that point in the appendix. ]]> 4.10 1975 The Rule of Metaphor
author: Paul Ricœur
name: Carl
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1975
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2010/08/27
shelves: philosophy, currently-reading, litcrit
review:
I love Ricoeur and enjoyed his take on metaphor in his slim volume "Interpretation Theory: Discourse and the Surplus of Meaning", and I'm interested in the Cognitive Linguistic take on metaphor, so I hope to read this as well. Actually, Gary Holland recently did an analysis of skaldic kennings using Cog Ling metaphor theory, and my dissertation is all about skaldic poetics, so it could be that this whole area is a chapter waiting to be concieved. I'd better read fast.

Nov 2008 update-- have read the first chapter and part of the next and am enjoying it so far! He spends a lot of time on Aristotle, as with his Time and Narrative volume 1. I think those two works, plus the short Interpretation Theory, share many of the same concerns, and they were all written roughly in the same period of his career (well, over the course of maybe 15 years, but all coming in the period after he took the linguistic turn himself and started bringing structuralism and post-structuralism into his hermeneutics). Rule of Metaphor also has a good review of his career up to that point in the appendix.
]]> <![CDATA[Picture Theory: Essays on Verbal and Visual Representation]]> 486533 462 W.J. Thomas Mitchell 0226532321 Carl 5 currently-reading 3.87 1994 Picture Theory: Essays on Verbal and Visual Representation
author: W.J. Thomas Mitchell
name: Carl
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1994
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2010/08/27
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Talent for War (Alex Benedict, #1)]]> 352774 310 Jack McDevitt 0441012175 Carl 4 3.76 1989 A Talent for War (Alex Benedict, #1)
author: Jack McDevitt
name: Carl
average rating: 3.76
book published: 1989
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2010/08/27
shelves:
review:
The first in the series-- been a few months since reading it, and can't remember exactly what I thought-- but still really enjoyed it, very interesting and original take on the advanced galactic civilization thing, and I enjoy the art hunter/archeologist as central character-- after all, a galactic civilization is going to have a hell of a lot of layers to dig through. Hm, makes me think of Karen Sander's new book on bog bodies-- her chapter on Freud could be relevant here...
]]> Dune (Dune, #1) 234225 Dune is the story of the boy Paul Atreides, heir to a noble family tasked with ruling an inhospitable world where the only thing of value is the "spice" melange, a drug capable of extending life and enhancing consciousness. Coveted across the known universe, melange is a prize worth killing for...

When House Atreides is betrayed, the destruction of Paul's family will set the boy on a journey toward a destiny greater than he could ever have imagined. And as he evolves into the mysterious man known as Muad'Dib, he will bring to fruition humankind's most ancient and unattainable dream.

A stunning blend of adventure and mysticism, environmentalism and politics, Dune won the first Nebula Award, shared the Hugo Award, and formed the basis of what is undoubtedly the grandest epic in science fiction.]]> 604 Frank Herbert 0340839937 Carl 5 4.21 1965 Dune (Dune, #1)
author: Frank Herbert
name: Carl
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1965
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2010/07/08
shelves:
review:
I'm going to give this 5 stars for the moment just because of it's classic status, and because it's been so long since I've read it that it's all glowy and beautiful in my memory. I believe we will be reading this for August for the sci-fi reading group I've started, so I will hopefully have a fuller review (and probably only 4 stars) in a little bit.
]]> <![CDATA[Star Wars: Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor]]> 2861954
Powerful remnants of the vanquished Empire, hungry for retaliation, are still at large, committing acts of piracy, terrorism, and wholesale slaughter against the worlds of the fledgling New Republic. The most deadly of these, a ruthless legion of black-armored Stormtroopers, do the brutal bidding of the newly risen warlord Shadowspawn. Striking from a strategically advantageous base on the planet Mindor, they are waging a campaign of plunder and destruction, demolishing order and security across the galaxy–and breeding fears of an Imperial resurgence. Another reign of darkness beneath the boot-heel of Sith despotism is something General Luke Skywalker cannot, and will not, risk.

Mobilizing the ace fighters of Rogue Squadron–along with the trusty Chewbacca, See-Threepio, and Artoo-Detoo–Luke, Han, and Leia set out to take the battle to the enemy and neutralize the threat before it’s too late. But their imminent attack on Mindor will be playing directly into the hands of their cunning new adversary. Lord Shadowspawn is no freshly anointed Sith Chieftain but in fact a vicious former Imperial Intelligence officer–and Prophet of the Dark Side. The Emperor’s death has paved the way for Shadowspawn’s return from exile in the Outer Rim, and mastery of ancient Sith knowledge and modern technology has given him the capability to mount the ultimate power play for galaxy wide dominion. Dark prophecy has foretold that only one obstacle stands in his way, and he is ready–even eager–for the confrontation.

All the classic heroes, all the explosive action and adventure, all the unparalleled excitement of Star Wars come breathlessly alive as the adventures of Luke Skywalker continue.]]> 316 Matthew Woodring Stover 0345477448 Carl 4
Anyway, still worthwhile. It is an interesting attempt to deal with the figure of "Luke Skywalker"-- my impression from some of the other material out there is that it is just too difficult now to write a convincing narrative about him b/c he is just TOO BIG in this universe-- this one, and others, really can do nothing more than repeat the archetypal narrative about his loss of innocence, nearly or truly falling into evil, then getting out, older and wiser-- except this just keeps happening over and over again. Though I admit that I feel that way about this novel in particular b/c I feel like it is too close, in some ways, to Kathy Tyers' "Truce at Bakura", one of the earliest expanded universe novels, and set only 1/2 a year before the events in this book.

I also thought the villain was not particularly compelling-- but look, I'm saying all the bad things about a book that I enjoyed very much. The 'meta' promise of the start is there, but not so obvious-- the ending in particular has me wondering just how deep we should think about this. But I'll leave that up to you. ]]> 3.75 2008 Star Wars: Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor
author: Matthew Woodring Stover
name: Carl
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2008
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2010/04/15
shelves:
review:
Matthew Stover's Shatterpoint was a Star Wars novel which I'd really enjoyed previously (more intelligent than the typical Star Wars novel), so I was looking forward to this-- and as you would expect from the cheesy title, this IS the most "meta" or self-reflexive Star Wars novel I've ever read-- but it didn't win me over entirely. In particular the science was just not working for me-- OK, lightsabers and hyperspace, that's out-there enough that I can say to myself "it's so far in the future that it's indistinguishable from magic for us" (thanks Arthur C Clarke), but when you have the orbital mechanics within the solar system changing as fast as they do in this book (and the plot depends on it) then we're talking about a solar system smaller than the diameter of the earth-- plus they have asteroids falling into the sun and causing solar storms which destroy ships, while star wars stories set 5000 years before have ships flying within thousands of miles of the surfaces of stars without any problems.

