Stockpiling for the Apocalypse that Never Came

[bookgazing]

Just before Cristmas I slipped and my debit card broke my fall. Ooops!

'On Lady and At Sea' – Kage Baker & Katherine Batholomew

'The Ladies of Nell Gwynne's are not your run-of-the-mill demi-mondaines. They are refined and educated ladies all, engaged in the more elegant and expensive forms of carnal delight in order to make their way in a hard world. But they also serve the Queen and the Empire, as the invaluable Ladies' Auxiliary of the technocratic Gentlemen's Speculative Society.
However, even the most dedicated operatives need a holiday from time to time. Nell Gwynne's shuts down for a month at the height of every summer for recreation and relaxation. This summer the Ladies have retired to a respectable boarding house in Torquay, since Mrs. Corvey, the Proprietress, is very fond of the sea. She also needs a deal of relaxing, as the cook at Nell Gwynne's has abruptly gotten religion and departed without notice for a less exotic position…

That is Mrs. Corvey's only worry, though, when she and the Ladies arrive in Torquay, the Riviera of England. They all look forward to taking the sun, some moderate sea bathing, reading novels and indulging in a little light archaeology. As Hebertina happily observes, “Here's to blessed chastity!”

However, Torquay has recently been invaded by an eccentric and overly romantic American, who has peculiar intentions—both toward the placid coast of Tor Bay, and the unassailable privacy of Lady Beatrice. There are rumours and sightings of a sea monster. There are dead butlers and thugs and fox terriers in inconvenient places. And the Ladies cannot summon assistance from the GSS, all of whose agents are pursuing convoluted schemes abroad in Europe.

It appears their holidays will not be nearly as quiet as might be hoped…but they will certainly be interesting.'

A pre-order, so I haven't even spent any money on this yet. Subterranean's international shipping costs were too much for me to justify paying for what is almost certainly going to be a slim book, so I had to pre-order it from Amazon. Excited to see the further adventures of the ladies.

'Excellent Women' – Barbara Pym

'Mildred Lathbury is a clergyman's daughter and a mild-mannered spinster in 1950s England. She is one of those "excellent women," the smart, supportive, repressed women who men take for granted. As Mildred gets embroiled in the lives of her new neighbors--anthropologist Helena Napier and her handsome, dashing husband, Rocky, and Julian Malory, the vicar next door--the novel presents a series of snapshots of human life as actually, and pluckily, lived in a vanishing world of manners and repressed desires.'

I wanted something with a trace of bitterness and this sounded like it would do the trick. It was recommended ages ago as a book about women who stay single.

'Farthing' – Jo Walton

'One summer weekend in 1949--but not our 1949--the well-connected "Farthing set", a group of upper-crust English families, enjoy a country retreat. Lucy is a minor daughter in one of those families; her parents were both leading figures in the group that overthrew Churchill and negotiated peace with Herr Hitler eight years before.

Despite her parents' evident disapproval, Lucy is married--happily--to a London Jew. It was therefore quite a surprise to Lucy when she and her husband David found themselves invited to the retreat. It's even more startling when, on the retreat's first night, a major politician of the Farthing set is found gruesomely murdered, with abundant signs that the killing was ritualistic.'

Ana sent me a very convincing e-mail about this one. It was a bit of a task to track down a copy, but I got one from a second hand seller in the end.

'The Scorpio Races' – Maggie Steifvater

'It happens at the start of every November: the Scorpio Races. Riders attempt to keep hold of their water horses long enough to make it to the finish line. Some riders live. Others die.

At age nineteen, Sean Kendrick is the returning champion. He is a young man of few words, and if he has any fears, he keeps them buried deep, where no one else can see them.

Puck Connolly is different. She never meant to ride in the Scorpio Races. But fate hasn't given her much of a chance. So she enters the competition — the first girl ever to do so. She is in no way prepared for what is going to happen.'

This book came with a strong recommendation from Renay. Horses :D Wild, murdery horses :D

'Underground Time' – Delphine de Vigan

'Every day, Mathilde takes the Metro to her job at a large multinational, where she has felt miserable and isolated ever since getting on the wrong side of her bullying boss. Every day, Thibault, a paramedic, drives where his dispatcher directs him, fighting traffic to attend to disasters. For many of the people he rushes to treat, he represents the only human connection in their day. Mathilde and Thibault are just two figures being pushed and shoved in a lonesome, crowded city. But what might happen if these two souls, traveling their separate paths, could meet?'

Victoria posted about this during her French novel week. It sounds complicated and promises an unhappy ending, but I really could do with a dose of realism from realistic novels right now.

'The Name of the Star' – Maureen Johnson

'The day Louisiana teenager Rory Deveaux arrives in London marks a memorable occasion. For Rory, it's the start of a new life at a London boarding school. But for many, this will be remembered as the day a series of brutal murders broke out across the city, gruesome crimes mimicking the horrific Jack the Ripper events of more than a century ago.

