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The longest unread book in my current inventory, and it's two books in one.

Books 23 and 24: Cordelia's Honor (Shards of Honor and Barrayar)
Author: Lois McMaster Bujold
Provenance: Bought at a Barnes and Noble in Tacoma on recommendation of damienroc... before I moved to Tokyo in 2002

Having let this book languish on my shelf for years and years, I sorta regret not reading it sooner; mostly, I did it because bannoubunkacoby lent me the second omnibus, and I felt I should read the one I owned first. I do think it helps to start at the chronological beginning in many cases, if you can.

The plot arc goes over the two novels in this edition, anyway, so reading them together in the omnibus worked quite well; I find space opera usually works best read in rapid succession, anyway. The first book, Shards of Honor, follows a Betan survey captain over the course of a couple of missions that don't go quite the way they're supposed to, and her meetings with an enemy captain/admiral that have a lot of impact on her life. The second, Barrayar, has much more in the way of political machinations and such on that planet, with rich themes of becoming a parent and views of romance underneath.

The two books weren't written back to back, and it shows; the writing isn't as crisp in Shards of Honor, nor is the plotting quite as tight, but the characters are already very strong, and it was still a quite enjoyable read. Barrayar was a delightful fast read, though; the characters there really drew me in, and the story was very interesting. I like machinations quite a lot, really.

Anyway, this is worth reading, I'd say, if you enjoy the genre at all. It's the start of a fairly long series, but these are self-contained enough, you could stop here if you wanted and not feel left out.

Next up: Young Miles. Just to show, I'm not following my advice in that previous paragraph about stopping.

A comedy of sorts, with flowing prose and references galore.

Book #22: The Liar
Author: Stephen Fry
Provenance: Borrowed from prodigalsword

I often don't care much for books that are straight-up comedies. Generally, I don't find them as funny as books that have other, more serious stories, but are leavened with comedy along the way. Maybe it's just that generally, the quality of writing in comedies isn't really all that good, and so all that's left is the laughs. Generally, though, you don't get that many laughs out of the book, and so you just feel disappointed.

I feel pretty mixed about this book, then. It was well written stylistically, certainly. The book flowed nicely, there were some very good scenes, and the references were quite nice, as well. Still, the plot overall was forced in places, hard to follow, and didn't gel well, and the characterization beyond the main character wasn't great. It made me laugh a couple of times, which is actually not that bad, but the rest of it wasn't great.

I can't say that I really recommend this, but if you're inclined to comedies, you could certainly do worse. I'll probably not be leaping on to reading the rest of his books, though.

Next up: More Haruhi, plus Cordelia's Honor. Might as well go both barrels for now.

Another book of baseball stories, if not intentionally so.

Book #21: Rob Neyer's Big Book of Baseball Blunders
Author: Rob Neyer
Provenance: Bought used off of Amazon.ca

The first of the two books of baseball stories by Neyer, this one focuses on the mistakes and miscues made, not by the players themselves, but by managers and the front office that left the players in those positions. Neyer's stance is that anyone can make a mistake that proves costly on the field, but a true blunder is one where there was a decision made that went wrong where the decision-maker (I can't say "decider" anymore without laughing) should have known better.

Most of the stories are interesting, and a few were obscure, although I knew more of these stories than the ones in his later book on baseball legends. The blunders are really just the flip side of the legends; both of them together constitute the fabric that really makes the sport so rich. He treats them similarly to the previous book, too: he examines the blunders to see just how bad they were. In some cases, they were as bad as they looked, and in others, they turned out not to be all that detrimental. The analytic approach to the stories works well, particularly since you get the story first to enjoy, and then learn about the impact.

All in all, I enjoyed the Baseball Legends collection more, but this one is also quite good. I'd start with the other one, though.

Next up: Still 涼宮ハルヒの憂鬱. I got slowed down by the migraines, but I'm back on it now.

Seems to me like I'm doing a lot of short story collections this year so far.

