timjones in 2013

I'm still doggedly finishing off my 2012 listings in my 2012 thread:

http://www.librarything.com/topic/129111

but, limited though my involvement in Club Read was in 2012, I've decided to hang in there - or rather, here - in 2013.

2012 was a particularly busy year of my life - I managed to read 52 books, slightly down on the previous two years. I have a funny feeling 2013 will be no less busy, so if I manage a book a week, I won't be too dissatisfied.

The big (potential) change this year is that I now have a Kindle - what effect this will have on my reading habits or reading speed, I'll be able to report over the course of the year!

Tim, glad you're back. I've only managed a book a week or more twice...this past two years.

I'm going to finish my 2012 listings in the 2013 thread. I can't go back there; it's a ghost town :-)

>2 dchaikin:, dchaikin: But at least you are going in the right direction!

>3 avaland:, avaland: I love the sound of tumbleweed in the morning, so I'm about to return to that ghost town one more time.

... aaaand my 2012 thread is finally up to date:

http://www.librarything.com/topic/129111

1. Raw Places by John Horrocks - poetry/collection (4/5)

Despite the historical and current importance of farming to New Zealand, farmer-poets are comparatively rare beasts here. John Horrocks is one such, and many of the poems in this collection take as their starting point his years spent farming in the windswept Tararua District north of Wellington.

There's a lot of fine poems in here - with John's permission, I'm hoping to post my very favourite, "Dogs", on my blog sometime soon - although set in the city rather than the country, it gives a good flavour of the book.

Welcome to 2013. (OK, i still have two 2012 books to comment on) The Laurice Gibert poem gave me a chuckle.

Welcome back tim and don't be shy post one of yor poems on here.

>7 dchaikin:, dchaikin: Thanks! This poem is actually quite atypical of Laurice's collection in subject matter, but to anyone who has slaved over one of CNZ's impenetrable grant application forms, it says what we have all been thinking.

>8 baswood:, baswood: All right, I will! Probably not my best, but my most recent - I'm concentrating on writing short stories at the moment, so new poems have become rare events. The note at the bottom explains the context.

The formatting may be a bit wonky here - it can be viewed in its original form at

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2012/10/tuesday-poem-on-contemplating-statue...

On Contemplating The Statue Of Courtney Love Outside The Front Entrance Of Nelson College for Girls

The sculptor has caught Courtney in the act of running away,
her uniform already half removed, the blue of the blazer (optional)
offsetting the pallor of her skin. She lasted just one term
yet is the most famous Old Girl of them all.

No telling what she’s running from: maths, tyranny,
the restraints – petty? essential? – that fence her round.
It’s all in her past, or in her genes. Hardly the College’s fault
that they caught her in the middle of a very difficult year.

As for what she’s running to: the hardest of all fates,
doomed to be more famous for whom she loved
than what she’s done. Kurt is still better known
than Hole, than Celebrity Skin, than the sound of her guitar.

Courtney is caught in the act as she makes a break for town.
One foot is raised, one shoe slipping off.
One hand grasps at nothing, or punches the air.
In the shadow of her plinth, a small boy sells lemonade.

Credit note: This is a new, unpublished (and very possibly unfinished) poem.

Tim says: I wrote this poem in Nelson, inspired by walking past - you guessed it - the front entrance of Nelson College for Girls. Some parts of this poem are true: Courtney did attend Nelson College for Girls for one term, it was a less than ideal experience for all concerned, and a small boy did have a lemonade stand further along the street. The lemonade was very sweet, but also very welcome on a hot Nelson day.

I've rounded up the first half of my book notes, reviews and interviews for 2012 on my blog here:

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2013/01/the-52-books-i-read-in-2012-part-1-1...

>10 timjones: Love that poem!

You mean to say there is not a statue of Courtney Love outside The Nelson College for girls.

Enjoyed your poem Tim. love the phrase break for town that immediatly made me think of break down.

12, kidzdoc and 13, baswood: Thanks, both of you!

Not only is there no such statue, but when Courtney Love asked the Principal of NCG if she could address the school as an old girl, the Principal said "no". This was 15 years ago, when Courtney's drug troubles were at their height, and apparently the same Principal, still serving, has said that Courtney would now be welcome to address her alma mater. We shall see!

I read this poem when I was the guest poet at Nelson Live Poets, a couple of days after I'd written it - I wasn't sure what reaction it would get, but it went over very well!

Wow, Tim, that's a gem. Glad you shared, glad Bas asked.

>15 dchaikin:, dchaikin: Thanks very much!

I rounded up the second part of my 2012 reading here:

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2013/01/the-52-books-i-read-in-2012-part-2-2...

2. Wolves Eat Dogs by Martin Cruz Smith - novel/thriller/police procedural (5/5)

This is the fifth in Martin Cruz Smith's Arkady Renko series, and it's outstandingly good - a return to the form of the first in the series, Gorky Park.

Renko is the classic god cop in a bad place: dogged, incorruptible and determined on uncovering the truth whatever the cost to himself. What lifts this book to heights the previous few entries in the series haven't matched in that much of it is set in the Zone of Exclusion around the Chernobyl nuclear plant. Smith does a great job of describing the eerie setting, teeming with wildlife but also home to scientific research teams and fugitive humans.

While it's not enormously hard, once the Chernobyl section of the book gets underway, to work out whodunnit, that really doesn't matter in this case - and how Renko saves his skin (or rather has it saved for him) provides the twist I didn't see coming. A tremendously good read even if you are not especially fond of thrillers.

I liked Polar Star almost as much as Gorky Park, but have yet made it to the third in the series. Sounds like I should.

Wolves Eat Dogs sounds very good, and I think I've read only one other book set in Russia so far; onto the WishList it goes! Should I start with the first in the series though?

19, EnriqueFreeque: Book 3, Red Square, is well worth reading too - and I haven't yet read #4, Havana Bay.

20, LisaMorr: Thanks! Here are all the books tagged "Russia" in my library - many, though not all, set there - dive in!

http://www.librarything.com/catalog/timjones&deepsearch=Russia

3. The Glass Harmonica by Dorothee Kocks - ebook; novel (4/5)

This ebook novel of Revolution-era France, post-revolutionary America, and the invention of pornography as a commercial genre is beautifully written, though I felt that there were times when the narrative stalled. The central character, the Corsican glass harmonica player Chjara, is very well delineated, but I didn't always find the actions of her American lover Henry so convincing.

