Return of the Book Thread

[Abagadro]

Finished Matter. Seriously meh.

[Johny Cee]

You guys read The Tower of Fear yet?  It's scary how topical that book is.  A foreign power has occupied a Middle Easternish city with a combination of its own troops and foreign mercenaries, a pseudo-criminal native underground with ties to a violent religious offshoot/cult, and ethnic tensions.

Just started that this morning. Sooo happy to see he has a list of characters at the front of the book. That was one thing I struggled with in the 'Instrumentalities of the Night' book, who was who.

The first Instrumentalities book is tough because Cook throws sooooo much background at you.  I'm pretty well read on most of the actual history being borrowed,  and I had a tough time with it.


Finished The Dragon Never Sleeps.  Loved it.  Military scifi, with that definite Cook edge. 

[JWIV]

I just finished Spin by Robert Charles Wilson.    Absolutely fantastic.   

[Murgos]

Finished Matter. Seriously meh.

I've been unable to get into it.  I'll pick it back up in a bit, I'm reading a book on linguistics at the moment.

[Abagadro]

I just finished Spin by Robert Charles Wilson.    Absolutely fantastic.   

Pick up Axis which is the sequel that just came out. It is good as well.

[Viin]

Just finished Battle Royale and Fate is the Hunter. Great books.

Started Anansi Boys, which I've had for awhile but haven't actually read yet.

[Morat20]

Finished Matter. Seriously meh.

Eh, just started it myself. I did, however, pick up a copy of The Wasp Factory and noted that the reprints of Consider Phlebas and Player of Games were out at my local B&N. Which gives me hope that I can fill in my collection of his fiction -- hopefully reprints of Crow Road and Feersum Enjin are in the works.

[Abagadro]

Just finished up Homicide: A year on the killing streets which is narrative nonfiction by David Simon (guy who created The Wire) and is the book the Homicide television show was based on. A really, really good read.

[lamaros]

Finally Finished Midnight's Children the other week, which I'd had for a while but had never got down to and finished. Thankfully it was included in a uni course so I pushed through. Slow going, only reading about 30 pages an hour. Took me over 12 hours for the lot I would guess.

[murdoc]

The first Instrumentalities book is tough because Cook throws sooooo much background at you.  I'm pretty well read on most of the actual history being borrowed,  and I had a tough time with it.


Finished The Dragon Never Sleeps.  Loved it.  Military scifi, with that definite Cook edge. 

Good to hear, since I was feeling like a dumbass while reading Instrumentalities. I have to remember to look for 'The Dragon Never Sleeps'. Currently reading book 7 in the Malazan series, 'Reaper's Gale' while at home, and 'Faerie Tale' by Feist while on the train to work. 'Reapers Gale' is taking a bit more to get me hooked than the other books did, I think that once the Malazan's enter the story, I'll be a bit more into it.

'Faerie Tale' is ok. For some reason I'm not digging it as much as I thought I would. 

[JWIV]

I just finished Spin by Robert Charles Wilson.    Absolutely fantastic.   

Pick up Axis which is the sequel that just came out. It is good as well.

My local library has this on reserve for me, so I'll be picking it up tonight from them. 

[Sky]

Truckin' through the Recluce series again. On my favorite one, the Magic Engineer. Then I see a new Modesitt book on the new book shelf, blah. It is nice to have the next couple of month's worth of reading mapped out, though.

Three cheers for JWIV for using the library!

[naum]

My Spring 2008 Reading List…

[cmlancas]

Wifetype is reading The God Delusion. She loves it.

Also, if you liked Krakauer (and I didn't look through that site in depth), check out Into Thin Air.

[lamaros]

Also, if you liked Krakauer (and I didn't look through that site in depth), check out Into Thin Air.

I nearly picked that up at the op-shop yesterday for $1. Worth it? I know nothing of Krakauer.

[naum]

Wifetype is reading The God Delusion. She loves it.

Also, if you liked Krakauer (and I didn't look through that site in depth), check out Into Thin Air.

About 2/3 way through God Delusion. Not enjoying much as other Dawkins I read (i.e., Blind Watchmaker, Selfish Gene). Started out good, hopefully interest will pick up in later chapters as in the middle he repeats himself a lot, and there, his arguments are just as silly as the fundamentalist Christians. But that's a topic for another thread :)

[Margalis]

I don't see how it's possible to write an entire book about how God doesn't exist. Mine would be about three sentences:

There is no actual evidence that God exists. That's why they call it "faith." The end.

