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What Else Are You Reading?
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What else are you reading - May 2021
Is this in the right place? You are the boss, but first time I’ve seen it up here.
reading the book that written by an 17 years old kid known as Terry Pratchett which called 'The Carpet People.https://www.terrypratchettbooks.com/b...
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Haha. Nope. I was wondering where it went..that'll learn me not to make threads before I've had my coffee!
Been on a road trip so more audiobooks: Seraphina was a good quality YA fantasy adventure that was a great example of the form. Really enjoyed the audio performance..
Listened to Artificial Condition which was great but I prefer the text as Kevin Free is the wrong voice for the character.
I now have to find another audio book to listen to.
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At least that's how I initially felt about James Marsters as Harry Dresden. However he grew on me and now I can't imagine anyone else as Harry.
A Desolation Called Peace - I need to get a move on it, keep stopping to work in the yard or watch hockey.Very happy with it so far...
Three Random :)
Rob wrote: "I actually really love Kevin Free as Murderbot. But I started with audio. I can imagine if you start with the text version and imagine your own voice most narrators are not going to live up to your..."In my head Murderbot has a voice somewhere between a man and woman, more like a masculine-sounding woman, because I feel like its more purely gender-neutral. Kind of like the alien Taelons from Earth: Final Conflict, but I don’t know whose narration would best fit that.
https://youtu.be/WXE3NpTUJME
So far, only three.Read: King Solomon's Mine (Adventure)
Reading: Lord of the Flies (Adventure)
Reading soon: Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (Fantasy)
Too much fun so far this month. Loved King Solomon's Mine. Everything I like in a good old fashion adventure book. Am liking Lord of the Flies, wonder why I never read it in high school or college. I am sure the second book in the Lord of the Rings trilogy will also be a treasure.
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LotR is not a trilogy. The Two Towers is the middle third of a single book, that is sometimes split into 3 books
I had tried listening to the audiobook of “king Solomon’s Mine” about 10 years ago, and bounced off of it a bit at the time. The language was so stuffy that it made it hard to listen to while driving. I should go back and try again. I figured the story should be interesting.
Just started The Galaxy, and the Ground Within. Last week, I went ahead and started Network Effect. Rogue Protocol was already checked out so I'll finish the novellas later.
Jerimy wrote: "So far, only three.Read: King Solomon's Mine (Adventure)
Reading: Lord of the Flies (Adventure)
Reading soon: Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (Fantasy)
Too much fun so far this month. Loved..."
Have you read Haggard's She: A History of Adventure? For my money, his masterpiece, although King Solomon's Mines is very much in the running.
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I went through a H. Rider Haggard phase when I was young. (Early teens). I loved She, King Solomon's Mines & the Allan Quartermain series.
I worry that if I tried to read them now they'd be more sexist & racist than I remember from 45+ years ago.
Joseph wrote: "Jerimy wrote: "So far, only three.Read: King Solomon's Mine (Adventure)
Reading: Lord of the Flies (Adventure)
Reading soon: Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (Fantasy)
Too much fun so far th..."
Hello Joseph,
King Solomon's Mine was the first Haggard book I have read, but I believe I have the entire Allan Quartermain collection, and after reading King Solomon's Mine I fully anticipate reading more. Thanks for the suggestion of She. What are some of your favorite authors? I have some go-to authors like Stephen King, Robert Jordan, Robert Howard, G.A. Henty, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Dean Koontz, and Steven R. Lawhead. I am rarely disappointed with any of their work.
Tassie Dave wrote: "I worry that if I tried to read them now they'd be more sexist & racist than I remember from 45+ years ago...."
I mean, they're not not, but considering their provenance, I don't think they're that bad, relatively speaking? Haggard at least had lived for a while in Africa, unlike many of his contemporaries, so there's a certain amount of verisimilitude.
