More Literary Popcorn

Still working out how to label things for future reference, sorting, etc - but "popcorn books" is definitely going into the mix. An awful lot of fiction writing is, for me, the equivalent of popcorn - I can chew through a ridiculous amount of written material (with a high degree of comprehension and retention) very quickly, if it's well-written, engaging, or otherwise fun to read. If it's highly technical, I can still get through it, but getting the data into short-term (and then long-term) memory takes some effort - and if it's just turgid, dull, or hard to "identify with" (I hate the phrase, but I haven't yet come up with a better one), I'll just give up (like I did on the True Blood series, whose protagonist has me rolling my eyes every couple of chapters).

So - this weekend, my popcorn bucket included the Nice Girls novels, written by Molly Harper - Nice Girls Don't Have Fangs, Nice Girls Don't Date Dead Men, and Nice Girls Don't Live Forever. They cross the line into Paranormal Romance, with not only a romance arc to each book, but an overarching romantic arc across all three (and a lot of loose ends tied up neatly in the third) - but they're still a lot of fun to read, even as a not terribly romantically-minded guy (INTP for those who buy into Meyers-Briggs typing). I'll probably plow through her Naked Werewolf series over the next couple of days, and then I'll be relaxed enough for another foray into Jules Verne and H. G. Wells.

Working Backwards: The Dresden Files

I've set up a list of current books I'm reading (technically, there are more than three, but the other one I've actually started reading is for research purposes, and I've put that particular project on hold for a little while), but I'd also like to start listing the other books I've read recently. My wife and I picked up Kindle readers this year (after using the free software on our various phones and computers), so I'll probably start with the titles I've read there, along with the books we picked up on our vacation trip to DC this summer.

So - first up is the entire run of Jim Butcher's Dresden Files novels, plus the short story collection:

1. Storm Front
2. Fool Moon
3. Grave Peril
4. Summer Knight
5. Death Masks
6. Blood Rites
7. Dead Beat
8. Proven Guilty
9. White Night
10. Small Favor
11. Turn Coat
12. Changes
13. Ghost Story
14. Side Jobs (short stories)

I chewed through these pretty quickly - Butcher's protagonist, Harry Dresden, is a fun character to read. The series is selling well enough that Butcher can get away with cliffhanger endings (at least on the last 2 novels), so I'm looking at the short-lived TV series to fill in part of the gap while I wait for the 14th novel.

Raison d'Etre

I was going to add "Books I'm Reading" to my general Steampunk blog, but as my reading interests are

1. not restricted to Victorian SF, Steampunk stories, or even fiction in general
2. crossing over with a developing interest in actually writing (beyond the blogs)

I figured that I'd split the literary stuff off into a separate blog area.

Mostly, I'd like to start tracking what I'm reading, with notes and general impressions, and I'd like to have a central place to put any other musings on lit, writing, etc.  So here it is...