Soon “Rippermania” takes hold of modern-day London, and the police are left with few leads and no witnesses. Except one. Rory spotted the man police believe to be the prime suspect. But she is the only one who saw him. Even her roommate, who was walking with her at the time, didn't notice the mysterious man. So why can only Rory see him? And more urgently, why has Rory become his next target? In this edge-of-your-seat thriller, full of suspense, humor, and romance, Rory will learn the truth about the secret ghost police of London and discover her own shocking abilities.'

Which I feel like I have been meaning to get for years, but which only came out last year. YA mystery with added creepery.

'This is Life' – Dan Rhodes

'In Paris, art student Aurelie Renard throws a stone that sets in motion a chain of events that will turn her life upside down.

Suddenly finding herself in sole charge of a stranger's baby, and with no idea how babies work, it's only thanks to the help of her adoring professor and her gun-toting heartbreaker of a best friend that Aurelie Renard is able to navigate her way through the most extraordinary and calamitous seven days of her life.

Meanwhile, in a Pigalle cinema, a naked man is doing his best to show the people of Paris, Aurelie among them, what it means to be alive...'

Here's a recommendation from the Bookslut blog. It's been long enough since I last read a book that I thought was both depressing and hopeful for me to try another one which I suspect will book provoke similar feelings
.
'Warhorses of Letters' – Marie Philips & Robert Hudson

'These powerfully moving letters were exchanged between two of the most significant warhorses in history: the dignified Marengo, devoted bearer of Napoleon; and the dashing Copenhagen, a slightly flighty racehorse who became the warhorse of the Duke of Wellington.'

I loved Marie Philips novel 'Gods Behaving Badly'. Loved it. Get it now, it's such a well written romp about gods transported into the modern day. So, when she announced her next project I was all over it. I just forgot to, y'know, actually get all over it and buy the damn book. That's remedied now.

'NW' – Zadie Smith

'This is the story of a city.

The northwest corner of a city. Here you'll find guests and hosts, those with power and those without it, people who live somewhere special and others who live nowhere at all. And many people in between.

Every city is like this. Cheek-by-jowl living. Separate worlds.

And then there are the visitations: the rare times a stranger crosses a threshold without permission or warning, causing a disruption in the whole system. Like the April afternoon a woman came to Leah Hanwell's door, seeking help, disturbing the peace, forcing Leah out of her isolation…'

Ana influences my purchases again with her review of Smith's newest.

'Mr Fox' – Helen Oyeyemi

'Fairytale romances end with a wedding. The fairytales that don't get more complicated. In this book, celebrated writer Mr. Fox can't stop himself from killing off the heroines of his novels, and neither can his wife, Daphne. It's not until Mary, his muse, comes to life and transforms him from author into subject that his story begins to unfold differently. Meanwhile, Daphne becomes convinced that her husband is having an affair, and finds her way into Mary and Mr. Fox's game. And so Mr. Fox is offered a choice: Will it be a life with the girl of his dreams, or a life with an all-too-real woman who delights him more than he cares to admit?'

I recently finished 'When Fox is a Thousand' and another fantastical fox story seemed like a good follow up.

'Why Love Hurts' – Eva Illouz

'Few of us have been spared the agonies of intimate relationships. They come in many shapes: loving a man or a woman who will not commit to us, being heartbroken when we're abandoned by a lover, engaging in Sisyphean internet searches, coming back lonely from bars, parties, or blind dates, feeling bored in a relationship that is so much less than we had envisaged - these are only some of the ways in which the search for love is a difficult and often painful experience.

Despite the widespread and almost collective character of these experiences, our culture insists they are the result of faulty or insufficiently mature psyches. For many, the Freudian idea that the family designs the pattern of an individual's erotic career has been the main explanation for why and how we fail to find or sustain love. Psychoanalysis and popular psychology have succeeded spectacularly in convincing us that individuals bear responsibility for the misery of their romantic and erotic lives. The purpose of this book is to change our way of thinking about what is wrong in modern relationships. The problem is not dysfunctional childhoods or insufficiently self-aware psyches, but rather the institutional forces shaping how we love.'

Non-fiction! I know, I know, I've got to pick up my non-fiction pace. Anyway Bookslut keeps praising it and it is relevant to my life right now.

'The Monstrumologist' – Rick Yancey

'These are the secrets I have kept. This is the trust I never betrayed. But he is dead now and has been for nearly ninety years, the one who gave me his trust, the one for whom I kept these secrets. The one who saved me . . . and the one who cursed me. So starts the diary of Will Henry, orphan and assistant to a doctor with a most unusual specialty: monster hunting. In the short time he has lived with the doctor, Will has grown accustomed to his late night callers and dangerous business. But when one visitor comes with the body of a young girl and the monster that was feeding on her, Will's world is about to change forever. The doctor has discovered a baby Anthropophagi--a headless monster that feeds through the mouthfuls of teeth in its chest--and it signals a growing number of Anthropophagi. Now, Will and the doctor must face the horror threatenning to overtake and consume our world before it is too late.'

You would not believe how hard it was to find this without its terrible new cover design. Ugh. I know, I'm not the target audience for this book, so shut up, right? I heard about this all over the place, but I think Angie is the one who really got me considering these books.

