Well… I was doing really well for much of October, and then around the 20th or so I just crashed.  Haven’t been able to read very much at all.  I started a number of things but ended up thinking “Eh, no.”  I did listen to a bit of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s My Own Words, but the recordings were so poor that it was hard to understand a lot of what she was saying.  I was listening to Mansfield Park, but gave it up.  That surprised me; usually I like Austen, but there wasn’t a single character in it that I found engaging. And while I put a lot of the blame on my inability to concentrate on myself, I think this is down to Jane.

I hope for better in November.

Oliver Twist: The Dickens Collection: An Audible Exclusive Series By: Charles Dickens – Back in my youth I was a big fan of the movie Oliver! (I was young, don’t judge.)  So when I started listening to this Audible Plus selection narrated by Jonathan Pryce (who does a wonderful job) I found myself singing songs from the soundtrack of the film. (Many of them are quite awful now that I have the perspective of age.)  I must say that I think the character of Oliver Twist was shortchanged by the film.  He’s not a little porcelain doll like Mark Lester, but a surprisingly resilient child who goes through more in 10 years of life than most of us will in 80.  But then years ago I had no real appreciation for what Dickens was telling his readers, and I was willing to buy into the isn’t-Victorian-London-jolly? message.  It’s not. It wasn’t. Not for the poor. And if you think David Copperfield is harsh, you may want to avoid Oliver Twist entirely.

Dickens’ usual humor is damped down here, and what there is has an air of sadness about it.  The characters are colorful, as you’d expect, but few are easily dismissed as the kind of over-the-top caricature Dickens loves to present; balloons of pomposity easily deflated, or people so horrible they cross over into fantasy in the readers’ minds.  I started reading this in September and fear it may have been a bad choice for a month in which the news was  so dire, so I put it aside to finish in October. Overall I enjoyed it.  Happy endings and just desserts were duly apportioned, and while I found the truth of Oliver’s parentage unnecessarily complicated, it didn’t distress me.  Glad I finally read it.

A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians: A Novel  (The Shadow Histories #1)  by H.G. Parry – So you remember how much I loved Parry’s first book, The Unexpected Escape of Uriah Heep?  Yeah… This one, not so much.  It’s an ambitious novel that covers both the French revolution, and the slave trade, neither of which seem to cry out for a fantasy retelling. Nor does one particularly work in context. The whole magical overlay lies uncomfortably on the history, feeling more shoe-horned in than well-integrated and intrinsic to the events.

To be blunt, I found it interminable. I got three quarters of the way through it, said, “Oh to hell with this,” and read the last chapter just to see Robespierre, who for my money came across as the worst sort of hypocrite, get what was coming to him.  Which of course he did because this is no A/U, but a straight out recounting of history.  And that’s a shame because as an A/U I think it would have worked better.

Taking history and wedging bits of magic into it does not an effective fantasy make.

Island on Fire: The Extraordinary Story of a Forgotten Volcano That Changed the World By: Alexandra Witze, Jeff Kanipe Narrated by: John Lescault – A shortish history of Iceland’s volcanos framed by the enormous and enormously devastating eruption of Laki in 1783, and the eruption of Eyjafjallajokull in 2010, which closed down European air space because of the ash cloud.  The information about Laki is drawn from contemporary accounts from all over the world since the eight month long eruption had worldwide effects so horrifying that I literally had to stop reading for a while.

There are shorter histories of other great eruptions; Tambor, Krakatoa, Vesuvius, etc., and a survey of some of the notable, and still active volcanoes on the planet like Mount St. Helen’s, Mount Rainier, and the Yellowstone caldera, many of which could be devastating on a world-wide scale if they erupted with the same force and duration of Laki. We live on this planet courtesy of the planet itself. If it doesn’t want us anymore, it will not hesitate to let us know.

The Invisible Orientation: An Introduction to Asexuality By: Julie Sondra Decker Narrated by: Reay Kaplan – Not as engaging as ACE, but quite comprehensive and organized. Decker answers a lot of pertinent questions about what asexuality is and is not, how asexuals live on a spectrum just as every other human being does, and the importance of representation in allowing people to understand their lives.  The bottom line is that if someone tells you who they are, believe them.  Yes, it could change, people are fluid and by their very nature can grow and evolve, so believe them.  They know best what goes on inside their heads.

This is an excellent resource not only for Aces, but for the people in their lives who want to try to understand what it means and how it is likely to affect their relationships.