Book #20: Fragile Things
Author: Neil Gaiman
Provenance: Bought online from chapters.indigo.ca (I think)

Having read a bunch of Gaiman's work in the past, and also his previous collection of short stories, I pretty much knew what to expect from this collection, and I largely got it. He's definitely got his own style and tone, and it appears in most of the work, but in a few cases, he departs from his own style and tries to write in the style of someone else, often to quite good effect. I really enjoyed Sunbird, for example, his take on a Lafferty story.

Anyway, there are a few misses in the collection, but it's mostly quite strong; I particularly enjoyed Sunbird, A Study in Emerald, The Monarch in the Glen, and How to Talk to Girls at Parties. Most of the rest was good, but some didn't quite do it for me (probably the worst from my view was Feeders and Eaters). I liked most of the poetry, as well. It's a solid collection, and it's worth going through if you're a fan, but I'd start with the novels if you want to try his work for the first time, personally.

Next up: 涼宮ハルヒの憂鬱. I need some Japanese time, and this should be fun.

Tons of cool old baseball stories, complete with context checks.

Book #19: Rob Neyer's Big Book of Baseball Legends
Author: Rob Neyer
Provenance: Bought online from Amazon.ca

The best thing about baseball for me has always been the stories. I like the games as well, but it's all the lore and reputations and legends that really round it out and make it real. None of the other sports have this sense of diverse and odd history, as far as I know.

I've owned a number of baseball anecdote collections of various sorts over my life, mostly when I was a kid, but I never really stopped to think about how many of them were really true, if all the events and people and scores were as described in the stories I was reading or hearing. That's the sort of info I find interesting, so when one of my favorites (he might well be my favorite, really) baseball writers released a book of that sort, I had to pick it up.

The best thing about this book is that, while it purports to check through all these old stories (and does), it revives a lot of them that I myself have never heard. Lots of the ones from early in the twentieth century, about people that I had only heard of in passing, make their way into the book, and getting to read more baseball stories is fun in itself.

The format, though, makes it even better: you get the story, and then Neyer's research of the details of the story to see if it matches up in reality. In most cases, it's not quite right or outright wrong, but some of the stories turn out to be true, and that's the nicest of all; legends don't have to be true, certainly, but it's even better when they are.

There are also sidebars with shorter stories and quick checks, and some longer essays about specific topics (the editing of the Glory of Their Times being the best of the bunch, I think). The writing style is the light, conversational one Neyer uses in his columns, and it makes for easy reading. I suppose if you want to take your baseball stories with no context and no way of knowing if they're true, this isn't the book for you, but if you want to know more about your baseball stories, and want more of these tales of the pastime to boot, this is a very good way to go.

Next up: Fragile Things. This time, I'll actually read it.

A retelling and reexamination of the best known chess match of all time.

Book #18: Bobby Fischer Goes to War
Authors: David Edmonds and John Eidenow
Provenance: Bought used at Regent

Chances are, if you know anything about chess history, you've heard about this match, where the lone American star triumphs over the big Soviet chess machine to take the world championship. Fischer has his advocates as the best player ever, as well, and this was his crowning moment, the apex of his career. It's definitely important.

Here, though, it seems that the received story doesn't get the full picture, and that's the point of the book: to draw out the rest of the details and reframe the story, as many history books aim to do. In this case, it's not just an intellectual exercise, as the availability of documents and interviews with people from the Soviet side, along with Freedom of Information Act documents for the American, really does add a lot to the story, and does make it come across differently. I knew Fischer was nuts, but I didn't realize to what degree; Spassky, the champ, turned out to be a lot more complex, thoughtful, and interesting than I thought. He viewed himself as a Russian, and not a Soviet, patriot, and the implication that has on the course of the process were surprising for me.

So while the basic story was familiar, a lot of the details, and thus the implications, were different, and I enjoyed that. On the minus side, I think they should have at least included the games in an appendix or such, if not in the main text; I realize it wasn't part of the story they were telling, exactly, but they go into enough detail, I'd have liked to see what was going on. Also, while they talk about a lot of the geopolitical stuff and the ramifications of all the hoopla and building of the match and such, it's not always well-organized, and so it feels a bit scattershot sometimes.