Anyway, still worthwhile. It is an interesting attempt to deal with the figure of "Luke Skywalker"-- my impression from some of the other material out there is that it is just too difficult now to write a convincing narrative about him b/c he is just TOO BIG in this universe-- this one, and others, really can do nothing more than repeat the archetypal narrative about his loss of innocence, nearly or truly falling into evil, then getting out, older and wiser-- except this just keeps happening over and over again. Though I admit that I feel that way about this novel in particular b/c I feel like it is too close, in some ways, to Kathy Tyers' "Truce at Bakura", one of the earliest expanded universe novels, and set only 1/2 a year before the events in this book.

I also thought the villain was not particularly compelling-- but look, I'm saying all the bad things about a book that I enjoyed very much. The 'meta' promise of the start is there, but not so obvious-- the ending in particular has me wondering just how deep we should think about this. But I'll leave that up to you.
]]> <![CDATA[All the World's Reward: Folktales Told by Five Scandinavian Storytellers (Nif Publications, No. 33.)]]> 4454596 325 Reimund Kvideland 0295978104 Carl 5 4.20 1999 All the World's Reward: Folktales Told by Five Scandinavian Storytellers (Nif Publications, No. 33.)
author: Reimund Kvideland
name: Carl
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1999
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2010/03/28
shelves:
review:
This is a great introduction to Scandinavian Folktales through five individual story tellers and their repertoires. I use this to teach my Scandinavian folklore course, and like it much better than the editors' collection of Legends and Folk Beliefs (though in any case, both books are the most complete presentation of texts in Scandinavian folklore available in English, as far as I know). Each section is in turn edited by another scholar who specializes in that particular country's folklore.
]]> Nova 85863
The balance of galactic power in the 31st century revolves around Illyrion, the most precious energy source in the universe. The varied and exotic crew who sign up with Captain Lorq van Ray know their mission is dangerous, and they soon learn that they are involved in a deadly race with the charismatic but vicious leader of an opposing space federation. But they have no idea of Lorq's secret obsession: to gather Illyrion at the source by flying through the very heart of an imploding star.]]> 241 Samuel R. Delany 0375706704 Carl 5 fantasysci-fi
March 2010: Recently reread this. Still consider it well worth 5 stars. A few more reads, this time taking notes, and I feel like I could write a dozen papers on it-- but I'm a bit too used to writing about Medieval Scandinavian lit, so I'm not sure I'll get up the momentum to actually manage this. Plus I'm not very familiar with Queer theory, and even in a not-so-explicitly-queer book as this, it would probably not be advisable to write on any of Delany's books without a solid foundation in that discourse.]]> 3.83 1968 Nova
author: Samuel R. Delany
name: Carl
average rating: 3.83
book published: 1968
rating: 5
read at: 2004/01/01
date added: 2010/03/23
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
It could be that this is not the Delaney novel which deserves the most stars, but for the time being it's the one of his novels which I found most accessible and enjoyable-- though probably just because this one is the closest to a space opera, and I grew up on Star Wars. I also like a short story he did on an archeological dig on Mars, I think from the '60s. You can find it in LeGuin and Atterbury's Norton anthology of Sci-Fi (I think it was Norton).

March 2010: Recently reread this. Still consider it well worth 5 stars. A few more reads, this time taking notes, and I feel like I could write a dozen papers on it-- but I'm a bit too used to writing about Medieval Scandinavian lit, so I'm not sure I'll get up the momentum to actually manage this. Plus I'm not very familiar with Queer theory, and even in a not-so-explicitly-queer book as this, it would probably not be advisable to write on any of Delany's books without a solid foundation in that discourse.
]]> Pushing Ice 89186 Rockhopper, push ice. They mine comets. But when Janus, one of Saturn's ice moons, inexplicably leaves its natural orbit and heads out of the solar system at high speed, Bella is ordered to shadow it for the few vital days before it falls forever out of reach.

In accepting this mission she sets her ship and her crew on a collision course with destiny—for Janus has many surprises in store, and not all of them are welcome...]]> 458 Alastair Reynolds 0441014011 Carl 0 currently-reading 4.06 2005 Pushing Ice
author: Alastair Reynolds
name: Carl
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2005
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/02/28
shelves: currently-reading
review:
I love discovering new space-based hard-sci-fi, and I've heard good things about Alastair Reynolds-- but I've got to say, this just looks like a more fleshed out sampling of Arthur C Clarke motifs so far-- lots of Rendezvous with Rama, plus a bit of 2010 with the Chinese as the bad guys racing to be first. Not necessarily a bad thing, but it does make me wish I were trying something a little more original of his. I do like reading fiction written by scientists (though I thought he must be a bit off having them exploring an asteroid with a ton of depleted uranium in their suits-- might make them weigh enough, but the inertia must be impossible to handle. But maybe I have something wrong, since Reynolds is an astrophysicist and I'm just a mythologist). Just read most of a chapter with several successive one-on-ones between captain and chief engineer-- maybe it was just supposed to reflect the empty time as they travel towards their destination, but it just felt like a poorly coordinated group of plot points. Well, the prose is way better than what I've been reading in Peter Hamilton's work, so I guess I can't complain too much. We'll see whether the overall plot in Pushing Ice matches up with the grandeur of Hamilton's-- though I will note, I wish I'd never picked up Hamilton-- worth reading once you've started, sure, and there is some intriguing and detailed world-building going on, but just doesn't do it for me enough that I feel like it's worth missing out on other books in the meantime. Reynolds, I'm reserving judgment on for the time being.
]]> Odd and the Frost Giants 2108198 And Odd has run away from home, even though he can barely walk and has to use a crutch.
Out in the forest he encounters a bear, a fox, and an eagle - three creatures with a strange story to tell.
Now Odd is faced with a stranger journey than he had ever imagined.
A journey to save Asgard, City of the Norse Gods, from the Frost Giants who have invaded it.
It's going to take a very special kind of boy to defeat the most dangerous of all the Frost Giants and rescue the mighty Gods. Someone cheerful and infuriating and clever.
Someone just like Odd...]]> 97 Neil Gaiman 0747595380 Carl 0 to-read 3.95 2008 Odd and the Frost Giants
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Carl
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2008
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/02/27
shelves: to-read
review:
Well, I'm obviously going to have to read this. I do like Gaiman, or at least want to, but am not always blown away by him-- and I didn't like the take on Beowulf he had for the animated movie. We'll see if I'm too much of a purist to enjoy this.
]]> <![CDATA[Mimesis (The New Critical Idiom)]]> 375517 192 Matthew Potolsky 0415700302 Carl 0 currently-reading 3.76 2006 Mimesis (The New Critical Idiom)
author: Matthew Potolsky
name: Carl
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/02/27
shelves: currently-reading
review:
I've never gone through an intro to the concept of mimesis before-- not sure I need it, but I figure I can skim this and make sure I'm not embarrassing myself whenever I bring it up...
]]> Memory, History, Forgetting 125876 Memory, History, Forgetting examines this reciprocal relationship between remembering and forgetting, showing how it affects both the perception of historical experience and the production of historical narrative.

