Travels With My Donkey - Tim Moore

I'll admit right off the bat to skipping several books I've read: The Blue Sword by Robin McKinley, Lady Knight by Tamora Pierce, Bill of Wrongs and probably at least one more.

Travels With My Donkey
Tim Moore
St. Martin's Griffin
Copyright: 2004
ISBN: 0312320833

I've also seen this book under the title Spanish Steps, which includes a photograph section from the trip.

Travels With My Donkey is one funny book in places. It charts the pilgrimage made by the author along the Camino De Santiago, the pilgrimage route across northern Spain. The book is rather irreverent in places, particularly as the author tends to refer to St. James, the patron saint of the pilgrimage as 'Jim', 'Jimbo' and 'St. Jim'. The latter name comes in more closer to the end of the pilgrimage.

On the other hand, the author has a way of turning phrases to make you laugh. For example, this one from the beginning of the book on page 19: "There were still wolves in some of the lonelier forests, and bears had been reintroduced by someone with his heart in the right place and a desire to see mine in the serrated, slavering wrong one."

Also often amusing is the way Tim describes the other pilgrims and the places along the route. Sometimes funny, sometimes simply breathtaking, especially for the places and the weather.

Watching the author change throughout the journey is interesting. Perhaps it's because I took so long reading the book (mostly in little half hour segments over my lunch breaks) but I didn't really notice the changes until at the end. At the beginning, Tim is frightened of the donkey he's decided he's going to use for the pilgrimage, but over the course of the journey that changes.

On occasion as Tim Moore writes about the medieval pilgrims he seems to perpetuate the stereotypes about the time period. On the other hand, the author often makes reference to the medieval pilgrimage guide and what it said about the places, which I found particularly interesting.

Overall, I highly recommend this book for anyone who is either interested in the pilgrimage route, likes travel literature, or who simply likes to read about Spain.

Gang Leader For A Day - Sudhir Venkatesh

Gang Leader For A Day
Sudhir Venkatesh
Penguin Press
Copyright: 2008
ISBN: 9781594201509

Although this book is found in the Community and Culture section of the local bookstore, I think it could just as easily have been located under Biographies.

Gang Leader For A Day is about the author's experiences while he was writing his dissertation on the lives of people in the housing projects of Chicago. And, he had some pretty incredible experiences. The first time he visited the projects, he was thought to be a member of a rival gang and spent the entire night under threat before he was allowed to leave. Or, later on, the event that gave the book it's title, the day he spent being permitted to make the minor decisions for the gang.

One thing the book does is make very clear that its a different world that they live in. Extortion and bribery seem to be the norm.

Gang Leader For A Day is not just about the gang, but also tells the stories of other people, the parents, friends, leaders in the buildings etc, which are also affected by the gangs and their behavior.

It really is amazing that the author was able to get so close to the gang the way he did, and his experiences make for fascinating reading. I will admit that this wasn't my usual reading fare, but I think I'm going to do some more poking around in this part of the library and see what else I can find.

Squire - Tamora Pierce

Squire
Tamora Pierce
Laurel Leaf Publishing
Copyright: 2000
ISBN: 9780679889199

In Squire, the third book in the Protector of the Small Quartet, Keladry is now a squire, having made it through her years as a page. As with Page, there are some fairly large jumps in time, but they don't affect the story any.

Keladry is the first woman to openly train as a knight in over a century. Unlike Alanna, she trains openly, in spite of all those who want her to quit and try every method, fair or foul to make it happen. By this point, most of the foul ones have been tried, and now it's up to Kel to gain the respect of those who don't think women should fight.

Unlike the other main characters Tamora has written in the Tortall world: Daine, Alanna and Beka, Keladry has no Gift, just natural talent and determination. LOTS of determination. And some good friends, both on two legs and on four.

This series is one in which each of the books gets longer, which is, in my mind a good thing.

Page - Tamora Pierce

Page
Tamora Pierce
Laurel Leaf Publishing
Copyright: 2000
ISBN: 9780679889182

Page is the second book in the Protector of the Small Quartet. Kel is back and just as determined to become a knight as she was in the first book.

Keladry is the first woman to openly train as a knight in over a century. Unlike Alanna, she trains openly, in spite of all those who want her to quit and try every method, fair or foul to make it happen.

Unlike the other main characters Tamora has written in the Tortall world: Daine, Alanna and Beka, Keladry has no Gift, just natural talent and determination. LOTS of determination.

Page covers Kel's second through fourth years as a page, so there are a number of big jumps in time. Despite this though, it's filled with details of training and life from disappointments to the joys both great and small.

The First Test - Tamora Pierce

Getting a start on the backlog of books I've read this week. I've got the rest of the series after this one to write up still.

