weaselmom | May reading list.

China Mieville - The Scar*

China Mieville - Perdido Street Station*

Donna Andrews - Murder With Peacocks*

Donna Andrews - Murder With Puffins*

Donna Andrews - Revenge of the Wrought-Iron Flamingoes*

Patrick McDonnell - Mutts 8: I Want To Be The Kitty*

Grace Marmor Spruch - Squirrels At My Window: Life With A Remarkable Gang of Urban Squirrels*

Jim Butcher - Storm Front (The Harry Dresden Files #1)*

Jim Butcher - Fool Moon (The Harry Dresden Files #2)*

Woo hoo! I did it! A whole month of reading only new stuff. I was a readin' machine this month.

The Scar was a Christmas gift from C, and I had been holding onto it until I could give it my full attention. My God, what an accomplishment (the book, not my attention span). It's actually the sequel to Perdido Street Station, which I didn't yet have. It was an interesting experience to read it first with no introduction to Mieville's world of Bas-Lag. His creation ranks up there with anything from Clive Barker for sheer bizarre imagination. There's no way I can explain what these books are about, and I can't recommend them to anybody who needs a happy ending. The grimness is unrelenting, the characters are unlikeable at best, and don't get too attached to anybody. (In this way, they remind me of the books of George R. R. Martin.) But C, I'm grateful to you for introducing me to these works of astonishing power and vision.

After those two books, my three new murder mysteries were downright cheery. I had perused Donna Andrews' series at the bookstore and thought I'd give them a whirl from the library. Turned out that I really like these books! She writes (or perhaps I should say the heroine speaks) the same way I would if I could write, in a breezy, casual, hyperbole-filled way. She pokes fun at, respectively, weddings, bird-watchers, and historical re-enactors.

These Jim Butcher books about Harry Dresden, Chicago-based wizard and PI, are great. I mean it. Who knew? They're funny, scary, thrilling, adventurous, a fine ride. We have vampires and demons and ghosts and sidhe and paladins and all kinds of critters. What impresses me most is that Butcher has thoroughly thought about the magic systems in his books, the associated costs of being able to do magic, the consequences of characters' actions. The fifth book should be out in August, and I can't wait.

Coming up in June: The Eyre Affair for Book Club, and then the next Harry Potter book. Is anybody going to the release party at the Southcenter Borders? Skarrin?