Reading Wednesday
Nov. 19th, 2014 03:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
brigdhWhat did you just finish?
Animal's People by Indra Sinha. A really excellent novel about the Bhopal gas disaster (though that event is never actually referred to by name). Animal is an orphan, a young man severely disabled by his exposure to the poisons as an infant, who walks on all fours and refuses to acknowledge that he's human. A crush on a girl leads to his involvement with an activist group, and gradually a plot develops involving the latest court case against the 'kampani' that built the factory; a newly-arrived American doctor who wants to build a free clinic but has secrets of her own; Ma Franci, an elderly, partly senile nun who only speaks French and is convinced the "Apokalis" has already begun, who raised Animal and wants to stay with him even when her order repeatedly tries to send her back to France; and several romantic relationships, boycotts, hunger strikes, fire-walking, and more. The best part of this book wasn't the plot but the language; the conceit of the entire thing is that it's based on tape recordings of Animal telling his story to a journalist, so it's a rambling monologue of metaphors and dreams and wordplay in at least three languages. It's lovely and compelling and I could have read so much more. Highly recommended.
The Shirt on His Back by Barbara Hambly.I really like this book - even more than I'd remembered - although it does have a sad lack of Rose. At least she's off-screen for a good reason. Also Shaw backstory! Even if it's very vague and only a little glimpse, it's nice to see more about him.
I was looking up something related to this book, and have just now realized that almost every single background character is a real historical person. Including the painter dude! Who was actually at the Rendezvous in 1837. Here one of my favorites of the paintings he did of it. Unfortunately I cannot find his sketches of either a chess game or a boxing match, so apparently Hannibal and Ben escaped being immortalized for art history. :D
I did find this tragic account of Kit Carson, who apparently had already become a famous pulp figure in his own lifetime. The first he learned about his fame though, was discovering a novel "starring" him in the belongings of a woman he'd been trying to save who had died anyway. Carson later wrote: I have much regretted the failure of the attempt to save the life of so esteemed and respected a lady. In the camp was found a book, the first of the kind I had ever seen, in which I was made a great hero, slaying Indians by the hundred, and I have often thought that as Mrs. White would read the same and knowing that I lived near, she would pray for my appearance and that she might be saved.
Anyway, back to fiction, I really like Morning Star, though Hannibal has so many flirtations in this book that I find it hard to tell who he's actually sleeping with (all of them? none of them? it shouldn't be this confusing!). I love Ben keeping a journal for Rose. I really like the mystery, and the parallels between all the different pursuits of vengeance, and also all the Frankenstein comparisons. I also really like how at least part of the mystery is left open-ended, and Ben's discomfort with that.
According to Shaw, on one of the three occasions between New Orleans and the South Pass that he'd spoken more than half a dozen words at a time [...] Shaw had mentioned on the steamboat, breaking a silence of nearly forty-eight hours on that occasion and then returning to it at once
Man, poor Ben. If Shaw was barely speaking and Hannibal was having regular panic attacks between fits of suicidality, that must have been a pretty terrible three month trip. He really earned his $500.
'What the hell good does it do me to get my life back, if it costs me the only thing that matters to me?' the fiddler had cried, on the occasion that January had tracked him down on the wharves at four o'clock one morning after a Mardi Gras ball.
I have a lot of things to say about this one line! It's yet another example of Hannibal talking about himself with life/death metaphors. And setting this on the wharves is totally a call-back to Ben's suicide attempt when they first met, right? Also, how did Ben even know to go looking for him at 4 am (because Hannibal was totally living with them while recovering I WANT TO BELIEVE THIS). Also - what was Ben's response? How do you answer a question like that? I really want the whole fic about this scene.
I just want all the fic and meta about Hannibal's new sobriety - about why now, what are his motivations, how does he feel about it - how do Ben and Rose and everyone else he knows feel about? Like, I am all about him doing this because he's in love with Ben and Rose and trying to be a better/more useful person, but I feel like there must be non-OT3 interpretations as well.
'I do,' replied January. 'But she is back in the city of the white men on the Great River, being unable to come with us on account of being with child.' Even speaking her name filled him with longing and with joy.
'Rose.' Morning Star gave him her beautiful smile. 'Sun Mouse told me.' Sun Mouse was her name for Hannibal - one which had been almost immediately picked up by every whore in the camp as well.
