Wednesday Reading Meme
Jun. 26th, 2024 10:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerWhat I’ve Just Finished Reading
Jane Louise Curry’s The Ice Ghosts Mystery, a pleasant children’s mystery from the 1970s. The Birds’ father, famous seismologist Dr. Bird, has gone missing in the Alps near the Austrian hamlet of Reisenmoos, where there have recently been seismological disturbances, perhaps connected to the recent sightings of the village’s fabled Ice Ghosts…
In fact, the ice ghost sightings are merely costumes to cover the comings and goings of the villains, who have invented an earthquake-causing machine, which they are using to blackmail cities into giving them cold hard cash. So that was a bit of a bummer, because given the choice I would always choose real ice ghosts, but that is simply not the story that this book is telling.
What I’m Reading Now
I have at long last begun William Dean Howells’ Italian Journeys! Howells’ travel books are always either a slog or a joy, and this one to my relief is a joy, even though Howells definitely thinks that I know more about the history of the various dukedoms of Italy than I do.
This book is about Howells’ travels in Italy during his consulship in Venice, during the American Civil War. The Italians, being in the midst of their own war for unification, were interested in this American war of near-disunification, and at one point Howells meets an Italian sea captain who informs him sternly that slavery isn’t really the cause of the war. No?, says Howells, wondering if the sea captain subscribes to the English theory that the war is about tariffs.
In Italy, the captain explains, they have found that such disorders always have the same root cause: “The Jesuits.”
What I Plan to Read Next
My birthday is coming! I usually have a short, fun book planned to read on my birthday (past contenders have included Kenneth Grahame’s The Reluctant Dragon and Mary Stolz’s Fredou), but this year the birthday book question fell to the wayside, as all my planning energies have been taken up by France. Will have to consider the question post haste!
Jane Louise Curry’s The Ice Ghosts Mystery, a pleasant children’s mystery from the 1970s. The Birds’ father, famous seismologist Dr. Bird, has gone missing in the Alps near the Austrian hamlet of Reisenmoos, where there have recently been seismological disturbances, perhaps connected to the recent sightings of the village’s fabled Ice Ghosts…
In fact, the ice ghost sightings are merely costumes to cover the comings and goings of the villains, who have invented an earthquake-causing machine, which they are using to blackmail cities into giving them cold hard cash. So that was a bit of a bummer, because given the choice I would always choose real ice ghosts, but that is simply not the story that this book is telling.
What I’m Reading Now
I have at long last begun William Dean Howells’ Italian Journeys! Howells’ travel books are always either a slog or a joy, and this one to my relief is a joy, even though Howells definitely thinks that I know more about the history of the various dukedoms of Italy than I do.
This book is about Howells’ travels in Italy during his consulship in Venice, during the American Civil War. The Italians, being in the midst of their own war for unification, were interested in this American war of near-disunification, and at one point Howells meets an Italian sea captain who informs him sternly that slavery isn’t really the cause of the war. No?, says Howells, wondering if the sea captain subscribes to the English theory that the war is about tariffs.
In Italy, the captain explains, they have found that such disorders always have the same root cause: “The Jesuits.”
What I Plan to Read Next
My birthday is coming! I usually have a short, fun book planned to read on my birthday (past contenders have included Kenneth Grahame’s The Reluctant Dragon and Mary Stolz’s Fredou), but this year the birthday book question fell to the wayside, as all my planning energies have been taken up by France. Will have to consider the question post haste!
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Date: 2024-06-27 12:56 pm (UTC)That rather reminds me of a moment in the fist Marvel Ant-Man, in which a character attributes assorted superhero/villain goings-on to...Gypsies.
no subject
Date: 2024-06-27 02:40 pm (UTC)