It's still a fast and interesting read, though, with a lot of interesting characters and insight into how the heights of the chess world work. If you're into chess, you'll probably enjoy it. If not, it'll probably never occur to you to try, anyway. It's a self-selecting book that way.

Next up: Fragile Things. I've heard a lot of these already, too.

Goes down pretty easy for a book this size.

Book #17: The War of the Flowers
Author: Tad Williams
Provenance: Bought at the Borders in Silver Spring... January 2005, I think.

I had this book sitting around for literally years, and had tried starting it once or twice previously before getting into it this time. It doesn't have to do with the writing itself, I think; it was probably because of the mood I was in at those times. The beginning of the book, like the first 150 pages or so, are also quite bleak; you get a sense of and empathize with how trapped the lead character, Theo, feels in his life, and it's not a fun place to be.

Then the scene moves to Faerie, where there's a lot of world-building and character development, chases and lulls, etc. The story comes alive there, and since Theo is on the run for a lot of it, it's good that Williams gets across a real sense of urgency. Faerie as a place with its own rules that Theo isn't really aware of comes off nicely, and the main supporting cast is generally quite good. I liked the plot, and how it played out. The falling apart of a fairly feudal society seen through the eyes of someone who doesn't really know the problems with the system is pretty interesting.

I had some problems with the pacing at points, though; there are lulls in the book, and there's a part which is ultimately like one conversation with bricks of exposition for a couple of chapters that really, I think, could have been better spread out over a couple of chapters. Which isn't to say I didn't like the exposition-giving character (to name who it is would be a spoiler); in fact, I think that's the most interesting character in the book.

Stylistically, Williams is quite good, I think, and as I said, I liked most of the characters. I didn't really like the love interest subplot; it wasn't tacked on, but I didn't really buy it, either.

The book is a fairly quick read once you get into it, especially for a 800+ page novel, but the beginning isn't fun. If you know that going in, I think it's better, so if you're in the mood for it, it's worth a try.

Next up: Bobby Fischer Goes to War. A chess book with geopolitical implications!

See, the Middle East actually can be funny.

Book #16: Florence of Arabia
Author: Christopher Buckley
Provenance: Bought online from amazon.com

Another fast and fun read from Buckley. This one has the same style and panache as the others, and so if you liked them, you'll like this, too. It's not his best work, but it's not his worst, and besides, his ceiling is quite high, anyway.

In this one, a State Department official proposes that the best way to achieve lasting stability in the Middle East is to emancipate the women there, and starts a TV network catering to changing women's views of the world. It turns out to be successful, and things spiral wildly out of control in interesting ways. I won't detail the plot, but it certainly goes in directions I didn't expect, and was very enjoyable.

Stylistically, I think it works very well, although there were a couple of loose ends around, but they didn't occur to me until I was writing this, so it wasn't that bad at all. It's a fun read, on a topic you don't normally find in the satire sections (at least, done well), so if you like the political satire genre, I'd say go for it.

Next up: The War of the Flowers. A brick, yes, but one I've had for a long time, and that I think I'll try again.

A far sight grittier than the movie, but still beautiful.

Book #15: Breakfast on Pluto
Author: Patrick McCabe
Provenance: Bookmooch

I picked this up a while back because I'd seen the movie, and because I'd always meant to read Patrick McCabe. I've been curious for years, and this gave me a chance to get into one. I wouldn't have called the movie happy, although it goes out on a fairly high note, but this is grades below happy. Not that you walk away depressed, but perhaps sobered.

This is the story of Patrick "Pussy" Braden, a transsexual growing up in Ireland and then moving to London during the IRA bombing period. He was abandoned as a baby by his mother, the child of an affair (and a probably non-consensual one) between a young woman, say 16 or so, and the village priest. So he has all sorts of issues, and it's clear from the frame of the book that he's been in long-term psychiatric care from pretty early on. The story has a lot of dark bits to it, but not gruesomely so.

