f13.net

The week of September 30th saw the release of new Neil Gaiman and a Richard K Morgan "Takeshi Kovacs" book,  and we're hitting the one month till A Feast for Crows, so I figure we need a new book thread.

Gaiman, Anansi Boys --

This novel picks up in the same world as American Gods,  with the same premise.  Gods exist.  Not a God,  but all gods.  From Christ to Odin to the trickster spirits of West African myth.  Not just historical gods, either, but gods of credit cards and railroad tracks and the internet.  God symbology extrapolated to the extreme, where human belief in near anything is distilled down to a physical and animate representation taking on that symbol's characteristics.  Dying and aging as belief is snuffed out,  and being replaced by new gods.

Anansi is Mr. Nancy,  who appears as a kindly yet lascivious older man in fedora and canary gloves, who also happens to be a trickster totem spirit from West African myth and the father of two boys.  It falls to his engaged son, very ordinary Fat Charlie, to return to Florida for Mr. Nancy's funeral where he discovers the existence of his brother Spider. 

Spider precedes to turn Fat Charlie's life upside down.

Anansi Boys reads like Neverwhere and Stardust.  Light-hearted and slightly fable-like, even if seemingly awful things are happening.  A strong thread of family and family connection runs throughout, with especial attention to how the actions of a parent always seem to be an acute embarassment to the child, and the process of the child maturing and taking on the parental role and world of responsibility.

Enjoyable read,  but nothing earth shattering here. 


Morgan, Woken Furies --

I like Morgan's "Takeshi Kovacs" novels.  Really.  Despite the man's flim-flammy political and socio-ecomomic worlds.  Morgan is pretty much guaranteed to have one "WTF just happened???  Fucking Christ, he didn't just do that" moments in his books.

My opinion on the latest is mixed.

Kovacs is back on his home world,  in a new sleeve.  And he's slightly off kilter, mentally.

While killing time between switching sleeves,  he wanders into a bar fight when neo-Fundies start beating down a woman for not wearing the proper head scarf.  After slaughtering said bearded neo-Fundies, Kovacs ends up entangled with the woman and her crew of mercenaries (De-coms) sent out to try and exterminate the sentient war machinery cluttering up the worlds largest continent.

Honestly, the book is a mixed bag.  I was willing to forgive the previous books cyberpunk roots because I enjoyed the noirish, paranoid, and violent plot.

Politics and economics start to come to the forefront.  A potential Quellist uprising (think Marx,  but more stupid) emerges,  and Kovacs elucidates on his hat of both the neo-Fundies and the ruling oligarchy that supposedly keeps the rest of the planet in near poverty.

Fucking hell.  At least it's better than Market Forces.  That book's world read like it was ghostwritten by a Skinhead labor organizer and crunchy granola vigilante.


A Feast for Crows --

Release date is November 8th, and seems to be holding steady.  We can hope.


Steven Erikson, "The Malazan Book of the Fallen" --

The author is a mix of Glen Cook,  Tolkien,  dashes of Martin.  Splash in maybe 10 years of animea, and the better 4 or 5 of Zelazny's Amber books.  Now put it into 800 page volumes of a 10 book series,  not counting side books written by the co-creator and developer of the world.  Presently on book 5,  with 6 due out in the next few months.

It's very good stuff,  a little wordy at times.  Books 1 and 2 are available in the States at your local bookstore.  The rest are only available overseas.  Coming out in the States soon,  but can be ordered from amazon.ca at a reasonable price.

There's also a few side books starring minor characters from the main storyline.

Book 1, Gardens of the Moon, is pretty good.  Some interesting characters,  and you really get a feel Erikson's influences.

Book 2, Deadhouse Gates, is outstanding.  Some very serious moments here.  Without getting into spoilers of any kind,  the entire sequence dealing with the retreat of a Malazan army across a desert during the course of the entire continent holding a revolution is astounding.

