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Making Money
Aug. 30th, 2025 07:20 pmI started my reread of Making Money only to realize after a chapter or two that I didn't recall any of it. At least one scene usually sticks in my mind*, and there are so many of Lord Vetinari being Lord Vetinari that I definitely should have remembered. Adora Belle Dearheart is one of my favorite minor characters, so I'd have at least recalled her.
And Mr. Fusspot. I would've remembered the dog, if only for one of the funniest scenes I have ever read in any Discworld book:
Watching a dog try to chew a large piece of toffee is a pastime fit for gods. Mr. Fusspot's mixed ancestry had given him a dexterity of jaw that was truly awesome. He somersaulted happily around the floor, making faces like a rubber gargoyle in a washing machine.
Maybe you have to have had a dog, idk.
Anyway, I think this is the first time I've read it. am enjoying it. Moist von Lipwig is such a conflicted, seat-of-the-pants sort of person.
*except for Night Watch, which failed to make an impression. I recalled that there was a rebellion at some point, but that was it.
And Mr. Fusspot. I would've remembered the dog, if only for one of the funniest scenes I have ever read in any Discworld book:
Watching a dog try to chew a large piece of toffee is a pastime fit for gods. Mr. Fusspot's mixed ancestry had given him a dexterity of jaw that was truly awesome. He somersaulted happily around the floor, making faces like a rubber gargoyle in a washing machine.
Maybe you have to have had a dog, idk.
Anyway, I think this is the first time I've read it. am enjoying it. Moist von Lipwig is such a conflicted, seat-of-the-pants sort of person.
*except for Night Watch, which failed to make an impression. I recalled that there was a rebellion at some point, but that was it.
Still reading Pterry
Aug. 17th, 2025 09:39 pmFinished my reread of Wyrd Sisters last night.
Every time I think I've found a Discworld book that contains nothing relevant wrt current events...yeah, no.
Every time I think I've found a Discworld book that contains nothing relevant wrt current events...yeah, no.
Feet of Clay
Mar. 17th, 2025 10:48 amStarted my reread with vague memories of the plot. Golems. The Watch. Some seriousness.
Then during my read last night I came to this part:
"In a way, it didn't matter who they were. In fact, their anonymity was part of the whole business. They thought themselves part of the march of history, the tide of progress and the wave of the future. They were men who felt that The Time Had Come. Regimes can survive barbarian hordes, crazed terrorists, and secret societies, but they're in real trouble when prosperous and anonymous men sit around a big table and think thoughts like that."
Pterry always managed to slip something in.
Then during my read last night I came to this part:
"In a way, it didn't matter who they were. In fact, their anonymity was part of the whole business. They thought themselves part of the march of history, the tide of progress and the wave of the future. They were men who felt that The Time Had Come. Regimes can survive barbarian hordes, crazed terrorists, and secret societies, but they're in real trouble when prosperous and anonymous men sit around a big table and think thoughts like that."
Pterry always managed to slip something in.
Still rereading Pratchett
Mar. 12th, 2025 10:58 pmI finished Soul Music last night.* It's a sweet story. I'm a fan of Death, and I do like Susan. I have an icon of her, but it's not in my free account batch and I don't know if I can exchange it.
Next up, Feet of Clay.
Liking this paper book stuff.
*make that early this morning
Next up, Feet of Clay.
Liking this paper book stuff.
*make that early this morning
rereading Pterry
Jan. 14th, 2025 09:50 amFor the past few weeks, I've been trying to pull away from nighttime screens by reading actual paper books. Imagine!
I've started with an out-of-sequence Pterry reread. First, Hogfather, because it seemed appropriate for December. Followed up with Guards! Guards!, then Lords and Ladies.
Now I'm reading Jingo, which seems appropriate to the times in so many ways. It also contains one of my favorite, idk, processes? Namely, Lord Vetinari* manipulating Sam Vimes into acting like, well, Sam Vimes.
*Lord Vetinari is one of my "Spock crushes**." In my mind, he's played by Alan Rickman.
