It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? (18/10)

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50 books a year, angela carter, hubert selby jr, Its monday what are you reading?, meme, Robert Rankin, wilkie collins

Another Monday, another meme. Things have slowed down since the last time I posted. The good news is, I’ve finally reached my 50 Books A Year target (yay!). And I’ve also began to focus more on my writing, which is why I haven’t been posting as frequently. More posts will follow on my thoughts and feelings on that.

But here is what’s going on from the book front:

Books Read
1. ‘The Passion of New Eve’ by Angela Carter
 
This gets 5/5 stars. An absolute joy to read. Review coming up!

2. ‘The Room’ by Hubert Selby Jr.

Scary stuff. This gets two ratings: 3/5 for story and 5/5 for execution of the writers’ craft. I’ll elaborate later in a full review.

Currently Reading
1. Retromancer by Robert Rankin

Still monkeying around with this one, but that’s only because (look below)…

2. ‘The Woman in White’ by Wilkie Collins

… this one has taken over! Who’d have thought Collins would turn out to be such a brilliant writer?

That’s it for now. Happy reading everyone!

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Wondrous Words Wednesday | Rankin Gets Curiouser and Curiouser…

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meme, Robert Rankin, wondrous words wednesday

Wondrous Words Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by BermudaOnion at Bermudaonion’s Weblog where we get to share new words that we’ve encountered in our reading. 

I’ve got more words from ‘Retromancer’, this time of the architectural persuasion: 

1. Cloisonné – A ancient method of decorating enamel and metalwork objects.

2. Champlevé – An enamelling technique in the decorative arts, or an object made by that process.

3. Calotte – In architecture, a round cavity or depression, in the form of a cup or cap, lathed and plastered; used to diminish the rise or elevation of a moderate chapel, cabinet, alcove etc.

Oh, and I discovered a delightful little phrase on my readings: ‘to travel by sparrow-fart’. Yes, ‘sparrow-fart’. I did a double-take at that one, blinked, and  then embarked on a five-minute giggling session thereafter. I somehow can’t imagine what a sparrow fart looks like let alone the dimensions of it and whether it would actually get anyone to their destination or not. All the same, the rest of my day was spent with images of little sparrows falling off their perches through the exertions of excessive gas. A most incongruous visual, what with the sparrow and the massive fart concept, but extremely effective in comedic terms!

Titillating Texts For Teaser Tuesday | Robert Rankin’s ‘Retromancer’ and the Roguish Mr. Rune!

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meme, Robert Rankin, teaser tuesday

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

The quote for today’s Teaser Tuesday is from Robert Rankin’s ‘Retromancer’. Called the “Frank Zappa of the SF/ Fantasy World” by the Fortean Times, this is a highly entertaining, off-the-wall account of complex time-travel, absurd magical encounters and medieval derring-do. Rankin’s prose is a gorgeous mash-up of quintessential English humour and pop culture references. If you are a fan of Monty Python, then I urge you to read this book IMMEDIATELY. It’s so much fun! Anyway, enough of my waxed lyricisms (is that a word? If it is, good. If not then from hereon let it be known that it is my copyrighted word). Here’s the teaser:

“I am a member of the Church of Banjeloleology. I know the local paper scorns and condemns our credos, but we are good people, Mr Rune, who mean no harm to others. All we ask for is the freedom to worship in the church of our choice. And the council agreed that as long as we eschew the practices of human sacrifice and drinking the blood of children, then we should be left to our own devices and desires.”

“Quite so,” said Hugo Rune. “Do you dance around in your bare scuddies at all?”

“Most of the time,” said Mr Hartnel. “Particularly on Thursday nights at nine at the Good Shepard Hall in South Ealing Road.”

“Many lady members?” Hugo Rune enquired.

“They outnumber gentlemen two to one.”

“I’ll tag Thursday night in my diary, then.”

The teaser is a bit long, but I wanted you to get the full effect of the narrative. Here’s hoping you put it on your TBR lists. You won’t regret it!

Wondrous Words Wednesday (29/09)

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meme, Robert Rankin, wondrous words wednesday

Wondrous Words Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by BermudaOnion at Bermudaonion’s Weblog where we get to share new words that we’ve encountered in our reading. 

This is the first time I’m participating in Wondrous Words Wednesday, and I’ve got a whole backlog of weird ones. They come from ‘Retromancer’, a steampunk novel written by Robert Rankin. This book has some really funny phrases. Rarely does a book make me laugh out loud, but this one does. One of the main characters uses a lot of arcane language that would make Shakespeare scratch his head. So, here they are: 

1. Thaumaturgical – “Upon mahogany shelves the leather spines of Mr Rune’s vast collection of Thaumaturgical books glowed with a rich patina.”

Def: Having, brought about by, or relating to supernatural powers or magic: fey, magic, magical, talismanic, thaumaturgic, theurgic, theurgical, witching, wizardly. See supernatural.

2. Pehurverance – “I simply abhor it’s pestilential pehuverance. Could you not open a window?” Def: Couldn’t find one! Maybe it’s a made-up word.

