New Comic Day + Random Foo
Apr. 11th, 2007 06:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
newnumber6This week I got four books:
Loners #1 (My Pick of the Week, barely, probably nostalgia playing the final role)
New X-Men #37 (like the story arc title, but the prelude felt a little thin)
newuniversal #5 (a bit slow, but I like the reintroduction of an original NU character)
Teen Titans #45 (not bad, one good moment in it)
Full reviews up as usual at my comic reviews site for anyone interested.
Had no joy on finding a used or sale copy of any of the newer SF books I've been eyeing, but I did get something almost as good (for a possibly really generous definition of almost). "The Forever Machine" (aka They'd Rather Be Right), by Mark Clifton & Frank Riley. This book has the dubious distinction of being the worst novel to ever win a Hugo award, and there was some suggestion that the voting was manipulated (it only took something like 40 or 50 votes back then to win, and I've heard the accusation that friends of the writer stuffed the ballot box). One would think with an honor like that, you'd be able to find it in used bookstores all over - reprinted and sold because it won a Hugo, but given to used bookstores because it wasn't very good. But apparently it's very rarely been reprinted - I've been looking for something like 10 years (in the casual way I hunt down used books on my list - a determined search on line or something would have turned it up easily, but that's 'cheating'), but this is the first I've found it. So we'll have to see if it lives down to the hype. More importantly though, it's closing a conspicuous gap--once I've read this, I will be able to say I've read every single Hugo award winning novel prior to 1989 (Retro-hugos not included). Then the quest will continue for the gaps in my 1989-to-present reading.
Skipped lunch, had a mix of strawberry mini wheats, multigrain cheerios, and MC Mixed Berry Granola cereal. Work was... well, work. I think I might be coming down with something. The load wasn't exceptionally heavy (probably a little lighter than usual), but for the first time in memory I actually had to stop and take a minute or two of break, near the end. There was a sort of tightness in my chest. I don't think it was my heart, since the beat seemed normal (for exertion), but I dunno, maybe I wasn't breathing smoothly enough or hadn't had about water. Ah well.
Oh, and since I didn't write about it before, Easter was good. My dad's birthday fell on Saturday, so we did a combination birthday/Easter thing at a Greek restaurant. It was theoretically a surprise, but I don't think it was all that much as some of my stepnieces haven't quite grasped subtlety yet. Anyway, the food was good. I had an awesomely tender roast lamb shoulder, greek rice and potatoes, greek salad, and some chocolate cake for dessert.
Also, just finished another writing cycle. Made my quota of 8000 words, although it was a bit slow going at times. I didn't quite finish anything, but I made some good progress on a couple fronts, and I think there's a good story taking shape in the new one I started, even though it'll need a lot of editing and still some more thought to resolve a couple of plotty issues. It's a time travel story, although none of the time travel is to our past - the entire story's set in the future. Another story, a cross-genre attempt, may not be salvagable as a whole (though I'm still trying), but some of the ideas I used in it I might like to use again in a more narrowly focused story.
Loners #1 (My Pick of the Week, barely, probably nostalgia playing the final role)
New X-Men #37 (like the story arc title, but the prelude felt a little thin)
newuniversal #5 (a bit slow, but I like the reintroduction of an original NU character)
Teen Titans #45 (not bad, one good moment in it)
Full reviews up as usual at my comic reviews site for anyone interested.
Had no joy on finding a used or sale copy of any of the newer SF books I've been eyeing, but I did get something almost as good (for a possibly really generous definition of almost). "The Forever Machine" (aka They'd Rather Be Right), by Mark Clifton & Frank Riley. This book has the dubious distinction of being the worst novel to ever win a Hugo award, and there was some suggestion that the voting was manipulated (it only took something like 40 or 50 votes back then to win, and I've heard the accusation that friends of the writer stuffed the ballot box). One would think with an honor like that, you'd be able to find it in used bookstores all over - reprinted and sold because it won a Hugo, but given to used bookstores because it wasn't very good. But apparently it's very rarely been reprinted - I've been looking for something like 10 years (in the casual way I hunt down used books on my list - a determined search on line or something would have turned it up easily, but that's 'cheating'), but this is the first I've found it. So we'll have to see if it lives down to the hype. More importantly though, it's closing a conspicuous gap--once I've read this, I will be able to say I've read every single Hugo award winning novel prior to 1989 (Retro-hugos not included). Then the quest will continue for the gaps in my 1989-to-present reading.
Skipped lunch, had a mix of strawberry mini wheats, multigrain cheerios, and MC Mixed Berry Granola cereal. Work was... well, work. I think I might be coming down with something. The load wasn't exceptionally heavy (probably a little lighter than usual), but for the first time in memory I actually had to stop and take a minute or two of break, near the end. There was a sort of tightness in my chest. I don't think it was my heart, since the beat seemed normal (for exertion), but I dunno, maybe I wasn't breathing smoothly enough or hadn't had about water. Ah well.
Oh, and since I didn't write about it before, Easter was good. My dad's birthday fell on Saturday, so we did a combination birthday/Easter thing at a Greek restaurant. It was theoretically a surprise, but I don't think it was all that much as some of my stepnieces haven't quite grasped subtlety yet. Anyway, the food was good. I had an awesomely tender roast lamb shoulder, greek rice and potatoes, greek salad, and some chocolate cake for dessert.
Also, just finished another writing cycle. Made my quota of 8000 words, although it was a bit slow going at times. I didn't quite finish anything, but I made some good progress on a couple fronts, and I think there's a good story taking shape in the new one I started, even though it'll need a lot of editing and still some more thought to resolve a couple of plotty issues. It's a time travel story, although none of the time travel is to our past - the entire story's set in the future. Another story, a cross-genre attempt, may not be salvagable as a whole (though I'm still trying), but some of the ideas I used in it I might like to use again in a more narrowly focused story.
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no subject
Date: 2007-04-12 04:24 am (UTC)I've never had much luck, conversely, with finding a lot of modern-y things in used stores. Sometimes I'll have a lucky streak, but I don't generally go looking for things you could easily find in librairies years after publication, or indeed, on new store shelves such as Jordan or even Herbert.
So mostly I turn to powells.com by way of powellsunion.com, as they've started listing their paperbacks, which are often pretty affordable. I've no idea how that stacks up for Canadian ordering, however.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-12 01:21 pm (UTC)New books generally are harder to find used, but I've got a decent chance of finding relatively new books, like ones published between 5 and 15 years ago. Older than that and they either get easier to find or harder to find depending on the exact book, and younger than that you have to be a little lucky. But I've had an astonishing run of luck at a used bookstore right next to the World's Biggest Bookstore. I found used paperback versions of both Dan Simmons' Olympos and Stephen King's "Cell" only a couple weeks after the paperback came out. Yes, it's only two, but it's still an astonishing streak. ;) - I suspect that they might have had a deal/strategy with the WBBS to get copies of some newer books as some kind of incentive to get people to keep checking in. So now when a book I really want goes paperback I try to give it a couple weeks and see if it shows up. :)
no subject
Date: 2007-04-12 01:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-04-12 01:47 pm (UTC)And that's a shame. On my way to work on comic day (because of the detour I have to take anyway for comics), if I so desire, I can hit 3 good used bookstores, 2 okay but either not very big or cluttered and not very organized ones, and 2 normal bookstores that occasionally heavily discount their stock that isn't selling well. So I'm pretty happening. And a couple years ago (before it moved), you could add an all spec-fic bookstore with a used book section.