and St George!

[liv]

Back in 2010, I celebrated St George's day by setting up a book-recommending meme. I had a lot of fun with it, and discovered some cool new books, and expressed my fluffy-liberal-patriotism in a way that feels comfortable to me. It seems to be in the spirit of three_weeks_for_dw since people are making an effort to meet new folk, so I think I'll run it again.

The idea is that you comment and recommend me a book, and I will rec you one in return. If I don't know you you can give me some clues as to what you like, or you can let me guess based on a snap judgement from scanning your profile. I'll keep trying until I find something you haven't read and like the sound of.

For my tastes, here's 10 years of booklog, if you're really keen. I read most genres with some preference for science fiction. I want books with good characters, then plot tied about equally with interesting ideas, and I like beautiful prose but I'd rather have a book with merely functional language and interesting characters than the other way round. I don't particularly care for horror or most action / thrillers, especially not if there's graphic violence. But I'm willing to expand my horizons if you suggest something really good! In any case I'm very happy if you just suggest something that you yourself like and you think isn't well known. Oh, and as well as English I read French and can sort of manage Swedish if it's not too dense / old-fashioned.

Who's on?

Comments

[vatine]

SF, probably not well know, in Swedish.
Bertil Mårtensson's "Jungfrulig planet".
My distinct recollection is that it was quite readable, but it's probably been over 20 years since I last read it (in a completely different vein, Mårtensson's text book in basic logic is also quite good).

[jack]

All of them!

...ok, maybe that doesn't work *hugs*

[liv]

Ee, thank you, yay recs for Swedish SF.

Have you ever read Dodie Smith's I capture the castle? Smith is more famous for writing the book that became the Disney cartoon 101 Dalmatians, but I capture the castle is about as different as it's possible to be. It's about a girl / young woman coming of age in an eccentric family.

[liv]

I would very much like to read all of the books, but you know, finite lifetime and all that!

Talking of all the books, though, d'you think Grandfather will have enough to read in the home? Should we give him a Kindle or something when we come up next week?

[rmc28]

I am going to recommend British Summertime by Paul Cornell. If you like, I will lend you my copy.

It's a time-travel sf novel, with much of it set in a recognisable time-and-place (Bath, early 2000s), interesting female lead character, and very British. There is some scary/nasty gore but not too much for me to cope with. We bought it on a whim, in Bath, in 2004, and I loved it. I still love it. It's very suitable for St George's Day. I might read it when I get home.

[shreena]

If you haven't read them, I heartily recommend Josephine Tey's "Brat Farrar" and "The Franchise Affair". Brat Farrar was so good that I finished it, let out a big "wow, that was amazing", and then reread it immediately. I have never previously felt any inclination towards rereading a book without pausing.

I also recommend Michael Innes, in particular "The New Sonia Wayward" which I read very recently.

I know you don't read much detective fiction but these are all so good...

[liv]

He was fun at Eastercon, and the book sounds interesting from the description. Thank you, I would love to borrow, possibly via Jack?

Thinking of books to recommend you, I'm sort of rejecting several that have no decent female characters, because apparently my brain assumes you're less tolerant of that kind of thing than I am? Anyway, a book that doesn't have that problem: have you read Zadie Smith's debut novel, White teeth? Very much a time-and-place and very British book.

[liv]

I have read and enjoyed the Tey, and I'm happy to try Michael Innes, thank you. Detective fiction is the sort of thing I like when it's good, but can't be bothered with formulaic stuff, unlike some other genres.

Detective fiction that's doing something unusual with the genre: have you read Michael Chabon's The Yiddish Policmen's Union? Having tested it on several of my friends I'm pretty convinced it's accessible to a non-Jewish audience. And very clever in lots of ways, and it also works as a whodunnit, I think.

[shreena]

Detective fiction is the sort of thing I like when it's good, but can't be bothered with formulaic stuff, unlike some other genres.

I get that - I'm like that with fantasy fiction, especially, (though also sci-fi), if it's really really good, I'm happy to read it but average/formulaic stuff, I just have no time for.

I think I have picked up the Michael Chabon in the library and pondered it but not actually read it - the recommendation helps sway me into it!

[forestofglory]

I'm going to re-recomend Joan Slonczewski's work. She's a micro-biologist who writes sci-fiction. There is lots of cool biology in all of her books.

Have you read any Lisa Goldstein? You might especially like The Alchemist's Door which features John Dee and Rabbi Judah Loew. Her work is hard to describe but it all has strong feeling of the magic and mystery.

An author I really like who I have discovered in the last few years is Marie Brennan. Her latest book is called a Natural History of Dragons, which is about a women in a Victorian-ish society who wants to study dragons. One thing I really loved about it was the voice. It's her memoir written when she is quite a bit older, and well know thus more able to not conform.

[vatine]

I don't believe I have, no.

In the "curiosity" section, there is Swedish SF, written by Swedish authors, that was first published in English (can't recall if it's Mårtensson or Lundwall, though). Some quick research shows it to be Lundwall (Alice's World, No time for heroes and 2018 AD, or King Kong Blues). IIRC the translation was done by the author.

