Home safe book roundup post!

After a VERY long trip all the way across North America, solarbird and I are back at the Murkworks again following the conclusion of our musical vacation! I will be resuming the writeup posts of everything that went on, including linking up to both Dara’s and framlingem‘s pics as soon as there are links to be had.

But in the meantime, there were books AND CDs aplenty that were bought, and so they must be duly documented! So here we go, first with the books!

Picked up at a queer bookstore in Toronto:

• Three, by Annemarie Monahan. This seems to be a “road not taken” kind of book, about three possible life paths for the same woman, questioning her sexuality. Possibly with some magic realism thrown in, I don’t know; the blurb suggests that these life paths are all about to collide, which suggests something magic-realism-y going on. Anyway, it sounded interesting, so I grabbed it!

Picked up in Quebec at the Archambault right by our hotel, which turned out to be an awesome store full of ALL THE THINGS I COULD EVER HOPE TO BUY, except maybe groceries and underwear. It’s probably a good thing for my pocketbook that I do not in fact live in Montreal:

• Luna: La Cité Maudite, by Élodie Tirel. This is a YA fantasy novel which came recommended by the redoubtable cow, on the grounds that it not only includes drow, it includes pretty much the entire R.A. Salvatore mythos, without even any of the serial numbers filed off. One presumes or at least hopes that there is some kind of licensing going on here, but really, one has no earthly idea! Grabbed it partly because it being YA means that hopefully the French will be easier for me to follow, and partly because the art on the cover is of this silver-haired elf girl riding a wolf, which TOTALLY made both me and Dara think “OH HEY! Clearbrook!”
• La Rivière des Morts, by Esther Rochon. This is straight-up Lovecraftian fantasy, which is generally relevant to my interests, and also recommended by the aforementioned cow. I had the pleasure of reading one of Rochon’s short stories while visiting said Cow, since she’d participated in a story exchange between the Anglophone magazine OnSpec and the Francophone SF zine Polaris, and I really liked the story of hers that got translated into English and which showed up in OnSpec. So I’m going to give this novel of hers a try when I’m feeling ambitious enough with the French.

Picked up while visiting brightbeak in Moncton:

• The Tale of Don l’Orignal, by Antonine Maillet (translated). The blurb on this one describes it as a fantastic tale with callbacks to Acadian history, and the cover art was charming, so I thought I’d give it a go.

And, picked up at the Geo Center on Signal Hill in St. John’s:

• Dictionary of Newfoundland and Labrador, by Ron Young. This appears to be a locally (well, local to St. John’s, that is) compendium of Newfoundland and Labrador dialect, which sounded like an awesome read–not to mention potential research material, given Christopher in Faerie Blood! So I snagged this with great enthusiasm.

Meanwhile, just to clear out some ebook purchases that need accounting for in the queue, all of which were nabbed from Barnes and Noble:

• House of Doors, by Chaz Brenchley. Because desperance is awesome and really, I need to get going on reading all of his backlogged books I’ve been buying up! This one’s got ghosts. YAY!
• A Raging Storm and A Brewing Storm, by Richard Castle. Because I still giggle like mad that stories by Richard Castle actually exist, for values of exist meaning “as the product of clever marketing and ghost writing”, and I’m doubly charmed that they’re extending this fun to include the Derrick Storm character.
• Geekomancy, by Michael R. Underwood. Because this is an interesting experiment in ebook-first publishing, and because seriously, you guys, how could I not check out a book chock full of geeky references AND an entire magic system based on pop culture? It’s almost TOO easy a purchase!

93 so far for the year!