On a lighter note:

Some of Erikson's fan forums make Vault poster look like some kind of enlightened thinktank.  The first time I browsed through, I actually considered trying to make myself hate the author. 

        http://www.malazanempire.com/forums/


I did manage to dig up some interesting links to Glen Cook interviews on the same site.  Most notable factoids are that the Dread Empire books will see reprint,  but the previously written and unreleased books may not.  It seems that Cook used to invite fans into his home to chat,  until someone walked off with his unpublished manuscript for the sequel to An Ill Fate Marshalling.

http://www.sfsite.com/10a/gc209.htm

Book 112 in the Robert Jordan series is out this week/next week. Entitled 'The Wheel of Time - Nyneave pulls her braid again' the book is eagerly awaited by people who enjoy 30 pages of plot development in a 900 page epic.

Book 6 of the Steven Erikson series has been delayed again until Feb 2006 ( orig due out in April this year ). We'll see closer to the time if it slips further

Woken Furies tried too hard to give the reader stuff to think about.  And, let's be honest, that's not why we were buying the book.

However, some of his advancement of the society was interesting.  There was more about how the hell an immortal society could actually function that I wanted to wrap my head around.

I'm not much for fiction, though I did read the newest Feist The Exile's Return. Nice twist shifting focus away from Talon for a while. I've got to get to some Glen Cook, there's not a lot in the library system, but my ladyfriend just took over fiction, so we'll fix that quick enough.

Mostly I read nonfic, and lately my guru has been Richard Dawkins, currently in the form of The Ancestor's Tale, a book of evolution based on Chaucer. Great read.

Also reading a huge variety of books, nice perq of the library, heh. No late fees ;) A book on mexican cooking, some stuff on hiking trails, the obligatory stack of tech books for work, should be getting in some biodiesel books we ordered for a new display.
Heh. Jordan lost his mind, I gave up on him after book 6 or 7. Long list at the library, though, people love it.

Ah yes robert jordans random novel generator was activated again. I think people buy those book in the same frame of mind that people watch slow moving car wrecks. Its always intersting to see somebody completly blow up. After seeing the reviews of the last one this should be amusing. I am very curious if he realizes that sooner or later he is actually going to have to attempt to progress the plotline.

kaid

Right now I'm rereading Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy. Red Mars and Green Mars were great. Blue Mars always feels like a bit of a letdown. The first two books had a lot of hard sci-fi and a lot of conflict. Mars vs Earth. Reds vs Greens. Metanationals vs everything else. Blue Mars is the slightly boring calm after the storm.

My uncle loaned to me that Wheel of Time prequel where Moraine meets Lan. Anyone read it? Is it any good or is it a lot of braid pulling, nose sniffing, and stoic silences like the main books?

Does anyone else hate waiting for the softback versions of books to come out? I don't have the money or space to buy many hardbacks so I end up waiting forever to get books that people have already read. Right now I'm waiting for the latest Harry Potter (you can't go anywhere on the web without getting spoiled for that book, dammit) and who knows when Feast of Crows will come out.

I've been on a non-fiction kick lately. I've read most of The Portable Beat Reader, Peace, Land, Bread (about the Russian Revolution of 1917), and Outsourcing America, a book about offshore outsource and what it really means for the American economy. On tap after that are a book on the NSA and Bob Woodward's book Veil, on the CIA secret wars from '81-'87.

I'm starting to read like my father.

My wife bought it, and I couldn't finish reading it.  It's an expansion on the Short Story, "New Spring" that was in the original "Legends" book TOR published.  Much like the last 5 books, the short story gave you all the salient bits you needed.  Reading the entire novel was a waste of time.  When the new book comes out I plan to take an hour or two and just read the last 5 chapters at Border's.  Anything you don't understand or miss you can flip back to the last time the character appeared and get up to speed.

I just started reading The Dark Tower series by Stephen King (the revised versions). I've never read anything by King before, but am really enjoying the first book. Very graphic, emotional, and hard to put down.

