Wednesday Reads/Where I am up to Wednesday

Recently, during the local "International Film Festival", we went to see - among others - a film called "The Summit", about the death of eight mountaineers on the ascent and descent of K2, the second-highest mountain in the world.  You may see the influence of this movie in the following.

I've just finished reading:
Three books that I am planning to post reviews for...
Life after Death - Beck Weathers - bio of one of the 1996 Everest clients.
High: Stories of Survival from Everest and K2, Clint Willis, ed - an anthology of narratives.
Savage Summit: the life and death of the first women of K2, by Jennifer Jackson - an absolutely fabulous narrative of the lives and climbs of the first five women who summitted K2, all of whom have now died.


I'm currently reading:
Into Thin Air by John Krakauer - the supposedly quintessential narrative of the 1996 Everest season.

K2: Life and Death on the World's Most Dangerous Mountain by Ed Viesturs and David Roberts - a history of a number of the most dramatic climbing seasons on K2.

Unpolished Gem, by Alice Pung - I've been listening to this at the gym, and now thinking I really must conclude it by getting out my paper copy.  So close to done.

After Elizabeth: The Rise of James of Scotland and the Struggle for the Throne of England by Leanda de Lisel - put aside because of my sudden mountaineering obsession.

The Bible.  Seriously, I've got about 50 pages of Revelation to go.

Next I plan to read - It's September, and I've read very few of the books comprising my 30 2013 challenge books.  So that's what I really need to get to.  These books include:

Gaysia, by Benjamin Law
The God Box, by Alex Sanchez
Dead Aid, by Dambisa Moyo
Manhattan Dreaming, by Anita Heiss
The Boundary, by Nicole Watson

I really need to turn my mind to these books.  And yet I really am captivated by all these dratted mountaineering books.

I also have, sitting next to me on the sofa right at this moment, Sheer Will: The Inspiring Life and Climbs of Michael Groom, by Michael Groom.

Review: The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf

The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf by Ambelin Kwaymullina

My rating: 5 of 5 stars



It took me a while to get into this, but once I did, *what* a ride!

Ashala Wolf is in Detention Centre 3, watched over by her betrayer, Connor, and interrogated by the Chief Administrator Neville Rose. They want her to give up her family, her Tribe - the group of Illegals, the possessors of rare abilities, who live together in the Firstwood, protected by a Pact they have made with the Saurs who live on the grassy plains between the Firstwood and 'civilisation'.

This is utterly brilliant dystopian spec fic. There's just enough world building to get me wanting so much more about this post-Reckoning world. The novel is structured in three almost-perfect acts, and despite being marketed as part of a series, works absolutely as a stand-alone book.

People have been raving about this book since the ARCs became available, and they're absolutely right to rave. The ideas that run through this book are twisty and fabulous: you can see Kwaymullina's view of the world and the way it has evolved in this 300-years-from-now future. And I have to assume that she knew exactly what she was doing naming the Chief Administrator "Neville Rose". It was that fact that made my gut churn all the way through the first third of this book. That fact that made the interrogation that much worse than if he'd been named, say, Gary. It has *such* a profound effect and surely anyone with an ounce of understanding of WA history would have the same reaction. It's not just me, right?

I am so looking forward to there being another book set in this world. I want to know so much more about it, and the people in it. But in the unlikely event that that doesn't happen, I will still have had *this* book, and that is a really important thing.



View all my reviews

Review: Miles off Course, by Sulari Gentill

Miles Off Course by Sulari Gentill
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

More fan mail for Sulari! Also, I am recommending the series to even more people than last time.

I loved the cameos! I had my suspicions about one of the less obvious ones, and it turned out I was right. And the couple of mentions of Norman Lindsay... Well, I was brought up with a healthy respect for Lindsay that survived the movie Sirens! And I love the thought of Lindsay sending Rowly a difficult model - and Rowly replying in kind.

And Wilfred is more adorable than ever. I don't know how anyone would cope with the real version (or Rowly and Kate with the fictional one) but as an occasional companion in fiction (and a pleasant foil to Rowly) Wil really is a winner. (Here I must admit I'm contemplating personal fic from Kate's point of view. Sinclair, not Leigh.)

All in all, a fabulous addition to the series. And next book we're in 1933 Germany! What... fun?

