Wow, looks like more people have joined The Read!
Welcome to: Boom Kitty, Jen Ji, Merc, Mrs. Walker and Rusty (all conveniently linked to in my handy list to the right)! Good luck to you all!
I'd introduce myself but I really don't know what to add to the information that's already over there in my About Me section. If anyone wants to know more, however, I'm always willing to talk about myself, so just ask.
Finally, I don't have a real plan for The Read except that I'd like to get through the huge stack of "books we own that I want to read." Well and there's also "use The Read as an excuse to buy books." So, I'm open to recs. I like:
* historical fiction (obviously) -- my preference is for the Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque periods in Europe and the various great civilizations of the Ancient Near East (Egypt, Persia, Greece, Rome) but I want to expand my horizons into something a little less Western Canon.
* historical non-fiction/biographies -- see above.
* science fiction and fantasy -- Anything good, although if it's by Neal Stephenson or Guy Gavriel Kay , I've either already read it, or will be reading it. I'm mostly over typical fantasy rewrites of Tolkien and if you rec anything by Heinlein I will indulge in a rant about how much he sucked. I like vampires but dislike zombies unless the book is really really good.
* Anything that's so transcendentally excellent that I should read it even if I'm not wild about the genre. Basically, I'm interested in the book you give to people and say "I know you're not wild about mysteries/modern fiction/romances/whatever, but you have to read this."
The one book I try to get everyone to read even if they don't like the genre? Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson. Seriously, freakin' read it, okay?
6 days ago
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So yeah, I love me some Neal Stephenson too - have you tried Iain M Banks? He's been one of my absolute favourites since I was about 12 and really, worth a look if you like the big ideas. Also, you must must MUST read Katherine by Anya Seton if you haven't done so already - written in the fifties and still so great (I see some bandwagonner has come up with something pretty identical but hey, this is the source). I've been bigging up Justina Robson over on my blog, that's pretty strong stuff, love it. Oh, and Sarah Waters, it's Victorian historical rather than your era but it absolutely rocks - Fingersmith, Tipping The Velvet, Affinity. And she did a WW2 one called the Night Watch, also good but I prefer the Victorian stuff. I also rather like Diana Norman, The Vizard Mask, A Catch of Consequence, Taking Liberties, good renaissance stuff about women trying to find a place in the world.
ReplyDeleteI LOVE recommending books. There's plenty more where that came from but Ive probably just rehashed a whole bunch of stuff you've already read so let me know if any of that's on the right track and I'll be more than happy to produce some more.
Happy reading!
Funny you should mention Banks, I just ordered one of his books on Amazon last night. :) And "Katherine" is a great book; I read it waaaay back and it's one of the books that sparked my interest in history. "Tipping the Velvet" has been on my read list for like *ever*.
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