It’s a sleepy Monday. Yes. And I shall not write overlong, but thought I should get caught up on some of my latest reading…all of these are very short and probably shouldn’t count as discrete books but…they are discrete books (if novellas!) and so I shall count them nonetheless.
20. Legion by Brandon Sanderson. Quite a remarkable story. I first got this when it came out in 2012. At the time I lived in Scotland and I remember pre-ordering it and having it shipped to Tampa home. When I was home for Christmas, picked it up and read it that break! And so the Legion Christmas tradition began…every time one of these novellas came out (and there are now 3!) I’d give it to myself for a Christmas present. Sanderson’s writing is never not a joy…and Legion, while being as weird a book as I’d read in a while, was a true delight. How shall I describe this? Basically the main character – Stephen Leeds – has some mental differences from the average person. He could possibly be described as schizophrenic, I suppose. He hears voices and sees people that aren’t there. But he is also – or so he calls himself – quite sane. His “aspects”, as they are called, are manifestations of different parts of himself, and while he knows they technically aren’t real, he does see these aspects and hear them and indeed…they all have their own personalities and skills. JC the security expert and bodyguard. Ivy the human relations expert. Tobias the general knowledge guru. And…many, many more – though Ivy & Tobias & JC are definitely the main ones. Anyway – it’s a fascinating story because Stephen goes through the story (solving a mystery…involving a time-shifting camera and dastardly corporate foes!) interacting with his aspects and chatting with them and they seem so real. Indeed in the context of the story, they most definitely are real characters, which is fascinating to think about because…at the end of the day, none of the characters in a story are real, yet we emotionally interact with them as if they were. Anyways, I shall not write more, but this novella was very much worth it. The Sanderson charm is present in abundance and some of the themes (…how do we deal with the tension between science and faith? what is sanity, really?) are quite thought provoking. Highly recommended.
21. Legion: Skin Deep by Brandon Sanderson. Second book in this series! Another delightful romp. This one involved Stephen Leeds and all his aspects trying to solve the mystery of a missing corpse…and trying to avoid getting killed by a deadly assassin hired by corporate thugs! I really enjoyed this one, getting to see even more of how Stephen uses his aspects and how their individual skills help him be awesome in oh so many ways. The book opening scene with Stephen attempting a date with a real live human woman (and it going terribly awry!) was simply hilarious. Again, how does one navigate the world when he sees and interacts with people that aren’t there? Well, sometimes not very well. But Stephen is remarkably well-adjusted for all that. This was a fun one.
22. Legion: Lies of the Beholder by Brandon Sanderson. Read this for the first time last week…obviously had to read the preceding two books in the series first, to remind myself of the backstory. But this one is the conclusion to the Stephen Leeds story, and what a conclusion! I don’t know if I’m entirely satisfied with it, but the reason for that lack of satisfaction is possibly just because of how attached I became to Stephen’s aspects. Certain things happened to his aspects (as indeed this book is about his mental fortress beginning to…degrade) and it made me sad because of how much I loved reading about them…Tobias & Ivy and JC…they’re just plain awesome! And then you remember that they are actually figments of Stephen’s imagination and so…why do I care about them so? Obviously I was sucked into this story and enjoyed Stephen’s quest here. Trying to reconnect with Sandra (the woman who helped Stephen create his aspects in order to maintain his grasp on sanity) is the main plot-line in this book, which I much enjoyed, as we’ve heard intriguing things about Sandra in the books before this and so here we finally meet her…and I shan’t describe too much more, but I do want to say that as much as parts of this book made me sad, the ending was beautiful. Hopeful and poignant. I am a bit depressed there will be no more Stephen Leeds stories to read, but I’m also happy to have such a wonderful little series in my collection. I shall most certainly revisit these from time to time.
23. Scott Pilgrim vs. The Universe by Bryan Lee O’Malley. Another Scott Pilgrim volume bites the dust! Volume 5 here. I’m almost done with the series (volume 6 is on my coffee table currently…) which makes me quite sad. This one was not quite as good in my opinion. Bit too much depression for me. The ending cliffhanger was most definitely not my favourite. (But definitely did make me want to read volume 6, which I suppose means the cliffhanger served its purpose!) This book had lots of Ramona/Scott drama, which I suppose I should be used to by now. And the Japanese twins, which…funny to say, but I think I actually enjoyed the way the movie portrayed their battle more than in this book. The band battle in the movie was utterly hilarious and awesome, while here…seeing them send waves of robots at Scott just wasn’t quite as fun. Still, Scott ultimately defeated them of course, although the fights are most definitely not the core of these books. Really – these books are about a few weird characters and their weird relating to one other. And I’m a bit weird (scratch the “a bit”?) so these stories resonate with me. I’m not sure if that should scare me or not. This one is probably my least favourite I’ve read so far, but still a solid Scott Pilgrim. One more to go. Gideon Time.
