(no subject)

Died on this day in 1437 aged 67 Joan of Navarre (my toy,wikipedia). Second wife of Henry IV, and also his third cousin. She had 9 children with her first husband the Duke of Brittany, and was regent for her eldest son (the next Duke) after his death; she had no children with Henry, but seems to have been on good terms with her step-children during the marriage. However after Henry's death she was accused of trying to kill Henry V (her step-son) through Witchcraft and was imprisoned for 4 years, after which she lived quietly away from court.

Born on this day in 1688 to King James VII of Scotland & II of England and Maria of Modena, James Stuart (my toy,wikipedia). The Old Pretender. As son of James II James would have expected to one day be king. However William&Mary became King instead, after the Glorious Revolution. James spent the rest of his life in exile, attempts were made to regain the thrown for him and for his son Charles, but they all failed.

Reading Wednesday

Read:
Busy week!

I finished
*Exotic England, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown. I like this, as a speedy summary of non-white people in England/under English control and the effects England had on them and that they had on England. Alibhai-Brown is mostly positive, although doesn't ignore the awful racism, and if the book has a point I guess it is mostly that English culture has a long history of reaching out and learning from others as well as of going out and stomping all over them and that the first part is good.

*What I have of Buffy season 9 (I read 2-4 recently, 1 previously)
I'm a bit "meh". But I have a dreadful I WANNA KNOW about it, which is daft, because clearly there is going to be an endless succession of Problems To Solve until Whedon (et. al) get bored

*Uprooted, Naomi Novik.
I like the dragons, so I picked up this.
OMG IT IS AMAZING. I COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN. I have no idea how to describe the "can not put it down" nature of it though, I don't know anything about writing technique. It's a fantasy novel more like a fairy-tale. It has people who do bad things because they have been corrupted by bad things, but it doesn't actually have any 'evil' people, which I rather like. Also I like that it has female magic-users who don't have their magic go away/wrong if they stop being virgins, at least one has children; which is rather an annoyance in a lot of this sort of story.
[caution - one scene of attempted rape; quite a lot of violence; contagious magical evil that makes people do bad things/changes their nature]

Reading:
Nemesis Games, James S. A. Corey (which is a pseudonym for two people writing together). Volume many of the Expanse. I like the series. Sort of noir-detective meets horr-ish SF (by which I mean the aliens are right out of a horror story, but the rest of the trapping are SF). At this point I'm mostly thinking "ah yes, more of the same", which is nice, I like that :) I wouldn't recommend starting the series here, the first is Leviathan Wakes, I like it and I don't like things that are mostly/entirely horror but also I'm not put off by being scared or reading about gross things (and if you are you probably won't like it). There is (already? going to be?) a TV show (which might make it to the UK at some point I guess) which I expect to have much more graphical disgusting things. I particularly like the just-casually-mentioned non heterosexual, monogamous relationships.

Next:
Probably Station 11. About which I hear Good Things.