24 and 25/50; Yep, Phillips

[cyphomandra.livejournal.com]

Laurence Yep, The traitor. This is the fourth book, chronologically, in Yep's Golden Mountain series - I read Dragonwings (set next, chronologically, but written earlier) years ago, when I was obsessed with fantasy (it was next to Jane Yolen's dragon books, and I picked it up assuming it was similar), and liked it but was grumpy about encountering only metaphorical dragons. Currently I am grumpy about endless fantasy trilogies instead, so possibly I should have gone back to these earlier - I hadn't realised until I picked this up that the series was now up to nine books.

( Laurence Yep, The traitor. )

( Caryl Phillips, The nature of blood. )

And it's beautifully written but unremittingly bleak. I've read a lot of good but depressing books recently, and although I've enjoyed them I wouldn't mind something lighter for contrast. Maybe I should avoid literary fiction in general (it hasn't been ending well for me for a while!) but I thought I might just take this opportunity to ask the community if they had any recommendations for this challenge that were a bit more upbeat, and weren't children's or YA - other genre is fine.