Wrybrarian in Esslingtn, DE.

My apologies for the infrequent postings this week and last--I'm on tour with the band in Europe. Here are the dates.

So far, I've finished just one of the books I bought for the trip, Man Out of Time, story of a hapless, jaded law school grad and his disaster of a first job. Which I'd link to, except for the fact that I have to run downstairs to do a sound check. Eeeek! More to come, folks. I still have to discoss The Russian Debutante's Handbook. And Germany, which is chock full of reading materials that I can make neither heads nor tails of.

Houndesheise.

As long as we're talking vintage SF, I'll mention that I've spent the last few weeks reading the Barsoom novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs. From the earlier half of the twentieth century, I snagged the first five books of the series at Project Gutenberg and converted the plain text to PalmReader format to read on my PDA on the el ride to work. Luckily, my Palm doesn't have a lurid cover. The later books in the series haven't passed into the public domain yet, so they're not available at Project Gutenberg.
These are some seriously escapist novels. John Carter, Virginian, travels by astral projection to Mars and battles the green, red, white, black, yellow, and more white races, always winning by virtue of his incredible skill with swords and incredible strength granted him by the lesser gravity on Mars. He's a complete jarhead, but always clever enough to grasp the quick solution to the unending pile of sure-death situations heaped upon him. There's an attempt at science in this science fiction, but it's wildly fantastic--swashbuckling on pirate ships that float through the air by the power of the unknown-on-Earth 8th color of light.
I'm nearing the end of Thuvia, Maid of Mars, the fourth in the series, and will probably finish the fifth early next week. I know I'll want to read the rest, but at first it was free and I don't know that I can bring myself to spend money on such pulp, filled with remorseless violence and well-meant but insensitive generalizations. Oh, trash, it calls to me!

It's just my luck that the day wrybrarian passes from anonymity into semi-anonymity (thanks to this month's Chicago Magazine article on Chicago bloggers featuring me, me, me!), I have to be reading the single book that has made me into an object of ridicule for my boyfriend, friends and even band. I imagine the workplace isn't too far behind.

I realize that it doesn't look good to be toting around a 1983 paperback with graphics featuring a rocketship, Mars panorama and Farrah Fawcett-esque silouhette on the cover, not to mention a caption that reads: She had the brain of a woman, the body of a spaceship...and the wiles of a siren born in the stars!. But read the first chapter yourselves before you join in my torment.

C'mon, guys.

It's vintage Anne McCaffrey!




Guys?!

I chewed up and spit out The Big Gamble in a just a couple of hours this weekend. Part of the Michael McGarrity's Kevin Kerney series, The Big Gamble is the police procedural equivalent of a romance novel. Read it for a snack, not a main course.

Sometimes I wonder what kind of world it is that we live in, and what drives people blow up hundreds of other people? wOuld this happen if the US hadn't been so proudly occupying other countries for decades and decades? What has Spain done to deserve being terrorized? And really, what has Iraq done? And would Saddam have been in power if it hadn't been for his allies in the West? Blah. These are the questions I ask myself, but I know there's no book out there to give me a straight answer, just countless fragments that I have to put together to form my own opinion.

In any case, my sympathies go out to the friends and families of everybody killed in Spain today. It all seems so pointless from over here.

Oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy. I just discovered LostBooks.org, an idea hatched by D.D. Shade, a compulsive reader of "speculative fiction" (read: sci fi, fantasy and the like), over lunch with Orson Scott Card and Teri Nolan.

(Incidentally, if you haven't read Ender's Game yet, do yourself a favor and buy it now.)

In D.D.'s words:
"An "official" Lost Book is one that is out of print and forgotten or back in print and forgotten. It can be a book written for young adults that is relatively unknown in mainstream speculative fiction (Diana Wynn Jones vs. R. K. Rowling). A lost book could be one that was overlooked by the Hugo and Nebula ballots. Or it could be a main stream speculative fiction publication that was ignored by the general readership."

I'm off to get some reading ideas and write D.D. fan mail.

Finished Lives of the Monster Dogs this morning, a fairy tale set in modern times about a group of dogs created with human intelligence by a Frankenstein-like inventor. Overthrowing their masters in an a hidden city in the Canadian wilderness, the dogs make their ways to New York City to live among its people. This is a strange novel, but a fascinating quick read.

