this is the post I meant to make last weekend...

I am overcome with ennui -- it's very disconcerting, especially because work is finally over and I can finally start working on my own stuff again.

I was in a bookstore on Friday (not even last Friday, now, but the Friday before that) and noticed that there was a new Alan Furst book out (Spies of the Balkans); it looks from the description like a retread of the plot of Dark Star, but set in Greece, Turkey and the Balkans with a Greek detective as the protagonist, rather than set in Paris with a Russian journalist, or whatever he was -- but they're usually journalists with Furst. Anyway, a retread, but Dark Star has one of my favorite Furst A-plots (smuggling Jews out of Nazi-controlled Europe), granted that the A-plot is pretty much not the point of any Furst book ever. And the change of setting and protagonist looks promising. ( I will talk about the A-plots anyway, and also rant about a book I read about three years ago under the cut, which means that there are spoilers for a book called Thread of Grace by Mary Doria Russell )

Anyway, what I really want is for someone else to read the new Furst book and tell me whether there's anything really new about it.

I can't believe that I have finally made this post! Maybe I will be able to post about Doctor Who someday, as well!