Reading Rainbow

So I took another break from the Dune series to catch up on some other reading, and to help build up some personal momentum for the end of the series.

Brandon Sanderson's completion of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series (A Memory of Light) was masterfully done.  Sanderson brought back a lot of my excitement for the series that had dwindled with Jordan's dithering over the series.  I don't know if I'll ever do a straight through reading of this series, but I can say I appreciate the ending.

Then I caught up on my Magic Chick-Lit books with Kim Harrison (Ever After) and Patricia Briggs (Frost Burned).  They're both always fun modern-magic reads.

And then I've been enjoying some comic book compilations on the iPad.  They're all books that I have hard copies of, but are fun to be able to read in bed or at work without carrying the trade paperbacks around with me all of the time.

And just last night, I finished Frank Herbert's Heretics of Dune.  I think this book is what shaped my memory of Frank Herbert's writing style.  When I began reading the books after the movie came out, I had read very little science fiction.  Heretics is an ever accelerating book of action with some of the events left to your imagination, being mentioned only by character's thinking back to them.

At lunch today I started Chapterhouse Dune, and I can remember parts of what is to come that make me want to sit and just read all day.

While the Wife's Away...

.. the husband reads.

Not that I wouldn't be reading anyway, but last night and today have been petty much dedicated to reading with only a slight break for a run for comics.

Last night, I finished Kim Harrison's Black Magic Sanction. I like that her character Rachel Morgan is no longer defined by making stupid decisions every third chapter. She's grown, and the book was wonderful to read. And of course, is set up for the next sequel.

This evening, I just finished Kelley Armstrong's Frostbitten. This one is back with the werewolves, especially with Elena as the main character. It read faster than the Harrison book, but was smaller. Still also a good femme-fantasy romp.

And now I'm on to Larry Niven and Edward M. Lerner's Destroyer of Worlds. I read the dedication and the dramatis personae.

The dedication: To Werner Heisenberg - Maybe

And the dramatix personae makes me near giddy to begin reading; it mentions the Pak.

White Witch, Black Curse

I think what intrigues me the most about Kim Harrison's books are their titles. Basing them on Clint Eastwood movies is really fun.

Although I need to look and see if Eastwood had anything to do with Dead Man Walking... (Not according to IMDB)

Anyway, this one stumped me a bit until I remember the movie of some famous author hunting in Africa: White Hunter, Black Heart.

As for the book, it's been great over the arc of the books to see Rachel Morgan become (mostly) responsible. She actually thinks before she gets herself into trouble, and does her damnedest to get herself out what she ends up in instead of going "woe is me" through half of the book. Harrison also ties in two short stories she wrote in Dates from Hell, and Holidays are Hell. The first is about Rachel as an eighteen-year-old, and the second is essentially how Ivy get matched up with Rachel in Inderland Security.

It only took me a little over two days to read, but this book will hold me until the next one. However, I am definitely eager for more.

Beneficial

I discovered something yesterday at the gym: listening to music while working out makes me work harder than listening to Smodcast.

Yesterday, because of the new Kim Harrison book in my hand, i decided to read while working out and listen to my rock playlist. This instead of listening to the latest SModcast, as has been my recent want.

And it turned out that by subconsciously matching my rhythm to the music instead of two mellow guys talking, I worked harder. My pulse went from edging close to 120 to being over 130 for most of the time in the gym.

A good thing to know.

Then on top of this, I have a bit of personal joy to share. At the beginning of March I had a physical related for my 40-Hour HAZWOPER certification, and found out I was down to about 195 pounds from anywhere between 200 to 205 for the end of last year. Tuesday I decided to check on the balance at the gym, with a little fewer clothes and without shoes. It turns out I am down to 190 pounds.

That was a nice little pick me up.

A Slight Shuffling

I've played around with the sidebar a bit. There's a new feature that reads RSS feeds, so I re-entered all of my links, and added in some new ones that I either hadn't put in before, or hadn't updated. I didn't do the title of the latest update because I thought it made it too long. I do think the site icon beside those with RSS is cool though.

I finished Wintersmith tonight, and will try reading Prom Dates from Hell. It has a Kim Harrison story in it, but her site notes that it is not a tale from the Hollows unfortunately, and is a whole new world (fuck you Aladdin, get out of my head!). We'll see.

After that I've got some non-fiction books (the horror!), and I'll be interspersing some graphic novels. I'm working through Y: The Last Man by Brian Vaughan as they come in from the library. I'm halfway through, and while it is a worthy read, I don't think I'll be purchasing it. It's kind of like Akira; people who read comics should read it, but I don't see the need to revisit it.

There was blood

So I'm sitting at my computer last night, and I have to sneeze. I do and then follow that with a good nose blowing. And then my left nostril just started running... with blood. The inside of my nose has been so fragile and dry with this sickness, it almost overshadows the sore throat. And the only thing I could remember from my first-aid class (only a month and a half ago) was to lean forward and pinch the bridge of my nose. Maybe there's no more to it than that, but that was all I could remember. Through the evening I had three more relapses, one of which I ended up with blood on my pants.

I ended up getting ahead of it and plugging it up safely, but I was nervous before going to bed. I kept expecting to wake up in the night with a big blood stain flowing over the pillow and onto the bed.

So today I am taking it easy... again. I'm tired of being inside. I don't mind being inside normally, but when you have to stay in it's annoying to say the least. So I'm reading.

I just finished Terry Pratchett's The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents which is really fun, and I caught more bad Pratchett in-jokes this time around. So I'm on to the fifth and sixth Kim Harrison book. When I'm done I'll go back to Pratchett and read the three Tiffany Aching books.

And speaking of Terry Pratchett, we watched the English television adaptation of Hogfather this week. That was really amazing. The only two big name stars were the ones who played Lord Downey and Archancellor Ridcully. I'm excited about The Colour of Magic which is actually TCoM and The Light Fantastic. It has Tim Curry and Jeremy Irons in it as well as a huge host of other big names. In fact, just go to IMDB and check out The Colour of Magic.

I am in awe.

And it had better come to the US soon.

Cincinnati of the Damned and other vacation locales

Right now I'm about half through Kim Harrison's Rachel Morgan series. I've been en joying the stories and have to agree with my friends who have also read them that Rachel is constantly doing stupid things, and that the background characters are usually more interesting that Rachel is. But I'd still recommend it for people who like a little romance/modern fantasy.

I also like it because the local home for non-humans (vamps, weres, and witches) is across the river from Cincinnati, and that's where I was born.

For other books in a similar vein (sorry), I like Magic Bites the first of the Kate Daniels series by Ilona Andrews.

But the best of all is Kelley Armstrong's Women of the Otherworld. It's almost a scientific modern fantasy series. There are werewolves which are covered in the first two books and I think the sixth, and then witches, warlocks, demons, vampires, and necromancers are slowly introduced. The characters are captivating and you can really feel their emotions as you read.

And now, I have to admit that aside from the old Thieves' World series, I don't usually read women authors. I think I got a bad taste in head over them from Lynn Abbey and Janet Morris. Morris always wrote of violent men and aloof and/or helpless women. Abbey, just never thrilled me. And so I was very surprised when I read my first book by Kage Baker.

I read a collection of short stories called Mother Aegypt, and I had never had my emotions played with so much while I read. So I started her Tales of the Company, and thoroughly enjoyed it, both the full length books, and the short story collections. And the Anvil of the World was a great fantasy world.