Miscellany – December 2007

And we close the year with a bunch of delightful (and not-so-delightful) winter reads...

1. Steven Brust's Dzur is finally out in paperback. It explores the interesting psyche of the Dzur warriorlords, and how our protagonist Vlad learns that the Jhereg can also learn from people whose idea of fun is tremendous odds against and very slim chances of survival. Good, but somehow more meditative in its violence than some of the others in this series.

2. Sarah Monette's The Bone Key is a wonderful homage to M R James and other creepy Victorian ghost-story writers. This is a collection of linked tales about a museum curator and the terrifying phenomena he encounters. Monette's stories, however, serve to develop the character of the protagonist – unlike the two-dimensional agents we find in other such tales. It was also pretty chilling: I had two nights of twitchiness from this book.

3. Mike Carey, author of the Vertigo series Lucifer and (for quite some time) JC:H, has recently delivered three books in an ongoing series. The occult-detective trope comes to life this time in the form of Felix Castor, exorcist and reluctant investigator of other events. The Devil You Know, Vicious Circle, and Dead Men's Boots are excellent examples of noir detection, managing to strike that elusive balance point in which the magicking is essential but does not destroy the sanctity of the plot by copious use of dei ex machina. If you like JC:H as a character, you'll find him being channelled here...

4. Steve Berry is at the Dan Brown thriller counter again, this time with The Alexandria Link. Berry is productive with the religion-related 'secrets man was not meant to know' thrillers. This is another. There isn't much to say else, except that it isn't a bad book. Sad.

5. Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill's The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: The Black Dossier suffers from Moore's occasional need for scurrility. The plot is thin, the story ribald (and disjointed because of it), and the whole production is full of running gags and in-jokes. Where LoEG volumes 1 and 2 were excellent stories in their own right, TBD requires too much back-story and cross-referencing to make its point. It's a pity; I was looking forward to this one.

6. Charles Moore's The Jennifer Morgue is out in paperback. It's the sequel to The Atrocity Archives, a spy thriller with horrific but humorous twists. In this installment, the secret agents of the Laundry go out into a post-Britannic, post-modern world to battle the horrors of another plane. The interesting thing about this one is the nature of the meta-plot. At what point do you realise which plot this is? A good read, if you like crafty eccentric thrillers. Oh yes, compare Ramona in this one to Juliet in Carey's books.

7. Eric Flint's 1634: The Ram Rebellion is indigestible. The book is too hard to swallow, and for once, it is hard to summon up enough enthusiasm to read through the 700 pages of how a male sheep becomes the symbol of an unlikely un-rebellion. Sort of. The others in the series are better.

And that's it so far! My current 'unread' stack is 23 books high. Sigh. I shall attempt to plough through as much of it as possible in order to meet the deadline for January. Till then, enjoy your holidays!