Reviews

In answer to a question I raised in my review of the previous book in the Blue Bloods series, the vamps do seem to get some in this volume, though the nookying does go undescribed. As one interpretation of the title implies, Revelations reveals stuff. Some secrets get told and you get a better idea of who the big bad is, but really, there's not much going on. Oh, except a lot of people die. Still and all, the series seems to be getting to that place where each book is a lead in to the next, not as solid a standalone story as it could be.

The Dog Collar Murders is the third in a mystery series with Pam Nilsen, political lesbian, as the unofficial detective. It's really weird for me to start in the middle of a series, so I'm not sure where I heard of this. Perhaps in the "also by Seal Press" section in the back of Skin, or maybe even referenced in an essay in that book about the "Barnard Sex Scandal." Wilson's book is about murders that take place during and after a sexuality conference in Seattle in 1988 or so (six years after the event that rocked Barnard and feminists all over the U.S.). The book, which is kind of niche, was published by Seal Press, which was "founded in 1976 as a small DIY publisher to provide a forum for women writers and feminist issues."

The second book in the Blue Bloods series begins where the last one leaves off. Our heroine is trying to solve the mystery of who is preying on her and her fellow teenage vampires, but the all powerful Committee denies that there is any danger.

Four books into the Sookie Stackhouse series, I'm finally willing to admit I'm getting hooked. That's not entirely stubbornness or snobbery talking; only with this one and it's predecessor, Club Dead did I read the books in a hurry. Plus, I liked that Harris thanked a librarian, Doris Ann Norris, in her acknowledgments page.

The Long Way Home, which I got from the Miami-Dade Public Library via Columbia interlibrary loan, takes up where the tv show leaves off, more or less. So far having read the first and third installment, I haven't really learned much about what happened immediately after the destruction of the hellmouth and Sunnydale, just that Buffy, the surviving Scoobies, and the potentials have relocated to Europe. And that somehow along the way, Dawn got turned into a giant, which is possibly some kind of mystical STD.

Rivalry was one of the "disposable" books I brought to France with me, since it was not on loan from a library. I did, however, acquire it from a library. It was in our giveaway pile at Barnard, though I'm not sure why. It's a Columbia University Press publication and women's studies-ish enough that I would probably order it if I read a good review. It's a translation of a 1917 novel. Can you say "public domain"? Being an academic press publication, it's also got a six page introduction (that I didn't bother to read). Oops--now that I look at the intro, I realize that homosexual that I am as a media consumer, I might not have read it (and might not buy it for the library after all), that the author was a man.

The latest in the Julie Tozer recommended YA "horrible-alternate-world-scenario" series, The Hunger Games, is the most compelling so far. In this future world, the U.S. is divided into twelve districts, ruled by a very nasty bunch. This nasty bunch, referred to as the Capitol and headed by a President Snow, require each district to provide two "tribute," really a male and a female teenager chosen by a lottery stacked against the poor, to participate in a multi-week snuff television spectacle. The nation is forced to watch as the 24 teens fight to the death. As with reality tv, the proceedings are augmented with interviews and special features. There is also heavy betting.

Another "horrible-alternate-world-scenario" suggestion from Julie the teen librarian, How I Live Now isn't a high tech horror story like Feed. It's scarier because it's far more realistic. The 15-year-old protagonist, a New Yorker with n eating disorder and a wicked stepmother finds herself vacationing with her cousins (one of the kissing variety) in England when war breaks out. Their house gets "sequestered," and children get separated by gender. The rest of the story is of their survival and how they find one another again.

For once I was less psyched to read a paranormal fiction series novel. I think I'm getting a little burnt out on them. I didn't enjoy this any less, but instead of a yummy snack on my usual menu of healthy enriching brain foods, it's becoming too much of the norm. Part of the problem feeding my carb-like genre fiction is that I privilege books I borrow from NYPL over Barnard/Columbia books because their due dates are more compelling. The rare books that I acquire in other ways (usually that are given to me) wait months or even years to get read. And what do I check out from NYPL vs. my academic library?--science and popular fiction, comic books and young adult literature. But what am I to do, I'm the English and American literature selector, so I have to read the reviews in Library Journal. Lately I've taken to saving appealing titles in RefWorks to read later, but it's not always possible to wait!