As for non-fiction, well, Standard Aircraft Handbook for Mechanics and Technicians is a bit of a yawn, though somewhat interesting. Unless it has to do with airplanes or military ops, I don't read much nonfiction unless you count all the crap I have to read at work.

Oh yes, I also recently finish The Hedge Knight, which is a comic written by George R.R. Martin and penned very well. Recommended!

My "Complete Calvin and Hobbes" newly released hardcover shipped today.

Honestly, it kind of reminds you while reading it of why you don't really like Robert Jordan anymore.  It's not as bad with the pointless exposition as he has gravitated now, but as a whole it just lacks any sort of kinetic energy.  It also has a lot of "Frodo & Sam" moments where you just wonder if Moiraine and Siuan are going to start making out or something.  Of course, it does have a better content to drivel ratio than most of his later work.  Oddly enough, I feel compelled to read some of the earlier books but I seemed to have lost them when I moved about a year and a half ago. 

I just finished Cook's The Silver Spike.  This one might be my new favorite.  I liked it a lot but Smeds aka Shed v2.0 was a bit hard to swallow.  Pedophile to badass in 5 easy steps! The ending was a bit severe too.  Ouch.  Happy, but.. wow.

Reading Gaiman's "Smoke and Mirrors" currently.  My first exposure to his writing. Pretty interesting with some fascinating twists on some old themes.

Oh wow.. I just found my Santa present.  Is it 'complete' or is it 100% fully complete?

I need to find some old Bloom County books too.

Nonfiction I can get in Magazines.  Though I recommend "Why Buildings Fall Down" and "Why Buildings Stand Up".   Theyr'e more in-depth than they sound, and cover some of the biggest structural failings and triumphs ever. (Well.. as of '94 when they were published.)

Heh. We have over 50 periodicals in the periodical room. I read about half of them, I can usually devour one a day between lunch and breaks. Max PC, PC Mag, PC Gamer, EGM, Time, Newsweek, MEJ, Rolling Stone, The Nation, Sierra, Fine Homebuilding, Discover, Scientific American, etc, etc, etc. The vast bulk of my reading is periodicals, mostly music, tech, science, news and homebuilding. Real narrow scope. Damn, where's that green text when you need it?

I find it ironic that Newsweek is calling the GOP out on competence (that is, lack of) and corruption...the same week the Pres nominates a Justice that was a personal friend and also lacks any judicial experience whatsoever. Not that it's at all out of character for him....

Apologies for the political statement, I just found it ironic.

Magazines don't do it for me anymore. They can't go into the depth that a book could, and are no longer as timely as anything on the Web. Now magazines on the web, that I could do. But print mags just really don't fit my lifestyle anymore.

Oh Irony... why must you pervade everything.

I just finished "The Cobweb" by Neal Stevenson and some other guy. Was a decent Political Thriller type. The main problem I ahd with this book was that I couldnt relate to any of the characters really, and so I didnt really give a damn. Overall an avarage book, with an interesting pre-Iraq (the first one) War, backdrop.

I picked up a few books that have been taunting me for a while.

Some one Come to Town, Some one Leaves Town. (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0765312786/002-5266598-9388822?v=glance&n=283155&n=507846&s=books&v=glance")

Friday by Robert A. Handlin (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/034530988X/002-5266598-9388822?v=glance&n=283155&s=books&v=glance"). Interesting note, when I did an amazon for the book, I just realized that my Father read this to me when I was a young kid. I knew I knew that name some where.

I also picked up Anansi Boys (Ill get to it at some point) and a book I cant remember the name of, but was basically the story of Satans fall from heaven to rull in hell, and the angle war that took place. (Im a sucker for angle war books)

Heh, oh, you mean Heinlein.

Funny that he read you Friday, since I think it's one of his more .. umm .. sexually explorative books.

