I’ve written recently about my triumphant domination of my New Years resolution regarding physical activity–that being my quest to average at least 20,000 steps a day. I admit it’s fun to discuss the “walking resolution” because I’m kicking total step butt on it. It turns out that 20K is really not that difficult when you decide to just change things.
This was not, however, my only resolution.
Today I must confess I have not been as diligent about the reading thing as I had hoped. Sigh.
To remind: my resolution was to read at least one short story each day. I stuck to that plan pretty well for about three months, then I got side-tracked and let it slip and never fully got back into the swing. Life took off, you know, and then my virtual dog ate all my electronic magazines, and you know exactly how that is, right? Honest–may the powers that be grant me a three-book contract if I’m lying!
I have read since then, of course. I’ve even talked about what I was reading around here every now and again. But I haven’t dug in and hit anything like the daily goals I had set. So, yeah, technically I have to consider my resolution to be a failure, but all is not lost. And I’ve sucked it up quite a bit recently, and have actually finished three novels in the past month or so. And since I can recommend all three, I figure I’ll talk about them over the next day or three, in order of my preference. So, let’s start here:
Speed of Dark by Elizabeth Moon.
I don’t think you can read this book and not come away having learned something about yourself and about the world around you. It won a Nebula award in 2003, despite being only tangentially a work of SF and despite there being almost no real plot, so you figure it has to have something going for it. For me (as it was for most of the other gazillion folks who have written about this book), that “something” is Lou Arrendale, an autistic worker in a group of autistic employees who is drawn so clearly that he exposes the very deepest truths about the nature of what it means to be human.
I read this because it was recommended to Lisa at a WorldCon panel she went to last fall, which I think is always a pretty good sign. I admit that–for me–the ending wasn’t as strong as the journey, but the journey was well worth it.
Highly Recommended.