Jerimy wrote: "King Solomon's Mine was the first Haggard book I have read, but I believe I have the entire Allan Quartermain collection, and after reading King Solomon's Mine I fully anticipate reading more. Thanks for the suggestion of She. What are some of your favorite authors? I have some go-to authors like Stephen King, Robert Jordan, Robert Howard, G.A. Henty, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Dean Koontz, and Steven R. Lawhead. I am rarely disappointed with any of their work."Burroughs (the John Carter books in particular) and Howard are on my list as well. Of more recent vintage (although my favorite books by them are, oh god, pushing 40 years old at this point), C.J. Cherryh (I'd recommend the Morgaine books starting with Gate of Ivrel) and Tanith Lee (especially the Flat Earth books beginning with Night's Master) are particular favorites.
Tassie Dave wrote: ""She Who Must Be Obeyed"I went through a H. Rider Haggard phase when I was young. (Early teens). I loved She, King Solomon's Mines & the Allan Quartermain series.
I worry that if I tried to read..."
Good point. There is almost always racism in all of the 1800's and early 1900's classics. Isn't that strange? It makes me wonder when writers started to incorporate it? If one were to study ancient text it is virtually non-existent. The bias is based on where one resides vice what race one is. If race is mentioned in the ancient texts it is to describe a distinction between human, giant, monster, angel, demon, Nephilim, etcetera. Yet in the 1800's and much of the 1900's it is a favorite topic that separated human beings into different categories as if we were different forms of life. Race in this fashion is a modern inaccuracy. Still, I can't help loving the classics.
Tassie Dave wrote: "Jerimy wrote: "I am sure the second book in the Lord of the Rings trilogy will also be a treasure."LotR is not a trilogy. The Two Towers is the middle third of a single book, that is sometimes sp..."
You sound like my daughter. I refer to it as a trilogy because I purchased the series as three separate books. Technically it is six books, as J.R.R. writes them.
My copy of Network Effect should be at the library this week so I read all four Murderbot novellas and both the short stories in preparation.
Joseph wrote: "Jerimy wrote: "King Solomon's Mine was the first Haggard book I have read, but I believe I have the entire Allan Quartermain collection, and after reading King Solomon's Mine I fully anticipate rea..."Joseph wrote: "Tassie Dave wrote: "I worry that if I tried to read them now they'd be more sexist & racist than I remember from 45+ years ago.
..."
I mean, they're not not, but considering their provenance, I do..."
I spent a year in Djibouti, Africa, and I can say from experience, based on his writing of King Solomon's Mine, he has a certain respect for the people there. I found the local population to be extremely intelligent and happy if one could believe that. Most of the population spoke Somali (Native language), French, Arabic (Irag dialect), and a few of them even spoke English.
Joseph wrote: "Jerimy wrote: "King Solomon's Mine was the first Haggard book I have read, but I believe I have the entire Allan Quartermain collection, and after reading King Solomon's Mine I fully anticipate rea..."Joseph, I love the John Carter Series. Have read most of them twice. Also loved the Conan Series. Looking forward to Bran Mak Morn, and Solomon Kane books. I will definitely look into your suggested reads. Looks like we have similar tastes. I might recommend some Steven R. Lawhead, but a note of warning, he is a Christian author, but he does not overwhelm his readers with dogma and he is not preachy.
Tassie Dave wrote: ""She Who Must Be Obeyed"I went through a H. Rider Haggard phase when I was young. (Early teens). I loved She, King Solomon's Mines & the Allan Quartermain series.
I worry that if I tried to read..."
I believe you may be pleasantly surprised if you were to revisit these books.
I read the first three of Lawhead's Arthur books (Taliesin, Merlin, Arthur) many years ago. I should revisit them one of these years, now that you've reminded me of them.
I just read Binti and was dreadfully disappointed by it after seeing it mentioned favourably here in the past. Oh well, not every recommendation can be a winner. Started on Fugitive Telemetry which I can confidently predict I will enjoy much more.
Yesterday I finished Windswept. It's the first book in a series, and tells of a young man discovering that he has strange magical powers. The stakes are low but there's still danger and risk. I like that the main character is trying to be good and heroic, but is also struggling with growing up. I plan to continue with the series once I read the other books I bought recently.
I'm currently reading some genre-adjacent nonfiction: Flame and Crimson: A History of Sword-and-Sorcery by Brian Murphy.
