reading – Into the West

Weekly Serial Release

Set in the Year of our Lord 1337 war gripped Europe. The Holy Roman Emperor sent the Teutonic Knights to conquer Lithuania and Russia. England and France opened their Hundred Years War. Ottoman Turks stalked the moribund Byzantine Empire.

The second son of the Willard of Willardhof in Saxony received a new name and a quest, neither of which he particularly wanted.

In addition to helping one of my favorite authors proofread her final manuscript, I’m also assisting my favorite uncle to self-publish serially, two chapters per week, an award winning ebook he wrote. This past Wednesday I published the twentieth chapter of The Dragon and the Dove, which officially marks the halfway point of the book.

In addition to being an author, my uncle is also an accomplished artist and painted the cover art for The Dragon and the Dove, to which I added the book title and author name.

Cover art for The Dragon and the Dove, written and painted by the author, Ron Andrea

The second son of the Willard of Willardhof in Saxony received a new name and a quest, neither of which he particularly wanted.

Return each Wednesday for the next two chapters in The Dragon and the Dove. Only ten more weeks of suspense left.

Start reading Chapter One today.

Privileged to Proofread

Song of the Mysteries by Janny Wurts ~ final manuscript proofreading

Final Volume Song of the Mysteries Forthcoming

For the past three weeks and three days, I’ve been honored and privileged to assist with the final proofread of the final manuscript of the final volume of Janny Wurts‘ series The Wars of Light and Shadow.

I’m only three-quarters finished with Volume 11 of Arc V entitled Song of the Mysteries, but the pace hasn’t slacked since the first page. In fact, it’s increasing with each subchapter to the point I’m finding it hard to sleep and constantly checking for the next installment to be proofread.

I was hesitant to share my excitement, but the author encouraged me to ‘shout anywhere’ I wanted to about this process. I will of course refrain from spoilers and only relate my feelings (minus specific details) for how the convergence is coalescing from every moment that came before, culminating from all previous ten volumes, into a wondrous, frenzied concerto of . . . and I’ll stop myself there. It has been, thus far, all I could have hoped for and beyond my wildest dreams or imaginings. Janny is the true Masterbard of her Paravian universe to my infinite delight.

This is my second time helping Janny with a final manuscript. The previous volume, Destiny’s Conflict, I help her proofread in 2016, before publication in 2017.

Much has changed in my life in the intervening seven years, but a return to Athera was just what my soul needed this winter, as I acclimate to a new location and continue to search for a new home here in the Pacific Northwest.

With only five chapters left to proof, I should have some final thoughts on this final manuscript in the next week or two.

Stay tuned and thanks for stopping by my much-neglected blog.

Take care!

My Reading Roars Back

Happy Lunar New Year and welcome to the Year of the Tiger!

Three dozen years ago, this Wednesday, I became a mom, bringing our son into the world. Derek did not slip quietly in, but roared with hunger and passion.

Today, he is a proud father and I’m a grandmother who lives too far away from her grandson. This year, I resolve to remedy this separation and cut my three hour flight, or three day drive, to less than a half hour. I also resolved, during my Christmas holiday family break, to return to reading, where I found my time better spent than hoping the next streaming series or movie would live up to its hype and being perpetually disappointed.

A few days before Christmas, I discovered an audiobook edition of one of my favorite books from the early 90s. Revisiting this novel thirty years later, it still brought tears to my eyes, but did not resonate as vibrantly as my rose-colored memories did. I’m glad I listened to it, but I’m not sure it rates a five star favorite ranking anymore.

I quickly followed that audiobook with my annual reading of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, this year narrated by Frank Muller and recorded in 1980. I immediately listened to many other Christmas short stories, including The Night Before Christmas by Moore, A Country Christmas by Alcott, The Fir Tree by Anderson, The Birds’ Christmas by Wiggin and “Yes, Virginia There Is a Santa Claus.” Betwixt and between all the classic Christmas tales, I enjoyed the Dune graphic novel. On the final day of 2021, I started Connie Willis’ A Lot Like Christmas, which became my first book of ten to finish since the beginning of 2022.