The thing that really sells this book is the style; much of the dirty bits (Pussy becomes a prostitute, you see) and the violent bits are skimmed past in interesting ways, and yet, at other times, in his fantasies, come out in some detail. The style, almost breathless, spinning words and rambling scenery and such, is just great. You really buy the character, and his view on the world. That world is dark and crazy here, and that's remarked upon as well, but Pussy makes his way through.

This is short, and a fairly fast read, but not light. If you want to try it, and you're interested in the time period, I'd say go for it. Just don't expect the movie when you do.

Next up: Florence of Arabia. Already done, actually.

Man, if this is right, I'd have had a terrible time at either Oxford or Cambridge (not that I'd have gotten in).

Book #14: Looking for Class
Author: Bruce Feiler
Provenance: Bought used off of Amazon.ca

A couple years ago, I noticed that Feiler had written a book about a year doing a master's degree at Cambridge during the time period just after he had gotten back from Japan (and written Learning to Bow, the other book of his that I've read). At that point, I decided I'd track it down at some point, and once I found it for cheap enough, I picked it up. I'm generally pleased with it, although I think the previous book was better.

Feiler definitely has a good grasp of language and flow, and you do get a sense of what it was like for him to be there. The system of education he describes sounds awful to me; no direction, very limited interaction with other students academically, and no real checks on progress for months at a time makes me wonder what you get from being there that you couldn't get from studying on your own, besides the imprimatur of the university. That counts for a lot, I know, but academically, I'm not seeing it.

This book had a lot more romance in it, since many of the students were interested in that, but still some descriptions and critiques of the society, including some interesting comparisons between there and Japan. Those parts tended to be the best, I thought. The descriptions of the other students were interesting but fairly one-note, and they don't really get developed. Maybe that's the way to bring them out most easily in this sort of setting, when there isn't really a plot for them to develop in, but it is noticeable.

Anyway, it's a fun and fast read, if you feel like some reading about British higher education from an American point of view. Probably I'd start with one of his other books, though.

Next up: Breakfast on Pluto. More exclamation points than you can shake a stick at.

A more disjointed history from a great lover of Tokyo.

Book #13: Tokyo Rising
Author: Edward Seidensticker
Provenance: Bought used off of Amazon.com

This is the second half of the history of Tokyo from Meiji on by Seidensticker, covering the time period after the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923 until the end of the Showa period in the late 1980s. Much like the first book, you get a very good sense of how much Seidensticker knows about the city: both the outward appearances and the pulse of it that lies underneath. He definitely gives a good sense of the changes over time, as well. One definitely can get a sense of Tokyo from the book.

That said, I feel that the book isn't as good as the first one, and certainly shouldn't be read without having read Low City, High City first. Again, the main trouble is one of organization. In the first book, mostly about Meiji, the chapters were grouped roughly by topic, which worked fairly well, although he jumped back and forth in time, and so it got hard to follow at points. In this one, the chapters are divided by time period: reconstruction after the earthquake, leadup to the war, occupation, etc. Each chapter tends to then look at each of the subareas of interest to Seidensticker: population movement, architecture, entertainment, etc. The problem still is that he jumps around in time a lot, and when you're grouping by time period, that's a real problem. It does get hard to follow some of the time, because of it.

But Seidensticker still has great stories and anecdotes to detail his points, still has that wry voice in his writing that I really like, still gives you lots of information about the city that I find quite interesting. I did still like the book, but I think it could probably have used a bit more revision before going out, so it all hung together a bit better. Even if I feel ambivalent about his main point (Tokyo no longer has a culture of its own, but has a national culture for Japan), it's well presented... just a bit jumpy sometimes. If you're inclined to books on Japan, this won't be a bad choice, but I wouldn't start here.

Next up: Looking for Class. Yeah, more non-fiction, but it's more about travel, so it should be faster.

Because I just can't stop myself from reading more about Lucas Cortez...