I liked the new Glenn Cook book a lot. Took 80 pages or so to really get going, but that was just because he introduced about 30 characters in about 30 pages.

As I recall she is raped early in the book.  I assume dear old dad breezed that part... ;)

The Pythagorean Theory?

I've been reading the series by Alistar Reynolds: Revelation Space, Chasm City, Redemption Ark and am now on Absolution Gap.  Pretty decent hard sci-fi.

Oh, and in what is becoming a personal tradition, would someone of you slackers pick up and read the Sun Sword series by Michelle West.  I enjoyed that world setting more than most fantasy I've read in years.  Though i will warn you, the writing style take some getting used to, and the last book leave way to many plot lines unfinished.  (It's sorta ends the way I feel thw WoT series will, with huge and important characters basically left hanging in varous spots b/c the author has no idea where to take them next).

Xilren

The only periodical I regularly pick up is The Economist.  I like it for the lack of most standard US news mag biases,  and the fact that most of their writers seem to have more background in economics/political economy then actual journalism.  Usually has some great and informative articles on Developing World items which would never make any US magazine.

As for current events type reading...   You REALLY need to pick up a copy of Fareed Zakaria's The Future of Freedom.  Great book,  and incredibly informative.

Zakaria's arguments about liberal autocracies vs. illiberal democracies are great.  Very depressing when you consider how often elections fail to provide liberal (guaranteed rights, freedoms, etc) governments in poorer countries.  Especially when you consider some of the people who have won open elections by catering along ethnic or class lines,  and then gone on to prove themselves completely antithetical to any notion of progress or reform.

It seems Erikson occasionally has people post updates for him to the site I linked above.  Per the latest,  he's done with Book 6.  He also claimed to be on Chapter 7 (someone guestimated based on his previous works this is about 300 pages) of Book 7,  and that it's flying along.

It's good to have both Jordan and Erikson mentioned in the same post,  nice segue.

Like Jordan, Erikson churns out huge doorstops of material.  Unlike Jordan,  Erikson's plotting is decentralized. 

There is no one main character.  You probably have between 10 to 15 fairly major characters a book.  It's pretty much guaranteed 2 or 3 of them get killed.  Even if a character survives,  the action in the series moves on to different locations so you tend to not see a character again for a book or three.  I'd say that most of the characters are decent,  and at least a couple of them are fucking classics.

Jordan's real problem is he's glued to Rand and a couple of the other characters,  and feels obligated to cover them pretty much every book.  This eventually lead to a dry well of not having anywhere to go with the characters without tieing up the main plot device.

The Silver Spike is brutal.  Every one of Cook's natural tendencies as a writer are massively exaggerated.  Amoral to outright evil characters,  who also are sympathetic.  Age and entropy (mostly Raven,  who isn't the badass he once was...)  Paranoia taken to extremes.  And God, the body count.  I wouldn't call it an especially easy read for these reasons.

Gaiman writes a mean short story.  Smoke and Mirrors is in paperback,  and there's another collection of short stories in I think limited edition hardcover.  Both collections share some of the same short stories.  Pretty much bouncing around between whimsy/fable, horror (in traditional and Lovecraftian molds), wierd and speculative fiction, noir...  basically all over the place.

Does Smoke and Mirrors have the noir story set in Nurseryland?  That one really struck me.

If folks have some more suggestions,  I'll jot them down and try to pick up some copies.  I mostly pick up new books by browsing,  so if it's hard to get or in limited print I may miss it.  I'll take a look for Michelle West next time I peruse the stacks.

Except that I like being away from computers. And with the wide variety of topics available at the library, I don't have to hunt through 50 websites to find a couple articles to read, I just grab the mags and head to the break room.

Of course, if something piques my interest, I can dig deeper on the web, that's the beauty of it.

Oh yeah, and the web is annoying, as are computers.

