books: american gods redux

I finished American Gods Wednesday night in a single long rush because I indeed got much more interested.



A part of me does not understand how he can write those brilliant, tiny ministories--the twins were especially gutting and wonderful, the former thief-maid was wonderful--and still want to go back to writing Shadow, who isn't nearly as much fun to write, as he does absolutely nothing. I'm also annoyed who he turned out to be, because if you are going to be the son of a god, interesting should be your like, middle name.

However, at least in-text, this seems to be his actual personality--the lack of one, I mean--and it did help somewhat to realize this was a deliberate writing choice for a pretty good reason. I don't knock that, but that does not make it more interesting. It was also--and I guess this was also a choice--a really bright contrast between the backstories, which were brilliantly colorful moments out of time compared to the slogging through the monochrome of Shadow's existence. It was also where I could appreciate Gaiman's prose, which is breathtaking, and it became a lot more fun to read once I focused on that rather than well, Shadow himself. Honestly, I'll be re-reading for some of the descriptive passages alone; they're utterly gorgeous, and possibly work even better on a tabula rasa character like Shadow, whose personality does not interfere with getting out an amazing sentence.

OTOH, the mythology makes everything worth it, almost.

I'm up next for Anansi Boys, since I've heard it is an improvement, and maybe a tighter focus--uh, for various definitions of tighter focus--will work better.

My current reading list:

1.) Anansi Boys
2.) Neverwhere
3.) Coraline

Then I'm biting the bullet and hitting Heinlein. I have avoided it for--well, my entire sci-fi reading life, really, but I feel that when the hardest sci-fi I've hit has been Gibson--who by the way is goddamn amazing--I need to update. So far, the following, but if anyone wants to suggest anything, feel free.

1.) The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
2.) Stranger in a Strange Land
3.) Have Spacesuit, Will Travel

This really does make it sound like I'm eating my vegetables--though by the way, I love vegetables, especially Brussels sprouts, so the analogy ends up weird--which I guess is true? But not in a literary pretentious way, I think. But there's an actual reason for this, though granted, it's a weird one.

Years ago, my boyfriend of the time convinced me to read Armor by John Steakley, and if you haven't read it, it's--I sent this book to several friends just to share the trauma (if you've read his Vampire$, it's like minus three times the lack of uplifting that one is, seriously).

The summary on the page is a lie of the most debatably vicious kind--it's kind of true, because the entire goddamn book is about how to test the human spirit to its limits. My summary would be a condensed version of an actual comparison in the book; you are looking down a well at a puppy you cannot possibly rescue with a broken leg who is dying, and you have to watch it, you can't stop, and worse, it isn't going to die. This book is a goddamn puppy in a well, and once you realize that, you also realize you can't look away because you're kind of stuck to the bitter end. I don't regret reading it, I think, but it did hit my limit on how many puppies I am willing to watch die, and that is none. It's amazing, and I can say with honesty that it was formative in my development as a reader and a writer; my internal ruler always compares what I'm writing to the well puppy and don't go there, so that worked out well. I also need to get a copy as soon as it is on ebook and read it straight though again, because I'm pretty sure there was more to it than the endless suffering of the human spirit while fighting giant insects, but damn if I can remember anything not a well-puppy.

Vampire$, otoh, is weirdly not as gutting, but it has bar none the best, most terrifying vampires ever written into prose. The amorality, the viciousness, the alienness while being human-shaped, human vice leashed to something so entirely inhuman it's grotesque. And what they do to their thralls is--I mean, torture is horrifying and everything, but it's nothing like the invasive--the word I want here is 'unclean' in the most archaic sense, but I'm not sure how to work that into a sentence where filthy is also a possible descriptor when it's entirely of the soul.

(Note: to make it that much more challenging, they are fucking hard to kill, so it's basically an exercise in horror just to kill them and I don't mean from the pov of the to-be-killed creature; it's goddamn traumatic to be the one doing it.)

I tried in two stories to pull it off--one in Queer as Folk and one in American Idol--and from two points of view at that--and I still couldn't nail how reading that made me feel, though it did exorcise a lot of my lingering issues with pretty much any vampire romance in the world that plays down the fact you're taking to bed something that is not and cannot ever be human again and human values just might not only not apply, but may either not make any sense to them or are kind of cute to fuck with, why not?

This is a long way of saying, a lot of sci-fi has a very strong tradition of overarching themes and losing the individual to prove an argument, or far worse and more painful, using the character for the proof of argument, which I'm not arguing this is terrible, I'm arguing that six hours of reading should not make me lose faith in existence itself.



So how is everyone else's weekend going? Read anything good?

