evelyn_b

Hardly a Murder Monday this week, since I haven't actually read anything in the past seven days but Susana Moreira Marques and a poetry chapbook called copy/body by Maryan Captan (not about murder). But here are a couple of useless placeholders anyway:

1. I didn't buy Ritual da Morte or any other books from the used bookstore before I left town, because I did a test pack first and found I didn't have room. The baggage restrictions I was worried about turned out to be less strictly enforced than they could have been, so it wouldn't actually have hurt anything if I'd just stuffed them in a tote. . . but I didn't know that at the time, so I'm six euro richer and several shabby paperbacks poorer than I might have been. I wish I'd taken a picture of the cover, though.

2. Some of you might enjoy this "Sherlock vs. Sayers" quiz (can you tell which dialogue was written by the BBC Sherlock team and which by Dorothy L. Sayers? Probably you can). There are no spoilers for either series. I was a little sorry to learn that the "Sherlock" for this quiz is notoriously incompetent detective BBC Sherlock, instead of the much more likeable and efficient ACD Holmes. At first I was going to say something concilatory about it like maybe it's easier to sell your eccentricity in writing than in live action, but actually other adaptations do just fine. Holmes doesn't even have to be a cartoon mouse for it to work.

(One of these days I'm going to watch Sherlock S4 and who knows, maybe it'll be goofy enough for me to start liking it again).

Archived from Livejournal

From bearshorty, fifty-five questions about books for me to answer instead of getting my work week in order.

( Questions about books! )

Archived from Livejournal

What I've Just Finished Reading

The Girl in Blue by P. G. Wodehouse. It's kind of an odd Wodehouse, a very late book, if the publisher's date is correct -- 1970! I didn't think to check until there was a stray reference to the moon landing; other than that and one or two other details, you'd never guess it hadn't been written in the Thirties. Maybe knowing the publication date made it feel more faded than it would have otherwise, but there's no way to tell now. It's mild and pleasant but not hilarious.

What I'm Reading Now

I haven't made much progress on Titus Groan or The Group; I've been in kind of a procrastinatory stew over the past couple of weeks and can't account very well for my whereabouts or activities. But I'm still enjoying them both a lot.

Also reading: Some Words of Jane Austen, which is exactly the sort of "literary criticism" I like to read. It's just this guy who's really into Jane Austen, going on a tear about the importance of various words like "sensibility" and "amiable," plus lots of quotes from the juvenilia, which invariably make me laugh.

What I Plan to Read Next

Probably How Far Can You Go? by David Lodge, whenever I finish Titus Groan. It's not next on the 99 Novels chronology, but it is in my house. It's also getting to be about time to read the next C. P. Snow book, The Light and the Dark, but I will have to get that one from the library.