SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion
SciFi and Fantasy Book Challenge
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2022 TBR Cleanup Challenge
Thanks Dj!More than Human and The Once and Future King are on the SFFBC shelf too.
Finished:3. Dressed to the nines
Drinking Midnight Wine by Simon R. Green
Love interest dresses to the nines
I enjoyed this one
so I've completed: 1, 2, 3. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 and 20 for a total of 20 out of 20 to complete the challenge!
CBRetriever wrote: "Finished..."Congratulations!!
CBRetriever wrote: "Finished:3. Dressed to the nines
Drinking Midnight Wine by Simon R. Green
Love interest dresses to the nines
I enjoyed this one
so I've completed: 1, 2, 3. 4, 5, 6..."
Congrats
CBRetriever wrote: "Finished:3. Dressed to the nines
Drinking Midnight Wine by Simon R. Green
Love interest dresses to the nines
I enjoyed this one
so I've completed: 1, 2, 3. 4, 5, 6..."
Yay! Congrats!
The Aneid of Virgil, books i. to vi. Ow. Reading this book is painful. At times I think that Virgil is more interested in showing Homer that he can make Rome's founder suffer more than the characters from the Odessey. For me, I also found it grating that Juno/Hera the Queen of the Greek Gods kept ranting about how the Trojans would bring their own gods and usurp the Greek Gods. This of course ignores the fact that Aneas was the Daughter of one and Zeus was the God that had promised them Rome. Every time they stop they are sending up sacrifices to the Gods, including her. Seems that someone was a bit confused about who was worshipping who.
All in all, I found this to be a painful read.
Zodiac
Okay, I saw a blurb that compared this guy to Sam Spade and I don't see it. Don't get me wrong it is a really fun read and I did have to keep checking to see who wrote it due to the fact that This is nothing like the other two books I have read by the same author or a fourth that I have started. His writing style usually comes off as more intense, and more serious. This is a fun romp, not in your face bull you-over funny, but more controlled and very well done. I found it to be the kind of read that grabs a hold and doesn't let go.
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman and A Vindication of the Rights of MenThis is an amazing work on the rights of Women which I initially bought due to thinking it was written by the author of Frankenstein. Turns out that wasn't the case. While the authors do share the same name, this work was written by her Mother. It was also written at the time of the French Revolution. While many of the complaints brought up in the book have been dealt with to a greater or lesser degree in most of the world, it is clear from this work how far Women have had to come to be even remotely considered equal.
While I found it difficult to read at times I am glad that I made the effort it was well worth it.
Dj wrote: "Zodiac Okay, I saw a blurb that compared this guy to Sam Spade and I don't see it. Don't get me wrong it is a really fun read and I did have to keep checking to s..."
it's on Goodreads and Amazon:
Sangamon Taylor's a New Age Sam Spade who sports a wet suit instead of a trench coat and prefers Jolt from the can to Scotch on the rocks.
I've read and enjoyed the book, but that's not how I'd characterize the main character
CBRetriever wrote: "Dj wrote: "Zodiac Okay, I saw a blurb that compared this guy to Sam Spade and I don't see it. Don't get me wrong it is a really fun read and I did have to keep ch..."
Glad to know I am not the only one that doesn't think he is a Sam Spade as well. It was a fun read though so I will forgive, although that is kind of the reason I generally don't read the blurbs. LOL.
I've finished three more books for the challenge: ✔︎ 6. Of its time: Summer World: A Season of Bounty
✔︎ 9. 9 or 22: There and Back Again
✔︎ 16. "Humans are doing the best they can": Paladin's Hope
Summer World: A Season of Bounty was on my dining room table for years as my late night snack reading. It really was, mostly, a support for my phone while I read many eBooks. That was partly because of an unfortunate design decision the publisher made. Small green text on cream colored paper is not a good reading experience if you're of a certain age. This challenge finally convinced me to push through anyway. TBR challenge for the win!
