Monthly Group Reads: Reading the Poll Losers Instead?

[Dawn]

I am tempted by the Robert Fagles translation, my library only has either Stephen Mitchell or William Rouse. Neither of which I really want to read, at least the first time.

[Jane]

Fagles did a wonderful translation of the The Aeneid so I'd take a look at his translation of the The Iliad.

[Dawn]

That is exactly why I'm interested. I really loved his version of The Aeneid.
I read a few comparisons of translations for The Iliad and Fagles, Fitzgerald and Lombardo seem to be the top three picks for readability.

[Gretchen]

I finished Ransom. If nothing else, as I said before, it makes me want to go out and get a copy of Homer's work. I enjoyed the lyrical writing Malouf used but I find myself wanting a little more.

[Margaret, Sherlockian Sheila]

I've got Ransom at home. Time will tell if it gets read this time round or becomes a library yo-yo. :p

[Gretchen]

Margaret wrote: "I've got Ransom at home. Time will tell if it gets read this time round or becomes a library yo-yo. :p"

Just when I thought my library pile was finally getting manageable, the library called and told me I had three more in today. On the bright side, I'm only left with library books that can be renewed one more time. All of the books that absolutely had to be back, are gone.

[Dawn]

It's a really fast read Margaret, a couple hours at most. Don't make it a yo-yo book. :)

[Margaret, Sherlockian Sheila]

I'll try not to. But I do have a couple of books in that batch that I've been wanting to read a little more than I do Ransom. :)

[Teanka]

I read during the weekend. It was interesting and very well written. I liked how Malouf took just one short episode of the Illiad and expanded it providing it with meaning. I've never given a lot of thought to Priam as a character, and I certainly didn't dwell much on the moments after Hector's death. But this story was very symbolic giving it meaning beyond the actual Troy War. I liked how the author depicted Beauty, the mule. Looking at the thumbnail of the cover, I thought it was a reference to the Trojan horse, but no, that's Beauty :). All in all, I liked this short episode far better than, say, by Colleen McCullough where you have the entire Illiad told from many perspectives but the story was somehow uninspired to me, a simple retelling. And I enjoyed the last chapter putting the entire episode in different light: did all of it really happen or is it 'only' a story?

[Judith]

Teanka wrote: "I read during the weekend. It was interesting and very well written. I liked how Malouf took just one short episode of the Illiad and expanded it providing it with meanin..."

I agree, Teanka. I like your take and the comparison to The Song of Troy. Malouf digs deep instead of the giant skim.

[Jane]

Judith wrote: "Teanka wrote: "I read during the weekend. It was interesting and very well written. I liked how Malouf took just one short episode of the Illiad and expanded it providing..."

I also agree. Malouf makes of this episode something to remember. Song of Troy is too scattered, trying to fit everything in.

[Jane]

How sad and unjust the Expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492!!! Story started out as a 'whodunnit' but now turning into an adventure of the survivor, Yonah.

[Gretchen]

I started Blood and Beauty: The Borgias; A Novel last night. I have picked this book up once before and I returned it to the library because I didn't have the time to work through it. I think having watched The Borgias on tv and read Kate Quinn's The Serpent and the Pearl and The Lion and the Rose, reading is a little easier the second time. I've already read further than I did last time.

[Jane]

Gretchen wrote: "I started Blood and Beauty: The Borgias; A Novel last night. I have picked this book up once before and I returned it to the library because I didn't have the time to work through i..."

Subliminally, you've probably picked up some historical facts from your reading.

[Gretchen]

Yes. I think it's easier to keep track of some of the secondary characters, like the various cardinals. There's also a lot of Giovanni's to keep track of. Good thing Rodrigo gave his kids slightly unique names.

[Jane]

Yes--Giovanni is nothing but the Italian form of John and you know how ubiquitous John is in English. :)

I read somewhere John and its non-English equivalents are the second most common male name ever. [Mohammed is #1]

[Gretchen]

Jane wrote: "Yes--Giovanni is nothing but the Italian form of John and you know how ubiquitous John is in English. :)

I read somewhere John and its non-English equivalents are the second most common male name ..."

I believe that. My mom and all of her sisters have names that start with J. Most of those names being female versions of the name John. Her brother, however, is not named John.

[Jane]

Gretchen wrote: "Jane wrote: "Yes--Giovanni is nothing but the Italian form of John and you know how ubiquitous John is in English. :)

I read somewhere John and its non-English equivalents are the second most comm..."

