alias_sqbr (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
alias_sqbr) wrote2011-06-20 03:08 pm
alias_sqbr) wrote2011-06-20 03:08 pm
Some comics I read and some books I didn't
Two graphic novels:
The Dark Phoenix Saga by Chris Claremont and John Byrne:
So glad I put off finishing this until after watching Xmen: First Class, since both it and Xmen 3 took parts of the plot and mangled them beyond recognition.
Anyway: The Hellfire Club tries to manipulate Jean Grey into releasing her full potential and being under their control, but in doing so creates THE DARK PHOENIX!!!! Written in 1979, and the art and writing are full of 70s mainstream comics cheese, but really good for what it is. Does do the whole "Woman is forced by evil men to be powerful, can't control it, may doom them all" plot, which I really don't like, but does focus on how Jean feels about the whole thing. Also Storm, who keeps talking about how much she loves her (I'm just saying) Reminded me how much I love Storm and Nightcrawler.
Logicomix by Apostolos Doxiadis and Christos Papadimitriou, art by Alecos Papadatos and Annie Di Donna: Bertrand Russel and the doomed search for a complete logical underpinning to mathematics. Readable with nice art, probably would have been more enjoyable if I was less familiar with the material, but has an awful lot of men explaining things (especially maths) to women. Like, a lot, even in the stuff set these days.
Three books I didn't finish:
Rosemary and Rue by Seanan McGuire: The prologue stops every. two. sentences. to explain some chunk of not very interesting worldbuilding, and after that the main character descends into a really deep aimless depression and that just wasn't a headspace I felt like being in. Apparently very good if you can get into it.
Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews: I got further into this but it annoyed me more. It starts with the main character being a kickass private investigator in a moderately interesting urban fantasy setting investigating her guardian's death. I liked this. Then around page 70 it all started to turn bad: she meets a shapechanger who is trying to create a "super-male that would be irresistible to all women", which is considered an entirely attainable goal (it didn't help that he was using blue eyes and lots of muscles, two traits I tend to find unattractive). Then we meet the werewolves. Oh god, urban fantasy werewolves, with the gender essentialist tropes of men as sex crazed possessive violent predators, and all women but the heroine being weak and/or bitchy if the author bothers to write any at all. And then the heroine got a teenage boy werewolf sidekick just like the heroine of the last urban fantasy novel I read and I gave up (on *checks* page 144 of 260, so I may force myself to skim through and see how it all ends) EDIT: Got bored, finished it. There were enough flashes of interesting fantasy thriller/horror to keep me interested (though it got a bit gross here and there and there was a random zombie near the end for no good reason) but ug, the gender stuff really was icky, I will not be reading any more. Which is a pity, since I do actually find the character and world interesting!
Fledgeling by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller:
(EDIT: I have apparently entirely misunderstood where this book was going! So I'm going to give it another shot)
One of the Liaden universe books. A teenage girl lives on an aggressively communalist planet focussed very much on supporting university based research. She's a bit clumsy and awkward and in combination with various unfortunate events this puts her in danger of being considered a danger to society who needs to be adjusted to fit better. Her mother's ex, a man of the benevolent feudal merchant Liadens, helps her deal with the situation.
I started reading this at Christmas and found it increasingly slow going, I eventually realised I was dreading the inevitable ending of an upper class man helping a young girl escape from a rigid socialist democracy into the freedom of a capitalist, classist society. This is not my idea of an enjoyable, escapist coming of age story, and is making me side-eye all the Liaden universe books I've read before. There's a line between having fun with Aristocrats in Space and actually advocating classism, I didn't think the books had crossed it but this one certainly felt like it did (admittedly, I haven't finished it, so I could be wrong).
I just want light sff stories about women being awesome and having character development and finding happiness without too much naked celebration of the kyriarchy, people. Is that too much to ask? (Yes)
I might go back and read some more Marjorie Lui (who was my introduction to romance novels, and sff romance in particular) Even if her writing is a bit crap at least she isn't really aggressively sexist. And she has actual three dimensional non-white/POC characters with speaking roles and everything!
The Dark Phoenix Saga by Chris Claremont and John Byrne:
So glad I put off finishing this until after watching Xmen: First Class, since both it and Xmen 3 took parts of the plot and mangled them beyond recognition.
