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highlyeccentricCurrently Reading: The Fifth Elephant (not Jingo, why did I think I had ordered Jingo?), my Christmas Eve pressie to myself. Convergence Culture. Technically, Welcome to Nightvale, but i got bored after a few pages and will try again some other time.
Recently Finished:
The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This was a re-read, with newly-purchased e-book. It must have been four years or so since I last read any Fforde, and that is just too long.
I cannot review in any serious mode. It probably has weaknesses. I don't care, I can't remember them. I can't explain it's brilliance, either, except to say that when I owned the hard copy I photocopied the poster advertising TOAST (approved by the TOAST MARKETING BOARD) out of the back and pinned it to my walls everywhere i went. And I d0n't even really like toast. Just. The delightful surrealness that's only a tiny step from plausible (to anyone who sees the number of adds for APPLES or BANNANAS sponsored by their respective peak bodies in Sydney, at any rate). The genetically re-engineered dodos. The fact that this is not set in the "future" but the mid-eighties. I can only flail.
The Sex Myth: The Gap Between Our Fantasies and Reality by Rachel Hills
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I keep dithering on the rating for this. I *enjoyed reading* this. It told me nothing I did not already know (except for tidbits about frat culture, meh), and didn't always manage things I knew in newly insightful ways. But there were a lot of times I pointed at the page and said "yes this!". Hills is quite good at breaking down theoretical frameworks into accessible chunks, but then a lot of her data/stories from interviews is just... cycles of stuff, under-analysed.
I felt like I was not the target audience for this book (I am too academic and abstruse) but I *have been* the target audience. This book would have been very much what I needed 5-7 years ago.
It's also really quite surprising that, in a book about sex, she talked to only one asexual person and no one in a poly relationship? She talks ABOUT polyamory, but not *to* poly practitioners, and although she's read widely on a bunch of feminist topics, does not seem to have read secondary material on either asexual relationship styles or poly ones. Which... given both of these groups do a *lot* of talking about how sex doesn't have to be the crux of any given relationship, from very different perspectives, that omission seems odd.
Note to self- excellent summary of 'heteronormativity' on p. 79. Use on undergrads.
Nameless by Sam Starbuck
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Oh, this was *pretty*. It isn't perfect - its pacing is slow and at times non-existent. But it's so pretty.
As usual I'm disappointed with the barely-thereness of the romantic plot: I actually feel like it would have been a stronger ending *without* any kissing. Or if the romance had had more weight earlier. And this time I'm side-eying the Miraculous Healing scene - I feel like it would have held enough weight if Lukas had merely Magically Fixed the problem-in-the-moment, not the problem-for-good. I mean, people with chronic heart conditions still get to decide they *choose* their lives? And could even manage to have a boyfriend inna big city! That could've strengthened the flimsy relationship conclusion, too.
Not substantial enough to review individually: Starstruck, There's Something About Ari and Stuck Landing, by L.A. Witt, L.B. Gregg and Lauren Gallagher respectively. All of them are low-priced gay romance ebooks from Riptide Publishing, all set in the same "Bluewater Bay" story-world. I really liked Witt/Gallagher's work (same person, different names, one for m/m and one for f/f stories), whereas I won't be picking up any more LB Gregg after There's Something About Ari, which was a hot mess of inexplicably poor characterisation and messy plotting.
Witt/Gallagher seems to do a fine line in "Uptight Man/Woman With Issues Must Overcome Issues To Woo A Man/Woman Who Is The Embodiment of All Those Issues", which is basically what I buy Riptide books for. Closeted man must overcome fears to woo the fearlessly out! Biphobic lesbian must get her head out of her arse to win love of hot bisexual stuntwoman! I'm cool with this. And deeply amused by the Totally-Not-Teen-Woolf-RPF "statistically improbable numbers of gays make a werewolf show" setting.
My one problem with the Witt/Gallagher ones is that Levi's bisexual-or-not status seems to flipflop wildly. I mean, I could grok "man identifies as gay although bisexual is technically more accurate", but I cannot grok that his *ex-girlfriend* and closest female friend hasn't figured out he is not totally unattracted to women? The scene were he gave said female friend a dressing-down for her biphobia re: her current ladyinterest was delightful, but the the entire rest of the narrative of Stuck Landing presumes he's gay, both before and after that conversation. It's weird.