But it's worth repeating that the novel is beautifully written, full of arresting descriptions and images. Although Dorothee Kocks' writing isn't as outré is Angela Carter's, it shares something of the same qualities. Overall, an intriguing novel that is well worth reading.

4. Judgement Call by J. A. Jance - novel/mystery (3.5/5)

An enjoyable but not particularly memorable police procedural, set in small-town Arizona. I did enjoy reading it as a relaxation during a busy work week.

5. Amigas by Elena Bossi and Penelope Todd - ebook; novel in Spanish and English versions (4/5)

Argentine writer Elena Bossi and New Zealand writer Penelope Todd wrote this bilingual novel (that is to say, the novel exists in complementary but not identical English- and Spanish-language versions within one ebook) after meeting at the University of Iowa Writing Programme in 2007 - and it's an interesting and enjoyable novel, if sad at times. It follows the chance meeting of two teenage girls, one from New Zealand and one from Argentina, at Rome Airport in 1969; their developing friendship, in person and then by letter; and the threat that occludes that friendship. What happens next would be telling...

The novel got off to a little bit of a slow start for me, but once the two girls meet, the story gripped me. Well worth reading.

6. Flaubert's Drum by Sugu Pillay - poetry/collection (4/5)

Born in Malaysia, Sugu Pillay is an accomplished poet and playwright. Flaubert’s Drum, which is her first poetry collection, is a very interesting and wide-ranging set of poems that moves between Asia and New Zealand, between epic and earthquake, between the turtles of Chendor Beach and the schist of Lindis Pass. I especially enjoyed the final section of the book, which does a lovely job of tying the book’s strands together.

7. The Shingle Bar Sea Monster and Other Stories by Laura Solomon - short stories/collection (4.5/5)

I've reviewed this one for Landfall Review Online and will post the link to the review when it appears. But, in brief, this is a very good collection of mainly but not solely magic realist stories set mainly in the UK and New Zealand.

PS: Here's my Landfall Review Online review of the book:

http://landfallreviewonline.blogspot.co.nz/2013/06/predicaments.html

8. Seven Nights by Jorge Luis Borges - nonfiction/essays (5/5)

Tremendous essay collection - Borges at the top of his form, lucid, knowledgeable and slyly witty, well translated by Eliot Weinberger. Each of these seven essays is good, but two in particular are highlights: the essay on Dante for its literary insights, and that on Blindness for its insights into being Borges.

Also, I think I now know why Gene Wolfe titled a novella "Seven American Nights", which is a bonus.

Hi - My first year on this thread and I'm still checking in with members. There may be no statue, but I see how it should look! Great poem. Look forward to more of your thread.

Merrikay

Many new reviews...looking forward to more on Borges.

>28 mkboylan:, mkboylan and >29 dchaikin:, dchaikin: Thanks! I would love to get round to posting here more often, and contributing more to other threads, but it seems to be only over the summer holidays that I manage much of that.

9. The Aviator by Gareth Renowden - novel/science fiction (4/5)

Gareth Renowden is best known in New Zealand as a journalist and science blogger – in particular, for the Hot Topic blog on climate change.

With The Aviator, Book 1 of a planned series, he turns to science fiction. In a world in which runaway climate change proceeds unchecked, airship pilot Lemmy (no relation to Motörhead) and his AI and human companions tour the world from their base in the Marlborough Sounds, visiting the communities springing up in parts of the world made newly livable and experiencing the terrible consequences of runaway climate change throughout most of the world.

If you like the great near-future science fiction novels of Kim Stanley Robinson, I think you will enjoy The Aviator.

10. "The Journey: Poetry" by Marvin Hubbard - poetry/collection (2.5/5)

I love the commitment to social justice in these poems, but unfortunately, most of the poems don't work well enough as poems for me to give the book a higher ranking. They tend to state their opinions - opinions I usually agree with strongly! - in abstract language without embedding them in either lived experience or interesting poetic language. I wanted to know more about how the poet's strong commitment to social justice plays out in the world, rather than having it expressed in mainly abstract terms.

11. Enter Night: Metallica the Biography by Mick Wall - nonfiction/music/biography (3.5/5)

Metallica are one of my favourite bands, even though I did not discover their music until after they had completed the two mid-1980s albums that in my opinion remain their best work, "Ride the Lightning" and "Master of Puppets". They have had many commercial highs - not always matched by creative highs - since then, but unlike their 1980s peers, have kept on trying to do new things musically even when it would have been easier all round to confine themselves to the nostalgia circuit.

Mick Wall's biography of the band is excellent on their early years, and very strong in discussing the influence of the presence, and then the absence, of bassist Cliff Burton, killed in a bus crash in 1987 - but as the years and the albums go by, the book becomes less and less informative. There's a lot more to be gleaned about their 'grown-up' struggles from the "Some Kind Of Monster" documentary, which documents the making of their worst album "St Anger" in a remarkably unsparing and revealing way - the complete opposite of the typical megastar musicians' vanity project - than there is in this book.

Still, because 2/3 of the book is so good on the band's early years and on their musical as well as personal roots, it is worth the attention of anyone with a more than casual interest in Metallica and their music.

How come I've never heard of Gareth Renowden before? Sounds like a pretty good book.

Always interested in good musical biographies

>34 AnnieMod:, Thanks, AnnieMod! It may be that you haven't heard of him because he's a New Zealand author - sadly, a good deal of potential fame dissolves in the miles of ocean between this country and anywhere else... But it is a good book: not quite as good as Kim Stanley Robinson's similarly-themed, perhaps, but then not many writers are as good as KSR. I will be interviewing Gareth Renowden for my blog at http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.com in the not too distant future, and will try to remmber to post the link here also.

Of course, the great thing for NZ authors nowadays is that our books can be made available online worldwide, as Gareth's are.

>35 baswood:, baswood: Me too! Enter Night is several classes above the cheapie "cut and paste" musical biographies which are far too common - but it is not among the very best I've read - though to be fair the best I've read are of classical composers whose careers are over rather than rock musicians who careers are still in progress.