You know how it is. Released the record this weekend, had an amazing CD release party and finished The Sabbathday River, a mystery about a woman who finds a baby in a river, the girl accused of killing it and the small-town courtroom drama that ensues. While not quite as excellent as promised (and of course I guessed the surprise ending 200 pages before it happened..as you will too, if you read it), a very interesting read with surprising literary value, that's perfect for filling a few hours while waiting to read coupons, recipes and cheese packages.

Anorexia. Hysteria. Sainthood?
One of the best, most thought-provoking articles I've read in a long time was this review of 4 books considering some young women who became virginal, mystical, and ecstatic saints. Whether you share or admire their passionate faith, or find it alien and impenetrable, their stories are fascinating and resonate with modern eating and self-mutilation disorders. I found this to be one of those rare book reviews where the material covered sounds fascinating, and the reviewer has a lot more to add. Recommended reading for Catholics, post-Catholics, feminists, post-feminists, and the curious. [Extra credit to the librarian who can figure out exactly "what St Francesca Romana did."]

Sweet baby Jesus, Robotic. That was beautiful, powerful, and moving. Meow, indeed.

I think I might have a winner going on right now - One Thousand White Women. It's all about white ladies from prisons and insane asylums and such who go off to the Western frontier to marry Native American dudes and have babies as part of a government program to tame the wild savages. It's done as a journal by one of the women - who was put in an insane asylum for, as the kids today like to say, "getting her freak on", and it is REALLY good so far.

Item! You may recall the CTA-advertised book that's not boring to read, Sine Die, that has been discussed here before. R. even found the definition. Well, the Hancock tower elevators have LCD video screens in them, so you can read some news or weather during your long ride up. And the Captivate Network's "Word of the Day" today is sine die. Which is two words, yes. The pronunciation key: SAI-NUH-DAH-HEE. Huh. Note: there's no archive at captivate.com, so if you follow that link after today, you'll be treated to a different definition (they're usually pretty banal).

More literate than bologna, plus it's in the Village Voice

Blogger is ruining her life.

For the love of God, To the Ends of the Earth was the literary equivalent of a bologna sandwich. Don't get me wrong. I love my bosom rippers. But when they're steeped in bad fashion and thinly veiled right-wing moralistic judgements, I embarrass myself just by reading them...

"Cat's smile slipped when she looked up at Travis. No man had ever attracted her more than he did at this moment. He was freshly showered, wearing a navy T-shirt and white cotton beach slacks." White cotton beach slacks!?! Dear God. Retreat, Cat! Retreat!

Here's the plot: Cat, a 29-year-old photographer who has been deeply hurt, both emotionally and financially, by her first husband--not mention the pain that will come once she is the victim of 50 or 60 sexual feline references--has never known love. Travis, 35-year-old millionaire, was wed and abandoned by at 18. But not before his "evil" first wife aborted her fetus. Er, that is snuffed out the life of his child, in Lowell-speak.

Of course, Travis has promised to live as if all women are whores whose affection can only be purchased, while Cat has vowed never to give her love or independence to another man. Cat and Travis are thrown together when she is contracted to take photos of his black-as-night pirate ship, The Wind Warrior. Naturally, the sexual tension between the two is too great to resist. But Travis wants to buy Cat, and refuses to believe that she is falling in love with him. After a lot of sex and such, Cat, who had believed herself sterile, becomes pregnant, Travis cries entrapment, Travis abandons her, Cat miscarries, Travis returns to heal her wounds and they sail off into the sunset on the Wind Warrior.

Before we say goodbye to Cat and Travis, let's celebrate End of the Earth's Literary Low Point with the following passage:

"'You make them see too much,' Cat said simply. 'You make them see that beauty is fierce, not soft, that it has the power to turn your soul inside out, forcing you to think again about the world and your place in it. Your Wind Warrior makes people afraid.'"

"'But not you, ' Travis said. 'You're like me, a wild creature caught in a civilized world. Come away with me, Cat.'"

"Cat knew that struggling against Travis would be a waste of energy. Even worse, it would increase her awareness of his disturbing male strength. Her skin burned with the tactile memory of his body rubbing over hers..."

Readers, you owe Cindy T. for this new addition to Wrybrarian, the bosom-ripper review. I'm generally too humiliated to admit the titles, let alone the content, but prepare yourselves for my upcoming review of Elizabeth Lowell's To the Ends of the Earth, the story of the impossibly male millionaire Travis and the "fiery-haired" photographer, Cat.

Meow.