Memory, History, Forgetting, like its title, is divided into three major sections. Ricoeur first takes a phenomenological approach to memory and mnemonical devices. The underlying question here is how a memory of present can be of something absent, the past. The second section addresses recent work by historians by reopening the question of the nature and truth of historical knowledge. Ricoeur explores whether historians, who can write a history of memory, can truly break with all dependence on memory, including memories that resist representation. The third and final section is a profound meditation on the necessity of forgetting as a condition for the possibility of remembering, and whether there can be something like happy forgetting in parallel to happy memory. Throughout the book there are careful and close readings of the texts of Aristotle and Plato, of Descartes and Kant, and of Halbwachs and Pierre Nora.

A momentous achievement in the career of one of the most significant philosophers of our age, Memory, History, Forgetting provides the crucial link between Ricoeur's Time and Narrative and Oneself as Another and his recent reflections on ethics and the problems of responsibility and representation.

“His success in revealing the internal relations between recalling and forgetting, and how this dynamic becomes problematic in light of events once present but now past, will inspire academic dialogue and response but also holds great appeal to educated general readers in search of both method for and insight from considering the ethical ramifications of modern events. . . . It is indeed a master work, not only in Ricoeur’s own vita but also in contemporary European philosophy.”�Library Journal 

“Ricoeur writes the best kind of philosophy—critical, economical, and clear.”� New York Times Book Review

]]> 624 Paul Ricœur 0226713423 Carl 0 currently-reading 4.08 2000 Memory, History, Forgetting
author: Paul Ricœur
name: Carl
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2000
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/02/27
shelves: currently-reading
review:
I'm reading this as a supplement to the Cultural Memory reading I'm doing-- not sure how closely it will relate, or how much it will help with the problems of source criticism for ancient, oral religious beliefs which I am investigating, but I love Ricoeur, so I'll give it a go anyway! I suspect it would be best if I were to finish the Time and Narrative series first, but this book seems more directly relevant, so I'm going to see what I can get through for the time being. It's huge though. Not sure I'll be able to afford the time.
]]> <![CDATA[The Devil's Eye (Alex Benedict, #4)]]> 3076046 Nebula Award winner Jack McDevitt is "the logical heir to Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke" (Stephen King).

Interstellar antiquities dealer Alex Benedict receives a cryptic message asking for help from celebrated writer Vicki Greene, who has been mind-wiped. She has no memory of her past life, or of her plea for assistance. But she has transferred an enormous sum of money to Alex, also without explanation. The answers to this mystery lie on the most remote of human worlds, where Alex will uncover a secret connected to a decades-old political upheaval, a secret that somebody desperately wants hidden, though the price of that silence is unimaginable…]]> 368 Jack McDevitt 0441016359 Carl 4 3.96 2008 The Devil's Eye (Alex Benedict, #4)
author: Jack McDevitt
name: Carl
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2008
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2010/02/27
shelves:
review:
This was my first Jack McDevitt novel, and I'm looking forward to reading more. Far future, galactic civilization setting for detective novels in which the main character is a dealer in art and artifacts. Not hard sci fi by any stretch of the imagination (the main lesson I take from this is that in tens of thousands of years human culture, social norms and infrastructure will be exactly the same as now), but very entertaining and fun, like this sort of SF should be.
]]> <![CDATA[Religion and Cultural Memory (Cultural Memory in the Present)]]> 355650 238 Jan Assmann 0804745234 Carl 0 currently-reading
The introduction is great-- if nothing else, read that for a good run down of what Cultural Memory is. So far the rest looks interesting as well, but I'm getting a bit frustrated that there is no clear connection to the problem I am supposed to be investigating at the moment.]]> 3.98 2000 Religion and Cultural Memory (Cultural Memory in the Present)
author: Jan Assmann
name: Carl
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2000
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2010/02/27
shelves: currently-reading
review:
Am reviewing literature on source criticism in religious studies for my former adviser-- he suggested I look into Cultural Memory theory, and I'm finding it fascinating! Not sure how much it will help with his project, but it would have been clearly relevant for my dissertation-- I will have to incorporate some of this when I rewrite it for publication (which I ought to be doing...)

The introduction is great-- if nothing else, read that for a good run down of what Cultural Memory is. So far the rest looks interesting as well, but I'm getting a bit frustrated that there is no clear connection to the problem I am supposed to be investigating at the moment.
]]> Snow Crash 830 Snow Crash is a mind-altering romp through a future America so bizarre, so outrageous� you'll recognize it immediately.]]> 438 Neal Stephenson 0553380958 Carl 4
I'm giving it 4 stars b/c of how interesting it is and b/c I could write a whole new dissertation on it-- fascinating book in light of the late 20th/early 21st century cultural world it is embedded in. No time for more now, I may try a brief analysis later.

Originally meant to be a graphic novel, and to be honest, it reads like it. The resolution of the plot fits a graphic novel format better, I think-- different standards.]]> 4.02 1992 Snow Crash
author: Neal Stephenson
name: Carl
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1992
rating: 4
read at: 2010/02/01
date added: 2010/02/27
shelves: fantasysci-fi, graphicnovels, adventure-thriller
review:
Dang, just erased my review.

I'm giving it 4 stars b/c of how interesting it is and b/c I could write a whole new dissertation on it-- fascinating book in light of the late 20th/early 21st century cultural world it is embedded in. No time for more now, I may try a brief analysis later.

