Sunday, May 27, 2012

Editorial Change

My brother, much taken up by writing his fiction, has decided to retire from the field (blog) and leave it to me. I say this with regret, since I valued his contributions, but I understand how one can become jaded with the posting of one's thoughts on the internet. It happened to me with my first blog. Granted, it took about six years for me and about six months for him, but the principle holds, I think.

It is not impossible that he will post occasionally; he will be welcome if he chooses to do so and perhaps one day he'll start in again on a regular basis.

Places

This week's book challenge is to name your favourite story settings. A wealth of choices here. Let's move from the mundane to the fantastic, shall we? Splendid.

First off, I really enjoy the setting of Half-Magic and its sequel which is nothing more exotic than the Midwest in the 1920's. The small town feel is really well done and would practically be magical even with the talisman. Marvellous story, marvellous setting, marvellous characters, and a marvellous book.

Closely set in time is the world of PG Wodehouse. Most of his stories take place in Edwardian England that is intended to be fairly real. The world his characters inhabit, however, is fiction in more than simply the events. The world of Half-Magic is real with magic events happening to real children. The world of PG Wodehouse is Edenic with little realism. It shines and is bright and there are rarely any hints that the world of that time included people who were hungry, or that wars were fought and another war loomed around the corner. All is gaiety in London, quiet country houses, respectful servants and beautiful girls where the greatest peril is an unsuitable engagement or that an aunt may ask you to do something you find distasteful, like pinching a silver cow creamer from your host. For all that, it is all the real world, the parts that are unpleasant have simply been edited out.

Next, the Mediterranean world of the mid-19th century is made alluring in The Count of Monte Cristo. Though, yes, it is almost all taken up with the world of the wealthy and noble and very little of it deals with the lives of the majority, it still makes me wish to visit and see the south of France, sail to Italy and find intrigue in Paris. Though I find the Aubrey-Maturin novels endlessly enjoyable, I'm not sure I'd really want to experience the damp, crowded environs of a ship at sea for several years, but some of the time spent ashore in this similar period of history would be fun. Mostly mundane, again, but further removed in time.

The worlds of Narnia and Prydain, though peopled with fantastic creatures, magic and full of adventure seem to me still less exotic than the far future Earth conceived in John C. Wright's Golden Age trilogy. He writes hard SF and scorns concepts that flaunt the laws of physics (no FTL space travel), but the things he imagines we will be able to do millennia from now boggle the mind in the way the best fantasy does.

Speaking of which, the world of Middle Earth is the best fantasy setting there is, mostly because it is so well-realised in so many ways. It is peopled with realistic characters despite their fantastic nature and the varied environs are alluring in their own ways. The timeless forests of Lothlorien, the endless plains of Rohan, the white city of Minas Tirith, the cosy town of Hobbiton, the wild empty moors of Arnor. Other works have similar scope, but none I have encountered has caused each part to seem so real.

Saturday, May 26, 2012

Know your history

Those who do not learn from history are doomed to... make maps that are incorrect.

Following a chain of links around the interwebs I found this poster which purports to show the brewery locations in the original United States. The problem? They left off almost half of Virginia. As any student of history knows, West Virginia only became a separate state in 1863 when it seceded from Virginia (reports that the communication of this act to Richmond included the phrase "how do you like them apples?" are not fully substantiated) because Virginia seceded from the United States and the good folks of the Mountaineer state thought this was a bit thick. I mean to say, really.

Perhaps this was why the poster was on sale?

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Blogger's ineptitude strikes again!

So they're retiring their Blogger in Draft blog because they now have a Google+ page. But the link, as of this posting, to that page in their announcement does not actually take you there. Well done, chaps. Well done.

Sunday, May 20, 2012

Every man is a hero.

'I was not aware that you were a hero, Mr Jagiello.'
....
'Of course I am a hero,' he said, getting up and laughing very cheerfully. 'Every man is a hero of his own tale. Surely, Dr Maturin, every man must look on himself as wiser and more intelligent and more virtuous than the rest, so how could he see himself as a villain, or even as a minor character? And you must have noticed that heroes are never beaten. They may be undone for a while, but they always do themselves up again, and marry the virtuous young gentlewoman.'

'I have noticed it, indeed. There are some eminent exceptions, sure, but upon the whole I am convinced you are right. Perhaps it is that which makes your novel or tale a little tedious.'

~ The Surgeon's Mate, by Patrick O'Brian

Saturday, May 19, 2012

Terms of Endearment

I'm not sure about this week's book challenge. It's listed as "Favorite words and phrases, or lines and literary allusions that would win your heart." It seems to have been interpreted by the others who are participating to mean "literary pick-up lines". That is to say, literary quotations one could use to win their hearts. Or something. I'd rather have taken it to mean some of my favourite lines and such, but that does not appear to have been the consensus view. (I'm with you fellers.)