I am endlessly amused that Hannibal has known Morning Star for something like 12 hours at this point, most of which were presumably taken up with having a wedding and sleeping, and yet he's already told her all about Rose. Also, okay: everyone has new nicknames! 'Tall Chief' is pretty self-evident, 'Winter Moon' is another name for the month of January (it took me an embarrassingly long time to figure that out), but what does 'Sun Mouse' mean? Is it a reference to Hannibal's thing about "The Sun spoke to me in a dream"?
I like the random accusations of Aaron Burr and Santa Anna. It's just so funny to me that people in the past had the same kind of weird conspiracy theories that we do today.
This book also has an amazing adventure sequence. I love everything about Ben and Hannibal falling in the river (also PLEASE I NEED huddling-for-warmth fic in the aftermath), meeting up with Shaw and the fight to keep from being captured, the threat of torture (and Ben's specifically freaking out over Hannibal being tortured), and then the absolutely amazing exchange when they've been rescued:
January caught Hannibal's arm as the fiddler stumbled, the drag of his weight - even perceived through January's own aching exhaustion - telling him that his friend was at the end of his strength. 'Go,' the fiddler whispered, and staggered again. 'You'll never get away—'
January tightened his hold. 'Rose will kill me if I make her find another Greek tutor.'
'I'm not fooling.'
'Neither am I.'
'Please,' panted Hannibal, and he made an effort to plant his feet. 'I've never been anything but a waste of air and boot leather. Please don't make me die with my last thought being that I caused the deaths of the only people I care about—'
'If I have to carry you,' January doubled his fist in his friend's face - 'it's going to slow me down. But I'll do it.'
OMG <3 And then there's totally horses so it's all unnecessary melodrama. BUT NECESSARY FOR MY HEART.
And at the end, Baby John! I don't normally like baby-fic, but this is possibly the sweetest and best ending ever.
(And here was the FFA discussion, now over.)
What are you currently reading?
Foxglove Summer by Ben Aaronovitch. The new Rivers of London book! :D I'm very much enjoying it so far.
The Mango Season by Amulya Malladi. So far I'm enjoying this much more than the author's previous book. An Indian woman living in America has a secret American fiancee; she goes back to visit her family and attempts to break the news.
Animal's People by Indra Sinha. A really excellent novel about the Bhopal gas disaster (though that event is never actually referred to by name). Animal is an orphan, a young man severely disabled by his exposure to the poisons as an infant, who walks on all fours and refuses to acknowledge that he's human. A crush on a girl leads to his involvement with an activist group, and gradually a plot develops involving the latest court case against the 'kampani' that built the factory; a newly-arrived American doctor who wants to build a free clinic but has secrets of her own; Ma Franci, an elderly, partly senile nun who only speaks French and is convinced the "Apokalis" has already begun, who raised Animal and wants to stay with him even when her order repeatedly tries to send her back to France; and several romantic relationships, boycotts, hunger strikes, fire-walking, and more. The best part of this book wasn't the plot but the language; the conceit of the entire thing is that it's based on tape recordings of Animal telling his story to a journalist, so it's a rambling monologue of metaphors and dreams and wordplay in at least three languages. It's lovely and compelling and I could have read so much more. Highly recommended.
The Shirt on His Back by Barbara Hambly.
I was looking up something related to this book, and have just now realized that almost every single background character is a real historical person. Including the painter dude! Who was actually at the Rendezvous in 1837. Here one of my favorites of the paintings he did of it. Unfortunately I cannot find his sketches of either a chess game or a boxing match, so apparently Hannibal and Ben escaped being immortalized for art history. :D
I did find this tragic account of Kit Carson, who apparently had already become a famous pulp figure in his own lifetime. The first he learned about his fame though, was discovering a novel "starring" him in the belongings of a woman he'd been trying to save who had died anyway. Carson later wrote: I have much regretted the failure of the attempt to save the life of so esteemed and respected a lady. In the camp was found a book, the first of the kind I had ever seen, in which I was made a great hero, slaying Indians by the hundred, and I have often thought that as Mrs. White would read the same and knowing that I lived near, she would pray for my appearance and that she might be saved.