Colin wrote: "I just read Binti and was dreadfully disappointed by it after seeing it mentioned favourably here in the past. Oh well, not every recommendation can be a winner. "
Not everyone liked it: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Trike wrote: "Not everyone liked it: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show..."Yes! Your review is considerably wordier than my own, but I agree with all the points you made there.
Got The Traveler's Gate Trilogy on a kindle deal a while back and started that this month. It was a well spent couple of dollars as I'm really enjoying it.
Read a Poul Anderson book, The Stars are Also Fire. It's a sidequel to "Harvest of Stars" and takes place both before and after events of that book.There's some interesting ideas here, but overall the book is ponderous and dull. Anderson was the king of short novels in his heyday, getting right to the action. This one just goes on and on with lots of worldbuilding and little movement. It's the story of how Luna was colonized and a new breed of humanity arose, told in excruciating detail.
There's a macguffin that I can't make hide nor hair out of. An outer system planetoid is supposed to be a critical items. Er, sure. Except that there are any number of asteroids or moons that would serve just as well. If there is a real distinction here it is entirely in Anderson's mind and not expressed in the book.
Anderson's writing style is more "modern SF" here than the choppy prose prominent in earlier works. It's like he's showing off what he has learned over the years. The writing is smooth, but tasteless.
Perhaps the best part is the ongoing appearance of a charismatic space businessman, Anson Guthrie. (I can't be the only person who wants to call him "Arlo.") Guthrie's strength of personality is critical in building the space company Fireball. It's as if this is a thin copy of Elon Musk, except the book was written in 1995. I'm amused to think that perhaps we were always going to need such a person, and eventually Musk moved into the role.
This is now the third book where Anderson works the theme of a humanity stultified by easy living. It seems to have obsessed him in later life. I can understand the concern, but really one book of that was enough. I didn't hate this book, but wasn't unhappy when it ended. The best part was crammed into the last five percent of the novel, and really most of the preceding 95% could have been greatly cut.
Also picked up two Rivers of London novellas, The Furthest Station and The October Man. Both had charms but lacked in storytelling. Furthest Station was the worst offender here, with several plot points hacked in and a greatly foreshortened ending. It seemed like this was a book that Aaronovitch just couldn't get to gel so he put it out as a novella for hungry fans. The base idea is amusing enough - ghosts riding commuter trains - but the mystery doesn't take.
October Man is a romp through German wine country. There's enough here to satisfy. We're introduced to the German version of the Folly, with plenty of local color and place names to give a Continental feel. The characters act in ways that feel German, at least, by my sense of Germans I've interacted with in business and during my travels. One very different point is the casualness that Continentals bring to the workplace. Even during a murder investigation people expect to be off at 5 PM. Contrast that to the buzzing hive that is London.
All in all a decent take on the greater magical world. River spirits are kind of shoehorned in here, with some callbacks to the main series that feel like rehashes of other plot points. Then there's the, forget their name but the group that comes in to deal with magical threats. Felt like the fire company in the main sequence and the leader was a clone of Frank Caffrey. But these borrows weren't too blatant so didn't ruin the story.
Tobias Winter's laconic narration provides a subtle underlying humor, as when he prepares dinner with his colleague Sommer's woefully underequipped kitchen.
Since I was jonesing for more Rivers of London I didn't mind the shortcomings, but these are not up to the snuff of the main sequence. Contrast that with the Abigail novella which told a full story with nuanced detail and a great take on Genius Loci. Aaronovitch can nail the novella length when he tries. These two didn't quite make it.
I finished the penultimate book in the Amber series (which is also the fourth book in the Second Chronicles of Amber): 
Knight of Shadows by Roger Zelazny
Rating: 3 stars
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
and I am going to read a story from
The Conquering Sword of Conan by Robert E. Howard
before I get started on the FINAL book in the Amber series:
Prince of Chaos by Roger Zelazny
Just finished A Desolation Called Peace. I have seen people say it is not as good as book 1. It is a different tale and I just adored it. I love this world and want more. I am so glad for my Teixcalaan name... I am ready to go to the City and be Three Random.