**crushes on literary/film/TV characters. Mr. Spock was my first. Lord Peter Wimsey. Loki from the Marvel TV series. And Vetinari.
I've started with an out-of-sequence Pterry reread. First, Hogfather, because it seemed appropriate for December. Followed up with Guards! Guards!, then Lords and Ladies.
Now I'm reading Jingo, which seems appropriate to the times in so many ways. It also contains one of my favorite, idk, processes? Namely, Lord Vetinari* manipulating Sam Vimes into acting like, well, Sam Vimes.
*Lord Vetinari is one of my "Spock crushes**." In my mind, he's played by Alan Rickman.
**crushes on literary/film/TV characters. Mr. Spock was my first. Lord Peter Wimsey. Loki from the Marvel TV series. And Vetinari.
the paper book thing
Dec. 18th, 2024 07:28 pmMy fiction reading has declined over the last few years. Markedly.
I do read. Online articles. Blog posts. Ebooks. But a paper book that I have to hold with two hands has been a rarity of late.
So a little over a week ago, I decided I wanted a seasonal read and dug out Hogfather. Bedtime reading, for 15 minutes, a half hour. Finished it, then grabbed Carpe Jugulum. Finished that—time for a Guards book. So, Guards! Guards! it is.
Feels weird to read something that requires the use of a separate lamp to see in the dark.
Anyway, I've reached the point where I look forward to that quiet time. Unplugged.
Not a situation I would've ever expected.
I do read. Online articles. Blog posts. Ebooks. But a paper book that I have to hold with two hands has been a rarity of late.
So a little over a week ago, I decided I wanted a seasonal read and dug out Hogfather. Bedtime reading, for 15 minutes, a half hour. Finished it, then grabbed Carpe Jugulum. Finished that—time for a Guards book. So, Guards! Guards! it is.
Feels weird to read something that requires the use of a separate lamp to see in the dark.
Anyway, I've reached the point where I look forward to that quiet time. Unplugged.
Not a situation I would've ever expected.
Two and a half weeks until Thrillerfest, which means not really the doldrums. More like, I should be thinking about what to pack but I can’t face it yet. I have a lot to work to do between now and then, so instead I’m dicking around online in search of bars in NYC that make sazeracs. Taking recs for food trucks and restaurants.
I get a year older during the visit. Born on the 4th, me. Looking forward to an NYC fireworks display. Also, walking the High Line, the Hudson Riverwalk. Puttering. I love New York. I really do.
And then there’s the con itself. I have a cool panel on Friday morning at 1020am:
WEREWOLVES, VAMPIRES OR WITCHES? Thrillers On The Wild Side
Panel Master: Heather Graham
Kelley Armstrong
Mell Corcoran
Christine Feehan
Alex Gordon
Donna Grant
Alexandra Ivy
Then I get to go to panels, sign some books, talk to folks, fangirl, etc etc. Hoping for decent weather.
Reading–I am ashamed to admit that I don’t read as much as I used to. I mean, I read a lot online–news and political blogs. Science articles. But as for fiction…I must have well over 200 books in my electronic TBR stack (we won’t even talk about the jammed bookcases). I finished Robin McKinley’s SUNSHINE a few weeks ago, and loved it. Wanted to start something else, but I have research to do and that means nonfiction. That current book is THE EPIGENETICS REVOLUTION by Nessa Carey, and I should be way further along than I am.
I feel…guilty. Writers should read. It’s a major tool in the kit. It’s the primary way to learn what’s out there.
Also, it’s fun.
I have some beta-reads on tap, so I can rebuild the reading muscles that way. Then there are some golden oldies: MR James, Terry Pratchett, Preston & Child. Honestly, if someone stranded me on a desert island with my iPad and a solar charger, I’d be fine for at least a year. Two, possibly.
Oh well, back to something resembling work.
setting things aside
Jun. 9th, 2011 12:10 amAfter some hemming and hawing, I've set aside the book I've been reading. I liked the first third or so, even though it moved rather slowly and the plot seemed subordinate to the developing relationship between the female protag and the tall, dark & dangerous male. The book hit near the top of the NYT hardcover list, and is still in the middle of the extended list. I wanted to like it at least enough to finish it because it's categorized as "gothic suspense," which is something I would like to write, and I wanted to see how the various elements played out.