[tig_b]

Having just unpacked another 10 boxes of books, I'm re-reading Asimov interleaved with easy-reading crime.

I have friends who won't read Asimov because he is 'sexist', but he is just reflecting the time he lived in - and by those standards I think he was less sexist than most.

Opus by Asimov
This provides the context for his writing as well as some interesting bits of history, religion and science,and of course his love of puns.
I didn't read it in one sitting, but the sections were just enough.

[ursula]

Gentlemen of the Road is my favorite Chabon book thus far (review here.)

You might like Paul Voermans' Weird Colonial Boy? It's sort of a dark Australian cousin of The Phantom Tollbooth.

[turnerwolf]

I am currently reading the Ian Rutledge series by Charles Todd. Genre is mystery with sub-arcs dealing with Rutledge's experiences in WWI and the shell-shock (PTSD) he suffers from as a result. A Test of Wills is the first novel.

[damerell]

CS Forester. The Hornblower books aren't just the best known, but actually his best; and while it pains me to say it, I wouldn't read them in chronological order, but start with The Happy Return, or maybe Hotspur or Atropos.

[ar]

I'll rec for you Shannon Hale's Princess Academy, a light, charming midgrade novel set in a fairy-tale kingdom called Danland. Miri, our heroine, has never felt like she pulls her own weight on Mount Eskel; she's small for her age, and her father doesn't allow her to quarry stone with the rest of the villagers. But when royal diviners say that the next princess of the realm will come from Mount Eskel, the kingdom sets up a "princess academy" to teach the mountain girls how to act like lowlander ladies. A whole new world of books and learning is opened up to Miri and her peers, and Miri has the chance to help her village in ways she never thought possible.

Things I tend to like include: Period settings, YA/midgrade novels, fairy tales, non-fiction on cultural history and music (especially regarding the US anywhere from the 1880s onward), stories with uplifting/hopeful messages, female main characters, classic literature, religious (especially Catholic) themes.

Things I don't to enjoy as much include: Secondary world fantasy, Twilight/Hunger Games and their respective knockoffs (basically any poorly thought out paranormal romance or dystopian fiction--though I do love good dystopian writing), stories where people live lives of quiet desperation and all secretly hate each other, ironic/superdark and ~edgy~ retellings of famous stories.

Things I'm reading right now:
The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration
Yes I Can: The Sammy Davis Jr Story
Secret Historian: The Life and Times of Samuel Steward, Professor, Tattoo Artist, and Sexual Renegade
Les Miserables
The Ramsay Scallop

Et cetera, et cetera. ♥

[liv]

Thank you. I've not been able to get hold of anything of Slonczewski's, but she's GoH at Wiscon this year so hopefully that means there might be renewed interest in her books. She sounds very cool. Lisa Goldstein and Marie Brennan are already on my to-read list, so I'm going to bump them higher up based on your endorsement!

I think shall recommend you some non-fiction: have you read Rebecca Skloot's The immortal life of Henrietta Lacks? It's about cancer research so very relevant to me, but also about American medical history. And a pretty accessible read, even though the subject matter is fairly depressing.

[liv]

I like Asimov, not because he writes amazing female characters, but for lots of other reasons. The nearest contemporary equivalent I've found is Robert Charles Wilson; he wrote a very Asimovian book called Spin which I'm fond of.

[liv]

Wow, dark Australian Phantom Tollbooth sounds really appealing! Have you read Ted Chiang's short stories at all? Some of the best SF I've ever read, and some of the underlying science is maths.

[liv]

Hello, welcome. Have you read Anthony Price's series at all? They are spy novels set in various periods of the 20^th century, starting with The labyrinth makers. They're not all perfect, but best ones are very good, and they really engage with the real psychological effects of war and front-line intelligence work, they're not just war porn.

[liv]

Interesting thought, thank you, and it's always good to have advice about how to read long series. Have you read the non-obvious Kipling? I strongly recommend Kim, even if you hated the Jungle Books.

[liv]

Hello, nice to meet you! Those are helpful descriptions for the purpose of recommending something to someone I don't know.

Let's see. Sherwood Smith's pair Crown Duel / Court Duel are good YA fantasy with a female heroine. From this description I think they'd be up your alley!

[syderia]

Have you read the Masters of Rome series, by Colleen McCullough ?
In SF, I would recommand the Partials sequence, by Dan Wells. (Artificial human beings, plagues, and a humanity unable to reproduce)
Another favorite of mine is En famille, (the beginning of the industrial age) from Hector Malot (it's in the public domain). While it deals with some of the same themes as his more famous Sans famille, it's shorter and I find it more uplifting.

[tig_b]

Just looked it up, and went straight to abebooks!

thank you

[ursula]

I personally have a harder time with sexism in Golden Age sf because it's so thoroughly mixed with the message that This Is The Amazing Future. Equivalent levels of sexism in more nostalgic writing are somehow easier to take. (This is a general comment, not one on Asimov per se-- I've read some of his short stories, but never got into his novels, possibly because starting with the Foundation prequels is a bad idea.)