View all my reviews

PS:   Oh! And I totally failed to note my appreciation of Harry Simpson, both Rowly and Wil's unswerving loyalty to him, and the fact that he never, ever spoke in dialect. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Sulari.  

[Review] Trisha: As I Am, by Trisha Goddard

Trisha: As I Am by Trisha Goddard
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

There's a moment, late in the book, where Goddard says to her readers that there's no reason to explain the format of her UK tv show, because if you've picked up this book you'll know all about it. She really is writing for a British audience, and her comment merely confirms what I'd sensed earlier on.

But I picked up this book because I remembered Goddard from Play School and from Everybody. It was listed under 'Australian authors' on the Bolinda Borrow Box ebook app, and I'm counting it as such for AWW, because it's an extra, not one of the listed books. (I really must get on with reading those listed books, actually). I know Goddard grew up in the UK, and moved back to the UK, but she lived and worked in Australia for 15 to 20 years, and those were years when I watched her on Australian television, and although that's not a great reason for counting her as Australian, it's good enough for me right now.

I chose this book on a whim, but I'm really glad that I read it. It was difficult to read: because of what Goddard went through, because of the way she was treated by others, because of the difficulty of reading something so open and honest, especially where mental health is concerned. But not surprisingly, the things that make the book difficult to read are also the things that are most important about the story. The racism she experienced in Australia (have we really moved on at all since?) the stress she suffered and her ways of dealing (and not dealing) with it, and the consequences of that; it really is a narrative written for her UK audience, but even without that context, I valued the book and learned a lot from it.

It's the subject matter rather than the writing style that makes this difficult to read. The style itself tends towards the breezy, and there often seems to be a surface shallowness. But I think the breeziness belies a great deal of hurt for Goddard, and that skimming over the surface is the only way that the story was going to be told.

View all my reviews

Top Ten Tuesdays - 7 Jan 2013

Sandra at Fresh Ink Books began following me on Twitter, so I started reading her blog.  And from her, I was linked to Top Ten Tuesdays at The Broke and the Bookish.

Top Ten Bookish Goals for 2013

1.  Get *my* book published.  This involves a lot of work on my part.  I absolutely acknowledge that I have been driving my editor mad with my lack of work.
2.  Goodreads Challenge 2013
3.  Australian Women Writers 2013
4.  Global Women of Colour challenge
5.  Rainbow Reads
6.  The rest of the books on my To Read in 2013 shelf
7.  Clear down my On Hiatus shelf
8.  Blog regularly here at Heidi Reads (hoping that Top Ten Tuesdays will help me.)
9.  Maintaining diversity in my reading
10.  Complete reading the Bible (without deutero-canonicals) from beginning to end.

Australian Women Writers Challenge 2013

So - my plan for the Australian Women's Writers Challenge 2013 is thus:

I have signed up for the Franklin level (read ten, review at least six) with a focus on intentional diversity including Indigenous writers.  I've picked out ten goal books

1. The Boundary, by Nicole Watson - I bought it a while ago and haven't yet read it..  Must.  Unaipon Winner, Crime/Mystery
2. Miles Off Course, by Sulari Gentill. Historial, Crime/Mystery
3. Exile, by Rebecca Lim, YA/Paranormal
4. Black Glass, by Meg Mundell. Dystopia
5.  El Dorado, by Dorothy Porter.  Crime, Queer, Verse novel
6.  Unpolished Gem, by Alice Pung.  Biography,
7.  Whitening Race, edited by Aileen Moreton-Robinson. Essays
8.  Manhattan Dreaming, by Anita Heiss.  Chick/Choc-Lit
9.  The Glory Garage, by Nadia Jamal and Tagreb Chandab.  Non-fiction, Religious, Cultural.
10.  This is Shyness, by Leanne Hall.  YA/Paranormal

8/10 by non-white Australian women
3/10 by Indigenous Australian women
4/10 by Asian Australian women
1/10 by Queer-identified Australian women


(Dammit - please tell me about non-white identified queer Australian women other than Vivienne Cleven.  Triple threats are awesome.)

All but three of these are already in my possession.

I sincerely hope that I'll read more books by Australian women than just these, but as per my plan to be as intentionally diverse as possible (and the fact that I've really fallen behind in a few series by white British women and white men this year), I'm only going with a challenge of ten books.  I'd rather not be sitting here at the end of next year trying desperately to finish my last few books.

Speaking of which...  better get back to it.