50 Book Challenge 2017 Part Six

[southeastdweller]

Welcome to the sixth thread of the 50 Book Challenge for this year.

The challenge is to read fifty books (or more!) in 2017, though reading fifty isn't mandatory. Any type of book can count, it's not too late to join, and please try to let us all know your thoughts on what you've read.

The first thread of the year is here, the second one here, the third thread here, the fourth one here, and the fifth one here.

What are you reading?

Why am I not surprised that I'm the odd one out re: Lincoln in the Bardo?

The narrative structure and multiplicity of voices work for me, though I did get tripped up at times. The foul language and focus on Hans Vollman's enormous member disturbed me much less than the character with multiple eyes not on his face. Those descriptions creeped me out.

Off to put on my reader response hat to ponder our different takes on Saunders...

The enormous member etc didn't disturb me - just seemed so pointless. WHY did he need to have an enormous member? WHY did we keep needing to be reminded of said enormous member? It just didn't make any sense.

And I can swear like a trooper with the best of them, but when you've got two characters who do nothing at all except flap around swearing, it really doesn't add anything (except some swearing - and I can do that myself) to the reader's experience.

For me, Vicar Man, Eyes Man and Member Man (except for his member) were the most interesting bits of the book, but the writer just didn't really do anything with them.

Cheerful

My favourite Father Ted episode ever

I thought the member was a remnant of the disappointing circumstances of his death, that he was denied the longed-for consummation with his bride? He wouldn't move on, so he was forced to physically bear this reminder? (Not a spoiler, by the way.)

As for the swearing characters, I thought they were a foil to the more "refined" characters, a part of the American social culture that's often been rebuffed?

The three major characters work for me, but then again I've often been accused of liking books (and movies) where nothing happens.

"however clever and packed with ingenuity, lacked emotional depth."

You expected "emotional depth" from a book about hacking the brain with verses from Sumerian legends?

31. Shadowplay - Laura Lam - 2nd book in the Micah Grey trilogy. This one had a lot more "YA angst" but while this should have annoyed me, they were hiding with a former stage magician who was teaching them his craft, which is something I always find interesting. Had a proper story that felt like while it was part of a larger storyline, was a complete book in itself.

As an aside, has anyone else found this with trilogies? There always seems to be 2 books that are really just one story stopped halfway through. So many times the end of a book feels like an abrupt stop rather than something that's complete, even if there will be further events in the characters' lives.

32. Lincoln in the Barbo - George Saunders - sorry in the "not impressed" camp.

Just checking in to keep this on my TIO list. No more completed books, having given up on Adults in the Room by Yannis Varoufakis for the moment (memoir about his time as Greek finance minister). I've listened to about 8 hours, and the multiplicity of ways in which he was stitched up is all too plausible, but I'm not sure I can take any more right now. I do sincerely hope that all of Theresa May's team about to be sent of to negotiate Brexit have read it in it's entirety though . . . . (and the Labour shadow cabinet too, come to that).

I've moved on to the new Cassandra Clare on audio for a bit of light relief - entertaining as always, though James Marsters' narration is a bit disappointing. On paper I've just started Reality Is Not What It Seems by Carlo Rovelli which dd highly recommends - good so far, but I've only read the first couple of chapters.

I'm glad I didn't give in to temptation on Lincoln in the Bardo!

VG - But If the member is a mark of issues in life, that means somebody having zillions of eyes and noses is also a mark, and I can't for the life of me think of anything that would explain why a ghost has lots of noses. And did I miss why the Vicar Dude was going to end up in the place where he didn't think he would be ending up (avoiding spoilers) - I may have done, because I was getting so frustrated towards the end!

The more I think about this book, the worse it's getting! As I was reading it, I thought it had a number of good points but they're getting overshadowed for me now by the silly stuff.

31. A houseboat on the styx - John Kendrick Bangs - for a reading challenge prompt. Meh.

Côte, I didn't necessarily expect emotional depth, but I always hope for it! So while I'm really glad I read 'Snow Crash', and it gave me lots to think about and to enjoy, that style of fiction is just not my personal favourite. I would like to read other books by Neal Stephenson, though, as I like reading a wide range of styles and substances.

Re 'Lincoln in the Bardo' (wot, no Italian piazzas?), I was confused by the many eyes and hands too. Why was there a multiplicity of himself? Was it that he had been fractured in life, trying to live a false version of himself? And we never do find out whether the vicar's description is what everyone experiences or what he might have done. The best bits for me were the historical quotations and citations about the White House etc (don't know how many of these were authentic, either) and the bits where we see what Abe is feeling and thinking.

20 A Call for the Dead by John le Carré
The first Smiley novel. Smiley is a somewhat ageing British intelligence officer who had been active in Germany before the second world war. A civil servant he's recently interviewed over communist party connections is dead, having left a suicide note. On visiting the late civil servant's widow, things don't quite add up. There are clear links to some of Smiley's old German connections, and he begins to investigate the possibility of murder.

