Kell's Legend - Andy Remic

I haven't finished all ten of the things I had to do before giving you an account of a glorious day in Sydney, or even what I was doing on Sydney ferries. The Hopefully Rather Minor Fridge Disaster has taken up more time than it ought, what with visiting friends for dinner and dealing with the wading pool on the kitchen floor. Plus my family is doing interesting things again. I rather wish my family would stop being so interesting.

To distract you from my great slowness, I thought I would give you a quick book review. I don't plan to review every single book Angry Robot puts out. For one thing, I've found one (finally!) I entirely didn't enjoy and it would be cruel and callous of me to rip it to shreds in public. I also found one I really adore, but don't feel like reviewing. But I do intend to cover most of them, if I can, because I'm still finding their reviewing policy fascinating and their books good.

Kell's Legend I got in e-version and read on the bus on the way back from Sydney. It was the perfect rollicking read for a bus journey, and I suspect I'll always think of it with the Southern Highlands looking boldly over the corner of my netbook.

Kell's Legend is rather old-fashioned. It's dark. It's more about doom and despair than about gloom and atmosphere. Lots of blood and other nasties. My notes show that I rather enjoyed thinking about this element, they run to lists of words. You really only need one example of a list to get an idea of how the darkness struck me "gorged with blood and evil and ice and clockwork death and perversion." I wonder what the girl sitting next to me thought of my cheerful annotations?

It has a beautiful young woman and a dangerous old man who owns a strange axe (always trust old men with axes). It has an exquisite but really stupid swordfighter. It has many, many evildoers. The pacing is good and Kell's Legend was a fine way to while away a bus journey.

This is not a book to read slowly, or a book that will bring with it much laughter. In fact, it's not funny at all. It's for a day when you yearn for the safety of a Conan-style book and for glory and fighting and a kind of mass insanity. By 'old-fashioned,' you see, I really meant 'sword and sorcery.' With vampires. Clockwork vampires. I rather suspect that this makes it steampunk sword and sorcery.

It's also old-fashioned in another way. If I had known in advance I would have done what I normally do with cliffhangers and either prepare for them (I gauge the pagecount to the end and resign myself) or wait so that I can read the next book immediately after. It's harder to gauge how far to go when one reads an electronic version on a bumpy bus, so I wasn't ready for the ending. Also, I prefer some feel of rounding off and finishing, even if there's a next volume. But it was old-fashioned. Made me think of those serials shown in cinemas in the 1940s (no, I'm not that old – I was researching them last year), lots of drama and a sudden halt to it. Come back next volume. Next week. Whether this is a good ending or a bad ending depends completely on each and every reader's need for a sense of conclusion. Which is a terrible note to end a review on. Can I blame the heatwave?

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Today is so busy! I made the mistake of taking the morning off and finally, finally getting some sleep. As far as sleep goes, it did the trick. As far as getting things done today, who would have guessed that I would have 2 vistors, lots of phonecalls and wildly exciting news by email. The wildly exciting news is about a friend's child, so Uncle Abe's place in the world has been taken and the universe is balanced.

Mum was one of the phonecalls and we swapped Uncle Abe stories. She likes the one where he left the car behind (I never remember that, so don't ask). I like telling people how he and I were at Mum's six years ago and he wasn't at all interested in discussing turning 90 (he wasn't avoiding it - in fact, he was quite proud, but it wasn't what he wanted to talk about, particularly) so he told me all about how he was fixing his grandson's computer, instead. I don't think I've seen Justin since he was a toddler - I need to meet him and ask him how well the computer did. My guess is, very well indeed. Uncle Abe was exceptionally good at fixing appliances and anything that could function he made to function. Except once. He was so upset when a kitchen appliance of mine was unfixable. It nearly broke his heart. He and Dad had a long, long discussion about it and worked out exactly what the manufacturers had done wrong. Mum's memory is of him fixing a radio and leaving its casing off, just in case he wanted to fix it some more.

Anyhow, I have 20 things on my to do list, and I ought to get a couple of them done before I get more visits and more phonecalls. I've only got an hour or so before the fridge repairman comes to take a look, so I need to get at least some things done by then. I got my first 8 hour sleep (in fact, I got 9 hours!) in over 2 weeks, though, so it was worth it.

PS Mum also told me about the talk she gave at an old folks' home this morning. Apparently some of the women were complaining about not being able to hear, but still managed to laugh at all Mum's jokes.

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My life is full of updates. I've crossed precisely three things off my list for today, but with so many updates from other people and other things, well, it's understandable.

I was so stressed this afternoon that for a full hour I did housework. It is perfectly possible to see large amounts of floor in my loungeroom. This is so terrifying I think I shall ignore it. Mind you, there are also places to sit now. Just when everyone's no longer dropping in, there are places to sit.

From Friday, I shall have chairs and be able to give people tea and coffee. Such couthness! This is because I get a new secondhand fridge on Thursday. The fridge doctor came round and declared my machine not-quite-dead but definitely not worth reviving. In fact, really, it's a zombiefridge. I'm getting a trade-in and an older but way, way more reliable model for about $100 more than it would cost to do a repair that might or might not last very long. For those who kindly worried about my finances, it's cutting it fine, but I can do it. I had money put aside to solve the key problem, you see. The key problem remains, but at least I have shall have milk for my coffee and butter for my bread.

I also sorted out more about Chanukah this afternoon. This means I am totally and entirely over my annual Christmas peeve. Poor as a cucumber, but no longer humbugged. Anyhow, if any friends are likely to be in Canberra the second Saturday in December and would really like to come and celebrate Chanukah, let me know and I'll send you an invitation.

Another update is the Sydney Freecon, the last weekend in November from Friday evening till late Sunday afternoon (ignore the website that says it was last weekend). I'm only going to be there on the Saturday, but Kate Forsyth and I are sharing a reading session (I love being on panels with Kate, so we kinda asked if we could). What's more Van Ikin is making an appearance, Terry Dowling is coming, Pamela Freeman, Richard Harland, Alan Baxter and several more: the list of writers and critics is rather cool. Lewis Morley and Marilyn Pride will be there too. They're both awesome. I get to ask them more tricky questions about things I know nothing about!

It's in Bankstown City Library and it costs nothing. This leaves you lots of money to spend on books. I shall be bringing a limited number (I'm carrying them in a backpack from Canberra) of Life Through Cellophane and In Bad Dreams 2. If you want to be certain of a copy, tell me and make sure you're in Bankstown Library on the Saturday. Mind you, you can always ask Galaxy to order them in. They haven't, but they have stocked books by Eneit Press in the past, so it ought to be just a matter of politely requesting, or something. If you want a special Gillian-comment, then getting it on the Saturday is obviously the way.

Does anyone have a special, favourite bit of Life through Cellophane that they'd love me to read out? Something with not too many spoilers? Or would you rather be surprised?