The First Test
Tamora Pierce
Laurel Leaf Publishing
Copyright: 1999
ISBN: 9780679889175

The first of the four Keladry novels, the Protector Of The Small Quartet. As with Tamora Pierce's other novels it's in the Childrens/Teens section of the bookstore, but that really doesn't matter.

This series is set after the Lioness Quartet and the Immortals series, although I'm not too sure how far after the latter set. Given some of the references made, it might have been helpful for me to read the final book of that series (In The Realm Of The Gods) before starting this series.

I found it to be a quick read (in part because I couldn't put it down) but a good one. The other books get longer.

Keladry is the first woman to openly train as a knight in over a century. Unlike Alanna, she trains openly, in spite of all those who want her to quit and try every method, fair or foul to make it happen.

Taming The Scotsman - Kinley Macgregor

Taming the Scotsman
Kinley MacGregor
Avon Romances
Copyright: 2003
ISBN: 0380817918

After this book the only one of the brothers left unmarried is Lochlan, and he's dealt with in the next book.

While a good and extremely funny read, I found this to be the most improbable of Kinley Macgregor's books that I've read so far. Things moved a little too fast I guess. On the other hand, the characters are fun and full of life. Also we see more about all of the brothers' lives and some of the events that shaped them.

I'm not saying much more as there's a really nice cliff-hanger in the ending of this story.

Kinley Macgregor under either name is the only Romance genre author I've bought and read books from. If you're looking for a guaranteed happy ending, her books are for you.

Claiming The Highlander - Kinley MacGregor

Claiming The Highlander
Kinley MacGregor
Avon Romances
Copyright: 2002
ISBN: 9780380817894

Another of Kinley MacGregor's novels set in the time of Henry II. As with the others, Claiming The Highlander follows one of the same group of characters. This time it's Braiden. What I found different with this novel was that both the characters, Braiden and Maggie seemed to learn some things about themselves and grow a bit.

Somehow, I suspect that Claiming the Highlander is set before Born In Sin. On the other hand, as events in the other books are barely mentioned, although the characters overlap, it really doesn't matter. Not to mention the fact that you know right from the start that the two main characters are going to end up together by the end of the book anyway. It's just the route they take to get there. And in this book, that was a particularly interesting one, although the situation was not realistic in the slightest.

Overall a good, if quick read, and one I'm likely to re-read eventually. I'm curious to see if the author is planning more of this series.

1984 - George Orwell

1984
George Orwell
Signet Books
Copyright: 1950
ISBN: 0451524934

I'd never read this science fiction classic before, or any others by George Orwell, and while it was a good read, I found it to be very uncomfortable as well. It's interesting how, even though it was written so long ago, it's not especially dated when you read it today.

Actually, with so much being computerized, some of the things in that book could be even easier today, such as editing history every time something happens.

1984 had to be the 'original' book for the idea of constant surveillance, something I've seen in other books such as Marion Zimmer Bradley's Traitors Sun. In any book I see it in, the idea is downright scary.

I still can't make head or tail of the ending of 1984, partly because, I guess, I was getting more and more uncomfortable and doing more and more skimming, to be honest.

I did find the insights in the excerpts of the Brotherhood's book to be fascinating, along with the afterword.

Born In Sin - Kinley MacGregor

Born In Sin
Kinley MacGregor
Avon Romances
Copyright: 2003
ISBN: 9780380817900

Kinley MacGregor also writes under the name Sherrilyn Kenyon, or is it the other way around? Either way, I started out reading her works with the Dark-Hunter series, and then tried these. I'm hooked now.

Set in England and Scotland, depending on the particular book, and in the time of King Henry II, the books are by turns funny and sad. But they always have a happy ending. I haven't read any romances by any other author though so I can't say how typical the book is.

I like these books a lot, although they're really quick reads.

With this one, the second one in the series, I've figured out how the series goes. It follows various connected men in a family. The first one, Master of Desire, follows Draven Ravenwood, while this one, Born in Sin seems to be number three, and looks at his squire, Sin MacAllister. This one had some particularly tense moments, although given the format of the book, you had to know that everything would turn out perfectly in the end somehow.

Master Of Desire - Kinley MacGregor

Master Of Desire
Kinley MacGregor
Avon Romances
Copyright: 2001
ISBN: 0061087130

Kinley MacGregor also writes under the name Sherrilyn Kenyon, or is it the other way around? Either way, I started out reading her works with the Dark-Hunter series, and then tried these. I'm hooked now.

Set in England and Scotland, depending on the particular book, and in the time of King Henry II, the books are by turns funny and sad. But they always have a happy ending. I haven't read any romances by any other author though so I can't say how typical the book is.

I like these books a lot, although they're really quick reads.

Emperor Mage - Tamora Pierce

Emperor Mage
Tamora Pierce
Copyright: 1995
Simon & Schuster Childrens Publishing
ISBN: 9781416903376

The third book in the Immortals Quartet, Emperor Mage is the sequel to Wild Magic and Wolfspeaker.

