Dragons, and a loud sucking noise

[celticdragonfly]

For some time now I've seen various bits online with people praising His Majesty's Dragon by Naomi Novik. Right, something about it being Patrick O'Brien with dragons, okay. Vaguely interesting concept, and yes, I'd tried Patrick O'Brien before, interesting time period, some charm, but oh my the writing got so terribly turgid, and trying to keep track of sailing details got to be too much to me. So I didn't think terribly much more about it.

Then recently I was trying to come up with other things to give my beloved Karl for Christmas, and went through his Amazon wishlists. It was on there, along with several other SF books that I thought likely to actually be in a local store - so I'd copied out the list, and went shopping. I got him that, and a Niven book.

Shortly after that, there was a figurative loud sucking noise, and Karl disappeared into the book. In a "wait, didn't I have a husband?" kind of way. Friday evening he made a point of making sure we got into a bookstore, before they closed, after our early New Year's Eve dinner out, and got himself the 2nd book, Throne of Jade. After he'd clearly liked the first, I'd offered to get him the 2nd for his birthday - and when he had it in hand, he tentatively offered to let me wrap it and hold it for his birthday - but he clearly did not want to wait. Saturday there was an even louder figurative sucking noise, and I totally lost Karl. Despite earlier promises about getting up early to bathe kids before church - he was up most the night, and I ended up going alone and rather miffed.

In curiosity, I'd picked up the 2nd book where he'd left it, and read a page or two - seemed rather interesting. Yet I realized I was quite reluctant to read the first one myself - expecting it to have the dreadfully turgid style of O'Brien. I mentioned this to Karl, and he assured me it was not so, and made encouraging sounds about me reading it. So I picked it up earlier today.

There was a loud sucking sound. I had Karl come up later - after I'd *finally* put it down just long enough for an overdue quick shower, and explained that aha, now I understood. I'm into the second book now. Clearly we're going to have to go buy the third book shortly. I expect Karl will get dibs.

Comments

[countrycousin.livejournal.com]

I also had seen the hype, and had a similar "I don't need this" reaction.

<sigh>

Maybe I do.

Thanks for the description of the conversion!

[archangelbeth]

*nod*

I, too, resisted it for a bit, because I feared turgid prose. But my friend got me copies, see...

*SCHLUCK* goes the book.

Books.

There's going to be a fourth later.

[ciorstan.livejournal.com]

And don't hold your breath, but Peter Jackson bought the film option for "Her Majesty's Dragon"...

[aeddie.livejournal.com]

He's got to do something while waiting for the whole "Who gets to do the Hobbit" thing winds to it's bitter end.

[celticdragonfly.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure I'm wild about the idea.

Watching Hogfather made me realize just how BAD a job Peter Jackson did of putting Lord of the Rings on the big screen.

Gorgeous, yes. But - Hogfather was so so much truer to the book.

I wish we could hand this to somebody who loved it as much as the guy who did Hogfather loved that, and who is as talented.

[joyeuse13.livejournal.com]

Depends on whether you loved the LotR books in the first place. I found them immensely tedious. IMO, the movies make them much more interesting.

[archangelbeth]

Indeed, so I have heard. I am crossing my fingers.

[xinef.livejournal.com]

Oh oh. I got a copy of the SFBC volume for Christmas with the first three books in that series. Better be careful when I start it!

[celticdragonfly.livejournal.com]

Ooh, I saw the cover art of that on the author's website. Pretty!

[selenesue.livejournal.com]

Ah, I'm glad I read the whole post. At first, I thought you said that because you thought the book sucked. [And why is "suck" a negative word anyway? For all the times I've been asked to... oh never mind, TMI. Grin]