Summer 2010 Reading Spectacular #1

So, it's been a hectic year. Just take my word for it; I don't plan to bore you with the details. I'll try to do better.

I'm planning to finish off the 52 Pages project which clearly didn't turn out to be a once-weekly entry in the end, but I'm determined to get to 52 pages in total regardless. I'm also considering another little project, but we'll see whether I get it up and running any time soon or not. Biting and chewing and all of that.

But here I am, and if nothing else, I'm back with this year's Summer Reading Spectacular, or, "What I Read Between the Beginning of July and Labour Day". I'm sure Sonya will be thrilled.

I finished up a few things just at the end of June, but technically those don't qualify, so I'll start with the things I've finished in the past few days.

I whipped through The Flash: Rebirth by Geoff Johns and Ethan van Sciver. It's a graphic novel which chronicles the return of Barry Allen, the second and "Silver Age" Flash from seeming death/obliteration back during the days of Crisis on Infinte Earths in the DC universe. Yeah, if you're not a comic reader, that probably makes little sense to you. I was around and reading back in the days of Crisis on Infinite Earths, DC's attempt to tidy up its mythology a bit, but I don't remember that much about it, to be honest. In any case ... I picked up Rebirth just out of interest since I don't read much comic-wise any more.

My reaction is somewhat lukewarm, though, perhaps because I'm removed from the current climate in the DC universe, but compounded by the fact that there just seem to be too many Flashes and Flash-like characters. There's Jay (the original Flash) who is around again these days (don't ask me). There's Barry Allen (who has returned). There's Wally West, the latest Flash. There's some teenaged Flash character, Bart Allen. There's Wally's kids, one of whom becomes the new Impulse. There's some Liberty Belle woman and some Johnny Quick character. Then there's the baddy, Reverse Flash. Seriously. Enough with the fast characters. We get it. I had thought they might be creating this storyline in order to whittle it down to one or two, but not so much. So there you have it. Maybe current Flash fans ate it up, but I just sort of went, "Huh?"

Next, I finished reading Just In Case by Meg Rosoff. You might recall that she wrote How I Live Now, winner of the Michael Printz medal and on my list of reading last summer. While I enjoyed Just In Case, it didn't grab me quite so immediately or firmly as her debut novel. This time around, she tells the story of David Case who has an experience that triggers an obsessive belief that Fate is out to get him and who subsequently tries to hide from Fate by changing his identity and name. That's just the start. It's a rather complicated narrative, in many ways, full of freak accidents, an imaginary dog, a male rabbit named Alice, mixed in with some teenaged hormones. The result is one of those "young adult" novels that I suspect has less appeal to its target audience than to those who have already passed the young adult stage. I'm not sure how readable the majority of adolescents will find it, though I have no doubt that a rather sophisticated sub-group of teen readers would eat it up.

Next up, I read Judith Guest's The Tarnished Eye, a very digestible suspense story about the vicious murder of an entire family in their summer residence in Michigan. Short, energetically written chapters and more insight than usual into the victims' characters helped to motivate quick, page-turning reading. I will keep my eyes opened for other Judith Guest titles; apparently she wrote the book Ordinary People, which was turned into a movie in the 80s.

Finally, a few minutes ago I finished reading Elephant: Issue 2, an "Arts and Visual Culture Magazine" from the UK. It's quite a hefty volume for a magazine, sitting around 200 pages, but one to read from front to back. Of those 200 pages, as well, very few are advertisements, though the magazine is quite lushly illustrated with images and works of art. I'm definitely going to watch for Issue 3 of this quarterly. I wish I'd discovered it at Issue 1. Darn.

There you have it. The start to my summer of reading. I've got five things on the go right now, so hopefully I'll manage to get through a few this coming week and keep you (both) up-to-date.