Reading, Watching, Playing
Sep. 15th, 2023 12:58 pmWatching
Caught up with The Witcher Season 3, then decided to do a rewatch of S1/2. Finished S1 but distracted by other new things before moving on to S2.
Re-watched Tennant Dr Who Specials so $DAUGHTER can remember his main aventures. Then moved on the a re-watch of Matt Smith because he's $DAUGHTER's favourite Doctor. Part way through Season 6 now. Amy's fleshbot just got dissolved.
Staring Watching The Wheel of Time S2, which is what distraced me from The Witchers S2 re-watch.
Bunch of other stuff watched recently, too.
Playing
A new level of Human Fall Flat dropped so I've half-finished that collaboratively with $DAUGHTER. Other than that I've been blasting my way through The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild on the Switch. Really enjoying it. For those who've played, I've done 110 shrines, all fours Divine Beasts and opened all the maps. I know where a few more shrines are but hanve't completed their shrine quests yet. Only found about 240 Koroks so far (of the 900! in the game). Still enjoying the challenge and it's a fascinating open-world game.
Reading
I finished the main Chronicles of Amber, but didn't read the short story collection. The Corwin stuff (1-5) was great, the Merlin stuff (6-10) so-so. I re-read This Immortal/...And Call me Conrad, which is some other people's favourite Zelazny. It's OK, but for me nowhere near as good as Lord of Light. One of the main things I love about Lord of Light is that it provides a solid explanation/justification for the re-telling of the myths. By the end, one knows where the people came from, how they got their "powers" and how they became gods. The motivations are believable and apart from an unfortunate bit of sexism (Zelazny fails the Bechdel Test in most of his books, I think) the whole thing still holds together amazingly well more than half a century after it was written. This Immortal left me with more questions than answers, the mythic elements were not as clear and were certainly not as well justified as in LoL. How old is Conrad? Pre/Post Disaster? Who knows... Nope, LoL is still my favourite Zelazny.
"Yama poured more tea. Ratri ate another sweetmeat." Probably my favourite quote from LoL, although "and then the fit hit the Shan." comes a close second.
After that I was Zelazny'd out so I moved on to The Stranger Times, recommended by![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
vivdunstan. A very enjoyable comic fantasy. He acknowledges his love of Pratchett which comes through in some of it. I found there were already two sequels (This Charming Man and Love Will Tear Us Apart) which satisfactorily continued the tales. There's a fourth due out in January, so I'll look for that one then. Some resonances with the Grimm TV show in there for me, which I really enjoyed back when so that added to my enjoyment. A little bit of resonance with Oddjobs and Oddjobs 2 I thought, in tone and a little bit in theme. The darkly comic tone is definitely similar.
Now started the most recent Rivers of London non-PC Grant novella (Winter's Gifts as long as many novels from the 60s and 70s) starring the US FBI agent introduced in an earlier PC Grant novel. From the title I was expecting a followup to The October Man (whose non-PC Grant protagonist is a German police office called Winter, who ends up paired with another officer called Sommer (i.e. Summer)).
I also found that there are two more in T. L. Hochu's Edinburgh Nights series. I liked the first one so these two are on the list next. I remember the first one well enough to no need a re-read, I think, though I'll decide whether or not to go back when I finish Winter's Gifts.
Caught up with The Witcher Season 3, then decided to do a rewatch of S1/2. Finished S1 but distracted by other new things before moving on to S2.
Re-watched Tennant Dr Who Specials so $DAUGHTER can remember his main aventures. Then moved on the a re-watch of Matt Smith because he's $DAUGHTER's favourite Doctor. Part way through Season 6 now. Amy's fleshbot just got dissolved.
Staring Watching The Wheel of Time S2, which is what distraced me from The Witchers S2 re-watch.
Bunch of other stuff watched recently, too.
Playing
A new level of Human Fall Flat dropped so I've half-finished that collaboratively with $DAUGHTER. Other than that I've been blasting my way through The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild on the Switch. Really enjoying it. For those who've played, I've done 110 shrines, all fours Divine Beasts and opened all the maps. I know where a few more shrines are but hanve't completed their shrine quests yet. Only found about 240 Koroks so far (of the 900! in the game). Still enjoying the challenge and it's a fascinating open-world game.
Reading
I finished the main Chronicles of Amber, but didn't read the short story collection. The Corwin stuff (1-5) was great, the Merlin stuff (6-10) so-so. I re-read This Immortal/...And Call me Conrad, which is some other people's favourite Zelazny. It's OK, but for me nowhere near as good as Lord of Light. One of the main things I love about Lord of Light is that it provides a solid explanation/justification for the re-telling of the myths. By the end, one knows where the people came from, how they got their "powers" and how they became gods. The motivations are believable and apart from an unfortunate bit of sexism (Zelazny fails the Bechdel Test in most of his books, I think) the whole thing still holds together amazingly well more than half a century after it was written. This Immortal left me with more questions than answers, the mythic elements were not as clear and were certainly not as well justified as in LoL. How old is Conrad? Pre/Post Disaster? Who knows... Nope, LoL is still my favourite Zelazny.
"Yama poured more tea. Ratri ate another sweetmeat." Probably my favourite quote from LoL, although "and then the fit hit the Shan." comes a close second.
After that I was Zelazny'd out so I moved on to The Stranger Times, recommended by
vivdunstan. A very enjoyable comic fantasy. He acknowledges his love of Pratchett which comes through in some of it. I found there were already two sequels (This Charming Man and Love Will Tear Us Apart) which satisfactorily continued the tales. There's a fourth due out in January, so I'll look for that one then. Some resonances with the Grimm TV show in there for me, which I really enjoyed back when so that added to my enjoyment. A little bit of resonance with Oddjobs and Oddjobs 2 I thought, in tone and a little bit in theme. The darkly comic tone is definitely similar.Now started the most recent Rivers of London non-PC Grant novella (Winter's Gifts as long as many novels from the 60s and 70s) starring the US FBI agent introduced in an earlier PC Grant novel. From the title I was expecting a followup to The October Man (whose non-PC Grant protagonist is a German police office called Winter, who ends up paired with another officer called Sommer (i.e. Summer)).
I also found that there are two more in T. L. Hochu's Edinburgh Nights series. I liked the first one so these two are on the list next. I remember the first one well enough to no need a re-read, I think, though I'll decide whether or not to go back when I finish Winter's Gifts.
