Books Old and New

So, my son literally (hahahahaha see what I did there?) devoured every single Matthew Reilly book I have, except for The Tournament. He barely had put down The Four Legendary Kingdoms and was already looking for more. (He was VERY upset with what happened in Scarecrow.)

So I gave him what I had of Diane Duane’s Young Wizards series, scraped together the money for  Games Wizards Play and it arrived just as he got through The Wizard’s Dilemma. I read GWP first of course, but hesitated on giving it to my son initially because of the sexuality/relationships subthemes. Son has a puppy-love girlfriend, but he isn’t mature enough yet for the more complicated hormones-sexuality-etc soup; and since I’d told him to come to me and ask if he had any questions, the introduction of a couple of young openly gay characters wasn’t something I was sure I’d explain just yet. So I went to have a chat with my son about the book.

Turns out though, he already knew that ‘gay’ = people who date/fall in love with the same sex, so while he doesn’t know/care about the nuts and bolts of it, he knows about that. (How, he’s not really sure. Kids pick up stuff.) Since Games never goes into more detail than ‘he’s/I’m gay/have a boyfriend’, I changed my mind on that score. Since we were talking about it already, I explained, very simply, what asexuality was, since that crops up too. (Son knows basic biological scientific sex; e.g. what makes a baby.)

I know there are some folks out there who will scream ‘censorship’ but, quite honestly, sod off. My son might be more emotionally mature than most kids his age (the death of two siblings will do that to a child who’s old enough), or perhaps a bit smarter (reading will do that) but I am pacing what he reads based on what I observe he’s ready to handle, or understand properly, or understands so he can properly enjoy or react to the work.This is a kid whose level of relationship is that ‘you’re boyfriend and girlfriend if you like each other and kiss and hold hands.’

In much the same way I wouldn’t hand him any of Anne Bishop’s books, and I love her writing, and am waiting until he’s a bit more mature before I give him any of Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter series, and going by current development, the boyo might not read the Monster Hunter Memoirs books until he’s 14 or 15.

Toward that end I’m trying to get my hands on hardcover David Eddings books; and trying to find the first trilogy of Dragonlance.

It’s rather interesting that most of my book purchases of late haven’t been new release books, but trying to hunt down older ones. I prefer hardcovers now because they’re more durable and stand up to re-re-re-re-reading. I got lucky and found a Domes of Fire volume that has Larry Elmore’s art on it.

This is the reason why ultimately, my Dragon Awards nominations are rather sparse.

Best Science Fiction Novel : Star Realms: Rescue Run by Jon Del Arroz

Best Fantasy: Monster Hunter Memoirs: Sinners by John Ringo & Larry Correia (I know Larry recused himself from further Dragon Award noms, but John Ringo’s still game for it)

Best YA novel: Would have voted for: Games Wizards Play – Diane Duane (released too early to qualify; first half of 2016)

Best Horror Novel : Etched in Bone – Anne Bishop

Best Graphic Novel: Jim Butcher’s The Dresden Files: Wild Card

Best Movie: Dr. Strange

Best video game: Would have voted for: Nier: Automata (released too early to qualify; first half of 2016)

Best Mobile Game: Would have nominated : Shadowverse by Cygames or Sword Art Online: Memory Defrag

Might have been a bit more complicated if there were anthology categories. I personally would have put Forbidden Thoughts for horror. A number of the stories there seriously, seriously disturbed me, for the same reason that reading about what happened to the sons of cassandra sangue punched me hard, and that, while I was clearly enjoying the series enough that Rhys was thinking of reading it, I advised him not to for now. He would have gotten too upset and probably bounced hard off a series I know he’d enjoy otherwise. Simon’s reaction was perfectly understandable. Me, I had to put down Written in Silver and do something else for a while while fighting off flashbacks of our own loss and pain.

But I came back to it when I was ready and read through that scene again later, and I was able to deal with it having compartmentalised it properly, and then sailed through the rest of the books – so quickly in fact, that Rhys took Marked in Flesh away from me when he saw I’d already reached halfway, when I’d only started the book maaaaaaaybe two hours earlier? when he’d tucked me into the couch for a change of scenery and so he could change the bedding. (I got it back after lunch, and finished it after a nap.)

Rhys got me the rest of the series as a birthday present earlier this year, and it just so happened that I got so sick from whatever flu our boyo brought home that I was more or less bedridden, and my tendency to basically zoom through books if they’re particularly absorbing makes him sadface – I do pout a little when a series is over because… well, that’s it! So he does it so I can enjoy reading for a little bit longer.

Alas, I’ve been too busy to read more than a few chapters of old favourites, to try get my brain to quiet down and let me sleep.

Speaking of, when did it become midnight, and oh damnit. I’ve been overtired from the last …two months…holy crap… hitting me like a runaway trans-Australian train and I haven’t been sleeping well. It’s affecting my health and ability to do stuff; but it’s not the sole reason for it. I’ve just been crazy busy with RL stuff. I haven’t been active on blogs much either, beyond the occasional comment here and there. There’s a reason why I bought this sign hanging by my monitor:

I did, however make 9kg of hamburger last weekend, to freeze. We had some tonight…last night… and the children declared it amazing. I’ll post the recipe sometime later. I also did a batch of a dozen tempura eggs for donburi from Shokugeki no Soma chapter 170, but I’ve been having problems trying to upload the pics. The Yukihira style method of cooking it worked wonderfully; but if you don’t have a good tempura sauce to go with it, even on rice it’ll be a bit lacking.

I sort of followed Soma’s described sauce here.

“Also, the sauce I used is Yukihira Diner’s special umami-packed sweet and salty sauce blend! It’s made by adding soy sauce and mirin to a base of bonito dashi stock that’s boiled down and concentrated. It goes perfectly with both the egg and rice.”

He’s right. It does. Alternately, you could probably try it on Nissin Ramen’s Tokyo Shoyu noodles.

Or perhaps make your own! ^_^

4 thoughts on “Books Old and New

  1. Patrick Chester

    I remember reading The Wounded Sky by Diane Duane when I was in high school in Central Illinois. So 14-15 or so. Not sure what it was doing in a Catholic High School’s library, but I checked it out and enjoyed it.

    1. R.K. Modena Post author

      I made it a point to also introduce Duane via books before even thinking of giving the boyo Harry Potter (they’ve seen some of the movies, because sleepovers, but… eh) simply because I enjoy Duane’s work more than HP. Both are quite enjoyable though.

      1. Patrick Chester

        Yeah, I liked her version of Starfleet since a novel form let her add a ton of very alien crew members that likely would’ve been difficult to do with special effects in TV or film.

        Though I want to see Naraht in a Trek film or TV show at some point. 😀

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