Well, sheesh, I just can't get myself back into typing mode... The day job continues to overwork me and stress me out. Thusly I do not type here like I should! I've been reading intensely, instead. I've been reading a lot of Fantasy, which makes my SciFi side cringe.

I've finished the first two books of the Dark Materials trilogy. and I got a random Witch World book at FictionWise (Andre Norton coauthored with Lyn McConchie)... it was about horses so I couldn't pass it up!

And now I've run into The Orphan's Tales: In the Night Garden by Catherynne Valente. I had marked it for some unknown reason, but when I came back I had just read a rave review about it and so put it in my shopping cart.

I looked up the Amazon reviews, and whoa, out of 18, 17 gave the book 5/5 stars. And then I noticed the price... I could get an ebook at Fictionwise for 2.70$ less than the dead tree version. And, since I have a bunch of credit coming to me at FictionWise, I didn't even have to pull out my credit card. Yay!

Yeah, okay, I get excited about buying books. laughs.

And after I finally downloaded my new book, I figured out why I had marked it in the first place... It won the Tiptree award in 2006!

I read the 2002 Tiptree Award winner, Light, a couple months ago, but did not like it in the least. Too gritty and incomprehensible. And I just finished the Tiptree biography, Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon, which won recognition in 2006.

So now I'm interested in all the Tiptree Award winners. The award started in 1991, with a few retrospective winners. It looks like there are one to three winners every year, so that's a nice pile of books. *grins*

The James Tiptree, Jr. Award, is an annual literary prize for science fiction or fantasy that expands or explores our understanding of gender... The aim of the award is not to look for work that falls into some narrow definition of political correctness, but rather to seek out work that is thought-provoking, imaginative, and perhaps even infuriating. The Tiptree Award is intended to reward those women and men who are bold enough to contemplate shifts and changes in gender roles, a fundamental aspect of any society.

  James Tiptree, Jr. Literary Award Council

Thumbs Up. And now I am thinking about making a list of the winners and typing up reviews as I read all of them. :)

Tag: books

Static8 > Journal > Archive > 15 Sept 2007 Entry