Idea for our first book? [Closed now, Poll was an onslaught]

[Eric]

Hi all, any idea for our first ever book choice?
I would like to start a vote in the last week of the month.
Keep the availability and readability in mind when proposing a title. Personally, I would suggest something that's available in paperback and no more than 500 pages.

[Josh]

Do we want to narrow down the criteria for the books? Even just for each month's book. Maybe stick to "Alternate Histories" or something like that.

[Eric]

Hi Josh, the thing is, we are still in total dark.
I merely collect all your names from scrapping hipchat room. What if I set a time travel theme and 80% of you guys are super into 50 shades of gray? (In that case I will kill this group but still, what if).
So for our first book, let's throw everything to the wall and see what sticks.

[Eric]

Alright, I guess I should start,
On the sci-fi / fantasy side:
Artemis, the same author of The Martian. Comparing from Mars, a moon colony sounds like a much more feasible goal for mankind, so I'm curious to see what it's like.

Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch, any time a book listed in both "horror" and "humor", I'm in.

The Fifth Season It's a bold name as everyone in Boston knows there are only about two and a half of them.

On the history/historical fiction side:
The Last Days of Night A closer look to the old "Thomas Edison is evil" story.

Rules of Civility A Gentleman in Moscow was a "rich to rag" story, this one is "rag to rich", expecting it to be as beautiful.

[Josh]

Good Omens is excellent. Also love American Gods from Neil.

[Asher]

Good Omens is awesome. I keep failing to finish American Gods. My suggestions here are largely books I have read(but would read again). The books that I am keeping an eye on aren't coming out for a bit yet.

Old Man's War - the book starts off something like "on my 75th birthday I did two things. I visited my wife's grave, and I joined the army"

Storm Front - there are a lot of dresden files books but they are pretty easy reads and you can generally stop after any given book.

Red Rising - this book always felt like sci-fi meets medieval society

[Eric]

So, I went through some of your bookshelves and found this gem:
The Gunslinger
It's on my list, some of you want to read it, some marked it pretty high.
Plus there is little risk kicking off a book club with a Steven King, right?

[Josh]

All those sound good! King and Scalzi are two of my favorite authors.

[Becky]

Hey guys, thank you for adding me to the group. I've never been involved in anything like this (none of my friends read or have any desire to do so), so I am looking forward to it.

I am fairly new to the reading game and since I started just over a year ago I haven't put the books down. I'm averaging one per month but more recently I finished 'The Whistler' by Grisham in 9 days - this is a personal best!

At the moment, I have liked everything I have read but would like to expand and explore some new genres. So if you don't mind, I will sit out of the recommendations for this round (but will of course vote to help with the final choice) and look forward to the first read!!

[Eric]

Hi Becky, nice to meet you!

I definitely agree that reading is about passion and exploration. English is not my first language, my first English reading experience is the first three books of A Song of Ice and Fire. (I still remember where I read the Red Wedding: in Seattle, on a commuter bus for Microsoft interns, I remember watching the Mt. Rainers and thought "WTF just happened?" ).

When it comes to club book choice, it's a similar thing, we want to balance between interest and exploration. We certainly want to choose a book everyone is passionate about because reading takes time, yet occasionally we want it to be something challenging to broaden our horizon a little bit. There are plenty of ways to do it, we will figure it out.

Welcome aboard!

[Josh]

Eric, I'm going to actually recommend AGAINST The Gunslinger - simply because it's the first book in a 7-book (well, 8-book) series.

What about "Eyes of the Dragon" of "The Talisman?" Those are pretty good entry-level King books.

[Eric]

Thanks for the info, Josh.
My original idea is that choosing a series opener might introduce a new world to some of us. But if it's not a very good standalone read, I'm OK to pass.
Talisman is a whopping 650 pages, we can probably save it for the holiday season two-month long read?
I will put both to "to read" and the Eyes of the Dragon to the nominated shelf for now.

[Eric]

Another "rule" I will propose is that we don't pick the same author twice in a year. (so we don't become King's book club etc.)

[Asher]

If we are going for a book a month I think a year might be a long time. I agree we should have varied authors but I think we you limit the auth to every few of months that should be sufficient. Some authors go for different styles with different series.

[Jonathan]

I really enjoy Scalzi, and my partner is working through Red Shirts for the first time.
But, I am always open to discovering new authors.

[Roger]

Reading books that are the first in a series is a good way to introduce people to new worlds and new authors, but I assume our goal will not be to then read the full series - subsequent books will be at members' discretion to read or not. Otherwise, we could spend a year (or more) reading through the entirety of The Wheel of Time. :-) Standalone books are also great - I usually read series, so I appreciate an opportunity and motivation to explore new standalone works.

Old Man's War is something I'd like to try. Having recently read Red Shirts (thanks, Josh!), I'd love to try some other Scalzi.

Artemis is also on my short list to read soon, so I'd be in support of that.

I've read Red Rising and really enjoyed that series. The fourth book recently came out, but I haven't read it yet.

If you haven't tried the Harry Dresden series, Storm Front is the first of that series and a fun, light read. It's early work by Jim Butcher, so not perfect, but the series is awesome and he gets better and better after every book.

Another urban fantasy series that I've enjoyed is the Iron Druid Chronicles, which starts with Hounded. The later books aren't quite as good (I think the author started to lose his passion for the series), but there's a lot of fun stuff in here.

Well, that's a few suggestions for now, and I'm sure we'll find something. I could spin out suggestion after suggestion until I reached the length limit for a post. :-)

[Eric]

Agreed, we are definitely going with the BFS, not DFS (I'm going bold with computer acronym here after seeing a C language book on a PM's shelf) in reading series.

btw. nudged a bunch of you guys on hipchat today. Nice talk! Seems we will have at least 6 active readers for this round, which is not bad. I will digest the nominee on Monday and produce the short list for vote then (I like that the Goodread has this secretly sleek UX so far, hope the vote system works well for us too).

Have a great weekend, we will start reading soon.

[Eric]

Sampled a few of the names above over the weekend.
Haven’t read a word of Gunslinger, only the emotional letter for the latest edition. Noticed that King regarded the work as somewhat immature.
The first chapter of Good Omens is disappointing, somehow I don’t care that much about bantering among a bunch of witty fallen angles. Culture barrier maybe?
Two chapters into Artemis. Feels safe, author makes sure everything holds up scientifically. Not sure if there gonna be enough wow moments though.
The prologue of Red Shirts is brilliant, fun and self aware. I have good feeling for the stories to come.
First chapter of The Old Man’s War is good as advertised. The humble setting only adds your expectations for the war.

So, if it’s up to me at this point, the short list will be

Artemis,
The Old Man ‘s War
Red Shirts

Any write ins? (I realize there are two from one author but oh well)

[Roger]

I read Red Shirts very recently, so although it was awesome, I would be happier with either of the other choices.