I enjoyed this. It felt at least as much of a crime novel as an espionage thriller, which was fine by me. Smiley is a great character, although I'm not convinced that he's physically up to a lot of what Le Carré puts him through. It felt a bit less plausibly/tightly plotted than The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, but it's really well written, and felt quite even-handed in its understanding of characters on both sides of the ideological divide.

Remus, perhaps the issue with the minister was righteousness or fear? He was so sure of one thing, and when it didn't play out, he couldn't accept matters and move on.

Ontop, yes, Bevins (eyes guy) was definitely fractured, and I also thought the multiplicity of sensory organs reflected his desire for a sensuous, sexual aspect of his life. Also Part Two, he was very concerned with outside perceptions, so maybe the eyes represented that self consciousness?

I saw Saunders be interviewed about Lincoln before I read it, which I'm sure has influenced my thinking about it, simply because I've heard the thought process that went into his choices. The same thing happened with Swing Time, which I loved but got middling-at-best reviews here. So, I do think I'm influenced in that way, which doesn't necessarily make me a great reviewer. I still love Saunders and Smith and how they play with form, though.

Nope - you're not selling the noses to me, sorry.

Book 58
A Man of Quality by John le Carre
The second George Smiley novel, which, on the whole, I didn’t like as much as the first, although I liked the setting of a British public school. This was fine – certainly enough to keep me interested – but it’s not something I’d bother re-reading.

65. Harbour Street - Ann Cleeves Yet another Vera. Solid as always. Strange reading about the snowy North East in soaring temperatures. These books are taking just the right amount of brain power at the moment. I have one remaining in the Vera series on my Kindle. In a very unusual fit of OCD I am feeling the need to read this one before I move on. I have Lincoln in the Bardo in my sights. Feel the need to see for myself!!

RMC I'm having a similar bout of OCD- currently on my 18th straight Inspector Wexford - may as well finish the series now. It's a welcome escape from current events.

Would never presume to, Remus.

I'm looking forward to seeing what you make of Saunders, RMC.

"I didn't necessarily expect emotional depth, but I always hope for it! So while I'm really glad I read 'Snow Crash', and it gave me lots to think about and to enjoy, that style of fiction is just not my personal favourite."

I think that the "cool" emotions in Snow Crash (and in other near-future cyberpunk novels, really) is intentional and is wholly consistent with the world and lives that are described in the book. It is like how the film Blade Runner was shot entirely in shades of blue/green. The story really wouldn't be the same if YT and Hiro were whining all the time about how sad they are that their lives are not so great, or whatever. Imho, of course

"Vollman's enormous member disturbed me much less than the character with multiple eyes not on his face."

WTH is this book? Is it Lincoln in the Wotsit? I'm glad to hear that my prejudice time-tested conviction that nothing good comes out of 1st books with silly names has been proved correct yet again

Stay well away, Cote. You'd last about three pages, and even then would need oxygen before you fully recovered.

(Persnickety Attitde Ahoy!) While Lincoln is Saunders' first novel, he has published well-received short story collections. And, the title's no more silly than Purgatory. (Persnickety Attitude Over)

That said, you'd haaaaate this book, Cote. Generally speaking, if I like a text, you'd probably best avoid it.

I have to say back in 1992 or whenever I thought calling your lead character Hiro Protagonist was the Coolest. Thing. Ever. (in my defence I was quite young, cyberpunk was pretty damn cool, and it felt like the future was being made all around us).

Vanderly - "the title's no more silly than Purgatory"

Purgatory is actually a thing. It's a word with a meaning.

WTH does "Lincoln in the Bardo" even mean?

"Generally speaking, if I like a text, you'd probably best avoid it. "

I wasn't aware of that. Thanks for the heads up.

I"m with you Sadik.

I also remember reading Neuromancer, Idoru, Snow Crash etc 20+ years ago and going WOW! There was nothing like these books in print before.

29. Nutshell by Ian McEwan. Written from the perspective of an unborn child listening in on the conversations his mother has with other people (mainly her husband and her lover), this requires you to suspend disbelief and accept that an unborn baby possesses the level of comprehension and emotion typical of an adult rather than a newborn. Notwithstanding this, I thought it was cleverly done and a good read. But then I am a McEwan fan (I know not everyone on this thread is).

30. The Penguin Lessons by Tom Mitchell. Sweet but unsubstantial memoir of a man who rescued a penguin from an oil slick, while working as a young teacher in Argentina in the 1970s, and kept it as a pet.

Roughly speaking, bardo is the Tibetan word for Buddhist purgatory. More precisely, it's the space in between lives (dead in this one, not yet in the next one).

Saunders said he got the idea for the book based on the visits that Lincoln made to the crypt that held his son's body. In the narrative, the cemetery itself is a bardo, ergo Lincoln in the Bardo.