Reading Records

I seem to be setting a record, within my own experience. It's been over a month since I've written a book review. In fact, I've only finished two books within the past month: Norman Lebrecht's The Life and Death of Classical Music and Dudley Pope's Ramage, reviews of which will come when I have finished reading a couple more books, and as time permits.

Meanwhile, I have bookmarks in more books than ever before. I am making very slow progress through each of them, given the smaller amount of reading time in my current schedule. Part of the reason my concentration is so finely diced is an amazing influx of Advance Reading Copies and hot-off-the-press books that have been sent to me by the authors themselves. So consider this a preview of coming attractions...

D. M. Cornish had his publishers send me Lamplighter, the second book of his "Monster Blood Tattoo" trilogy; they took it on themselves to send me five other books that they thought I might like - and their judgment isn't bad.

Robert "Diesel" Kroese, late of the hilarious blog Mattress Police, is self-publishing his novel Mercury Falls and I was one of the winners of a free copy. I hope to have my review done soon enough to help him sell more - ideally, in time to buy a few copies as holiday gifts.

Steve Augarde has been kind enough to agree to an interview, but I've been delaying in sending him my questions until I have a chance to finish his new book X Isle, a UK copy of which I am thrilled to hold in my hands since it hasn't been published in the US yet.

Out of sheer perversity, I have also been trying to read Ted Bell's Nick of Time, Alison Croggon's The Riddle, and F. Paul Wilson's The Tomb (book one of the "Repairman Jack" series, recommended to me by a friend). And I am keeping a weather eye out for the long-awaited arrival of Diana Duane's A Wizard of Mars, the latest "Young Wizards" novel, which the author has generously offered to send me. AND, P. W. Catanese is sending me an ARC of Dragon Games, the second installment in "The Books of Umber."

So yes, I am doing frightfully well in the free-books department. I have never had so many opportunities to take an early look at books I was already planning to read. I hope I can pull a few pieces of my personal life together soon enough to make it worth the authors' trouble.