ASK Musings

No matter where you go, there you are.

Daily Archive: 22/07/2013

Monday

22

July 2013

0

COMMENTS

What I’m Reading – July 22 2013

Written by , Posted in What I'm Reading

A lovely summer Monday in Seattle. It’s my day off, so I’ve been running errands, doing laundry, reading (A Song of Ice and Fire: Book Two), and catching up on the day’s news. In an effort to write more, I’ve decided to do a compilation post every day, with at least weekly in-depth posts on a topic of interest, plus the Cannonball Read V reviews as I finish up books.

So, on with today.

– A quick reminder from the good folks at Shakesville on how to stop rape: Today in Rape Culture

– A feminist I follow on twitter – Amanda Marcotte – was the subject of a whole lot of negative tweets by Dr. Jane Chi, a fellow feminist. I’ve not read any of Ms. Marcotte’s longer form articles or books, so I was unaware of the issue. This article clarified that for me. As a very privileged feminist myself, I recognize that voices from women whose experiences more closely match mine than other people’s get way more coverage than makes sense (even when those voices are good, they shouldn’t drown out the feminists who are persons of color). It’s a shame that Ms. Marcotte perhaps willfully chooses to ignore the broader issues of intersectionality: An Open Letter to Amanda Marcotte

I’m also on the lookout for some good articles on the media coverage of that baby that was born in London today, focusing more on the hoopla and the bizarre idea of royalty still existing. If you know of any please send them my way.

Monday

22

July 2013

0

COMMENTS

A Game of Thrones: A Song of Ice and Fire Book One

Written by , Posted in Reviews

200px-AGameOfThrones

 

I’ve watched all three seasons of A Game of Thrones and enjoyed them immensely. My husband has read all five of the books; I had not heard of them until the TV show started. I usually don’t go in for fantasy books (nothing about Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit appeals to me), although I did enjoy reading and watching the Harry Potter series. I think I enjoy magic, and castles, and ridiculous concepts of honor; I just didn’t realize that there were books out there that had the things I like without the things I don’t.

I bought the bullet and bought the first book at the airport before leaving on my honeymoon. We were taking five flights total, and while I had a kindle full of fun books to read, I knew that for about 20 minutes at the beginning and end of each flight I’d not be able to access it. So I figured it made sense to have a physical book that I could easily step away from (because I knew what was going to happen next) and that was broken down into such small chunks that I could stop and start without getting lost. This fit the bill perfectly.

I loved this book. I loved the narrative device, I loved the character development, I loved the writing. It’s clearly difficult to form my own visions of people and places now that I’ve seen actors and sets assigned to them, but that didn’t take away from the book for me. In fact, I think it helped me keep everything straight in my mind, at least as much as I could. We learn about so many different people in this first book that I think I might have been confused if I didn’t have the TV show in the back of my mind to jog my memory.

As seems to be the case with most people I’ve discussed this with, my favorite chapters are the ones dealing with Arya, Daenerys, and Tyrion. I like Arya’s spunk, Daenerys’ steadfastness, and Tyrion’s self-awareness and humor. I’m not so much interested in Bran, or Jon, or really any of the other Starks, and Sansa. Oh Sansa. The women in this book are interesting and not one-dimensional (except perhaps Sansa, at least initially); the men are complicated and not all just excited to pick up a sword. And while there were many brutal scenes involving poor treatment of women, I don’t get a misogynistic feeling from the writing. Martin has chosen to set the book in a fictional world but it still has a lot of the same issues (expressed in different ways) as we have in this one. I look forward to reading book two, and anticipate that it’s going to be very hard to fit any other books in between now and when I finish book five.