A Wolfe by Any Other Name Might Be a Warg

I returned to reading The Annotated Hobbit after a two week hiatus, said hiatus caused by notes and illustration captions found in the Introduction and annotations in the first five chapters. As I noted last week in a Tolkien memorial post, I’ve since started reading and completed several nonfiction titles, some of which actually grew out of The Annotated Hobbit annotations.

The first footnote of Chapter 6 delved into a connection between Tolkien’s us of “Misty Mountains” to a poem from the Old Norse Elder Edda. A few pages later, in the seventh footnote, I learned the chapter name, “Out of the frying-pan into the fire,” is a traditional proverb which The Oxford Dictionary of English Proverbs has examples of going back to the sixteenth century. But turning to the next page, I discovered the best, and ninth, footnote of the chapter, containing a reference to correspondence, in 1966, between Gene Wolfe and Tolkien on the use of the word warg.

Tolkien described his use of warg in a letter to Gene Wolfe of November 7, 1966: “It is an old word for wolf, which also had the sense of an outlaw or hunted criminal. This is the usual sense in surviving texts. I adopted the word, which had a good sound for the meaning, as a name for this particular brand of demonic wolf in the story.” Tolkien derived the word from Old English wearg-, Old High German warg-, Old Norse varg-r (also = “wolf,” especially of a legendary kind).
Footnote 9, Chapter 6 Out of the Frying-pan Into the Fire, The Annotated Hobbit

Reading Recap ~ January 2020

I’m a bit stunned to find myself already facing February. Where did my January disappear to? So many reading ambitions and so few goals achieved. I find myself five books behind my pace to reach my annual goal of ninety-six books (eight books per months). Basically, I finished three books last month. Not that I wasn’t constantly reading something (I’ll discuss my overflowing currently reading dilemma in a bit).

Here’s the three I actually started and finished during January:

Hard Times by Dickens

The first book I started and finished during the first week of the new year was Dickens’ Hard Times. This was the winter reading classic selection for my local library adult book club. We meet on the second Thursday and have lively discussions, including about this shortest and last published work of Charles Dickens.

I listened to the audiobook read by Simon Prebble and managed to complete it with just thirty minutes to spare before arriving at the library for the discussion. We were split as a group whether we liked this book. It is not your typical Dickens and had some portions that were a bit of a slog to muddle through. In hindsight, we all agreed we should have read Little Women in light of the release of yet another movie adaptation over the holiday break. We decided that next winter we will allow ourselves the luxury of reading a classic that might be adapted and released during Thanksgiving or Christmas holidays.

Ransom Kidnapped

My notes from first session of Mythgard Academy webinar discussion on Out of the Silent Planet by C.S. Lewis.

I spent a couple of hours past my usual bedtime last Wednesday evening with Corey Olsen and three dozen new friends discussing the first five chapters of Out of the Silent Planet by C.S. Lewis. I’m proud of myself for making it to the end of the discussion, which ended at 11:15 p.m. I’ve probably read the first book of the Space Trilogy a half dozen times since I first discovered it in the 70s as a pre-teen. I’ve never had an opportunity to do a serious in-depth reading and discussion so I am very excited about the opportunity presented by Mythgard Academy and a generous donation of a patron thereof.

While I participated live in the GoToWebinar session, where I could interact with Corey Olsen via chat, you can watch to the session via the Signum University Youtube channel (link to the playlist) or listen via podcast. Old habits die hard; even knowing the session was being recorded, I took transcript-like notes (because I can still type over a hundred words per minute and can easily keep up with a single person lecturing).

What follows are my notes from Wednesday’s first webinar on Out of the Silent Planet.

Mythgard Malacandra

Tonight I join the latest Mythgard Academy selection featuring C.S. Lewis’ first book in the Space Trilogy series.

