Books to Read While the Algae Grow in Your Fur, February 2014

Attention conservation notice: I have no taste. To exemplify this, the theme for the month was finally getting a tablet, and so indulging in a taste for not very sophisticated comic books.

John Rogers et al., Dungeons and Dragons: Shadowplague, First Encounters, Down

Comic book mind candy. It is with praise and affection that I say it made me want to play D&D again.

Nunzio DeFilippis, Christina Weir, Christopher Mitten, and Bill Crabtree, Bad Medicine

Lora Innes, The Dreamer, 1: The Consequences of Nathan Hale

Matt Fraction and David Aja, Hawkeye, 2: Little Hits

Comic book mind candy, assorted flavors.

Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky, Sex Criminals, 1: One Weird Trick

Comic book mind candy, but so wonderfully weird as to deserve special mention. If your orgasms stop time for everyone else, wouldn't you (ROT-13'd for spoilers) ratntr va n frevbhf bs eboorevrf gb fnir ybpny yvoenevrf , obviously?

Alan Moore and Jacen Burrows, Neonomicon

Comic book mind candy. One the one hand, I am glad I am not alone in seeing the (ROT-13'd for spoilers) Wrfhf Puevfg/Terng Pguhyuh cnenyyryf . On the other hand, this is so pervy, in such an ugly way, that it made me feel soiled and somehow complicit in a way very few books do. (Also, I suspect Moore doesn't altogether regard it as mind candy.)

Gail Simone and Walter Geovani, Red Sonja, 1: Queen of Plagues

Comic-book mind-candy, but enjoyable as such without apology. (And yes, that Red Sonja.)

Carrie Vaughn, Dreams of the Golden Age

Mind candy; sequel to After the Golden Age, half a generation later. Good, but not as good.

Franco Moretti, Distant Reading

A collection of essays, in which Moretti works his way from his early, more conventional ideas about literary history to the Graphs, Maps, Trees position. Despite the promise of the publisher's blurb, the recent work, some of which actually does feature principal components, is not included. I enjoyed reading or re-reading these essays, but I'm very much on his side, and it doesn't make a good introduction to the debate.

Konstantin Kakaes, The Pioneer Detectives

It takes a special kind of person to find a gripping read in a decade-spanning saga of high-precision measurement, celestial mechanics, academic dispute, and detailed numerical modeling of thermal stresses. If you read this blog, you are very likely to be that kind of person: go be gripped. (I forget where I saw this recommended.)

Books to Read While the Algae Grow in Your Fur; Scientifiction and Fantastica; Cthulhiana; Writing for Antiquity; The Commonwealth of Letters; Physics; The Eternal Silence of These Infinite Spaces