What more do you need?

[cmlancas]

Not sure if that was green or not, but if it wasn't,

I think it is more about the phenomenon (from what she has told me) and why it works/persists. I think you of all people know that most books are more complicated than, "This is what I think, and I'm not going to explain why." 

It's not really that useful to construct declarative sentences and expect people to buy into them. 

[WayAbvPar]

Also, if you liked Krakauer (and I didn't look through that site in depth), check out Into Thin Air.

I nearly picked that up at the op-shop yesterday for $1. Worth it? I know nothing of Krakauer.

Into Thin Air is a FANTASTIC book. Read it immediately.

Then, if you want to really hate organized religion in general and Mormons in particular, read Under The Banner Of Heaven.

[cmlancas]

WAP, I read the book first, and then realized it was non-fiction.


Fucking NON-FICTION. 

[Margalis]

I think it is more about the phenomenon (from what she has told me) and why it works/persists.

"People find it comforting to believe in things greater than themselves and/or like to explain things they don't understand via magic."

Is it a mystery why religion works/persists? Maybe I'd have to read it...

[cmlancas]

Yep, lots of things are obvious after we see 'em, but that's what writing is for!

Common sense in beauty? Fuck, Kant's a hack!

Come off it, Marg. 

[Lt.Dan]

Don't freak out, this is about 2 months of reading.

Just read League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Sandman Vol 1.  Both kind of surprised me.  LoEG since I saw the movie and thought it was shite.  The graphic novel on the other hand is pretty interesting.  I'm sure fans of the series were horrified to see their dreams destroyed Hollywood-style.  Sandman since I can easily take or leave Gaiman and find a lot of what he does to be over-hyped.  

Also read Midnight Tides.  Probably the last the Eriksen book I'll read.  Seems like I have to wade through 500 pages so slow-moving space filler to get the exciting stuff at the end.  I wouldn't mind since his endings are fantastically good but I've read too much fantasy fiction to want to endure anymore of that bullshit.  He's not Jordan-esque by any means but MT was a loooong way from the goodness of his first couple of books.

Now about half-way through Mieville's Iron Council.  Not as enjoyable as Perdido Street Station or The Scar but haven't worked into the finale yet.

Non-fiction finished up Freakonomics.  Really easy read and pretty interesting (for a closet economist, skeptic, and maths major like me).  Really interesting discusion about convential wisdom and how Galbraith's definition was more about it being a cop-out for convenience sake, rather than any kind of reasonable explanation.

[Johny Cee]

The latest "Dresden" book is out.  Good entertainment read.  Butcher writes series fiction well. 

I'm finishing up Krugman's Conscience of a Liberal,  and also reading The Discovery of France.

[Margalis]

I just picked up League 1 and 2 last night along with Top Ten, 3 Peguin collections of Lovecraft, American Gods by Gaiman and Barker's The Great and Secret Show.

Finished reading "The Death of the Fourth Estate", a collection of Counterpunch essays, and Barker's Damnation Game. Other than that haven't been reading much recently, been busy.

[Morat20]

The latest "Dresden" book is out.  Good entertainment read.  Butcher writes series fiction well. 

Is it? I might have to stop on the way home. The wife is reading those (she's up to Dead Beat). I just finished Matter -- which apparently I like more than Abragadro -- and The Wasp Factory.

The latter is...well...fuck, Bank's fiction tends to be a little warped. Good. But, well, different. I don't know if it's a Scottish thing or a Banks thing.

[Johny Cee]

The latest "Dresden" book is out.  Good entertainment read.  Butcher writes series fiction well. 

Is it? I might have to stop on the way home. The wife is reading those (she's up to Dead Beat). I just finished Matter -- which apparently I like more than Abragadro -- and The Wasp Factory.

Dead Beat is where the series starts to kick it up a notch.  Basically,  there's one story per book that gets finished up for better or worse each book. 

- The overall background storylines (the war, Summer vs Winter, intra-supernatural politics) advance a couple steps with some good foreshadowing thrown in. 

- Decent character growth and development between books.  Harry starts out as a bit of a bumbling dork,  moves to a borderline breakdown territory, and has been maturing quite a bit in the last few books.

