The 2013 TBR Pile - Progress Update

With the year officially half over, I thought it appropriate to take a look back at my 2013 TBR Pile, and how I've fared against my plans.



A Look Back



I accomplished exactly what I intended to in January, wrapping up the Wheel of Time saga with Jordan & Sanderson. While I found the final volume disappointing (see my review), and felt Sanderson was really stretching the material to fill three books, it was a satisfying kick-off to my plans.



February was a bit more of a challenge, with an entire trilogy awaiting me, but it worked out very well. I read (and thoroughly enjoyed) the first two books of The Demon Cycle from Peter V. Brett, and managed to get through them quickly enough to give the latest an advance read (see my review).



After some back-to-back-to-back series reading, I took it easy for March and April, using the opportunity to catch up with Lee Battersby (review) and Guy Gavriel Kay (review). As it turned out, they were two of my favorite reads of the first half of the year, and a pair of books I always knew I would have to read immediately.



For the month of May, I opted for a repeat of February and dove in for a back-to-back-to-back read of Raymond E. Feist's final Riftwar novels. This was a bit of a gamble, since I hadn't read any Feist in a very long time, but the first two were entertaining enough to keep me going, and the finale of The Chaoswar Saga (review) was a fitting finale to the saga.



June, as it turned out, proved to be my first stumble. I gave the first book of The Expanse from by James S.A. Corey a read, but it just couldn't hold my interest enough to finish it, must less two more books. Daniel Abraham's fantasy saga, The Dagger and the Coin, was in my plans too, but given that he's half of the team that makes up the aforementioned Corey, I couldn't motivate myself to make the jump.

Looking Forward



We'll have to see what July brings, but it's looking like I just might be back on top of my game with a back-to-back-to-back reading of The Broken Empire from Mark Lawrence. I'm reading the first book now and thoroughly enjoying it - it's both what friends have promised and what foes have warned, and I love both aspects.

August is likely to see me finally giving Alastair Reynolds a read, provided there are no further delays with the second book of Poseidon's Children. In addition, James Enge has entered my plans with his Tournament of Shadows (the ARC of the upcoming second book landed in my lap last week), and R.A. Salvator and Paul S. Kemp are on the TBR list as well, with the first two books of The Sundering.

For September, I was looking at Scott Lynch and The Gentleman Bastard sequence, which would be another back-to-back-to-back read, but that may be delayed somewhat since I have Alex J. Cavanaugh's sci-fi saga to catch up on (the ARC of CassaStorm is staring back at me from the shelf as we speak), and the final volume of the King Rolen's Kin saga from Rowena Corey Daniels to enjoy. As for October, I'm fully committed to a back-to-back-to-back-to-back read, following Stephen Donaldson through to the end of The Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, which will keep me busy well into the night for a while.

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The Prose and Perils of a Christian Nation (#bookreview)

Something a little bit different this morning - a dual review, looking at Frederic C. Rich's debut novel from two very different perspectives . . .



When I first read the synopsis for Christian Nation, I was excited. It sounded like a fantastic alternate history/future dystopian novel, built around a premise far more plausibly terrifying than aliens, zombies, or vampire plagues. What I found in its pages is really two books, both of which are deeply flawed, but which combine to provide a whole that's more fascinating than the sum of its parts.



As a novel, as a narrative work of fiction, this is a rather weak tale. It's told as a series of personal recollections, framed by the act of writing a forbidden memoir. While that kind of framework has its uses, and has certainly been done successfully before, Rich makes a mistake (in my mind) of never straying far from the physical detachment of memoir. There's very little action or excitement, no insights into the thoughts or emotions of those populating the tale, and a distinct lack of urgency. It's a very clinical telling, and one that does little to endear readers to the narrator/protagonist, making it difficult to become emotionally invested in the tale.



It bothered me that so much of the story depended upon coincidences and well-time accidents, but it bothered me even more that government sanctioned murder was required to enable significant turning points in history. Those murders really strained the credibility of "it could really happen here." At the same time, I had an issue with the the narrow-minded focus on the evils of homosexual sin, especially in a world where it's a second 9/11 type terrorist attack that polarizes the average citizen into supporting the establishment of a theocratic government. Similarly, the complete lack of interest in foreign affairs is troubling, not so much in their lack of interference, but in following through on Palin's platform of retribution against the Islamic terrorists.



