Again, relatively brief:
Recently read:
Death before Facebook, by Julie Smith. I liked the first-person narrative voice, and it's good as a story about the detective and some of the people she knows, but if the assorted amateurs hadn't decided to treat a murder as a puzzle and maybe tell the police things later if they got around to it, things would have gone better. (They're denizens of a computer bulletin board, very clearly based on the WELL, at a time when far fewer people used them, to the extent that the detective has to ask for a basic explanation of what it is and how it works.)
"In the House of the Seven Librarians," by Ellen Klages. This is a fairy tale that I picked up in chapbook form at Potlatch. The librarians of the title are the denizens of an officially closed and clearly on some level magical Carnegie Library (they stayed behind when the town built a new library), and are living a quiet life until someone returns an overdue book, and leaves their firstborn child in payment of the fine. I'd heard part of this read aloud a while ago (maybe at![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
papersky and ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rysmiel's home), and am glad to have read the whole thing.
A Fish Caught in Time: The Search for the Coelacanth, by Samantha Weinberg, is about the scientific discovery of the coelacanth, and the efforts to learn more about it. Weinberg covers Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer, the museum curator who first saw a coelacanth and recognized it as something important; the other scientists involved over the years; and a variety of people involved, from fishermen to politicians. "Discovered" in this case means that Courtenay-Latimer had enough scientific context to see it as something other than the relatively rare and not very desirable fish called gombessa: as with many "newly discovered" animals, it already had a name. The book also has quite a bit about the fish themselves (both the current species and their fossil ancestors): I now know that a coelacanth's eye has a tapetum, like a cat's; also, they don't have vertebrae, only a notochord.
Moominpappa's Memoirs, by Tove Jansson. I didn't like this as much as the moomin book I read last week; it's mostly Moominpappa's viewpoint, much of it as-told-by, and I like Jansson's third-person narrative voice better, and I think I like Moomintroll better than his father.
Currently reading:
At the Relton Arms, by Evelyn Sharp. I don't remember who recommended this novel to me: it's my current kindle reading, and I'm enjoying it despite being annoyed at most of the male characters. Sharp is having fun with some of the clichés about romance and courtship.
Recently read:
Death before Facebook, by Julie Smith. I liked the first-person narrative voice, and it's good as a story about the detective and some of the people she knows, but if the assorted amateurs hadn't decided to treat a murder as a puzzle and maybe tell the police things later if they got around to it, things would have gone better. (They're denizens of a computer bulletin board, very clearly based on the WELL, at a time when far fewer people used them, to the extent that the detective has to ask for a basic explanation of what it is and how it works.)
"In the House of the Seven Librarians," by Ellen Klages. This is a fairy tale that I picked up in chapbook form at Potlatch. The librarians of the title are the denizens of an officially closed and clearly on some level magical Carnegie Library (they stayed behind when the town built a new library), and are living a quiet life until someone returns an overdue book, and leaves their firstborn child in payment of the fine. I'd heard part of this read aloud a while ago (maybe at
papersky and rysmiel's home), and am glad to have read the whole thing.A Fish Caught in Time: The Search for the Coelacanth, by Samantha Weinberg, is about the scientific discovery of the coelacanth, and the efforts to learn more about it. Weinberg covers Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer, the museum curator who first saw a coelacanth and recognized it as something important; the other scientists involved over the years; and a variety of people involved, from fishermen to politicians. "Discovered" in this case means that Courtenay-Latimer had enough scientific context to see it as something other than the relatively rare and not very desirable fish called gombessa: as with many "newly discovered" animals, it already had a name. The book also has quite a bit about the fish themselves (both the current species and their fossil ancestors): I now know that a coelacanth's eye has a tapetum, like a cat's; also, they don't have vertebrae, only a notochord.
Moominpappa's Memoirs, by Tove Jansson. I didn't like this as much as the moomin book I read last week; it's mostly Moominpappa's viewpoint, much of it as-told-by, and I like Jansson's third-person narrative voice better, and I think I like Moomintroll better than his father.
Currently reading:
At the Relton Arms, by Evelyn Sharp. I don't remember who recommended this novel to me: it's my current kindle reading, and I'm enjoying it despite being annoyed at most of the male characters. Sharp is having fun with some of the clichés about romance and courtship.
.