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Jul. 3rd, 2007 07:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
furyofvissarionFlora Segunda - Ysabeau S. Wilce. Charming but a bit unsatisfying in some ways. Flora is the youngest in the Fyrdraaca family, one of the four great families of the Republic of Califa. Each of these families lives in a huge house, which is maintained by a magickal Butler. However, Flora's mother banished Valefor, their Butler, meaning that their house--Crackpot Hall--is ramshackle & dangerous, & most of the upkeep falls to Flora. She decides to restore Valefor, & the plot spins out from there. What I liked was Flora's voice; her slang was cute w/o being cutesy (tum for tummy, sandwie for sandwich) & she is a smart, headstrong girl. I did get kind of tired of reading about these four uberspecial families that run everything. I'm guessing there will be sequels to this book, & if so I'm hoping that we'll hear more about other folks that live in Califa.
The House of the Scorpion - Nancy Farmer. Disturbing!! Matt is a clone of El Patrón, a rich & powerful man who runs Opium--a country carved out from between the US & Aztlán (what was once Mexico). He lives cloistered in the family compound in Opium, knowing only that he's a clone & that most human beings think he is no better than a beast. Eventually, despite his sheltered life, he figures out why the 143-year-old man cloned him, & makes his escape to Aztlán, where he runs into creepy super-left-wing Communist-types. The book does end on a hopeful note, but phew, Farmer makes you work to get there. This was a really good read, but the kind that makes you shiver a bit.
Clutter's Last Stand - Don Aslett. One of the more pointless books on simple living I've read. Nothing new here that I haven't read before, & it's coupled w/an especially annoying Puritan ethic towards fashion, crafting, & just plain beauty/aesthetics. He also thinks that bumper stickers or shirts w/slogans are only for people whose personalities are so weak they can't otherwise make an impression. He also says that the best dressers are the ones whose clothing you don't even notice. And he mocks people who go to garage sales for buying things like mismatched dishes (er, most of our dishes don't match, & I like it that way, b/c I get to have a greater number of interesting pieces). In addition to all this, the book seems to have only the loosest of organizational structures, & seems fairly devoid of actual advice--I guess Aslett was too busy hectoring to dole out some.
The WisCon Chronicles: Volume 1 - Edited by L. Timmel Duchamp. The most interesting things here, for me, were the essays (well, Livejournal posts) about various panels @ the con, including the Cultural Appropriation one. Some of the transcripts worked all right as reading, but some of them were just too herky-jerky disjointed. Several academic papers presented at the con were reprinted (none of which were super intriguing to me), as well as some other essays & the interview Samuel Delany did w/Joanna Russ. Two things pissed me off: In Rosaleen Love's "A Think Tank for Feminists," (which has annoying little typographic cutesy bits--like the word "raised" is in superscript, the word "flattened" in subscript, etc.) she refers to a trans woman as someone "who is not an actual woman, who was not born an actual woman." Fucking ew. And then, Diantha Day Sprouse relates some of the backlash overheard after the Cultural Appropriation panel & the first Carl Brandon Society awards. Some of it I'd heard before, but some of it showed depths of white privilege assheadedness I had hoped WisCon attendees didn't have: "Why should minorities get special treatment at WisCon?" "Where are the awards for white people?" I am glad I didn't overhear any of that, b/c I think I might actually have slapped someone. Anyway--despite all this, I did enjoy reading the book, & am excited that the "Vol. 1" in the title promises more to come. When?
Wicked Lovely - Melissa Marr. Alternateens dealing w/faeries that are anything but sweetness & light? It wasn't a new idea when Holly Black did it (although I like the way she does it), & it's not new here. Combine that w/the fact that the faeries here are the ever-present Celtic-inspired variety, & you have me yawning right off the bat. Oh, & we have yet another book about a young girl who is being forced to give up everything to save someone else (in this case, the faeries she doesn't even like). At least she manages to win a compromise for herself (& injects a hint of polyamory while doing so), but really... how many more cliches can you fit in this book? It's a shame b/c I actually thought Marr's style was pretty good.