As with the others, this is a really good read, I'm finding. Tamora Pierce has worked a lot of real information about animal behavior into the story, which she also did for both of the first two books, but I forgot to note.

Despite being a childrens/teen story, Emperor Mage is an engaging read. However, being for younger readers (Indigo has the series in the Teen Series section) the story is rather a quick read.

The other thing is, there is a bit of a 'nobody ever dies' thing, which I won't say more about so as not to spoil the story.

Emperor Mage does something not a lot of fantasy I've read does. The gods in the story are not all happy things. There are consequences for neglecting their worship, as the characters find out here.

Answers to questions raised in the previous two books are starting to come together by the end of this one.

Overall, as with the rest of the series, I really liked it.

Wolfspeaker - Tamora Pierce

It's a double whammy today with two book reviews.

Wolfspeaker
Tamora Pierce
Copyright: 1994
Simon & Schuster Childrens Publishing
ISBN: 1416903445

The sequel to Wild Magic, this is the second book in the Immortals Quartet. It's just as good, if not better, building off of the storyline of Wild Magic. Again, this is a book you could read on it's own without a problem.

My one complaint with this book is a formatting choice. There is nothing setting off mental communication/talk between animals from description or anything, making it a bit hard to figure out sometimes. And with a lot of it, reading got a bit annoying after a while.

The story wound itself up nicely while setting off the threads for the third book, which I'm looking forward to reading.

As with Tamora Pierce's other books I've read, I found myself staying up late to read more. I kept saying 'just one more chapter' to myself. Well that finally ended when I finished the book. This is a good story for children or adults.

The characters keep growing and becoming more rounded with each book in the series as well. For example, the Stormwings, while still villains are no longer completely evil.

Flight In Yiktor - Andre Norton

Flight In Yiktor
Andre Norton
Tor Books
Copyright: 1986
ISBN: 08125472717

Flight in Yiktor is in many ways the sequel to Moon of Three Rings and Exiles of the Stars. However, although Krip and Maelen are major characters in the story, they are not the viewpoint characters. That honor goes to Farree, a new character.

The story builds on the previous two, especially the events of Exiles of the Stars, and more of the history of the Thassa is learned.

I can't help but wonder. Is this the only book with Farree? I'd like to know more about him and his background. Despite this being a re-read, the book was as gripping this time as it was when I first read it. In fact, I liked it better, I think. I remember being disappointed that the story wasn't from the combined viewpoints of Maelen and Krip as were the first two books.

Wild Magic - Tamora Pierce

Wild Magic
Tamora Pierce
Simon & Schuster Childrens Publishing
Copyright: 1992
ISBN: 1416903437

The first book in Tamora Pierce's Immortals series, Wild Magic is set about a decade after the final book in the Song of the Lioness Quartet. This book is followed by Wolf-Speaker, Emperor Mage, and In The Hand Of The Gods.

Although it's a children's/teen book, as with her other books, I find that it can be enjoyed by all ages. I certainly do.

In part, this book sets up the world, and it's not particularly needed to have read the other books Pierce has written, as the characters are all introduced here. Also, even though this is the first book in the series, it stands on its own quite well, coming to a satisfying conclusion.

Pierce is great at coming up with unusual and interesting twists on magic for her books and characters. Daine is no exception, the main character for this series and she learns and grows in interesting ways.

Well worth the read, and a book which has stuck in my head over the years. I'm glad to have found it again.

Andre Norton - Moonsinger

Moonsinger
Andre Norton
Baen Books
Copyright: 2006
ISBN: 9781416555179

Moonsinger is Baen Books' omnibus edition of Moon of Three Rings and Exiles of the Stars. Baen claims that this is the complete saga, however, there is also Flight into Yiktor, which involves the characters: Krip Vorlund and Maelen. In addition, the copyrights for the books were originally much older than the 2005 (Exiles of the Stars) and 1996 (Moon of Three Rings) printed in this edition. Perhaps the author redid the copyright to enable this edition? Another note: in order to fit both stories in the one volume, the print is, I find, unusually small. It's only harder to read in bad light.

Moonsinger is a Free Traders novel, set in the far future from the Solar Queen series, which it does make references to: the planet Limbo and the use of cats on board ship, as well as the endless conflicts between Combine and Free Traders. It is really interesting to see how things have changed and yet not changed in the intervening years.

Moonsinger involves more magic/mind arts than the Solar Queen novels, and in fact 'esper powers' as they are referred to are an accepted talent of many, as well as being a mainstay of the Thassa of Yiktor.

I'm talking around the plot and story, trying not to give anything away, so all I'll say is that Moonsinger is a good science fiction read, and for all that the stories are old, they are not dated in any way. I suspect that this will remain a classic piece of science fiction for a good while longer.