June is over. This is a look at what I wrote in June. I've split it into books and comics. Yeah. Go.
Books
This is about the crew of a sort of smuggling pirate space ship. Which
is awesome. I like pirates, and space. It’s about the captain, Darian Frey, who
is extremely annoying for a lot of the book, but read my review if you want to
know how much he bugged me. He gets a tip from an old buddy, to go after a huge
loot on a ship called the Ace of Skulls, he can keep it all. When he shoots it
to bring it down he hits something he’s not supposed to hit and the ship blows
up and kills everyone on board. And the crew becomes public enemy number one
and they have to run, and also try to find out what happened, and who set them
up. I really liked it and I really want to read the rest of the series.
So this is George Orwell’s fiction debut. He wrote one other book before
this, but it was non-fiction. This is based on Orwell’s own life in Burma as a
police officer. It basically looks at the corruption, imperialism and racism
that permeated the English empire. The main character is John Flory, an English
timber merchant, who is quite progressive, for his time. He is friends with a
Burmese doctor, and tries to get him an introduction into the all white club
he’s a member of. He’s sort of trapped by the racism of his peers and the
massively corrupt Burmese magistrate plotting Flory’s friend’s downfall. It was
pretty meh. The plot was pretty non-existent. The characters are just so racist
and awful, which I know is the point, but they were awful beyond the point sort
of. Flory was so self righteous and annoying. I could not understand what
interest Flory could possibly have in Elizabeth and how he could be so wilfully
blind about her. She was just awful. I didn’t enjoy it much. It… the writing is
lovely, it’s Orwell, but it was just so meh.
This was a favourite from my childhood. I really loved this when I was a
kid, and it totally holds up. The jokes are hilarious. Roald Dahl was
absolutely fantastic at writing for children. It was great. It’s about a girl
named Sophie, she’s like… eight, and lives in an orphanage. One night she sees
a giant on her street blow something into the house across the street, the
giant hears her, kidnaps her and takes her to his cave. It turns out he blows
dreams into children’s rooms. He is scared of the other giants, who eat humans.
And with Sophie he decides to put a stop to the giants. There was quite a lot
of philosophy in the book, which I didn’t remember, not surprising. I think I
read it when I was eight. It’s funny. The giant’s way of speaking is really
interesting and weird. It’s so great.
So this took me for fucking ever to read. I don’t know why. Whenever I
was reading it I thought it was great, then I put it down and let it lie for
like a week, picked it up, loved it again. It’s so weird. Anyway. This is the
second book in a trilogy. It’s about a man named David who has lost his memory
(or has he?), and people write him letters to tell him about his life. In this
one we hear the story of David through the memory of Ole, Tom Roger and Paula.
Ole was sort of David’s stepbrother for a couple of years when they were kids.
Tom Roger his friend and ally in crime when they were about 14-18. Paula was a
friend of his mother, and a nurse working in the hospital when David was born. The
stories are told by these people who aren’t necessarily life’s winners. And
Carl Frode Tiller is very good at writing these people who aren’t great, and
who I don’t like, and I sort of want to sympathize with anyway. He writes in
different styles for every character, which is fascinating, and impressive.
It’s so good.
This is Truman Capote’s non-fiction masterpiece. It is about the murder
of the Clutter family in Kansas in 1959. Two men, Dick and Perry, murder four
members of the Clutter family, Mr and Mrs Clutter and their teenage children,
Kenyon and Nancy, for an assumed fortune. They then run off to Mexico. Capote
was really fascinated by the case, and went to Kansas to write the story. He
didn’t publish it until 1966, I think because he waited until the killers were
executed. It was truly fascinating. Capote was an amazing writer, and he makes
you feel empathy with the killers, and obviously with the family. I listened to
it on audiobook, and it was good. The guy who read it, Scott Brick, read it in
this lazy Kansas accent, which I loved. He read it, this’ll sound weird, it was
like he wasn’t reading, just telling the story, which I liked. Also, the last
paragraph, I guess, was sort of heart breaking. It was so beautiful. The only
complaint I have is that there are basically no chapters, and there aren’t like
chapter breaks, which made it hard to pause it when I had to do something else.
Other than that it was a great way to get the story. It was great.
This was lovely. It was very sweet, and a bit weird, but I found it
interesting. That was a boring sentence. Anyway. This is about a golem, called
Chava, who is made for a young Polish man, brought to life on her way over to
New York, and then loses her master to a ruptured appendix. She is then left
rudderless and alone and can feel everything everyone feels. She is alone in a
city where she knows no one and she knows nothing about how to exist in the
world. It’s also about a Djinni, called Ahmad, who comes out of a bottle in a
tinsmith’s shop. He has been trapped for centuries, and he doesn’t remember
why. They’re both sort of lost and alone and they strike up a weird friendship.
