reading, catching up

[eor]

My most recent book was Bill Bryson's A Walk in the Woods his story about walking the Appalachian Trail. Bryson writes a good mixture of humor and autobiography with a sprinkling of info dump, with only the occasional tangent of soapboxing. This book is really for people who will never walk the AT and probably won't walk even a few miles of it. Bryson pokes fun at the people who drive to the top of Mount Washington in a car, but the tone and tenor of the book are suited to them. He goes on at length about how scary the woods are, but despite his lack of preparation and occasional bonehead move, the woods never offer him any reason for fear.

I do not favor the portrait of the moose in this book. To portray a large wild herbivore as dumb is ecologically and socially reckless. Ecologically, because these animals fulfill a very real role in the great forest. Our northern lakes are filling, in part because there are not enough moose to keep the aquatic vegetation in check. It's a rare herbivore that outgrows all its predators. Socially, because you should never represent a moose as comical to any human unfamiliar with moose. Some dumb human will treat a moose like a cow (bovine), when they should treat them like mad bull (also bovine). Moose have hooves the size of dinnerplates. Their kneecaps can come up to the windshield on a full sized pickup. They can kill you without even a thought.

Incidentally, the bit in which he talks about the dangers of hypothermia takes place along the same ridge that I crossed early one spring with a pulled muscle in my leg, a stiff crosswind, fog, and thoughts of my own mortality.

This is a fun book and it reminded me how much I miss the woods, even if they aren't as scary as Bryson makes them out to be.

11. Bill Bryson "A Walk in the Woods"

I finished Jasper Fforde's last Monday or Tuesday. It was a very fast read for me once I got sucked into it. I preferred this book to its predecessor, The Last Dragonslayer, in part because it felt much more of an ensemble piece. All the little characters who were mentioned in the first book actually got more air time in this book. I thought the pace was good. In contrast to Dragonslayer, the action moved along fast enough to keep the bad guys off balance as well. Its sad when a bad guy has to act out of character just to allow the good guy to get to the end of the plot. In this book just doing what they do keeps them busy.

The very end kind of fizzled for me because everything got too easy and big things got done too quickly, but that's a minor quibble with an otherwise fine, fun story.

10. Jasper Fforde The Song of the Quarkbeast

This month's Asimov's was a double issue, so it had a lot of stories. Highlights: Tom Purdom's "Bonding With Murray", which I thought was a great look at people's relationships with technology. I also enjoyed Sandra McDonald's "Sexy Robot Mom", but I really want to see the story go farther, I was just starting to get into it!

9. Asimov's April/May 2012