Up Next: ... idek. Finishing the current ones, then stocking up e-books for travel, I guess.
Recently Finished:
The Eyre Affair by Jasper FfordeMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
This was a re-read, with newly-purchased e-book. It must have been four years or so since I last read any Fforde, and that is just too long.
I cannot review in any serious mode. It probably has weaknesses. I don't care, I can't remember them. I can't explain it's brilliance, either, except to say that when I owned the hard copy I photocopied the poster advertising TOAST (approved by the TOAST MARKETING BOARD) out of the back and pinned it to my walls everywhere i went. And I d0n't even really like toast. Just. The delightful surrealness that's only a tiny step from plausible (to anyone who sees the number of adds for APPLES or BANNANAS sponsored by their respective peak bodies in Sydney, at any rate). The genetically re-engineered dodos. The fact that this is not set in the "future" but the mid-eighties. I can only flail.
The Sex Myth: The Gap Between Our Fantasies and Reality by Rachel HillsMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
I keep dithering on the rating for this. I *enjoyed reading* this. It told me nothing I did not already know (except for tidbits about frat culture, meh), and didn't always manage things I knew in newly insightful ways. But there were a lot of times I pointed at the page and said "yes this!". Hills is quite good at breaking down theoretical frameworks into accessible chunks, but then a lot of her data/stories from interviews is just... cycles of stuff, under-analysed.
I felt like I was not the target audience for this book (I am too academic and abstruse) but I *have been* the target audience. This book would have been very much what I needed 5-7 years ago.
It's also really quite surprising that, in a book about sex, she talked to only one asexual person and no one in a poly relationship? She talks ABOUT polyamory, but not *to* poly practitioners, and although she's read widely on a bunch of feminist topics, does not seem to have read secondary material on either asexual relationship styles or poly ones. Which... given both of these groups do a *lot* of talking about how sex doesn't have to be the crux of any given relationship, from very different perspectives, that omission seems odd.
Note to self- excellent summary of 'heteronormativity' on p. 79. Use on undergrads.
Nameless by Sam StarbuckMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Oh, this was *pretty*. It isn't perfect - its pacing is slow and at times non-existent. But it's so pretty.
As usual I'm disappointed with the barely-thereness of the romantic plot: I actually feel like it would have been a stronger ending *without* any kissing. Or if the romance had had more weight earlier. And this time I'm side-eying the Miraculous Healing scene - I feel like it would have held enough weight if Lukas had merely Magically Fixed the problem-in-the-moment, not the problem-for-good. I mean, people with chronic heart conditions still get to decide they *choose* their lives? And could even manage to have a boyfriend inna big city! That could've strengthened the flimsy relationship conclusion, too.
Not substantial enough to review individually: Starstruck, There's Something About Ari and Stuck Landing, by L.A. Witt, L.B. Gregg and Lauren Gallagher respectively. All of them are low-priced gay romance ebooks from Riptide Publishing, all set in the same "Bluewater Bay" story-world. I really liked Witt/Gallagher's work (same person, different names, one for m/m and one for f/f stories), whereas I won't be picking up any more LB Gregg after There's Something About Ari, which was a hot mess of inexplicably poor characterisation and messy plotting.
Witt/Gallagher seems to do a fine line in "Uptight Man/Woman With Issues Must Overcome Issues To Woo A Man/Woman Who Is The Embodiment of All Those Issues", which is basically what I buy Riptide books for. Closeted man must overcome fears to woo the fearlessly out! Biphobic lesbian must get her head out of her arse to win love of hot bisexual stuntwoman! I'm cool with this. And deeply amused by the Totally-Not-Teen-Woolf-RPF "statistically improbable numbers of gays make a werewolf show" setting.
My one problem with the Witt/Gallagher ones is that Levi's bisexual-or-not status seems to flipflop wildly. I mean, I could grok "man identifies as gay although bisexual is technically more accurate", but I cannot grok that his *ex-girlfriend* and closest female friend hasn't figured out he is not totally unattracted to women? The scene were he gave said female friend a dressing-down for her biphobia re: her current ladyinterest was delightful, but the the entire rest of the narrative of Stuck Landing presumes he's gay, both before and after that conversation. It's weird.
Up Next: ... idek. Finishing the current ones, then stocking up e-books for travel, I guess.