I’m on page 26 of 608 of Souls in the Great Machine by Sean McMullen: currently loving the mysterious ‘Call’. And Lemorel! She’s a scary lady! Joyful and amazing so far.
image – William Chang https://www.flickr.com/photos/misterwilliam/ licence https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/
a bouquet of roses,
of diamonds and baby’s breath
a few stars thrown in
to confuse over scale
and Satan peering from a black black hole
deep, deep, deep in the vase
a bouquet of roses
roses, foxes and diamonds
diamonds and baby’s breath
breath, and a few stars
the scale is confused
and Satan’s in there too
peeping out a black hole
gravity in the vase
down deep, deep
© Copyright Alex Ankarr 2017
Image – Vaughan’s Seed Company; Henry G. Gilbert Nursery and Seed Trade Catalog Collection, no known copyright restrictions.
Aerodynamics of Pork by Patrick Gale
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I read this book so very long ago that it’s probably hardly fair to review it, really. I will say that I loved it at the time, and I’m interested to discover now from other reviews that it was intended as a subversion of the traditional romance novel. A little irony there, because the gay relationship struck me as the very essence of Harlequin, barring the homosexuality.
The Beautiful and Damned by F. Scott Fitzgerald
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Not the worst Fitzgerald, that’s This Side Of Paradise. Pretty mediocre considering it’s ol’ Scotty though.
Photo in the public domain by Jack Kurzenknabe
And now he’s for it: Ree has jerked back, too, almost instantaneously, grabbed a hold of him by both arms, and is looking full into his face with wild, wild eyes. And wild eyes on a werewolf are pretty damned wild: there’s a glint in Ree’s, that tell Penn he’s at real risk now, and must tread with the utmost care. ‘I’m sorry, my lord,’ he begins. ‘I apologise most deeply.’ And he’d do well to end right there: but Penn has always been pretty close to a fool on certain subjects. He lifts his eyes: just glancingly. ‘But why, my lord, why would you…’ And he peters out: but his meaning is clear enough.
Ree throws him away from himself, and stalks to the other side of the hall: and rants as he does it. Penn accounts himself fairly lucky to be ranted at: rather than, say, torn limb from limb. ‘I’ll do as I please. In my own household, Penn, my own household, I think I have a right to dispose of my… of members of staff as I see fit.’ He’s not even looking at Penn: has leaned to look out the window, is clutching at the internal railing that circles the cabin. It squeaks, almost buckles under the strain. ‘Of course, it is not my business if you choose to…’ The pause is long, and Ree seems to collect himself, to come to and wake up a little.
Then he swivels around, and lopes back to Penn, and takes a hold of his forearm once more. It’s not a savage grip: only hard and steady, and his look is intent, his mouth a very thin line. ‘No. Scratch that: it is entirely my business. You are property, Penn, as is she. I will dispose of the pair of you as I see fit, I will: only think yourself lucky I do not bar you from her company and sell her to the local whore-house while I’m at it. Enjoy her while you can: it’ll be brief enough.’
Penn’s limbs tremble under the force of Ree’s grip, and it’s not from fear. It should be, but it isn’t. This is his problem, right here: he hasn’t the self-preservation to keep his anger and rebellion tamped down, or only just barely. Never has had: it’s a wonder he’s survived this long. Now, he should be quaking under Ree’s hands, aware of their deadly potential. But no, instead he’s quaking with fury. And what he longs, absolutely longs to do, is to lift his eyes and stare right into his master’s face. And to strike him.
And if he has such a deathwish, he might as well take the sharpest knife from the kitchen here, and drive it straight into his heart forthwith, to make of the job a quicker one.
© Copyright Alex Ankarr 2013 All rights reserved to the author. No inspirations for characters drawn from real-life individuals, no resemblance to real individuals intended.
Read the sequel to Wolf Slave immediately, available on Amazon and free to read to members of Kindle Unlimited! Find out what’s next for Ree and Penn, and if love or freedom are in Penn’s future, in Wolf Runaway, 2nd in the Wolf Wars quintet!
Black Coffee Blues by Henry Rollins
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Oh, Henry. The ladies love ya. The dweebs wanna be ya. All you need is a Nudie suit, cowboy boots and some lounge-singer crooning lessons, you could rip up Las Vegas!
I can’t be objective about Henry, and I have no idea about the artistic merit of this book at this point. It’s just Henry, and Henry has been part of my life too long not to love it.
Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I’m giving this five stars but that might be partly out of sentimentality. Reading as an adult, a lot of the things Anne has to say strike me as saccharine, verging on treacly. But it had such a hold on me as a kid that I’m powerless to mark it down.
The Hampstead Mystery by Arthur J. Rees
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Slow, thinly characterized, dubious ‘psychological’ deductions, descriptions and motivations ascribed. Numerous patronizingly stereotypical portraits of working-class characters and women. Not genuinely awful, but not of the first rank and certainly very much of its time. One point five stars really.
Crazy Vanilla by Barbara Wersba
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I expected a little more from this than I actually got – it felt as if at any moment a profound epiphany might appear, but that promise was never quite made good. Still, I did enjoy it. The best thing was reading about Tyler’s love of nature and animals, which felt deeply real. His opinions and reading about the anthropomorphization of animals in human culture was especially interesting – more so than his personal relationships, really. I found his issues with his older brother’s sexuality a bit tacked-on and not really credible. Still a worthwhile read though.
Love and Freindship by Jane Austen
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I’ve always been under the impression that this was just a fragment of Austen’s juvenilia and of doubtful utility and value. Which is why I left it so long to check it out, but turns out I’ve been missing out. Whatever a modern day Jane would have been up to and gets up to, in modern adaptations of her persona and work – working her own Youtube channel, snapchatting away, book-blogging and fanficcing and whatnot – it’s kind of superfluous, redundant. This is the snarky teenage Jane, and it comes through on every page. Plus, I’d just like to say for anyone who’s read it – the 9th parcel, silver buckles! lol.
