Lost worlds and ports of call
I’ve wanted to read Nick Hornby for quite some time. Now I have a nice matching set from which I can pick and choose. It’s not a complete set, and I face the tough task of finding books in the US that match this format. To start with I picked Fever Pitch.
More or less complete now.
Along with the four Henning Mankell books pictured here, all with a curiously similar cover design, I’ve bought four other Mankell novels, six Per Wahloo (and Maj Sjowall) novels, two Asa Larrson novels, five by Jo Nesbø, a couple of P.D. James books (one fiction, one non-fiction), a Patricia Highsmith classic, and a detective book by the 2014 Nobel Literature Prize winner: the French writer, Patrick Modiano.
Scandinavian crime landscapes
I haven’t read all the books yet. Nesbø has a cinematic and kinetic style, steeped in Hollywood. His anti-hero is dark, bitter, unlikeable. Mankell is more sedate, his main character morose but not as bitter and self-destructive as Nesbø’s Harry Hole. I’m still reading Asa Larrson, and don’t yet have a feel for her main characters yet. I know the Highsmith novel will annoy me, because the main character is a conman, a crook, a swindler. I haven’t read James in well over a decade, but I used to like her books. Wahloo and Sjowall come highly recommended, and I look forward to reading their books.
Today I received in the mail a copy of Alongside Night: The Graphic Novel. Based on a screenplay of J. Neil Schulman’s 1979 debut novel, and updated for the present age, this new version Alongside Night also has finished production as a movie. The trailer is available on IMDB.com, and stars some big names such as Kevin Sorbo, Tim Russ, and Garrett Wang (the latter two from Star Trek: Voyager). The graphic novel appear adapted from the screenplay rather than the original novel, which makes it shorter and changes some of the settings but no major plot elements.
Just finished Ramez Naam’s sequel to his superb 2012 novel Nexus, called Crux. Quite a breathtaking book in terms of near future ideas and non-stop action. Picking up a few months after the events in Nexus, the sequel rushes down the same paths, with many old characters plus a few new ones. Naam has narrative talent, and clearly a third book will follow.
Over at Wired, and interview with Margaret Atwood. Also, some notes from a panel on political fiction, with contributions from other writers.
This puts my small collection to shame.
A few years ago, when the number of Discworld books were below 20 and I was scouring used book stores for some of the early books, I bought only paperback. Since then, I have a few hard covers, but I still usually wait for the paperbacks, despite their awful covers. If I had the money, I could scrap all those books and get the collector’s library. Each volume is only 10 quid, which means they’ll be devilishly hard to get in the US.
I’ve been following Scott Bieser’s serialized online graphic novel, Quantum Vibe, since day one. This month the first volume of his panels was published as a book, available from the usual sources. Weighing in at 236 pages, the first volume focuses on Nicole, a young woman, often irresponsible and prone to drink and scenes, who embarks on a new career and life of adventure after getting dumped by her flake boyfriend.
In the aftermath of her depression and self-indulgance, she is fired and forced to look for new work. She interviews for a job as personal assistant to a peripatetic inventor/businessman, Dr. Seamus O’Murchadha, who has a bold and ambitious project that needs a pilot and all-around gopher. Young Nicole at first is overwhelmed, bt later accepts, and begins a journey that will take her from the sun and outward, with stops along the way at various planets and orbital stations. Continue reading
From the remarkable people at Subterranean Press, news about a vast anthology in the worlds of grandmaster sf writer Poul Anderson. Multiverse contains stories by writers like Greg Bear, Nancy Kress, Gregory Benford, and many others. Currently available as a pre-order, it will be available in limited and trade editions.
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