A Walk in the Woods

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This particular romp takes us through hiking the Appalachian Trail in the eastern most states in America, through the stereotypical storytelling, facts and ranting of Bryson. The trail starts in Georgia and works it's way along the coastal states to Maine. Bryson and his friend Katz decide to walk the whole thing, with no hiking experience, as well as being rather unfit.

I enjoyed this book a lot more than I thought I would. I was worried it would be a bit too much about their particular hike and day to day activities. Walked, pitched tent, slept, walked, etc. But I should have known better. While there were parts that were definitely regarding them on the trail, these were tied in wonderfully to history, science, tales of environmental destruction and woe, but also the wonderful anecdotes of the other people they encounter on the trail or experiences they have.

As always, Bryson handles his stories about the environment and the amazing devastation we humans are causing, and then through our own incompetence are increasing, beautifully. He doesn't preach (possibly unlike the reviewer). He states with an air of exasperation. What troubles me is that it is nearly 20 years since the books publication. I hate to think of the state of affairs now.

My one problem with the book, is the whole thing was written in the imperial system. Which is fine, as Bryson is an American in America. But as there were so many measurements (miles hiked per day, feet of mountains, slopes rising at rates) and temperatures, it really did hurt my brain converting all the time to meters, kilometers and celsius. There were a few pages in the last third of the book which were discussing mountain heights in great detail. I couldn't keep up. The book was thrown across the room with a long and loud tirade about backwards systems.

It honestly detracted from my enjoyment of the book as I had to stop at least once a page to convert something in my head to a vague approximation. And I probably was off a lot of the time. I was more annoyed as my copy was an Australian copy. I would recommend people check if there is a metric version available if you think this would bother you too.

But it honestly is a minor quibble. It's another enjoyable, educational and very funny read.

Room

You know when you find a book that is so engrossing, you can't do anything besides read it? This was one of those. In the middle of this book, I completely tuned the world out. Lexx talked to me for ages and I have no idea what he said. Turns out, after he repeated himself, he was asking if we should go out. The answer was a yelled "No! Not yet!" and I promptly returned to the book and devouring the rest of my fingernails.

This is the story of Jack and his Ma, who are locked in a small room together. The story is told from Jack's perspective, which while some have found irritating, I enjoyed as a writing device. As the narrative is from a 5 year old's perspective who has absolutely no idea what the real world is like, and what normal is. I think the author uses this perfectly to describe to us a horrific situation. Jack doesn't think his world as horrific. It just is.

The second half of the book is where I really engaged with the characters.

*SPOILER ALERT*

Once we are drawn into Jack and Ma's escape, I had this desperate need to know they'd be okay. As mentioned above, I had invested 10 fingernails to the cause. Watching the freak out of Jack, the elation and then despair of Ma when the world wasn't what she expected, the complete lack of comprehension, understanding and empathy of the outside world. It was fascinating and yet makes me hope that we treat actual victims of such trauma so much better than this.

You can come back now.

For a book that deals with incredibly heavy issues, the ending for me is one full of hope. I was wondering while reading, how on earth you tie something like this up, but the author does it well. It allows the readers to gently and happily disengage with the characters. I can't give it 5 stars as there were parts that annoyed me somewhat, but it's a pretty damn good read.

In The Woods

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After being told again and again to read this book, I finally got to it for our Irish themed read for March. And I can see why there is hype. This is an intensely and intricately crafted psychological crime novel.

We all know by now how much I like place, and this book does setting by the bucket loads. Whether it's the dank, wet and slightly dark setting of the present day murder, or the intense, hot summer of Rob's past. The juxtaposition of the two is slightly disorientating.

But so is the rest of the book. The book plays with your head, although you may not really notice it at the time. It's clever. It's subtle. It reads a bit slow at the start, but it's building. Trust, relax and read.

I got a little frustrated with the character development in this book, with characters doing things I didn't agree with. While no one is completely unlikable, there was a lot of shouting at them. I find it frustrating when characters I don't hate/dislike do stupid things.

I'm being entirely vague about this book I know. I just don't want to give anything away, as even apparently insignificant things stack up in this book. But I want you to read it. Take away message for the night. Read it and let it play with your head.

Neverwhere

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Neverwhere is one of those books I never really want to review. Just because I really do not think I could possibly do the book justice.

Disclaimers out of the way, you probably already know I am a big Neil Gaiman fangirl. Also, I own the TV series that Gaiman had originally written, so I knew vaguely what was going to happen. Gaiman was asked to write a TV series, to which he wrote Neverwhere. However, he apparently found the experience incredibly frustrating as the producers and directors kept on cutting out parts of the dialogue and the story. He then wrote a book, that got played with by publishers to sell better. So this version of Neverwhere, is the story he wanted to tell.