Originally meant to be a graphic novel, and to be honest, it reads like it. The resolution of the plot fits a graphic novel format better, I think-- different standards.
]]> <![CDATA[Witchcraft and Magic in Europe, Volume 3: The Middle Ages (Witchcraft and Magic in Europe (Paperback))]]> 804431
Witchcraft and Magic in Europe combines the traditional approaches of political, legal, and social historians with a critical synthesis of cultural anthropology, historical psychology, and gender studies. The series, complete in six volumes, provides a modern, scholarly survey of the supernatural beliefs of Europeans from ancient times to the present day. Each volume of this ambitious six-volume series contains the work of distinguished scholars chosen for their expertise in a particular era or region.]]> 304 Bengt Ankarloo 0812217861 Carl 0 4.00 2001 Witchcraft and Magic in Europe, Volume 3: The Middle Ages (Witchcraft and Magic in Europe (Paperback))
author: Bengt Ankarloo
name: Carl
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2001
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2009/12/27
shelves: currently-reading, middleages, oldnorsestudies, history, culturecriticism, anthropology, folklore
review:
This book, and maybe whole series, would probably be good for me to skim in preparation for the section on magic in my Scandinavian Folklore course which I am teaching this Spring. Looks good so far, after reading maybe an 8th of the book.
]]> <![CDATA[Out of the Silent Planet (Space Trilogy, #1)]]> 102549
Written during the dark hours immediately before and during World War II, C.S. Lewis’s Space Trilogy, of which Out of the Silent Planet is the first volume, stands alongside such works as Albert Camus’s The Plague and George Orwell’s 1984 as a timeless classic, beloved by succeeding generations as much for the sheer wonder of its storytelling as for the significance of its moral concerns.

While searching for a place to rest for the night, Dr. Elwin Ransom is abducted by a megalomaniacal physicist and his accomplice and taken to the red planet of Malacandra (Mars) as a human sacrifice for the alien creatures that live there. Once on the planet, however, Ransom eludes his captors, risking his life and his chances of returning to Earth, becoming a stranger in a land that is enchanting in its difference from Earth and instructive in its similarity.

First published in 1943, Out of the Silent Planet remains a magnificent and suspenseful tour de force in which epic battles are fought between the forces of light and those of darkness. It is the incredible beginning to C.S. Lewis’s spectacular Space Trilogy, which also includes Perelandra and That Hideous Strength .]]> 158 C.S. Lewis 0743234901 Carl 5 fantasysci-fi 3.98 1938 Out of the Silent Planet (Space Trilogy, #1)
author: C.S. Lewis
name: Carl
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1938
rating: 5
read at: 1992/01/01
date added: 2009/12/17
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
I agree with Joe Bergesen's review-- my favorite of the Space Trilogy books. The most campy, feels like old school HG Wells sci-fi, but with a healthy dose of the fantastic mixed in, just a good ol' romp with depth. I also loved Perelandra. I need to reread That Hideous Strength, but I remember thinking it was pretty dang weird. I think I agree with Tolkien-- too much of Charles William's influence.
]]> <![CDATA[The Anvil of Ice (The Winter of the World, #1)]]> 487818 0 Michael Scott Rohan 0517075288 Carl 5 fantasysci-fi Okay, to close off this disjointed review, some final reasons I recommend this book:
-- wonderful coming of age story, does the whole wish-fullfillment narrative of "rags to power, if not riches" better than anything I've read, and maps well onto the life of any kid capable of reading something like this at an early age-- though I don't recommend it just for children, and some parents might not appreciate the sex scenes, which get steamier with each novel.
-- gets magic right in a way rarely done-- maybe reminiscent of much of Tolkien's magic, in which it is a craft, a skill, arcane learning, not necessarily occult learning. Tying it to smithcraft is genius! Wow, I still wish I had time to make a forge and trying making something on my own! My first attempt at a fantasy novel, back my freshman year in highschool, I totally ripped this off, and probably will again. By attaching magic to material culture (and not just with smithcraft) he grounds the supernatural just enough in this otherwise very nicely and accurately painted prehistoric culture (well, pre OUR history, anyway). I'm glad this series, along with Tolkien, was my introduction to magic in fantasy-- Harry Potter may be fun, and may be set in a world closer to ours, but the magic does not have flesh on it's bones, like this does.
-- Like I said in my review of Orson Scott Card's novel Speaker for the Dead, this could be considered "anthropological" in a way-- only now it is anthropological/archeological/mythological- fantasy. A very nice combination. I don't think MSR is a professor in my field, but he's done a lot of research in it, and has published at least one book in my field-- and certainly these novels have all the depth and clarity of vision and anthropological realism that you find in Tolkien. Meaty. MMMMMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.....
-- The perfect length! Does not get overblown, like Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series (though I did like that), though it has just as epic a storyline-- and somehow manages to make it feel more "real" at the same time that it is more "mythic"-- both of those terms being horrendously ambiguous, I realize, and what mythologist hasn't cringed at contemporary uses of the word "myth"-- but I feel like that's the best way I can explain it.
]]> 4.75 1986 The Anvil of Ice (The Winter of the World, #1)
author: Michael Scott Rohan
name: Carl
average rating: 4.75
book published: 1986
rating: 5
read at: 1991/01/01
date added: 2009/12/17
shelves: fantasysci-fi
review:
This is one of my favorite books ever. Well, I read it in 6th grade, and it could just be that it hit me just so at that point in my life so as to make it one of my favorites forever, but still. MSR has put together an amazing combination of myth/folklore (and he really did his research! Or so I see now that I'm a mythologist), prehistory, and modern fantasy. I've reread this book more times than anything except Lord of the Rings, and maybe Chronicles of Narnia. I like this first installment best, I think. A sort of fantastic bildungsroman (well, not really)-- or a coming of age story at any rate, in which the one coming of age realizes just how special he is (after humble origins-- a kolbitr, to use the Icelandic phrase), enters into the study of and takes steps towards the mastery of arcane powers, etc. This book is so influential for me that I can hardly write a review for it, any more than I can for Lord of the Rings. Which I should really do sometime. This series (the Winter of the World) was the source of a quest of my own during jr hi and hi school, as I bought the first book in 6th grade, finally found the second maybe 3 years or more later, and finally found the last either at the end of high school, or right when I started college. I suppose that makes the whole thing a bit more exciting for me, as the key moments in the maturation of the main character could be taken as a sort of parallel to my own life, which was obviously full of changes during the period I read the books.
Okay, to close off this disjointed review, some final reasons I recommend this book:
-- wonderful coming of age story, does the whole wish-fullfillment narrative of "rags to power, if not riches" better than anything I've read, and maps well onto the life of any kid capable of reading something like this at an early age-- though I don't recommend it just for children, and some parents might not appreciate the sex scenes, which get steamier with each novel.
-- gets magic right in a way rarely done-- maybe reminiscent of much of Tolkien's magic, in which it is a craft, a skill, arcane learning, not necessarily occult learning. Tying it to smithcraft is genius! Wow, I still wish I had time to make a forge and trying making something on my own! My first attempt at a fantasy novel, back my freshman year in highschool, I totally ripped this off, and probably will again. By attaching magic to material culture (and not just with smithcraft) he grounds the supernatural just enough in this otherwise very nicely and accurately painted prehistoric culture (well, pre OUR history, anyway). I'm glad this series, along with Tolkien, was my introduction to magic in fantasy-- Harry Potter may be fun, and may be set in a world closer to ours, but the magic does not have flesh on it's bones, like this does.
-- Like I said in my review of Orson Scott Card's novel Speaker for the Dead, this could be considered "anthropological" in a way-- only now it is anthropological/archeological/mythological- fantasy. A very nice combination. I don't think MSR is a professor in my field, but he's done a lot of research in it, and has published at least one book in my field-- and certainly these novels have all the depth and clarity of vision and anthropological realism that you find in Tolkien. Meaty. MMMMMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.....
-- The perfect length! Does not get overblown, like Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series (though I did like that), though it has just as epic a storyline-- and somehow manages to make it feel more "real" at the same time that it is more "mythic"-- both of those terms being horrendously ambiguous, I realize, and what mythologist hasn't cringed at contemporary uses of the word "myth"-- but I feel like that's the best way I can explain it.