But the protag is just irking the hell out of me. She's in big trouble, researching dangerous stuff in her field of expertise, and afeared for her life. She's Powerful. Headstrong. Yet she fled England with Tall, Dark & Dangerous, then remained behind in France with his vampire mother--yes, it's a beastie book--while he returns to England to get the lay of the land and try to work things out with the various parties. All the tense stuff happens offstage while protag moons and misses TD&D and researches a completely different documents and oh hell, I just gave up.
The Amazon reviews are funny. There's a significant number, and most are 4-5 stars. But there are over a hundred 1-star reviews, and from the few I read, those readers are irked for the same reasons I am. It's a romance with a suspense plot that occasionally comes up for air, and if the lovers aren't working for you, there's no reason to keep reading.
I've moved on to a supernatural thriller by an author I've never read before. But he's an award-winner, and very well thought of. I'll see how this one goes.
Line of storms moving through, courtesy of a cold front. Tomorrow's highs will be in the 60s, a good 30 degrees lower than today's. The heat hasn't been very comfortable, but it's done the tomatoes a world of good. They've tripled in size over the last couple of days, I swear.
But the protag is just irking the hell out of me. She's in big trouble, researching dangerous stuff in her field of expertise, and afeared for her life. She's Powerful. Headstrong. Yet she fled England with Tall, Dark & Dangerous, then remained behind in France with his vampire mother--yes, it's a beastie book--while he returns to England to get the lay of the land and try to work things out with the various parties. All the tense stuff happens offstage while protag moons and misses TD&D and researches a completely different documents and oh hell, I just gave up.
The Amazon reviews are funny. There's a significant number, and most are 4-5 stars. But there are over a hundred 1-star reviews, and from the few I read, those readers are irked for the same reasons I am. It's a romance with a suspense plot that occasionally comes up for air, and if the lovers aren't working for you, there's no reason to keep reading.
I've moved on to a supernatural thriller by an author I've never read before. But he's an award-winner, and very well thought of. I'll see how this one goes.
Line of storms moving through, courtesy of a cold front. Tomorrow's highs will be in the 60s, a good 30 degrees lower than today's. The heat hasn't been very comfortable, but it's done the tomatoes a world of good. They've tripled in size over the last couple of days, I swear.
setting things aside
Jun. 9th, 2011 12:10 amAfter some hemming and hawing, I've set aside the book I've been reading. I liked the first third or so, even though it moved rather slowly and the plot seemed subordinate to the developing relationship between the female protag and the tall, dark & dangerous male. The book hit near the top of the NYT hardcover list, and is still in the middle of the extended list. I wanted to like it at least enough to finish it because it's categorized as "gothic suspense," which is something I would like to write, and I wanted to see how the various elements played out.
But the protag is just irking the hell out of me. She's in big trouble, researching dangerous stuff in her field of expertise, and afeared for her life. She's Powerful. Headstrong. Yet she fled England with Tall, Dark & Dangerous, then remained behind in France with his vampire mother--yes, it's a beastie book--while he returns to England to get the lay of the land and try to work things out with the various parties. All the tense stuff happens offstage while protag moons and misses TD&D and researches a completely different documents and oh hell, I just gave up.
The Amazon reviews are funny. There's a significant number, and most are 4-5 stars. But there are over a hundred 1-star reviews, and from the few I read, those readers are irked for the same reasons I am. It's a romance with a suspense plot that occasionally comes up for air, and if the lovers aren't working for you, there's no reason to keep reading.
I've moved on to a supernatural thriller by an author I've never read before. But he's an award-winner, and very well thought of. I'll see how this one goes.
Line of storms moving through, courtesy of a cold front. Tomorrow's highs will be in the 60s, a good 30 degrees lower than today's. The heat hasn't been very comfortable, but it's done the tomatoes a world of good. They've tripled in size over the last couple of days, I swear.