The story tell us of Richard who lives in London, and an encounter he has with a girl who appears out in front of him from nowhere on a busy London street, bleeding and begging for help. Much to his high achieving, social climbing girlfriend's protests, he helps the girl and hides her in his flat. This action embarks Richard on a weird and wonderful adventure that timid Richard never would have ever dreamed about, through a world that exists underneath London, London Below.

The whole concept of London Below is fantastic. The thought that there is a parallel city to London Above (or what we would just call London) is actually not so hard to imagine. The city has been reshaped and rebuilt on itself for 2000 years. Each time that happens, more tunnels, corridors and structures get forgotten. The forgotten Tube stations are a great example. Spaces that are intricately built but not needed any more. Not only that bits of the city itself gets forgotten, but the inhabitants of London can get forgotten as well. In fact it's a way we refer to homeless and destitute people already.

The other beautiful thing about this book is it turns the city into a character. Whether that is the turning of places and landmarks into actual characters like Old Bailey or the Angel Islington, or turning them into the literal meanings of their names eg. Knightsbridge or Shepherds Bush, but also the city itself is an overwhelming presence in the book. It's an entity that follows you the entire time.

I must say I probably loved it more as I spent time in London last year so it was all nice and fresh in my mind again. But I am still slightly torn whether American Gods is still my favourite Gaiman. I think it is, but only by a rat's whisker.

Affinity

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Sticking with the gothic theme for a bit. Affinity is a book I actually hadn't heard that much about. But after loving Tipping the Velvet so much last year, the last time I was at the secondhand bookshop I picked it up. Which was fortuitous as there were a few other Sarah Waters options, but this was the one chosen as a group read for April.

The book is another Victorian London historical fiction. We meet Margaret, the eldest, single sister in her family, as she starts her first day as a Lady Visitor to the infamous Millbank prison. Millbank is not a particularly nice place. At least by this stage, the worst prisoners in England were sent to another prison in London, but this was still not a nice place to end up at all.

Inside Millbank, Margaret meets a prisoner called Selina, who is a spiritualist. We all know how fascinated the Victorians were with the occult, spirits, magic and the like, so it isn't a surprise that Margaret is fascinated with Selina and her abilities, and ends up being drawn in deeper and deeper.

Right, so, we can all guess by now that I am a skeptic. In my experience these kind of people prey on people desperate for a message from someone they throw tells and information into the medium's lap. HOWEVER, the disclaimer for this book is that I wanted it to be all true for the story. I  am never one to let facts get in the way of a good story. Unless you swear to me something is a scientific fact and it is blatantly wrong. That pisses me off. Otherwise, I'm all for a bit of fun.

And while I wouldn't describe this book as fun, and while I couldn't completely disengage my disbelief this book drew me along quicker than I would have thought. And talk about a twisty ending!! I was hanging around 3 stars until I started hitting the twists. I didn't like it as much as Tipping the Velvet. I thought it may have been her first book, but looks like it was the second. And then it struck me, that was the problem with this book. It had a lot of second album syndrome to it. It wasn't bad, just felt a bit rushed and not quite as thought through as that debut.

A short review I know, but still a fun and surprising Victorian, gothic read.

End of the World Dystopian Read - The Age of Miracles

I wanted to like this book. I had heard so many good things about it. The unquestionable Jennifer Byrne had it even listed it in her top 5 reads for 2012. So I was sorely disappointed when I just did not care.

The premise for the story is that the Earth is slowly beginning to stop rotating. And then the book was supposed to look at the consequences that then occurred because of the lengthening of the days. Such as crops being unable to grow, how to make society function to a time, etc.

When it was first announced that this was occurring  the days had already extended by 90 mins. I'm not sure how no one had noticed this yet, unless it had occurred incredibly suddenly. But this book does not let science get in the way of a story.

Explanations? Pfft!
Physics? Not needed!

Let me list the issues:
1. Earth slows down rotating. No one knows why. At least they seem slightly perplexed about this.
2. Gravity changes. While not scientifically inaccurate, no one seems bothered by this, except soccer balls and birds.
3. The Magnetic field buggers up and disperses somewhat. Life carries on and no one cares. Well... we would be stuffed. Dead in fact. We could not go out in the sun full stop. The kids getting a nasty case of sunburn is ridiculous. They would have extreme radiation poisoning closely and quickly followed by death. And it's not just the sun people. Cosmic radiation anyone? But we will conveniently forget all about that. Also, without the magnetic field, the solar wind would strip away the Ozone layer. You know. Just minor inconveniences.
4. The Auroras are everywhere. Lies. You can't have an aurora with no magnetic field. It's the solar wind charging particles in the field! How can you... just... nevermind.
5. Things are better in Mexico at the equator. No. Just no. It would be the opposite, at the Poles things would be better, but as highlighted above, I actually just think you're fucked no matter where on Earth you are.
6. Trying not to spoil here, the book goes for about 9 months when the day goes from 24 hours to about 60 hours. The last couple of pages suggest either something has been fixed, or a reality which could not exist. With nothing mentioned at all. Suspend critical thinking people!

