The OF Blog: Late October Book Porn

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Late October Book Porn


Lots of books have been purchased or have been received as review copies recently.  Thought I would highlight some of these in this post.  I have already read Colson Whitehead's Zone One and once I get caught up with the planned National Book Award and World Fantasy Award reviews, I'll try to review it within the next week or so.  The hard-to-read title is a Franklin Mystery edition of John Buchan's The 39 Steps.  Yes, I might try to read a few more mysteries in the coming months, just to try out other things for a while.  Very excited to receive Péter Nádas' Parallel Stories today; it promises to be an absorbing historical fiction of the last days of Eastern European communism.  Also received a review copy of John Warner's The Funny Man; the premise intrigues me.  Might review the Barnes in the next week or two; I've already read it and gave my brief thoughts on it and the other Booker Prize finalists last week.  Might get to the other titles in the coming month.


Bought a lot of Library of America editions back on the 14th at McKay's.  Slowly growing my collection (it's around three dozen volumes out of nearly 220).  Kameron Hurley's Infidel was a good sequel to her earlier debut, God's War.  Caitlin Sweet's The Pattern Scars is lyrical, with a good story to boot.  The late Brazilian writer Moacyr Scliar's Kafka's Leopards is simply a must read for those who are fans of Kafka and Borges, among others.  Might review this one after a re-read in the near future.

3 comments:

James said...

I will be looking forward to your review for Zone One. I dislike zombies and, since they tend to be rapidly decomposing bodies under the strain of animation, exposed to the weather, and walking snacks for any scavenger or predator, find them rather silly. I don't understand the popularity and doubt that I ever will. Zone One might actually catch my interest if it turns out to be better than average or, at least, different.

Larry Nolen said...

Well, let's just say Whitehead's book is rather introspective in scope and the zombies take on a different role than usual. More in the coming week or two.

tim said...

That Nadas looks hot! And it will feed right into my current reading obsessions (Red Plenty by Spufford, Love and Capital by Gabriel, Sputnik Caledonia by...well, I don't remember, The Restoration Game by MacLoed...).

 
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