books read in January 2013
Friday, 1 February 2013 11:14![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
usuallyhats
(No December post as all I really wanted to say was "I love how Dustin Nguyen draws women's hair" which, while true, is possibly not worth an entire post all on its own.)
Can You Forgive Her? - Anthony Trollope
X-23: Target X
Doctor Who: The Devil in the Smoke - Justin Richards
The Cold Commands - Richard Morgan
Captain Vorpatril's Alliance - Lois McMaster Bujold
The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller
The Diviners - Libba Bray
Legion of Monsters
Teen Movie Times - Karen Healey
Nightwing: The Hunt For Oracle
Zatanna: The Mistress of Magic
Streets of Gotham: The House of Hush
Birds of Prey: Platinum Flats
I'm torn on Can You Forgive Her?. On the one hand, Trollope's views on women, the position of, are very conservative and therefore pretty antithetical to me. On the other, he clearly views women as people worthy of interest, whose stories deserve telling, so I usually enjoy reading his books. (This may sound like I'm damning him with faint praise, but nearly 150 years after this book was written, "not very good at women" is still often seem as at best a minor caveat to someone's status as a great writer, because women, so mysterious and opaque, who knows WHAT they're thinking, amirite guys? So.) I think this was why the ending was somewhat unsatisfying: Trollope couldn't really reconcile the personalities of Alice Vavasor and Glencora with the conventional endings he fitted them into.
Between X-23: Target X and NYX/X-23, which I read last year, I really think Marvel should call a moratorium on upskirt shots of teenage and pre-teenage girls. You wouldn't have thought this would be something one would need to call a moratorium on, but APPARENTLY SO.
The Devil in the Smoke was pretty slight and the writing veered between good and average, but it was still fun, and only increased my desire to see more of the Paternoster Row Gang, especially since I don't feel like we've yet seen them be as awesome as they have the potential to be. SPIN OFF PLEASE.
Captain Vorpatril's Alliance I feel is definitely a lesser Vorkosigan, but still pretty much a delight to read. It suffered mainly from being a bit like A Civil Campaign, but not as good, though "not quite as good as A Civil Campaign" is pretty high praise. It made me have a lot of feelings about Simon Illyan, also, and I was sad that there wasn't as much resolution to that bit of the plot as I would have liked. (Also, I thought for a moment that the cover wasn't as terrible as they usually are. And then I turned it over. OH DEAR. So glad I got it from the library instead of buying it...)
I got off on the wrong foot with The Song of Achilles, because it had one of those fancy built in bookmark ribbons which was just the right length to dip in the bath, and thus required some annoying wrangling. I did enjoy it, after that, except for two major criticisms: the treatment of women (the tragedy of what happened to Iphigenia was that it made Achilles sad, apparently) and the blankness of Achilles as a character. I could've dealt with not understanding why he'd fall for Patroclus - love is weird and illogical - but I didn't understand ANYTHING he did. None of his decisions, actions or reactions made any kind of sense to me. (This may have been a mixed blessing: I started understanding him more towards the end, and consequently liked him less. :/) This was particularly marked whenever Odysseus appeared - he was much more alive than Achilles, as a character. (There was also one major plot point that wasn't really resolved, which was annoying.) So overall, basically a good read, but frustratingly flawed.
I very much enjoyed reading The Diviners: it brought to life both the glamour and the dark underbelly of the time period excellently. There were a few awkward paragraphs, and the odd instance of characters doing or saying (or more likely, not saying) something mostly because the plot demanded it, though, and I was a little disappointed that it turned out that a lot of the characters were being set up for doing things in later books instead of this one, but none of these things really marred my enjoyment of it that much. And I adore the title.
Legion of Monsters was pretty slight, but I was only reading it for Elsa Bloodstone so I didn't really mind. I love her guns and her sarcasm, and her integrity, and her gravity-defying hair. Which at one point she soaked in holy water, the better to fight vampires with. It was that sort of comic. ♥
My feelings on Nightwing: The Hunt For Oracle are basically ORACLE IS SO AWESOME. Also, the greatest panel in the history of comics is even better in context.