The Great Fire By: Jim Murphy Narrated by: Taylor Mali – The Fire is our civic mythos here in Chicago. We love to hear about how the city was destroyed only to come back bigger, stronger, and more vibrant than ever in spite of all the doomsayers who predicted that the city was finished.  This is an exhaustive account of the 31 hours during which the fire burned, the conditions which made it possible for the city to lose control of the blaze so quickly, and even the flat out stupidity that certainly contributed to the destruction.  There are many first hand accounts quoted, and make for fascinating reading.  I enjoyed the heck out of it, but then Chicago is in my bones and blood.

Written in Stone: Evolution, the Fossil Record, and Our Place in Nature By: Brian Switek Narrated by: L. J. Ganser – I loved this book.  It frames evolution in three important examples; the whale, the horse, and man. And while some of it is highly technical, I expect that if I had the hard copy in front of me as I was listening, all would be made more clear.  Nevertheless none of that detracted from my enjoyment of and longing to participate in the exploration of the fossil record.  But why, I wonder, does the mental image of the Taung baby always make me sad?  That little skull…

Birds of a Feather (Maisie Dobbs Mysteries Series Book 2) Jacqueline Winspear – The second Maisie Dobbs mystery is just as good as the first one. The ensemble cast continues to come together.  That’s my favorite part of so many mystery series, too, watching the characters come together in a community around the central character, but creating bonds between themselves as well.

This second one is dark as well, and involves three murders and a missing woman all of whom were somehow linked during the war.  Someone has killed the three in a towering rage, but the why of it remains at the heart of the mystery.  Why these three women? Is the fourth a murderer or a potential victim? Who could hate these fairly unexceptional women so much that they would commit such violence on them?  And how will Maisie manage to juggle a job, the three related deaths, and several personal problems that could eventually prove to be life-changing?  Wonderful series.  Can’t wait to read the next one.

The Mysterious Affair at Styles: Hercule Poirot Mysteries, Book 1 By: Agatha Christie Narrated by: Richard Armitage – This is not only the first Poirot mystery, but Christie’s first novel, and while it’s compelling, I have to admit that the seams show.  Her narrator feels like the idiot Dr. Watson from so many Sherlock Holmes adaptations, and he’s clearly there to show the reader how smart Poirot really is.  He’s not needed, and his stumblings and fumblings detract from the narrative.  But apart from the narrator, the rest of the cast works pretty well.  She’s clearly just getting to know Poirot, and he’s warmer and more humane than I would have expected. I quite liked him.  Characterization aside, the plot was clever, though the pacing did drag a bit.  Still, for a first novel?  Yeah, it’s all there, all the things that would make Christie one of the most celebrated mystery writers of the 20th century.

The Year of Magical Thinking By: Joan Didion Narrated by: Vanessa Redgrave – I’ve had some problems reading Didion before, so when this showed up in Audible Plus I thought I’d give her another try. And yes, I am quite glad I did because it’s an important book.  But… you know how I sometimes say a book broke my heart?  This one went so far beyond heart-breaking that I wasn’t even able to cry as I listened.  She opens by saying that it will happen to the reader, we will lose those we love most in our lives.  She’s right.

It’s all as she describes it, the magical thinking, the disconnects where you think of your loved one as still in the world, just not in the room with you.  The superstitious dread of taking certain actions because… why?  What worse could happen?  And yet there’s that seed of doubt.  Or maybe it’s hope.  For me it was always the thought that one day I’d get a phone call that said, “Oh it was a huge mistake, we’re sorry.  Please come and fetch them.”  Or maybe I’d see the people I’d lost on the street, and I’d be angry with them for pretending to be dead, but so relieved that I wouldn’t be able to do anything but hold them close.  Joan Didion knows.  She gets it. She broke my heart.

Murder by Other Means: The Dispatcher, Book 2 By: John Scalzi Narrated by: Zachary Quinto – Every time I read Scalzi I think, “How do I never remember how much I enjoy his work?”  It’s been a while since I read Dispatcher #1, but I had no trouble getting up to speed with this one.  And it’s a good ‘un, too with some great twists and turns.  I really must read more Scalzi.

Ring Shout P. Djèlí Clark – Imagine that the KKK in the 1920s was taken over by evil, hate-eating monsters.  Yeah I know it’s not a huge stretch, considering the nature of the KKK, but try to imagine it anyway.  And a few people (mostly women of color) are able to actually see the members who have “turned” and have dedicated their lives to eradicating them.  You’ve got Ring Shout in a nutshell there, but it’s so much more than a monster story.  It’s a reclaiming of a history of hate and oppression, turning it into a story of triumph.  P Djèlí Clark, is always worth reading.  His ideas and approaches are always unique, and his writing is wonderful.  I recommend anything he has written.

So I’m about two thirds of the way through a book about genes and the tree of life, and so far it’s been riveting, so maybe I’m getting my reading mojo back.  Fingers crossed.