Mythgard Academy Presents

Out of the Silent Planet

Meeting on Wednesdays at 10 pm Eastern Time

January 8th through February 5th

Nearly six years ago I re-read Out of the Silent Planet for the 1939 Retro Hugo Awards. I gave it my top slot vote for the Best Novel category, followed by Galactic Patrol and T.H. White’s The Sword in the Stone. I was a bit disappointed when Lewis came in second to the White, but you can’t win them all.

I originally read the Space Trilogy in my early teens and those paperbacks are long gone. Over the years, I’ve picked up copies from used books stores, garage sales and Friends of the Library annual book sales. This past weekend, I remembered I’d registered for the class when it was first announced weeks ago and went searching for all my editions: print, electronic and audio. I quickly found two nearly pristine in very good condition and apparently unread paperbacks buried in my brimming bookshelves.

My Top 50 Books from Last 10 Years

The end of the year and this decade arrived unexpectedly. Well, not completely unexpectedly for the former, but the whole ‘where did the twenty teens go?’ thing caught me by surprise. I’ve been reading and listening to ‘decade in review’ articles and podcasts for the last couple of weeks. Which inspired me to analyze my reading of 965 books over the last ten years.

The following compilation of ‘Top Five’ books for each year starting in 2010, do not include my occasional re-reads of favorites, like the works of Tolkien, Lewis, Jordan, Donaldson and Modesitt.

2010 (read 102)

Blackout/All Clear by Willis (Hugo/Nebula/Locus Best Novel Awards)
Under Heaven by GGK
The Art of Racing in the Rain by Stein
A Civil Compaign by Bujold
Breath and Bone/Flesh and Spirit by Berg

2011 (read 75)

Wars of Light and Shadow (books 5-9) by Wurts
The Lions of Al-Rassan by GGK
The Wise Man’s Fear by Rothfuss
The Empire Trilogy by Feist & Wurts
Ready Player One by Cline

Second Wave of Short Fiction

Last week, I finished listening to or reading the rest of the short fiction I had earmarked for perusal before end of year in a previous post. I’m very grateful to the podcasts of various SFF magazines that fit perfectly into my daily commute. Many of the authors below are new to me. Only Aliette de Bodard, KJ Parker and Sarah Pinsker have I read previously.

December 16th I listened to “Portrait of the Artist” by KJ Parker (3.5-4 stars) published in a special double-issue of Beneath Ceaseless Skies. After dinner I read “The Imaginary Palace of the Winter King” by Sarah Tolmie (3.5-4 stars) from the February 2019 edition of Strange Horizons. “Winter King” was also available via a podcast but I felt like reading the ebook edition I receive as a Patreon of that magazine.

End of Year Short Fiction Dash

Last week I wrote about my annual reading goal, which got me thinking about all the science fiction and fantasy magazines and podcasts I subscribe to. I support two at Patreon: Uncanny and Strange Horizons. I follow several more via my Podcast Addict app on my phone: Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Clarkesworld, Escape Pod, Lightspeed and Podcastle. My Patreon magazines also have audio podcasts of select stories.

Most of the year, I’m heads down in full length books and novels. Only when I reach December, when my book clubs take a break for the holidays, do I come up for air enough to review any novellas or novelettes published in any of the magazines listed above. So I spent some time earlier this week, scrolling back through my Patreon posts to find all the ebooks I forgot to download for Uncanny and Strange Horizons. Then I scrolled through all the podcast episodes for authors I liked or had heard of for any works at least 40 minutes long (the length of half of my daily commute). I added several to my playlist and downloaded the ebooks to my tablet. My commute and lunch time reading was taken care of for the entire week.

Last Sunday, I read “A Time to Reap” by Elizabeth Bear (published in Issue 29 over the summer) and gave it four stars. At lunch on Monday, I read “The Blur in the Corner of Your Eye” by Sarah Pinsker (published in Issue 31 very recently) and didn’t like it quite as much as Bear’s story, so gave it a 3.5-4 star rating.