I tend to try to keep an eye on NZ and AU authors and awards.... but he slipped under my radar. Now I have a book and will get around to reading it... soon I hope :)

But you are probably right - keeping an eye on UK is a lot easier then down under... so I do miss a lot of books (the Aurelias awards help a bit... but just a bit)

My review of James Brown's poetry collection "Warm Auditorium", which I read in 2012, is now online at http://landfallreviewonline.blogspot.co.nz/2013/04/missed-boats-loose-cannons-ho...

Landfall Review Online links can be a bit touchy - if that link doesn't work for you, look in the left-hand menu under the heading "Missed Boats, Loose Cannons, The Hospital Tuck".

I'm impressed that you are keeping such a close eye on developments in this part of the world, AnnieMod! If you want to look out for NZ science fiction and fantasy awards in particular, the Sir Julius Vogel Awards are a good place to keep an eye on. Like the Hugos, they include awards in both professional and fan categories: http://www.sffanz.org.nz/sjv/sjvAwards.shtml

I am coming from a small country... and UK, Canada and USA are not the only English-speaking countries in the world. So when I started reading in English, I tried to keep an eye on the 4th one as well... it just kinda made sense :)

Are these the counterpart to the AU Aurealis Awards?
You know... as different as NZ is, I never really thought if NZ does not have their own awards... So thanks for the link :)

>42 AnnieMod:, AnnieMod: I wish everyone had the same attitude!

In the strict sense, the Sir Julius Vogel Awards are the equivalent to Australia's Ditmar Awards, which are also presented annually at that year's national science fiction convention - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ditmar_Award.

But in terms of prestige, then yes, they probably are the NZ equivalent of the Aurealis Awards.

It's nice to make the acquaintance, albeit virtually, of someone from Bulgaria! Here in Wellington, I have friends from Kyrgyzstan and Serbia, but I haven't had the pleasure of meeting anyone from Bulgaria yet :-)

Ah Wellington, what a beautiful city. My husband and one of my daughters and I were lucky enough to spend two weeks there (in NZ) Rented a car and spent a week on each island. I loved the museum in Wellington with the immigration story. My husband is still convinced NZ is the perfect place to live. Grass is always greener right?? Wait.....in NZ it really is! I used to have the NZ herald as my homepage on my pc so I could get a daily dose of something different and a little more balanced than this U.S. press. I keep Occupy Christchurch on my Facebook for still another perspective.

Enjoyed your review of James Brown.

I also enjoyed your review of James Brown's latest collection. I empathised when you said readers who have a limited tolerance for poems that comment on the circumstances of their own creation I am one of those readers and while I acknowledge that a favourite topic of many poets is about 'the writing of a poem' you can certainly have too much of it.

>44 mkboylan:-46: Thanks, mkboylan, dchaikin and baswood, and apologies for the long delay in replying - it's been a very busy couple of weeks!

mkboylan, NZ is not without its problems, but we certainly start with the sizeable advantage of having a relatively small population in a fertile country - even though our ancestors managed to import enough predators to wipe out lots of our unique birdlife :-(

A little bit delayed but I'd like to add my recommendation for the Metallica documentary "Some Kind Of Monster". I know nothing about Metallica but found it fascinating to watch the dynamics of all those big egos who have been thrown into spending a lot of time in each other's company.

>48 wandering_star:, wandering_star: Absolutely! The amazing thing as that all those big egos were willing to allow themselves to be exposed so publicly - which is to their credit.

12. "Names: Poems" by Marilyn Hacker - poetry/collection (4.5/5)

Marilyn Hacker is a distinguished American poet whose work I had not previously read. Contrary to my perception of her as a “difficult” poet, and though many of the poems in this collection are long, I found them to be moving, engaging, beautifully written and full of meaning. There is a sureness of voice which I enjoyed, but without the dogmatism that can be its shadow. These poems were a very pleasant surprise to me, and are worth the attention of any poetry lover.

13. Night's Glass Table by Karen Zelas - poetry/collection (4/5)

It took me a little while to warm up to this collection by Christchurch poet Karen Zelas, but once I did, I enjoyed these sharply-observed poems about relationships, travel, family, and life in post-quake Christchurch.

14. Open by Andre Agassi - nonfiction/sports/autobiography (4/5)

The book group I'm in chose this as the book group for our next meeting at a meeting I wasn't at: not being a huge tennis fan, I wasn't sure this would be for me, but in fact it's a very interesting study of the effects ruthless parental ambition can have on a young athlete. Andre Agassi's father pushed and pushed him to become a top tennis player - and he did; but the psychological fallout wrecked the younger Agassi's life for many years. The story of how he gradually and painfully overcame this makes for an often moving autobiography - though the descriptions of the tennis matches themselves tend to blur into one. Perhaps that's appropriate.

>50 timjones: Appreciate the review of the Hacker collection, Tim. We just purged a fair number of her volumes from our poetry library (we have purged about 80 books generally from our collection). Dukedom originally picked up his copies because of her collection with Delany.

>53 avaland:, avaland: Thanks, Lois! On the basis of this collection, I'd definitely read more of her work. (I knew of the Delany connection, but have not read any of his work for many years.)

15. Chinaman: The Legend of Pradeep Mathew by Shehan Karunatilaka - novel/picaresque (4.5/5)

Shehan Karunatilaka, who is a guest at the Auckland Writers & Readers Festival 2013, studied at Massey University. Perhaps this is why this entertaining picaresque about the greatest and least recognized Sri Lankan cricketer, Pradeep Mathew, a Tamil spinner whose imaginary exploits often echo the real exploits of Muttiah Muralidaran, is full of references to New Zealand – from the expected (Hadlee, the Crowes, Dipak Patel) to the less expected (Anchor Milk) - and why the final scenes of this novel about Sri Lanka take place in and around Wanganui.

But the novel weaves a rich tapestry of cricket, politics, corruption, the Sri Lankan civil war, and a dogged journalist with a dodgy liver determined to track his elusive quarry down. Highly recommended.

16. Race Across Alaska by Libby Riddles (and Tim Jones!) - nonfiction/sport/adventure (4/5)

First of all, I'm not the Tim Jones who co-wrote this book - though I would have enjoyed co-writing it, because it's a fascinating story of courage, endurance and bravery. Those three qualities apply to everyone who takes part in this dog-sled race of over 1000 miles through the late Alaskan winter, but in particular, in this retelling of Libby Riddles' 1985 race victory, it applies to her decision to press on towards the finish line in a storm that kept every other competitor hunkered down. It could have all gone horribly wrong - but it didn't, thanks to Libby Riddles' preparation and her superb dog team.

