I suppose one of the advantages of applying to study English is preparation consists of reading lots, and not slaving in a hospital or law firm all summer. And, to avoid feeling guilty about this, I have been reading lots.

Firstly, A S Byatt's Possession, which I adored for about two thirds, before suddenly becoming disappointed and disillusioned with it. It's a very self indulgent book, and you feel as if much of it, particularly the lengthier journal entries, are a vanity on Byatt's part, to prove herself to the literati as a Serious Author. This isn't helped by the weakness of the plot: two academics (one a typical male everyman, another an ice cold feminist, Byatt's strength not being characterisation) discover love letters between a prominent Victorian poet, and an obscure feminist, assumedly lesbian fairy poet, and from there seek to prove their discovery, following a neat and improbably chronologically correct chain of poems, journals and letters, before their work is snatched and taken credit for by The Forces of Darkness (The obsessive American professor's characterisation is pure Goodkind, including implied paedophilia.) I have to say, aside from the aforementioned Literary Points Scoring, I have no idea why Byatt chose to bother with the modern plotline, given the much more compelling nature of the relationship between the poets, which is worth reading for. This subplot is touching, well thought out and characterised, and never rises to the melodrama of its modern counterpart. The present day storyline, however, is weak, improbable, filled with stock characters, awful, clumsy parallels and a truly awful final 'showdown' (I swear Byatt has taken this from a Scooby Doo episode, it is that ridiculous). Possession has at its heart a genuinely compelling story, smothered under a self indulgent literary facade. A shame.

Jonathan Barnes' The Somnambulist also suffers from excellent concept, awful execution syndrome. It's a lurid, ridiculous Victorian romp, packed with eccentricities and freaks galore, which collapses entirely, as many detective novels do, when its central conspiracy is revealed, and turns out to be much less exciting than it had seemed. Unfortunately, The Somnambulist, goes a step further; the revelations is not only uninteresting, but also ignores much of what had already happened, leading to a huge number of loose ends being entirely dropped (such as the titular character himself, and the reverse time travelling King of London, Cribbs, all fascinating, tantalising characters which demand some kind of resolution to justify their presence at all.) and the stupidest ending to a novel I've ever come across: a pitched battle at London docks between the outcasts of London, the Police, secret government agents, a pair of demonic public schoolboys, and the reanimated corpse of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, dripping acid and leaving destruction in his wake. This has little to no relevance to the rest of the book, and is both unsatisfying and entirely bizzare. Only read if you are prepared to be seriously disappointed by the end.

Sarah Water's Affinity, a lesbian tale of Victorian spiritualism and imprisonment, is decidedly superior, and makes much better use of its 19th Century setting. The gloomy, despairing atmosphere of the prison, and the narrator's bleak home-life is nothing short of excellent, without ever resorting to melodrama. It's gripping, and surprising, right to the very end, and reminds me a great deal of Joanne Harris' Sleep, Pale Sister, which is a very good thing. Highly recommended.

Speaking of which; I could really use advice on which Woolf novel I should start with - I've read the opening thirty pages of both Mrs Dalloway and To The Lighthouse, and would like to have finished one or the other (or another entirely) by the end of the summer.

Being home alone for two weeks is an interesting experience. So far I've learnt that I never want to have cats of my own (Being cooped up with THREE of the bastards, and it raining everyday), much as I like them, and that I really, really, really don't like being alone. The novelty wears off very quickly. It's strange, especially given how detached I normally am, how little I'm enjoying this.

Still, I have UCAS to occupy my time. Joy. Still haven't decided on Unis, which is a little worrying - I know I want to apply to Durham (I would be so happy if I were to get in here), UCL ( though living in London is a little daunting), and Exeter (though I'm not sure which campus, Exeter requires higher grades, but Cornwall seems nicer). Considering Cambridge (Surprisingly I quite liked it after visiting the open day, Oxford not so much. Will blog about this in a day or two), though I've heard being accepted for Cambridge gets you an atuomatic rejection from Durhm, the logic being no-one would turn down an Oxbridge place for Durham. Which is irritating, as I would :(
York and St Andrews are tied for my final slot - St Andrews looks wonderful, but I'm not sure I like not being able to do English only until the third year. York seems interesting, if a little inflexible in the course structure. I'veb een able to rule out Warwick and Leeds, on the grounds that I wouldn't want to live for three years in Leeds or Coventry.

