![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Words in the Heart Wednesday
Aug. 24th, 2016 09:54 amArchived from Livejournal
What I've Finished Reading
( Feet of Clay )
Also finished in two days, though not exactly the same two days: Second Foundation. This one has a lot of fast-paced space adventure, which by Foundation standards means we get a continuous arc of many months instead of the usual "twenty pages of meetings + a fifty-year time jump." Don't worry, there are still plenty of time jumps! Arkady Darell, the fourteen-year-old fugitive, is delightful in a very Asimovian and 1950s way. The reader can probably see the big twist coming a little ahead of everyone else, but that's a feature here, not a bug. I love the brief but evocative descriptions of Trantor, now an agricultural planet, and its massive, silent ruins. The thing about the Foundation books is I don't actually care who wins, but they're fun anyway.
I didn't finish Nana in two days, but I did finish it. ( Nana does all right for a while )
And The Story of an African Farm, but I'll save that one for next week, or something.
What I'm Reading Now
The Dark Lantern is just as odd and fascinating and chock full of physical details as ever. Richard, the awkward and stiff-necked butterfly collector, has married Hetty, a sweet, good-humored girl who doesn't understand him but loves him anyway for reasons that are never entirely clear (as sometimes happens). Her father doesn't approve of Richard (he calls him a "humorless stick," which is accurate) and Richard's job depends on him remaining unmarried during his probationary period. Hetty is willing to wait, but Richard doesn't trust her, or himself to keep on attracting her, so they marry in secret. Is this ever not a terrible plan? Hetty goes back to live with her parents, but then she gets pregnant, so it has to come out. Now Hetty and Dickie have set up housekeeping and are waiting for the baby to be born before they attempt to make up with Hetty's dad. The last thing Hetty's dad did was punch Hetty hard enough to knock her unconscious. Everything's a little low-level awful, due in large part to Dickie's humorless stickness -- I was going to quote a passage here, but it looks like I've left the book at home, so next time! Poor Hetty can't do anything right.
Dickie is another character type I haven't necessarily seen a lot of in books - sort of a misanthropic socially conservative nerd? He assumes people won't like him and it makes him more unlikable, and spends a lot of mental energy recasting his insecurities as rare and unfashionable virtues. He reminds me a little of a younger, more physically attractive Ignatius J. Reilly. I think I mentioned this before -- one of the things that makes him interesting is that he's a prude by late Victorian standards, and the other characters recognize him as such.
Meanwhile, Hetty's brother Hughie has syphilis, and is busy trying to hide it from his innocent sister and mother. Aww, Hughie. :( Maybe if you'd been a little more prudish yourself, you wouldn't hurt so much. :(
I just started Foundation's Edge, a 30-years-later sequel to the Foundation trilogy. I haven't been able to get through the later Foundation books before, but now I am in a Foundation-positive mood, so we'll see how long the momentum lasts. Some guy keeps saying there is no Seldon Plan; the Seldonites are taking it badly. I'm inclined to agree with him; the whole thing's seemed fishy from the start.
What I Plan to Read Next
Homegoing, a new book(!) at some point in the near future -- I keep seeing it around and it looks good. The next Watch book, or Equal Rites, possibly depending on which one the library has (if the library has either). Pere Goriot. Maybe some nonfiction??
What I've Finished Reading
( Feet of Clay )
Also finished in two days, though not exactly the same two days: Second Foundation. This one has a lot of fast-paced space adventure, which by Foundation standards means we get a continuous arc of many months instead of the usual "twenty pages of meetings + a fifty-year time jump." Don't worry, there are still plenty of time jumps! Arkady Darell, the fourteen-year-old fugitive, is delightful in a very Asimovian and 1950s way. The reader can probably see the big twist coming a little ahead of everyone else, but that's a feature here, not a bug. I love the brief but evocative descriptions of Trantor, now an agricultural planet, and its massive, silent ruins. The thing about the Foundation books is I don't actually care who wins, but they're fun anyway.
I didn't finish Nana in two days, but I did finish it. ( Nana does all right for a while )
And The Story of an African Farm, but I'll save that one for next week, or something.
What I'm Reading Now
The Dark Lantern is just as odd and fascinating and chock full of physical details as ever. Richard, the awkward and stiff-necked butterfly collector, has married Hetty, a sweet, good-humored girl who doesn't understand him but loves him anyway for reasons that are never entirely clear (as sometimes happens). Her father doesn't approve of Richard (he calls him a "humorless stick," which is accurate) and Richard's job depends on him remaining unmarried during his probationary period. Hetty is willing to wait, but Richard doesn't trust her, or himself to keep on attracting her, so they marry in secret. Is this ever not a terrible plan? Hetty goes back to live with her parents, but then she gets pregnant, so it has to come out. Now Hetty and Dickie have set up housekeeping and are waiting for the baby to be born before they attempt to make up with Hetty's dad. The last thing Hetty's dad did was punch Hetty hard enough to knock her unconscious. Everything's a little low-level awful, due in large part to Dickie's humorless stickness -- I was going to quote a passage here, but it looks like I've left the book at home, so next time! Poor Hetty can't do anything right.
Dickie is another character type I haven't necessarily seen a lot of in books - sort of a misanthropic socially conservative nerd? He assumes people won't like him and it makes him more unlikable, and spends a lot of mental energy recasting his insecurities as rare and unfashionable virtues. He reminds me a little of a younger, more physically attractive Ignatius J. Reilly. I think I mentioned this before -- one of the things that makes him interesting is that he's a prude by late Victorian standards, and the other characters recognize him as such.
Meanwhile, Hetty's brother Hughie has syphilis, and is busy trying to hide it from his innocent sister and mother. Aww, Hughie. :( Maybe if you'd been a little more prudish yourself, you wouldn't hurt so much. :(
I just started Foundation's Edge, a 30-years-later sequel to the Foundation trilogy. I haven't been able to get through the later Foundation books before, but now I am in a Foundation-positive mood, so we'll see how long the momentum lasts. Some guy keeps saying there is no Seldon Plan; the Seldonites are taking it badly. I'm inclined to agree with him; the whole thing's seemed fishy from the start.
What I Plan to Read Next
Homegoing, a new book(!) at some point in the near future -- I keep seeing it around and it looks good. The next Watch book, or Equal Rites, possibly depending on which one the library has (if the library has either). Pere Goriot. Maybe some nonfiction??