The one thing that disappointed me about the book is that, while it does a great job of covering the race itself, there is little coverage of the lead-up to it and no coverage at all of the aftermath, in which Riddles, as the first woman to win the race, shot to fame. I would loved to have heard what effect this had on her life, but there are only the barest hints in this book. Still, as a record of one of the world's most demanding sporting events, this ranks very highly.

17. Ninety Degrees North: the Quest for the North Pole by Fergus Fleming - nonfiction/exploration (4/5)

18. The Continuing Adventures of Alice Spider by Janis Freegard - poetry/chapbook (4/5)

19. The Spiral Tattoo by Michael J. Parry - novel/fantasy/police procedural (3.5/5)

More to follow...

17. Ninety Degrees North: the Quest for the North Pole by Fergus Fleming - nonfiction/exploration (4/5)

I have plenty of books about Antarctic exploration, so though I should balance it up with this account of the attempts by various European and American explorers to reach the North Pole from the late 19th to early 20th centuries. It's an enjoyable but slightly disjointed affair - the narrative of the attainment of the North Pole is much more tangled than that of the South Pole, and as a result, the impression left is one of bungling, chauvinism and malice leavened by amazing feats of endurance. Still very interesting, though.

The earlier explorers were very brave indeed, not having modern technology to help them through.

> 59, NanaCC: Indeed they were! But they were also, often, poorly led and worse equipped, which made their sufferings much worse.

20. The Clock Winder by Anne Tyler - fiction/novel (4/5)

This novel starts from an archetypal premise - that of an outsider of lower social class entering the world of a large upper-middle-class family, and the effect each has on the other - and it took me a while to warm to it; one plot twist in particular was all too predictable. But with that exception, the book veers off in some unexpected directions, and by the end, I was very happy that I'd read it. As a bonus, it is also extremely well written.

18. The Continuing Adventures of Alice Spider by Janis Freegard - poetry/chapbook (4/5)

Janis Freegard is an excellent New Zealand poet who features an alter ego called Alice Spider in many of her poems. This US-published chapbook brings together a number of the Alice Spider poems: with Janis' permission, I published one as a Tuesday Poem on my blog, and it gives you a good feel for the surreal, quirky, and often funny world of Alice Spider:

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2013/05/tuesday-poem-alice-spider-discovers....

19. The Spiral Tattoo by Michael J. Parry - novel/fantasy/police procedural (3.5/5)

I enjoyed this entertaining first novel about a large troll and a small flying Eleniu who are partners in the City Guard of a trading city with six sentient races. There's nothing especially original in this fantasy world, but it makes a good backdrop to the murder investigation which is at the foreground of the story.

There were times the plot seemed to be spinning its wheels a bit, and the formidable antagonist is kept in the background too long in my opinion, leading to a rather rushed ending. However, with these reservations, I had a lot of fun reading this story, and have now hopped onto Amazon to buy the second novel featuring these characters.

22. Hidden Agendas: What We Need to Know about the TPPA by Jane Kelsey - nonfiction/politics (4.5/5)

23. Drought and other intimacies by Pat White - poetry/collection (3.5/5)

24. The Apex Book Of World SF 2 edited by Lavie Tidhar - science fiction/anthology (4/5)

25. A Man Runs Into A Woman by Sarah Jane Barnett - poetry/collection (4/5)

More to follow...

My review of Laura Solomon's short story collection The Shingle Bar Sea Monster and Other Stories, listed above (#7) is now up at Landfall Review online:

http://landfallreviewonline.blogspot.co.nz/2013/06/predicaments.html

LRO links can be a bit dodgy - if this doesn't work for you, look for the review titled "Predicaments" in the menu of reviews.

I seem to be carving out a niche as their reviewer of NZ-stuff-that-isn't-realism: I've got a new NZ SF novel to review for them next.

How was Racing in the Street?

>66 dchaikin:, dchaikin: Your wish is my command - see next post!

21. Racing In The Street: The Bruce Springsteen Reader by June Skinner Sawyers - miscellany (essays, reviews, fiction, poetry)/music criticism - 4/5

I've been an unabashed Bruce Springsteen fan from the time I first heard "Sandy (Asbury Park, 4th of July)" - I don't like everything he's recorded, but if I made a list of my all-time favourite 100 songs, there would be a lot of Springsteen on it.

So this reader (which follows his career up to "The Rising") was a very welcome companion to his music. It collects articles, reviews, interviews, and even some fiction and poetry built around Springsteen's work. It's not all laudatory - some of the articles focus on the early music-biz hype that both brought Springsteen to prominence and led to a backlash - and most of the articles are careful, considered, and very interesting.

The fiction included in the reader, though good on its own terms, felt somewhat peripheral, but did show Springsteen's cultural reach.

Well worth reading if you're a Springsteen fan - and if you're not, the song that gives the book its title isn't a bad place to start.

An aside: several pieces in the book talk about the sacramental quality of Springsteen's music and performances, and there are several excellent articles on this theme on the "Rock and Theology" site:

http://www.rockandtheology.com/?tag=bruce-springsteen

(A warning, though: music may start to auto-play when you click this link)

Tim, I'm a newish Springsteen fan. I've only been listening to him with interest for a few years now. I'm intrigued by the book. Thanks for the review. :)

oh that was a fun link. Going back for more later. Great topic. My personal favorite theology/music story is in the first anthropology book I ever read, The Forest People by Colin Turnbull (I know - very dated) but the Pygmies Turnbull is with says they don't in the devil, God. Turnbull asks them what do they think is going on then when bad things happen. They say God fell asleep and they get this giant didgeredoo like thing and carry it off into the jungle to play it to wake God up. I knew it had to be beautiful music and got obsessed with hearing it, and Turnbull had recorded it. This was before the internet, but I got a copy from Tower in NYC. What a disappointment that was! Still - one of my favorite stories and helpful for me. Now I'll never hear Springsteen the same! Thanks.

