2024 Reading Summary: April (+ Writing Update)
Completed reads for April:
- The Difference Engine, by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling
- Carnival of Saints, by George Herman
- The Snow Spider, by Jenny Nimmo
- Emlyn’s Moon, by Jenny Nimmo
- The Chestnut Soldier, by Jenny Nimmo
- Death Comes As the End, by Agatha Christie
- Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
- The Most Dangerous Game, by Richard Connell
- The Origin of the Lombard Nation
- Prometheus (poem), by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
- Ganymed (poem), by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
- The Code of Hammurabi
- Kings of the Night, by Robert E. Howard
- The Orphic Poem of the Derveni Papyrus (fragments)
- They Came to Baghdad, by Agatha Christie
- The Adventure of the German Student, by Washington Irving
- Letter to Sura [On Ghosts], by Pliny the Younger
- The Spectre Bridegroom: A Traveller’s Tale, by Washington Irving
- Kidd the Pirate, by Washington Irving
- The Devil and Tom Walker, by Washington Irving
- The Devil and Daniel Webster, by Stephen Vincent Benet
- Cain (play), by Lord Byron
- The Wild Huntsman (poem), by Gottfried August Bürger
- The Apparition of Mrs Veal, by Daniel Defoe
- The Ring (poem), by Thomas Moore
- The Venus of Ille, by Prosper Mérimée
- Lokis, by Prosper Mérimée
- Markheim, by Robert Louis Stevenson
- Thrawn Janet, by Robert Louis Stevenson
- Olalla, by Robert Louis Stevenson
- The Body-Snatcher, by Robert Louis Stevenson
- Will o’ the Mill, by Robert Louis Stevenson
- The Sire de Malétroit’s Door, by Robert Louis Stevenson
- The Pavilion on the Links, by Robert Louis Stevenson
- The Merry Men, by Robert Louis Stevenson
- Alciphron (poem), by Thomas Moore
- The Haunted and the Haunters; or The House and the Brain, by Edward Bulwer-Lytton
- Confessions of an English Opium-Eater, by Thomas de Quincey
- Hallowe’en Party, by Agatha Christie
- At Bertram’s Hotel, by Agatha Christie
Hammurabi is Harper’s translation. The Orphic Poem of the Derveni Papyrus is Sider’s.
A solid time for reading, albeit we are dealing with copious shorter texts, often followed up from H.P. Lovecraft’s Supernatural Horror in Literature essay. Lovecraft’s essay is an excellent starting-off point for investigating the Horror genre prior to the 1930s.
Also a decent amount of writing this month:
- At the Bottom of the Garden earned itself a name-change, becoming The One Who Saw Too Much. It ended up complete at 3,600 words, and has now been sent-off.
- Meanwhile, I also completed a 2,700-word piece, The Sweetest Flower of Nuulath, which is based on the Sweet Roland fairy-tale from the Brothers Grimm.
- Just before the end of the month, I managed a 3,000-word piece, Dangerous Antiques, about a British steel magnate and the dreaded Mortensen Cabinet.
- And I dusted off my old necrophiliac Christmas porn story, A Christmas in Bohemia, polished it up, and sent it off to another hapless market. It really is amazing how coming back to old stories with fresh eyes makes a difference from an editorial perspective.
There is an excellent bilogy of books called “Empyrion” by Stephen Lawhead. It is consists of two parts: “The Search For Fierra” and “The Siege of Dome”.
https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/73936
LikeLike