Finally, A S Byatt's Possession is many shades of wonderful, despite some issues with characterisation I think you, alankria , would really enjoy this.

Will blog about recent trips, and papery things soon.

Today has been weirdly lovely, weather wise, which has been very conducive to revision. I've been able to play cello outside, which is slightly surreal, but the sound is so much richer. Of course, my joy is slightly dampened by the knowledge that today is both the beginning and the end of the British Summer. Come June, and half the country will be underwater, just like last year. And the year before.

Finished Mieville's The City & The City. Disappointing, in a word. There was so much potential, the first half was wonderful, full of tantalising glimpses and promises of strange and cool mysteries and academic disputes to be solved.But then the second half swung around, and the plot devolved into a dull detective novel, with a very unsatisfying conclusion. It's not a bad book, per say, just not anywhere near as good as I'd expected from Mieville (though that said, out of the four novels I've read by Mieville, only The Scar has ever been completely wonderful, with a satisfactory ending).

Back to revising now, joy. I think the thing I resent most about exams is the large amount of time either spent revising, or feeling guilty for not revising, and how both detract from all the things you've suddenly thought of that you'd rather be doing instead.

So after deciding I wasn't gong to do Nano this year, I am now doing Nano.

I only discovered this yesterday, so I have absolutely no plans or notes, or hell, even a clue what I'm doing with my novel. Should be, ah, interesting. 2,019 words so far, with a planned 2k for today.

Gaiman's The Graveyard Book is surprisingly good, so far, though it looks like its going to have the usual bland hero (Is this a staple of YA or something? Every YA book I've read with a child/ teenage protagonist has been entirely unremarkable.)  Still , some lovely ideas and worldbuilding so far (I particularly like the Lady on Grey)

Started playing this on Halloween. There is a staggering amount of content in here, most of it top quality (Tiberius69's entry was a particular delight. ChaosWielder's was really quite disturbing. ActorOfVeil's bothered the fuck out of me). Though there are a few weak entries, I'm not sure what the point of Stinkeen's is. But on the whole, well worth playing, and reinstalling NWN2 for, even for just a few hours.

Adam Miller's entry was, as per usual for Miller, all style and no substance, and more than a little pointless. but I must confess I have quite a strong dislike of Miller's work, mainly due to the fact the females in his mods are always bisexual, but the guys? Are always straight. This bothers me on two levels 1) the reduction of female/female relationships to male titillation and 2) The complete absence of homosexual men (probably because as we all know, they're icky, right?) In the readme for the first Dark Waters mod, I remember him saying there was no m/m undertones in the sidetrip to the showers because "It's a family-friendly mod". That pisses me off on so many levels.

Anyway, back to Nano!

I had a wonderful weekend in London, (WHY is it so expensive!?!? Srsly, if it wasn't for that, I would love to study down there. Sigh), mostly at the rather splendid British Museum (though most of it seemed to be closed, or, fun, they were closing sections AS we got to them.)

Saw the Hadrian exhibition, and i have to say, it was really very good. there was a very nice section on Trajan, his family, and their links to Hadrian, as well as on Hadrian's architectural impact and his conquests. There was, perhaps, a little bit more on his Villa than any sane person might want to know, but meh, some of it was interesting.

But the section on Antinous? Was really overhyped. I think it was just there to remind us HADRIAN WAS GAI OKAY!!! GEDDIT? GAIIIIIII!!!!!? I mean, yes, Hadrian had a boy toy, yes it was unusual for such a strong attachment, yes, he had a very nice body, but his personality, his background? Nada. There was some very fascinating stuff on Roman Sexuality, and the cult of Antinous, but not enough sadly. Sabina, was also rather neglected.

Not complaining though, overall excellent exhibition. A bit miffed I might miss out on the Babylon one, given how wonderful Ancient Middle Eastern civilisations are.
BTW The Korean gallery is beautiful, and way underrated. Go and see.

Bought books. Lots of books. About 15 I think, plus another 10 from Play.com/ Bookshops in Liverpool. I don't have the time/ money for these. :(

In other news, Gaiman's Sandman is awesome (although shops have developed the interesting technique of managing to always have every issue but the one I need.)

