anke

Originally published at ankewehner.de. You can comment here or there.

They had got away with nothing worse than bruises and were catching their breath, Nico grinning like a loon.

Once he was sure the thugs weren’t following them, Martin told her, “You’re crazy, you know.”

“What? They looked at me funny and hesitated. ‘S a distraction.”

“OK, but that?”

“Think they didn’t know the song?”

“If they knew it, it helped with looking crazy.” Martin didn’t think the lyrics fit Nico’s upbeat rendition.

She sniffed and straightened up. “‘Minstrel Boy’ seemed appropriate. ‘S traditional.”

“Traditionally it doesn’t use the same melody as ‘Pop Goes The Weasel’.”

“It doesn’t?”

“No.”

Originally published at ankewehner.de. You can comment here or there.

Sonant is a modern fantasy novel self-published by A. Sparrow, available for free at Smashwords. I needed a bit to get into it, but after a while it became a pageturner I couldn't put down (despite editing flaws). The general atmosphere reminded me a bit of Stephen King books, but a bit less dark.

The official blurb:

Something strange lurks in a bell jar in the music room of wealthy eccentric, Aaron Levine, feeding on the sounds his mercenaries create. Bassist Aerie Walker, lured back into performance after a failed odyssey in professional jazz, finds herself involved with this band of musical alchemists as a Deliverance Ministry attempts to exorcize the demons perceived to dwell in Aaron's abode.

The viewpoint characters are Aerie, above-mentioned bassist, who is struggling with depression and finding a paying job; John, stay-at-home stepdad and neighbour of that bands usual "stage", who has some trouble understanding why his wife considers bad music "devil's work"; and Donnie, the priest that ends up, at John's wife's insistence, trying to get rid of the demons that must be behind that unholy noise from the house across the street.

The book keeps the question which side is right - has Aerie been drawn into Bad Things, or is the religious faction hysteric? - open for a long time, and in my opinion even at the resolution doesn't reduce either to cardboard-cutouts. Things that I found really fun to read were the pragmatic attitudes of most of the "exorcists" to their holy-magical job, and the interaction between Aerie and her bandmates; generally there's a neat cast of secondary characters with personality in this book.

I had the feeling it let up a bit towards the end; mostly a romantic subplot I'm not sure was supposed to be absurd and funny, or taken seriously. Anyway, romance doesn't take up much of the book.

Suspense and mystery, mundane problems, and the occasional scene of comic relief made for a very nice mix.

On the not-so-good front: The book should have had someone else proofreading. I noticed missing quotation marks, comma mistakes, dropped words, or the kind of mistakes you get when you have two possible versions of a sentence in your mind and write down a combination of both. However, this wasn't so common and bad that the "I want to know what happens next!" factor didn't pull me through.
Formatting was neat for the most part; one page or so towards the end had a slightly bigger fontsize, and there was an empty page before each chapter heading.

Being not a music buff myself I have no idea if the parts of the book talking about music and instruments sound well done to someone who is familiar with the subject. Apart from the very start, I did not find them distracting or in the way of the story despite my unfamiliarity.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to re-read this, and would pick up a sequel if it happened.

Available for free at Smashwords

I don’t. I suspect the reason why I prefer English songs to German ones is that ignoring the lyrics is easier. I also tend to skip songs/poems inserted into stories, but before I go off on a tangent too far, here’s the point: I’d like to make some music recommendations, including lastfm links where I could find them.

First, I love soundtracks. Y’know, the score kind.

Probably my favourite bit of soundtrack from recent years is Up is Down from the third Pirates of the Caribbean soundtrack, by Frank Zimmer. It’s from the “rocking the boat” scene. The contrast between the lighthearted and more dramatic bits is well balanced, and over all it jut makes my feet tap every time I hear it.

Another piece I fell in love with is the title theme of the fifth season of Babylon 5. There’s a spirit of big things ahead captured here. I eventually found it on the CD The Ragged Edge. Unfortunately it’s very short; when I cut it out two other bits it was stuck to, only 1:30 were left.

One thing I claim occasionally is, “Everything is better with e-guitars”. It’s why Metallica covering Ennio Morricone’s Ecstasy of Gold sounds pretty awesome to me.

Mind, electric violins are wonderful, too, and since they’re not quite as common can be a nice change.

There is, of course, Vanessa Mae. I got the album The Violin Player cheaply some time ago, and my favourite song is Classical Gas.

One musician I discovered recently is Ed Alleyne-Johnson. He acconpanies his own playing by recording bits and looping them, and it just sounds awesome. He has both original compositions and covers of pop/rock songs. Of what I heard, my favourites are Sweet Child o’Mine and Zephyr Song, both covers (of songs by Guns N’ Roses and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, respectively). Of the original compositions I quite like Orange.

One of the few musicians/bands I ever saw live was Charlie McMahon and Gondwana. Didgeridoo and whatever else. Unfortunately there is hardly anything on lastfm, but maybe you can find it on your own if you’re interested. Swarm – which is a very loooong song, only gets started properly 3 minutes in – from the album Travelling also features an electric violin, and the rhythm combined with the burr of the didgeridoo and the sweeping violin melody puts flight in my mind. (Like “flying”, not like “fleeing”, OK? OK.)

Originally posted at ankewehner.de. You can comment here or there.