Convalescent reading

[flemmings]

Had some flu-allergy-arthritis combination last week, apparently attendant on getting a tooth crowned, with an accompanying psychic malaise that made reading anything but Pratchett feel nightmarish. Worked at Michael Chabon's essays on the grounds that non-fic is more steadying than fiction, and certainly more than the fiction I have in the on the go pile-- Ackroyd's Chatterton (*why* do I read Ackroyd, she moans again), An Instance of the Fingerpost, Jack Maggs: the horrors of London, in short. But Chabon has an essay about Phillip Pullman that gave me horrors-by-association, because Pullman is just as lowering and depressing and kimoi as Ackroyd, *and* he isn't even writing about London. (Also want to call him Chabon-dama, soap bubble in Japanese, because natch I pronounce Chabon as if it were French, which I doubt the Murcans do.)

So I tried Dick Francis, but the malaise killed even him. This was the one with the Rupert Murdoch-like robber baron figure; and the Murdochs of the world are certainly not undone by seeing the actual victims of their manipulations suffering on tape. (Break In. I'm still looking for the one where the hero has a gay roommate who teaches him how to put on make-up. Or so I remember it.) Then I started Robertson Davies' ghost stories, but Davies is just so-- (o)rotund and Upper Canada Compact and an ass. Flu affects more than the physical taste buds, evidently.

The cure obviously is to start reading some women. I have a couple of Melissa Scott's SF novels, but... but... they aren't Astreiant, basically. Space ships. Didn't get far with those.

And then it seems there may be a librarian's strike soon, so I went off to a couple of libraries and picked up a lot of Nnedi Okorafor and Nalo Hopkinson. If I'm to be fantodded, let it be in a good cause.

Comments

[incandescens]

Sympathy on the malaise, both physical and psychic, and I hope it clears soon, and that you find congenial reading matter in the meantime.

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

The second Dark Matter anthology worked a treat, thank you.

[tekalynn.livejournal.com]

Have you read Melissa Scott's Shadow Man? Not always the cheeriest read, but interesting world building and gender role deconstruction.

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

Haven't seen that one around. The downside of having a world famous SF collection is that other libraries don't get stuff in because 'Judith Merrill has it'-- and Judith Merrill doesn't circulate. (Unlike the real Judith Merrill, but that's another story.)

[mvrdrk.livejournal.com]

I hope it all clears up soon. When I'm in that kind of a state, I tend to revert to "known classics". Last time it was re-reading Howl's over and over for two weeks. LOL!

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

My problem is the way known classics lose their remembered goodness when my back is turned, like that Dick Francis. Pratchetts are usually good for a second read, given how fast I read them the first time.