But the protag is just irking the hell out of me. She's in big trouble, researching dangerous stuff in her field of expertise, and afeared for her life. She's Powerful. Headstrong. Yet she fled England with Tall, Dark & Dangerous, then remained behind in France with his vampire mother--yes, it's a beastie book--while he returns to England to get the lay of the land and try to work things out with the various parties. All the tense stuff happens offstage while protag moons and misses TD&D and researches a completely different documents and oh hell, I just gave up.
The Amazon reviews are funny. There's a significant number, and most are 4-5 stars. But there are over a hundred 1-star reviews, and from the few I read, those readers are irked for the same reasons I am. It's a romance with a suspense plot that occasionally comes up for air, and if the lovers aren't working for you, there's no reason to keep reading.
I've moved on to a supernatural thriller by an author I've never read before. But he's an award-winner, and very well thought of. I'll see how this one goes.
Line of storms moving through, courtesy of a cold front. Tomorrow's highs will be in the 60s, a good 30 degrees lower than today's. The heat hasn't been very comfortable, but it's done the tomatoes a world of good. They've tripled in size over the last couple of days, I swear.
Lunchtime reading
Mar. 5th, 2007 11:27 am"Kings and corporations scribbled IOUs on the backs of napkins and promised to sort everything out once the heat was off."
Back to reading BLINDSIGHT by Peter Watts--it's lunch break, ok?--and enjoying the hell out of it. Tracking the POV changes, or the changes that turn out not to be, is proving a bit of a challenge, but I still like it a lot and frankly, I usually don't go in for harder SF.
Funny how you can come to care for characters. Putting someone in a vulnerable position doesn't always do it--I've read crying and wailing and death in the wings and set the book aside after a few chapters. Niceness is not, Not, NOT a prerequisite. Don't need to want to have a beer with them. Need to want to *read* about them. Two completely different things.
Maybe it's the internal tension, and the hint of frustration. Resignation. Anger. It's inexplicable as any other sort of attraction, when you come right down to it, and why shouldn't it be.
Must go read now...
Back to reading BLINDSIGHT by Peter Watts--it's lunch break, ok?--and enjoying the hell out of it. Tracking the POV changes, or the changes that turn out not to be, is proving a bit of a challenge, but I still like it a lot and frankly, I usually don't go in for harder SF.
Funny how you can come to care for characters. Putting someone in a vulnerable position doesn't always do it--I've read crying and wailing and death in the wings and set the book aside after a few chapters. Niceness is not, Not, NOT a prerequisite. Don't need to want to have a beer with them. Need to want to *read* about them. Two completely different things.
Maybe it's the internal tension, and the hint of frustration. Resignation. Anger. It's inexplicable as any other sort of attraction, when you come right down to it, and why shouldn't it be.
Must go read now...
Lunchtime reading
Mar. 5th, 2007 11:27 am"Kings and corporations scribbled IOUs on the backs of napkins and promised to sort everything out once the heat was off."
Back to reading BLINDSIGHT by Peter Watts--it's lunch break, ok?--and enjoying the hell out of it. Tracking the POV changes, or the changes that turn out not to be, is proving a bit of a challenge, but I still like it a lot and frankly, I usually don't go in for harder SF.
Funny how you can come to care for characters. Putting someone in a vulnerable position doesn't always do it--I've read crying and wailing and death in the wings and set the book aside after a few chapters. Niceness is not, Not, NOT a prerequisite. Don't need to want to have a beer with them. Need to want to *read* about them. Two completely different things.
Maybe it's the internal tension, and the hint of frustration. Resignation. Anger. It's inexplicable as any other sort of attraction, when you come right down to it, and why shouldn't it be.
Must go read now...
Back to reading BLINDSIGHT by Peter Watts--it's lunch break, ok?--and enjoying the hell out of it. Tracking the POV changes, or the changes that turn out not to be, is proving a bit of a challenge, but I still like it a lot and frankly, I usually don't go in for harder SF.
