bookishness

I'm copying a friend and writing down what I'm reading right now, mostly because I've had books scattered everywhere, with little slips of paper, or gum wrappers, or paper napkins, or takeaway menus, marking a spot in their pages. I wasn't sure what I was reading. I'd just pick up whichever partially-read book was nearest and read, and then put it down somewhere, and now that I've gathered them all into a pile on my dresser to finish, I find that it's bigger than I thought, and more haphazard.

1. The 13 Clocks by James Thurber.
Thanks to the lovely Kat, I have this for a bedtime story. It is all kinds of marvelous.

2. The Arabian Nightmare by Robert Irwin
Bizarre and happily mad, and apparently meant for reading in bed.

3. The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman
Reading this again because I am outlining the plot as part of an exercise given to me by Geoff Ryman. It's very interesting, and humbling, and educational.

4. Japanese Fairy Tales by Iwaya Sazanami
Which contains one of my favourites, "The Tea Kettle of Good Luck."

5. V For Vendetta by Alan Moore
Books with pictures in are always good.

6. The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror (2007) edited by Ellen Datlow and Kelly Link & Gavin J. Grant

7. The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher by Kate Summerscale
A book that "aims to be factual," about murder and detectives in Victorian England.

8. Orlando by Virginia Woolf
Was feeling guilty that I hadn't read anything of hers.

9. Little Kingdoms by Steven Millhauser

Magazines:
current issues of The New Yorker, Harper's, Good, and National Geographic. This isn't my usual magazine diet. Usually, there's quite a bit more fluff, but this is what happens when you get delayed at the airport and have already read the fluffy magazines they have at the newsstand, so you're forced to buy the stuff that has actual columns of text about things that happen in the real world.