I liked Summer World overall but not as much as the author's Winter World: The Ingenuity of Animal Survival or, especially, Mind of the Raven: Investigations and Adventures with Wolf-Birds. All remind me to take some time to look around and listen when I'm out in the woods.
There and Back Again has been on my TBR list since it came out at the turn of the century. It's a retelling of The Hobbit, but as science fiction, in space, and with more than just male characters (wow). After reading the first chapter I was left wondering how this book could survive given the aggressiveness of the Tolkien estate regarding intellectual property. It turns out that it can't. The estate didn't buy the author's argument that this is "a transformative feminist commentary" and so I ended up having to get this from the virtual sub-sub-basement of a large used book store. It's a shame. I prefer this in many ways to the original.
If you've read other T. Kingfisher paladin romances Paladin's Hope will feel comfortably familiar. This one benefits from having more gnole involvement and added insights into their culture. The challenge prompt appears on page 34 of my edition.
Progress: 15/20
Raucous wrote: "The challenge prompt appears on page 34 of my edition."And that is indeed where the prompt came from ^_^
Raucous wrote: "I've finished three more books for the challenge: ✔︎ 6. Of its time: Summer World: A Season of Bounty
✔︎ 9. 9 or 22: There and Back Again
✔︎ 16. "Humans are doing the..."
Looks like you weren't the only one to complain about the print formatting since the author has changed it. Now it is black print.
I went ahead and got a used copy of There and Back Again. I am looking forward to reading it.
Dj wrote: "... Looks like you weren't the only one to complain about the print formatting since the author has changed it. Now it is black print. ..."That's good to hear. It felt like a coffee table book (designed to be looked at and admired, not read) in the first edition. Admittedly a very small coffee table book...
Raucous wrote: "Dj wrote: "... Looks like you weren't the only one to complain about the print formatting since the author has changed it. Now it is black print. ..."That's good to hear. It felt like a coffee ta..."
I had a small coffee table book once. It was Shakespeare or Hamlet, in the original Klingon. Really it wasn't as much fun as it sounded. I think whoever wrote it up overlooked the point with armored vehicles and powered weapons.
The Wars of the Roses: A Captivating Guide to the English Civil Wars That Brought down the Plantagenet Dynasty and Put the Tudors on the Throne
I don't know a great deal about British history but the War of the Roses has always had a special place in my heart. It isn't because I know anything about the Wars really, but because I found a book called the War of the Rings, and thought it was similar. Wasn't it was a special edition of the Lord of the Rings. Still, because of that error sticking in my memory, I have always wanted to find out more about the War of the Roses.
With this book, I finally got that opportunity and in a sense, the War of the Rings was almost tame in comparison. I think the phrase that best comes to mind is, What a Bloody Mess'. If anyone ever thinks that their family has issues they should read this. Decades of War, the Destruction of great amounts of National wealth, and a huge cost in lives all because they didn't want to agree on which side of the family should rule the Nation. In the end, this round of violence ended up with both sides of the family being kicked to the curb.
This book is a general overview but a very good one. I may have to go for a deeper dive sometime in the future.
Do you know what's creepy, DJ? I was just looking up the War of the Roses last night! It's not like I've spent my life wondering about that war, but something made me think of it so I spent several useless hours looking into it online. That and the Hundred Years War. I guess it wasn't totally useless, because I learned that the Hundred Years War was actually a little over 116 years. Now we can all sleep soundly tonight since I've shared some of the fruits of my research ;)
Mod
Dj wrote: "The Wars of the Roses: A Captivating Guide to the English Civil Wars That Brought down the Plantagenet Dynasty and Put the Tudors on the Throne "There's a French equivalent series: Maurice Druon's] The Accursed Kings Series: The Iron King / The Strangled Queen / The Poisoned Crown (this just contains the first 3 of the 6 books). It deals with the French side of the 100 years war and all the Kings, Queens, potential Kings and political maneuvering of that time period. It's quite readable and I enjoyed it.