]]> <![CDATA[Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith]]> 10890 Operating Instructions and Bird by Bird, her fans have been waiting for her to write the book that explained how she came to the big-hearted, grateful, generous faith that she so often alluded to in her two earlier nonfiction books. The people in Anne Lamott's real life are like beloved characters in a favorite series for her readers: Her friend Pammy; her son, Sam; and the many funny and wise folks who attend her church are all familiar. And Traveling Mercies is a welcome return to those lives, as well as an introduction to new companions Lamott treats with the same candor, insight, and tenderness.

Lamott's faith isn't about easy answers, which is part of what endears her to believers as well as nonbelievers. Against all odds, she came to believe in God, and then, even more miraculously, in herself. As she puts it, "My coming to faith did not start with a leap but rather a series of staggers." At once tough, personal, affectionate, wise, and very funny, Traveling Mercies tells in exuberant detail how Anne Lamott learned to shine the light of faith on the darkest part of ordinary life, exposing surprising pockets of meaning and hope.]]> 275 Anne Lamott 0385496095 Carl 0 to-read 4.14 1999 Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith
author: Anne Lamott
name: Carl
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1999
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2009/12/17
shelves: to-read
review:
I've heard good stuff about this-- in fact, I think my ex-girlfriend might have recommended it-- and would like to read it at some point.
]]> <![CDATA[Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word]]> 164515 216 Walter J. Ong 0415281296 Carl 4 4.13 1982 Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word
author: Walter J. Ong
name: Carl
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1982
rating: 4
read at: 2006/08/01
date added: 2009/12/17
shelves: oralityliteracy, anthropology, folklore
review:
Read this book really fast for my qualifying exams and so my memory of its virtues and vices might not be all that clear, but I would say this is required reading for those interested in Oral theory, folklore, etc. I believe we've come a little ways since Ong-- for example, I think that at the time he wrote this Ong denied the idea of "transitional literacy" (a culture was either literate or or oral or print), whereas he was later convinced otherwise by those who researched manuscript cultures-- but this book is an easy to read account of many of the basic ideas of a giant in the development of oral theory. Actually, I need to read it again. I remember there being some interesting points made about what could be called the ontological differences between oral and literary cultures-- but I can't remember it all that well right now.
]]> Body and World 375325
Todes emphasizes the complex structure of the human body; front/back asymmetry, the need to balance in a gravitational field, and so forth; and the role that structure plays in producing the spatiotemporal field of experience and in making possible objective knowledge of the objects in it. He shows that perception involves nonconceptual, but nonetheless objective forms of judgment.

One can think of Body and World as fleshing out Merleau-Ponty's project while presciently relating it to the current interest in embodiment, not only in philosophy but also in psychology, linguistics, cognitive science, artificial intelligence, neuroscience, and anthropology. Todes' work opens new ways of thinking about problems such as the relation of perception to thought and the possibility of knowing an independent reality; problems that have occupied philosophers since Kant and still concern analytic and continental philosophy.]]> 337 Samuel Todes 0262700824 Carl 0 currently-reading, philosophy 4.00 2001 Body and World
author: Samuel Todes
name: Carl
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2001
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2009/12/17
shelves: currently-reading, philosophy
review:
This book was recommended in lecture by Hubert Dreyfus as picking up where Merleau-Ponty left off (not that he had much choice of stopping, since he died!) Todes is another philosopher who died an untimely death, but it sounds like this book is a quality legacy. From what I've heard, it continues in the vein of M-P's existential phenomenology, exploring human ontology as embodied creatures, and, I assume, exploring the ways in which our higher cogntive functions all grow out of our embodied experience as different modes of being-in-the-world, to borrow Heiddegger's phrase. I would also imagine that it covers a lot of the same ground as Cognitive Linguistics, but in a more philosophically thorough way. But I don't really know for sure yet, because I've just started it (finally!).
]]> Stardust 16793 Alternate cover edition can be found here

Young Tristran Thorn will do anything to win the cold heart of beautiful Victoria—even fetch her the star they watch fall from the night sky. But to do so, he must enter the unexplored lands on the other side of the ancient wall that gives their tiny village its name. Beyond that old stone wall, Tristran learns, lies Faerie—where nothing not even a fallen star, is what he imagined.]]> 248 Neil Gaiman 0061142026 Carl 0 currently-reading 4.11 1999 Stardust
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Carl
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1999
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2009/12/17
shelves: currently-reading
review:
I'd really like to manage to read this before seeing the movie-- but I may have to give in, since I don't want to miss the movie in the theaters!
]]> Mere Christianity 11138 191 C.S. Lewis 0684823780 Carl 4 4.32 1952 Mere Christianity
author: C.S. Lewis
name: Carl
average rating: 4.32
book published: 1952
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2009/12/17
shelves:
review:
Argh, I tried to undo the duplication of this book on my list, and it looks like I erased my review of it. I'll rewrite it someday. Maybe after rereading the book.
]]> <![CDATA[Prosimetrum: Crosscultural Perspectives on Narrative in Prose and Verse]]> 1702826
In virtually all the literary traditions of the world there are works of verbal art that depend for part of their effect on the juxtaposition of prose and verse. This volume takes the first step towards a comparative study of "prosimetrum", the mixture of prose and verse, with essays by leading linguists and literary scholars of a selection of prosimetrical traditions. The nature of what constitutes verse or prose is one underlying question addressed. An outline of historical developments emerges, especially for Europe and the Near East, with articles on classical, medieval and nineteenth-century literatures. Oriental prosimetrical literatures discussed include that of Vedic Indiaand the old literary cultures of China and Japan; also represented are oral and oral-derived folk literatures of recent centuries in Africa, the West, and Inner Asia.