I just finished Trainspotting (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0393314804/qid=1128611623/sr=8-3/ref=pd_bbs_3/104-9843611-8960725?v=glance&s=books&n=507846) by Irvine Welsh, which was excellent and I highly recommend it.  The thick scottish accent of some of the 'voices' takes some getting used to but wasn't that hard to understand really.

Non-fiction wise I'm reading Head First Design Patterns (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0596007124/qid=1128611776/sr=2-2/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_2/104-9843611-8960725?v=glance&s=books) and I find that it's a pretty good treatment of the subject.  If you do OOP and don't really have a good idea what design patterns are and why you should use them I recommend it.  It is MUCH easier to read and understand the the Gang of Four original.  The book is java centric but with a little effort it applies well to any object orientated programming language and especially .NET stuff.

You shut your damn filthy mouth.

Welsh is good, but for contemporary Scottish writing, I think that James Kelman and Alasdair Gray are better.

Nope it is To Reign in Hell (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0312870493/002-5266598-9388822?v=glance&n=283155&n=507846&s=books&v=glance"). Seems pretty cool from the few pages I read.

It is a decent book. Not one of Brust's best, IMHO, but not horrible. It kind of rambles a bit, which made it a bit of a tough read for me.

I dont recall. But my dad did read me some pretty advanced stuff when I was a kid. Including the first 4 DUNE books, also the LotR trilogy, and tons of shorts from Analog. He was a big SciFi buff, and thats probably why I like that stuff now.

Already done.  I couldn't wait for the books to come out.  The prequel duology (Hunter's Oath and Hunter's Death) sets up a lot of what happens in this series, but like you said, it seems like nothing is really resolved at the end.  I have a feeling there will be another series coming out, and if so I can't wait for that either.  You're right, the cultures she sets up are really rather interesting and different (or rather, different twists on the familiiar.

Alternatively, for something resonates and explores the 'funny' Scots, try Christopher Brookmyre.  Just DON'T take it too seriously.

Start with Boiling a Frog.

I really like Ian Rankin's books.  Being mystery novels they're not high literature or anything but they are a great read.  He takes two, sometimes three different plotlines and merges them together in a very complicated way.  They are mostly based in Edinburgh and he draws heavily upon the culture.

Haven't a clue to that story.

But this I know well. And it's true.  We're all frogs in various states of parboiled. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiled_frog)

Amazon linky (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0740748475/104-0660621-9519102?v=glance)

To answer the question, it's 1440 pages and bloody heavy. If it's missing anything, I haven't seen it yet.

I can't wait to pick this little gem  (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1582345929/qid=1120008336/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_1/103-7367973-9294248?v=glance&s=books&n=507846) up:

(http://www.sfgate.com/blogs/images/sfgate/culture/2005/06/28/1582345929.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg)

Try Gil's All-Fright Diner by A. Lee Martinez.  Its like Lovecraft meets Terry Pratchett, and the first book in a long time where I enjoyed the first chapter in the bookstore so much I bought it.

I also wanna pick up the sequel to What Einstein Told His Cook (food science junkie).

Isn't that titled What Einstein Told his Cock?  No?

No, it's "Lament for the Death of my Cook". That's a joke, for those of you who were sober in high school.

Hmmm.  I read the book this guy did on the impending on how to prepare for the impending zombie invastion.  Not nearly as amusing as you would think.  Thank god I picked it up at a steep discount.

If humorous grotesque is your thing,  try Stiff: The Curious Life of Human Cadavers.  A journalist looks at the history of human cadavers in a humorous manner.

I just this minute got A Feast for Crows delivered ( thank you Amazon UK ). I thought they were splitting it up into 2 books, or is that only the paperback edition? This one makes no mention of the fact its part 1 of 2 or the like. Hope its not part 1 as its 753 pages long :)

Got the Jordan Knife of Dreams last week too ( a sucker is me). I was pleasantly surprised to find out it actually advanced the story quite a bit. I reckon it will finish next book as everyoone actually seems to be getting up off their arses and heading for the final battle.