>69 dchaikin:, dchaikin and >70 mkboylan:, mkboylan: Thanks for the comments! mkboylan, why was it a disappointment?

Springsteen just played Glasgow but I couldn't bring myself to go. It wasn't the ticket price (£65), it's just that he now seems a tribute act to himself. I love the early albums (with the exception of Born in the USA which sounds manufactured to me) but since 1990 his albums have at best been OK*. I still don't understand why after ToL, the E-Street band gone, he didn't choose collaborators that would push him out of his comfort zone.
My main theory about why it went wrong though is simple - Springsteen, like a lot of writers, ran out of material - his early albums are powered by life in New Jersey, ToL by his divorce - afterwards he was happy and content.

(* there still have been great songs like Streets of Philadelphia and Devils and Dust - and two great compilations, Tracks and The Promise).

Racing in the Street is just a great song, it just oozes a sense of America where the dreams have been replaced with disappointment but there still is a spark of possible redemption. (Plus it has that part when the band start to play and there is a loving guitar line).

71 It was a series of very low notes and very repetitious. Guess I expected a melody?

Sounded like a dying animal. I

>72 Jargoneer:, Jargoneer: I like many of the songs on Magic, although the production is very compressed - and I think Wrecking Ball is his best album for many years. Have you listened to that one?

>73 mkboylan: and >74 mkboylan:, mkboylan: Definitely sounds like an acquired taste ;-)

22. Hidden Agendas: What We Need to Know about the TPPA by Jane Kelsey - nonfiction/politics (4.5/5)

The Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement is an agreement currently under negotiation between the US and 9 other countries in the Asia-Pacific region, including New Zealand. It has relatively little to do with trade but a great deal to do with taking various aspects of the law of these countries - covering such issues as investment policy, environment policy, and intellectual property/copyright policy - outside the control of their citizens and placing them under corporate control. (For Americans, think NAFTA on steroids.)

In other words, if passed, it would represent a substantial loss of national sovereignty and democratic oversight over law-making and public policy. I don't like that idea, so I'm glad NZ academic Jane Kelsey has written this concise study. (I found her previous book on the subject, No Ordinary Deal, to be too dry and academic - this one is written for the general reader.)

Hidden Agendas is well worth reading if, like me, you are concerned about the corporate/security State's increasing encroachment on people's economic, political and civil rights.

24. The Apex Book of World SF 2 edited by Lavie Tidhar - anthology/science fiction (4/5)

(Disclaimer: I have a story in this anthology.)

I enjoyed reading The Apex Book of World SF 2 a lot. Rather than going for the usual Anglo-American suspects, editor Lavie Tidhar has assembled an anthology of science fiction stories from authors around the world, with South America, Europe and Asia all especially well represented. Like any anthology, there are some stories that didn't grab me, but also a number I liked very much: my favourite was "The Sound of Breaking Glass" by Joyce Chng of Singapore, a delicate and moving story.

This anthology is well worth reading for its own sake - and well worth reading if you want a wider view of contemporary SF.

23. Drought and other intimacies by Pat White - poetry/collection (3.5/5)

This collection of poems draws on Pat White's experience as a farmer in the drought-prone Wairarapa region of New Zealand. These are technically very adept poems, and Pat White is a considerable New Zealand poet and author - but, for my own taste, I often found them a little too reticent - these are poems for the strong, silent type, even when they are admitting to personal weaknesses and doubts.

>77 timjones: hi Tim,
your book Hidden Agendas: What We Need to Know about the TPPA sounds very interesting. And very specific. I'm thinking I wouldn't find it at the local Paper Plus :)
I will check the library catalogue soon, but if they dont have it, could you tell me- where did you find it?

Hidden Agendas sounds horrifyingly important!

80, I readthereforeiam and 81, mkboylan: I agree, it is important!

Both "No Ordinary Deal" (the long book - lots of good info, but v. academic) and "Hidden Agendas" (the more concise book) are published by Bridget Williams Books and available from the publisher.

No Ordinary Deal (paperback and ebook): http://www.bwb.co.nz/books/no-ordinary-deal

Hidden Agendas (ebook): http://www.bwb.co.nz/books/hidden-agendas

I hope this helps!

Thanks for that. $39.95 is up there in price, but not unexpected. Its a shame as it has priced me out of the market this time :)

25. A Man Runs Into A Woman by Sarah Jane Barnett - poetry/collection (4/5)

All the poems in this debut collection are very technically accomplished. I found some of them a little too abstract for my taste, but the best poems here are among the best I've read in the past couple of years. I found out after finishing the collection that my favourite poem in it, "Mountains", was included in Best New Zealand Poems 2012. Here it is: http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/iiml/bestnzpoems/BNZP12/t1-g1-t1-body-d1.html

26. Tropic of Skorpeo by Michael Morrissey - novel/sf

I'm writing a review of this one for Landfall, so I will Say No More, Guv until that's published!

>75 timjones: - compression - the curse of modern music. With every Springsteen album I have high hopes but end up a little disappointed, I agree with the sentiments of Wrecking Ball but find much of it, especially the music, very heavy-handed. (To be fair to Springsteen he may have made disappointing albums but he hasn't made out-and-out stinkers like some of his peers like Neil Young or Bob Dylan).

Have you come across this online magazine (it can be downloaded) - International Speculative Fiction.

>87 Jargoneer:, Jargoneer: Re Wrecking Ball: My favourite song by a long way is the title track, but there are some other tracks on there I like a lot, too.

Re International Speculative Fiction: I hadn't heard of that, and thanks for putting me onto it!

27. Wolf at the Door by J. Damask - novel/urban fantasy (4/5)

Joyce Chng (J. Damask) is a Singaporean author whose work features, among other places, in The Apex Book of World SF 2. I was so impressed by her story in that anthology that I bought this novel, about werewolves of Chinese descent living in Singapore, and I enjoyed it.

The great strength of this novel is the way the author interleaves the social dynamics of pack and family, as both family members and outsiders threaten to disrupt the lives of the protagonist and those near and dear to her.

There is a quite complex sequence of flashbacks embedded in this comparatively short novel, and those didn't work so well for me - the story they told was interesting, but in the limited space available, I found it too fragmentary. Still, that didn't detract from my enjoyment of the main story, which is well characterised and well told.