Comments

[msilverstar]

I wanted to ask you before but didn't want to spoil you: what do you think of the vagina dentata in American Gods?

[seperis]

Bilquis's--consumption early in the book or the threat of it later?

[msilverstar]

The consumption -- it just turned me off re-reading the whole thing

[amireal]

I'd... Move Stranger in a Strange Land to last. Maybe throw in Lazarus long or Friday before that.

[seperis]

Ooh, give me a clue why? *INTENSELY CURIOUS*

[amireal]

Stranger us INTENSLY Heinlein (also do Not read the version that's the directors cut that added back like 70k words) and while its arguably a seminal work you'll get a better experience out of his YA stuff and some of his other adult work. His writing style has patterns that make Strangers easier to read if you know them. Starship Troopers is an excellent example of his need to Pontificate through story telling while still being entertaining but because its YA the digressions are much shorter.

[twistedchick]

Agree re reading Stranger later. Also -- notice the first publication date whenever you read Heinlein. Sometimes it seems that he's recycling weary ideas, but it's not uncommon that he might be either the first or one of the early writers to deal with those ideas in that particular way.

You may also want to look at The Past Through Tomorrow, which is short stories and essays. Some of the essays, including the travel articles, discuss themes that appear in his stories and the timing for them. For instance, IIRC: Starship Troopers was written after he and his wife were traveling in Russia and were there during a Cold War spy incident that instantly moved them from friendly travelers to possible enemies in terms of how they were treated (the shooting down of the U2 spy plane with pilot Francis Gary Powers, which the US had said didn't exists, wasn't there, etc.) His experiences feed into his stories and have a direct effect on how much or how little they translate to today.

[truelove]

I have never managed to read Stranger.

I chewed through all his YA and a good chunk of his adult stuff in my teens. I tried Stranger. I could not get through it. I hate that it's the one book of his that's gotten wider literary recognition. I mean, yeah, I get why it's an important book. I just... ugh.

ETA: Wow, um, so you can tell I wrote this at work! Hello randomness and cutting off early.

Anyway, yes. I always advise people going into Heinlein to hold off on Stranger and be prepared to possibly hate it like it is impenetrable High Literature. I mean, not everyone does! But it's definitely a difficult book. I usually tell people to start with the YA and give Stranger a go later on. I'll second the rec of Tunnel in the Sky, it's up with Have Spacesuit Will Travel for me for favourites. I'm also very fond of Door Into Summer, even if it... well, Heinlein's id is a weird place is all I can say. Podkayne of Mars was awesome until I wanted to start punching things in the face so, uh, there's that.

[msilverstar]

Agree agree agree!

[tygermama]

okay, there's this book I've been dying to discuss with someone that I think you may like

It's called 'Child of a Rainless Year' and it's by Jane Lindskold. It's magic realism, the protagonist is a woman in her late forties/early fifties, has GREAT place porn, a romantic subplot that was so understated that I ended up wanting more of it for once and the magic is subtle and wonderful and...

It's one of my favourite books but no one I know has ever read it.

so, you know, if you're looking for suggestions, I guess.

(more on topic, I loved American Gods but I agree with you about Shadow, the book is more about the side characters with a teeeeeeny bit of character development but it's world building is breath-taking)

[starfish]

I am re-reading American Gods and I'm amazed at how much I've forgotten about it.

re: Heinlein -- right after college, in the days before the Internet when I was reading paperbacks voraciously ALL THE TIME because of lack-of-cable, I read pretty much ALL the Heinlein. Still have most of them, in fact, despite dunno-many moves. I loved Moon is a Harsh Mistress and The Cat Who Walks Through Walls although I haven't read them in a while, so there are probably ~issues~ galore. (Bob's male protagonists are not always shining examples of feminist thought. They're not all misogynistic asshats, but there are leanings. To that end, I do not recommend Job: A Comedy of Justice, if you get through your list. The narrator is a complete bag of douche (and yes, that's a narrative choice, blah blah blah, but it really freaking painful to read his constant mansplaining).) One that I loved in spite of ~issues~ was The Number of the Beast, which required some hand-waving at the 'science' but was fun.

[aurora]

Since you seem to be on a Gaiman kick, I would also add "The Graveyard Book" book to your next-up list. I adored it.

[synecdochic]

The ability to appreciate Heinlein often goes hand-in-hand with your ability to turn off noticing many and varied -isms. I adore Heinlein, don't get me wrong, but he is most definitely a product of his times and things that were fairly progressive at the time have ... aged very very badly. (And he was not universally progressive even at the time; he has a really, really weird mix of progressive and reactionary.) He also had some very very weird obsessions that shine through in a lot of places, more so the later you get in his work.

