January was a major wrap-up month, where I finished two books I'd swapped out for commute reading. And then I went back to school full-time and finished nothing in February; the YBF#9 was dragged out from the end of January through the very beginning of March. There was also a lot of fragmented Greatest Hits rereads, such as the "75% of Outbound Flight / Survivor's Quest" reread that isn't logged here. But here is what I actually finished:

How George Rogers Clark Won the Northwest, and Other Essays in Western History (Reuben Gold Thwaites) (1903): Nonfiction. The publication date is not a typo.

My roommates and I spotted a box of free books on the street, and of course had to investigate. This is one of the books we found. The "Northwest" of the title refers to the old American Northwest: Ohio, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, etc. The prose dates the book, as does its blatant racism and laser-sharp focus on the male gender's historical triumphs. There's something pretty cool about the firsthand accounts of interviewing Revolutionary War veterans that made it worth my time to normalize for the dated attitudes and go with it.

The Metaphysical Club: A Story of Ideas in America (Louis Menard) (2001): Nonfiction yoinked from the Pulitzer lists. A very academic look at the people and ideas of post-Civil War American philosophy. This was interesting and detailed and included entertaining side-trips, including a little education on the history of post-secondary academics and research in America. However, nothing stuck very well; this is another book that I wanted to have a discussion about to get more traction on the material.

Choices of One (Timothy Zahn) (2011): Post-ANH pre-Empire romp: the Emperor's Hand investigates treason on the Outer Rim, the Rebel Alliance looks for a new base in the same system, and sneaky OCs set up Imperials and Rebels to take a fall.

Adjusting one's expectations is important. One makes different demands of Serious Business nonfiction than distracting fiction. And when I need mindless distraction, Star Wars delivers. Choices of One pushes the boundaries of sneaky and unreliable narration and might go over the line into author manipulation, but kept me entertained. I am not sure if baby Jedi Luke or the Thrawn-Car'das galactic road trip were more fun.

Year's Best Fantasy 9 (David Hartwell, Kathryn Cramer, ed) (2009): What the title says. The good, or at least smoothly written or thought-provoking, included Kage Baker's "Running the Snake", an alt-history Shakespeare; Naomi Novik's swashbuckling "Araminta, or The Wreck of the Amphidrake"; and "The Film-makers of Mars", where Geoff Ryman's prose does exactly what he wants it do. James Stoddard's "The First Editions" might not be a classic for the generations, but the idea of turning people into books (literally) is such an interesting conceit I thought about it for several days.

The bad: Doyle and Macdonald's "Philologos; or, A Murder in Bistrita", a vampire-werewolf-supernatural evil thing that reads like the first draft a larger "supernatural hunter in Europe" thing; "The Salting and Canning of Benevolence D.", by Al Michaud, a longwinded yarn whose punchline is half-spoiled by the introduction; Howard Waldrop's Penzance / Peter Pan / other? pirate crossover "Abast, Abaft!", which suffers from my limited Gilbert and Sullivan tolerance, as well as my Disneyfied knowledge of Peter Pan canon; "Dearest Cecily" (Kristine Dikeman) combines epistolary format with a really stupid catty fight over a man, managing to fail a Bechdel test in a story with no men.

The ugly: "A Buyer’s Guide to Maps of Antarctica", Catherynne Valente. Valente's writing concerns run almost, but not quite, ninety degrees to my reading interests. So the nonstandard narrative structure that reads like infodumps - if indodumps can be emotastic - didn't do a lot for me. Lisa Goldstein's "Reader's Guide" had a similar structural problem: it looked like a "figure out the story from the questions" story, and morphed into something completely different. I also didn't appreciate the pre-story introductory blurbs; as mentioned, "The Salting and Canning..." blurb includes a spoiler, which significantly detracted from my reading experience. The introductions to the remainder of the stories didn't significantly help me direct my attentions to stories' strengths, or at least adjust my expectations to be in line with author intent.

Other notables: Peter Beagle has two stories in this collection; "The Rabbi's Hobby" and "King Pelles the Sure", which are small-scale "people" stories. This works much better for me in "The Rabbi's Hobby"; I came to Beagle at the wrong age to appreciate the fairy tale-ish style of "Pelles" and The Last Unicorn. So it's technically well-executed, but not my thing.

