Read in 2017

Still catching up on reviews
112 books (some of which were novellas), 79 by women
all but 3 were fiction

My best five some novels which engaged me and which I reread at least once, regardless of their flaws or failings:
- Too Like the Lightning -- Ada Palmer
- Chalk -- Paul Cornell
- City of Stairs -- Robert Jackson Bennett
- All Systems Red -- Martha Wells
- Untamed -- Anna Cowan
- Spectred Isle -- K J Charles
- Christopher Wild -- Kathe Koja
- Touch -- Claire North
- Hammers on Bone -- Cassandra Khaw

My various book-sites:
- Blog
- Librarything
- Goodreads

Monthly culture: December 2017

09DEC17: Antony and Cleopatra (Shakespeare), RSC, Barbican
( Read more... )

14DEC17: Belshazzar's Feast, Cecil Sharp House
( Read more... )

15DEC17: The Last Jedi, Odeon Leicester Square
I liked the man playing the Wurlitzer at the beginning (Imperial March, of course). ( Read more... )

16DEC17: Hamilton, Victoria Palace Theatre
I had expected to find it interesting: I hadn't expected to be so engaged, but I was wholly focussed on the production throughout. ( Read more... )

19DEC17: 'Glory to the Christ Child', The Sixteen, Cadogan Hall
( Read more... )

Culture 2017

copied and pasted from last year's apart from the numbers / faves

A quick review of my cultural outings in 2017. Everything is reviewed! (Sometimes rather cursorily.) Check out my monthlyculture tag.

I am not going to investigate the ticket box, so won't 'fess up to seeing anything more than once. Also, with the advent of e-ticketing, I don't have physical tickets for everything. Come the apocalypse and the demise of the internet, I will have to rely on actual memories. Eeep.

Bracketed figures show range over the last 14 years [eeep! see year-in-summary tag for my Cultural History for over a decade].

Film: 16 (4-20). Best three = Thor: Ragnarok, The Limehouse Golem, Dunkirk.

Theatre: 15 (1-15). Best three = Hamilton, Twelfth Night, Edward II

Concerts (classical): 9 (2-22). Best three = Beethoven 9th Symphony; Ex Cathedra; Bach St John Passion

Opera: 3 (0-6). Best three = well, that'd be all of 'em, then: Elisir d'Amore, Der Freischutz, Il Barbiere

Gigs: 7 (0-9) Best three = Shinedown (supporting Iron Maiden), Hayseed Dixie, Belshazzar's Feast

Books: See 'em all here; reviews here (ongoing: am behind on reviewing).

Also in 2017: moved house; visited Finland, France, Monaco, Spain; two conventions; one bout of pneumonia. No other major changes. Oh, wait: I had a story published in Visionary Tongues/.