The House of the Scorpion - Nancy Farmer. Disturbing!! Matt is a clone of El Patrón, a rich & powerful man who runs Opium--a country carved out from between the US & Aztlán (what was once Mexico). He lives cloistered in the family compound in Opium, knowing only that he's a clone & that most human beings think he is no better than a beast. Eventually, despite his sheltered life, he figures out why the 143-year-old man cloned him, & makes his escape to Aztlán, where he runs into creepy super-left-wing Communist-types. The book does end on a hopeful note, but phew, Farmer makes you work to get there. This was a really good read, but the kind that makes you shiver a bit.
Clutter's Last Stand - Don Aslett. One of the more pointless books on simple living I've read. Nothing new here that I haven't read before, & it's coupled w/an especially annoying Puritan ethic towards fashion, crafting, & just plain beauty/aesthetics. He also thinks that bumper stickers or shirts w/slogans are only for people whose personalities are so weak they can't otherwise make an impression. He also says that the best dressers are the ones whose clothing you don't even notice. And he mocks people who go to garage sales for buying things like mismatched dishes (er, most of our dishes don't match, & I like it that way, b/c I get to have a greater number of interesting pieces). In addition to all this, the book seems to have only the loosest of organizational structures, & seems fairly devoid of actual advice--I guess Aslett was too busy hectoring to dole out some.
The WisCon Chronicles: Volume 1 - Edited by L. Timmel Duchamp. The most interesting things here, for me, were the essays (well, Livejournal posts) about various panels @ the con, including the Cultural Appropriation one. Some of the transcripts worked all right as reading, but some of them were just too herky-jerky disjointed. Several academic papers presented at the con were reprinted (none of which were super intriguing to me), as well as some other essays & the interview Samuel Delany did w/Joanna Russ. Two things pissed me off: In Rosaleen Love's "A Think Tank for Feminists," (which has annoying little typographic cutesy bits--like the word "raised" is in superscript, the word "flattened" in subscript, etc.) she refers to a trans woman as someone "who is not an actual woman, who was not born an actual woman." Fucking ew. And then, Diantha Day Sprouse relates some of the backlash overheard after the Cultural Appropriation panel & the first Carl Brandon Society awards. Some of it I'd heard before, but some of it showed depths of white privilege assheadedness I had hoped WisCon attendees didn't have: "Why should minorities get special treatment at WisCon?" "Where are the awards for white people?" I am glad I didn't overhear any of that, b/c I think I might actually have slapped someone. Anyway--despite all this, I did enjoy reading the book, & am excited that the "Vol. 1" in the title promises more to come. When?
Wicked Lovely - Melissa Marr. Alternateens dealing w/faeries that are anything but sweetness & light? It wasn't a new idea when Holly Black did it (although I like the way she does it), & it's not new here. Combine that w/the fact that the faeries here are the ever-present Celtic-inspired variety, & you have me yawning right off the bat. Oh, & we have yet another book about a young girl who is being forced to give up everything to save someone else (in this case, the faeries she doesn't even like). At least she manages to win a compromise for herself (& injects a hint of polyamory while doing so), but really... how many more cliches can you fit in this book? It's a shame b/c I actually thought Marr's style was pretty good.
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no subject
Date: 2007-07-04 07:26 am (UTC)Charming but a bit unsatisfying in some ways.
That's a good way to put it. I wonder if I'm tiring not only of people from special families that run everything but also societies that are comparatively feudal. I did like that Flora was headstrong and pretty smart, and not really afraid of anything. A bit trite at the end, maybe . . .
re: backlash at WisCon
Yeah, it's there. It seems like every year that I've looked at the evaluation surveys, there are complaints about just about every element at WisCon. Okay, nothing blatantly racist or sexist, but definitely some missing clues. As I said more than once during the con, idiocy knows no bounds. Alas, even WisCon isn't exempt. Rats!
re: Marr
I too really like the way Holly Black does her books. There's enough of what I like of faerie-human interactions to give it a sort of flavor I like. Meanwhile, the main characters come across very well as individuals (even if I never can remember names).
no subject
Date: 2007-07-12 09:58 pm (UTC)I just read Black's 3rd book--still good! I think Valiant is my favorite of the 3, but Ironside was delish too.
no subject
Date: 2007-07-13 11:52 pm (UTC)