I liked the non-human aspects, I like legends and folklore. It was a bit long,
and full of a lot of back story and jeesh there was a lot of stuff, and at the
same time I felt like she took some short cuts and just… I don’t know. It was
sort of lush and gorgeous though.
Comics
Agh. Rat Queens. They give me life. They’re so good. There’s a skygod
called N’rygoth, who is creepy. There’s arguing and drinking. There’s some
exciting backstories, like Dee and her priest-y husband, and Violet and her
awesome rebellion, Violet and her creepy dad, and Betty is my favourite
Halfling thief there ever was. They’re so layered, and so much more than just
women who kick ass. They’re complex and fascinating, I love them.
I saw this in my local comic shop and thought; yeah, I need that. I read
it, and I liked the story, or stories, but I didn’t know enough backstory, so I
didn’t necessarily understand what was going on. Like why and who, and how, and
also huh? So therefore I decided to read some Thor, and then eventually some
more Loki. I’ve looked up where I can start. And then sort of work my way back
to this, or I guess forward to this. Anyways. I liked Loki, he’s sort of trying
to be good, but he’s ambivalent, and still himself. The jokes are great. The
Avengers make an appearance, and Clint’s little story is amazing. It’s not so
much a story, as like four panels of him playing a gardening simulation and
somehow being trapped by the National Guard. It’s so weird, and great. So I’m
looking forward to finding out how Loki ended up where he is.
In my attempt to figure out how Loki ended up where he is I started
reading Thor. Someone online said this might be a good place to start, although
I am still missing a massive amount of backstory, but it’s okay… I think,
because they do sort of play catch up and explain how they got to where they
are. Basically Asgard has fallen/disappeared, Thor is in the void, and he’s
called back by his alter ego Donald Blake, and he sort of reclaims Asgard, I
guess, and frees the gods from their human hosts, and Loki has an evil plan,
and he’s a fucking gorgeous chick, which, how did that happen? I need to figure
that out, I guess. Also Thor is in some sort of spat with Iron Man, I’m not
sure why, I’m guessing it has to do with something that happened while Thor was
in the Void? Also, if you’re curious, if you Google Thor, the entire front page
refers to the marvel character, not one reference to the actual god. So that’s
interesting.
That's my June reading. On towards July.
Retribution Falls by Chris
Wooding
So this is George Orwell’s fiction debut. He wrote one other book before
this, but it was non-fiction. This is based on Orwell’s own life in Burma as a
police officer. It basically looks at the corruption, imperialism and racism
that permeated the English empire. The main character is John Flory, an English
timber merchant, who is quite progressive, for his time. He is friends with a
Burmese doctor, and tries to get him an introduction into the all white club
he’s a member of. He’s sort of trapped by the racism of his peers and the
massively corrupt Burmese magistrate plotting Flory’s friend’s downfall. It was
pretty meh. The plot was pretty non-existent. The characters are just so racist
and awful, which I know is the point, but they were awful beyond the point sort
of. Flory was so self righteous and annoying. I could not understand what
interest Flory could possibly have in Elizabeth and how he could be so wilfully
blind about her. She was just awful. I didn’t enjoy it much. It… the writing is
lovely, it’s Orwell, but it was just so meh. 
The BFG by Roald Dahl
So this took me for fucking ever to read. I don’t know why. Whenever I
was reading it I thought it was great, then I put it down and let it lie for
like a week, picked it up, loved it again. It’s so weird. Anyway. This is the
second book in a trilogy. It’s about a man named David who has lost his memory
(or has he?), and people write him letters to tell him about his life. In this
one we hear the story of David through the memory of Ole, Tom Roger and Paula.
Ole was sort of David’s stepbrother for a couple of years when they were kids.
Tom Roger his friend and ally in crime when they were about 14-18. Paula was a
friend of his mother, and a nurse working in the hospital when David was born. The
stories are told by these people who aren’t necessarily life’s winners. And
Carl Frode Tiller is very good at writing these people who aren’t great, and
who I don’t like, and I sort of want to sympathize with anyway. He writes in
different styles for every character, which is fascinating, and impressive.
It’s so good.
In Cold Blood by Truman
Capote
This was lovely. It was very sweet, and a bit weird, but I found it
interesting. That was a boring sentence. Anyway. This is about a golem, called
Chava, who is made for a young Polish man, brought to life on her way over to
New York, and then loses her master to a ruptured appendix. She is then left
rudderless and alone and can feel everything everyone feels. She is alone in a
city where she knows no one and she knows nothing about how to exist in the
world. It’s also about a Djinni, called Ahmad, who comes out of a bottle in a
tinsmith’s shop. He has been trapped for centuries, and he doesn’t remember
why. They’re both sort of lost and alone and they strike up a weird friendship.
I liked the non-human aspects, I like legends and folklore. It was a bit long,
and full of a lot of back story and jeesh there was a lot of stuff, and at the
same time I felt like she took some short cuts and just… I don’t know. It was
sort of lush and gorgeous though. 
