![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Wednesday Reading Meme
Dec. 18th, 2013 09:52 amWhat I’ve Just Finished Reading
Rumer Godden’s The Greengage Summer, which is about a group of children who spend a few weeks in a French hotel, alone because their mother has fallen ill and is in the hospital. Nothing much happens for most of the book: it’s a slow exploration of the hotel, and the routine of the hotel and the routine the children make for themselves while they’re there, and the complicated intersecting relationships of the people who run the hotel.
And then, having set up so many dominoes, Godden gently flicks them down. It’s rather fascinating to watch.
This is an adult book about children rather than a children’s book. This isn't so much about content as about, how shall I put it - underlying worldview. The first word that came to mind is bleak or possibly jaded, but that's not quite right. The book is not jaded, but many of the characters are, and their actions are driven by pettiness in a way that is uncommon in children's books.
I think perhaps in children's books, evil usually has a cause deeper than shallowness? I'll have to think about this more.
What I’m Reading Now
Maggie Stiefvater’s The Scorpio Races, which is amazingly awesome. I like the main characters a lot, particularly Puck (Sean took more time to grow on me, because he doesn’t like anyone except his stallion), but I love, love, love the island setting. I love the way its customs unfold as we, through Puck, learn more about the titular Scorpio Races. Every year, humans capture, train (not tame. Water horses are never tame), and race the deadly water horses which rise from the sea and occasionally eat people.
Because obviously if your island is beset by deadly flesh-eating horses of dooooom, the thing to do is to capture them and race them. Obviously.
And I love also that, although the deadly doom horses of the deeps are clearly the most important thing, Stiefvater remembers to flesh out other aspects of the islands as well. I would really, really like to eat a November cake.
Oh, oh! And I love the sibling relationships in this book, particularly Puck's friendship with her little brother Finn. Basically I like this book a lot.
What I Plan to Read Next
Sutcliff’s Mark of the Horse Lord is next, but after that I’m not sure. You guys, I have so many books that I’m planning to read over break, I don’t even know where to start.
But I've finished all my course work, so now I have time to read AS MUCH AS I WANT!
Rumer Godden’s The Greengage Summer, which is about a group of children who spend a few weeks in a French hotel, alone because their mother has fallen ill and is in the hospital. Nothing much happens for most of the book: it’s a slow exploration of the hotel, and the routine of the hotel and the routine the children make for themselves while they’re there, and the complicated intersecting relationships of the people who run the hotel.
And then, having set up so many dominoes, Godden gently flicks them down. It’s rather fascinating to watch.
This is an adult book about children rather than a children’s book. This isn't so much about content as about, how shall I put it - underlying worldview. The first word that came to mind is bleak or possibly jaded, but that's not quite right. The book is not jaded, but many of the characters are, and their actions are driven by pettiness in a way that is uncommon in children's books.
I think perhaps in children's books, evil usually has a cause deeper than shallowness? I'll have to think about this more.
What I’m Reading Now
Maggie Stiefvater’s The Scorpio Races, which is amazingly awesome. I like the main characters a lot, particularly Puck (Sean took more time to grow on me, because he doesn’t like anyone except his stallion), but I love, love, love the island setting. I love the way its customs unfold as we, through Puck, learn more about the titular Scorpio Races. Every year, humans capture, train (not tame. Water horses are never tame), and race the deadly water horses which rise from the sea and occasionally eat people.
Because obviously if your island is beset by deadly flesh-eating horses of dooooom, the thing to do is to capture them and race them. Obviously.
And I love also that, although the deadly doom horses of the deeps are clearly the most important thing, Stiefvater remembers to flesh out other aspects of the islands as well. I would really, really like to eat a November cake.
Oh, oh! And I love the sibling relationships in this book, particularly Puck's friendship with her little brother Finn. Basically I like this book a lot.
What I Plan to Read Next
Sutcliff’s Mark of the Horse Lord is next, but after that I’m not sure. You guys, I have so many books that I’m planning to read over break, I don’t even know where to start.
But I've finished all my course work, so now I have time to read AS MUCH AS I WANT!
