Reading Wednesday

Finished reading: Beauty is a Wound by Eka Kurniawan. To recap from previous Reading Wednesday - Indonesian magical realism, following a particular family as horrible things happen to all of them, and it's really, really good! Though, emphasis on horrible things happening to people. Yikes. If the novel didn't have such a light tone, I wouldn't be able to handle it. I was completely sucked in by it, though. Seriously seriously hard to put this book down, and that hasn't happened to me in a while.

Currently reading: The Man Who Spoke Snakish by Estonian author Anders Kivirähk. Set in some kind of early pagan medievalish period. People can speak the language of snakes! And use it to command other animals! I'm not too deep into it yet, so I'm not quite sure where it's going, but I'm enjoying the ride a lot. Also: Apparently bears are very seductive. Who knew?

Reading next: My package from Salakirjat finally arrived, so this means I'm probably reading The Magic Songs of the Finns next! Or at least the parts of it that are chunks-of-text. If I don't end up finding something really cool at the library that I want to tackle first, at least. Anyway, originally, this was compiled by Lönnrot. English translation is Abercromby, 1898... I'm not sure if there's a more recent English translation, it might be something I should look into. Anyway, the edition is a lovely hardcover (with lots of Gallen-Kallela illustrations in it!) and it's just such a nice book all around, I can't stop touching it. As for what it is - like the title implies, it's a compilation of spells for tons of different purposes, as well as some other magic odds and ends. Really neat.

I partly decided to pick this book up for fanfiction research/inspiration purposes - I have a feeling that it might be useful for Stand Still Stay Silent stuff, possibly also A Redtail's Dream too (though I might have to rely more heavily on the Kalevala for that one, since I have this one idea for a difficult story that would be very directly related to it, rather than the loose inspiration that Sundberg herself took with aRTD). But also, I confess I bought it just... because I am a huge nerd. Why not.

I just... have two gripes. Well, make that three. Firstly: Tiny text! Ach! I'm not that old, but even glancing it makes me feel squinty, urgh. Secondly, like I mentioned above, the translation is from 1898. It reads like a translation from 1898. Let's leave it at that. And thirdly, everything is in prose. Which does again, come back to the translation, not something I'd hold on the publisher of course, but arrrrgh prose translations of not-prose things, why! Oh, well. I'm sure I'll find it all fascinating anyway.