Paging Matt:

I read the Jirel of Joiry book. Terrible writing , but great stories. Which made me respond to it in this schizoid way. Some of it was just unfamiliarity, so I think that whichever story came first, I would have disliked it because I was so unused to the style; the further I went on the more I got immersed. And I know they're, jeez, 70 years old, so I do understand that, and viewed in that light they're amazingly modern. But there was a part of my brain that was just critiquing and thinking "Why don't you give her someone to talk to instead of having 10 straight pages of interior monologue?!" And then on the other hand I kept staying up too late to keep reading when I could barely keep my eyes open. "Black God's Kiss" was probably my favorite, because I heart irony. Anyway, thanks for mentioning the stories, they were definitely worth seeking out.

I think the full effect of Foucault's builds with the overall arc, but there are some definite snarky bits, like the part where they prove that the measurements of a kiosk add up to the square root of the distance to the sun, or some such.

So, I finally finished Strange and Norrell. I'd bogged down hard, really losing patience with the writing, but once I was able to committ more than a couple hours to it, I found I really liked it. Funny and bittersweet.

Did anyone watch the "new" Miss Marple mystery, which was an adaptation of "By the Pricking of my Thumbs"? They included Miss Marple and Tommy and Tuppance Beresford, which I can't remember if it was that way in the book. They also seemed to make Tuppance an alcoholic (she even had a flask!), which I remember not at all!

Am I craxy, or were these things in the book and I just missed them (I read most of the Christie oeuvre from age 11-13)

Okay, I haven't read the book but was excited to see Tommy and Tuppence with Miss Marple.

Oh I was very excited to see Tommy and Tuppence and Miss Marple, too! I HEART Tommy and Tuppence. I was just kerfuzzled.

wow...there's one I don't know. I'm surprised. Oh, and somebody tell me the world doesn't need a Tommy and Tuppence crossover Wooster story because suddenly I have an urge.

No, the world ABSOLUTELY needs a Tommy and Tuppence/Wooster X-Over.

I think the world, generally, just needs more Tommy and Tuppence. I actually love then more than I love Nick and Nora, actually.

I think the world, generally, just needs more Tommy and Tuppence. I actually love then more than I love Nick and Nora, actually.

Me too! It probably helps being exposed to them at a young age.

Not Matt, but:

And I know they're, jeez, 70 years old, so I do understand that, and viewed in that light they're amazingly modern.

I'm a big fan of CL Moore, too (read "Shambleau" and the first two Jirel stories for the SF Feminist lit class I took in college), and this is what really struck me about them. "Shambleau," especially, is amazingly modern, considering it was written in, what, 1936? I really think Moore was at least 10-15 years ahead of her time in her style.

I like to think that the female writer in the ST:DS9 ep "Beyond the Stars" was based on her, or at least women like her--ones who had to hide their gender behind pseudonyms and androgynous pennames, but who had talent to spare. (James Tiptree, Jr., aka Alice Sheldon, was remarkably talented, even though most of her stories/books end up being strident feminist tracts--"Houston, We Have a Problem" was the one I read for that class, and most of us students had serious issues with her anti-male attitude.)