Rated The Gun Seller 6/10
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Rated Wuthering Heights 6/10
<div>Audible threw me another free month, and I saw this available to stream, so I thought I'd finally give it a go. I've previously had luck with finally getting around to various classics via audiobooks, but I think maybe I would've found reading this a bit easier in print because of all the similar names. This is no slight on Joanne Froggatt, who narrates it very well. I was just having my own moments of "Wait, now WHO are we talking about?" so I had to consult the Wikipedia page to refresh my memory. Ymmv!<br><br>That said, this is a grim tale with some interesting bits, some less so, but I'm not sorry I listened.</div>
Rated The Chronology of Water 10/10
The thought that most often occurred to me while reading was that <i>The Chronology of Water</i> is perhaps the truest thing I’ve ever read. Even if I have not personally experienced the same things, I know many who have, and in the parts where Yuknavitch and I overlap, her words feel so true that they hurt in the same way a massaged, sore muscle does. I wince for a moment, then think, <i>Please keep going</i>. And within all the turmoil, I find a certain amount of peace. <br><br>(My full review appears at <a href="http://davidabramsbooks.blogspot.com/2012/10/swimming-away-chronology-of-water-by.html">The Quivering Pen</a>.)
Rated Gallifrey: The Inquiry 8/10
This is very good. Romana gets to flex some Presidential Power.
Rated The Way the World Ends 10/10
What a great (long) short story. I had recently wondered if Jess Walter had any new material out, and how great to find this.
Rated Legs Get Led Astray 8/10
Chloe Caldwell's personal essays have a way of making me dissect my own life, whether I want to or not. I say 'me' instead of 'you' (though I bet it would be true for you too), and I am disregarding the editorial 'we.' Reading Legs Get Led Astray is not an abstraction — it is her voice and my brain having a conversation through the page. And though at times what I remembered through her past made me uncomfortable, it was only because I knew the feelings to be true. I enjoyed <i>Legs Get Led Astray</i> in the same way a song can hurt so good. Love, lust and loneliness — Over and over I say that is what I want to read and what I want to write, and this book makes me want to write.<br><br>Wrapped up in music and smells and drugs and strewn pieces of clothing, Caldwell writes from a place of longing for connection, while also yearning for distraction. Release. If you gathered all the songs she mentions throughout the book, you'd have a really good playlist. She is unafraid to admit when she's been fearful, when she's been the fuck-up, or when she judged too soon. But she also loves wholeheartedly, generously, and it's endearing. None of her stories come across like, "Hey, look at me shocking my audience!" No. She is writing to someone.<br><br>Is it you?<br><br>(My full review appears on <a href="http://glorifiedloveletters.blogspot.com/2012/04/legs-get-led-astray-essays-by-chloe.html">Glorified Love Letters.</a>)
Edited 86d ago
Rated Silver Nitrate 8/10
<div>This was really good. Spooky old cinema magic? Yes, please.</div>
Wants to read Retromania: Pop Culture's Addiction to Its Own Past
Rated The Twenty Days of Turin 6/10
I think I would have liked this more if I were more familiar with the time period/location (1970s Italy) to which this story alludes, and also if I'd read more of it while not drowsy. However! It's a good book with pleasantly unsettling elements, and plenty of other people should get more out of it than I did.
Rated Katabasis 5/10
<div>If this book is meant to replicate the futility of certain sections of hell by being a little bit of a slog to read, then mission accomplished.<br><br>Alice is just SO special, dontcha know, SO SPECIAL. She doesn't need pesky things like FEMINISM or FOOD or NORMAL HUMAN RELATIONSHIPS. She has THE WORK! And her coworker/fellow grad student is just TOO GOOD to be CHRONICALLY ILL! He must HIDE it! <br><br>I don't need my main characters to be likable, but I gotta have some reason to care how it all shakes out for them.<br><br>Look, I really loved Yellowface and Babel, so I was quite surprised that I didn't really like this much. I get that it's supposed to be a tale of not killing yourself for academia and/or terrible "mentors," but it doesn't seem like Alice learns a whole lot. I guess it was innovative in that it was a dude, for once, who got <spoiler>fridged, temporarily, in order to advance her plot, but I didn't care that much.</spoiler><br><br>The magic system and the intellectual rigor were not turn-offs. I get it; it's Cambridge. And the writing itself was 99% perfectly fine. (Writers, please never make me read "quirked a smile" again, though.) It's just that, if we're writing a story about fucked up priorities, I guess I just expected a little more revelation other than <spoiler>"Now I will have an undead boyfriend who is ashamed of his health."</spoiler><br><br>YMMV!</div>
Wants to read Waging Heavy Peace: A Hippie Dream
Wants to read Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City
Edited 86d ago
Rated Doctor Who: The Guardian of the Solar System 10/10
As much as I love the Eighth Doctor audio adventures, this (along with its first 2 parts) is the best storyline I've heard from Big Finish... And not just because of my undying love for Jean Marsh. The writing is great, the sound, all of it. Beyond recommend all three for any Doctor Who fan.
Rated The Man Who Fell to Earth 9/10
<div>I was surprised by how much I loved this. I have a free month of Audible, so I listened to the audiobook that was available without having to use a credit mostly because I'd seen both the movie and the TV show, and I thought, "Well, why not complete it?" But this mostly holds up as both a product of its time and as a story that's still relevant today (alas), all while remaining innovative and interesting.</div>
Wants to read Interrobang
Edited 86d ago