They did split Feast into 2 books.  That should give you some idea of just how fucking huge it would have been if it were a single volume, and why the publisher had coniptions when they got it.

Hm.. guess I'll have to check-out RASFW-J to see if the new Jordan's really worth buying or not. Spoilers never bothered me much.

I need to move to the UK!

AFFC is still listed as a November 8th release by Amazon. However Knife of Dreams looks like it is out! How in the hell did that escape my attention?!??!?

There's no Part 1 or 2. Theres just AFFC and A Dance with Dragons to be released in the future.

AFFC is done (http://www.georgerrmartin.com/done.html)

No Jon Snow is bad. No Dany I can live with, but only if Martin puts in more lesbian sex scenes in the next book to make up for it.


In other news, I rushed right out and bought Knife of Dreams. I am such a weak man. The reviews I have seen made mention of the fact that there is actual plot development in this one. We shall see. Do we need a spoiler thread in which to bitch/praise when finished with it?

You poor bastard.

I've given up on Jordan.  Couldn't get through his last novel in the series.

If I'm going to work to make myself finish a book,  I might as well work at Perdio Street Station or Lilith or the Gormenghast books.

Heinlein is a weird fellow. Some of his books I really liked, like The Puppet Masters for example. Then there are books like Farnham's Freehold in which 24th century black bangers drive around in pimped out flying caddies. (No, I'm not kidding) My father has a very large collection of science fiction books (most of which are original printings, including the orginal hardbound rings trilogy among a ton of others) and he said that Heinlein was in a car accident at hit his head, at which point his writing totally changed.

I have no idea if that particular story is true, but it is true that his writing got very different. His later books have a weird sort of conservative asshole bent to them. Not a religious right type of conservative, but more like a sleazy conservative, like a conservative Bill Maher. They have a fair amount of misogyny and racism in them. (Farnham's Freehold is distasteful in a lot of ways, it's like the book the editors on the Cornell Review would write if they got together to write science fiction)

If you like sci fi I highly reccomend Jack Vance. His writing has that really fabulous educated sounding 50s-60s quality to it, where 20% of the words are words that have fallen out of favor in everyday use. I find reading that sort of stuff fascinating, it really shows you how much times change in 30 years or so. It's almost like reading Old English at times. Of course, the stories are great in the pulpy way.

I'll second Vance, he's the reason I visit used book stores. I probably have about 25 of his books. I'd mention which books by Heinlein I like, except I recently found the same books on the favorite list of a particular internet celebrity's blog (curse whoever linked that here) and I don't want to go there.

I just ordered RJ and GRRM's new jobs.  RJ has fallen off a bit, but I think it's easy to get lost in a twelve volume work.  Anyway, I still think he's good, just not the best, and of the caliber he maintained for the first 5 books or so.  At any rate, I feel obligated to stick it out no matter how bad it gets.  Once you're ten books deep, it's a committed relationship with four kids and a mortgage.  There's no conceivable way out.

I disagree with your characterization of Farnham's Freehold.  Black People Doing Bad Things!=Racism.  The message of the book is that when ANY racial group gets the upper hand, they are generally going to act assholish and racist toward everybody else.  I remember one scene in the book when the suddenly civil-rights conscious whites get upbraided by a black who also time traveled/whatever with them about what HE had to go through in their time period.

Blah.

Read the cover of the new Jordan.  I just have no desire to revisit the series. 

If you're going to follow a bunch of different protagonists in a variety of locations,  you need to make a real and conscious effort to tie up thier stories every volume.  Martin generally does this,  but will leave one or two floating as a cliffhanger.  Jordan regularly leaves ALL his protagonists hanging,  to the point where you need a quick refresher to figure out where they are and what they're doing.  Overall,  would be a much better structure to follow one or a couple through something to a wrap up,  where the next volume you can follow the next. 