( Table of contents behind cut. )

Numbers game: 4 total finished. 4 new, 0 reread; 2 fiction, 2 nonfiction.

This entry cross-posted at http://ase.dreamwidth.org/579028.html, where there are comments.

Jhegaala (Steven Brust) (2007): Vlad Taltos visits his homeland while on the run from the Organization. This wasn't the book I expected (road trip with personal development and witty Jhereg). If it developed the "transformation" theme associated with the title, it was the transformation of the village Vlad visits, which I wasn't as invested in. The window dressing was very nice - reasonably interesting secondary characters, plot that didn't completely implode when prodded with a logic-stick - but I built up some anticipation based on the time-line skip between Phoenix and Athyra which wasn't fulfilled here.

A Fire Upon the Deep (Vernor Vinge) (1992): Reread. Space opera. The only countermeasure to a threat engulfing all high FTL civilizations is carried with a handful of sapients on one ship, the Out of Band II, and two children at the bottom of the FTL zone.

As usual, memory plays tricks. The "Net of a Thousand Lies" so strongly conjures usenet, my memory recalls more of it than is actually present ("hexapodia as key insight"), overlaying my subscriptions circa 199. I also forgot the horrific deaths of the Straumer children, what a brat Johanna was (in those circumstances? It was understandable brattiness), what a prick Pham Nuwen was, and how all of this came together in a riveting space opera. The "fun space opera" bit stuck. I think I had more thoughts on this, but they have been subsumed into...

The Children of the Sky (Vernor Vinge) (2011): Sequel to A Fire Upon the Deep; Tines' World after the Straumers and Out of Band II.

This book wins on raw entertainment. It's coherently written in clear prose about a fairly black and white moral dilemma. People are good or villains or misguided, and the misguided are redeemed. This is not a subtle novel. (One could argue that Nevil's wickedness is influenced by Recent Events, but that's not particularly subtle.)

( Spoiler-cut. )

Amdijefri was my favorite part of Fire; Joanna and Ravna got to be rock stars in Children. This is more about personal taste than writing quality, I think. I am not a fan of traveling circus troupes, but I'm a sucker for tough girls and politics.

A Deepness in the Sky (Vernor Vinge) (1999): Reread; Pham Nuwen's Adventures in the Slowness. The first time I read this I missed the setup for the translators' revolt, so this time I tried to read closely for those clues.

( Spoilers. )

At first, I hadn't planned to reread this, since I was pretty sure the library didn't have a paperback edition, and I had no plans to stuff a 700-page hardcover into my commute bag. (The commute bag is a Timbuk2 Classic Messenger, size small, awesome as long as the train reading is trade or mass market paperback.) So I was pleased to discover that Deepness benefited from being at the end of the alphabet during the last bookcase cull, and was on my shelf in paperback.

---

That was November. In December I started two nonfiction books, but didn't finish them; flipped through several Union-Alliance novels, and reread Heavy Time (1991) and Hellburner (1992) cover to cover. Heavy Time, about independent asteroid miners versus a large, corrupt, and bureaucratic corporation, has a resolution that is even more out of left field than most of Cherryh's novels, which is I guess what happens when your protagonists high cards are a salvaged miner-ship and Ben Pollard, part-time hacker and full-time pain in the neck. Hellburner is comfort reading for me. The rest of my December reading time was taken up with professional journals.

Numbers game: 6 total finished. 2 new, 4 reread; 6 fiction.

This entry cross-posted at http://ase.dreamwidth.org/575559.html, where there are comments.

I am back from my New Year's Chicago trip. The pork belly pastrami is eaten, and the Museum of Science and Technology t-shirt that says C-H-I-C-Ag-O with mass values has made a successful debut as part of my commute wardrobe.

Tomorrow is the SF bike party. I know what I'm wearing, so perhaps I should see about properly adjusting the headlight mount and sticking fresh AAA's in the tail-light, and maybe try strapping things to the cargo rack (Christmas present for me my bicycle me!). Or I could surf the internet. Decisions, decisions.

At some point I should write my 2011 retrospective / 2012 look-ahead. The placeholder version is: I regret almost nothing about 2011. 2012 is forecast to be demanding and rewarding all at once. A slice of real destiny, to paraphrase a favorite author. The material rewards are unlikely to manifest before 2013, but the important stuff - engaging work, community, a good exercise program, etc - are already in gear and moving me forward.