Never thought of the female versions--of which my name is one.
My daughter, Bibi, has two sons whose names are variants of John. [Her husband, also named John, is a very conservative guy.]:)

[Terri, Wyrd bið ful aræd]

John and Johann are also very common in my family on both my parents side. It seems even modern genreations are happy to reuse it as a first or middle name to honour the John name of forefathers.
No Johannas though. Seems only the males of the family keep picking up the John.

Where has it all come from I wonder. he was in the bible. But obviously it came before that.

[Gretchen]

My mom's name is Janice (an extension of Jane) and I wanted to give one my girls Janice for a middle name but was told I couldn't because it's a dumb name for a modern girl (my mother's words).

[Terri, Wyrd bið ful aræd]

Ah, dear mother-in-laws. ;)

I have done my family trees on most of my family branches and I have to say, Jane, Janace, Johanna, Joanna..none of the feminine of John shows up anywhere. Same with my husbands family tree. He has plenty of John. It is also a treasured middle name in his family. But no female versions of the name.
How bizarre. I have never thought of that before.

Lots of Marys and Catherines though.

[Jane]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_(gi...

Gretchen, oh pooh!
The year I was born there were several movie stars named Jane, and my mother latched onto that. [One was married to Ronald Reagan at one time.] Oh gosh, I'm giving away my age. :)

[Jane]

Gretchen wrote: "My mom's name is Janice (an extension of Jane) and I wanted to give one my girls Janice for a middle name but was told I couldn't because it's a dumb name for a modern girl (my mother's words)."

When my daughter's first daughter was born her husband wanted Theresa [after his mother] and middle name Jane [after me] but Bibi doesn't like either name. Oh well.

[Gretchen]

Jane wrote: "Gretchen wrote: "My mom's name is Janice (an extension of Jane) and I wanted to give one my girls Janice for a middle name but was told I couldn't because it's a dumb name for a modern girl (my mot..."

We had so many grandmas, great-grandmas, and great-aunts telling us we couldn't use any of their names for middle names. I told them I was going to name my girls whatever I wanted and if I wanted to honor them they needed to deal with it :P In the end only my oldest has a middle name for a great-grandma (Mary). The twins were given middle names after Mr. Gretchen and myself (Erica and Margaret). Naming kids is hard. I'm glad I'm done.

[Jane]

My mom never gave either my sister or me middle names since she said 90% we'd get married some day and could just use initial of maiden name when we sign our names or fill out forms.

[Gretchen]

Back to the book....Cesare Borgia is history's ultimate bad boy. He tops my list any way.

[Terri, Wyrd bið ful aræd]

Are you finding it as Dawn described it? Small font, but not hardwork.

[Gretchen]

The font seems a little small but that might be because I just finished Wine of Violence and the copy I read was a large print edition.

[Gretchen]

I finished Blood and Beauty: The Borgias; A Novel and thought it was excellent! I'm glad it came up in a group read poll otherwise I don't know if I would have ever came back around to trying to read it again.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Dawn]

I think it's definitely the best fiction book I've read about the Borgia.

The G.J. Meyer non-fiction on the Borgia is really good and I highly recommend it for a more in depth look at where the rumours came from and some different ideas on what was true and what wasn't.

[Gretchen]

Dawn wrote: "I think it's definitely the best fiction book I've read about the Borgia.

The G.J. Meyer non-fiction on the Borgia is really good and I highly recommend it for a more in depth look..."

I have the Meyer book on my tbr. I have been working on a biography of Catherine the Great since February that I have to finish before I can get to any more non-fiction.

I have read just about all of the fiction there is about the Borgias (which is surprisingly little). I might even have to read The Godfather one day. Dunant's book was far and above the best of what I have read so far.

[Dawn]

I'm a little bogged down in two non-fiction's myself so I understand no wanting to start more.

[Gretchen]

I recently started The Last Jew. It might be a trudgefest (apparently that's not a word but I don't care). So far there's quite a bit of jumping around and information dumps. It's good information but I hate when my fiction suddenly turns into nonfiction.

[Gretchen]

I finished The Last Jew. The writer writes a beautiful story when he's actually telling a story. My biggest problem was the information dumps throughout the book. There was a part where he is describing a medical licensing examination and ancient medical texts are quoted word for word. It goes on for two or three pages. There were also pages of historical context when the protagonist would enter a new town. I think had there been less of this sort of thing, I would have enjoyed the book a great deal more. I think I am going to try some other works by this author at some point.