- Good character relationships,  especially between books. 

- No DBZ style massively powering up the main character that really fucks with many series. 

- I especially like the way Butcher gives equal time and import to a bunch of different mythological backgrounds.  There's something fun about the way you can have celtic fearie types duking it out with wizards or Christian mythology demon-types or secret holy order types.

Really alot of similarities to Whedon.  Except without the one-note snarky Whedon hero-types.

[Morat20]

Dead Beat is where the series starts to kick it up a notch.  Basically,  there's one story per book that gets finished up for better or worse each book. 

- The overall background storylines (the war, Summer vs Winter, intra-supernatural politics) advance a couple steps with some good foreshadowing thrown in. 

- Decent character growth and development between books.  Harry starts out as a bit of a bumbling dork,  moves to a borderline breakdown territory, and has been maturing quite a bit in the last few books.

- Good character relationships,  especially between books. 

- No DBZ style massively powering up the main character that really fucks with many series. 

- I especially like the way Butcher gives equal time and import to a bunch of different mythological backgrounds.  There's something fun about the way you can have celtic fearie types duking it out with wizards or Christian mythology demon-types or secret holy order types.

Really alot of similarities to Whedon.  Except without the one-note snarky Whedon hero-types.

Hell, I loved it for Dresden's ride at the end. :)

My wife's a writing teacher, and she's found them interesting simply because you see him go from "first published novel" -- written off a submission for a creative writing class, I think -- and work his way through a pretty demanding publishing schedule. You can see him grow as a storyteller, make mistakes, correct them, make new mistakes, etc. It really helped him that urban fantasy is THE genre right now -- at least he doesn't have too many lesbian vampires. Fuck, his main character was celibate for years, which is HUGELY different than a lot of the best-selling urban stuff at the moment. :)

Oh, and yes -- I've read the Kim Harrison stuff. Not Hamilton's stuff, though. I'll read virtually anything, even if it has lesbian vampires. Sometimes just for lesbian vampires.

Another author you can see that developing author vibe with is Pratchett. His early stuff is really crude (discounting the outright parodies of The Color of Magic entirely) compared to his later stuff. And you can see when he sort of "steps up" as a writer and plateaus off at a new level.

[Der Helm]

I did not have enough time in the last 18 months to read books for fun, but this semester break I caught up with some reading. I really liked Good Omens (Pratchet/Gaiman)and American Gods(Gaiman) which I think have already been mentioned here.

Next on my list is a textbook about second language acquisition, the time of reading for fun is over 

[murdoc]

I have looked at the Dresden books a few times and just haven't taken the plunge yet. Are they books you should read from the beginning, or can you jump into the series a bit later?

I thought 'Good Omens' started out fantastic, but it kind of lost it's steam about 3/4 of the way through it for me.

[Arrrgh]

You should start at the first Dresden.  They're all entertaining anyway.

[HaemishM]

I just finished Gaiman's Angels and Visitations, which was a good set of short stories. I swear though, some of those stories ended up elsewhere in his writing, like maybe in the Sandman. They were all early stories from before he got the Sandman gig, I gather. Still a good collection of stories if you like his melancholy style of writing.

Just got like 10 books from the local library book sale for $1. I love library book sales. I started on The Great Gatsby because I've just never read it.

[Johny Cee]

I just finished Gaiman's Angels and Visitations, which was a good set of short stories. I swear though, some of those stories ended up elsewhere in his writing, like maybe in the Sandman. They were all early stories from before he got the Sandman gig, I gather. Still a good collection of stories if you like his melancholy style of writing.

Just got like 10 books from the local library book sale for $1. I love library book sales. I started on The Great Gatsby because I've just never read it.

Gaiman's short story collections tend to reprint short stories over and over.  If you've read one collection,  make sure to scan the table of contents to figure out which ones you haven't seen before.

[Margalis]

I hate that, that's why I always look for complete collections.

I'm a little bit through the first Lovecraft compendium. It holds up surprisingly well so far, written in 1920 but not anachronistic at all.

[Samwise]

I'm a little bit through the first Lovecraft compendium.

Oo, is there a new series of Lovecraft collections coming out?  What's the title/publisher?  I've got a few of the Del Rey collections but there's a lot of duplication between them and probably a lot of stuff I'm missing too.