What are you reading or have recently completed?

[Quantum]

Recently finished this month

Mortal Showdown
Review to come soon. Has quite a bit of relevance to current events in the Ukraine.


Stein On Writing: A Master Editor of Some of the Most Successful Writers of Our Century Shares His Craft Techniques and Strategies
Definitely one of my top 10 writing guides. Comprehensive and detailed with a plethora of examples.


All You Need Is Kill
What it does, it does well. Fast-paced military sci-fi with the usual hot-blooded soldierly prurience and detailed action sequences.

[Graeme]

Some interesting books right there.

[Graeme]

Just purchased the Stein book on your recommendation.

[Quantum]

Try his triage revision method. I'm going to.

[Graeme]

I have a few different ways to revise. The number of errors that made it through to ATW were a tiny fraction of the number for ASA, so I must be improving

Hopefully TDD will be slick.

[Scout]

I wonder sometimes what you guys are reading. I'm about two thirds into American Dirt about a woman and her son trying to escape from Mexico. It's a good read. Will be back with my thoughts on it. What are you reading?

[Leonie]

I've been working my way through some of the Hugo Packet, and am now having a break by reading Jim Butcher's Dresden Files series.

[Christine]

I wanted to get right into it but I had a terrible vertigo attack on Sunday and I was so foggy headed the last couple of days. So I hope today or tomorrow I will be able to get into the book!! It looks really good!!

[Scout]

I finished American Dirt, a best-selling novel about a mother and son who leave Mexico on the run from a cartel leader. I always read about the author before I begin a book, and the woman who wrote this is white and not a migrant, although she did 4 years of research. So, as I read, even though the story was intriguing and very readable, I found myself wondering if it reflected the true experience of a migrant. I have mixed feelings about this one because of that. I think it's a story better told by one who's been through the experience. Still, it was a page turner.

[Scout]

Just finished Writers and Lovers by Lily King. Probably females would appreciate it more than males (Just my opinion). It's very well written and a breeze to read.

[Lizzie]

Scout wrote: "I finished American Dirt, a best-selling novel about a mother and son who leave Mexico on the run from a cartel leader. I always read about the author before I begin a book, and the woman who wrote..."

I spent a few days with a female journalist from NY. She had spent a lot of time with some former "coyotes" doing research for an article on how illegals immigrants are smuggled across the border, which included using some of the drug routes, such as the tunnels back in the 80s, and some of their "clients" attempting to escape the cartels. The stories of what she had learned were very interesting.

She writes for various publications such as New York Times magazine and such. When I met her she was doing one on prisons, but she had covered some very dark things.

[D.]

Recently finished the updated version of "Let's Get Digital" by David Gaughran, an indie publishing expert. It's free on Amazon and I highly recommend it.

Writing a sequel to my unpublished novel but it's slow going.

Just started reading "The Ocean at the End of the Lane" by Neil Gaiman. I don't have a feel for it yet, though it is drawing me in.

[Scout]

I'm reading The Van by Roddy Doyle, an Irish writer. It's about two working class Irishmen who have lost their jobs and decide to buy a food truck (the van). It's been a while since I've read a novel that made me laugh out loud, but this one does.

[Lizzie]

Scout,

You would like The All-Girl Filling Station's Last Reunion by Fannie Flagg. I read it several years ago. I would read more of her stuff but she doesn't include her books in KU or prime library.

[Scout]

Yes, Lizzie! Love Fannie Flagg, but I missed this one somehow. Will definitely look for it. Thanks for the recommendation! I'm reading some Chekhov short stories now, but just got a notice that someone has it on hold and it has to be returned in a couple of days. Will read what I can until then and come back with a report. Thanks again!

[Gary]

‘Heat’ Bill Buford

[Lizzie]

Leonie wrote: "I've been working my way through some of the Hugo Packet, and am now having a break by reading Jim Butcher's Dresden Files series."

My daughter likes those too. I read them at her insistence up until around 2014 when she went back to WI. Just ok for me as I am not into that genre.

[Scout]

Reread some Chekhov short stories and wasn't as impressed as previously.