Book #12: Personal Demon
Author: Kelley Armstrong
Provenance: Bought new off of amazon.ca

It's not a secret that I'm a Kelley Armstrong fan, so it's perhaps not a surprise that I picked this up and read it as soon as I could when it came out. I was pretty happy with the results, but it's not perfect.

Here, we have two narrators: Hope, a half-demon who's got a hunger for chaos, and also Lucas, the sorceror first in Dime Store Magic and Industrial Magic. The latter definitely has his own voice, and it shows in his narration. The former, unfortunately, I felt seems pretty close to some of the previous narrators in the series. She's definitely different in terms of her power set, so it's not like a direct overlap, but it does feel not as far off as I'd like.

Still, I like the writing style on the whole, you get some characters you like back, and some new ones. And the plot is very solid: twisty, but in ways that work well and tie into the rest of the series. Hope infiltrates a gang that might have pretentions to taking on a Cabal, and both the parts with the gang and the fallout once all the schemes are working goes quite well. It was engrossing; I tore through the book in a couple of days, basically.

I'm mostly dinging it for the character similiarities, but everything else here is good, and I like it better than the previous book in the series, which is a good sign. If you like her, you'll like this one, too.

Next up: Tokyo Rising. Should finish the other half while the first is fresh in my mind.

I've got my spine, I've got my academic crush.

Book #11: Low City, High City: Tokyo from Edo to the Earthquake
Author: Edward Seidensticker
Provenance: Bought used off of amazon.com

Having just gone to Tokyo, it made sense to start reading this book; I started it when I was there. This is an effort of Seidensticker's to capture the mood of the city during the period between the start of the Meiji Restoration and the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923. Seidensticker is well known as a great lover of the city, and so I was looking forward to reading this book, the first in a two volume set.

For the most part, I was happy with it; he goes through the time period both in terms of a variety of topics (commercialism, culture, architecture, geography, etc.) and documents how they changed over the course of the period. Some of it linked to other areas; once, say, the Ginza Bricktown was built, it became a draw for more Western culture, so it fit both in the cultural change and the architecture parts. It made for a lot of interesting reading, and it's no secret I'm a fan of Seidensticker's writing style. On the whole here, he struck an elegiac tone; there's a lot of "this was so great, and it's gone now" kind of passages, although he does note in some places where things are better, too.

On the other hand, I did find the book difficult to follow at points; since he jumped around in the chronology a lot, remembering what happened when and how it linked to other stuff became a bit hard. While going through topic by topic and addressing the changes is a valid way to write this sort of book, doing it on a paragraph by paragraph basis does get confusing, after a while.

Still, on the whole, I definitely enjoyed it, and will read the other half of the two-volume set after...

Next up: Personal Demon. Because I can't resist Kelley Armstrong, and Lucas has a viewpoint.

More con man action - this time with more pirates!

Book #10 - Red Seas under Red Skies
Author: Scott Lynch
Provenance: Bought online from chapters.indigo.ca

This second book in the Gentlemen Bastard series sees our heroes, Locke Lamora and Jean Tannen, starting off with a plan to rob the biggest and most secure casino in the city they're living in now. Things get complicated pretty quickly, not surprisingly, and soon there are a whole merry bunch of plots and counterplots all weaving around each other. They all come together pretty nicely in the end, and just about everything important is mentioned at some point, so it's all pretty fair play. I liked that part of it, as usual.

The writing is still strong, and the plot is very good, and the characters... well, Jean certainly feels a good deal more fleshed out now, Locke gets some advancement, and the rest of the secondaries are by and large believable and interesting, although not all of them. Some, like Requin, feel fairly straight out of central casting. Still, they do the job well enough; it's probably just that they come across not quite as good as the first book.

The pacing in the book, though, is the main point; it comes and goes from the main city, which is okay in and of itself, but the main part on the sea with pirates doesn't show until a few hundred pages in, and much of the action at the end goes by very quickly. The bits with the main city during the pirates part felt a bit out of place, too, even if they made sense for plot reasons; it's just that it's snuck in, almost, in the larger arc of the story.

