I got Knut's book at Borders on Friday. Also this book by a friend of mine, which they had several copies of, but in the camping section, which made no sense. I'm hoping there were some in a display I didn't see somewhere.

I was able to just put both "Whipping Girl" adn "Woman's World" on hold

they couldn't identify woman's world, or at least not the book Steph is reading.

I have to warn all y'all: the cut-and-paste clipping style is, to me, distracting. You know how we often talk about fonts and the impact they have, etc.? This is like that, because it's more than just different fonts; it's different sizes (radically so, some times), some pages have illustrations from magazine, and even each page number is a clipping (also radically different from each other).

It's a credit to the author that the story is compelling enough that I'm following it and quite absorbed in it, but I know that if it were typeset in the standard way, I'd have finished it LONG ago.

ION, I have to say that the one good thing about driving to the beach for vacation (despite it being a 10- to 12-hour drive) is that I don't have to worry about airline luggage weight allowances, and I can therefore bring as many books as I want (much to The Boy's chagrin).

That's my idea of a perfect vacation: a house right on the beach, with tons of books. (The addition of The Boy's ENTIRE family [including his parents -- yikes!] scales it back down from "perfect" to "probably will be quite nice as long as I don't kill people for always being up in my bidness.")

They made you wear name tags at a wedding?

Yes. And we had lists of people we were supposed to meet.

What did yours say?

What my nametag always says: my name in integral form. Along with my LJ name, which I had written upside down, not having written it initially.

What the heck kind of wedding was this???

An AWESOME wedding. Look for the LJ writeup soon. I never did figure out how she knew the bride and/or the groom, but I'm sure I can find out.

I'm jealous, it sounds very cool! Also, jealous cause I'd love to meet her, I love the Smart Bitches!

She would make a good Buffista! I saw her again at brunch today. We discussed how small her fists are, and she put hers in someone's mouth. And I made her laugh, which pleased me.

None of the reviews I've read had the same problem, though, so it could be just me.

You missed my review, then. I also thought the ending, with Marcus solving his problems by telling his parents the truth and having adult connections and power step in to fix things, rather completely undercut all the points Doctorow was trying to make about the power of youth and distributed revolution.

Also, Doctorow got the US Constitution completely wrong. No way could the Governor kick DHS out of the state. There's a thing called the Supremacy clause.

I also have Knut's book in my hands, haven't cracked it yet.

I just finished Kate Elliott's latest, Shadow Gate, and I'm baffled to find that either she's writing a fantasy crossover with an earlier SF novel series, or she just really loves re-using cultures she invented twenty years ago. Very odd.

Really, which culture, Suela? I'm very curious, I think I have most of her other stuff...but I haven't read Shadow Gate or the first one in that series, yet.

Oh, and I semi-take back what I said, upthread, about the latest Kushiel book. I still felt the denoument was rushed, but the actual ending was fine, I thought. I'd still be fine if she wanted to write another book though. :) Or just a few post-novel short stories or something. I wouldn't be surprised if she writes more, though...but it seemed like she might get into the story of the England equivalent (...Alba?), and while I enjoy those characters, I'm not sure I'd be as into that story.

Happy 104th Bloomsday, folks!

Ineluctable modality of the visible: at least that if no more, thought through my eyes. Signatures of all things I am here to read, seaspawn and seawrack, the nearing tide, that rusty boot. Snotgreen, bluesilver, rust: coloured signs. Limits of the diaphane. But he adds: in bodies. Then he was aware of them bodies before of them coloured. How? By knocking his sconce against them, sure. Go easy. Bald he was and a millionaire, maestro di color che sanno. Limit of the diaphane in. Why in? Diaphane, adiaphane. If you can put your five fingers through it it is a gate, if not a door. Shut your eyes and see.

Stephen closed his eyes to hear his boots crush crackling wrack and shells. You are walking through it howsomever. I am, a stride at a time. A very short space of time through very short times of space. Five, six: the Nacheinander. Exactly: and that is the ineluctable modality of the audible. Open your eyes. No. Jesus! If I fell over a cliff that beetles o'er his base, fell through the Nebeneinander ineluctably! I am getting on nicely in the dark. My ash sword hangs at my side. Tap with it: they do. My two feet in his boots are at the ends of his legs, nebeneinander. Sounds solid: made by the mallet of Los demiurgos. Am I walking into eternity along Sandymount strand? Crush, crack, crick, crick. Wild sea money. Dominie Deasy kens them a'.

Won't you come to Sandymount,
Madeline the mare?

Rhythm begins, you see. I hear. Acatalectic tetrameter of iambs marching. No, agallop: deline the mare.

Open your eyes now. I will. One moment. Has all vanished since? If I open and am for ever in the black adiaphane. Basta! I will see if I can see.

See now. There all the time without you: and ever shall be, world without end.

Molly should have crushed you like a slug, Leopold, but instead, she gave us this:

I was a Flower of the mountain yes when I put the rose in my hair like the Andalusian girls used or shall I wear a red yes and how he kissed me under the Moorish wall and I thought well as well him as another and then I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes.

Thank you, James Joyce, for making the final chapter something separate from the rest of the book and allowing me to write a long essay on Ulysses for my Modern Lit final without actually reading the whole damn thing.

My college girlfriend has a t-shirt that reads: "The Ineluctable Modality of the Visible" and she will be wearing it today.

I hope there's not actually a "the" at the beginning of that t-shirt. tsk.

I'm sure it's textually accurate and my post is the errant quote.