As a borderline sci-fi novel, there are some really interesting concepts in Christian Nation, but I'm not sure if they're flawed, or just not fully developed. For instance, the Purity Web certainly has the potential to be more horrifying that Big Brother, and should leave you second-guessing yourself every time you go online. It has the potential to be awe-inspiring, menacing on an unprecedented level, but it ends up being downplayed. That, for me, is one of the story's biggest failings. Even if you can't make the reader care for your characters, you should be able to make them fear for themselves.



Finally, it must be said that this is also a rather linear tale, one with a ending that's never in doubt, which makes it impossible to generate any sort of suspense. The cast of main characters is small, and none of them are every really defined beyond their faith, their politics, and their career. It's almost as if they are merely props with which to explore a philosophical idea - which, of course, is precisely what they are.



As a philosophical treatise, this is a somewhat narrow-minded, but well-intentioned tale . . . but I promised to let Sally review that aspect of it.

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Like Bob, I was intensely curious about Christian Nation from the moment he first brought it to my attention. I do like a enjoy a good alternate "what if?" history novel, but I was far more interested in this as a book of ideas. As a reader who is apparently destined to be persecuted on multiple fronts in Rich's theocratic state, I was interested to see how he would develop his ideas and justify his conclusions.



Oh my gosh. I mean no offense to my friends south of the border, but this is a quintessentially American novel - full of arrogance, self-importance, and return to thoughts of manifest destiny. The political and religious leaders of Rich's novel not only believe that the establishment of America as a pure Christian Nation is required for the second-coming, but that they were granted the land by God for that sole purpose. There is some lip service provided to the idea of supporting a Jewish state in Israel but, for the most part, the new rulers of America don't give a damn about anybody outside their borders. The Bible may not have been written by them but, by God, it sure as sin was written for them.



Along the same lines, the new rulers are not content to merely accept the will of God and rule their country according to the literal dictates of the Bible. The 10 commandments are a great inspiration, but in America you go big or you go home, and it takes 50 new commandments , in the form of The Blessing, to get things done. I really don't know whether Rich was being satirical in so wholeheartedly embracing the worst stereotypes outsiders have of America, but he plays just about every card in the deck. The Blessing has to be the ickiest part of the novel, several pages of racist, sexist, homophobic that just makes you queasy to think of anybody buying into.



It's not just American stereotypes at work here, however, but misogynistic religious ones as well. In the new Christian Nation, it's homosexual men who are the enemy, and sodomy that is the world's greatest sin. Islamic terrorists loading rocket launchers around airports are bad, but Rich's theocratic leaders would run right past them to stop two young men from loading something far smaller, and far less lethal, into one another. His is a world where single men over a certain age are legally assumed to be homosexual, and where gay sex is grounds for execution. Lesbians, however, merely have to be watched (I guess some things never change), and women merely have to be pleasant and obey their husbands - who can, of course, demand any sort of kinkiness they desire. I do have to give Rich credit for making a lovely, charismatic gay man one of his protagonists, though, even if he never gets kissed, much less sodomized, anywhere on the page.



Whew. Could it really happen the way Rich suggests? Could a theocracy take root in America, rise to absolute power, and then gleefully abuse that power until everything that made the country America is gone? I sure as hell hope not but, then again, he makes it clear the world felt the same way about Nazi Germany once upon a time. As a cautionary tale and a philosophical exploration of what happens when the lines between church and state are erased, this is a fascinating read. It's very dry, and full of long passages that I'm sure even lawyers and university professors will be tempted to skim, but it is interesting to see how easily we can be convinced to give our freedoms away.

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Ultimately, Christian Nation is an intriguing read, and possibly even (to borrow an overused term) an important one. It's not a great work of fiction, but it is a good work of speculative fiction in that it makes you think, ponder, and really consider the possibilities. I think I enjoyed it a bit more than Sally, but I also think she found it a bit more disturbing than I did.





Expected publication: July 1st 2013 by W. W. Norton & Company

Hardcover, 352 pages

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Some Decent but DNF Titles (#bookreview)

I seem to be in a bit of a rut lately, and I suspect it's because I've been reading too far (or perhaps just too much) outside my core comfort zone. I've been dabbling a lot in genres that I generally enjoy in small doses, and finding that you really can have too much of a good thing.



The following books are not 'bad' by any means - if they were, I'd politely shelve them away and never say another word - they just didn't work for me. Hopefully, by shedding some light on them, I can help them connect with the right readers.