I'm not sure there are such things for me. Being male, in our culture, I would be expected to do the picking up. Or perhaps I should say "wooing". (Bit nicer connotations, that.) I could reinterpret it to mean what sorts of literary allusions and quotations I would use to attempt to win a woman's heart. On the other hand, it's been a while since I've had to win a woman's heart; having been married for nearly a dozen years I've been focused on keeping rather than gaining, if you will. Still, some thoughts on the whole business after the jump.

Friday, May 18, 2012

Coming Soon

I'll have a post up on the book challenge before the week is out and I'm working on a couple other ideas as well, but it's been a busy week with work and a new baby and a mother-in-law visiting. More content soon. Really.

Saturday, May 12, 2012

Thoughts on Lloyd Alexander

One of the muses at the other club is musing today about Lloyd Alexander and his works. It's all well and good; we here at this club are fans as well. But not such fans that we cannot criticize a little bit too. Here are a couple of posts from about a year ago in which I consider Alexander and his books.

Self-referential posts; hard to be more egotistical than that!

Thursday, May 10, 2012

In the end, there can be only one.

Really, this week has been an exercise in bragging more than anything else. It's not like I actually needed to count any of those other authors to see if they were at the top, because even a casual glance at my shelves reveals the answer. He's the greatest master of prose in the 20th century, a man who makes his writing light and airy and yet it takes a lot of talent and work to make something look so easy. Not only that, but he was prolific as well, writing nigh unto 100 books. Which means I have about 25 more to collect. In first place, going away in a walk, is PG Wodehouse, of whose books I have 76 (including two copies of Frozen Assets/Biffen's Millions). After the jump are the books I own arranged in chronological order.

Really? You're counting those as books?

Yes. Yes, I am. The second place entry on my list of authors is one Stan Sakai. That sounds well until I tell you that most of the books are trade-paperback collections of comic books. That sounds bad until you've actually read some of his work and realize that, despite the talking, anthropomorphic animals, the stories have real depth. There is comedy, tragedy, and drama in these stories because they're well done tales of Japan in the feudal era and the characters just happen to have fur and whiskers on occasion.

I guess I could put it this way: I don't read comics, but I do read Usagi Yojimbo.

Monday, May 7, 2012

An incomplete collection

Number three on my list of authors by whom I own the most books is someone who is pretty much guaranteed to climb further up since I intend on eventually owning nearly all of the books he wrote and I'm not nearly there yet.

In a respectable, but impermanent third place is Rex Stout with 26. Every single one of the books I own by him is a Nero Wolfe mystery; though he did write a few others with other characters, Wolfe was far and away the most common main character.

I wouldn't say I'm obsessed; I'm just dedicated.

So the book challenge this week is the author of whose books I own the most. (Ending a sentence with a preposition is something up with which I will not put.) This seems too easy. Am I supposed to just list a name? 'Cause that would be boring. I suppose I could talk about why I have so many books by a single author, but when you see who it is, the reason will be obvious. I guess I'll do a bit of a suspenseful countdown and list off a few others who were not quite the top dog.

So, forthwith, the top five authors on my shelves by number of books I own starting at the bottom and working up.

A son is born!

Yesterday morning, at about 0-dark-thirty, my wife gave birth to my first son. Now I have an heir, I just need to find something for him to inherit. Picture after the jump.

Thursday, May 3, 2012

Naming Conventions

This week the book challenge is to list names from books you'd be willing to saddle your kids with. Or something like that. Unlike the lovely Muses from the other club, this is less of an academic exercise for me. Not only have I gone through the naming process twice for my own offspring (I won't go so far as to call them the "fruit of my loins", as my father-in-law is fond of doing in regards to his own children; though in most cases the KJV provides wonderful phrases), but, with my wife due to give birth to our third child before the month is out, we are in the midst of doing it in earnest for the third time.

So what names have we chosen/will we choose that come from our favourite books?

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Indirect illustration of character

I am fond of the Aubrey-Maturin series of books more than any other series. The stories are good and the people are magnificent. Each is unique and well-drawn, but particularly the main characters that persist throughout all 20 books. Not only are they well done, but one is allowed to see them grow, change, develop and alter as time and events pass and occur.

And, with such a scope to work with, O'Brian is more easily able to show what they are like rather than merely telling. Not that he would have been unable or disinclined to do so even in a single book, but the opportunity afforded in 20 is greater by far.

There is a particular character with whom Maturnin interacts in the third book (the one I am reading now; I re-read the series every year) that I find particularly illuminating as to Maturin's inclinations and character and I find the whole thing very, very moving. I'm going to spoil a minor sub-plot in the third book, so if you're scrupulous about such things, don't read further.