![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
Books I've Read: Sept-Oct 2022
September 2022
Slippery Creatures by K.J. Charles - text
This is the start of an m/m historical romance series set just after WWI. That is, not so much a romance series as a series with a romance that develops over the course of the books. With Charles’s work there’s always a tricky balance for me between enjoying the plots and characters and finding the sexual content too emphasized for my taste. This series is a bit heavier on the sexual side than some of the others, to the point where it sometimes feels like the plot is more like connective tissue. And yet I keep reading for the marvelous writing.
Jane and the Canterbury Tale by Stephanie Barron - text
It took me almost a year to finish this book -- not sure why, since it's a series I've definitely enjoyed in the past. There was a time back in the '90s when I was deeply into historical mysteries and followed a number of series, but I've mostly drifted away from that genre. That may be why it took me a while to stick to this one. It was...ok? The secret backstories were a bit improbable, but that's not unusual. Long-lost relatives, hidden identities, etc. The conceit of the series is Jane Austen as an amateur detective, but other than various members of Austen's family and circle being part of the scaffolding, the premise got used up fairly early on.
The Oleander Sword by Tasha Suri - audio
Second volume in the Burning Kingdoms series. The series has a lovely, complicated, central lesbian romance, embedded in an epic fantasy of empires and magic. For the first half of the book, The Oleander Sword felt very much like a “middle book” in taking the elements introduced in the first volume, expanding the scope, and setting things up for a later climax. But then everything starts changing into new and strange shapes and you realize that all your assumptions about “good guys” and “bad guys” have been mistaken. The immediate conflicts resolve with the understanding that a far more drastic challenge lies ahead in the final volume. Yes, I’m being a bit coy about exactly what that drastic shift in understanding is, but I think it’s more enjoyable to experience it for yourself. (Eagerly awaiting the third installment which isn't out yet.)
October 2022
The Haunting of Tram Car 015 by P. Djeli Clark - text
A Dead Djinn in Cairo by P. Djeli CLark - audio
A novella and a novelette set in the same magical alternate early 20th century Egypt as the novel A Master of Djinn, which I listened to back in May. Like A Master of Djinn, A Dead Djinn in Cairo features Special Investigator Fatma el-Sha’arawi and her girlfriend who…well, that would be a spoiler. Fatma will ensnare the heart of every reader who likes a dapper butch detective. "Haunting" shares the setting but features a different magical detective. Great worldbuilding and some fun characters.
The Tale of Princess Fatima by anonymous - audio
I wasn't specifically aiming for a Middle Eastern theme month. This is a translation of a medieval Arabic story, The Tale of Princess Fatima, Warrior Woman: The Arabic Epic of Dhat Al-Himma, translated by Melanie Magidow. Despite the focus of the narrative on a supremely competent warrior woman who becomes the leader of her clan, defeating rival families and Byzantine crusaders alike, the story needs a lot of content warnings for misogyny, sexual coercion and rape, and just plain annoying relatives. But embedded within the historic context is a casual acceptance of fictional women warriors and of female same-sex desire, though the latter gets only a brief mention in passing. I happened upon references to this tale in some of the articles I read for The Lesbian Historic Motif Project, so when the work turned up in translation I thought it would be an interesting read.
A Thief in the Night by K.J. Charles - audio
A short Audible Original. Standard K.J. Charles fare which means m/m antagonists-to-lovers with engaging characters and more sex than I'm interested in reading. (It does sometimes bother me that the couples in Charles novels more often than not don't really *like* each other much until overwhelming persistent sexual desire convinces them to try getting to know each other a little better. But OMG the writing is so marvelous.)
Mrs. Wickham by Sarah Page - audio
Another Audible Original (which I get free with my Audible membership, so I'm more willing to take a chance on them). An Austen pastiche following the post-P&P life of Lydia and her Mr. Wickham. The story endeavors to redeem the character of the charming and amoral pair. The writing was ok, but I had a hard time buying the plausibility of Mr. Wickham’s utter change of personality that was the core of the happy ending.
So evidently this pair of months was anchored by Middle Eastern settings, Jane Austen, and K.J. Charles. Not entirely an inadvertent theme, but not planned either.