Compounding this is the fact that none of the protagonists seem to be doing anything vaguely related.  At least in Martin,  you may follow a bunch of different people,  but they cross paths with and plot against the rest.  Even if you don't get Tyrion's point of view for 200 pages,  you've probably gotten the PoV of people he's in direct confrontation with,  or are plotting against him,  or are simply in the same location.

Jordan is from the school of suddenly throwing up huge threats that seem to have little or no genesis, too.  The whole Perrin subplot that last few novels has been bizarre.  Out of nowhere,  a bunch of the desert folk (forgot the name) just decide to follow a painfully obvious and weak character for no apparent reason than "to give Perrin something to do". 

Not even going to mention the relationships.  His male protagonists seem to be accumulating harems.....

David Drake's ongoing fantasy series ("Lord of the Isles" maybe?)is a good counterpoint.  It's fairly enjoyable light reading.  It's not earthshattering,  or even that good.  The plot in each novel is well told,  and they mesh well.  Issues brought up are generally resolved,  and the series arc is advanced a couple steps.  Even if the characters take off in 5 or 10 different directions.

Erikson's Malazan series likewise has a huge number of protagonists.  But you don't see them every single book.  You get Kruppe (a knockoff of the Mocker/Saltimbanco character from Cook's "Dread Empire", by the way) one novel,  and then maybe he'll show up a couple books on.  Or a major protagonist in one novel only has bit parts in another.  Right now,  I think there are only 1 or 2 characters that have popped up in more than two novels.  And they're usually bit players, as far as the story arc is concerned.

Yes.  Jordan also needs to kill off some people.  Badly.

That's the other route.  People like Cook turn the end of some of their books into abatoirs, tying off the loose ends and shaking up the ranks.

My major problem with Martin is that some of his characters tend to have almost no rational motives for their actions.  There's some thuggery just to be thugish some time.  I mean, seriously, if you're a psychotic serial killer or sadist I'm sure that a regime would have some good uses for you.  I just don't see how some of these people hang out at court,  or are trusted advisors, or whatever their motives are.  The Mountain and Vargo,  Joffrey, etc.

They put Vargo in charge of one of the bigger castles.  I mean... huh? 

At least there's no way he could screw up the Last Battle right?

If he did, that's just be the cherry on top.  He started the whole series after having 'a vision' of this huge climactic epic battle.  He knows the ending and exactly what's going to happen there, and has since he first started sketching out his notes.  The problem is he just doesn't know how the fuck to get there, it would seem.

The ship started going down when nearly every main character became separated and started doing their own independent thing.  The pace of the book became neccessarily slowed.  Sure, you can have three chapters of Mat, three of Rand, three of Perrin, three of Egwene/Aes Sedai, three of whoever, and then start the cycle again.  But the book becomes episodic with that many threads to follow; unlike in the first few books when most or all characters traveled together.  And really, who gives a shit about Perrin?  Crazy ass Rand is interesting, crazy ass Mat is interesting...stalwart Perrin?  Not so much.

The only way Jordan could redeem Perrin as a character is if he were to bitchslap his wife, throw her down and fuck her in the ass while simultaniously forcing her to go down on Berlain.

But that's just me, your requirements may vary.  It'll never happen anyway, because "they don't 'get' women. If only they understood them like <generic male lead>"

So what are you saying?

Up to page 172 so far. It seems like things might be coming to a head on a couple of the story lines, but we shall see. My biggest complaint is that are WAY TOO MANY Aes Sedai and Wise Ones; I can't remember who is a Darkfriend and who is just a bitch (hint...all of them are the latter, seemingly). I am having similar problems with the Forsaken (Chosen)- so many have been recycled it is hard to recall who used to be whom.

Jordan would have been far better served to limit the POVs to the top 10 characters in the book instead of a PoV for damned near every fucking named character at one time or another. It is all just such a mishmash at this point. I shouldn't have to take notes to keep track of WTF is going on.