On the whole, though, still a very strong effort, and a very enjoyable read. I'll pick up the next one when it's out, for sure.

Next up: Low City, High City. Actually about half way done with it; a history of Tokyo makes sense just now, too.

Conning, conniving and canals - lots of twists, lots of goodness.

Book #9: The Lies of Locke Lamora
Author: Scott Lynch
Provenance: Bought at Joseph Beth Bookstore in Pittsburgh (it came with a free tote bag, too)

Confidence game stories are really the flip side to mysteries; it's trying to figure out how everything gets pulled out in the end, rather than how it got done in the first place, and much of the rest is the same. So it's probably not a surprise that I like these, too; they even have the additional thrill of seeing how all the parts work together, and such.

This book, the first of a promised 7 book series, is a pretty masterful display of how it works. You've got the super-tricky and stylish lead, his smart and muscular sidekick, the tight gang, and the array of opposing forces and marks. There's a lot of backstory for the main character, and it helps a lot. The characters are really sharp, and easy to believe as part of their world.

This is a book that really does come across as well crafted; little bits of info and plot points crop up later in a well-planned way, and that makes the whole thing that much more enjoyable. The characters use other people, get used, and it's all very entertaining. It also stands by itself quite well; you could stop after his one and still feel satisfied if you don't want to read the next book in the series. If you're in the mood for some slick crime, this is a good way to go.

Next up: Red Seas under Red Skies. Book 2, right away, if that's an indication of how I liked it.

Magic plus betrayal, with a helping of somewhat unreliable and interesting narration? That's for me.

Book #8: The Prestige
Author: Christopher Priest
Provenance: Bought at the Barnes and Noble on Murray Ave. in Pittsburgh, December 2006

Whatever the merits of the film based on this book (I liked it, but I acknowledge it had some flaws), the film did bring the book back into the spotlight, and for that, we must be thankful, because this is a very, very good story. Very good plot, believable and well-written characters, stylistically different but well done for each of the characters' viewpoints, and full of interesting ideas and ties to the rest of the world.

Here we have the story of two rival magicians, told through their own personal notebooks, and also their descendants, who meet at the beginning of the book in a sort of framing story. But it's the two magicians, Angier and Borden, who are the centerpieces of the story, and they are at the same time so similar and so different: their ambitions are the same, but their beliefs and ways are different. The two notebook idea really allows you to compare them fairly directly. Even in terms of style and lines, you feel like you're meant to contrast the pair, and see how much they match up.

But there's also an element of mistrust that you can feel for them; they're obviously trying to hide their secrets some of the time. Borden's narrative makes it more explicit than Angier's, but it's there for both of them. Further, their recollections of events works differently. Both of them try to put themselves in the best light, but both are willing to admit they have failings. They're very human, and that's a large part of why it's so engrossing. It's also, though, that they really have surprises in store all along for us; I actually missed my guess on a large plot point, and it still fit, which is nice to see.

Anyway, bottom line: definitely worth reading. Give it a shot. I should try some of his other work at some point, too.

Next up: The Lies of Locke Lamora. By popular request.

A baseball book, yes, but one that tries to get at wider cultural implications.

Book #7: You Gotta Have Wa
Author: Robert Whiting
Provenance: Bought online from chapters.indigo.ca

Surprisingly, considering all of my interest in Japan and in baseball, this is the first book on Japanese baseball that I've read. Like most good sports books, it's a pretty fast read, although unlike most baseball books, there's not really a central sports narrative. Instead, it's about what the sport is like in Japan, and how the players are treated, both native and foreign.

The answer seems to be, bad and worse. The culture is very punitive on the native Japanese players, with non-stop training and incredibly strict codes of behavior. Arguably, it's worse than most of the society in general, I'd say, although Whiting basically wants to make out Japanese baseball to be an extension of the society itself. Certainly, there's something to that - the chapters on the Koshien tournament and the Yomiuri Giants make the case pretty cleanly. The things you wouldn't be allowed to do in your company, like take leave to go to a parent's deathbed, or the general moral codes (always defer to the older and wiser ones, don't complain about pain, etc.) are here, too.