That having been said: his juveniles are very entertaining, and his short stories are generally less tooth-grindy than the novels. TMIAHM is a good place to start (it's actually my favorite of his novels); I think you might also like Podkayne of Mars (although it might annoy you; I'm not 100% sure) -- there are two endings for that, the one Heinlein originally wrote and the one his editor insisted on publishing; I prefer the original but there is much debate. I'm also fond of Tunnel in the Sky. Methuselah's Children and Time Enough for Love are entertaining, but there are a bunch of other books I prefer: Lazarus is best taken in small doses.

Starship Troopers is one of those books I think every sf fan should read at some point, but it's also one of those books that requires a really close reading; people have been arguing about What The Author Really Was Arguing for a very long time and I think it's best saved for once you've read a bunch of other Heinlein. Stranger in a Strange Land is a must-read, but I think the reason amireal advises you to wait is because Stranger is sort of the pivotal Heinlein book: everything before it is more tight adventure SF and everything after it is more social SF. (There are exceptions; I am generalizing like mad here.) People's reactions to later Heinlein are very, very varied. Of the later books, I have a guilty love of Number of the Beast, which is Heinlein writing fanfic gleefully and unrepentantly, including fanfic of his own stuff (so it's best saved for once you've at least read the books with Lazarus in them).

Unless you are going for the complete collection, avoid Sixth Column and Farnham's Freehold (the racism is really awful in both; although people argue strongly that FF subverts a bunch of racist tropes, it's the kind of subversion that you have to look for, while the reinforcement of the awful tropes are right up front; Sixth Column is just unrepentant) and while I love Friday-the-character, there are some really objectionable bits in there right up front. (It does get better, though.)

[devon]

I actually think that with Seperis' love of dark, apocalyptic stories, she might enjoy Farnham's Freehold. I think it's a given that you can't have a story like that without "us" and "them". It's less racist than one might expect from the time it was written, maybe more than what people now want to read, but I was intellectually stimulated by both those books. When Heinlein wants to make a point, he goes all the way.

[amireal]

You kind of nailed it there. Though I admit to a fondness for door into summer and have spacesuit will travel and the one with the broken gyroscopes :). I'm sort of truly fascinated by how his later stuff all references the same universe and suddenly your mind is blown. Sort of. Then I wish for some of those pain killers he had.

[lillian13]

I would rec Space Cadet and Citizen of the Galaxy before Starship Troopers. And definitely some Podkayne of Mars or The Rolling Stones before Stranger in a Strange Land.

[devon]

I'd put off "Stranger" until later, too. It's pretty weird, and it uses some of the conventions he builds on in his earlier works. His short stories are great - he has good pacing and emotional investment. I have several of them in plain text format here: http://home.intranet.org/~greyhat/ebooks/Heinlein/

Heinlein liked to write about heroes, especially early on. In his juvies, the young person started out ordinary and got to do something heroic. "Podkayne" was the first one I read because I was at a book sale, and it had a girl on the cover. I think all his other juvies are about boys, but they're still fun to read.

"Moon" is a good adult book to start with, because it's got great world-building, global politics, and also "ordinary folk" heros. Alas, Heinlein has pretty much 3 types of characters - ordinary heros, ordinary dumbshits, and women who are all competent but pretty much interchangable, even in his later stories. If you are willing to forgive him that, his imagination in other areas makes up for it, imo.

[reginagiraffe]

If you aren't boycotting her, I can recommend Sarah Monette's The Doctrine of Labyrinths fantasy series, Melusine, The Virtu, The Mirador, and Corambis. I've only read the first two, but there's lots of angst, and politics.

[ruric]

I read my way through Heinlein in teens and I adored his books. I hit Stranger in one of those formative periods and it changed the way I thought about the world. I've never quite dared to go back and read it, in case it doesn't hold up with time. *G*

I also loved the Lazarus Long Series (though I suspect Lazarus is the ultimate Marty Stu) - Time Enough For Love was a book I could not put down - but again not too sure how well they'd stand the test of time. And the later books in the series where he gleefully fanfics his own work are a great exmaple of an author having an unmitigated amount of fun with his own stuff.

I also remember loving Glory Road. Alas all my Heinlein is up in my cottage in Wales and not in my flat in London. Gah. Maybe I should look at getting some on the Kindle. *G*

I'll be interested to hear how you find his work.