[Terri, Wyrd bið ful aræd]

That would be annoying! That the author quotes verbatim or paraphrases another book or text. What a silly thing to do for that many pages.

[Codex]

Depends on how it is done, I'd say. In one of our books we have several pages in which the protagonist gives a public lecture that is paraphrasing excerpts of Lucretius' "De rerum natura". Just that all the time he is interrupted by the audience which is getting offended by his demonstratively displayed scholarship and starts throwing objects. The trick, hence, is not to quote in a single extended passage but to distribute text and action. ;-)

[Gretchen]

I feel like I've read quite a few poll losers lately. I wasn't able to get my hands on a copy of Eagles at War this month but I was able to get Tides of War which I hope to start soon. Ben Kane doesn't appear to be a very popular author around here so not many of his books are found in local libraries and the used bookstore I frequent rarely sees used copies come through.

[Gretchen]

I have been reading Instruments of Darkness. It's a time period I'm not overly familiar with. There are flashback scenes that take place in America during the Revolutionary War while the main story takes place in England after the war. The blurb, as well as the book's sub title, would have you believe Harriet Westerman is meant to be a main character but she's taking a back seat to her younger sisters, Rachel Trench. It's not an earth shattering story so far. Perspectives are constantly changing, making the story rather choppy. I'm not normally a fan of constantly changing perspectives because I find they tend to be choppy.

[Jane]

Gretchen wrote: "I feel like I've read quite a few poll losers lately. I wasn't able to get my hands on a copy of Eagles at War this month but I was able to get Tides of War which I hope..."

If I'm not mistaken Ben Kane hasn't sold well in the U.S. for whatever reason. I bought my copy of Eagles at War
from the U.K.

[Kimber]

Jane wrote: "Gretchen wrote: "I feel like I've read quite a few poll losers lately. I wasn't able to get my hands on a copy of Eagles at War this month but I was able to get [book:Tides of War|1..."

On his discussion page: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

He states that due to poor sales in the States his U.S. publisher won't be picking up the Eagles trilogy. *sigh*

[Gretchen]

I finally finished Instruments of Darkness. It wasn't a terrible book, I just wasn't very focused on reading. I didn't think the mystery was all that great. It was more of a thriller than a mystery but a weak thriller. The characters were well developed enough with potential for greater development that I will pick up the next book in the series.

[Margaret]

Anyone interested in reading September's poll loser - Redemption of Alexander Seaton?

Margaret

[Jane]

I did reread The Boat of Fate and it was just as good as the first time I read it. I especially liked Sergius Paullus' character development and how he dealt with each turn in his fortunes. I think I identified with him strongly; some aspects of his personality and mine are the same.

[Terri, Wyrd bið ful aræd]

That always makes a book more fun. When you see some of yourself in a character. For me it was your dreaded Uhtred. :-)

Has this author written any other hist fic?
( I guess I could go look for myself, but that defeats the purpose of chatting with another human on 'social media'. :) )

[Jane]

Terri wrote: "That always makes a book more fun. When you see some of yourself in a character. For me it was your dreaded Uhtred. :-)

Has this author written any other hist fic?
( I guess I could go look for m..."

Believe it or not, he writes primarily science fiction. I believe this is the only historical fiction he wrote.

[Terri, Wyrd bið ful aræd]

Whoa. That's a leap between genre. Did he write sci fi first? Or the hist fic first?

That's what David Anthony Durham did with Pride of Carthage. He is a fantasy writer who did one hist fic and then only wrote fantasy. Until recently, when he finally wrote the Spartacus one.

[Jane]

Terri wrote: "Whoa. That's a leap between genre. Did he write sci fi first? Or the hist fic first?

That's what David Anthony Durham did with Pride of Carthage. He is a fantasy writer who did one ..."
Roberts died in 2000. He did write an alt hist fic novel, basically a collection of interconnected short stories. Sci fi came first--1964-- and The Boat of Fate came c1971.

[Jane]

I guess I'm weird but I search out "oldies but goodies." :)

[Terri, Wyrd bið ful aræd]

Haha. I think you have a lot of luck finding obscure books. Where do you find them mostly? Online like Abebooks?

[Jane]

Yes.

a few the library has had, but mostly I'll purchase.