Archive for September, 2010

Reading Meme: Day Seven

Day 07 – A writer you don’t like

I already answered this one, didn’t I? Chalker really is the end game answer to that question. Oh, but Patricia Cornwell worked her way into that state, too, as the Scarpetta books went on, becoming less plausible/less possible for the reader to figure out (and I don’t read mysteries so I can be clever, I just want the story. But I want a *chance* at figuring ‘em out, dammit.), and I gave up on Elizabeth George after reading about eight of her books in a row because oh my god the depression. But I didn’t start out not liking them. It was an evolution, whereas despite reading eight or ten Chalker books I never liked any of them.

I’m sure there are others who fit into this category, but I’m coming up short this time, so this’ll do.

Reading Meme: Day Six

Day 06 – Your favourite writer

I’m afraid this meme is going to get a bit repetitive, at this rate. Guy Gavriel Kay is probably my favorite writer, though I do not unconditionally love everything he’s written. I really have to go back and re-read A SONG FOR ARBONNE, which I wasn’t particularly taken with, but I wonder if it would improve upon re-reading. And I will probably never re-read THE LIONS OF AL-RASSAN because the last chapter makes me crazy, which is a crying shame, as up to that point it’s my favorite of his books.

But–to throw a wrench in the monkeyworks–another favorite of mine is Hemingway. Like GGK (and this is the only way in which they are similar), Hemingway either works for you or does not work for you. He happens to work for me.

Oddly, because I don’t read a lot of poetry, some of my other favorites are poets: Rainer Maria Rilke and Dylan Thomas, to whom I was introduced thanks to Vincent in Beauty and the Beast; Tennyson (who is my favorite poet), to whom I was introduced thanks to Robert A. Heinlein; Walt Whitman, to whom I was introduced thanks to my freshman English course in college.

Now I’m trying to think if there are any authors whose writing I love unconditionally, and damned if I can think of any. I mean, I could be coy and say C.E. Murphy, but even that’s not true. The poets, weirdly enough, come closest. Huh.

Readign Meme: Day Five

Day 05 – A book you hate

I really do wish I could remember the book I read when I was 19, the one that made me say, “Christ, I can do better than *this*,” and sit down to write my first novel. But I honestly have no idea what it was.

There are, though, some books I can make blanket “I loathed this” statements about. In fact, there are authors who fit wholesale into that category: Jack L. Chalker is one of them. And for some reason I read quite a *lot* of Chalker as a teen, so I can say with impunity that I really dislike his books.

Stephen R. Donaldson narrowly misses that categorization, too. I read the Covenant books–at least three or four, disliking them more and more as I went on–and had I realized the Mordant’s Need books were by the same writer I’d never have picked them up. But I did, and I quite like them, so Donaldson isn’t a wholesale loss for me.

One book I actually feel sort of guilty admitting to disliking, because the author died recently and was the friend of many of my LJ-writer-friends, is Robert Holdstock’s MYTHAGO WOOD, which I mistakenly believed had been written by Charles de Lint. I disliked it so violently that I held it against de Lint for about fifteen years before discovering he hadn’t written it. I *still* haven’t read any de Lint, but at least I’m no longer blaming someone else’s book on him.

Nor did I like Michael Swanwick’s THE IRON DRAGON’S DAUGHTER, which still frustrates me because I love the title beyond reason. In fact, the Inheritors’ Cycle books were spawned by that title, and I’m grumpy that I can’t use it for myself.

Outside the genre, I positively hated THE RED BADGE OF COURAGE. I do believe it’s the first book I ever quit reading. I stopped at the bit where the guy gets shot through the cheek. It was just too gross, even though I had a quiz on it. Fortunately, my friend Peter had finished the book and told me what I needed to know (in exchange, I told him what happened in LORD JIM, and I believe we both passed the tests). And A SEPARATE PEACE is also on my short list of gaaaah never again. And I already mentioned the great disappointment of EMILY’S QUEST, which is probably enough to end this blog on. :)

Reading Meme: Day Four

Day 04 – Your favorite book ever

Ted says the answer to this is Guy Gavriel Kay’s TIGANA, and he’s probably right. I’ve read it, I don’t know, a dozen times, and it continues to work for me, which GGK either does or does not, for readers. I love its inevitability of tragedy and the moments of joy that counteract them–though largely they’re so well entwined you don’t get one without the other in that book. The doom is all *perfect*, and I just adore it.

EMILY’S CLIMB, by L.M. Montgomery, is another one for the short list, though. It’s the second of the Emily books and my favorite of the three (the third, sadly, fails on so many levels, particularly the end, which is just a *disaster*, that I stopped re-reading it when I re-read the series, but the first two are splendid.).