28. Old Hat by Mark Pirie - poetry/collection (3.5/5)

This is a collection of triolets - 8 line poems with several lines repeated, based on medieval French poetry. Mark Pirie is a fine poet, but this is a very restrictive form, and I found that the limitations of the form limited my interest in many of the poems here - still, despite that, there are some fine poems in this collection.

29. Let me be Frank by Sarah Laing - cartoons/graphic memoir (4/5)

"Let me be Frank" is Sarah Laing's memoir of her five months as the Frank Sargeson Fellow, a literary fellowship in Auckland. It's an entertaining book that shows off her skills as both an author and a graphic artist, though ironically, one of the themes of the book is that having well-developed skills in both these areas makes it hard for her to be taken as seriously as she would like in either.

If that makes the book sound like an exercise in whinging, it isn't - instead, it's a well-told (and drawn) tale of balancing literary life and motherhood.

30. Skirting The Boundary by Isabelle Duncan - nonfiction/history of women's cricket (4/5)

I'm planning to review this one on my blog, so will just say here that if you are interested in women's sport in general or women's cricket in particular, then I recommend this book - my only reservation being that it is strongly focused on women's cricket in England and to a lesser extent Australia, and goes into a lot less depth about other countries - but there are extenuating circumstances which I'll cover in my review.

89> Chinese werewolves -- sounds intriguing. Have you read Toby Barlow's Sharp Teeth?

>91 janeajones:, janeajones: No, but it sounds interesting - thank you!

26. Tropic of Skorpeo by Michael Morrissey - novel/sf (3/5)

My review of this NZ science fiction novel is now up at Landfall Review Online:

http://landfallreviewonline.blogspot.co.nz/2013/09/punkoids-and-slutoids.html#!/...

31. The Linen Way by Melissa Green - nonfiction+poetry/memoir (4.5/5)

This is a very moving personal memoir by a poet whose work drew the praise and admiration of such great poets as Derek Walcott and Joseth Brodsky, yet who has fought a decades-long battle against mental illness and the impulse to suicide.

"The Linen Way" quotes liberally from Melissa Green's debut collection The Squanicook Eclogues, a multiple prize-winner on its publication in 1987 that was republished in 2010, and also features poetry by Brodsky and Rilke.

This is another excellent ebook from New Zealand's Rosa Mira Books, whose adventurous publishing programme includes writers from the US and Argentina as well as New Zealand.

Highly recommended to everyone, and even more highly recommended if you love poetry.

I found The Squanicook Eclogues available as an ebook and very affordable on Amazon, Tim, but not The Linen Way. Where did you obtain it?

>95 Linda92007:, Linda92007: The Linen Way is available from the publisher, rosamirabooks.com, in a range of formats, including for the Kindle.

On my blog, I've interviewed Melissa Green, the author of #31 above:

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2013/10/an-interview-with-melissa-green.html

32. A Game of Thrones - 4.5/5

33. A Clash of Kings - 4/5

34. A Storm of Swords - 4.5/5

35. A Feast for Crows- 3.5/5

36. A Dance with Dragons - 4/5

High (but most certainly not heroic!) fantasy novels, Books 1-5 of the projected seven volumes of "A Song of Ice and Fire".

I'm writing an overview of the series for my blog and will post it here soon ... I hope!

Just trying to catch up after a long-ish absence. I can see how you have spent your October! (with George)

Interesting reading, as always.

>99 avaland:, avaland: I read a bunch of other books during and between the readings of Books 1-5, but I have fallen so far behind I have made brief notes of and on those books and will endeavour to load them up to LT once the Christmas holidays (the main public holidays here in NZ) start. In the meantime, however, I can at least present...

Maybe Modern Life Isn't Rubbish After All: George R. R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire":

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2013/10/maybe-modern-life-isnt-rubbish-after...

This is my appreciation - mingled with some criticism - of the first five books of "A Song of Ice and Fire"

>100 timjones: I understand about the inability to keep up. I'm behind three or four once again.

37. Iceland Saga by Magnus Magnusson - nonfiction/history (4.5/5)

A very interesting and enjoyable telling of Iceland's history through the medium of the great Icelandic Sagas. While this approach means some aspects of Iceland's history are downplayed - for instance, I'd love to have read more about how volcanic eruptions and climatic change have affected Iceland since its settlement - I still found this book fascinating - and as a bonus, Icelandic place names now make a whole lot more sense to me.

38. The Guild by Felicia Day - graphic novel (4.5/5)

This was a re-read - something light between finishing volume n of "A Song of Ice and Fire" and starting volume n+1. As I did the first time I read it, I enjoyed this origin story for the web series - it's well told, well drawn, and often poignant as well as funny.

39. The Casual Vacancy by J. K. Rowling - fiction/novel (4/5)

Suppose J.K. Rowling had written a book about a stultifying middle-class family who kept a young wizard under the stairs - and then decided to throw away the bit about the young wizard, and write about the middle-class family and their equally insufferable social milieu instead. If she had, "The Casual Vacancy" is the book that would have resulted. It's a very well-written and well-observed novel about the English bourgeoisie at their worst: narrow-minded, self-serving and intolerant. It is a fine novel, but far from an enjoyable one.

40. Regeneration: New Zealand Speculative Fiction II edited by Anna Caro and Juliet Buchanan - fiction/anthology (4/5)

Another fine collection of New Zealand speculative fiction stories from the same team that edited and produced "A Foreign Country: New Zealand Speculative Fiction".

The Guild was such a fantastic series. I never did get around to getting the novel though, I was afraid it wouldn't add much to the story.

It's nice to read a sober review of The Casual Vacancy probably not something I would read but reviews from the camps of HP fans and HP haters makes their reviews untrustworthy.

>107 stretch:, stretch: Felicia Day followed up The Guild graphic novel (originally 3 issues) with a series of one-shots about the other main characters. None of those grabbed me enough to make me want to buy them, but I do recommend The Guild itself.

Re The Casual Vacancy, I count myself as someone who read and enjoyed the Harry Potter books (especially #s 3 and 7), but is by no means a massive J.K. Rowling stan, so I'm glad my review was useful. We read the novel for my book group, and I think I was the one who enjoyed it least - and even I thought it had many good qualities, but I wasn't really in the mood for so relentlessly downbeat a book.