Kafira is a novel with a great premise, but I found I stumbled over too many things in the opening chapters, and just couldn't find my way back into the book. John G O'Neill is a solid writer, and spins some really interesting plot threads here - political, sci-fi, and bio-terror included. Moon landings get me excited, and I've been a huge fan of plague stories, so this seemed like a good fit. Unfortunately, I had a hard time settling in with the style of the narration, and had trouble connecting with the main characters. It's a fast-paced thriller, with a good deal of imagination but, ultimately, just not for me.





Be Careful What You Wish For offers up a concept that intrigued me, but I just couldn't find the hook to keep me reading. Adam and the gang are well-established, evoking memories of the guys I used to play AD&D with back in high school, but I can't really speak to their development. While neither wishes themselves nor wishes for magic to be real are hardly new, Daniel Black's choice to place that magic in the context of a role-playing game is something different. As much as I wanted to like the book, however, I found the pacing a little too slow, and the mix of genres a little too awkward for my tastes. Urban fantasy fans will likely find more to appreciate here, as will hardcore RPG fans who remain closer to the game.





Having had the ARC in my possession since December, I took several stabs at The Darwin Elevator, hoping that I might eventually find my way into it. After all, there are several authors (Steven Erikson immediately comes to mind) who demanded patience and perseverance with that first book, but who have since become favorites. I must say, Jason M. Hough has a great imagination, a flair for intense action, and a knack for dark/witty humor, but it felt like this novel could have used a more ambitious editor. The characters didn't hold any appeal for me, which really drained the story of any significant source of tension. In addition, I really struggled to grasp some of the politics and societal rules, which just seemed rather backward. Ultimately, this struck me in much the same way as Control Point, but readers who found the appeal there will likely enjoy this.





Despite an impressive pedigree of authors, After the End: Recent Apocalypses suffers first from familiarity, and second from its recent competition. Paula Guran has collected a nice variety of tales here, but while I had read many of them before, none were memorable enough for me to realize it right away, and none were strong enough for me to feel the urge to read them a second time. As for the competition, I know it's unfair to judge one book against another, but there have been some stellar collections of original apocalyptic fiction lately, and this one does suffer by comparison. Likely a good collection for those who haven't read the stories before, or who haven't been spoiled by recent reads, but I simply ran out of patience waiting for something 'new' to surprise me.

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Through A Hole In The Universe with Catfish McDaris (INTERVIEW)

Catfish McDaris is an American poet and author, born in Albuquerque, New Mexico, who has written poetry and prose for the past 20 years. An ex-G.I. Joe who hopped freights and hitchhiked across the country, he's built adobe houses, tamed wild horses, made cattle troughs, worked in a zinc smelter, and even painted flag poles.



Our very own Donald Armfield sat down for a chat with Catfish, to talk about his writing and his career, drawing an exclusive piece from him in the process!



What was it like working at the Post Office, during the Anthrax scare?



While working on the letter sorting machines at the main post office in Milwaukee we would get all kinds of threats. Anthrax and Ricin were supposedly sent to Washington D.C. or other politicians often. The letters would go through the bar coder and sorter and they would explode in white powder, 99% of the time it was baby powder, rice, or oatmeal. We'd sometimes get covered in a huge cloud and Haz-mat teams were called and sometimes dogs for bombs. We'd be quarantined and checked for poisoning and sent for showers. When Jeffrey Dahmer was captured we got bombs on the way to prison to blow him up. We evacuated quite often. There were several shoot outs inside the building in my 30 year career and one guy went and committed a murder while on the clock and I watched the FBI drag him off in handcuffs



What sets the mood for you, to sit down and write?



Since I'm an alcoholic and addict that has been clean for 9 years, I drink coffee. I have a wife of 30 years and a daughter of 25 they give me a reason to stay sane. I garden, shoot pool, stay away from all my old bad influences. I haven't worn a watch in 3 years. I no longer care what I own or owe, when you get to that point you're almost invincible. I do have a little snack of pills from Dr.Feelgood.



Some publishers would definitely publish your work, why did you decide to go the Chapbook route?



I wrote a novel and it bounced around NYC, with agents and never saw daylight. I discovered Bukowski, another postal worker like myself. I started writing stories and the small press world liked them. I started writing poems and reading them in public. There was a great scene in Milwaukee and if you hold your own on stage here, you could do it anywhere. I met some famous folks along the way and read at some great venues. I invented Wordstock in 94 and a series of poetry and music events and gave all the proceeds to Hope House, a charity for homeless women with children. Editors from the small press invited me to do chapbooks with them and I later discovered no one buys poetry. You need academic credits to get the big publishers to take notice.



What's in the future for Catfish McDaris?



