books continued

I just read my last post to see where I'm at, and I'm honestly a little disappointed. I haven't been doing the 3 hour round trip train commutes since May so I've been reading the same book for over a month now. I'm on the final act, and it's been a fun ride. Still talking about Perdido Street Station if you're wondering, and tops out at just over 600 pages if you're wondering about that part. I'd like to point out two things about Mieville's writing that have hit me lately. First is to just go ahead and give you another reason he's such a good writer. About a month ago I came across Jim Butcher's blog (on how to write a first SF/F novel), copied it and made it into a pdf for my own personal reference when offline, and picked up on an interesting point concerning voice. The only viable options for inexperienced writers are 1st person and 3rd person voices, and what Butcher brought to light is that authors are naturally good at one or the other. Butcher himself is a natural 1st person guy (most often utilized in detective-type stories), and apparently wrote about 5 unpublishable 3rd person voice novels before figuring that out. Anyway, this relates to China Mieville because 'the city and the city' which has all kinds of award nominations to go with at least the one Arthur C. Clarke win is a 1st person book, while Perdido Street Station (2 wins and a few more nominations) is 3rd person. The second thing I found interesting in Mieville's writing is his utilization of rules found in pen and paper rpgs. Thinking specifically here of a character who is a great scientist, but overweight, can't shoot a gun to save his life, and can't beat up anybody except a strung out junkie. You can't have your cake and eat it. Most writers in epic fantasy who follow this rule tend to start out with a dumb jock hero type who eventually learns to be...whatever. Caring, smart, thoughtful, good, whatever. Kinda boring. Well, I also wanted to list off the next few novels I hope to read and why.

1. Under the Dome, Stephen King. The premise is that an alien has put an impenetrable dome over a small town in (you guessed it) Maine, and the people stuck inside have to figure out what to do to coexist in the new absence of law.

2. The Scar, China Mieville. The second novel set in the Bas-lag universe. This one away from New Crobuzon and out on the high seas. Apparently a patch or expansion to Second Life was inspired by this book. Can't get enough of Bas-Lag, but I wouldn't mind a break from the post-grad level writing, it's hard to read with interruptions.

3. The Desert Spear, Peter V. Brett. Back to Jason Statham-style demon slaying. Hack, slash, rinse, repeat. Not a boring read.

4 and 5 are also China Mieville books, unless book 5 of Ice and Fire comes out before then, then that goes to the top of the list. Gotta give Aquila a bath. Thanks for reading (probably talking to myself around August or September).