pameladean's copy of Checkmate sitting on my desk here, riiiiight here, not quite in arm's reach but close enough that if I leaned I could get it. But I did not. I picked up dd_b's copy of The Memory Trap instead (another Anthony Price), and I think Mr. Price is doing better than almost any other author I know at making the transition through glasnost from the standpoint of a western writer whose plots depend a good deal on internationl politics. I think it's that Price's characters were not static anyway, like some spy novel characters are. There is no perpetual thirtysomething in the Price books. People grow old, die, spawn, retire, wander off. The change was written into the books from the very start. It's a good thing to write in. It's why the Vorkosigan books aren't zombie versions of their former selves, I think. Although Gorbachev probably had rather little to do with it.But that wasn't where I was going. I was going to The Ringed Castle. Can you tell I'm tired? I did not authorize it to be only 8:45. I was almost sure I'd signed off on 10:30 at the very earliest. It has been that kind of day. Week. Month. Well...yes. You get the picture. It's not just that it's that kind of life for me, either. Lately has been more so.
Ahem. The Ringed Castle. It had Dr. Dee in it, and it didn't end at all conclusively, and this is exactly what I mean by authors earning things. Dorothy Dunnett has convinced me that she will continue to tell an interesting story, so while I said some words my mom doesn't want to hear from me when I saw Dr. Dee on the page, there was no question that I would keep reading. No question at all. These books, they're very good for days when one is feeling slightly cruddy, because they're just so self-indulgent. A book like that will not get stern with one for lying propped on pillows with a mug of tea. It will not chide one to get up and take notes and think about what one is doing next with one's own work. All that can come later. It will urge one to keep reading, now, maybe one more chapter? Of course one more.
And Philippa. Ohhhhhhhh, love the Philippa.
It being not yet 9:00, I suppose I'd better do something with the rest of my evening. Notecards? Yes, probably. Sigh. Maybe some of the easier notecards. The harder ones can wait for later in the week. Except that I'm down to mostly hard ones. Well, fee.