Professor KARL REICHL teaches in the English Department at the University of Bonn; Professor JOSEPH HARRIS teaches in the English Department at Harvard University.

Contributors: KRISTIN HANSON, PAUL KIPARSKY, JAN ZIOLKOWSKI, ARDIS BUTTERFIELD, PROINSIAS Mac CANA, JOSEPH HARRIS, JUDITH RYAN, W.F.H. NICOLAISEN, LEE HARING, STEVEN WEITZMAN, WOLFHART HEINRICHS, DWIGHT REYNOLDS, JULIE SCOTT MEISAMI, KARL REICHL, WALTHER HEISSIG]]> Joseph E. Harris 0859914755 Carl 0 to-read 3.67 1997 Prosimetrum: Crosscultural Perspectives on Narrative in Prose and Verse
author: Joseph E. Harris
name: Carl
average rating: 3.67
book published: 1997
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2009/12/17
shelves: to-read
review:
I loved his Singing the Past book, so I'll have to see if I can get around to this one.
]]> <![CDATA[Bloodtaking and Peacemaking: Feud, Law, and Society in Saga Iceland]]> 385954
People in the saga world negotiated a maze of violent possibility, with strategies that frequently put life and limb in the balance. But there was a paradox in striking the balance—one could not get even without going one better. Miller shows how blood vengeance, law, and peacemaking were inextricably bound together in the feuding process.

This book offers fascinating insights into the politics of a stateless society, its methods of social control, and the role that a uniquely sophisticated and self-conscious law played in the construction of Icelandic society.

"Illuminating."—Rory McTurk, Times Literary Supplement

"An impressive achievement in ethnohistory; it is an amalgam of historical research with legal and anthropological interpretation. What is more, and rarer, is that it is a pleasure to read due to the inclusion of narrative case material from the sagas themselves."—Dan Bauer, Journal of Interdisciplinary History]]> 415 William Ian Miller 0226526801 Carl 5 oldnorsestudies, middleages 4.25 1990 Bloodtaking and Peacemaking: Feud, Law, and Society in Saga Iceland
author: William Ian Miller
name: Carl
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1990
rating: 5
read at: 2005/01/01
date added: 2009/12/17
shelves: oldnorsestudies, middleages
review:
The best book I know on Medieval Icelandic culture as expressed through the sagas (though PM Sorensen's Saga og samfund/Saga and Society is damn close). The first two chapters alone should have been (and only occasionally were) required reading in my reading and composition course on Norse literature and mythology. Miller does an excellent job explaining feud, economics, honor, gender roles, etc in the sagas while at the same time being properly aware of the problematic nature of any attempt to reconstruct "viking society" through the sagas. The reader is made aware that no such reconstruction is being attempted, at the same time that ample evidence is drawn on from both Medieval Icelandic culture (around the time the sagas were written) and the quasi-fictional vision of early Icelandic society presented in the sagas themselves.
]]> Swedish Legends and Folktales 497296 232 John Lindow 0520035208 Carl 4 folklore 4.22 1978 Swedish Legends and Folktales
author: John Lindow
name: Carl
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1978
rating: 4
read at: 2000/01/01
date added: 2009/12/17
shelves: folklore
review:
A decent introduction to Swedish Folklore for the beginner/English speaker, though for graduate students or higher working with Swedish Folklore I recommend Bengt af Klintberg for legend tradition (John's book is actually a translation of selections from Klintberg's work, and it was to Klintberg that he pointed me my first semester), and for Folktales, or Fairy Tales, Swahn.
]]> <![CDATA[Medieval Folklore: A Guide to Myths, Legends, Tales, Beliefs, and Customs]]> 866112
While most books on medieval folklore focus primarily on the West, this unique volume brings together an eclectic range of experts to treat the subject from a global perspective. Especially remarkable are the surveys of the major medieval traditions including Arab-Islamic, Baltic, English, Finno-Ugric, French, Hispanic, Hungarian, Irish, Italian, Jewish, Scandinavian, Scottish, Slavic, and Welsh.

For anyone who has ever wanted a path through the tangle of Arthurian legends, or the real lowdown on St. Patrick, or the last word on wolf lore--this is the place to look.

The

Ulrich Marzolph -- Arab-Islamic
Thomas A. DuBois -- Baltic
John McNamara & Carl Lindahl -- English
Thomas A. DuBois -- Finno-Ugric
Francesca Canadé Sautman -- French
Samuel G. Armistead -- Hispanic
Éva Pócs -- Hungarian
Joseph Falaky Nagy -- Irish
Giuseppe C. Di Scipio -- Italian
Eli Yassif -- Jewish
Stephen A. Mitchell -- Scandinavian
John McNamara -- Scottish
Eve Levin -- Slavic
Elissa R. Henken & Brynley F. Roberts -- Welsh]]> 470 Carl Lindahl 0195147723 Carl 5 folklore, middleages 4.08 2000 Medieval Folklore: A Guide to Myths, Legends, Tales, Beliefs, and Customs
author: Carl Lindahl
name: Carl
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2000
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2009/12/17
shelves: folklore, middleages
review:
Haven't read the whole book, obviously, but it has been helpful for the occasional reference. None of these articles will be a sufficient source unto itself if you are writing a paper on one of these subjects, but no encyclopedia article ever is. There is a longer, 2 volume version which I believe has more thorough references for each article. Obviously the longer version would be better for those using the book for advanced research, but the paperback is more affordable!
]]> <![CDATA[The Challenge of Jesus: Rediscovering Who Jesus Was & Is]]> 889083 Today a renewed and vigorous scholarly quest for the historical Jesus is underway. In the midst of well publicized and controversial books on Jesus, N. T. Wright's lectures and writings have been widely recognized for providing a fresh, provocative and historically credible portrait.

