Books: What have you been reading?

[Deathstroke]

The Long Call by Ann Cleeves
Attachment 134304

Bought it on a whim and I have no regrets so far. Ann Cleeves does such a good job with the various characters especially Det. Matthew Venn. I'm jealous of his relationship with Johnathan. ��

A couple months back, it was the selection of the month for the Mystery Book Club I co-run at the town library. I was looking forward to reading it but I ended up not finishing the book. I just couldn't get into it. I'm glad you enjoyed it.

[The Darknight Detective]

New book: King's Reign (2017), the fourth Xander King prequel novel by Bradley Wright.

[Malvolio]

Star Trek: Mutiny on the Enterprise by Robert E. Vardeman

[The Darknight Detective]

New Kindle reads: the short story With Pistol and Second Reader (1918) by Hapsburg Liebe and the history book The 'Adventures of England' on Hudson Bay: A Chronicle of Fur Trade in the North (1920) by Agnes C. Laut.

[Jim Kelly]

New Kindle reads: the short story With Pistol and Second Reader (1918) by Hapsburg Liebe and the history book The 'Adventures of England' on Hudson Bay: A Chronicle of Fur Trade in the North (1920) by Agnes C. Laut.

When I did my Canadian Studies degree at the University of Alberta in the 1980s, one of my Can Stud courses was the intellectual history of Canada and an important figure we covered was Harold Adam Innis, who wrote THE FUR TRADE IN CANADA. His writings were heavily influential on people like Marshall McLuhan and John Kenneth Galbraith.

I also read many other books about the fur trade just as a history of the people--the indigenous people and their relationship with the Europeans of that era. And in the summers, I worked at Fort Edmonton Park as a historical interpreter, where we were in costume as fur traders from the 1840s. I even greeted the Governor General in French when she came to visit the Fort, in my role as Chief Factor John Rowand.

When I was at the U. of A., many of my profs were some of the leading lights of Canadian thought and letters--yet as a young man I failed to fully appreciate them or digest all they had to offer. That's a great regret of mine.

These days, my bedtime reading is BLEAK HOUSE by Charles Dickens. A book I've had for decades yet never could get into. Well, this is because the first chapter is dead boring. And the second chapter is almost as sleep-inducing. But the third chapter captured my interest at last. It's weird that Dickens made the opening so stultifying--that's not what you're supposed to do as a writer. And his novels were serialized. Given that BLEAK HOUSE had a great following in serialized form, maybe most of the readers tuned in after the opening credit sequence.

[MajorHoy]

. . . These days, my bedtime reading is BLEAK HOUSE by Charles Dickens. A book I've had for decades yet never could get into. Well, this is because the first chapter is dead boring. And the second chapter is almost as sleep-inducing. But the third chapter captured my interest at last. It's weird that Dickens made the opening so stultifying--that's not what you're supposed to do as a writer. And his novels were serialized. Given that BLEAK HOUSE had a great following in serialized form, maybe most of the readers tuned in after the opening credit sequence.

I'll take Bleak House over Martin Chuzzlewit.

[The Darknight Detective]

When I did my Canadian Studies degree at the University of Alberta in the 1980s, one of my Can Stud courses was the intellectual history of Canada and an important figure we covered was Harold Adam Innis, who wrote THE FUR TRADE IN CANADA. His writings were heavily influential on people like Marshall McLuhan and John Kenneth Galbraith.

I also read many other books about the fur trade just as a history of the people--the indigenous people and their relationship with the Europeans of that era. And in the summers, I worked at Fort Edmonton Park as a historical interpreter, where we were in costume as fur traders from the 1840s. I even greeted the Governor General in French when she came to visit the Fort, in my role as Chief Factor John Rowand.

When I was at the U. of A., many of my profs were some of the leading lights of Canadian thought and letters--yet as a young man I failed to fully appreciate them or digest all they had to offer. That's a great regret of mine.

I consider myself part-Canadian (some of my Irish ancestors lived in Quebec for a half century during the 19th century and I still have cousins there today), so, as is the case regarding my Irish and Italian heritage, I enjoy learning more about my Canadian roots.

These days, my bedtime reading is BLEAK HOUSE by Charles Dickens. A book I've had for decades yet never could get into. Well, this is because the first chapter is dead boring. And the second chapter is almost as sleep-inducing. But the third chapter captured my interest at last. It's weird that Dickens made the opening so stultifying--that's not what you're supposed to do as a writer. And his novels were serialized. Given that BLEAK HOUSE had a great following in serialized form, maybe most of the readers tuned in after the opening credit sequence.

Still haven't read a Dickens novel, but I have read all of his short stories and novellas.

[Deathstroke]

I finished the James R. Benn mystery novel Blue Madonna.

[The Darknight Detective]

New book: On the Road: The Original Scroll (1957;2007) by Jack Kerouac and the first novel from the Duluoz Legend series (yeah, I had no idea this was a thing, either). I have known about the autobiographical novel since the '70s and read part of it in college during the '80s, but this will be the first time I will be reading the whole thing (and then some).



Kindle-wise starting tomorrow, it will be the short story The Govenor-General's Trunk (1909) by Arthur Train and the novel The Capture of Paul Beck (1911), the second installment in the Paul Beck series by M. McDonnell Bodkin.

[The Darknight Detective]

New books: rereading The Sword of Aldones (1962), the second Darkover novel by Marion Zimmer Bradley...



... and on my Kindle, the short story The Nun of Newstead (1903) by H.C. Bailey and the non-fiction book The Blackwood Group (1897) by Sir George Douglas.

[The Darknight Detective]

New books: Reckless Endangerment (1998), the tenth Butch Karp-Marlene Ciampi novel by Robert K. Tanenbaum...



... and on my Kindle, it's the short story The Medicine Ship (1915) by James B. Connolly and The "Goldfish": Being the Confessions of a Successful Man (1914) by Arthur Cheney Train.

[Deathstroke]

New books: Reckless Endangerment (1998), the tenth Butch Karp-Marlene Ciampi novel by Robert K. Tanenbaum...

I loved that series.

[The Darknight Detective]

New Kindle reads: the short story The Shears of Atropos (1905) by Henry C. Rowland and the collection of newspaper columns 1001 Afternoons in Chicago (1922) by Ben Hecht.

[the illustrious mr. kenway]

The Rising Storm by Cavan Scott. It's part of the "Star Wars The High Republic" line

[Deathstroke]

I finished the Kyle Mills thriller Code Red, the last book in the Mitch Rapp series that he'll be writing. The series will now pass to Don Bentley.