Oh yes, if someone's having problems commenting on LJ, PM me or comment on the DW version. I believe I have have invite codes if you need to create an account to comment.

This entry cross-posted at http://ase.dreamwidth.org/574424.html, where there are comments.

Merry Christmas, everyone, and happy Boxing Day, everyone else. I have indulged in the ways of my people: reading in bed half the morning, dim sum for lunch, a movie checked out of the library for later. Hopefully your day has been as pleasant.

This entry cross-posted at http://ase.dreamwidth.org/573635.html, where there are comments.

Not a great month for fiction; guess it's time for a nonfiction binge.

The Exile Kiss (George Alec Effinger) (1992): Third book chronicling Marîd Audran's rise as Friedlander Bey's lieutenant and presumptive heir. This time, kingpin and lieutenant are thrown into Arabia's Empty Quarter and must restore themselves to the city while fighting a murder charge.

The Exile Kiss reminded me of Steven Brust's Teckla. For people who haven't read it, the relevant section is the professional assassin protagonist's awakening moral qualms about killing people for a living and his involvement in a criminal organization. Then he does the Omelas thing. In The Exile Kiss, Marîd questions his feelings about ordering an assassination, and while recognizing the sophistry of those around him, decides he doesn't feel that bad and orders people killed anyway. Something about lessons from Bedu nomads showing he must shoulder the burdens of leadership for the greater good. If the greater good means greater influence over others' lives and deaths, so be it.

One is cautioned to distinguish character ethics from author ethics, but either way, this one left a bad taste in my mouth.

The Magicians (Lev Grossman) (2009): This is so derivative. Or a commentary on other works, whatever. Brooklyn!Holden Caulfield is swept into not-Hogwarts and a world of magic, eventually to make his way into a Narnia-Oz-ish fantasy world. (What is this? "If Chabon can get out of the lit ghetto into the fruitful - ha! - fields of genre, I can too"?)

( tl;dr, lots of handwaving and minimal spoilers. ) The Magicians can be praised for its easy accessibility to audiences raised on guardian Lions and magical boarding school adventures, but it lacks novelty and compassion, reducing its appeal to the fading charms of faddish popularity and conceit.

The Child Garden (Geoff Ryman) (1989): Picked up on the strength of Air when I desperately needed a bus book. I wish I'd purchased the $2 copy of The Sharing Knife: Horizon instead.

The edition I read was published by Small Beer Press. It is littered with sloppy copy-edit errors, like tooth-rattling potholes in the road of narrative. So future purchases from Small Beer Press will include spot-checks for actual editing.

The copy-edit threw me out of a story I wasn't sure I liked. The premise - humanity in a post-industrial scarcity Earth; half-cocked science cured cancer, which is key to living past forty; a time-disjointed narrative, skipping around Milena's mostly-linear life - teetered on the edge of suspended disbelief. Sometimes I fell over the wrong side. (The "child garden" of the title is one of the orphanages that raises the many children who outlive their parents' twoscore.) Sixteen year olds agonizing about their forbidden lesbian impulses - Bad Grammar, according to the Party and Consensus of the world - and their short lives and their other neuroses is more misery than I usually sign up for in my fiction. A larger-than-life dramatization of Dante's Inferno, genetically engineered "polar bear" people, viral transmission of a singing disease, and the end-of-novel confirmation that Milena isn't that reliable a narrator were more my speed.

Ryman won a Clarke for this; I can see why. The cancer biology wasn't completely unlikely in the '80s; the male pregnancy thing probably was pretty shocking and novel. (I'm curious about the worldbuilding: it's implied male pregnancy is terribly uncomfortable and almost certainly fatal. So why does any man go through with it? If that's supposed to be Milena's unreliable narration and a comment on the value of human life per Ryman circa '89, I'm only vaguely catching it.) However, Berowne and Mike's nonstandard pregnancies ring distractingly close to May's in Air, as do some of the other narrative themes - the handling of the gravitational angels, for example - which retrospectively makes Air look less mind-blowingly novel and awesome. Overall, this was on the weak side of "okay", aggravated by the copy-edit problems.

Dzur (Steven Brust) (2006): Vlad Taltos returns to Adrilankha, dines at Valabar's, and solves a little Jhereg problem for his ex-wife.

