Ookings of d00m

18.Issola by Steven Brust

Cosmic Vlad is cosmic. Also, *sniff*. Chronologically, this is as far as I got when I initially read the Vlad books.

19.More Eric Meyer On CSS by Eric Meyer

Eric Meyer's a pretty good writer, and I am interested in CSS. However, my last big drive to learn a pile of CSS a few years ago covered most of the new techniques Meyer presents, so I mostly got some incremental improvements to my skill set. Also, it reminded me why I stopped getting excited about CSS and web design - to make pretty designs you really need to be either a good artist, a good photographer, or have access to a really nice stock photo library. Next time I'm doing web design I'll probably be glad for all the IE bug workarounds from this, though.

20.Athyra by Steven Brust

Paternal Vlad is... not so paternal actually. Hi Dee Hi Dee Ho la. Step on out.

21.Orca by Steven Brust

Financial Vlad is financial. Surprise endings! (not that surprising if you were paying attention)

22.Dragon by Steven Brust

Military Vlad is military. Some day I think I might work up something about the never-ending fantasy series and the apparent need for one installment wherein the hero enlists. Vlad does it, Tavi of Calderon does it, and I'm sure comparisons can be pulled out for Miles Vorkosigan and Harry Dresden, too. Tangentially, there's also a common theme of premise threat and having it followed through late in the series, but that's a different post that requires spoiler warnings and footnotes. Some times I just need to remind myself that I always hated writing essays in school.

23.Ink-Stained Amazons and Cinematic Warriors by Jennifer K. Stuller

My Fandom Has a Publisher! This is a great book. Stuller writes from what seems to me to be a distinctly fannish meets academia POV. The book examines female heroes in comics, movies and TV. It covers how they're portrayed in contrast with male heroes, where they succeed and fail from a feminist perspective, and how the archetype of the female hero is forming. I especially like the parts about how the female hero's journey (in constrast to the Conradian hero's journey) is shaping up in popular culture. This is, in a lot of ways, the book I had been hoping for with Mike Madrid's book on femlae superheroes in the last booklog post. Stuller's language use is interesting - she uses feminist/academic terms fairly casually, but also uses what I think of as fan language - "The Scoobies", "Uber-whatever", etc. All in all, I am quite happy that I picked this up. It's given me a lot to think about, especially for gaming and writing female heroes.

So, my next Vlad books will be ones I actually haven't read before. Next up, Dzur, followed by Jhegaala. Then I have to wait for paperbacks. I should probably head to chapters and put in my next order...