Out of his own commitment to both historical scholarship and Christian ministry, Wright challenges us to roll up our sleeves and take seriously the study of the historical Jesus. He writes, "Many Christians have been, frankly, sloppy in their thinking and talking about Jesus, and hence, sadly, in their praying and in their practice of discipleship. We cannot assume that by saying the word Jesus, still less the word Christ, we are automatically in touch with the real Jesus who walked and talked in first-century Palestine. . . . Only by hard, historical work can we move toward a fuller comprehension of what the Gospels themselves were trying to say."

The Challenge of Jesus poses a double-edged challenge: to grow in our understanding of the historical Jesus within the Palestinian world of the first century, and to follow Jesus more faithfully into the postmodern world of the twenty-first century.

]]> 202 N.T. Wright 0830822003 Carl 0 4.15 1999 The Challenge of Jesus: Rediscovering Who Jesus Was & Is
author: N.T. Wright
name: Carl
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1999
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2009/12/16
shelves: currently-reading, christianity
review:
Looks fun so far. Many of the things he points out do not seem as controversial or new as he seems to think they are (but maybe that's just me), while other things are pleasantly surprising and interesting.
]]> <![CDATA[Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold]]> 17345
Set against the backdrop of Glome, a barbaric, pre-Christian world, the struggles between sacred and profane love are illuminated as Orual learns that we cannot understand the intent of the gods "till we have faces" and sincerity in our souls and selves.]]> 320 C.S. Lewis 000625277X Carl 5 literaryandhardtoclassify

Recently reread this and enjoyed it again-- maybe not as much as the first time, but still good. I'd forgotten how central the issue of true love and possesive, self centered love is-- a lesson I suppose it is good to revisit. I like that the "apologetics" of this book avoids rationalist attempts to "prove" God and Christianity with logic. Not that one shouldn't apply logic to their faith, but any argument that you pull together is going to have its holes and will be more about bolstering your faith and making yourself feel good than about diving into the journey which your faith takes you on. Again, I'm not advocating brainless Christianity-- just pointing out that proving the unseen (or disproving it) is going to tie you up in all sorts of deconstructable knots. This book is about the person at the heart of the conflict of faith, and about the love at the heart of the Christian faith. Lewis' understanding of that love, of course, but I think he makes a good "case". Ultimately a story about what it is to be human, set within the problem of what it is to be in relationship to diety-- though the latter theme would probably just frusterate or anger anyone not already sympathetic to Lewis' veiwpoint, I think-- I have trouble seeing any of my atheist friends (or agnostic friends who tend more towards the atheistic side of things) enjoying this the way I did. Not that you have to hold completely to Lewis' understanding of things to enjoy it, but I do recommend approaching it with a sympathetic "ear" (for both sides of Orual's story) if you want to get anything out of it. ]]> 4.15 1956 Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold
author: C.S. Lewis
name: Carl
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1956
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2009/12/16
shelves: literaryandhardtoclassify
review:
It's been years since I've read this, so I can't say much, but it is one of my favorites. A novel length treatment of the Cupid and Psyche myth, and to my mind reminiscent of Ursula LeGuin's Tombs of Atuan, though Lewis' novel predates hers (I don't actually know why it reminds me-- the religious setting, I guess, though this book isn't so much about escape from evil powers as about recognizing the evil in oneself). Continues Lewis' apologetics in fictional form, which I think I prefer (as long as he doesn't get too preachy or cocky). I need to reread this soon!


Recently reread this and enjoyed it again-- maybe not as much as the first time, but still good. I'd forgotten how central the issue of true love and possesive, self centered love is-- a lesson I suppose it is good to revisit. I like that the "apologetics" of this book avoids rationalist attempts to "prove" God and Christianity with logic. Not that one shouldn't apply logic to their faith, but any argument that you pull together is going to have its holes and will be more about bolstering your faith and making yourself feel good than about diving into the journey which your faith takes you on. Again, I'm not advocating brainless Christianity-- just pointing out that proving the unseen (or disproving it) is going to tie you up in all sorts of deconstructable knots. This book is about the person at the heart of the conflict of faith, and about the love at the heart of the Christian faith. Lewis' understanding of that love, of course, but I think he makes a good "case". Ultimately a story about what it is to be human, set within the problem of what it is to be in relationship to diety-- though the latter theme would probably just frusterate or anger anyone not already sympathetic to Lewis' veiwpoint, I think-- I have trouble seeing any of my atheist friends (or agnostic friends who tend more towards the atheistic side of things) enjoying this the way I did. Not that you have to hold completely to Lewis' understanding of things to enjoy it, but I do recommend approaching it with a sympathetic "ear" (for both sides of Orual's story) if you want to get anything out of it.
]]> <![CDATA[Interpretation Theory: Discourse and the Surplus of Meaning]]> 125877 Ricoeur, Paul 108 Paul Ricœur 0912646594 Carl 5 literarytheory It's been a while since I read this, so I'll try to go back over it and give a more detailed review at some point. ]]> 3.99 1976 Interpretation Theory: Discourse and the Surplus of Meaning
author: Paul Ricœur
name: Carl
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1976
rating: 5
read at: 2005/01/01
date added: 2009/12/16
shelves: literarytheory
review:
A nice, short book that ranges from Structuralism to Speech Act Theory to Metaphor and manages to bring it all together into a fairly easy to understand thesis on how we read. A bit out of date now, I suppose, but I think I see some foreshadowing of Cognitive Poetics, though of course with Ricoeurs own phenomenological twist to it all.
It's been a while since I read this, so I'll try to go back over it and give a more detailed review at some point.
]]> <![CDATA[The Broken Estate: Essays on Literature and Belief]]> 46956
In the grand tradition of criticism, Wood's work is both commentary and literature in its own right--fiercely written, polemical, and richly poetic in style. This book marks the debut of a masterly literary voice.]]> 304 James Wood 0375752633 Carl 0 currently-reading 4.10 1999 The Broken Estate: Essays on Literature and Belief
author: James Wood
name: Carl
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1999
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2009/11/08
shelves: currently-reading
review:
Borrowing this from Jane, my cousin in law (I've been blessed with two cousins-in-law on that side of the family with a taste in books which nicely compliments my own). James Wood is not religious himself, from what I understand, but, from what I've seen so far, gives a sensitive and thoughtful look at religion and faith in literature. His introduction includes a nice meditation on the differences and similarities between fiction and religion, both of which call for a certain sort of believing, but with important differences. Will have to review this more when I've read more and have more time-- I'm supposed to be editing a diss. chapter right now.
]]> <![CDATA[Bodies in the Bog and the Archaeological Imagination]]> 7089919

Known for his red hair, day-old stubble, and uncannily preserved two-thousand-year-old physique, Tollund Man—a mummified body discovered in 1950s Denmark—was an instant archaeological sensation. But he was not the first of his kind: recent history has resurrected from northern Europe’s bogs several men, women, and children who were deposited there as sacrifices in the early Iron Age and kept startlingly intact by the chemical properties of peat. In this remarkable account of their modern afterlives, Karin Sanders argues that the discovery of bog bodies began an extraordinary—and ongoing—cultural journey. 