Iceland Saga sounds interesting, Tim. I'm going to go pop it in my Amazon wishlist. It is an intriguing place to visit and I'd like to go back and see more further outside the west area.

>109 avaland:, avaland: I doubt I'll ever get there, but my interest in countries if often inversely proportional to how likely I am to visit them! In fact, visiting the less remote lands of Wellington Central Library today to stock up on reading for the holidays, I got out a more general history of Iceland Iceland's 1100 Years and, browsing nearby, also found a well-illustrated book about the Faroe Islands, The Faroe Islands.

Have you ever been to the Faroes - or, heading the other way, to Greenland?

41. Rising To The Surface by Latika Vasil - fiction/short story collection (4.5/5)

A fine debut collection of short stories by Wellington (NZ) author Latika Vasil - a collection whose power is cumulative, and derives from the author's understated, observational style. You can read my interview with Latika Vasil here:

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2013/07/an-interview-with-latika-vasil.html

42. Tear Water Tea by Saradha Koirala - poetry/collection (4.5/5)

This is the second collection by Wellington, NZ poet Saradha Koirala, whom I admire very much for her word choices, which always seem to be exactly right. I enjoyed her first collection, Wit of the Staircase, and I think "Tear Water Tea" is better yet - more varied in style, more sophisticated in delivery. It's also beautifully illustrated.

You can see a sample poem, which I think captures Saradha's style well, here:

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2013/08/tuesday-poem-secret-i-dont-mind-you....

and read my interview with Saradha here:

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2013/08/an-interview-with-saradha-koirala.ht...

>110 timjones: - the only way to get to the Faroes normally is to go to Denmark and get the ferry from there. I know this thanks to Scotland playing the Faroes at football a number of times - then you had fishermen transporting Scottish fans direct. The most important thing to know about the Faroes is that their second largest industry is stuffed puffins.

>37 timjones: - That's interesting, Magnus Magnusson was a TV celebrity in the UK, presenting Mastermind for years and I always assumed his books were coffee table items but it sounds like I've being doing him a disservice. (One of his daughters still reads the news on BBC Scotland but if the BBC still stands for something, it is nepotism).

I was at the Scottish Poetry Library recently and they had a couple of copies of Voyagers. Just started dipping into it, Louis Johnson is one that has made a big impression - never heard of him before and yet I gather he was a major poet in New Zealand.

43. Something for the Birds by Jacqueline Fahey - nonfiction/autobiography (3.5/5)

This autobiography of a well-known New Zealand artist covers the first half of her life. It's full of interesting material - she grew up in Timaru, not far upcountry from Janet Frame's Oamaru, and readers familiar with Janet Frame's work and life may find a number of echoes here - but Fahey doesn't have Frame's facility with narrative, and the telling of her story is so jumpy that it's often hard to work out who is doing what with whom where. Still, it's worth seeing past the disjointed narrative for the picture this book paints of growing up Irish Catholic in mid-20th Century New Zealand.

>113 Jargoneer:, Jargoneer: Thanks for the info re the Faroes!

I don't know about his other books, but Iceland Saga definitely isn't a coffee-table book.

It's nice to know Voyagers has made it to the Scottish Poetry Library! Yes, Louis Johnson was definitely a major NZ poet. There's a useful summary of his literary career here:

http://www.bookcouncil.org.nz/writers/profiles/johnson,%20louis

>110 timjones: No, have not been to those places (although from Boston one does fly over the tip of Greenland on the way to Iceland!)

>113 Jargoneer: A poetry library! how wonderful! Stuffed puffin: stuffed as in taxidermy or stuffed as in dietary? (the reason I ask is that I did try puffin in Iceland...and minke whale and horse. As they say, in Iceland if it's cute, they eat it.)

Smyril Lines has a 2014 schedule for Faroes to Iceland, but yes, you'd have to get to Denmark first.

I was wondering if it was that Magnus Magnusson. He also had another life translating some of the sagas in Penguin editions.

>116 avaland:, avaland: I don't know which form of puffin Jargoneer meant, but I suspect the answer lies here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faroese_puffin

I think I'd cope with stuffed puffin better than with kiviak:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiviak

>117 SassyLassy:: I'm getting sufficiently interested in Iceland and its literature that I think I may try reading some of the sagas in translation - but I also want to read Halldor Laxness' Íslandsklukkan (Iceland's Bell).

44. The Custom of the Country by Edith Wharton - fiction/novel (3.5/5)

I like Edith Wharton's writing very much, and this novel has many of her strengths, but I struggled with it because of Edith Wharton's relentless snobbery towards her main character, Undine Spragg, a loathsome and predatory specimen of the "nouveau riche" who preys on and ingratiates herself into classy but faded old-money New York society.

Edith Wharton directs (or at least strongly nudges) the reader to hate Unidine and take the side of her victims, but the old rich of New York are no better than the nouveau riche in my view: their old money ultimately derives from expropriating Native American land, so why should I sympathise with them?

Thus, although Undine is most certainly far from likable, I found myself with a sneaking admiration for her, and felt that, portrayed by another author with a broader range of human sympathies, she could have emerged as a heroic, or at least anti-heroic, character. I'll fight you for her, Edith!

45. The Rope Walk by Maria McMillan - poetry/collection (4/5)

It's taken a long time for Wellington poet Maria McMillan's first collection to appear, but the wait has been worth it: this collection, another beautiful job of production from poet and publisher Helen Rickerby's Seraph Press, is a good showcase for Maria's poetry and is well worth reading. You can see a sample poem from the collection here:

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2013/08/tuesday-poem-ghosts-by-maria-mcmilla...

Interesting viewpoint on Undine Spragg, Tim. I am still reading The Custom of the Country and hope to finish it this week, before I can consider my impressions of the novel and Undine, who is certainly a very original character.

I have started a thread here in the Literary Centennials-group, where you might want to re-post your review, especially because your review is such a good starter of a possible discussion of the book.

>121 edwinbcn:, edwinbcn: Done - thanks!

#94/97 - you have me really interested in Melissa Green. That interview was riveting, at least that's as my impression as I read through it. I will try to search her poetry out, and look into getting The Linnen Way.

And back at #101 - terrific blog post on Game of Thrones etc. You almost make me want to read it.

