Archive for dark fantasy

a journal of the conquest, war, famine, and death year

Posted in Books, Kids, pictures, Statistics, Travel, University life with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 11, 2023 by xi'an

Read Les chiens et la charrue (Le cycle de Syffe, tome 3 ) by Patrick K. Dewdney, which came out after a long hiatus (esp. when missing the parution in September 2021!). It thus proved hard to remember the complex structure of this universe, as well as the names of characters from the earlier volumes. But after one slow third of the book, including an endless river slog, the right pace set in and I read the remaining 400 pages quite quickly (the trip to Jeddah helped!), with a climactic ending, despite a few too many coincidences. Looking forward the next tome, next year maybe?! While still being stuck in the (disappointing) last tome of Christelle Dabos’ The Mirror Visitor, I read another Max Gladstone’s, Dead Country (The Craft War I), within a few days, despite some weaknesses in the style (heavy infodump disguised as teacher/pupil conversations) and in the story. Unsure I will pursue this series.Had an enjoyable early dinner at Otto, a Rue Mouffetard izayaka. Despite some highlights of the menu being unavailable, the remaining dishes were worth the visit! (And the bet that there would be a table available on a warm Saturday evening.)

Watched Korean Money Heist, which, I am told, is the K clone of La Casa de Papel (I had not watched). Very light and requiring a high tolerance for unlikely so unlikely twists, but with very good actors who managed to keep the pace till the last episode. With a appearance supposedly of the martyr city of Kherson, even though it is actually Hallstatt, Austria. (Just why would a North Korean student read Mayakovski’s poems in a Latin language while in Vladivostok?!)

a journal of the conquest, war, famine, and death year

Posted in Books, Kids, pictures, Statistics, Travel, University life with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 25, 2023 by xi'an

Read both following volumes of Peter May’s Lewis trilogy, The Lewis Man and The Chessmen. The stories remain focussed on the same few characters as in the first volume, with some predictable developments and a rather heavy borrowing to the local history in the shape of a peat-bog mommy or a plane crash. And of the terrible early 20th Century policies of dispatching orphans throughout Scotland without ever checking on their well-being. Rather disappointing in the end with way too many convenient coincidences, implausible twists of fate, and larger than life characters. (And very artificial dialogues of teenagers, either in the 1980’s or in the 2010’s.) Read also two remarkable Tanizaki’s short stories, Fumiko’s feet and The mermaid’s lament. Which demonstrate impressive writing style. And his Diary of a mad old man, written in a completely different way, about an hypochondriac old man obsessed by his son’s wife, who negotiates glimpses at the highest price. It reminded me of Kawabata’s Sound of the Mountain, although the later is much more ambiguous on that relation. (Obviously not the only one to note the similarities.)

Moved the title of this recurring post to add another horseman for another year. Next round, if any, I will have to borrow a fifth horseman from Terry Pratchett!

Had another great lunch at KGB, in the Odéon district of Paris, which stands for Kitchen Gallery Bis and has no obvious Russian connections. Both the surprise collection of primi piatti (incl. a wagyu bouillon and a cold squid salad) and the half-baked tuna were original and an avalanche of flavours. I skipped the desert, centred on rhubarb, as this is our current fare, making fresh rhubarb [from the farmers’ market] marmalade once or twice a week (with a heavy spoonful of ginger).

Watched part of The Mother, a total waste of time as another action movie with implausible situations, a complete disregard to real life constraints, and the permanent glorification of guns.

a journal of the plague, sword, and famine year

Posted in Books, Kids, pictures, Statistics, Travel, University life with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 2, 2023 by xi'an

Read Brent Weeks’ The Way of Shadows, a rather traditional tale of an orphan boy learning assassin’s skills from a master, within a crime guild organisation tolerated by a feudal structure itself ruled by a below-par king, with the usual dilemma between dedication to the (gory and amoral) job and love+friendship+loyalty constraints. Both collide when the love+friends+kingdom come under actual threat from a neighbouring total-evil kingdom. Some aspects of the dilemma are interesting, other are not and weaknesses in the scenario abound. The final climax of this first volume is quite disappointing, but cannot be discussed as a sequence of major spoilers. I wonder whether the following volumes will see some improvement. And Gone to Dust by Matt Goldman, a somewhat enjoyable detective novel but… lacking a proper level of surprise, with whiffs of Marlowe emanating from the central character, Nils Shapiro, an annoying tendency to brand name dropping, detailed descriptions of itineraries that should bore even the locals, and the of-so-convenient! recourse to Somali terrorism in the middle of Minneapolis, to solve the day. Plus a painful insistence on how foul Winter is in Minnesota…

Had a week of Venetian fare at Da’a Marisa, the de facto cantine of Ca’Foscari! And a sampling of neighbouring cannoli, not always successful and not competing with the cannoleria I visited in Milano, which made me cook a batch myself for Easter weekend. With the result that the tubes were reasonable but the ricotta filling too liquid.

Watched the last season of the BBC series His Dark Materials, while wondering whether or not the third volume of the Book of Dust would ever appear. And Kill Boksoon (길복순) which is a manga style movie playing on the hardship of being a single mother when working full time as a contracted killer! Very light (and gory) if rather funny.

the sandman

Posted in Books, Kids with tags , , , , , , , , , , on September 5, 2022 by xi'an
“What is missing – regrettable for a story made of this material – is the strangeness and the anxiety that immediately distinguished The Sandman from all other comics.” , Le Monde
Although I never read any of The Sandman comic books, and could not finish Gaiman’s American Gods, I nonetheless watched (decidedly Netflixy!) Netflix’s rendering over the past week, which I found mostly pleasant if on the light (although dark) side. Except for a few gems like Morpheus’ stroll with Death in Richmond and Hammersmith. And the unbearably lengthy “24 hours” episode about an endless spiral into primal violence, induced by the psychopath John Dee and Morpheus’ ruby. The actors are mostly terrific, starting with Tom Sturridge playing Morpheus as a young Robert Smith! But also Vivienne Acheampong as Dream’s librarian or Stephen Fry as … Fiddler’s Green! As a aside, I found out that the (much lighter) Netflix’s series Lucifer is also inspired by the corresponding Sandman character.

Hellbound [지옥]

Posted in Books, Kids with tags , , , , , , , , , , , on December 24, 2021 by xi'an