Calvey wrote: "Just finished A Desolation Called Peace. I have seen people say it is not as good as book 1. It is a different tale and I just adored it. I love this world and want more. I am so gl..."It’s definitely not as surprising, but you can’t be fresh and new the second time. I found it more Space Opera than court intrigue. I liked it, though.
Parable of Sorrow and The Parable of Talent by Octavia E. Butler. The books nail the present social and political climate that we are experiencing! Scary!
I finished the first two books in Ed McDonald fabulous Grimdark series Raven's Mark, Blackwing, Ravencry, and a third of the way thru Crowfall. Audio books narrated by Colin Mace who is an easy listen. John Gwynne's first in a new series came out on the May 4th , The Shadow of the Gods . Rip thru the Murderbot series save for the newest, but it is cued up for my next run around town day.
Finally received the final book. The Book of Koli by M.R. Carey. Just want to dump all the books am reading and jump into this book but...cool the heels. Anticipation can cloud the moment so patient is the word of the day! This 3 book series is turning out to be "the bomb". Later.
I am currently rereading Network Effect the months pick.being a long way behind on fantasy I went on a trawl through the local libraries audiobooks and picked The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue which starts perfectly. Just a lovely audio book so far (2.5 hours in).
Finished Flame and Crimson: A History of Sword-and-Sorcery and, for no particular reason, started The People of the Mist by H. Rider Haggard.
I finished Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, and am now working on Shogun, and The Adventures of Bigfoot Wallace. Shogun is one of the most entertaining books I have ever read, so far. There is plenty of humor, violence, Japanese culture, English culture, ethics, perverted sex, and danger. I have also picked up a good deal of the Japanese language, and I am only on page 264. I don't like to put the book down, so luckily it is my go-to book for lunches, and breaks at work, and there are over 1150 pages in the book to occupy me.
So, I’ve been putting in a lot of highway time the last month, and will probably have it for the foreseeable future. So I was catching up on some audiobooks I stockpiled before stopping my audible subscription a few years ago. I made it through The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress. It was of its time, interesting, and good narration. Not my favorite Robert A. Heinlein but OK.I was starting in on Ninefox Gambit, and was about an hour in, when a library hold on Peace Talks came in early. So I decided to switch over and give that a go for my drive today (about 7 hours total, 3 1/2 so far). Man this is giving me the feals already. I was glad I was alone in the car for some of those father daughter scenes. As with most Dresden books, the odds are piled against him, it just seemed like the pile is higher, earlier this time. But we will see.
I started the new Andy Weir book, Project Hail Mary. So far I'm enjoying it. It has a similar feel to the Martian. I don't want to give too much away but after two chapters, it is reminding me of Seven Eves by Neal Stephenson in regards to the central problem of the novel.
John (Nevets) wrote: "...I was starting in on Ninefox Gambit, and was about an hour in, when a library hold on Peace Talks came in early. So I decided to switch over and give that a go for my drive today (about 7 hours total, 3 1/2 so far). Man this is giving me the feals already. I was glad I was alone in the car for some of those father daughter scenes..."I'm not crying, you're crying.
Finished with The Old Drift - a fantastic multi-generational genrebender, it reminded me of The Prey of Gods except that it is set in Zambia. One of the best books I've read so far this year.Continuing with Sorrowland, Rivers Solomon's new book.
In light of the Mass Effect Legendary Edition release (which I won't get to play until after I finish my current game), I started Mass Effect: Revelation by Drew Karpyshyn.
Hexarchate Stories. The novella Glass Cannon is outstanding and some of the other stories are quite good.
Rick wrote: "Hexarchate Stories. The novella Glass Cannon is outstanding and some of the other stories are quite good."Yeah, when I was done I thought, "there's enough worldbuilding here for another trilogy." And I would like it. NOW!
Rick wrote: "Hexarchate Stories. The novella Glass Cannon is outstanding and some of the other stories are quite good."These are great titles.
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The Sword and Laser
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With books I mean, not the other thing..