Slippery Creatures by K.J. Charles - text
This is the start of an m/m historical romance series set just after WWI. That is, not so much a romance series as a series with a romance that develops over the course of the books. With Charles’s work there’s always a tricky balance for me between enjoying the plots and characters and finding the sexual content too emphasized for my taste. This series is a bit heavier on the sexual side than some of the others, to the point where it sometimes feels like the plot is more like connective tissue. And yet I keep reading for the marvelous writing.
Jane and the Canterbury Tale by Stephanie Barron - text
It took me almost a year to finish this book -- not sure why, since it's a series I've definitely enjoyed in the past. There was a time back in the '90s when I was deeply into historical mysteries and followed a number of series, but I've mostly drifted away from that genre. That may be why it took me a while to stick to this one. It was...ok? The secret backstories were a bit improbable, but that's not unusual. Long-lost relatives, hidden identities, etc. The conceit of the series is Jane Austen as an amateur detective, but other than various members of Austen's family and circle being part of the scaffolding, the premise got used up fairly early on.
The Oleander Sword by Tasha Suri - audio
Second volume in the Burning Kingdoms series. The series has a lovely, complicated, central lesbian romance, embedded in an epic fantasy of empires and magic. For the first half of the book, The Oleander Sword felt very much like a “middle book” in taking the elements introduced in the first volume, expanding the scope, and setting things up for a later climax. But then everything starts changing into new and strange shapes and you realize that all your assumptions about “good guys” and “bad guys” have been mistaken. The immediate conflicts resolve with the understanding that a far more drastic challenge lies ahead in the final volume. Yes, I’m being a bit coy about exactly what that drastic shift in understanding is, but I think it’s more enjoyable to experience it for yourself. (Eagerly awaiting the third installment which isn't out yet.)
October 2022
The Haunting of Tram Car 015 by P. Djeli Clark - text
A Dead Djinn in Cairo by P. Djeli CLark - audio
A novella and a novelette set in the same magical alternate early 20th century Egypt as the novel A Master of Djinn, which I listened to back in May. Like A Master of Djinn, A Dead Djinn in Cairo features Special Investigator Fatma el-Sha’arawi and her girlfriend who…well, that would be a spoiler. Fatma will ensnare the heart of every reader who likes a dapper butch detective. "Haunting" shares the setting but features a different magical detective. Great worldbuilding and some fun characters.
The Tale of Princess Fatima by anonymous - audio
I wasn't specifically aiming for a Middle Eastern theme month. This is a translation of a medieval Arabic story, The Tale of Princess Fatima, Warrior Woman: The Arabic Epic of Dhat Al-Himma, translated by Melanie Magidow. Despite the focus of the narrative on a supremely competent warrior woman who becomes the leader of her clan, defeating rival families and Byzantine crusaders alike, the story needs a lot of content warnings for misogyny, sexual coercion and rape, and just plain annoying relatives. But embedded within the historic context is a casual acceptance of fictional women warriors and of female same-sex desire, though the latter gets only a brief mention in passing. I happened upon references to this tale in some of the articles I read for The Lesbian Historic Motif Project, so when the work turned up in translation I thought it would be an interesting read.
A Thief in the Night by K.J. Charles - audio
A short Audible Original. Standard K.J. Charles fare which means m/m antagonists-to-lovers with engaging characters and more sex than I'm interested in reading. (It does sometimes bother me that the couples in Charles novels more often than not don't really *like* each other much until overwhelming persistent sexual desire convinces them to try getting to know each other a little better. But OMG the writing is so marvelous.)
Mrs. Wickham by Sarah Page - audio
Another Audible Original (which I get free with my Audible membership, so I'm more willing to take a chance on them). An Austen pastiche following the post-P&P life of Lydia and her Mr. Wickham. The story endeavors to redeem the character of the charming and amoral pair. The writing was ok, but I had a hard time buying the plausibility of Mr. Wickham’s utter change of personality that was the core of the happy ending.
So evidently this pair of months was anchored by Middle Eastern settings, Jane Austen, and K.J. Charles. Not entirely an inadvertent theme, but not planned either.