[telesilla]

I read a ton of Heinlein in my teens and early 20s and I slowly became less and less enthusiastic about his stuff, particularly the later works, which I find really really self-indulgent. And even when I liked him, I couldn't stand Stranger for some reason. The only one of the adult books that really holds up for me is TMIAHM and even in that one, well...his libertarianism, he is showing us it. The YAs are generally good, because his politics aren't as in your face. In his favor, he's a really good, compelling storyteller, so as synecdochic said, if you can turn off your awareness of -isms he's worth reading.

If you're looking for classic hard SF, you might want to try some Clarke. Rendezvous with Rama considered a must read and is probably his best; his characters are a little flat, but the story is good and the setting is amazing. Imperial Earth is kind of dated, but I've got a soft spot for it because it's the first serious book I read with a bisexual male character. His short stories are usually good too.

And of course, if you read Clarke and Heinlein, you should round it off with something by Asimov--the third of the Golden Age's Big Three. The Foundation series is really ambitious and doesn't always succeed, but it's considered one of those must reads as it I, Robot.

When it comes to writing, none of these guys can hold a candle to Gaimen or Gibson, but all of them were incredibly influential in the development of the genre.

[domarzione]

I've never touched Heinlein; I'm not a big scifi/fantasy reader (which is a little odd considering where I've spent most of my fannish life). I plodded through all six books of Dune (never again), I reread LotR every few years, but I've missed out on almost all the rest of the classics. I keep meaning to read Ender's Game and some Stirling, but never quite get around to it.

Liked American Gods muchly, never quite got around to Anansi Boys (or if I did, I don't remember a thing about it), and found Neverwhere somewhat boring. As for Shadow and his lack of color compared to everyone around him... if you've read the Sandman saga, Morpheus sort of suffers the same fate, but everyone around him is so much fun and you still weep like a baby at the end.


NYPL put a bunch of Nero Wolfe and Travis McGee (John D. McDonald) novels up on their ebooks site, so I have been devouring those; I remember my mom reading the latter when I was young but these were my first and I can see what she loved about them. Nero Wolfe is just good times.

Also a bunch of WWII-era nonfiction (British spies! Black soldiers! American industrialization saving the world!), but that's not everyone's cuppa. And I keep reading tidbits that I want to retcon in my fic, but I haven't figured out how to make notes on a Kindle Fire, where I can't exactly stick a post-it on Page 154.

[cesare]

Heinlein: Starship Troopers is a really fast read, so I would actually recommend reading it first, and also last.

Reading Troopers first gives a quick sense of some of Heinlein's hobbyhorses, strengths, drawbacks, style tics, etc. It's a brisk story and I think it'll give you an idea of how much more of his work you're going to want to try-- if you love Troopers, more, if you don't love it, less...

But I think however much Heinlein you end up reading, it's worth coming back to Troopers and reading it again when you're more familiar with him, since it's a fast read, and seeing what more you get out of it on the second pass.

I really like his short story collection The Menace From Earth, fwiw.

If you do venture further into his bibliography, look out for his later stuff, it gets... I just felt bad for him, reading I Will Fear No Evil and To Sail Beyond The Sunset. It seemed like he got really keen on trying to empathize with a free-spirited female perspective, and... well, mileage varies, I imagine, but for me it was not working.

Also: so much incest. Tons of incest. To Sail Beyond The Sunset practically comes off as some kind of incest manifesto.

Though I liked Time Enough For Love (also one of his later works, and incest-ariffic.) Lazarus Long is utterly Marty Stu-ish but I don't personally find Mary Sue/Marty Stu-ness to be a dealbreaker.

Like just about everyone else here, I wasn't big on Stranger in a Strange Land.

Finally, if you're going back to classic science fiction roots, let me recommend, if you haven't read it, The Stars My Destination. If I could get everyone who likes science fiction to read one book in the genre, that's the book I'd choose.

I also imagine you've probably read Theodore Sturgeon but if you haven't, I think you'd like him-- I'd point you at "A Way Of Thinking" in particular.

[out_there]

3.) Coraline

I read that while on a family holiday (keep in mind, I was 25 reading a kids book) and enjoyed the hell out of it. Just enough creep-factor to unnerve me, and such a great imagination. In some ways, I almost prefer Neil Gaiman's kids books because they're both the level of creepy-awesome I would have adored as a kid, and have enough of a thrill to involve me as an adult.

(Also, The Graveyard Book. Sure, it's a kids story but it is fantastically written, wonderfully fleshed out, and I adore that things weren't spelled out for the reader. I suspect as a kid I might not have entirely got some of the implications, but a book that can be reread and loved all over again as you get older is a thing of joy.)

[grammarwoman]

If you liked Gibson, you should really try Neal Stephenson, specifically "Snow Crash" and "Diamond Age". I enjoyed his exploration of cyberspace, human relations, history, myth, and so much more.