Ten Books A Reading Journey
Helloooo!
This has been on my to do list for quite a few weeks. Earlier this year reviewer Roseanna Pendlebury did a blog on the ten fantasy books that took them on their reading journey. I wondered if I could work out from my shelves ten books that I’d highlight.
Now these are not my all-tome favourites but books that have made me look at reading differently as a normalish human being and then a blogger. So here are ten books and one anti-book that has equally shaped my reading
So where does a young Womble start?
1 – Doctor Who And The Daemons by Barry Letts
I was a Doctor Who fan from when I was five and in the early 1980s we lack a) only just started the VHS revolution and b) tv from long ago was very rarely repeated. For a fan this led us to novelisations and my library had loads but while Terrance Dicks write a lot and is very much an author I appreciate this story I found myself coming back to. The Doctor gets summoned to a archaeology dig that goes wrong, there are rumours of dark magic, village cults, a witch and a moving statue and behind ti all aliens. Its very hard looking back not to see here is a book that intersects my love of science fiction, fantasy and horror even if child appropriate (but these books also had few issues with killing people). Ita a really fun adventure and one of those I keep wanting to watch the TV version and reread but I don’t want the memories of this book sullied too much. Here a 1970s budget is not an issue, I don’t have to worry about actors and it flows really well. I read a lot more Doctor Who growing up especially in the 1990s after the show ended and writers experimented more but this I think is very much where I started in the reading of the genre
The Anti-Book – The Lord of The Rings by JRR Tolkien
Picture it I’m watching Channel 4 I suspect somewhere between 1984-86. They showed the animated Lord of the Rings. Its very good and visually striking it also is badly named as it ends about halfway! Happily, there was an announcer who using stills from the film explained the lack of a sequel and so walked us through what happened next. But says I I want to experience this for myself! I know the library. There was a sumptuous hardback with a folded map in it
Reader, I tried
I tried
I tried and this book didn’t work for me. I never really got moving. I found the language opaque, the pace annoying and it didn’t work like the cartoon did. This really set me back on reading fantasy in the 1980-90s. That and my libraries’ curious ability to never have many books in sequence and I’d no real relatives or friends to suggest books I should read. So this is how Dragonlance, Wheel of Time, Game of Thrones and more all passed me by unawares.
It was not until 1997 (so circa 10 years) I would finally finished LOTR and while so glad I took that sucker down at last. I’ve few fond memories of it. I’ve mellowed over time and I appreciate the importance of the novel a lot more and even some of the writing when I reread it on the blog last year but its not my favourite and big quests with dark lords I’m still wary of but epic fantasy as we will see has moved on a lot.
2– Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett
So I had a friend at school who told me I’d like Pratchett. I went on holiday and there was this new paperback with a strange cover. I did not through get time to read it until I got back. I read it the first day back pretty much in one sitting. Its got moments of pathos on life and death and for those who grew up in the 1980s/90s a lot of commentary on out-of-town shopping centre that younger readers may find quaint. But death jumps out as a character and even as a youngish fan I sense fantasy is being toyed with affectionately and the plotlines really gels well by the end. It’s not difficult to say that for me this is where I discovered fantasy can make you laugh at it and also be very smart about being human. There was a huge backlist to get into and this became an annual purchase with new books. If you read Pratchett you start to look for what it is referencing and so more reading widens. It is not my favourite Discworld tale but I’ve a huge soft spot for it!
3 – Assassin’s Apprentice by Robin Hobb
I think this was a 1996 purchase from my newsagent. It had got a great write-up in SFX magazine which was pre-internet how I found out about books and blimey little did I know how my heart was about to get pummelled. Its very character focused. It plays with gender roles, it has a main character who can be annoying and who you want to hug. All the things Lord of the Rings did not awaken in me this book did and Hobb is a gorgeous writer for creating characters and world very subtly. This series which is one I want to read again in the future is big, changing and not afraid to make readers get hurt or angry. It made me not afraid again to read fantasy books and my first copy (sadly now lost by lending) was well thumbed. Perhaps a 2026 project for the blog is calling…
4 – Queen City Jazz by Kathleen Ann Goonan
It looks like this came out in 1994, but I think I read this much later when we had a local Borders to browse. Again SFX was very keen on it and if the last two awakened in me a new love for what fantasy can do this book does something similar for SFX. We have a strange, troubled future, nanite technology and an absolutely epic conclusion with living cities storms and more. This book was a reading experience I’d not had before. That first sense of wonder as to what technology can do. Around this time, I was often persuaded to read Banks, Hamilton, Reynolds and never quite got the thrill but his with that strange, weird streak has stayed with me. I was not a fan of the other books in the series, but this one gave me an itch for reading more interesting SF than the usual lists of Asimov and co you were always getting in the 1990s as a place to start as anew fan.