Anyway: The Hellfire Club tries to manipulate Jean Grey into releasing her full potential and being under their control, but in doing so creates THE DARK PHOENIX!!!! Written in 1979, and the art and writing are full of 70s mainstream comics cheese, but really good for what it is. Does do the whole "Woman is forced by evil men to be powerful, can't control it, may doom them all" plot, which I really don't like, but does focus on how Jean feels about the whole thing. Also Storm, who keeps talking about how much she loves her (I'm just saying) Reminded me how much I love Storm and Nightcrawler.
Logicomix by Apostolos Doxiadis and Christos Papadimitriou, art by Alecos Papadatos and Annie Di Donna: Bertrand Russel and the doomed search for a complete logical underpinning to mathematics. Readable with nice art, probably would have been more enjoyable if I was less familiar with the material, but has an awful lot of men explaining things (especially maths) to women. Like, a lot, even in the stuff set these days.
Three books I didn't finish:
Rosemary and Rue by Seanan McGuire: The prologue stops every. two. sentences. to explain some chunk of not very interesting worldbuilding, and after that the main character descends into a really deep aimless depression and that just wasn't a headspace I felt like being in. Apparently very good if you can get into it.
Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews: I got further into this but it annoyed me more. It starts with the main character being a kickass private investigator in a moderately interesting urban fantasy setting investigating her guardian's death. I liked this. Then around page 70 it all started to turn bad: she meets a shapechanger who is trying to create a "super-male that would be irresistible to all women", which is considered an entirely attainable goal (it didn't help that he was using blue eyes and lots of muscles, two traits I tend to find unattractive). Then we meet the werewolves. Oh god, urban fantasy werewolves, with the gender essentialist tropes of men as sex crazed possessive violent predators, and all women but the heroine being weak and/or bitchy if the author bothers to write any at all. And then the heroine got a teenage boy werewolf sidekick just like the heroine of the last urban fantasy novel I read and I gave up (on *checks* page 144 of 260, so I may force myself to skim through and see how it all ends) EDIT: Got bored, finished it. There were enough flashes of interesting fantasy thriller/horror to keep me interested (though it got a bit gross here and there and there was a random zombie near the end for no good reason) but ug, the gender stuff really was icky, I will not be reading any more. Which is a pity, since I do actually find the character and world interesting!
Fledgeling by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller:
(EDIT: I have apparently entirely misunderstood where this book was going! So I'm going to give it another shot)
One of the Liaden universe books. A teenage girl lives on an aggressively communalist planet focussed very much on supporting university based research. She's a bit clumsy and awkward and in combination with various unfortunate events this puts her in danger of being considered a danger to society who needs to be adjusted to fit better. Her mother's ex, a man of the benevolent feudal merchant Liadens, helps her deal with the situation.
I started reading this at Christmas and found it increasingly slow going, I eventually realised I was dreading the inevitable ending of an upper class man helping a young girl escape from a rigid socialist democracy into the freedom of a capitalist, classist society. This is not my idea of an enjoyable, escapist coming of age story, and is making me side-eye all the Liaden universe books I've read before. There's a line between having fun with Aristocrats in Space and actually advocating classism, I didn't think the books had crossed it but this one certainly felt like it did (admittedly, I haven't finished it, so I could be wrong).
I just want light sff stories about women being awesome and having character development and finding happiness without too much naked celebration of the kyriarchy, people. Is that too much to ask? (Yes)
I might go back and read some more Marjorie Lui (who was my introduction to romance novels, and sff romance in particular) Even if her writing is a bit crap at least she isn't really aggressively sexist. And she has actual three dimensional non-white/POC characters with speaking roles and everything!
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I really, really liked this when I first read the comic as a teenager - for all the "Jean is so dangerous and must be stopped!" we got to see her try to stop herself, use some of the power by choice, and make her final decision as everyone else tried to protect her. I don't think I even realised how much of the female characters' viewpoints we get with this run of X-Men (even more when Kitty joins) and how rare that is.
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Is that Ekaterin Vorkosigan in your icon?
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Where's it from? It's a lovely picture.
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