Reading Wednesday

[troisoiseaux]

Read The Last Days of New Paris by China Miéville, a bizarre (I mean, it's Miéville, so like, coincidentally, water is wet) novella set in a WWII-era Paris where the fight between Nazis and the Resistance has been complicated by the addition of demons and "manifs," the manifestations of Surrealist art as the result of an "S-Blast" that warped reality itself. This never really clicked for me, but in fairness, I am definitely not the target audience— I don't know anything about Surrealism, or most of the people featured as characters in the pre-"S-Blast" chapters. Anyway, that's my annual Miéville read sorted.

Currently reading Never Caught: The Washingtons' Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave, Ona Judge by Erica Armstrong Dunbar, which is what it says on the tin (nonfiction). I feel like this strikes a good balance in how to fill the gaps of the historical record while centering the story on a woman who couldn't leave much of one— there's a lot of she would likely have...s in describing Judge's experiences, without veering too far into presenting speculation as fact or putting words in her mouth, as it were.

Currently listening to The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett, a mystery in a fantasy setting (my go-to niche for audiobooks, I guess?); the vibe is like sticking the Sherlock Holmes stories, Pacific Rim, and Annihilation in a blender, with Fantasy Roman Empire aesthetics on top. Enjoying this!

Comments

[sabotabby]

Oh, I'm sorry. That's probably my favourite Miéville, but I am the target audience. The most important thing to know is that none of the bonkers RPF stuff is made up. That's literally how all of those people were.

[troisoiseaux]

Every book is someone else's cup of tea! I think Embassytown is my favorite of his.

I did previously know of Jack Parsons, who quite honestly might be less weird in this book than in his actual life, so I can only imagine!

[sovay]

I did previously know of Jack Parsons, who quite honestly might be less weird in this book than in his actual life, so I can only imagine!

Jack Parsons set a very high bar in his actual life! By which I mean I hope no one I know ever approaches it!

[troisoiseaux]

Like, when "death at 37 in a home laboratory explosion" isn't even the wildest thing on your Wikipedia page.........

[isis]

Ooh, I really enjoyed The Tainted Cup! Waiting impatiently for the second book...

[troisoiseaux]

Ooh, I didn't realize it wasn't a standalone!

[whimsyful]

the vibe is like sticking the Sherlock Holmes stories, Pacific Rim, and Annihilation in a blender, with Fantasy Roman Empire aesthetics on top Oooh this sounds intriguing!

[troisoiseaux]

A more accurate explanation would be "the Sherlock Holmes stories set in a Fantasy Roman Empire with kaiju (a la Pacific Rim) and Contagions with Weird Botanical Effects (a la what I have, perhaps inaccurately, gleaned second-hand of Annihilation)," but it didn't have quite the same ring to it...?

[ioplokon]

That Miéville story reminds me a bit of Morrison's Doom Patrol (The Painting that Ate Paris & Albert Hoffman's Bicycle stories in particular), which might be a more accessible way into surrealism, at least on the visual side.

[troisoiseaux]

Huh. Interesting!

[chelseagirl]

Mieville used to be one of my absolute favorites, when he was writing big sprawling books with lots of worldbuilding. Then, it seems to me at least, he got caught up in wanting to be literary, and got brief and ambiguous and kinda lost me. He's co-authoring something with Keanu Reeves, which is probably going to be a great film role for Keanu eventually but in the meantime I'll probably revert to type and buy it in hardcover and then wonder why.

[troisoiseaux]

I've been working my way through his oeuvre mostly at random, so I actually have no idea if I've been reading his older or newer books, but yeah, he really goes off on the sprawling world-building!!

Wild to learn about the Keanu Reeves collaboration.

[marginaliana]

Miéville is so hit-or-miss for me - I also couldn't quite get into The Last Days of New Paris, and then Kraken swung all the way to the other end of the spectrum in being too straightforward. But The City & the City really hit that sweet spot, I thought.

[troisoiseaux]

I quite liked Kraken, which was the first of his I read; my biggest problem with it was that it was just so very 2009-10 that all the pop culture references were jarring to read. ("I can haz squid?") I'd say Embassytown, Perdido Street Station, and The City & the City are my top tier Miévilles, though.

I also read, but struggled a lot with his overly grandiloquent writing in, October, so there appears to be a direct inverse relationship between how much I like a Miéville book and how "real world"-based it is...?

[skygiants]

"I can haz squid" also launched me right out of Kraken and fully across the room when I read it.

[troisoiseaux]

I wonder whether all the memes in the Locked Tomb books will feel just as jarring 10 years from now...

[skygiants]

Last Days of New Paris definitely felt for me like a constant stream of in-jokes that I was only half-getting at best, but he clearly was having an amazing time writing for himself and I do respect that.

[troisoiseaux]

Yeah, agreed on both counts.