What Else Are You Reading - October 2014

[Adelaide]

I am currently reading The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August and really enjoying it. Also rereading Cyteen and liking it, but realizing that it might be too dense for my mood right now.

I also started reading Nailbiter #1 and am finding it both creepy and enjoyable. I am totally gonna get my horror on this month.

[terpkristin]

Enjoying The Thousand-Dollar Tan Line and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

And still mopping up some other books I started ages ago and have put down but not for good. :D

Edited because I fail at posting. ;) Rocket scientist and all that.

[Joel]

Currently reading Black Hawk Down for some nonfiction. I've been really enjoying it a lot.

Then I might start in on Shadows Beneath by Brandon Sanderson, Mary Kowall, Dan Wells, and Howard Taylor.

But that may be put on the back burner because I should be getting Ancillary Justice from the library very soon. I've been on the wait list for quite some time. Super excited to try it out.

[Kristina]

I literally just finished Clockwork Princess. I loved (loved!) the Mortal Instruments, and the prequel series-The Infernal Devices-was also amazing. This last book had me in tears, for the first time in my reading life! I think next I'm going to finish up Alif, then knock out some more Iron Driud. The first one was fun.

[Joseph]

Just finished The Troupe by Robert Jackson Bennett -- holy cow, that was good! -- and am about to start The Masked Empire by Patrick Weekes because I'm really, really excited about the upcoming Dragon Age: Inquisition computer game and want to get myself ready for it.

[Scott]

I've preordered Ancillary Sword so will probably wait until next month to read this months pick. I'm enjoying Name of the Wind but progress is slow since I'm just reading on this tube.


The Name of the Wind


Batman: The Dark Knight Returns


Ancillary Sword


Business Model Generation: A Handbook For Visionaries, Game Changers, And Challengers

[Dharmakirti]

I finally finished Gravity's Rainbow. Never before have I felt such a sense of accomplishment upon finishing a book.

I should finish up The Gap into Conflict sometime today. I'm really liking this and I look forward to the next book in the series.

I'm also reading The Decameron with another Goodreads group.

[Carolina]

Dharmakirti wrote: "I finally finished Gravity's Rainbow. Never before have I felt such a sense of accomplishment upon finishing a book..."

I've been meaning to read that one, was it good?

[[deleted user]]

Took me a few days to put together my thoughts on Caitlin R. Kiernan's The Drowning Girl. A very unique book, on many levels. Not sure I'd recommend it . . . . not even sure I like it! And yet I gave it 5 stars.

Here's my review

[Jeff]

Listening to Alif the Unseen but about to Lem it after 28% in. It's just not clicking for me and I'm very bored w/ it.

[Sean]

In addition to the pick, I'm (re)reading A Night in the Lonesome October by Roger Zelazny, because it's finally back in print (if you don't have it, you should get it). I'm also listening to Elantris by Brandon Sanderson.

[Whitney]

I have to finish and do a paper on Richard III by William Shakespeare.

then I want to finish:
A Time to Die
The Spiritglass Charade
Leviathan Wakes,I, Robot,Half a King

[Lindsay]

Rabindranauth wrote: "Took me a few days to put together my thoughts on Caitlin R. Kiernan's The Drowning Girl. A very unique book, on many levels. Not sure I'd recommend it . . . . not even sure I like ..."

Agree 100% with your review. I read it last year and thought it was brilliant, but harrowing. Mental illness is such a difficult thing to write convincingly and what Imp goes through in this book would be difficult to handle if you were neurotypical, let alone the level of disability that she operates at.

And I also agree it's a book to be appreciated not so much enjoyed. I think you'd have to be a fairly sick puppy to enjoy something like this.

[Lindsay]

I finished off Echopraxia by Peter Watts (the sequel to Blindsight). Very good hard SF with a bibliography that makes a core of good reading all by itself. If you've read other stuff he's written you know what to expect. He writes psychologically and philosophically disturbing hard SF and this is more of the same.

After that I read Sword of the Bright Lady by M.C. Planck which explores what happens if you drop a mechanical engineer into a D&D-like fantasy world (complete with leveling up, an alignment system and an XP-equivalent mechanic) and then gets into the political, economic and societal structures of that sort of world and the effect of a one-man industrial revolution.

Now I'm reading The Darwin Elevator by Jason M. Hough. Interesting premise and good so far.

