Books moral and immoral

[Artemis@BC]

I have never, ever managed to get to be #1 on a library waiting list .

Well, you have to be kind of, um, obsessive about it.

I have the "new titles" page bookmarked for both my local libraries, and I check them daily -- sometimes more than once a day if there's a particular title I'm expecting. I'm more obsessive about DVDs from the library -- not because I feel any great urgency to see the film (after all, if I did, I'd see more in the theatres, and probably 90% of my new release movie viewing is via library DVDs), but because some library patrons are, shall we say, complete asshats when it comes to handling CDs & DVDs, so if I'm near the head of the queue there's less of a chance that the disc will be scratched or covered in jam.

I'm less obsessive for new release books, but when there's a highly anticipated new title for me coming out, I do tend to check the listings fairly frequently. Since the pub. date for The Casual Vacancy was announced months ago, I managed to get in right away for that one.

(Technically I'm #9 in the queue for The Casual Vacancy, but they're getting 15 copies so I count that as being #1.)

[PrincessLeppard]

My dad really enjoyed Imperial Hubris. I plan to read it....some day....

[numbers123]

The first 5 Anita Blake books are pretty good (first is really good). After that, she had a "personal revolution", divorced her husband and embraced sex (her description) and the books turned into porn with no more mystery.

Like rfisher said the first books were good, then Hamilton got "sex revolutionized". I found the Sign of the Zodiac series by Vikki Pettersson. I've read book 1 and 2. I am not sure about the rest of the series. I love the Sherrilyn Kenyon series Dark-Hunters, The Chronicles of Nick and the Leagues.

[zaphyre14]

I have read this but can't remember the details. I generally like this series (not as much as her Joe Sandilands books). I'm a little OCD about reading series in chronological order and this isn't the first in the series (but maybe you have already read the first one or maybe you aren't OCD like me and don't care ).

I've read "The Tomb of Zeus" which was the first Talbot book in the series. I'm kind of obsessive about reading series in order myself, although I've become looser about it since I've gotten into audio books and have been taking whatever I can get from the library in whatever order they have.

As for Urban Fantasy, I like Harris' Sookie Stackhouse series, but I've given up on Laurel K Hamilton entirely. Jeannine Frost is my current author-of-choice in that genre.

[peibeck]

Scathing review of "A Casual Vacancy" from the NY Times, which was generally favorable to the HP series overall.

Re-thinking my plan of going to buy it over lunch hour.

ETA: Wall Street Journal recaps other reviews

[Zemgirl]

Scathing review of "A Casual Vacancy" from the NY Times, which was generally favorable to the HP series overall.

Quoting from the review:

Instead of an appreciation for the courage, perseverance, loyalty and sense of duty that people are capable of, we are left with a dismaying sense of human weakness, selfishness and gossipy stupidity. Instead of an exhilarating sense of the mythic possibilities of storytelling, we are left with a numbing understanding of the difficulty of turning a dozen or so people’s tales into a story with genuine emotional resonance.

Leaving aside the question of whether this book is well written or not - that doesn't sound all that different from a lot of what's published as literary fiction these days. Why should Rowling be expected to explore the sort of themes she did in HP when writing in a completely different genre, especially when other lit fic authors aren't writing tales of courage and loyalty, either?

[rfisher]

Oh dear. I hate lit fic. I'll pass and wait for her next HP book. I'd never make it through the first chapter of the book. I hate dull.

[skatingfan5]

Oh dear. I hate lit fic. I'll pass and wait for her next HP book. I'd never make it through the first chapter of the book. I hate dull.

From the NYT review:

Unfortunately, the real-life world she has limned in these pages is so willfully banal, so depressingly clichéd that “The Casual Vacancy” is not only disappointing — it’s dull. The novel.... reads like an odd mash-up of a dark soap opera like “Peyton Place” with one of those very British Barbara Pym novels, depicting small-town, circumscribed lives.

This is definitely not a book for children: suicide, rape, heroin addiction, beatings and thoughts of patricide percolate through its pages ...and alarming scenes of violent domestic abuse.

Dear me, I guess J.K. Rowling must have managed some sort of unhappy sorcery to turn those ingredients into dullsville.

[IceAlisa]

Instead of an appreciation for the courage, perseverance, loyalty and sense of duty that people are capable of, we are left with a dismaying sense of human weakness, selfishness and gossipy stupidity.

Why should we be left with any kind of positive note, e.g. appreciation of courage, etc? I don't think that being left off with a depressing commentary on the human nature is necessarily a bad thing. It's quite popular with the rude Euros. That, on its own, is not a problem.

