Ookings of d00m

I gave up on Feminisms after about 70 pages. I'll come back to it (or possibly another feminist text) later, and be more selective about the articles I pick - Feminisms had a lot of articles that were far, far too academic for someone of my limited background - I haven't the grounding in academic film criticism, literary criticism or other spheres in the Humanities, so I kept getting frustrated.

9.Bad Monkeys by Matt Ruff

mycrazyhair was right - I liked this one. Quick read. I should go get more Ruff.

10.Whiskey and Water by Elizabeth Bear

Faeries! Magic! Doom! I liked this one better the Blood and Iron, possibly because the characters felt that much more like people I'd know. Also, Bear writes killer dialogue.

11.Shadowplay by Tad Williams

Faeries! Magic! Doom! I found it somewhat jarring to go from Bear to Williams. Williams doesn't have Bear's knack with amazing dialogue, so his charcters seemed somewhat wooden after Bear's. Williams does to a wonderful job at painting a vivid image of a complex and compelling world and plot, though, and I eventually got wrapped up in it. There's also an interesting comparison to be done on the two books based on how they handle feminist/gender issues, but I'll leave a deepr exploration of that to someone's Women's Studies paper.

12.Renfield by Barbara Hambly

Dracula retold from the point of view of Ryland Renfield, mad slave of Dracula. Hambly mimic's Stoker's writing style, with much of the book in the form of letters. She also includes a few direct excerpts from Stoker's work, which are identified for the obessive reader.

I'm past due for something serious, so next up will be Michael Pollen's In Defense of Food