sophinisba | No one will ever replace Frodo in my heart

I'm enjoying reading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix very much.

I'm about 300 pages in and am really enjoying all the Harry angst, the nightmares and the missing Cedric and all that. (Cedric!) I'm pretty grossed out and fascinated by this punishment that Umbridge is giving him in detention. As a Snarry fan I wish we could read more about Snape, but I have been enjoying those few scenes he's in. And maybe I'm silly and she's not that interesting a character or whatever, but I think the little scenes between Harry and Cho are adorable. I love all this badness going on at the Ministry of Magic which makes the whole world seem scarier.

It's also fun reading this one without having seen the movie (the only other one where I did that was PoA) so I don't know what's going to happen and there's a little more suspense.

I'm glad I've looked around in that fandom just a little now so that I can appreciate that, yeah, there are things about the books that even devoted fans find annoying, and that makes it easier to take those in stride rather than fixate on them.

Mmmm, I just read the part where Hermione and Ron suggest that Harry teach them defense against the dark arts, and I was so touched, just loved seeing how much his friends admire him without him realizing it (which of course reminds me a little of Frodo).

What books are you ladies reading these days?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I am reading The Fiery Cross by Diana Gabaldon, which oh dear god the cheese, but I like it anyway. Fifth in a series. Time travel romance/historical fiction with mild fantasy elements. It's dorky, but I like it.

Hee, cheese can be very nice, especially in summer. Is that the series you mentioned on your LJ a few months ago with the female protagonist who's a total Mary-Sue? That entry made me laugh.

It may have been

I need a new book to read! I just finished Stephen Lawhead's "Song of Albion" trilogy, which I loved, and hope to find his "Pendragon" series soon.

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon. Highly rec'd by my two most reliable rec'ers, and wonderful so far. Have to read it fast, as I'm leading my teensy best pals book club discussion on it soon. Also, The Coming Plague because emerging diseases are fascinating. Hefty, but episodic chapters that are chewable, and have lots to chew.

What is the Kavalier and Clay book about?

My mom, who retired two years ago, is in four book clubs and she loves them. I went to a couple meetings with her the year I lived at home and it was a lot of fun. We read a really terrific book, Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides, that I now recommend to all my friends.

I really, really, really, really hated Kavalier & Clay. It was good up until the end, though, because as it turns out REAL LITERATURE is not allowed to have anything resembling a resolution.

♥ Yeah, resolutions are so plebeian. You are done with grad school omg! You are a free woman!!! Nobody gets to tell you what to read now!

Middlesex is another my S loved.

Kavalier and Clay starts before World War II with two young men finding a life long friendship, which will result in them creating a famous comic book hero/series that will propel them to fame and fortune and adventure. I have just started it - beautifully written, funny, with rich characterizations.

Amazon link to K and C for more info (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0312282990/ref=pd_sim_b_1/102-7548910-1602542?%5Fencoding=UTF8&v=glance&n=283155)

Hee. Your thoughts are very similar to mine! I have had a harder time getting into the books BEFORE Goblet of Fire, frankly! I've taken too long through Chamber of Secrets, and I'm hoping Azkaban is a little better (I think the kidlets are still too young to be interesting characters to me? Or something?). But CEDRIC! Yesss! Do you SEE the Cedric/Harry lurve?

Dude, you're gonna love Order of the Phoenix. There's this part right near the beginning where Dudley makes fun of him because he's been saying Cedric's name in his sleep, and Dudley's like, "Who's Cedric? Your boyfriend?"

They take me an absurdly long time too though, considering how easy they are to read. I do think now I'm close to catching up I'll probably do so this summer and then I can read the fic when I'm in the mood without fear of spoilers.

eeeep! (about that line). Well, I read Goblet of FIre right after seeing the movie and could hardly put it down. But I really have struggled through the first books...D'oh! I might just skip ahead this summer while getting to catch up on reading! :-)

I'd still give PoA a try though. Almost everybody seems to like it a lot better than the first two. There's a lot of orphan angst and fear, and the relationship between Harry and Lupin is very nice. I think you'd enjoy it a lot.

Okay! I really don't have much more of CoS to get through and then I'll try PoA, too. *grin* yay, I have more reading time now! ;-D

I remember when I was on the first two whenever I found out someone was a Harry Potter fan I would ask them right away, "Is it true they get better as the series goes on?" because I wanted to believe it was worth it! Most people tell me they like either the 3rd or the 4th best but I am really loving number 5.

Then I'm so looking foward to getting to the 5th one! Yay!

I adore Snape but not a Snarry fan though :-(

I read fics in the HP fandom, here and there.

I've been reading the 'Chronicles of Narnia' for about, oh, the last 5 months or so. I'm at the second last story now - The Silver Chair - and hopefully I'll finish the book SOON!!! I have so many other books waiting for me to read, some I've bought almost a yr ago but the fanfics win each time *grins*

I still haven't read a whole lot of Snarry or any kind of HP fic, but I've come across some really great writing there. I like that they don't seem to shy away from the darkfic and morally ambiguous stuff, which makes sense, you know, considering the source text and Snape's character especially.

The Chronicles of Narnia are awesome. I haven't read them in way too long, but they were my seven favorite books when I was a kid (and I hadn't read LOTR!).

Heh, but I know how it is about the fanfics winning out over the books, I do indeed. :)

I'm reading (just because I'm translating) Merlin, by Jane Yolen. A part of a trilogy about a young Merlin. Very, very good and poignant.

Oh, that's cool. I read a book of hers a few years ago that was really great, Briar Rose. I've done a little bit of translating documents and short articles but I would think literary translating would be so much more challenging but also rewarding.

OT, Sophie, but is all your fic tagged with "fic" or do you have it stored elsewhere as well? Thanks!

Yup, unless I've missed something by accident all the fics are tagged with "fic" and with the fandom they're in (hobbits, faculty, firefly, elijah), and multipart stories have their own tags, and I also have a fics index page linked from my userinfo:
http://sophinisba.livejournal.com/20113.html
I find the lj entry with links much easier to manage than the memories feature. Thanks for the interest, Elanor.

No one will ever replace Frodo in my heart

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject