Reading Wednesday

[yuuago]

Work has left me braindead, so this week's Reading Wednesday is going to be a quick one. ;)

And welcome to the new people who've added me recently. I'm looking forward to getting to know you.

Anyhow -

Finished reading: The Grimoire of Kensington Market by Lauren B Davis. Canadian version of HCA's "The Snow Queen", yay! However, it's a portal fantasy, and most of the story doesn't actually take place in Canada, which was disappointing for me to say the least. On the upside, the story picks up quite a bit once the protagonist makes her way into the fantasy world, and I got sucked in after that. Also, the Kai-equivalent character is the Gerda-equivalent's sibling rather than love interest in this story; I rather like that as a narrative choice.

Currently reading: The Supernaturals by David L Coleman. It's sort of like The Haunting of Hill House, except there's a paranormal investigation television show involved somehow. I'm not very far into this one, and it has yet to grab me, but I've been craving horror and a breezy airport novel seemed a good bet.

Reading next: Current library haul is as follows -

+ The Last Hero by Terry Pratchett - one of the few Discworld-related books that I haven't read yet. :)

+ The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden. I don't know anything about it other than "fantasy set in Russia" - but that's enough to interest me.

+ Fryderyk Chopin: A Life and Times by Alan Walker. It's what it says on the tin. All I know about Chopin is that he was a Polish dude who composed some cool tunes, so I'm looking forward to learning more. :D

Comments

[merit]

I really enjoyed the Bear and the Nightingale. The trilogy finishes soon, which is even better for a new reader! There's been a few Eastern European / Russian themed fantasy novels of late.

[yuuago]

Oh, it's a trilogy? I'll have to seek out the rest if I like this one. :D
I've been really appreciating that there have been more EE-inspired books coming out as of late. It's an underused setting in English-language work, I think. Though hopefully the success (?) of those will lead to more translations of actual EE stuff as well (I don't know if this is becoming more common, but I haven't gone looking either).

[merit]

Yes, I'm told the final book comes out in January :)
I've also appreciated it! It is good to get out of the rut of WE inspired books. I'm not sure either; I haven't seen many translations though.

[minutia_r]

Heh, Guy Gavriel Kay also does the Canadian portal fantasy thing. BUT, Sean Stewart's Resurrection Man and The Night Watch, are, IIRC actually set in Canada (although it's been a while since I read them and I'm not 100% sure they're not set on the American side of the PNW, though I know Sean Stewart himself lived (and perhaps still lives) in Canada. A cursory google didn't answer this question definitively.) Also, they're doing a somewhat SSSS-like magical apocalypse worldbuilding, and in general I really enjoy his writing, so I think you'd like them if you haven't already tried.

[yuuago]

Oooh, magical apocalypse worldbuilding, yess! I'll have to see if I can find those, thanks for the rec. :D

[minutia_r]

It's always my pleasure to recommend books! Speaking of which, if you're looking for more fantasy set in Russia, CJ Cherryh's Rusalka is great (the sequels are okay too, but not nearly as good).

[still_intrepid]

Ooh another Snow Queen one that sounds good...! And same, them having a siblings relationship appeals somehow - maybe because that’s how I understood it when I was young?

The Last Hero is fun because it goes back to Rincewind and the wizards and the silver horde but also checks in with rest of the Ankh Morpork crew and there’s lots of Carrot and Leonard of Quirm.

ETA: also Chopin!!

[yuuago]

I think for me the reason the siblings idea works is because... I don't remember the original story, but in the adaptations I've seen, Kai (or whoever) is an absolute jerk. And it's easier for me to imagine a girl going to rescue some jerk if the jerk is her brother rather than just some guy she has a crush on. Or something like that. :Va

The Last Hero is fun because it goes back to Rincewind - You had me at "Rincewind". ;)

[adastrad]

I really enjoyed The Bear and the Nightingale! Any fantasy set somewhere that's not Western Europe is my jam and, while I'm no expert, I felt like the Russian setting was used well. I got pretty absorbed into it, anyway!

Also, ahh you said this to someone else, but I also wish more non-Western European writing would be translated into English. It's frustrating and saddening, the wonderful stories that are out there but not being more widely read because they're not translated, or, if they are, they're really difficult to get access to.

[yuuago]

Aughhh yes, frustrating indeed. Like... I KNOW there is a ton of cool stuff out there! But I can't read it! This is a travesty!

But since EE stuff seems to be a ~trend~ right now, at least in fantasy, I have high hopes. It's happened in other genres, at least (I'm mainly thinking of Nordic noir here).

[adastrad]

A travesty made worse because I just googled for books recently translated into English and google's top result for me was just... google translate. If I could do it myself, google, I would!

I did find a few EE things when I got google working correctly! But since I'm not very aware of the Trends, I don't know how to tell if there are more than before. That's a great point with Nordic noir, though! I always tend to forget about it since it's not my genre, oops.