Haven't read Ilium, but I adored
Hyperion and
The Fall of Hyperion. Recommended to me by the lovely man who used to give me a lift to and from work. He hid a burning creative light beneath a cynical, techie carapace. I adored him, and regret losing contact.
I recommended he read
Against A Dark Background, and he dismissed it as sci-fi-lite. I claimed it was because it had a female main character (okay, I was 19) and he gave me
Hyperion in return. We talked about it for the next week. I was embarrassed that he picked up on far more of the literary references than I did, because I assumed as a techie he wouldn't be well read. Thank goodness I met him, or I might still be insufferable today
Anyway.
Recently read.
The Good House, Tananarive Due
Supposed to be a horror. FAR too much given away on the back page. Written by a black woman, and all the major characters are black (and most are female). Always interesting to read from a different perspective. No real scares though. Good horror is hard to find.
As you can see below I keep trying though.
London Under Midnight, Simon Clark
Some interesting ideas. Again, supposed to be a new slant on the vampire genre, but not densely written enough to occupy you for more than an afternoon. And the ending was like a soap opera episode.
The Silver Face, Edward Wright
Lightweight, good fun. I'm a big fan of complex and literary murder mysteries. This was neither and I guessed the killer very quickly. Which is not like me. But this killer had a sign round their neck saying, "Hello, I've just been introduced as the killer!" And that was before someone even died. Nicely evocative of '50's Hollywood though.
Monster Nation, David Wellington
Zombie novel. Don't bother.
I've read others, but am losing the desire to write about them.
FTR:
Blood Atonement, Dan Waddell - C
Bloody Mary, Whiskey Sour and Fuzzy Navel[3 novels], J A Konrath - C+
Little Face, Sophie Hannah - C+
The Japanese Corpse, Janwillem Van de Wetering - C
I'll be back at the library sometime this week because I've reserved a DVD (
Let the Right One In, if you're wondering), so I'll try to choose more carefully this time, instead of my usual snatch and grab. I also promise a review of
Mr Darcy, Vampyre and
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.