Ladylark's Journal

I wrote a post that's apparently not showing up on people's reading lists.

So... does this one?

As I said, since this space might actually get some traffic again (or might not; for various reasons I'm not convinced the inevitable fandom migration is going to travel in this direction) I might as well post some content. Given the time of year, and that I'm not averse to following the crowd sometimes, let's do a roundup of books that I've read this year.

It's actually a very short list by my standards. I've been watching a lot of TV this year and been busy with other things so I've actually not read that many books. Though to be fair this isn't a complete list. For one thing, it doesn't include all the non-fiction I've read for work, or the reasonable amount of fanfic from the first half of the year, though not much of that in the past few months* as I've been too busy. But I think it's probably most things I read as actual dead-tree books.

On the plus side, 12 books is few enough I can say a few words on each. Mostly what I thought of them rather than what they're about, at least for the more well known books.


( In sort of but probably not entirely the order I read them, with short reviews: )

I kept up my habit of only allowing myself to buy new books in quantity (i.e. browsing shelves rather than seeking out newly published novels that I've been waiting for) once I'd finished all or most of the ones I had stacked up from last year. So I've now restocked it with fresh. Maybe I'll keep track of them as I go along this time. Certainly I'm going to try and read more than I did last year: last year's pile started with 6, this time I think it's about 10.


*other than the one-chapter-per-week Down to Agincourt reread and discussion with my Book Club

Posting here mostly to say... yes, I do have a presence here. If this is where the Next Great Fandom Migration ends up, you know where to find me.

As you can see from the date of the previous entry, I drifted away along with everyone else (it was a mirrored LJ). I never made it to Tumblr, I went to Twitter instead. That's where you should go if you want an update of what I've been up to in the last decade. Quite a bit, really.

If people start coming back, it'll be nice to have a place more centred around longer posts again! But I probably won't post much unless there's people to talk to.

Welcome, any Tumblr refugee friends who find me here! It'll be nice we if can get things going again, if we blow the dust off, these digs are pretty nice.

Come one, come all to the 2010 Discworld Convention, which I seem to have volunteered to be involved with ;)

http://www.dwcon.org

It's in Birmingham, over the August Bank Holiday next year, and will be masses of fun. The website has been up for just over a week, and already over 300 memberships have been bought, so sign up and come along!

Slightly smaller and more informal (and a whole lot sooner) is the afp camping event. http://community.livejournal.com/dw_augbh_2009/ If you have any connection to afp at all, you're welcome along, so come and put your name down. A new poll has just gone up about meals and stuff.

There is a current trend on my friends list. It seems to consist of people going 'sod that!'

(for those who aren't in that particular circle - every two years in August there is a Discworld convention. For the past 10 years there has been a 'con-in-a-field' in the alternate years, which consists of a few events, lots of beer, tents, and meeting friends. Attendance cost £5. The organisers of said event no longer being in existance, a replacement event was mooted. This has turned out today to be costing in excess of £70)

Along with everyone else, I can't afford that much. I want to get together with people, i'm not fussed about the events. A few people seem to be suggesting alternative arrangements, i'm up for that.

Any surrounding arrangements (that I may have mentioned to a few people, involving Indian food) could still happen, especially if there was a get together somewhere else that weekend... I've got the friday booked off work at the moment.

So, today I submitted my thesis.

Whee!

The acknowledgements section contains the following sentence:

"The support of various people was appreciated, both in the online fora of
#afp, qqabal, and livejournal, and my offline friends, officemates and
housemates. You kept me sane."

Thanks guys.

"Stop it, that's Isildur!"

We have a cat!

He's currently sitting inside the lower edge of the throw that covers the sofa. His name is Chad, and he seems to like following people.

Yesterday I bought two books. Both of them were things I have been meaning to read for a while.

The one that I decided to read first was 'The Time Travellers Wife' by Audrey Niffenegger.

Books are entertainment, they are a way of telling stories. I've read some good books recently, including Anansi Boys, by Neil Gaiman, and Thud! by Terry Pratchett, and Dracula by Bram Stoker. These are books that were enjoyable, and thought provoking.

But sometimes, you come across a book that drags you into it, that encircles you in a world of ideas and thoughts. That you devour, because the feeling of reading it is so delicious, but at the same time you feel bad for gulping it down in such quantities - it should be savoured, stretched out, made to last. These are books that when you have to put them down, still whizz around in your thoughts, the ideas produced maintaining a life outside the pages, inside your head. When you finish, you stop, and ponder, and wait a while before doing anything else.

The Time Travellers Wife is such a book. I read it last night until 1am, and then stopped at the end of a section because I didn't want to read it when I was too tired - I wanted to be able to concentrate on it. I've been reading it most of this afternoon, and just finished it. The edition I have is called a 'future vintage classic' and has reading notes in the end. Now, I didn't notice this when I bought it, and i'm generally not a fan of such kerfuffle and analysis, especially when the book is so new. 'Vintage future classic'? How can you tell? But in this case it might be almost justified.

I know i'm waxing somewhat lyrical about this, but it's been a while since i've encountered such a *good* read. I feel like I want the entire world to read it as well, just so I can nod at them and go 'see how good it is?'. Of course, the world may not agree with me; *you* may not agree with me! For all I know, the experience I described above is unique to me, and nobody else gets that euphoric feeling from reading fiction.

But I thought i'd tell you about it anyway.

Oh, what's the book about? It's the story of a man, and a woman, and the intertwining of thier lives. Henry is an inadvertant time traveller, and because of this his life has not run in a linear fashion - his wife meets him before (in his eyes) he ever meets her. I hasten to add that the information i've just given all becomes apparent in the first few pages of the novel.

The other book that I bought yesterday is 'Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell' by Susannah Clarke. I hope it is as good.

Well. This weekend gone, I went to the Clarecraft Discworld Event. This is basically a camping get together in a field for Terry Pratchett fans (the Man in the Hat is always there too).

I've been meaning to make a post about my great weekend, and I will, below, but i've just found out that since Clarecraft (the company that make the lovely figurines based on the Pratchett characters and who host the event) are closing down business, this was the last CCDE ever.

This makes me very sad. I was at the first event ten years ago, in 1995. It was basically my first introduction to Fandom, of any sort. CCDEs have been a regular part of my life ever since, and I cherish the wonderful atmosphere, and the chance to see people I only get to see once a year, or sometimes once every two years (those who don't go to the much more expensive and rather different conventions in the intermediate years).

There will probably be some kind of camping event in 2007, but it will not be CCDE (if in name only), and an era has ended.

Right, so, the weekend. There were tents, and there were people, there was a fun fencing tournament, and there was beer and cider (though the latter was not drunk by me) and I met old friends and new, and if I listed them all it would go on for ages. Other people have posted far more comprehensive reports than I have. I did feel that I was drifting around a lot of the time, I said 'hi' and gave hugs to everyone, but lots of people I would have liked to sit down and have a chat with, and I never seemed to actually get round to it. In particular I would have liked to properly get to know Sessifet, who I only really got to say hi to, and Alex and his family who I didn't get properly introduced to because I think it was assumed that I knew them when I didn't :) I also managed to completely miss Ppint.

I had a wonderful time though, despite the above, and despite our tent being pitched on a slope that turned out to be slightly more steep than I originally thought. It didn't make sleeping particularly comfortable, but I was glad I bought a nice big new tent because it turned out to have an enormous porch that was able to shelter our whole mini-encampment when the heavens opened on saturday night.

Roll on the next camping event, whatever form it may take. I hear it is already being discussed, hurrah for the new organisers!