American author George R. R. Martin called The Accursed Kings "the original game of thrones", citing Druon's novels as an inspiration for his own series A Song of Ice and Fire.[
Michelle wrote: "Do you know what's creepy, DJ? I was just looking up the War of the Roses last night! It's not like I've spent my life wondering about that war, but something made me think of it so I spent several..."LOL. That kind of thing happens. There is a series where a bunch of people from a Coal Mining community in West Virginia goes to the middle of Germany to take part in the 100 years war. Not that they were looking to do that but hey, time travel doesn't always ask your opinion.
CBRetriever wrote: "Dj wrote: "The Wars of the Roses: A Captivating Guide to the English Civil Wars That Brought down the Plantagenet Dynasty and Put the Tudors on the Throne "There's a French equi..."
Does that make Game of Thrones a historical fiction? LOL. While the book is well written and pretty good, I remember reading the first one and thinking. I would like a little more Fantasy in my Fantasy Novel, please.
Dj wrote: "Does that make Game of Thrones a historical fiction?"Game of Thrones had dragons, the White Walkers, direwolves, giants, children of the forest, the Red Priestess, so it had enough Fantasy for me. It also had the scheming and politics of the War of the Roses and the Accursed Kings added to "grey", not black or white characters which made it more interesting. I call it a possible history of an imaginary world
DivaDiane wrote: "Hey me too! But then the dragons…"True there were the Dragons, and I have always had a soft spot for Dragons. LOL.
CBRetriever wrote: "Dj wrote: "Does that make Game of Thrones a historical fiction?"Game of Thrones had dragons, the White Walkers, direwolves, giants, children of the forest, the Red Priestess, so it had enough Fan..."
Very true, but most of those didn't show up until after the first book and a thousand odd pages of political intrigue. It is the first book that didn't really set the pace for me.
Dj wrote: "Very true, but most of those didn't show up until after the first book and a thousand odd pages of political intrigue. It is the first book that didn't really set the pace for me. "dunno - I'm one of those that loved it from the starting scene
CBRetriever wrote: "Dj wrote: "Very true, but most of those didn't show up until after the first book and a thousand odd pages of political intrigue. It is the first book that didn't really set the pace for me. "dun..."
No worries I know a number of people who did. It is a matter of taste and that is always the case with the things we like and the things we don't.
Ametsapolis Rising
I read more than one book at a time so sometimes it is a little difficult for me to become fully immersed into the story. There are times however when a book grabs onto me and compels me to read it faster than I might otherwise. This was one of those books. The story is full and rich and once I got into it I was held in it and felt a need to finish. This book is one of the best reads I have been involved in for quite some time. The world-building is excellent and the characters are wonderfully fleshed out (at least for the main characters.).
I highly recommend reading this one.
1. Book with nine lives - Harriet Tubman: The Road to Freedom. Subject of the book led a dangerous life but survived.✔️Biography of famous hero of the Underground Railroad. Not very long, at 220 pages, and some of those pages are given to filling in the historical background. The lack of detail is partly because as an illiterate former slave whose most famous activities were dangerous and illegal, Tubman didn’t leave a lot of documentation. She did lead a long life after the Civil War in the town of Auburn in upstate New York, running local black charities and apparently sometimes working at fairly menial jobs, but this phase of her life is summed up in a chapter of 24 pages.
I don’t mean to complain about the book’s brevity. It seems well researched, but even at this length the author repeatedly has to resort to speculation about Tubman’s activities. The author is an academic historian and the book seems to have been well received when it was published in 2004.
I bought my copy at the Women’s Rights National Historic Park in Seneca Falls, New York, in the summer of 2016, so it’s been on the shelf a little over 6 years.
12/20 on the challenge.
CBRetriever wrote: "Dj wrote: "The Wars of the Roses: A Captivating Guide to the English Civil Wars That Brought down the Plantagenet Dynasty and Put the Tudors on the Throne "There's a French equi..."
I've been eyeing off the Accursed Kings for a while. I think might have to take the plunge now.
Been a while since my last update. Work and study have been a priority over the challenge but I'm still chipping away. Recently completed are;5. One for the Clubhouse - Fight Club - Chuck Palahniuk. Fight Club is one of my favourite movies. This is one of the rare instances where the movie is better than the book. I didn't mind this, but I think I prefer my esoteric weirdness on the screen rather than the page.