Future writing projects are a long piece about going into the Veterans Hospital for a 6 month boot camp rehabilitation to get clean called: Lipstick On A Pig. I'll have a new book from Kolkata, India in Bengali by year’s end. An old interview I did that was translated into Esperanto should see daylight again. I was just in The Lowdown an anthology dedicated and with Lawrence Ferlinghetti. I received Big Pulp today which contained my imaginary trip to visit Ginsberg and Burroughs. I have lots of other tricks up my sleeve. With the Web instead of snail mail and SASE's for submissions it's insanely easy to be a writer. Beware of face book.

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Through A Hole In The Universe

(exclusively for beauty-in-ruins)

I’ll be the exterminator in a flea circus

play trombone in a bedbug parade

the worm swimming in a sun yellow

bottle being shared by alley skunk skanks

until their eyes fill with death tears forever

Kahil Gabran saying: it’s all love baby doll

or David Lerner: people hear my poetry and

weep, scream, disappear, start bleeding, eat

their television sets, beat each other to death

Change my name to December Q. January and

swim in the Sea of Tranquility and to the bottom

of the Mariana Trench and find a mermaid harem

and send up poems in bottles and never come back.

αωαωαωαωαωαωαω

A huge thanks to Catfish for stopping by!

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Waiting On Wednesday - Doctor Sleep by Stephen King

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted by Jill over at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.



This week's pre-publication "can't-wait-to-read" selection is:



Doctor Sleep by Stephen King

Sept 24, 2013 (Scribner)



Stephen King returns to the characters and territory of one of his most popular novels ever, The Shining, in this instantly riveting novel about the now middle-aged Dan Torrance (the boy protagonist of The Shining) and the very special twelve-year-old girl he must save from a tribe of murderous paranormals.



On highways across America, a tribe of people called The True Knot travel in search of sustenance. They look harmless—mostly old, lots of polyester, and married to their RVs. But as Dan Torrance knows, and spunky twelve-year-old Abra Stone learns, The True Knot are quasi-immortal, living off the “steam” that children with the “shining” produce when they are slowly tortured to death.



Haunted by the inhabitants of the Overlook Hotel where he spent one horrific childhood year, Dan has been drifting for decades, desperate to shed his father’s legacy of despair, alcoholism, and violence. Finally, he settles in a New Hampshire town, an AA community that sustains him, and a job at a nursing home where his remnant “shining” power provides the crucial final comfort to the dying. Aided by a prescient cat, he becomes “Doctor Sleep.”



Then Dan meets the evanescent Abra Stone, and it is her spectacular gift, the brightest shining ever seen, that reignites Dan’s own demons and summons him to a battle for Abra’s soul and survival. This is an epic war between good and evil, a gory, glorious story that will thrill the millions of devoted readers of The Shining and satisfy anyone new to the territory of this icon in the King canon. 





It was November of 2009, An Evening with Stephen King, at the Canon Theatre in Toronto. I sat there and listened as he did a little reading from Under the Dome, talked about a myriad of topics on stage with David Cronenberg . . . and teased a project he'd been thinking about, one involving a grown up Danny Torrance. The Shining has never been one of my favourite King novels, likely because it's the only one where I saw the movie first, but I love how he seems to be bridging his early work with his later work here, and I'm excited to discover more about The True Knot.



If you're keeping track, we're officially down to 3 months and counting . . .

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Stacking The Shelves & What I'm Reading

Stacking The Shelves is a weekly meme being hosted by Tynga's Reviews, while Mailbox Monday is being hosted by Dolce Bellezza this month (see Mailbox Monday for each month's host). Both memes are all about sharing the books you've added to your shelves - physical and virtual, borrowed and bought. It's Monday! What Are You Reading? is a weekly meme hosted by Book Journey, and it's focused on what's in your hands, as opposed to what's on your shelf.

With an average of two reads per week scheduled into the middle of August, I've been trying to hold off on adding to the TBR pile, but a pair of pleasant surprises arrived in the mail this week.

Emperor of Thorns

by Mark Lawrence

Hardcover, 448 pages

Expected publication: August 6th 2013 by Ace Hardcover



Acquired via the author . . . signed, no less!

Christian Nation: A Novel

by Frederic C. Rich

Hardcover, 352 pages

Expected publication: July 1st 2013 by W.W. Norton & Company



Acquired via publisher/publicist.

Armed with an Amazon giftcard I won via the ARTifacts project, I also did a little shopping this week:

 

As for what we're reading, the team has reviews coming up over the next 2 weeks for:

What's topping your shelves this week?

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