[[deleted user]]

I'm nearing the end of Ghost Hawk. It's rather meandering, not a page-turner by any means. But it has characters you care for. It includes a good bit of the early history of MA and RI. It's not very S or L, but one of the main characters is a ghost.

I've also just begun Dude: The Big Book of Zonker. Available on-line at my local library. Doonesbury is kind of a record of my generation, it's sometimes a bit sad looking back on the story as it nears the end. We were so young once.

[Dharmakirti]

Lindsay wrote: "I finished off Echopraxia by Peter Watts (the sequel to Blindsight). Very good hard SF with a bibliography that makes a core of good reading all by itsel..."

Have you read Scott Bakker's Neuropath? He explores some simliar ideas as Watts' does in Blindsight but he uses the psycho-thriller genre as oppsed to hard scifi (although, it does contain some hard sci fi elements). Also, if you liked the philosophy of mind that Watts was exploring in Blindsight, Scott Bakker's blog, Three Pound Brain, might be of interest. He uses his blog to explore the implcations of "Blind Brain Theory," his theory of conscisousness and cognition.

Edit: I knew Mr. Watts mentioned Neuropath on his blog at one point in time, here is the link: http://www.rifters.com/crawl/?p=14

[Jennifer]

I just finished The Ghost Brigades. I enjoyed it but I liked Old Man's War a little bit better. But I did jump right into The Last Colony. I guess I'm in a Scalzi mood to start the month off.

[Joe Informatico]

Just finished The Mirror Empire. I'm still undecided about the plot and characters, but man, that worldbuilding. Once in a while, it's nice to get some actual "epic" and "fantasy" in my epic fantasy, so bonus points to Hurley for that.

Working through the audiobook of The Mad Ship, the second Livetraders book.

Resuming The Heart of Valor because I'm going to an event featuring Tanya Huff and a few other Canadian SF&F authors in a few weeks, and hoping to get a few more of their books under my belt.

And then, I guess I'm hoping either City of Stairs or Lock In comes in from the library for me.

[Rob, Roberator]

Joe Informatico wrote: "Just finished The Mirror Empire. I'm still undecided about the plot and characters, but man, that worldbuilding. Once in a while, it's nice to get some actual "epic" and "fantasy" i..."

Your book selection seems awfully familiar..

[Dharmakirti]

Joe Informatico wrote: "Just finished The Mirror Empire. I'm still undecided about the plot and characters, but man, that worldbuilding. Once in a while, it's nice to get some actual "epic" and "fantasy" i..."

I read Mirror Empires prologue last night and it seemed interesting but it didn't compell me to read on. I still want to read it, but I think I'm going to wait until after I read Martha Wells' The Element of Fire, her first Ile-Rien novel.

[[deleted user]]

Lindsay wrote: "Rabindranauth wrote: "Took me a few days to put together my thoughts on Caitlin R. Kiernan's The Drowning Girl. A very unique book, on many levels. Not sure I'd recommend it . . . ...."

Agreed, Kiernan does an amazing job of not only depicting that but also how Imp deals with it. All through the book there was this sense of extreme fragility to her, especially with how close she comes to breaking point at multiple times over the course of it. Excellent stuff! So far, I don't know anyone that's enjoyed the entire book; everyone has their favorite moments, but that's as close to enjoyment as it gets, hah.

[[deleted user]]

Lindsay wrote: "I finished off Echopraxia by Peter Watts (the sequel to Blindsight). Very good hard SF with a bibliography that makes a core of good reading all by itsel..."

I loved Echopraxia! I love his different takes on God as a metaphysical being, I think my favorite was the relation of God to the concept of digital physics. Absolutely top notch stuff. I'm going to enjoy expliring those notes he has at the end when I can find the time.

[[deleted user]]

Joe Informatico wrote: "Just finished The Mirror Empire. I'm still undecided about the plot and characters, but man, that worldbuilding. Once in a while, it's nice to get some actual "epic" and "fantasy" i..."

You should check out The Garden of Stones by Mark T Barnes. One of the most underrated series ever. That guy is what it would look like if China Mieville wrote epic fantasy. Crazy insane worldbuilding, and dont get me start on the characters. It took me two books to decide who I wanted to root for, they're all so incredibly grey.

[Dara]

I can't find anything that strikes my fancy so I'm going with The Thousand-Dollar Tan Line.