Inspired by The Exile Kiss, I picked up the several Vlad novels that came out after I decided I wanted to graduate from college and cut back on the leisure reading. Dzur was the first to come out after this decision. Five years later, it was okay but not great reading; I didn't care much about the mystery, wasn't engaging my brain to figure out the thematic connections, and was creeped out by the Vlad/Issola spoiler. Whatever was going on with the qualities of the Dzur in Vlad's delicious meal and less delectable machinations with respect to the Jhereg (Right and Left Hand), I was thrown out of it every time Vlad caressed his Great Weapon. No, I am not editing that sentence, I am passing on the raised eyebrow quotient.

Numbers game: 4 total finished. 4 new, 0 rereads; 4 fiction.

This entry cross-posted at http://ase.dreamwidth.org/572066.html, where there are comments.

Please bear with the length of this delayed double feature.

AUGUST
Fire Monks: Zen Mind Meets Wildfire at the Gates of Tassajara (Colleen Morton Busch) (2011): Nonfiction. During the California 2008 fire season, a Zen retreat was evacuated under threat of fire. Ultimately, five long-term residents remained to defend Tassajara from the Basin Complex fire.

( Better than nice. )

This was a quick, easy read: I picked it up Friday morning and finished it in Saturday afternoon. I felt like it added to my sense of Bay area community. Recommended if you're interested in Zen practice or fires.

Proust was a Neuroscientist (Jonah Lehrer) (2007): Nonfiction. Essays on the link between 19th and 20th C artists' insights and early 21st C scientific research. Walt Whitman, George Eliot, chef Auguste Escoffier Marcel Proust, Paul Cezanne's paintings, Igor Stravinsky's "riot" of Spring, Gertrude Stein, Virginia Woolf, and neurophysiology.

The first essay, on Whitman, was surprisingly entertaining. (Full disclosure, I loathe Whitman's writing. High school english inflicted "Song of Myself" on me during my period of vigorously rejecting all things transcendentalist.) This would have been better if I'd spaced out the essays; trying to read all of them without a break emphasized the collection's limited scope and Eurocentrism. It also suffered from trying to bridge science and the arts: with a foot stretching into each sphere, it did a very incomplete job rooting in either topic.

Fullmetal Alchemist, v.9-27 (Hiromu Arakawa) (2004 - 2010): EPIC WIN. I wanted something absorbing and fun for my train reading, and this fit the bill. My enjoyment makes it hard to write up: good entertainment is something I know when I see it. How do you pick out the components of pleasure when your brain is caplocking with happy reactions?

( Thumbs up for awesome female characters, complex plot, detailed and coherent worldbuilding, and shades of moral gray. )

Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith (Jon Krakauer) (2003): Nonfiction. Interleaving of the 1984 murder of Brenda and Erica Lafferty by Brenda's brothers-in-law with a history of Mormon faith contributing to the environment that let men think God wanted them to commit murder.

( The book has a weird depth (or shallowness?) of focus on one murder and all the history of fundamental Mormonism. )

Under the Banner of Heaven is interesting, but deals with people's cruelty in the drive for power, which makes for stressful reading. It's also sharply dated by its references to 9/11 and the absence of references to Prop 8. Worth reading if you're interested in the intersections of organized religion, power, and violence, but pack a strong stomach.

When Gravity Fails (George Alec Effinger) (1987): Fiction. A 22nd century Arabic punk gets the noir treatment. I will save the cognitive dissonance of the shift from FLDS to erratic Islam and the hilariously long list of novels I thought I'd picked up for another time. (This wasn't hard SF, Jerusalem Poker, or Srs Lit Bzns. Moving on!) I enjoyed the setting and atmosphere of the novel, without any particular attraction to the plot or protagonist, Marîd. Marîd suffers from saying he is a loner, relying on his native cunning to survive, between scenes of Marîd interacting with his girlfriend, buddies, and wider social network, and adjusting to some heavy-duty cyberpunk wetware upgrades with barely a pang. (Well, the denouncement with Hassan and Okking may be the pangs.) If I have to question whether the character's words and actions are congruent, and the book is not going for an unreliable narrator schtik? You're doing something wrong.