3. Hierophant – this is a type of tarot card (High Priest/ Pope)

4. Parousia – meaning the second coming of Christ

That’s it for this week. My favourite is ‘pehuverance’, what’s yours?

It’s Monday, What Are You Reading? (27/09)

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angela carter, hubert selby jr, Its monday what are you reading?, meme, Robert Rankin

I missed last weeks ‘Monday’ meme, partly because I forgot (oops) and partly because I’ve been obsessed about the filming of the new ‘Pirates of the Caribbean 4’ movie that’s taking place in Greenwich. I’ve been travelling up there since Monday to see if Johnny’s arrived yet (excitement!), but no… it was just production setting up bluescreens, castle facades and other piratey stuff. If you’re interested you can check out my blog post complete with pictures.

I heard through Twitter that Johnny’s going to be there today. Whether I’ll go to see him is another thing entirely. For one I’ve got a sore throat which will probably turn into a monster cold! But I suppose that’s what you get for standing around in the cold waiting for a celebrity to turn up! I’d hate to have a job as a London paparazzi. If I do see him, I’m going to *hopefully* have him sign my copy of ‘The Rum Diary’ and ‘Fear and Loathing’ by Hunter S. Thompson. He’s supposed to have the filming rights for it (Hunter gave it to him before he died).  

That aside, I’ve also been busy writing a guest review for The Blue Bookcase – the first one for me, so I’m pretty excited about that! About my 50 Books a Year thing… yeah, I’m on no. 50 at the moment and I’ve got about 3 books on the go. So it’ll be a surprise to see which one gets it!

Enough of the banter, more about the books.

Books Read
1. ‘Lavinia’ by Ursula Le Guin
 
This gets 4/5 stars. Review can be found here!

2. Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert 

Although executed in a masterful way, this gets 3/5 stars. Review can be found here.

Currently Reading
1. The Passion of New Eve by Angela Carter

This wasn’t really on my list of reads, but my curiosity got the better of me. And would you believe it, its explosive stuff. It’s a novel of beautiful contradictions which looks like it’ll get the full 5/5 from me. A literary buffs heaven. Who said Women’s fiction was all romance and barbie-doll stuff. Angela Carter will eat you for breakfast! Djuna Barnes, read it and weep!

2. Retromancer by Robert Rankin

…And now for something totally different. Fancy a bit of Monty Python on tap? Then I recommend Rankin. He’s awesome. Can’t believe I haven’t come across him earlier. He totally takes the crap out of big, blockbuster novels. This one is a play on WIlliam Gibson’s famous cyber-thriller ‘Neuromancer’. Another 5/5’er, methinks.

3. The Room by Hubert Selby Jr.

We’ve had comedy and we’ve had uber-feminism. To counterbalance all this we have: the Selby. Which by the way, is beginning to irk me very much. I’m skipping pages. Too, much, graphic, gore. I’m not the squeamish kind, but I kid you not when I say that if I didn’t have a firm grasp on what Selby was actually trying to do as  ‘writer’ in his art, I’d put this book away and never touch it again. This one will be a tough review indeed.

That’s it for now. Happy reading everyone!

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? (13/09)

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Anne Frank, Cara Lopez Lee, Cheri Laser, gustave flaubert, hubert selby jr, Its monday what are you reading?, meme, Robert Rankin, ursula le guin

Another Monday, another post! Okay, so this time there’s been some ‘movement’ in the way of reading. I’ve managed to finish one book, but I have another four lying about. This bumps my 50 books a year to a total of 47. It gets harder and harder as I get to the end! But I did have a weird week… in fact it got so bad I did a little rant about it.

Other bookish news include the fact that two bloggers I admire are getting their books published this year. That makes me very happy. Cheri Laser’s ‘The Truth About Cinnamon’ is currently on Amazon.com. You can check out her blog on the link provided. It’s pretty unique, as she’s been using it to track her road to becoming a published author. The insight she gives is invaluable to people who are also looking to follow that rocky path.

Another fabulous author is Cara Lopez Lee with her memoir ‘They Only Eat Their Husbands’. It’s about a journey around the world and ultimately to the centre of one’s being. It’s coming out from Ghost Road Press and Cara’s going to be doing some book signings too. You can find out more from her website.

I met these lovely ladies through the blogosphere. Their generosity with their experiences have inspired me to take up the pen yet again. hopefully this time I’ll follow through and be like them. I wish them every luck in the future.  

OK, so here’s the rundown folks. The titles are familiar now to everybody. You could recite them in your sleep!

1. ‘Madame Bovary’ by Gustave Flaubert – (evil little book! Very good, but refuses to be finished!)

2. ‘Diary of Anne Frank’ by Anne Frank – (Just started after I finished ‘Lavinia’. So far so good.)

3. ‘Retromancer’ by Robert Rankin – (Should have had this finished 2 weeks ago. After it fell on the floor in a hospital, I didn’t pick it up again.) 

4. ‘The Room’ by Hubert Selby Jr. – (I want to finish Bovary before I get onto this. I need totally concentration!)

The book I finished was ‘Lavinia’ by Ursula K. Le Guin.

That’s it from me. Nothing exciting as of yet, but I might have something coming up in the following weeks. Fingers crossed :).