[Walter]

Just finished listening to my commute book, Decline and Fall of Rome. Now listening to Empire of Gold : A History of the Byzantine Empire.

And reading the current BotM as well.

[Thane]

Sean wrote: "In addition to the pick, I'm (re)reading A Night in the Lonesome October by Roger Zelazny, because it's finally back in print (if you don't have it, you should get it). I'm also listen..."

You can't go wrong with that one!

I am finally getting to His Majesty's Dragon and loving it.

[Tamahome]

Liked Letter 44 volume 1 (comics), if you like politics in your science fiction. My review. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Batman vol 4 Zero Year - Secret City, too. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Paolo]

I recently finished Leviathan Wakes, which was pretty good, and just got started with Tigana.

[Phil]

Just finished Betrayal by Aaron Allston. It's the first Star Wars book I've ever read and I was pleasantly surprised. There were lots of good action scenes and the plot was actually quite complex.
Starting Alif the Unseen.

[[deleted user]]

I started off the month with some Lovecraftian horror (The Imago Sequence and Other Stories by Laird Barron) and for my first ever audiobook, a classic (The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway). Likely candidates in the sci fi/fantasy genre for this month include Lock In by John Scalzi, War Dogs by Greg Bear, Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie, The Doubt Factory by Paolo Bacigalupi and The Steel Remains by Richard K Morgan.

[Tamahome]

I'm also 25% into Lawrence Block's A Walk Among the Tombstones, also adapted as a new Liam Neesan movie. I could see the similarities with Taken. I read the book in Liam Neesan's voice. There's discounts if you buy the print version and the kindle version and the audio version. If you've ever seen the movie 8 Million Ways to die with Jeff Bridges, it's the same character, Matt Scudder, ex alcoholic private detective and ex cop.

[AndTheRest]

Just finished The Casablanca Tango by James Lileks, a tremendously enjoyable noir mystery as seen through the eyes (and camera lens) of a 1947 newspaper photographer. I wasn't expecting that feeling of disorientation on being dropped onto an alien world or into a fantasy culture, but this strange setting where the pulse of society is measured by rival big city newspapers, where TV only exists in the 6th floor showroom of the downtown department store, and the language rings unfamiliar rhythms and phraseologies, that is most certainly what I felt.

Also just finished City Beyond Time: Tales of the Fall of Metachronopolis by John C. Wright. If time travel stories are of interest, this one surely belongs in your collection.

[Jenny (Reading Envy)]

Dharmakirti wrote: "I finally finished Gravity's Rainbow. Never before have I felt such a sense of accomplishment upon finishing a book."

Congrats! Now I'll go look for your review to see what you thought!

I'm in the middle of The Writing Life by Annie Dillard, a book about writing that I think any aspiring (or experienced) writer should read. Dillard wastes no words, and her ability to revise until perfection is inspiring.

[Ally]

I wanted to read Alif the Unseen but my library does not have a copy and I can't justify buying it (it doesn't sound interesting enough to me). Hoping next month's book is a different story.
Otherwise, I am currently reading Hyperion by Dan Simmons, a book which was recommended to me by a member of a sci fi book club I am part of, and I am quite grateful for the recommendation because it is turning out to be a fantastic read. One of those books where you start reading it and are totally confused about practically everything the author is writing, then as you go on you find yourself becoming more and more immersed in the world (or in this case "Worlds") of the characters and before you know it, you're an expert on all the terminology and history of this universe. Anyways such a great mystery unraveling in this one.
Next I'm picking up The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin.

[Jenny (Reading Envy)]

Ally wrote: "I wanted to read Alif the Unseen but my library does not have a copy and I can't justify buying it (it doesn't sound interesting enough to me). Hoping next month's book is a differe..."

Ally, we read Hyperion earlier in Sword and Laser so when you finish, feel free to jump in on old discussion threads. People loved that book so I'm sure they'll be happy to talk about it more.

[Ctgt]

Andy wrote: "I started off the month with some Lovecraftian horror (The Imago Sequence and Other Stories by Laird Barron) and for my first ever audiobook, a classic ([book:The Old Man and the Sea|..."

Hope you enjoyed "Imago" as much as I did. Love Barron.

[Ctgt]

Tamahome wrote: "I'm also 25% into Lawrence Block's A Walk Among the Tombstones, also adapted as a new Liam Neesan movie. I could see the similarities with Taken. I read the book in Liam Neesan's vo..."