Anyway, back to fiction, I really like Morning Star, though Hannibal has so many flirtations in this book that I find it hard to tell who he's actually sleeping with (all of them? none of them? it shouldn't be this confusing!). I love Ben keeping a journal for Rose. I really like the mystery, and the parallels between all the different pursuits of vengeance, and also all the Frankenstein comparisons. I also really like how at least part of the mystery is left open-ended, and Ben's discomfort with that.
According to Shaw, on one of the three occasions between New Orleans and the South Pass that he'd spoken more than half a dozen words at a time [...] Shaw had mentioned on the steamboat, breaking a silence of nearly forty-eight hours on that occasion and then returning to it at once
Man, poor Ben. If Shaw was barely speaking and Hannibal was having regular panic attacks between fits of suicidality, that must have been a pretty terrible three month trip. He really earned his $500.
'What the hell good does it do me to get my life back, if it costs me the only thing that matters to me?' the fiddler had cried, on the occasion that January had tracked him down on the wharves at four o'clock one morning after a Mardi Gras ball.
I have a lot of things to say about this one line! It's yet another example of Hannibal talking about himself with life/death metaphors. And setting this on the wharves is totally a call-back to Ben's suicide attempt when they first met, right? Also, how did Ben even know to go looking for him at 4 am (because Hannibal was totally living with them while recovering I WANT TO BELIEVE THIS). Also - what was Ben's response? How do you answer a question like that? I really want the whole fic about this scene.
I just want all the fic and meta about Hannibal's new sobriety - about why now, what are his motivations, how does he feel about it - how do Ben and Rose and everyone else he knows feel about? Like, I am all about him doing this because he's in love with Ben and Rose and trying to be a better/more useful person, but I feel like there must be non-OT3 interpretations as well.
'I do,' replied January. 'But she is back in the city of the white men on the Great River, being unable to come with us on account of being with child.' Even speaking her name filled him with longing and with joy.
'Rose.' Morning Star gave him her beautiful smile. 'Sun Mouse told me.' Sun Mouse was her name for Hannibal - one which had been almost immediately picked up by every whore in the camp as well.
I am endlessly amused that Hannibal has known Morning Star for something like 12 hours at this point, most of which were presumably taken up with having a wedding and sleeping, and yet he's already told her all about Rose. Also, okay: everyone has new nicknames! 'Tall Chief' is pretty self-evident, 'Winter Moon' is another name for the month of January (it took me an embarrassingly long time to figure that out), but what does 'Sun Mouse' mean? Is it a reference to Hannibal's thing about "The Sun spoke to me in a dream"?
I like the random accusations of Aaron Burr and Santa Anna. It's just so funny to me that people in the past had the same kind of weird conspiracy theories that we do today.
This book also has an amazing adventure sequence. I love everything about Ben and Hannibal falling in the river (also PLEASE I NEED huddling-for-warmth fic in the aftermath), meeting up with Shaw and the fight to keep from being captured, the threat of torture (and Ben's specifically freaking out over Hannibal being tortured), and then the absolutely amazing exchange when they've been rescued:
January caught Hannibal's arm as the fiddler stumbled, the drag of his weight - even perceived through January's own aching exhaustion - telling him that his friend was at the end of his strength. 'Go,' the fiddler whispered, and staggered again. 'You'll never get away—'
January tightened his hold. 'Rose will kill me if I make her find another Greek tutor.'
'I'm not fooling.'
'Neither am I.'
'Please,' panted Hannibal, and he made an effort to plant his feet. 'I've never been anything but a waste of air and boot leather. Please don't make me die with my last thought being that I caused the deaths of the only people I care about—'
'If I have to carry you,' January doubled his fist in his friend's face - 'it's going to slow me down. But I'll do it.'
OMG <3 And then there's totally horses so it's all unnecessary melodrama. BUT NECESSARY FOR MY HEART.
And at the end, Baby John! I don't normally like baby-fic, but this is possibly the sweetest and best ending ever.
(And here was the FFA discussion, now over.)
What are you currently reading?
Foxglove Summer by Ben Aaronovitch. The new Rivers of London book! :D I'm very much enjoying it so far.
The Mango Season by Amulya Malladi. So far I'm enjoying this much more than the author's previous book. An Indian woman living in America has a secret American fiancee; she goes back to visit her family and attempts to break the news.
no subject
Date: 2014-11-19 09:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-11-19 09:58 pm (UTC)