(Image used under Creative Commons License. Photo credit: The Wanderers Eye)
At 9 o’clock this morning the heat and humidity was unbearable, and that was just my exposure to it walking from my front door to my truck. After a brief respite, summer made its return last week.
Yes, a cool refreshing drink is one way to beat the summer heat. But that is not what I am referring to.
Tip #317 for beating the summer heat?
Buy Books!
Subterranean Press is one of my favorite specialty presses. On occasion they offer “grab bag” specials in which they release slightly damaged material for an incredibly significant discount. These grab bags can include signed and limited editions as well as second or third printings. My friend Jeff contacted me during Subterranean’s most recent grab bag offer and we decided to go halves on the 11 book grab bag option. The package arrived quickly and in fantastic condition and on a recent Wednesday night Jeff came by so that we could open up the box together to see just what we got.
Tor Books, arguably one of my favorite publishers long before I started receiving the occasional book to review, has recently released their Top 10 SFF Novels of the Decade. As their post indicates, over the course of a week 10,000+ votes were cast for roughly 1600 titles and in the end 10 science fiction/fantasy books were left standing.
And the winners are:
(Image from Laughing Squid)
Increased stress at work (move planning and new computer system implementation) have, not surprisingly, left me feeling more tired than usual. I have been combating that fatigue with reading, a renewed addiction to Fallout: New Vegas, and a voracious appetite for episodes of 30 Rock that I hadn’t watched…but not with blogging. I have several book reviews to catch up on, but in the meantime…
Neither icy rain nor falling snow could stop the intrepid postal workers from delivery goodies ordered from Amazon and Ebay. Nor could it stop me from driving to the local chain bookstores to use their irresistible discount coupons!
And so, here are the books that have found their way inside my home over the past few weeks:
Image by the amazing classic illustrator Alex Schomburg
I am mid-way through my re-read of Jo Walton’s book Among Others and am at the point where her protagonist, Mori, finds joins an SF book club. On the way back to the boarding school from the first meeting the school librarian Miss Carroll asks, “You don’t get a lot of chance to talk to people about the things that matter to you, do you?” It was a question that resonated with me the first time I read it and it did again this evening.
Mori’s joy at discovering a group of people who love science fiction as much as she does echoes that which I discovered for the first time a little over a decade ago when we moved to Kansas City. I met a small group of friends who were into similar things and over the years our conversations and sharing of books and films has enriched and expanded my life, making up for all those years of solitary reading with no one to share book talk with. (Cue sad music)
They are my karass. But now my karass has expanded and I would like to invite you to be a part of it as well.