I actually decided earlier this year to make a point of completing more of my book back-log before adding anything else, so this challenge was well-timed for me!

The Collected Poems of WB Yeats by WB Yeats and A Reader’s Guide to WB Yeats by John Unterecker (In progress)

Genre: Poetry (Irish)
I’m steadily making headway through these two volumes and really enjoying them. Most of Yeats’ work is fairly straightforward if you’re familiar with the poet’s personal life and Irish mythology/history (and are willing to look things up) but Unterecker’s guide has been invaluable for elucidating some of the more obscure references in Yeats’ poetry. Some poems (e.g. The Collar-bone of a Hare, The Phases of the Moon) were nigh incomprehensible to me on first reading but considerably more interesting to read with the aid of Unterecker’s notes.
I’ve been taking my time with these—reading only ~4 pages/day—so I don’t anticipate finishing anytime soon, but they’ve been fantastic reads thus far.

Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie (Completed)

Genre: Mystery (classic)
This was my first Agatha Christie novel and I thought it was a solid mystery. I wasn’t sure what to expect going in given the novel’s age (publication date: 1934) but it was relatively well-plotted and had some nice twists and turns. I appreciated that Christie didn’t resort to many of the coincidences and plot contrivances you occasionally see in detective novels; most of the evidence is in plain sight and could be pieced together by an exceptionally keen-eyed reader. That being said, there were a couple clues which came out of nowhere, which always leaves a sour taste in my mouth.
Overall, though, I enjoyed my time with it.

Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank (Completed)

Genre: Science-fiction (classic)
[Warning: I try to keep spoilers vague or limited to what’s on the back of the book, but if you’re particularly averse to spoilers I recommend skipping this review.]

The present pandemic had me craving some post-apocalyptic fiction, so I scrolled through my audiobook backlog and found this: Pat Frank’s 1959 novel about a nuclear war between the USSR and USA.

My experience with it ended up being a little uneven. The book’s greatest success is definitely its exploration of what everyday life might be like in the aftermath of a nuclear holocaust. It delves into problems I hadn’t even considered in a post-fallout world, such as issues of transportation, communication, fragmented communities, and the early stages of ecological collapse. It’s obvious Frank put considerable thought into his vision of societal breakdown.

I also appreciated that the book didn’t wallow in the attendant miseries of such a life. Many post-apocalyptic novels seem to relish tormenting their characters with misery upon misery, but it takes immense skill to pull off an atmosphere of absolute despair without becoming predictable or emotionally numbing the reader (at which point suffering becomes tedious rather than poignant).

The problem here is that Alas, Babylon goes too far the other direction: just about everything goes as well as can be hoped for the residents of Fort Repose. Rather than wallowing in misery, Frank lets his protagonists off-the-hook time after time, allowing conflicts to fizzle out or resolve themselves before anyone has a chance to suffer or grow from the experience. Said protagonists are also fairly bland, and almost all are Gary Stues / Mary Sues. It ends up reading more like some doomsday prepper’s fantasy of post-apocalyptic survival rather than the brutal reality foretold by experts.

Ultimately I came away with mixed feelings. I feel like Frank really could have extracted a lot more juice out of this premise. It was enjoyable enough that I never felt like abandoning it, but it was also never so compelling that I had difficulty putting it down. The characters felt half-baked, but the world they inhabit and the problems they face were sufficiently interesting that it mostly kept my attention.

Anyway, after Alas, Babylon I decided I hadn’t had quite enough post-apocalyptic fiction, so yesterday I moved on to…

The Boy on the Bridge by M. R. Carey (In Progress)

Genre: Horror
I just started this yesterday so I don’t have much to say about it beyond first impressions. Fifty pages in and I’m hooked though; Carey is a brilliant writer, and given how much I loved The Girl with All the Gifts I expect I’ll really enjoy this. I’ve had this ebook in my backlog for years but actually ended up checking out the audiobook from the library yesterday afternoon—the narration is done by Finty Williams (daughter of Dame Judy Dench and Michael Williams) and is outstanding.

I didn't get as much reading done this month as I had hoped but it was nevertheless a lot of fun! Making a commitment to getting through my backlog has been far less of a chore than one might have assumed.

• The Sot-Weed Factor by John Barth
• The Song of the Lark by Willa Cather

Successes:

About 80% through with Underworld by Don DeLillo. I really think DeLillo is a great writer and enjoy his style of composition (I suppose it's accessible post-modernism*) but I can't say this one is as successful as his other work Libra. It has it's moments, for sure, but it's not quite as cohesive. Lives touch lives, and that's cool. We might be delving into one character's story and it briefly mentions a moment or idea that was prominent a few chapters ago in another character's story. I like that stuff. It's amorphous, this feeling it's trying to capture and I'm all about that because life isn't cut-and-dry. It's nebulous and intangible and books like this kind of hint at that. Still, I don't know that some grand idea is filtering through the mess in a clear way. NOT A BAD BOOK, though. and I'm not done, so maybe I just haven't got to the punchline.

*I really ought to do more reading into literary criticism and history so I know what the hell I'm talking about.

FAILURES:

I lost about 3 days worth of reading due to other obligations. But, hey, I'm trudging along.