15. Fluffy! - Bear Head - Adrian Tchaikovsky. I wasn't really expecting a sequel to Dogs of War so I was pleasantly surprised when this came out. This won't be to everyone's taste but I enjoyed it a lot.
16. "Humans are doing the best they can” - Heroes: Mortals and Monsters, Quests and AdventuresHeroes - Stephen Fry. Fry combines his almost flippant sense of humour with a clear reverence for the material. I've really enjoyed his versions of the Greek myths in both Mythos: The Greek Myths Retold and this one. Now on to Troy.
Twelve down, eight to go.
Petar wrote: "CBRetriever wrote: "Dj wrote: "The Wars of the Roses: A Captivating Guide to the English Civil Wars That Brought down the Plantagenet Dynasty and Put the Tudors on the Throne "T..."
Any time is a good time to dive into something that you have been waiting on.
Petar wrote: "Been a while since my last update. Work and study have been a priority over the challenge but I'm still chipping away. Recently completed are;5. One for the Clubhouse - Fight Club..."
Thanks, I have been debating on the Fry book. Looks like I will be taking it up soon.
Mod
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3. Dressed to the nines - Wodehouse On Wodehouse Wodehouse’s character Bertie Wooster contributed a column on “What the Well Dressed Man is Wearing” to his Aunt Dahlia’s publication, “Milady’s Boudoir”.✔️13/20
Omnibus volume containing three previously published more or less autobiographical books from the 1950s. “Bring on the Girls”, co-written with Guy Bolton, recalls the authors’ collaboration on successful musical comedies in the 1920s and earlier. Lots of highly polished anecdotes about famous Broadway names of the period. “Performing Flea” is the most substantial and interesting of the three. It consists mainly of letters written by Wodehouse over many years to an old schoolfellow and longtime friend, a less successful writer named W.P. Townend. There is discussion of the craft of writing, opinions on various other writers, and descriptions of the author’s day to day life. There is also a memoir of Wodehouse’s experiences in a German internment camp in WW2, very interesting if you are at all interested in his life. The third of the books, “Over Seventy”, was to me the slightest, mainly just general facetiousnness about life in the 1950s, vaguely contrasted with the way things used to be. Barely worth the read.
As a whole, though, a very interesting and entertaining volume.
Mod
Stephen wrote: "3. Dressed to the nines - Wodehouse On Wodehouse Wodehouse’s character Bertie Wooster contributed a column on “What the Well Dressed Man is Wearing” to his Aunt Dahlia’s publication..."didn't know he'd been in an interment camp in WWII. I'll have to look that book up as my father was a POW in WWII. This book is about where he stayed for the last year or two of WWIII: Stalag Luft One: Or Vacation with Pay, My Stay at the German Rest Camp for Tired Allied Airmen at Beautiful Barth-on-the-Baltic. He, unlike Wodehouse, would never talk about it but he did get a Purple Heart and had a scar on his leg where he was wonded
I read for prompt No. 9 - 9 or 22 - A Stitch in Time (Star Trek:!Deep Space Nine), which does the job twice. I really enjoyed it. It like an autobiography of the Cardassian character Garak, written by the actor who played him. It was quite moving!I’m no reading A Song for a New Day, which is for the revolution prompt. Not sure yet why it fits this prompt, but someone else chose it too and I’ve been meaning to read it. It’s a bit disturbing how prescient the author was.
DivaDiane wrote: "I read for prompt No. 9 - 9 or 22 - A Stitch in Time (Star Trek:!Deep Space Nine), which does the job twice. I really enjoyed it. It like an autobiography of the Cardassian character Garak, written..."I think that was probably me, reading Song for a New Day. I really enjoyed it and I thought it ultimately was a good pick for the prompt. I agree, Pinsker really nailed some things in her story.
