Zero History by William Gibson
Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) by Mindy Kaling
Leviathan Wakes by James S. A. Corey
Caravaggio: A Life Sacred and Profane^ by Andrew Graham-Dixon
The Art Detective: Fakes, Frauds, and Finds and the Search for Lost Treasures^ by Phillip Mould
The Vanishing Velázquez: A 19th Century Bookseller's Obsession with a Lost Masterpiece^ by Laura Cumming
Caliban’s War by James S. A. Corey
Abaddon’s Gate by James S. A. Corey
Pep Talks for Writers* by Grant Faulkner
North and South^ by Elizabeth Gaskell
Emma^ by Jane Austen
Nemesis Games by James S. A. Corey
The Convenient Marriage^ by Georgette Heyer
The Corinthian^ by Georgette Heyer
Sylvester^ by Georgette Heyer
The Grand Sophy^ by Georgette Heyer
Pride and Prejudice^ by Jane Austen
Sense and Sensibility^ by Jane Austen
Me Before You^ by JoJo Moyes
Arabella^ by Georgette Heyer
Faro’s Daughter^ by Georgette Heyer
Northanger Abbey^ by Jane Austen
Stephen Fry’s Victorian Secrets^ by John Woolf, Nick Baker
Mary Barton: A Tale of Manchester Life^ by Elizabeth Gaskell
The Weaver Takes a Wife^ by Sheri Cobb South
Howard’s End^ by E. M. Forester
The conclusion of William Gibson’s Blue Ant Trilogy held a few surprises. Mostly, it was just solid near-future storytelling. I feel like it may have had a bit less compelling social commentary than the two previous works in the series, but the settings were vividly executed.
I don’t engage a whole lot with celebrity worship, but I admire Mindy Kaling a lot and was curious about her writing, so I picked up her autobiography. She’s a very good writer and an interesting person, and I’m glad I read her book that covers her life through her stint as a writer and actor on The Office. It didn’t include her time writing and staring in The Mindy Project but she has a book out now about that and I should pick it up.
My husband got me started watching The Expanse on SyFy. He’d read the books and recommended that I read them. They’re my absolute favorite sci fi books right now. James S. A. Corey (actually the pen name for a writing duo) handled multiple POVs more deftly than anyone publishing right now, and they have the science of space travel nailed down. I love hard sci fi, and this is some of the best.
At this time, I started listening to more audiobooks. I’d been having trouble finding time to read, but I can listen to an audiobook while I’m doing chores, so I find this to be a good compromise. I listened to the Caravaggio biography while driving from Boston to southern Indiana to move the family back home. It’s very comprehensive and a good read. His life was wildly exciting, so it would take effort to make this into a boring book. I definitely thought this was going to be a chore to get through for research purposes, but it wasn’t a chore at all.
Grant Faulkner is one of the founder of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) and this was the first year I participated, so I picked up his Pep Talks for Writers book to flip through for inspiration. I did not win. I do not write quickly and 2,000 words a day is an exhausting pace for me.
Once again, I picked up a classic after having watched the mini series adaptation. North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell is marvelous, and I can’t believe I didn’t know about Elizabeth Gaskell until now. Margaret is just the sort of female protagonist I enjoy in classic literature, and the story is an interesting exploration of how we feel “at home” where we find ourselves habituating, and how to deal with loss and unmet expectations.
Mary Barton: A Tale of Manchester Life is one of Elizabeth Gaskell’s Victorian era novels, and it’s working-class historical setting was fascinating. I haven’t read any Victorian novels outside of Dickens, so I liked getting a different perspective on the time period.
Another historical female author of note I can’t believe I’d never heard of before is Georgette Heyer. I kept seeing her name pop up in Facebook groups I’m in. She was an author who pretty much invented the genre of Regency Romances and was wrote nearly 50 novels from the 1920s through to the 1970s. Some of her works are better than others, but they’re all in the same vein. They’re quaint and not nearly as salacious as modern romance novels. They generally end much like an Austen novel, with a kiss and/or a wedding. My favorites are Venetia, The Grand Sophy, and Arabella and perhaps Faro’s Daughter.
The Weaver Takes a Wife by Sheri Cobb South was a historical romance that the Audible app recommended to me. It wasn’t good, but it passed the time.
I was very happy to close out the year by finally getting around to reading Howard’s End by E. M. Forester. It was not quite as enchanting as A Room with a View but strong-willed female protagonists are totally my thing, so of course I loved it. It had such a strong sense of place.