On the other hand, Marîd's low-brow 22nd century is an entertaining mix of bypassed cyberpunk and predictive power. Everyone has something like a cell phone, and information is power. The fringe elements that make up Marîd's social circle include transsexuals for whom somatic alteration was not cheap, but was possible; the surprise isn't that a female stripper used to be a boy, it's that she was a rich boy. The cyberpunk elements - wetware modifications that allow users to utilize personality modifications and knowledge add-ons - are one of the coolest elements in the story, cleverly and maddeningly presented as so mundane no one really thinks about what this means for the human condition, even as doctors evolve more sophisticated variations on the "moddies and daddies" theme. Such mundanity leaves the sense of wonder entirely in the reader's hands and mind, for a mixed experience.

Numbers game: 23 total finished. 23 new, 0 rereads; 20 fiction, 3 nonfiction; 19 graphic novel-ish, 1 essay collection.

SEPTEMBER
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (Philip K. Dick) (1968): If PKD's purpose in writing this was to convince me Rick Deckard is Stanley Kowalski without the animal magnetism, it succeeded. If it is to set forth an argument that human beings will be petty and venal in most circumstances, it succeeded. If it's to envision a bleak postapocalyptic San Francisco, win. It's a venal story whose redeeming qualities are the local color (SF = love!) and curious reflections of 1968's nightmares. Robots are evil! In the future, Earth will be overrun by mechanical facsimiles of animals! And robots, too!

Every now and then, someone suggests PKD's fiction in my hearing, and I make the mistake of listening to them. PKD writes well-crafted stories I dislike, and I don't see a good reason to read any more of them at this time.

Fledgling (Octavia Butler) (2005): Octavia Butler writes a Mary Sue vampire novel. Seriously! Shori's an amnesiac genetic engineering experiment who can walk in the day, has the strength of grown vampire men, is 50 years old and looks like a 10-year old African-American human, and oh yes, survived the slaughter of her entire vampire family as well as all their human symbiotes.

As you may have gathered, this isn't my favorite Butler novel. It plays with power dynamics in Butler's usual mode, but in a "vampire novel!" context, exclamation point mandatory. Vampires are not my thing. Erotic relationships between adults and apparent children are really not my thing. Butler's usual writing talents couldn't overcome those handicaps to make this book interesting or memorably enjoyable for me.

The Outskirter's Secret (Rosemary Kirstein) (1992): Reread. If I won the lottery, there are two writers I could try to endow. Kirstein would be one of them. (Doris Egan is the other. Lois Bujold doesn't need my endowment; she regularly publishes in hardcover already.) I love the Steerswoman series for its worldbuiling, the protagonists, and general enjoyability. The Outskirter's Secret has my favorite worldbulding and a really fantastic Rowan-and-Bel travelogue.

A Fire in the Sun (George Alec Effinger) (1989): Sequel to When Gravity Fails. Marîd Audran, now one of underworld kingpin Freidlander Bey's lieutenants, visits his mother, investigates a murder, and foils a plot launched by Bey's major rival. Marîd continues to puzzle the reader with questionable characterization, grumbling about his lack of freedom while lapping the cream of servitude from his whiskers. The characterization seems inconsistent; it feels like Effinger had a Better Idea between When Gravity Fails and A Fire in the Sun, but didn't manage to completely integrate the retcon. The worst part for me was the giant brother-gun Effinger put on the mantlepiece early in the novel, which he never bothered to fire. Whether that was just sloppy writing or sequelitis in the works, it was poorly handled.

Numbers game: 4 total finished. 3 new, 1 rereads; 4 fiction, 0 nonfiction.

This entry cross-posted at http://ase.dreamwidth.org/571829.html, where there are comments.

I got into the school program I've been applying for; school starts in January 2012 and then I am in classes or internship rotations until March 2013. The rotations will be in East Bay and way East Bay; since rotations don't start until June '13, I'm boxing off the commute issues for future resolution. This month's project is accepting the financial aid I've already been offered (mostly loans, yikes), and applying for every grant and scholarship that looks applicable. And oh yes, giving myself a pat on the back for getting into a competitive program.

This entry cross-posted at http://ase.dreamwidth.org/571337.html, where there are comments.

Now that I've bashed off and replaced my pedal reflectors, added a bottle cage in the REI parking lot (while thinking, is it really this easy? Huh), and stayed out until past midnight with bike party people, I am thinking about serious upgrades for my commuter bike. Toe-clips and straps, a cargo rack, fenders, and additional visibility options, including fancypants lights have been catching my eye. There are some even flashier wheel spoke lights available too, but I am exercising a little taste and restraint.

My morning commute is starting the slide from foggy early morning into foggy darkness, which is one reason I'm eyeing the fancypants lights. It's likely some classic bike gear is in my future: one of the "please don't hit me" electric yellow jackets, maybe LED ankle-straps, and almost certainly a helmet or bag rear light. Sure, drivers will probably think I look like a dork, but if they're noticing my dorkiness they're not blindly sideswiping me.

The cargo rack is looking more and more appealing as I discover the real estate constraints of a 15" frame. (Most likely spots for the lock bracket clash with the bottle cage. This is a problem.) Ortlieb seems to be the preferred brand for the discerning Caltrain commuter; Ortlieb bags are also a mint. So getting the rack and some bungee cords for a few paychecks may be the way to go. Getting the bike lock out of my bag will be enough of an improvement for the moment.

This entry cross-posted at http://ase.dreamwidth.org/569114.html, where there are comments.

I finished FMA! I have come out on the other side of capslock of joy. Instead, I'm burbling at norabombay to read the manga, and wondering if (how many) FMA fanvids have been made with Set Fire to the Rain.

Since I have been slacking at posting, a hasty slice of life! Work is going okay. The person on maternity leave is still on leave, and has been vague on when she wants to come back to work, so it seems my summer job will continue until the end of September. This happily complicates other parts of my life: I'm interviewing for a one-year school-plus-internship program that starts in February, and ought to spend next month and a half doing internship tours. Instead I will have to take days off work to tour. My life, so hard.

To the east coasters caught between earthquakes and hurricanes: yikes! Hang in there. Or move to San Francisco; the Virginia quake was worse than anything I've experienced in the year and a half I've been in the Bay area. If we get a big quake in the next week, you are welcome to come back and mock this post.

This entry cross-posted at http://ase.dreamwidth.org/567959.html, where there are comments.

Ten Years That Shook the City: San Francisco 1968-1978 (Chris Carlsson, ed) (2011): 328 pages of left-flavored essays on the late '60s / post-'60s / '70s San Francisco liberal scene. This wasn't great: it's SF History 201, and I needed City History 101. Also, the essay quality was uneven; a few were very entertaining and well-written, many were competent, and several had careless copy editing mistakes, such as an extra endnote. If the writer doesn't care enough to fix easy stuff like spelling and commas, can I trust they got the facts right?

( Cut for space. ) Overall, the collection was mildly interesting, but so uneven I can't recommend it unless you have a lively pre-existing interest in accounts of that era. I'm taking recommendations for further reading on San Francisco history to feed my itch for local history.

Fullmetal Alchemist vol 1 - 8 (ch 1 - 33) (Hiromu Arakawa) (2002 - 2004): Manga. Brain candy. Addictive brain candy. I must apologize for the capslock in advance, because I know it's coming.

The premise: two boys try to resurrect their mother with alchemy. It backfires spectacularly. Now they're on a quest to get their original bodies back. I got as far as page 3 of the first volume before thinking, "this is going to be awesome, or a trainwreck. But it could be an awesome trainwreck!" And I was right! There is fridging (Nina Tucker), and the Ishbalan civil war is probably not social justice compliant, and I don't care. The story slides past the worst possibilities during the initially episodic storytelling and firms up nicely, adding vivid secondary and tertiary recurring characters as the plot develops an arc and the worldbuilding opens up. The female characters are at least as competent and likeable as their male counterparts. The story's focus is on the military, but civilians, kids, old women all get their moment to shine. The expanding storylines loop around and back into Ed and Al's quest, sticking to and heightening the premise's emotional core. In short? ROCK ON.

( High points for plot, likable characters, and judicious killing of your darlings. )

Also, norabombay? FMA is fantasy, but it's heavily influenced by the European industrial revolution, so there are trains. Lots of trains. *Innocent face*

Maskerade (Terry Pratchett) (1995): Magic, mysterious deaths and the stage... Discworld does Phantom of the Opera. Pratchett's writing is a pleasant cup of tea, but very often I find it's high quality English Breakfast when I am craving Earl Grey. Or oolong. Or jasmine in green tea. I like the Discworld novels without the powerful attraction other people do.

Numbers game: 10 total finished. 10 new, no rereads; 9 fiction, 1 nonfiction; 8 manga, 1 essay collection.

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