[Lizzie]

In the Star Trek world they are doing "autobiographies" of some of the big characters. I read Captain Kirk a while ago and liked it. Last week I read Jean Luc Picard and was disappointed by it. Very heavy of in the beginning and not very much post series. I am collecting them all in hard cover.

I read J.J. Green's latest book in her Star Mage saga. She writes well and tells a good story.

I am working my way through David Drake's Lt. Leary's series. I like his balance of characters vs. military battle details (not excessive). The stories are up and down, but so far, I am through book 5, still enjoying it, and still wanting to read the rest. The lead female character is really what has pulled me into the series; not Lt. Leary.

[D.]

The Library Book by Susan Orlean. Mostly about the big fire that destroyed the LA library in 1986, but about so much more, including the evolution of the library and the city, the eccentric early librarians, architects and others, the arson investigation. Riveting.

[Scout]

Thanks for the recommendation. I'll look for it. Just finished John Sandford's Masked Prey. If you're familiar with him and his Prey books, I'll just say that this wasn't one of his best.

[Scout]

I recently re-read Conrad's Heart of Darkness, which I read in high school. Because of the language, it won't be taught today. A guy goes into the darkness of the jungle, leaving civilization behind, and sets himself up as a god to the natives, losing his humanity in the process. Without the constraints of civilization, he succumbs to the darkness in himself, a darkness we all have in our hearts.

[Barbara]

I just finished "Before She Knew Him", by Peter Swanson. I did finish it but it was pretty anticlimactic because the twist was so obvious so early on that by the last third I was pretty bored, skimmed a lot to get to the predictable end.
This was the "young couple moves into a new neighborhood and there's something strange about th neighbor/neighbors." This seems to be one of the two major plot lines of suspense thrillers lately, the other being "group of people go to a remote location cut off from civilization and there's a psycho in their midst."
In other words, I'm either reading "Rosemary's Baby" or "And Then There Were None."

[J.]

LOL, Barbara. The "domestic thriller" does seem to have taken off and I'm also seeing a lot of novels about the crazy neighbor, roommate, spouse or co-worker.
I recently finished "The Bar Sinister", by Richard Harding Davis. Published in 1903, a long short story or short novella about a dog from the streets who has a reversal of fortune for the better. There were also a couple DNFs - finding it hard to get really as engaged in contemporary books as I've been with those written a century ago.

[Scout]

Just finished Louise Penny's The Grey Wolf. Her novels are kind of "cozy mysteries," with lots of fireplaces, good food with good friends. I read one when I don't feel up to serious reading.

[J.]

Finished "The Murder of My Aunt," by Richard Hull, a minor classic from the 1930s. I thought it was a good idea, but the long passages that involved the prospective murderer's plotting and research began to drag down the pace. I thought it would have been much better as a novella or even a longish short story.

[Papaphilly]

Just finished Candide and enjoyed it.

[Philip]

Just finished The Path to Leadership by Montgomery of Alemania. Was it worth reading…? Just.

[Barbara]

Tried another Peter Swanson book, A Talent for Murder. I have to say, my comment about another book I read a while back applies - if you told me it was written by AI, I'd believe it. Flat one dimensional characters, nothing much in terms of plot, about a third of the way through it really started to drag, once again, I had to skim a lot to get to the end.

[J.]

I read a Freida McFadden book. I forget the title - a young couple goes to look at the remote house of a psychiatrist that has been put on the market. The twist was evident pretty early on and a lot was loaded into the last 25% or so of the book
I also finished "The Red Scream," by Mary Willis Walker. Walker wrote a stand alone in the late 80s, followed up with a 3 book series in the early 90s and then stopped writing. I don't know why - it was a very solid, well-paced thriller about a Texas journalist who comes to doubt the guilt of a death row inmate who is the subject of her recently published true crime bestseller - so does she investigate the possibility that he may be innocent of the crime which means the material in her book is false? Interesting premise, the first in her series, won the Edgar.

[Barbara]

The McFadden book was called "Never Lie" - I read it a while back and put it up on my books a few weeks ago.

[Papaphilly]

"I Have Nothing to Hide": And 20 Other Myths About Surveillance and Privacy. It is very eye opening.

[Charissa]

Currently, I'm reading "The Happiness Files" and "You Don't Want To Know".