However, if the writing sucks as badly as the condom citation (and I suspect it does, considering that JKR doesn't exactly shine at dramatic narrative writing) and on top of this, overall the book is dull, now those are serious flaws.

I might borrow it from the library to see for myself. But I am deep into my 3rd Maigret novel. Damn, that Simenon was one talented bigot. Here's someone who can set up an atmosphere of mediocre people living mediocre lives in a mediocre suburb with violence lurking under the surface--Maigret Stonewalled.

[rfisher]

From the NYT review: Dear me, I guess J.K. Rowling must have managed some sort of unhappy sorcery to turn those ingredients into dullsville.

Most of the reviews found the dull being the biggest issue. I knew it was dark, but dark doesn't have to be dreary. I gathered from her interviews that she's put a lot of her own past (depression and OCD behavior) along with political climates into the book. She sort of did with Harry abeit somewhat constrained, but the humor and Harry's essential good qualities were always there. Seems she left those out and the characters are just dark and boring. She described the book as a comedic tragedy, except it seems she was short on the comedic parts. She needed a quick witted Ron to liven things up.

[Prancer]

Oh, Nook Color and Nook Tablet owners, look what's out:

Overdrive App: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/over...=2940043354334

3M Cloud App: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/3m-c...=2940043913227

Now you can download library books directly to your device.

[galaxygirl]

Oh, Nook Color and Nook Tablet owners, look what's out:

Overdrive App: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/over...=2940043354334

3M Cloud App: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/3m-c...=2940043913227

Now you can download library books directly to your device.

Nifty! Now if they'd just do that for the regular Nooks...

[skatesindreams]

Why don't you read Ms, Rowling's book, and decide for yourselves if it's dull/boring?

[Artemis@BC]

Why don't you read Ms, Rowling's book, and decide for yourselves if it's dull/boring?

That's certainly what I intend to do. I only agree with literary reviews about 50% of the time anyway. And while positive reviews often encourage me to pick up a book, negative reviews never discourage me from a book I'd planned on reading.

BTW, the AP reviewer liked it!

[skateycat]

Just finished The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan with little skateycat. Moving right along to book two The Sea of Monsters.

[Matryeshka]

The past couple of years have become a fan of urban fantasy - romance or dramatic. I have read everything in my favorite series, and it will be a while before new books are available, so I am looking for something new to read.

These are the stuff I read:
Jim Butcher's Harry Dresden series, love it.
Patricia Brigg's Mercy Thompson and Alpha & Omega series (love, love this - found it accidentally in an airport shop)
Iliona Andrew's Kate Daniel's series, really like this
Nalini Singh's Guild Hunter series, sort of like this. I love the world, the writing is not always great (and I find the smut parts boring , I don't normally)

I'm just requoting because except for the Nalini Singh, we have almost the exact same urban fantasy tastes, and I'm looking for new stuff too. You're way too nice when it comes to Singh. Though I will give it up to her in one respect--her talent to be able to write sex between two hot, buff magic pepole in a way that's as sexy as Charles Dickens prose about factories is extraordinary.

I'm reading Gunmetal Magic right now; I like hearing more about the boudas and Andrea's descriptions of Kate are

As for JKR, she could have written Hamlet and it would have been universally panned; I didn't expect critics to like it. I'm going to wait till someone I know reads it first.

[IceAlisa]

Maigret Stonewalled turned out to be rather overwrought. A very implausibly twisty plot. Again, Maigret is a bit too heroic and idealized for my taste but there is value in the quality of prose and atmosphere. Maigret's future trademark traits such as not really having a method other than to try and get into the victim's and the killer's head as much as possible, are nascent. The novel is one of the Maigret earliest so the style and the main character were still shaping up--not bad at all for the beginning of the series.

I will continue on with Maigret and the hundred gibbets. The title is a bit melodramatic though. I think after Harry Potter and the Dragon Tattoo I am hooked on being hooked on a series. At least this one has 70+ novels.

[Artemis@BC]

I'm about 1/4 into The 100-Year Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared. (Yes, I picked it up just because of the title.) Cute story, lots of dry humour.

[flyingsit]

Finished We Need to Talk About Kevin.. I didn't hate it, but there wasn't a single character I actually liked or respected. Except the teacher.

[Impromptu]

After years of hearing about how wonderful it is, I've uploaded Mark Helprin's Winter's Tale. I'm trying to decide whether to read it right away, or wait for a nice snowy day (which could be as soon as 4 weeks from now, given that I live in Minnesota).