I wasn't wowed by Zatanna: The Mistress of Magic, but I didn't dislike it, and I really liked Zee. I laughed every time she wrongfooted a villain by punching them instead of using magic, because I am easily pleased.
I was all ready to sing the praises of Streets of Gotham: The House of Hush, and there was a lot of stuff I liked about it - the Carpenter story was cute; Dustin Nguyen's art is always appreciated, as is any interaction between Colin and Damian (♥); I liked seeing some backstory for Thomas and, particularly, Martha Wayne that wasn't centred on Bruce's manpain, and Zee's appearances were cool - but then it threw in a really graphic, gratuitous child abuse element that I REALLY hated. It was so unnecessary: it was window dressing, just there to go "look how despicable this minor villain is". No need. (I think the contrast with the gorgeousness of the art made it worse).
...that's kind of a downer to finish on, so I'll add that though I was mostly meh on Platinum Flats, I did really like Oracle's fearlessness when faced with the Joker. "You took nothing from me." ♥
Can You Forgive Her? - Anthony Trollope
X-23: Target X
Doctor Who: The Devil in the Smoke - Justin Richards
The Cold Commands - Richard Morgan
Captain Vorpatril's Alliance - Lois McMaster Bujold
The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller
The Diviners - Libba Bray
Legion of Monsters
Teen Movie Times - Karen Healey
Nightwing: The Hunt For Oracle
Zatanna: The Mistress of Magic
Streets of Gotham: The House of Hush
Birds of Prey: Platinum Flats
I'm torn on Can You Forgive Her?. On the one hand, Trollope's views on women, the position of, are very conservative and therefore pretty antithetical to me. On the other, he clearly views women as people worthy of interest, whose stories deserve telling, so I usually enjoy reading his books. (This may sound like I'm damning him with faint praise, but nearly 150 years after this book was written, "not very good at women" is still often seem as at best a minor caveat to someone's status as a great writer, because women, so mysterious and opaque, who knows WHAT they're thinking, amirite guys? So.) I think this was why the ending was somewhat unsatisfying: Trollope couldn't really reconcile the personalities of Alice Vavasor and Glencora with the conventional endings he fitted them into.
Between X-23: Target X and NYX/X-23, which I read last year, I really think Marvel should call a moratorium on upskirt shots of teenage and pre-teenage girls. You wouldn't have thought this would be something one would need to call a moratorium on, but APPARENTLY SO.
The Devil in the Smoke was pretty slight and the writing veered between good and average, but it was still fun, and only increased my desire to see more of the Paternoster Row Gang, especially since I don't feel like we've yet seen them be as awesome as they have the potential to be. SPIN OFF PLEASE.
Captain Vorpatril's Alliance I feel is definitely a lesser Vorkosigan, but still pretty much a delight to read. It suffered mainly from being a bit like A Civil Campaign, but not as good, though "not quite as good as A Civil Campaign" is pretty high praise. It made me have a lot of feelings about Simon Illyan, also, and I was sad that there wasn't as much resolution to that bit of the plot as I would have liked. (Also, I thought for a moment that the cover wasn't as terrible as they usually are. And then I turned it over. OH DEAR. So glad I got it from the library instead of buying it...)
I got off on the wrong foot with The Song of Achilles, because it had one of those fancy built in bookmark ribbons which was just the right length to dip in the bath, and thus required some annoying wrangling. I did enjoy it, after that, except for two major criticisms: the treatment of women (the tragedy of what happened to Iphigenia was that it made Achilles sad, apparently) and the blankness of Achilles as a character. I could've dealt with not understanding why he'd fall for Patroclus - love is weird and illogical - but I didn't understand ANYTHING he did. None of his decisions, actions or reactions made any kind of sense to me. (This may have been a mixed blessing: I started understanding him more towards the end, and consequently liked him less. :/) This was particularly marked whenever Odysseus appeared - he was much more alive than Achilles, as a character. (There was also one major plot point that wasn't really resolved, which was annoying.) So overall, basically a good read, but frustratingly flawed.