Rereading Bernard Cornwell's The Winter King at the minute, and rather enjoying it, despite not really knowing much about the Arthurian legends beyond the very basic stories. The fact it's reasonably accurate for the historical period, and the Byzantine/ Dark Ages is probably my favourite period in history, is a huge plus.

Schoolwise- 6th Form's very meh. Classics and RE are what I'd imagined it to be like, actually intelligent debate, we're treated like adults, everyone can cope with the subject, interesting, difficult but so much better than GCSE. History and English Lit, the subject I want to do for degree for fuck's sake? Terrible. And the teachers are all good, the subject matter interesting, though I'm not overly-enthusiastic about history. The problem? The people in my classes are morons. Why are you doing English fucking Literature, if you don't read for pleasure? And why do you whine about a subject you chose to take, and treat the teachers with no respect? And you're paying for this? Jesus fuck. I am seriously pissed off at the amount of time wasted on having to explain simple concepts that we've either already gone through/ or are so fucking basic, it's unbelievable. Like, and I shit you not, the fact that Glasgow is NOT in Ireland, the Cabinet is NOT a piece of furniture, and Ireland? Is not actually attached to England.

I've complained to about 5 different teachers today. I'm fucking paying for this. I could've just gone to a proper college, but decided to stay on, and this is what I get? I don't fucking think so. And while I appreciate the advice, you know, I don't really want to drop History to do Drama so I can get moved to the other English group. I don't think I should have to do that, somehow.

Apologies for the little rant, but I am very pissed off. Also, does anyone know how to get the Rich Text formatting option when posting? It seems to have disappeared for me, so I can't use italics, or bold or anything anymore. Thanks :)

So, I've finally finished Guy Gavriel Kay's The Sarantine Mosaic. I think I'll leave it a few months before reading The Lions of Al-Rassan. Kay's books take a lot of time and involvement (Tigana took me 2 months, The Sarantine Mosaic 3 and a half). Plus, they leave you emotionally exhausted. The last line Crispin says to Styliane? Made me cry for quite some time.

The Sarantine Mosaic was a huge improvement on Tigana. For one, the main view point character, Caius Crispus, was vastly more sympathetic and interesting, than whiny, self-pitying Devin. Sure, Crispin's wife and children had recently died, but from plague. So there was nothing he could do about it. No angst, just move on. Like Tigana the viewpoint bounces a lot, and we get the viewpoints of quite a large cast of characters. But it works, mainly because, Kay's laid the duology out like a mosaic, with the same themes, lines of dialog, images and characters recurring over and over again. The fact that Crispin is a mosaic artist, and stays an artist, is wonderful (and sad there are so few artists in fantasy, considering what could be done with them). The plotting is intricate, the setting (alternate Byzantium under Emperor Justinian) is wonderful, the characters fascinating (OK, there are perhaps a few too many beautiful, powerful and witty women. But Kay does at least make them all very different, and all flawed. plus Alixana is awesome), and the prose is beautiful, though understated. A far-cry from the OTT melodrama of Tigana, although Kay can't quite resist the occasional moment of melodramatic angst and annoying omniscient narrator foreshadowing. I'd highly recommend it, even if you don't like Kay's other works.

Not sure what to read next now. I'm over 2/3 of the way through Joanne Harris' Sleep, Pale Sister, and loving every minute of it (interesting choice to only have 4 characters, and have them all as viewpoint characters).
I've started K J Bishop's The Etched City, and the first few pages I've read have been very intriguing. Looking forward to seeing where this is going.
Alan Carey's Scar Night, and Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, are both splendid, at least the little I've read has been.
I doubt anything's going to quite move me the way Mieville's The Scar did, but still, lots of interesting, different stuff to read.

I'm going to Durham in a couple of days (YAY!) mainly because, for once, my mum wants to look at the same Uni I do.

Anyway, while there, apparently, they have these shops there that sell books. Now as a poor deprived urchin from Liverpool this concept is alien to me. I may get confused.  I might buy some books while in Durham. However, I have enough tradition fantasy fare to keep me going until next year (40 books last count), so I want something a bit different to look for. Steampunk. I've not really tried anything from this genre (unless Mieville's Bas-lag novels count?). So reccys would be much appreciated. Preferably books with strong female characters, I get rather bored with all male casts.

Thanks in advance.

BTW Dentists are the handmaids of Satan. My mouth has been dead now for 3 hours. Eating a chocolate digestive? Not fun.