'Chasing the King of Hearts' – Hanna Krall, 'Mr Darwin's Garden' – 'Kristina Carlson and 'The Mussel Feast' – Birgit Vanderbeke

'A German modern classic about the Fall of the Wall, a Finnish postmodern Victorian novel about faith versus knowledge and a Polish love story spanning 60 years from the Warsaw Ghetto to Israel.'

(blurb taken from the Peirene website)

And my Peirene subscription : )

'Tipping the Velvet' - Sarah Waters

'When Kitty is called up to London for an engagement on "Grease Paint Avenue," Nan follows as her dresser and secret lover, and, soon after, dons trousers herself and joins the act. In time, Kitty breaks her heart, and Nan assumes the guise of butch roue to commence her own thrilling and varied sexual education - a sort of Moll Flanders in drag - finally finding friendship and true love in the most unexpected places.'

I found all these pretty hardcover Virago editions in the big Waterstones in the city. Couldn't resist this one...or the next one.

'My Brilliant Career' - Miles Franklin

'First published in 1901, this Australian classic recounts the live of 16-year-old Sybylla Melvyn. Trapped on her parents' outback farm, she simultaneously loves bush life and hates the physical burdens it imposes. For Sybylla longs for a more refined, aesthetic lifestyle -- to read, to think, to sing -- but most of all to do great things.

Suddenly her life is transformed. Whisked away to live on her grandmother's gracious property, she falls under the eye of the rich and handsome Harry Beecham. And soon she finds herself choosing between everything a conventional life offers and her own plans for a 'brilliant career'.'

(blurb taken from Amazon)

So pretty.

'Once a Jailbird' - Han Fallada

'For Willi Kufult, prison life means staying out of trouble, keeping his cell clean, snagging a precious piece of tobacco - and dreaming of the day of his release. Then he gets out. As Willi tries to make a new life for himself in Hamburg, finding a job and even love, he still cannot escape his past. Gradually he becomes sucked into a world of drink, desperation and deceit, and with one terrible act, he is ensnared in a noose of his own making...'

One for after the festive season.

'Ammonite' - Nicola Griffiths



'Change or die. These are the only options available on the planet Jeep. Centuries earlier, a deadly virus shattered the original colony, killing the men and forever altering the few surviving women. Now, generations after the colony has lost touch with the rest of humanity, a company arrives to exploit Jeep–and its forces find themselves fighting for their lives. Terrified of spreading the virus, the company abandons its employees, leaving them afraid and isolated from the natives. In the face of this crisis, anthropologist Marghe Taishan arrives to test a new vaccine. As she risks death to uncover the women’s biological secret, she finds that she, too, is changing–and realizes that not only has she found a home on Jeep, but that she alone carries the seeds of its destruction. . . .'

And finally one from the Gollancz Masterworks series. These were scattered all through the SFF section of Waterstones and I had to restrain myself from buying all the ones by female authors.

I feel better now. Consumption therapy works again.

All blurbs taken from Goodreads unless otherwise stated.

Comments

[theliteraryomnivore.wordpress.com]

I am one more voice in support of Farthing. Just… Walton is really great at echoing very specific genres (here, the 1940s British cozy mystery) to the T while maintaining her own voice, and the Small Change trilogy, which I've not finished yet, has a lot of brilliant points to make about the nature of evil. It's the best thing by her I've read so far.

And that edition of Tipping the Velvet is gorgeous. I'm laid out in bed with a stomach bug, and right at the level of my head on my wall is a quote from Tipping the Velvet.

[bookgazing]

It's too pretty, I was too weak to resist. Should I read Fingersmith first, do you think? I got that last year and haven't read it yet.

[theliteraryomnivore.wordpress.com]

While I do delight in calling Tipping the Velvet, Fingersmith, and Affinity Waters' Victorian Women in Love trilogy, the novels are utterly standalone, sharing only setting and same-sex romance. It depends on what you want to read—the stunning, brilliant punch to the gut that Fingersmith is or the bildungsroman that is Tipping the Velvet.

[nymeth]

All teh awesome books! Why Love Hurts was on my Christmas list, but alas, Santa can only get to so much. Really curious to hear your thoughts on that one. And on everything else too :P

PS: If you love Farthing and then have trouble finding copies of the rest of the series, mine are yours for the borrowing. I was lucky enough to find them all on Better World Books for relatively cheap last year.

[bookgazing]

Thanks, I did have trouble finding the first one so I may take you up on that.

[(Anonymous)]

Wow, that should last you a while! LOL! I read my first Oyeyemi last year, the one you bought sounds even better!

[(Anonymous)]

That wasn't meant to be anonymous, sorry!
Joanna at www.createyourworld.me

[bookgazing]

I have White is for Witching too, just trying to work out which to go with first.

[renay]

THE SCORPIO RACES. *________*

[bookgazing]

All down to you ;P

[necromancyneverpays.wordpress.com]

So many people I know reading Mr. Fox, I am going to have to join in!

[bookgazing]

Perhaps a good readalong idea?

[classicvasilly.wordpress.com]

Wow! Your debit card definitely broke your fall! :-) Happy reading.

-Vasilly

[bookgazing]

My debit card needed a lie down :P