2. Don't be suspicious - The Spy and the Traitor: The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War - Ben Macintyre. My first Ben Macintyre book and I enjoyed it immensely. Macintyre knows how to spin a good yarn and in this tells the story of a remarkable man. It may fly a little too close to hagiography on occasion, but it is a cracking good read.13/20
I've finished another three books for the challenge: ✔︎ 3. Dressed to the nines: Gideon the Ninth
✔︎ 7. "Revolution is in the individual spirit": Broad Band: The Untold Story of the Women Who Made the Internet
✔︎ 13. Thorns and roses: The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches
Black is definitely Gideon the Ninth's color and she wears it well. I had mixed feelings about this book though. I was fascinated by the world that the author built and by the characters (especially for a first novel) but it was both high in interpersonal conflict and oh so dark for my normal tastes. Despite that it was compulsively readable - even allowing for my need for trauma breaks.
Broad Band: The Untold Story of the Women Who Made the Internet is another book that generated mixed feelings. The earlier chapters were strong. I learned new things about the women who set some of the initial direction for the field. The book seemed to lose some focus when it got to the early web and social networking days and ended much earlier, chronologically, than I would have liked.
I read The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches as an antidote to the darkness of Gideon the Ninth. It delivered. I'd highly recommend it to fans of heartwarming found family novels. The main character and her romantic interest match the roses/thorns theme. I identified (I'm not going to say as which one).
Progress: 18/20
Raucous wrote: "I've finished another three books for the challenge: ✔︎ 3. Dressed to the nines: Gideon the Ninth
✔︎ 7. "Revolution is in the individual spirit": [book:Broad Band: The Untold Stor..."
I am glad you enjoyed Gideon the Ninth in spite of it being outside your comfort zone. I would normally have passed it by as well and was glad that I was brought to it as part of a challenge.
I got to the halfway point yesterday. We’ll see if I can read the other ten books on my list before the year runs out.
Mareike wrote: "I got to the halfway point yesterday. We’ll see if I can read the other ten books on my list before the year runs out."Best of luck.
7. "Revolution is in the individual spirit” - Rocannon's World - Ursula K. Le Guin. This didn't really grab me. It's a short book but dragged a bit. I appreciated Le Guin's attempt to establish a unique world but none of the characters were particularly engaging and there was a distinct lack of suspense. It wasn't bad, and I will continue on with the series, but I was a little disappointed.14/20
Petar wrote: "7. "Revolution is in the individual spirit” - Rocannon's World - Ursula K. Le Guin. This didn't really grab me. It's a short book but dragged a bit. I appreciated Le Guin's attempt to ..."I am giving this one another shot. I read it a long time ago but every time I have tried to restart it I have set it aside. Even though the series doesn't need to be read in order that is my preferred method and the second book in the series is on the club bookshelf. So I am hoping to get through Rocannon's World and move on to the next one.
Wishing us both luck in that endeavor.
Dj wrote: "Petar wrote: "7. "Revolution is in the individual spirit” - Rocannon's World - Ursula K. Le Guin. This didn't really grab me. It's a short book but dragged a bit. I appreciated Le Guin..."I'm like you DJ, I really prefer to read a series in order even when they don't have to be. I also have a personal bucket list goal of reading every Nebula and Hugo Award winner and there's a couple of books later in the series that have won both.
So, yeah, best of luck!
SciFi and Fantasy Book Club
Books mentioned in this topic
Paladin's Grace (other topics)Paladin's Grace (other topics)
The Map: Finding the Magic and Meaning in the Story of Your Life (other topics)
Living the Hero's Journey: Exploring Your Role in the Action-Adventure of a Lifetime (other topics)
A Song of Shadow (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Maurice Druon (other topics)Simon R. Green (other topics)
Simon R. Green (other topics)
Simon R. Green (other topics)
Nicholas Eames (other topics)
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I've checked off a few more off my list:
✅6. Of its time - More Than Human which I loved. I love older SF for the ideas and the brevity. This one also wasn't devoid of femal..."
Way to go. Love the little write-ups you give. It helps me decide what other books might be coming up in the future.