OK let’s skip the early 2000s a bit I was reading a little but also working a lot and not getting much free time. I’d get my usual annual Stephen king, I carried on with Hobb, Joe Abercrombie and I got more online and very much then I was started to look at my reading habits. This was the time I realised I was reading pretty much nearly all straight white male authors – also circa 30 books a year so I really was not me. So, what books got me really back into the genre and made me eventually want to blog?
5 – A Madness of Angels by Kate Griffin
Yes, urban fantasy was taking off a lot in the 2000s and this one really stood out for me. Rather than simply take a place name and make it real or insert magical folk into cities Griffin did something more fantastical and weirder. Here have electric angels taking over our magician Matthew Swift. It’s a book that dives you in the deep end and is not afraid for you to flounder. The writing is gorgeous, and I became a huge fan of it. There is a strong sense of the weird in this story and Griffin (now better known as Claire North) is very much one of my favourite authors of all time. A book not afraid to do things differently and that sense of the strange I recognise this something I tend to like to see. There is humour and darkness ion these books and they’re one I hold dear for showing me what you can do in any sub-genre.
6 – The Fifth Season by N K Jemisin
I read this before I was blogging on this site (and my first blogging site was up in the air so nothing was getting written down) and never reviewed it (hmm there is an idea) and this was one of those books that blew my mind. The way it uses three characters to explore a location and its history is excellent and then it pulls the rug out from under you. An exploration of power, oppression, control and so much more and its an elegant and inventive read. A book that captivates and makes you think. That’s what I love in my reading, and it weaves fantasy and science fiction very seamlessly. It’s a bit of a sea-change in how fantasy could be a lot more than medieval European style battles and opened up the world for a lot more invention. When there are books like this to talk about then getting back to reviewing for myself was growing in my mind.
7 – New Suns edited by Nisi Shawl
I really liked this anthology. It gathers a huge range of up-and-coming authors whose careers were and have since gone on to tell unique stories with a refreshing focus on people of colour and other cultures Something publishing has slowly started a long road to opening up the doors for. It for me really stood out and was one I was very keen on when I was invited to Jury for Starburst’s book awards. I loved the debate with other judges and that’s something I’ve enjoyed in reviewing is getting the chance to connect with other people who enjoy reading and then have a weird hobby of writing about it. It also has the strangest memory as this got announced in 2020 just prior to lockdown and the world changing in so many ways. A two-day event where more and more people just vanished had a huge, weird feeling but I was very happy this book got the acclaim it deserved and that for me is something I really enjoy using reviewing to push for.
8 – Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
I’ve not really talked about horror in this list. Like many children of the 90s I was getting my Stephen King books but rarely dipped my toes further in the water. There are a few authors I’d carried along - Phil Rickman’s folk horror before folk horror Merrily Watkins series being one. I suspect I tended to use thrillers more for horror in the 2000s and 2010s but like many other people Mexican Gothic with its fungi horror and its fascinating theme of colonisation and the damage that it does. It felt like a sea-change in horror and Moreno-Garcia is an author I love to read in whatever form they have since written. I definitely think this helped me move much more into reading horror the last few years and appreciate it for being a very smart and expansive genre in its own right.
9 -This Is Our Undoing by Lorraine Wilson
One of the best features of being a reviewer is learning how big publishing and that there are books being published you don’t always easily find I at Waterstones or whatever WH Smith is called at the moment. The independent presses are a vital part of the ecosystem of publishing and take chances on books and authors. It has been a growing part of reviewing to look at these and see what is going on. I’d known Luna Press Publishing for a while and generally trust them. Going with no knowledge of an author and then being wowed. There is nothing like that for me and a dark almost apocalyptic future with supernatural and ecological themes combined with Wilson’s writing was the catnip. There is nothing like booktempting and this was very much the type of book I like to work through at and I know in our Subjective Chaos awards lots of other judges all felt this was something special for Best debut. I like watching authors evolve and Wilson is an author I’ll be watching develop for years to come.
10 – The Coral Bones by EJ Swift
So, this journey has been about books that are important signposts for me in my reading journey and I’m going to finish with a book that crosses quite a few streams. I was a huge fan of the output of Unsung Stories which was a publisher I discovered through blogging. I was suggested this was up my street and oh my it was. This has become one of my favourite ever books. It takes the past, present and future of environmental science and creates something special and eloquent. I worked hard on this to booktempt but when Unsung closed up I feared all was lost. I was very pleased to see jo Fletcher Books pick this up, then the Clarke Award shortlisted it and Swift has just gone on to write another of my favourite books in the form of When There Are Wolves Again which all bar North Americans seem to be able to read. I’d had not found this book without this journey I’m still on.
The books we start off reading are rarely the ones we always read forever. We experiment with what a genre has to offer. There are authors taking established ideas and having fresh takes, subversive takes and my own tastes change too. Genres evolve and one popular sub-genre may not always carry across to the next decade yet alone sometimes the next year. In the words of the Thirteenth Doctor I want to know what happens next!