I've read the first four Scudder books and really enjoy the series. I didn't like the fourth book as much as the previous three but it looks like this is one of those series that turns a corner with the fifth book.

[Ally]

Jenny (Reading Envy) wrote: "Ally wrote: "I wanted to read Alif the Unseen but my library does not have a copy and I can't justify buying it (it doesn't sound interesting enough to me). Hoping next month's book..."

Thanks so much, I had a feeling this was a book that was already read by the group, look forward to seeing if people enjoyed it as much as I am.

[terpkristin]

Ally wrote: "Otherwise, I am currently reading Hyperion by Dan Simmons, a book which was recommended to me by a member of a sci fi book club I am part of, and I am quite grateful for the recommendation because it is turning out to be a fantastic read."

Just know, when you get to the end, you more or less have to read The Fall of Hyperion, otherwise you won't get the end of the story. The rest of the Cantos is good, too (Endymion and The Rise of Endymion), but if you don't at least read Fall, you will feel very let down by how Hyperion ends.

I'm listening to Cat Trick as well as Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. And I have some other books that are in the background but not relevant... ;)

[Michal]

I finished The Eye of the Heron on Friday, have gone back to reading Bulfinch's Mythology.

[terpkristin]

Oh yeah, I finished the Veronica Mars book, The Thousand-Dollar Tan Line, Friday night. This was after binge-watching the show and then the movie over the last month and a half or so. I enjoyed it, though it wasn't anything deep. I hope that there will be more.

[Trike]

It's that time of year when I start feeling pressure to complete my annual reading challenge of reading two books with titles from each letter of the alphabet.

I thoroughly enjoyed XOM-B, which I picked up purely because it started with an X, but it's like a kinetic action flick that has the first unique take on zombies I've seen since the movie 28 Days Later.

But I need another X! And Y! And Z! Gah!

[Jenny (Reading Envy)]

terpkristin wrote: "Oh yeah, I finished the Veronica Mars book, The Thousand-Dollar Tan Line, Friday night. This was after binge-watching the show and then the movie over the last month and a half or s..."

Yeah it was cute in the best way! Did you listen or read? I loved the audio since Veronica herself reads it.

[terpkristin]

I listened, it was so much fun to have Kristen Bell do the reading. :)

[Walter]

My wife and I have been watching the Veronica Mars series via Amazon Prime. We're maybe two thirds of the way through the third season. Haven't read any of the books, though. Are these books you're referring to the licensed fan fiction from Amazon? If I weren't so overwhelmed with my own projects, I'd be tempted to take a stab at one of those. (I did include at least one VM reference in my current project, though). :)

BTW Terp, Jenny, have either of you caught any of the web spin-off series, 'Play It Again Dick'? Haven't watched any yet, I wanted to wait till we're done with the last season and the film, but have heard some good things about it.

[[deleted user]]

Ctgt wrote: "Hope you enjoyed "Imago" as much as I did. Love Barron."

I'm on the last story now and yes, I'm enjoying it immensely. I haven't read much of this Lovecraft-inspired stuff before so it took a little getting used to, but I think I've acquired the taste in a big way. Any recommendations for similar stuff that I might want to try?

[terpkristin]

There's only one book so far...I don't think it's licensed fan fiction, it's actually from the creator of the show (Rob Thomas). Haven't seen the web series yet, I only found out about it the other day. If you decide to read the book, do it after you've seen the movie (as it references things that happened in the movie).

[Jenny (Reading Envy)]

Haven't heard of Play It Again Dick, but terp is right - the books are from Rob Thomas himself. The writer, not the singer.

[Walter]

Jenny, 'Play It Again Dick' is a web series produced by Rob Thomas in which a somewhat fictionalized version of Ryan Hansen uses the show to launch a Veronica Mars spin-off, with him playing his character Dick Casablancas as a detective. As I understand it, the series will be a mishmash of 'reality' bits of the actors playing skewed versions of themselves alongside bits of the 'Play It Again Dick' series with the old regulars playing skewed versions of their old characters.

Sounds like a lot of fun; looking forward to checking it out.

[Paolo]

Ally wrote: "I wanted to read Alif the Unseen but my library does not have a copy and I can't justify buying it (it doesn't sound interesting enough to me). Hoping next month's book is a differe..."

Much love for Hyperion! It's probably my favorite book out of the ones I've read this year.