Books

[dsrtao]

I've been running short of books.

_Midnight Alley_, Rachel Caine

Book three about the vampires of Morgantown, Texas. Now we know: these are the only vampires left in the world, and they are all getting sick. Also, nobody blinks at a 16 year old freshman girl switching mid-semester into senior-level courses, including physics. This may be because the author's understanding of physics appears to be at the pop-science level. Oooh, strings. Also also, we are now two for two in bad things happening at big off-campus parties.

Comments

Branch Out

[robertdfeinman.livejournal.com]

Perhaps you need to investigate some new genres. I think the appeal that many find in science fiction and fantasy is the implicit social commentary and not the technology.

Jules Verne is always mentioned for his scientific foresight, but what makes him a great writer is how he always tied the situation back to the human condition. Captain Nemo is the most obvious example.

I don't have any suggestions, but there are many novels from the past two hundred years which dealt with social conditions in the framework of a family or personal narrative. There were a rash of the them in the Dickens period dealing with the problems of the industrial revolution, there were a similar set in the US at the turn of the 20th Century as well. The current movie about oil based upon a novel of Upton Sinclair seems to indicate that some of these themes are still relevant.

I'm sure there are many contemporary examples as well, but I haven't been keeping up, I have enough trouble with the non-fiction BSO's (book shaped objects) that pundits keep publishing that deal with world affairs and economic concerns.

Sometimes a good librarian can make suggestions based upon what you have been reading. It's worth asking for some advice.

[dsrtao]

I think I read to escape both reality and history. I view most of history as "examples in What Didn't Work Out Well". I've read most of the 18th-20th century's canonical literature, anyway.

[robertdfeinman.livejournal.com]

Try mysteries. They at least provide a puzzle to be solved which may be intellectually stimulating in a way far removed from other challenges.

There are enough varieties that you may find a genre you like. I once read all the Father Brown stories, but I'm cured now...

[ladymacgregor.livejournal.com]

hey - I LIKE Father Brown! AND Lord Peter Wimsey! AND Miss Marple! AND Spenser, and Precious Ramotswe, and Judge Dee, and Jane Austen (girl detective!) and Aunt Dimity, and . . .