BLACK SUN RISING by C.S. Friedman’s another one for the short list. I like the whole trilogy, but there’s a moment in BSR which just makes me shriek with glee, so even if I didn’t really like the book to begin with, that moment puts it way over the top into the realm of my favorites.

You know, going back to day one, /Michele Sagara’s “Cast” series should have gone onto my list of favorite more-than-three-books series. They read like urban fantasy, except they’re totally second-world, with dragons and elves (she said, handwaving wildly to suggest the word is only vaguely accurate but will still give you the right idea) and leonine aliens and tentacled aliens and hawkmen aliens, where “aliens” means “non-human races” rather than “little green men”. Anyway, they’re really good reads, and if you want to try the world out, there’s a Cast novella coming out in a new anthology from Luna, HARVEST MOON, er, next week actually. This is not a paid advertisement. :)

Right then. That’s enough of the reading meme for today!

Reading Meme: Day Three

Day 03 – Your favorite recent book

*looks despairing* This would be easier if I’d read more than seven books this year, all of which I quite liked. I may have to go with Jack Campbell’s THE LOST FLEET: VICTORIOUS, which is the final book in the Lost Fleet series, which are military SF that do exactly what they say on the box. I have enjoyed them probably beyond their actual literary value because of that, but since there’s not much more you can ask for in books, yeah, I think that might be my favorite recent book.

Close runner-up, though, is Jackie Kessler and Caitlin Kittredge’s SHADES OF GRAY (sequel to BLACK AND WHITE), which is a superhero novel and also does exactly what it says on the tin to a very satisfactory level. That, it seems, is what I’m looking for in books right now. :)

Also, one more guest blog from me over at Drey’s Library, this one about the future of the Old Races universe!

Reading Meme: Day Two

Day 02 – A book that you wish more people had read

I’m not sure I have a good answer for this one. Possibly Kim Stanley Robinson’s “Science in the Capital” series, encompassing FORTY SIGNS OF RAIN, FIFTY DEGREES BELOW, and SIXTY DAYS AND COUNTING, which I find to be brilliant, thought-provoking, and exciting environmental novels. They remind me of Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself” with their lyricism: they are books which should be read at least half-aloud to appreciate the rhythm of the words. They are not, I fear, easy reads, but I really like them. At the very least I wish all politicians would read them.

Darn. That’s all I’ve got for this one.

New Interview!

September is the month of interviews, it seems. New interview posted at Bookmark Your Thoughts! Enjoy!

Reading Meme: Day One

Picked this meme up at Livejournal, and thought it would be an entertaining way to generate some content for CEMurphy.net. It’s 30 days of answering questions about favorite books, and you can’t go wrong with that!

Day One: Your favourite series of books (with more than 3 in the series)

The Belgariad, by David Eddings: Okay, so maybe I’m still fourteen at heart, and maybe they’re classic predictable fantasy tropes, but I still love those books. Especially Silk and Barak, who remain among my favorite characters ever.

The Dark Is Rising Sequence, by Susan Cooper: I think part of the reason I love these above and beyond all the other fantasy I read as a kid is that the magic doesn’t…quite…go away. It more goes on hiatus, with the hope of returning someday. And this is the only series which ever inspired me to memorize poetry, which I can still quote, lo these thirty years later. Honestly, I think this is one of the greatest series in the genre.

The J.P. Beaumont books, by J.A. Jance: I actually need to go back and catch up on these, as it’s been years since I’ve read them, but these detective novels set in Seattle are among my favorites, for, among other reasons, the fact that J.A. Jance said, “I don’t know what happened. I sent them off on a cruise at the end of a book, and when I came back to write the next one they were married!” about a couple of the characters. That’s exactly how it works. :)

The Benjamin January novels, by Barbara Hambly (): set in 1830s New Orleans, these have not only a fantastic sense of the historical, but are terrific mysteries as well. The main character, Benjamin January, is a free man of color and a surgeon trained in Paris who has returned to his beloved, complicated New Orleans after his wife’s death. I cannot recommend these books highly enough.

The Anne Books, L.M. Montgomery: Though the later books are not as beloved to me as the first few, I still do love the Anne books. And I think they’re probably a good place to wrap up this particular blog, since I’m afraid I’d go on all day otherwise. :)

Live at Bitten By Books!

I’m up and running over at Bitten By Books for the next day or so–there’s a new interview posted, and I’ll be popping by regularly to answer questions. There are a couple of prizes for people who participate–a copy of TRUTHSEEKER, and an Irish Care Package which will also include a copy of TRUTHSEEKER, so come on over and chat!

guest blogging!

I’m guest blogging over at Drey’s Library today (and off and on all month!). Pop on over for a chance to win a copy of TRUTHSEEKER!