I very much enjoyed reading The Diviners: it brought to life both the glamour and the dark underbelly of the time period excellently. There were a few awkward paragraphs, and the odd instance of characters doing or saying (or more likely, not saying) something mostly because the plot demanded it, though, and I was a little disappointed that it turned out that a lot of the characters were being set up for doing things in later books instead of this one, but none of these things really marred my enjoyment of it that much. And I adore the title.
Legion of Monsters was pretty slight, but I was only reading it for Elsa Bloodstone so I didn't really mind. I love her guns and her sarcasm, and her integrity, and her gravity-defying hair. Which at one point she soaked in holy water, the better to fight vampires with. It was that sort of comic. ♥
My feelings on Nightwing: The Hunt For Oracle are basically ORACLE IS SO AWESOME. Also, the greatest panel in the history of comics is even better in context.
I wasn't wowed by Zatanna: The Mistress of Magic, but I didn't dislike it, and I really liked Zee. I laughed every time she wrongfooted a villain by punching them instead of using magic, because I am easily pleased.
I was all ready to sing the praises of Streets of Gotham: The House of Hush, and there was a lot of stuff I liked about it - the Carpenter story was cute; Dustin Nguyen's art is always appreciated, as is any interaction between Colin and Damian (♥); I liked seeing some backstory for Thomas and, particularly, Martha Wayne that wasn't centred on Bruce's manpain, and Zee's appearances were cool - but then it threw in a really graphic, gratuitous child abuse element that I REALLY hated. It was so unnecessary: it was window dressing, just there to go "look how despicable this minor villain is". No need. (I think the contrast with the gorgeousness of the art made it worse).
...that's kind of a downer to finish on, so I'll add that though I was mostly meh on Platinum Flats, I did really like Oracle's fearlessness when faced with the Joker. "You took nothing from me." ♥
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Date: 1 Feb 2013 15:34 (UTC)Also, the greatest panel in the history of comics is even better in context.
ISN'T IT JUST. <3
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Date: 1 Feb 2013 22:01 (UTC)no subject
Date: 1 Feb 2013 20:02 (UTC)Zatanna was very entertaining in the Batman comic I saw her in. She just does whatever she wants, and it's never what anyone else expects from her.
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Date: 1 Feb 2013 22:10 (UTC)She just does whatever she wants, and it's never what anyone else expects from her.
YES. I love her for that.
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Date: 1 Feb 2013 22:26 (UTC)no subject
Date: 1 Feb 2013 22:58 (UTC)I like the Hush storyline a lot, though it does tend to forget that there are women in the Batfamily too. :( But on the other hand, it makes me ship Bruce/Selina far more than I ever expected to, which is fun!
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Date: 2 Feb 2013 00:43 (UTC)I am excited for more Selina, then, because she was MY FAVORITE part of The Dark Knight Rises, and I haven't seen as much of her being awesome since I really got into comics, which seems...the opposite of how things should go. But maybe I just got distracted by Batgirls and Robins? :P
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Date: 4 Feb 2013 11:00 (UTC)But maybe I just got distracted by Batgirls and Robins? :P
MWAHAHAHA. ...I mean, yes, that can happen. ;) Have you read any of the Ed Brubaker/Darwyn Cooke run on Catwoman? There's lots of Selina awesome there.
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Date: 4 Feb 2013 17:47 (UTC)I have not read any of Catwoman's solo books at all. My library has Jeph Loeb's Catwoman: When in Rome, and some of Gotham City Sirens, but not any of the collected Catwoman runs.
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Date: 4 Feb 2013 22:12 (UTC)Very tempted by the Batman & Robin annual! I think it may depend on how grumpy I am feeling about the DCnU next time I go to Forbidden Planet or buy stuff from Comixology though... ;)
I liked "When in Rome", too, though not as much as the Brubaker/Cooke stuff.
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Date: 4 Feb 2013 23:10 (UTC)It was pretty fabulous. There was Titus the dog and Alfred scolding and Damian being ridiculous (but fairly un-horrible!) and Bruce having more emotions than a rock of equivalent size, unlike his usual.
Good to know, thanks! You are kind of the best with comics recs ♥.
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Date: 5 Feb 2013 12:18 (UTC)Ahaha, OK, that does sound awesome!
:D thanks!