Now do not get me wrong. Science fiction you have to break some rules. Obviously. However, I want you to explain it to me. Even if it is "we have this thing but it means everything works". I can deal with that. But don't break the laws of the universe willy-nilly and don't explain anything. Or don't not understand physics and hope that no one notices. And don't do it repeatedly! To quote Terry Pratchett "the rule in science fiction is you are allowed one impossible thing," If you do more, and do it badly, you look like a knob.

You know what though, I could overlook some if not all of the scientific cluster-fuck that is above if the story or characters were likeable. They weren't. Julia, the girl who is our narrator, isn't too bad. And her love interest Seth too. But I just could not care. It was a young adult novel with a cataclysm involved, but it didn't really matter. It was ridiculous. The world is ending and I'm listening to an 11 - 12 year old worrying about whether a boy likes her or not, or why doesn't she get to go to the popular girls party. Seriously?

It wasn't a good coming of age story, it wasn't a good dystopian apocalypse story. It had a decent idea that was not all that terrible to read, just frustrating. I again feel like it was a young-adult book as she didn't have the knowledge or the story for an adult one. So lets write it half-arsed, and publish it as a young adult book. Gosh that makes me angry.

It also had a self-indulgent section at the back of the book that explained the type the book was written in, which just opened itself up to more criticism, as it wasn't the lively read the type was supposed display. All in all, Jennifer and I will be having words.

Lexx says that if you all want to read a good sci-fi dystopia with well based science in it, we should all go read Anathem. While debriefing to him before posting, he was adamant I gave you all a good book to read.

The Windup Girl - #24

When I started this challenge, I asked on Facebook for recommendations from other countries that people had read. I had Danish and Swedish friends recommending lots of Scandinavian lit, Czech friends providing opinions on a large range of European lit, Sri Lankian friends suggesting relevant selections, language students from all over suggesting other texts, linguist friends recommending everything! But the one that sparked my interest the most was a quiet suggestion to read this book, set in Thailand.

Reading the review there were a few things that sparked my interest. Hugo award winning always a plus. Steampunk huge win. Dystopia also a good sign. But the Thailand thing confused me. Why on earth Thailand? Why would that work? I need to read this!!

So I did, and am so very, very glad my friend Dennis told me too. 

The book is set about 100 years in the future. Everything that is a possibility now has gone wrong. Climate change, rising sea levels, near exhaustion of fossil fuels, genetic engineering and the subsequent control of food sources through corporations. Incredibly close to reality and then taken that step further. A good dystopia for me is one that is completely within the realms of possibility that terrifies you slightly. And makes you reconsider your choices. This book did that for me.

So the Thailand connection is that the Kingdom of Thailand is one of the best placed countries after the Expansion (what we are in now) and then the subsequent Contraction. They also closed and then strictly monitored their borders and limited imports as so to keep plagues and diseases out of the country. So far it worked. There was a lot of tech explanation at the beginning of this book to explain the world, what had happened and how it worked. There is very, very limited fossil fuels for example so explaining how the factories work with genetically engineered elephants (megadonts) winding large spindles, and hand-crank radios back in vogue and such. Be prepared to stick with it, but the book I feel is worth it.

The story otherwise was fascinating. The idea of a Windup Girl and her issues, problems and trials where great. I really liked Emiko herself as well. I emphasised a lot with her. While some of the scenes with her were possibly unnecessary they really made me understand her story's climax. And cheer her on!! Maybe this makes me a horrible, callous person, but as a true Aussie, I love an underdog.

The character of Hock Seng, while he really annoyed me at times as a person, I felt for him and his story as a refugee. He is Malaysian-Chinese, and in this world all ethnic Chinese ended up being driven from Malaysia, as the vast majority of them were ethnically cleansed. "Driven" I mean escaped. The refugees are called Yellow Cards in Thailand and are second class citizens. The story of Malaya and the Green Headbands is not again unimaginable with the rise of extremists of all different types of religions, especially in SE Asia. The interaction between the Malayan Chinese and the Thais I found heartbreaking. The contempt and thinly veiled malice was a little too true to home. The control through labels and cards. I worry as the last two governments in Australia have had such terrible policies on refugees that this is not such a dystopian future for us, it may be tomorrow... That is one of the truly terrifying parts of this book.

Otherwise, I really enjoyed going into Kanya's story and her own back story and where she had ended up. She and Jaidee were a welcome surprise as they aren't mentioned any where I found as main characters, yet they really are. At 500pp though, we needed a few more main characters. These guys provided the story beautifully.

For me, the book ticked all the boxes. Good story. Disconcerting, realistic dystopia. The essence of Thailand with the heat, humidity and mangosteens (yum yum yum). Read it