   

Throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Sanders shows, these eerily preserved remains came alive in art and science as material metaphors for such concepts as trauma, nostalgia, and identity. Sigmund Freud, Joseph Beuys, Serge Vandercam, Seamus Heaney, and other major figures have used them to reconsider fundamental philosophical, literary, aesthetic, and scientific concerns. Exploring this intellectual spectrum, Sanders contends that the power of bog bodies to provoke such a wide range of responses is rooted in their unique status as both archeological artifacts and human beings. They emerge as corporeal time capsules that transcend archaeology to challenge our assumptions about what we can know about the past. By restoring them to the roster of cultural phenomena that force us to confront our ethical and aesthetic boundaries, Bodies in the Bog excavates anew the question of what it means to be human.

]]> 344 Karin Sanders 0226734048 Carl 0 currently-reading 3.84 2009 Bodies in the Bog and the Archaeological Imagination
author: Karin Sanders
name: Carl
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2009/11/07
shelves: currently-reading
review:
A book on the bog-bodies and their reception over the years in art, literature, archeology, etc-- by Karin Sanders, one of my dissertation committee members. Looks pretty accessible so far, if any of you non-academic types would like to read something by a world-class scholar on an interesting topic.
]]> <![CDATA[Tales Before Tolkien: The Roots of Modern Fantasy]]> 23596 –Michael Moorcock, author of The Eternal Champion

Many of today’s top names in fantasy acknowledge J.R.R. Tolkien as the author whose work inspired them to create their own epics. But which writers influenced Tolkien himself? In a collection destined to become a classic in its own right, internationally recognized Tolkien expert Douglas A. Anderson, editor of The Annotated Hobbit, has gathered the fiction of the many gifted authors who sparked Tolkien’s imagination. Included are Andrew Lang’s romantic swashbuckler “The Story of Sigurd,� which features magic rings and a ferocious dragon; an excerpt from E. A. Wyke-Smith’s The Marvelous Land of Snergs, about creatures who were precursors to Tolkien’s hobbits; and a never-before-published gem by David Lindsay, author of A Voyage to Arcturus, a novel that Tolkien praised highly both as a thriller and as a work of philosophy, religion, and morality.

In stories packed with magical journeys, conflicted heroes, and terrible beasts, this extraordinary volume is one that no fan of fantasy or Tolkien should be without. These tales just might inspire a new generation of creative writers.]]> 528 Douglas A. Anderson 0345458567 Carl 0 3.91 2003 Tales Before Tolkien: The Roots of Modern Fantasy
author: Douglas A. Anderson
name: Carl
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2003
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2009/10/20
shelves: currently-reading, fantasysci-fi
review:
Finally found a cheap copy of this-- they've started offering it in a smaller size. Looks fun so far, just a collection of pre-Tolkien fantasy which may or may not have influenced him-- with some it is clear he had at least read the authors, with others it's speculation, but in any case it seems very nice as a reader of early fantasy (as in, from the Romantic era with one German tale right up until the first half of the 20th century). Have only read the first so far, Ludwig Tieck's "The Elves" (trans. Thomas Carlyle), and it was as awkward and stilted as you would expect from that era-- which is fine, I'm happy for it to be representative of the time. Anyway, seems like a decent collection for someone who isn't writing their dissertation in this field.
]]> Crystal Witness 335069 276 Kathy Tyers 055327984X Carl 3 3.76 1989 Crystal Witness
author: Kathy Tyers
name: Carl
average rating: 3.76
book published: 1989
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2009/10/20
shelves:
review:
Am rereading this now-- will say three stars for the moment, as it is a fine book if not earthshaking. Relatively short, which I like-- I wish people still felt OK writing/publishing shorter novels in sci-fi and fantasy these days, it would allow readers more reading time and thus allow for more a wider field of competition. Anyway, this is an enjoyable pulp sci-fi romance of 80s vintage, better than many things I've read, but not something I'd nominate for an award or write a paper about (the former of which I would do, and the latter of which I did, for Kathy's novel Shivering World, which is easily my favorite of hers. Behind SW, ironically, I would rank her Star Wars novels, though I've only read one. After that, I'm less certain).
]]> <![CDATA[En krigares hjärta (Trilogin om Frihetskrigen #1)]]> 6665563 Drakfjällen blänkte i det klara dagsljuset. Det var omöjligt att säga om den tänkte krossa dem eller gripa tag i dem. Kylan från vattnet var glömd. Paniken bröt igenom alla barriärer. Han skrek.

Sayn är uppfostrad till krigare tillsammans med Sheeba, den kloka wyvern som är hans enda vän. De skickats till en karg klippö lång ute i Stormarnas hav för att tjänstgöra som gränsvakter. Ön attackeras och anfallet leds av den mystiske Korgath, som har fått magiska krafter av den demoniska Andra Sidan, som i tusen år väntat på att ta herraväldet över Unadan.]]> 382 Niklas Krog Carl 0 currently-reading
Briefly, the setting is high fantasy (the type that provides a map at the beginning), has magic, empires, and special soldiers who patrol on flying creatures which aren't quite dragons. Everything you could want! ]]> 3.73 1997 En krigares hjärta (Trilogin om Frihetskrigen #1)
author: Niklas Krog
name: Carl
average rating: 3.73
book published: 1997
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2009/10/19
shelves: currently-reading
review:
I have been reading this book for YEARS! I bought it the first time I lived in Sweden (IN 2001!!!) b/c it was the only Swedish fantasy out back then, besides children's lit (though it was kept in the kids section b/c they had no fantasy section). At the time my swedish wasn't great and I had trouble getting far in it. Now I can read it fine, but am always distracted by other things I "should" be reading. In any case, this is an excellent book so far, better than most american fantasy I read these days, appropriate for both kids and adults. More Swedish fantasy has come out since, particularly a bunch associated with NeoGames (I think that's what it was called), but I haven't had a chance to get to those either. Krog still seems like the strongest out of contemporary Swedish fantasy to me, so I want to finish him first, then move on.

Briefly, the setting is high fantasy (the type that provides a map at the beginning), has magic, empires, and special soldiers who patrol on flying creatures which aren't quite dragons. Everything you could want!
]]>