Other people's words
May. 31st, 2004 04:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annathepiperOne good thing about having been sick all weekend is that I was able to do a bit more reading. By all rights I probably should have made a bigger dent in my To Read shelf--but as it happened I wound up re-reading two old things as well as doing new reading. And, well, okay, one thing I've finished off lately was actually done before I got sick, but I'll count it here in this post anyway.
Cape Random: Read as part of my GBS-inspired 'learn more about Newfoundland' kick. This was a hard read--not because of the complexity of the story, necessarily, but because I got this feeling out of the story of simultaneous... how to put this?... density and sparseness. Density because there was a lot of information being conveyed by the words, but sparseness because the writing style was... well, sparse, and bare, and suited to a tale about a tiny settlement on Newfoundland shores. But it was also one of those "slice of life" kind of books rather than anything with a beginning, middle, and end; this seems to happen sometimes, I find, in books that are trying to be "lit-ra-cher" rather than telling a story. There was a good deal of story in this book, but much of what was set up about the main characters never reached any kind of a satisfactory resolution, and I finished it mostly feeling appreciative of having gotten a glimpse of the atmosphere it portrayed rather than having been much interested in any of the people in the tale.
Have His Carcase: Wanted to get more of Dorothy Sayers out of the way so I could give![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kathrynt back some more of her books that she loaned me, way back when I broke my arm last year. And I've been having problems finding the ones that go between this one and Murder Must Advertise, so I went ahead and read this one. Many giggles for the various ways that Lord Peter proposes to Harriet Vane in this book, though I wound up wanting to throttle the girl a couple of times for not giving him a better chance!
The Dark on the Other Side: This is an old Barbara Michaels novel that I decided to re-read, on a whim. I've re-learned that this isn't really one of my favorites; it's one of her older works, set in what was at the time the "current day", but it's also one of her more dated works. The collegiate styles and such that she describes in there feel very much late-sixties-early-seventies. What kind of puts me off more, though, is how much of the book's action is centered on philosophical debates about the nature of good vs. evil, as opposed to actual action. The ending is cheesy, too. I have this one just because I love the author's work in general and collect everything she's written under both this name and that of Elizabeth Peters, but it isn't one of the ones that I'd recommend to others as an introduction to Michaels/Peters. The one good thing about it is that her initial description of her hero does stand out well in my head as one of those "not ugly but has more character than handsomeness" kind of descriptions... and I can respect that.
Into the Darkness: Another Barbara Michaels that I re-read on a whim--and this one, I like more. This one is less Gothic-y/supernatural-y than many she wrote under this name, and is more of a suspense kind of story, with less dated-ness and a better-paced plot. Lots of fun stuff about jewels in it, and a stoically taciturn hero who damn near makes the heroine keel over in shock the first time he lets loose a real smile at her. Hee hee. Possibly one of my favorite Barbara Michaels works; I'll have to think about this a bit and see if that holds up. I tend to like her Elizabeth Peters books better than her Barbara Michaels ones. And the funny thing about reading this one when I did: the hero has Dorothy Sayers books in his personal collection, and quotes one at the heroine at one point.
Cape Random: Read as part of my GBS-inspired 'learn more about Newfoundland' kick. This was a hard read--not because of the complexity of the story, necessarily, but because I got this feeling out of the story of simultaneous... how to put this?... density and sparseness. Density because there was a lot of information being conveyed by the words, but sparseness because the writing style was... well, sparse, and bare, and suited to a tale about a tiny settlement on Newfoundland shores. But it was also one of those "slice of life" kind of books rather than anything with a beginning, middle, and end; this seems to happen sometimes, I find, in books that are trying to be "lit-ra-cher" rather than telling a story. There was a good deal of story in this book, but much of what was set up about the main characters never reached any kind of a satisfactory resolution, and I finished it mostly feeling appreciative of having gotten a glimpse of the atmosphere it portrayed rather than having been much interested in any of the people in the tale.
Have His Carcase: Wanted to get more of Dorothy Sayers out of the way so I could give
kathrynt back some more of her books that she loaned me, way back when I broke my arm last year. And I've been having problems finding the ones that go between this one and Murder Must Advertise, so I went ahead and read this one. Many giggles for the various ways that Lord Peter proposes to Harriet Vane in this book, though I wound up wanting to throttle the girl a couple of times for not giving him a better chance!The Dark on the Other Side: This is an old Barbara Michaels novel that I decided to re-read, on a whim. I've re-learned that this isn't really one of my favorites; it's one of her older works, set in what was at the time the "current day", but it's also one of her more dated works. The collegiate styles and such that she describes in there feel very much late-sixties-early-seventies. What kind of puts me off more, though, is how much of the book's action is centered on philosophical debates about the nature of good vs. evil, as opposed to actual action. The ending is cheesy, too. I have this one just because I love the author's work in general and collect everything she's written under both this name and that of Elizabeth Peters, but it isn't one of the ones that I'd recommend to others as an introduction to Michaels/Peters. The one good thing about it is that her initial description of her hero does stand out well in my head as one of those "not ugly but has more character than handsomeness" kind of descriptions... and I can respect that.
Into the Darkness: Another Barbara Michaels that I re-read on a whim--and this one, I like more. This one is less Gothic-y/supernatural-y than many she wrote under this name, and is more of a suspense kind of story, with less dated-ness and a better-paced plot. Lots of fun stuff about jewels in it, and a stoically taciturn hero who damn near makes the heroine keel over in shock the first time he lets loose a real smile at her. Hee hee. Possibly one of my favorite Barbara Michaels works; I'll have to think about this a bit and see if that holds up. I tend to like her Elizabeth Peters books better than her Barbara Michaels ones. And the funny thing about reading this one when I did: the hero has Dorothy Sayers books in his personal collection, and quotes one at the heroine at one point.
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Date: 2004-05-31 08:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 08:19 pm (UTC)