Funny how you can come to care for characters. Putting someone in a vulnerable position doesn't always do it--I've read crying and wailing and death in the wings and set the book aside after a few chapters. Niceness is not, Not, NOT a prerequisite. Don't need to want to have a beer with them. Need to want to *read* about them. Two completely different things.
Maybe it's the internal tension, and the hint of frustration. Resignation. Anger. It's inexplicable as any other sort of attraction, when you come right down to it, and why shouldn't it be.
Must go read now...
Sunday evening
Jan. 7th, 2007 07:39 pmI can't read Rupert Everett's autobio while I'm working on Endgame. He has A Style and I'm an awful mimic and it's kind of like the time I watched All About Eve, then afterwards wrote about three pages of dialogue, all of which I wound up pitching. Because I pick up the beat and the language and Rupe on the Loose in Paris is not the flavor for which we are looking. Not now. Maybe later.
Still revising. In a way, I hope these next few weeks last forever, but in another way, the end can't come soon enough. I like this book, but I want it done. It's dragged on like the raising of the Titanic, and it's time to move on. To what, I have no clue. But on, in any case.
Still revising. In a way, I hope these next few weeks last forever, but in another way, the end can't come soon enough. I like this book, but I want it done. It's dragged on like the raising of the Titanic, and it's time to move on. To what, I have no clue. But on, in any case.
Sunday evening
Jan. 7th, 2007 07:39 pmI can't read Rupert Everett's autobio while I'm working on Endgame. He has A Style and I'm an awful mimic and it's kind of like the time I watched All About Eve, then afterwards wrote about three pages of dialogue, all of which I wound up pitching. Because I pick up the beat and the language and Rupe on the Loose in Paris is not the flavor for which we are looking. Not now. Maybe later.
Still revising. In a way, I hope these next few weeks last forever, but in another way, the end can't come soon enough. I like this book, but I want it done. It's dragged on like the raising of the Titanic, and it's time to move on. To what, I have no clue. But on, in any case.
Still revising. In a way, I hope these next few weeks last forever, but in another way, the end can't come soon enough. I like this book, but I want it done. It's dragged on like the raising of the Titanic, and it's time to move on. To what, I have no clue. But on, in any case.
Everyone's talking about 2007 reading, so lemming that I am...
Reading duties for the PKD are over, so I can go back to reading-not-as-homework again. Started Blindsight, and was grabbed pretty firmly by the Prologue. Reading will be spotty until I get the Endgame revisions finished, but I think I'm going to like this one. I usually hate jumping on book bandwagons--I'm always fighting the feeling that something is being shoved down my throat--but, well, if this continues the way of the Prologue...
Also received Rupert Everett's autobiography, which looks like it will be fun.
Reading duties for the PKD are over, so I can go back to reading-not-as-homework again. Started Blindsight, and was grabbed pretty firmly by the Prologue. Reading will be spotty until I get the Endgame revisions finished, but I think I'm going to like this one. I usually hate jumping on book bandwagons--I'm always fighting the feeling that something is being shoved down my throat--but, well, if this continues the way of the Prologue...
Also received Rupert Everett's autobiography, which looks like it will be fun.
Everyone's talking about 2007 reading, so lemming that I am...
Reading duties for the PKD are over, so I can go back to reading-not-as-homework again. Started Blindsight, and was grabbed pretty firmly by the Prologue. Reading will be spotty until I get the Endgame revisions finished, but I think I'm going to like this one. I usually hate jumping on book bandwagons--I'm always fighting the feeling that something is being shoved down my throat--but, well, if this continues the way of the Prologue...
Also received Rupert Everett's autobiography, which looks like it will be fun.
Reading duties for the PKD are over, so I can go back to reading-not-as-homework again. Started Blindsight, and was grabbed pretty firmly by the Prologue. Reading will be spotty until I get the Endgame revisions finished, but I think I'm going to like this one. I usually hate jumping on book bandwagons--I'm always fighting the feeling that something is being shoved down my throat--but, well, if this continues the way of the Prologue...
Also received Rupert Everett's autobiography, which looks like it will be fun.