For the foreigners, there's the feeling of not really being wanted, of only grudgingly being part of the team, and of having to take all of the blame for things going wrong even when you did a good job. There's the additional part, too, of not wanting the foreigner to be too successful, and so they have to deal with widened strike zones, constant walking when they've been hitting well, etc.

Of course, it's not like any of this is news for people who deal with Japan, although I really wonder how much of what he describes still holds. For example, he talks about the travails of the foreign manager in Japan, but with Bobby Valentine and Trey Hillman having won championships now, it's hard to see. The loyalty to the team must have weakened, with more Japanese stars coming to the US. Other changes likely have occurred, as well; I'll look to his other work for that.

Anyway, it's a good read, and a nice intro to Japanese baseball; I look forward to reading some of his more recent work, to get a feel for what's going on these days.

Next up: The Prestige. Magical.

Short stories and conversations with a dash of flair and a trifling of substance.

Book #6: Music for Chameleons
Author: Truman Capote
Provenance: Bought used from Regent

I picked this up some time last year, partly because I never read anything by the guy, and partly because I recalled andreait saying this was one of her favorite books. Capote definitely has a style, and it's on display here in this collection of non-fiction stories and conversations. At least, one assumes it's non-fiction; he says so, at any rate.

He did live a very varied life, so it's easy enough to accept the stories as true; the old woman with the cats in her freezer, being smuggled onto a plane by Pearl Bailey, etc. Some of the stories are definitely better than others, and the showpiece, Handcarved Coffins, was only all right, all around. Most of the "conversational portraits" in the third section of the book, except for the last one, were very well done, and even that one (a conversation with himself) wasn't that bad. The earlier ones didn't get into my head as much, I have to say.

His writing style does draw in the reader, though, and the decision to include himself in the stories probably was a good one; his influence on what's going on is a big key to the reactions of people around him. Not a great book, for me, but a good introduction to Capote, I s'pose.

Next up: You Gotta Have Wa. Because it's getting on towards baseball season.

A tragedy of the sort that really fits into the Japanese storytelling tradition... even if it's not really Japanese.

Book #5: The Harsh Cry of the Heron
Author: Lian Hearn
Provenance: Bought online from chapters.indigo.ca

I read the rest of this series last year, and found myself enjoying it, almost despite myself. I generally don't like faux Japan stuff, but Hearn really has a good feel for the aesthetics and dialogue styles. There was obviously a lot of research and craft that went into the stories, and into this one, as well.

This book is set a good fifteen years after the events of the last one, and to some degree, it suffers the same problem as that of the previous book I read, in that there's a decent amount at the outset that feels like, "Look, here are the old characters you know, and here's what they're up to now!" Which is fine, but it should be more in service of the story than I felt it to be.

But once you get past that part, it's a very good story, a fine tragic tale of a man, Takeo Otori, getting caught up both in his good and bad intentions. Trying to rule a country in a peaceful way can be very hard, when all of your traditions say that the least insult is an excuse for warfare, and the seams are showing a bit in Otori's realm. At the same time, he's keeping a number of secrets, and not always from the right people.

This book expands the scope of the world, and brings in the rest of the not-quite-Japanese islands, with the Emperor and his chosen warlord, along with foreigners and religious issues, too. All of this was handled nicely; I did like the political machinations that generally took the place of the fighting of Brilliance of the Moon. Her dialogue and her views into the thoughts of some of the characters are very nice; Shigeko in particular is a good addition to the cast.

Problems? There are pacing issues still, and some of the characters that are supposed to be important, such as the former female lead, get shunted off a lot. Still, on the whole, I quite liked this... and any tragedy that's enough to wring out a few tears has to be told quite well, right?

Next up: Music for Chameleons. About as far from Japan as you can get.