Living Dead in Dallas

I was going to leave Living Dead in Dallas by Charlaine Harris, the second Sookie Stackhouse novel, until True Blood Season 2 was on but I forgot until I was actually reading it. No matter, from what I've read about season 2 I think True Blood is going in a different direction.

Which is good because Living Dead in Dallas starts with the death of Lafayette and it would be terrible if True Blood lost that character.

Anyway, on to the book. It was as readable as the first book and I actually thought the writing showed improvement. On the other hand, I didn't think the voice of Sookie Stackhouse was as strong as it had been in Dead until Dark. It is still in first person POV and the supporting cast still has a cardboard cut out feel.

Sookie's relationships with the vampires Bill and Eric are deeply problematic. The trope of male desire being dangerous and uncontrollable is front and centre. Indeed it is male desire that kills Lafayette. Sookie spends a lot of time thinking about how her appearance affects the men around her and what they like to see her in. The feminism that was evident in Dead until Dark has been dropped for this second book.

It was ok. Better than the first one in some respects, not as good in others. I'm looking forward to True Blood in the summer.

Getting to Yes by Roger Fisher, William Ury and Bruce Patton is about principled negotiation. It's about applying fairness and ethics in negotiations, gives advice about how to deal with aggressive negotiation and is full of handy examples. It's an old book and has been quite influential, so while reading it, I had a sense of having heard it all before. There's no harm in repetition with these things though and the Q&A section at the back was very useful in illustrating application. Highly recommended.