Books, books and more books - an update on all things bound

[featherynscale]

First off, I finished The Dark Tower sometime over the weekend, and still haven't quite recovered. I haven't been along for that ride as long as some, but I picked up The Gunslinger when I was a sophomore in high school, so that's...*churning* *processing* *calculating*... 12 or 13 years. And most of the thought related to the series in those 13 years has been along the lines of "You're just building up expectations which are no doubt going to be destroyed by your standard stupid King ending. It's all going to be for nothing." Surprisingly, this turned out not to be the case. There is a fairly standard moment of Stupid King Ending, but it's earlier in the book, and actually established as a plausible event (sort of) within the story, so it's fairly palatable. The actual endings, of which there are two, are pretty damned stunning. It ends the only way it could possibly end and still be satisfying, and King provides further ending material for those who Just Have To Go On. So, to my partners, and other folks who haven't made it to the Tower yet, keep going. It's worth it.

Second, I actually am going to make my 50 books this year with quite a bit to spare. I've finished 47 and am currently reading 2 more. So that's 49, and only one more to go. Had I been feeling more dramatic and less greedy, I'd have saved the Tower for 50. Oh well.

Third, I am in the middle of the second to newest Anita Blake book (mmm....Twinkies), and will soon be done with those as well. I've finished the Tower, I'm almost out of Blake, and I'm still waiting (oh so patiently) for George R.R. Martin's next. I need a new series or three. Any suggestions? Or hell, good books that don't come in a series (I mean, gods forbid I should read anything that isn't sci-fi/fantasy)?

Fourth, I am proud to announce that I am doing my part to keep our Kansas City Public Libraries in business, by dutifully checking out thousands of books at a time, and then failing to return them until I've piled up a substantial fee. I forgot to take my books back *again* today. Perhaps I will be smarter tomorrow. They say reading will do that for you.

EDIT: And rio_luna promised me her Diaspora religion reading list... *poke poke*

Comments

[pete3great.livejournal.com]

What's the point of reading 50 books if all you're going to read is fiction? Get some history books, those are always fun.

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

I mostly read for style and language - the actual content is sort of secondary. And then there's the escapism - some of this stuff is brain-vacation material.

I generally read a more balanced fiction/non-fiction load, but I got caught up in the trash-fiction vampire thing this year. You remind me there's a bio of Nikola Tesla on my washstand that's waiting for me, and something on the Crowley/Newberg relationship stuck in a bag somewhere....

[pete3great.livejournal.com]

trash-fiction vampire and Crowley/Newburg (or is that Nueburg? I can never remember). obviously you're big on the homoerotic as well! ;)

if that's the vein, find a copy of "What you should know about the Golden Dawn" by Regardie. I've use that book to settle many an argument about Regardie's links to the OTO and A.A.

I find history great for escapism. I would suggest "How the Irish Saved Civilization" (if you haven't already read it), "1000 A.D.," "In the Heart of the Sea" (yay! cannabalism!)) and "The Plague Years." I'd also suggest "Carnage and Culture." Just read that one for the history and ignore the guy's theories about Western culture being inately superior to all others.

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

Excellent - thank you for the recommendations. It's true that homoerotic themes do not hurt my interest level any, and history of magical societies and movements is always much fun. I tend to skew more towards the alarmingly speculative earlier stuff, the Templars and that sort of thing rather than that which is later and more likely to be accurate, but I may have covered that talking about homoerotic themes, above.

[pete3great.livejournal.com]

All modern Templar organizations are spurious. We now know for sure that the Templars were innocent of all charges, and the their forcible disbanding was nothing more than what it seemed: A massive land grab by a desprate prince and corrupt pope. The Vatican released its papers on the Templars about two years ago. It always happens. The papacy keeps the wrong secrets and these wacky myths pop up. The Caliphate slanders the name of a great man, deMolay.

3 days later, when I get the comment...

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know that the whole historical Templar thing has no mystical bullshit conspiracy theory content. The thing that's interesting to me about that (and similar exercises in speculative history) is that those myths create history - in the case of the Templars, the Templar story springs all these secret societies that actually do exist, based on recreating the Templars that never were. Same deal with the Rosy Cross - the original organization never exists/never does what people think it does, but suddenly, the myth exists, and actual organizations are built on the myth. I think that's very exciting.
The other aspect I like of it is the storytelling challenge - it's like all of these theorizers were given a set of "facts", some true and some false, and told to build the best and most complete explanation that includes all the given facts. It's a hell of a game, and I imagine someone will be playing it about us someday.