Hoping to catch up on the rest here soon.

ETA - The Linnen Way is now available on amazon HERE

She has an author page HERE

>123 dchaikin:, dchaikin: Thanks - glad you liked those two posts, and thanks for adding those links.

46. The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson - nonfiction/memoir (3.5/5)

This is Bill Bryson's memoir of growing up in Des Moines, Iowa in the 1950s and early 1960s. I'd classify this as minor Bryson: it's always interesting, occasionally very funny, but doesn't reach the heights of his best books - perhaps because his childhood was simply too happy and, mostly, too uneventful to provide enough material for a consistently interesting book.

>119 timjones: Interesting thoughts on the Wharton. How do you think a reader contemporary to the time in which is was written would have responded? Undine is an anti-hero much like Becky Sharp, yes?

I was intrigued to read recently that Julian Fellowes cites the book as one of his inspirations. No wonder there's been talk that he's like to do a show set in the Us during the Gilded Age.

I read The Custom of the Country in August, and loved it. I thought Undine was one of those characters you could love to hate, or hate to love. I enjoyed your review.

>126 avaland:, avaland and 127, NanaCC: Thanks for your comments - and I'm glad my review has provoked them!

Custom of the Country was another book I read for the book group I'm in and - as seems to be something of a pattern! - most of the book group had a more positive reaction to it than I did. avaland, it's many years since I read Vanity Fair, but from memory Becky Sharp is presented more sympathetically than Undine Spragg is by Edith Wharton.

There's no doubt Undine is something of a monster, but my point is that the class whose representatives Edith Wharton paints with sympathy are somewhat monstrous too. I suspect how a contemporary reader would have responded would depend very much on their own background.

47. Theatre of the Gods by Matt Suddain - fiction/novel/SF (3.5/5)

I've reviewed this book for Landfall Review Online, so I'll wait until that review appears before saying more here.

48. Inferno by Dante Alighieri - poetry/verse narrative (5/5)

I'm re-reading the Divine Comedy (in the translation by Mark Musa) for the first time in a number of years. From memory, this is the third time I've read it, and it remains as wonderful as ever - this time, though, I'm dawdling rather than hurrying through it, and as a result I'm paying more attention to the poetry itself - and the excellent blank-verse translation by Mark Musa. What a book!

49. The Autobiography by Bill Bruford - nonfiction/autobiography (4/5)

Bill Bruford came to fame early as the drummer for progressive rock band Yes before leaving to strike out into more challenging musical territory with King Crimson and then various jazz and jazz-rock groups.

This is a bittersweet autobiography, as it was written at the point at which Bruford had decided, after forty year's active service, to retire from being a professional musician. Bruford is very much a thinking drummer, and this is a thoughtful autobiography. Much of what he says about the problems of maintaining confidence in one's abilities, and of dealing with a rapidly evolving (devolving?) industry, I could identify with from my own (much more modest) writing career.

There is at times a slight whiff of "you young people today don't know how lucky you are" at which I suspect the younger Bruford would have taken umbrage - but this is still well worth reading for those interested in Bruford's musical career or in what it's like to try to maintain a meaningful career in the creative arts.

Good to catch up with your reading Tim. I have quite a lot of Bill Brufords various jazz-rock ventures in my collection and so it's good to hear he has written a serviceable autobiography - I might well read that.

I also have the Musa translation of the Inferno which I hope to get to next year.

>132 baswood:, baswood: I hope you enjoy both of them - I think you will!

I don't often listen to jazz, and even less so to jazz-rock, but I was listening to "Miles Runs The Voodoo Down" last night and thinking 'I could go a bit more of this'. Would you classify that as jazz-rock?

50. Sidelights: Rugby Poems by Mark Pirie - poetry/chapbook (3.5/5)

Rugby is New Zealand's national sport, but it hasn't been the subject of very much New Zealand poetry. This chapbook is full of rugby poems, all of them interesting, and some of which I enjoyed very much. I'm going to post a review and, I hope, a sample poem on my blog, and will link to that from here.

I would classify Miles runs the Voodoo down as Jazz-Rock, but with more emphasis on the Jazz side of the equation. Whatever it's genre it's great listening.

>135 baswood:, baswood: Thanks, and agreed!

51. The Happiness of Rain by Jan Hutchison - poetry/collection (4/5)

I enjoyed this collection - mostly nature poetry, including some fine poems about Banks Peninsula near the author's home city of Christchurch, but it also includes poems about such diverse subjects as John Clare and Katherine Mansfield.

In 2012, I featured Jan Hutchison on my blog: You can find an interview with Jan here:

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2012/07/an-interview-with-jan-hutchison.html

and the title poem of the collection here:

http://timjonesbooks.blogspot.co.nz/2012/07/tuesday-poem-happiness-of-rain-by-ja...

52. The Faroe Islands by Liv Schei - nonfiction/geography/history (4.5/5)

In the past few years, my long-standing interest in Antarctica has broadened to encompass the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions as well. I've been reading about Iceland recently - and now I've moved south-east, about halfway between Iceland and the Shetlands, to the Faroe Islands, a remote but rather wonderful collection of islands settled a couple of hundred years before Iceland. This book is a very interesting guide to the history, culture and geography of the Faroes. Recommended if you're interested in travel (including armchair travel) or geography.

Caught up finally. Too much to comment on, but I really enjoyed Maria McMillan's Ghosts. And I'll keep Musa in mind for my I theoretically get to Dante.

>139 dchaikin:, dchaikin: Thanks!

53. Havana Bay by Martin Cruz Smith - novel/thriller/police procedural (4/5)

I see that my second book for 2013 was Wolves Eat Dogs, in my view the best of Martin Cruz Smith's series about ex-Soviet detective Arkady Renko - and Havana Bay is the one book in the series I hadn't previously read. While it doesn't quite match Wolves Eat Dogs, it's still very good.

Renko is a fish out of water anywhere outside Moscow, but doubly or triply so when plonked down in Havana, where (as usual) he gets beaten up, starts a new relationship, and solves a complex crime. There are times the travelogue aspect takes over a little too much, and (unusually for me) I figured out what was going on well before the end which reduced the tension somewhat, but on the plus side Renko's Cuban partner-in-crimesolving is a very well-realised character who could shoulder a series in her own right. Recommended.