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New Reviews: Connie Willis's Remake and Bellwether April 30, 2002 (8:35 PM) ( link ) ADDED reviews of Connie Willis's Remake and Bellwether, both of them minor Willis works. Mists of Avalon is proceeding swimmingly--I'm about a tenth through the book right now, I think, and so far it's only mediocre. Unlike TH White's The Once and Future King, The Mists of Avalon hasn't yet grabbed my attention--in large part because of the somewhat vicious anti-Christian and anti-male bashing that takes place during the story. DH Lawrence's The Rainbow is ok so far--I've only read about 40 pages into it, and it seems like the first chapter is just a lot of background exposition. The dialogue is, to my modern ears, faintly ridiculous, but I'm sure I'll adjust to that as I continue reading. One month left.... April 29, 2002 (1:27 PM) ( link ) One month left at Harvard, and here are the books I'm going to read, in order: 1. DH Lawrence's The Rainbow 2. Vikram Seth's A Suitable Boy (finally) 3. Tim Power's Last Call 4. Vonda McIntyre's Dreamsnake 5. Mervyn Peake's Titus Groan To finish this all I'm going to have to read one of these a week, which will be nigh-impossible. But at the very least I hope to get through Seth's book; I've been meaning to read this for ages (the first mention was on October 30, 2001), and hopefully I will actually read it before I graduate. English vs. Americans, and DH Lawrence April 24, 2002 (4:59 PM) ( link ) Over the past weekend I got into a minor tiff with Yu Ping and Cheryl, who is also a Singaporean, about whether England or the USA has had better writers since 1776. I argued strenuously for the USA. But both Yups and Cheryl pushed for Britain (naturally enough). In particular, Yu Ping recommended that I read DH Lawrence's The Rainbow, Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure, and James Joyce's The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, all of which she had read for an exam while in Singapore. So, today I checked out Lawrence's The Rainbow and will begin reading it. I expect to read Hardy's book next, and finally—perhaps over the summer—to read Joyce's (again). Joyce is interesting—of course I've read Portrait before, but I hated it; Dubliners was much more to my tastes (with "The Dead" being perhaps the best short story I have ever read, except perhaps for Raymond Carver's "Cathedral," or James Baldwin's "Sonny's Blues"). But I never re-read Portrait after growing up a bit, and I've found that books I once read as a kid are much better now—Great Expectations, Old Man and the Sea, even "Sonny's Blues," which bored me to tears the first time and then moved me to tears the second time. I also checked out a book of poems by Philip Larkin, whom I have never heard about. But supposedly he's good. Now I've never been good with poetry; there are some poems I like a lot, but I tend to dislike beautiful language when it's not really about anything. To me it's sort of like dressing an ugly woman in a beautiful gown, except replace the concept of ugly with the concept of meaninglessness. Ok, so that doesn't work either. Anyway, I'll be reading a couple of Larkin's poems a day, which is supposed to be good for the soul if nothing else. New Review: Terry Pratchett's The Colour of Magic April 22, 2002 (10:38 PM) ( link ) ADDED a (very brief) review of Terry Pratchett's The Colour of Magic. I really want to read a big, passionate book again: even The Chronoliths and The Princess Bride, while entertaining, felt a little bit thin. It hasn't been since Jay McInerney's Bright Lights, Big City that I was truly moved by a book. Hence, Marion Zimmer Bradley's The Mists of Avalon, which should be big and boisterous enough even for me, and eventually Michael Ondaajte's The English Patient, which I haven't touched for weeks. New Reviews: Robert Charles Wilson's Darwinia and The Chronoliths April 16, 2002 (7:15 PM) ( link ) ADDED reviews of Robert Charles Wilson's Darwinia and The Chronoliths. I'm currently chugging through Connie Willis's Bellwether (not very good so far), and Terry Pratchett's The Colour of Magic (slightly amusing). I think it's high time for me to embark on another huge, epic, all-encompassing novel. A Suitable Boy at last? Sigh. New Reviews: Four of them April 8, 2002 (1:15 AM) ( link ) ADDED reviews of Robert Bloch's Psycho, William Goldman's The Princess Bride, Jorge Luis Borges's Ficciones, and Joan D. Vinge's The Snow Queen. By tomorrow or the day afterward I should have reviews of Darwinia and Remake up. I'm definitely getting worse and worse at writing these things, though, even after 73 of them. Pretty sad, if you think about it. Book Reviews Soon April 7, 2002 (5:59 PM) ( link ) Despite a long silence, I haven't stopped reading. Soon, I'll be posting a couple of reviews, including Robert Bloch's Psycho, Joan Vinge's The Snow Queen, William Goldman's The Princess Bride, Jorge Luis Borges's Ficciones, Robert Charles Wilson's Darwinia, and Connie Willis's Remake. I will soon be reading Wilson's Chronoliths and Willis's Bellwether, and I'm trying to read Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient.

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