Minor spoiler in black-I was reasonably happy to see the death of a semi-memorable tertiary character in the prologue, just for the sake of something INTERESTING happening before the last chapter.

Thanks for putting that shit in black.  That makes you almost as considerate as that guy in the smoker thread who kept his jack butts in his coat pocket until he could find a waste bin (gross).

I just found out about this, but there is a recapitulation available at http://www.dragonmount.com/Books/Knife_of_Dreams/ that will get you up to speed.  I plan to read it when my copy arrives.  A refresher course should make things more enjoyable, in the past I've scratched my head in consternation wondering who the hell was who and what the fuck was what.

Cool! Thanks for the link- just printed out the recap so I can drag it along with me.

That Jordan can't write people or plausible situations, so he may as well just go over the top.


Anywho : Here's the "Official" RASFWR-J FAQ (http://linuxmafia.com/jordan)  That's maintained by some of the oldest fans of the series who've posted in the usenet group since the days that Usenet was actualy a viable source of information. If you have a question about the series, that's probably the single best source of information you'll find, outside of hunting Jordan himself down.

Yeah but that will probably contain spoilers.  The link I posted is specifically designed as a refresher course before you read the latest and greatest. 


And I think you give RJ a little less credit than he deserves.  Yeah, he's fallen off, but he's not shit.

I'll pick of Feast of Crows when in paperback for sure.

I'm just starting on Feist.  Damn, I should have done that earlier.  Almost done with Magician: Apprentice.

It is refreshing to read about people that aren't idiots for once, and when a surprise happens, I'm surprised right along with them.

Listening to the Dark Tower series during my commute. I'm on book 3.

Several of the chapters in the last one (A New Spring?) absolutely are shit.  A few of those passages started nowhere, went nowhere and meandered through bad dialogue in a way so horrible it completely fails any attempt at alliteration.

The Riftwar saga is one of my very favorites. I envy you getting to read it for the first time! Enjoy the ride.

I think the battle scene where Mandragoran takes on seven swordsmen at once is worthwile.

Also, alliteration?  I didn't know fantasy epics were really just thinly-disguised alliteration contests.  A typical scene from a RJ book is just a few dudes standing around trying to outmanuever each other verbally.  And I can see how that wouldn't appeal to everyone.  But there is a point.  It has some merit.  OH THE INTRIGUE!

I recently just reread the whole Riftwar saga books, and the ones he did with Janny Wurts (Mistress of Empire, etc.)  It had been a while and I'd forgotten the whole story line to them.  Forgot how much I'd enjoyed them the first time around, now I want to pick up all the other books he wrote afterwards in that same world.  Good thing the holidays are coming up - gift cards FTW!

I also completely missed the release of the new Jordan book, and agree with Dusematic - when you are 10 books into a series, you are almost obligated to finish it off, no matter how bad it seems to be getting.  Now I need to reread all the books again though, or at least skim them heavily to see if I can figure out the plot again.  That should take long enough for Knife of Dreams to come out in paperback.  Fucking hardbacks, hate that it takes a year for the paperback to be released.

My copy of KoD just arrived.  It's so crisp and fresh.

Damn, looks like Galad is going to be Pedron Niall Jr. in a hot sec.  He just improbably killed Eamon Valda.  I desperately need to talk to someone about this.

I jsut read "A Reader's Manifesto." It's not new (2002) but it was quite good and I recommend it to anyone who likes reading or (and especially) writing.

Saw that forecast ages ago.. good to know, though. I hadden't seen that particular plot point in my search for 'what's happening in the new book' yet.

Man, I hope you just didn't spoil that for the 2 Robert Jordan fans on this site.  They probably had to sit through 300 pages of braid tugging to get to that event.

I haven't read since book 8.  I have no idea what you just said though, which is probably a good thing. Err wait, this is WoT right?

Does this new book have actual plot progression? Like enough to warrant re-reading the series?

I still don't get it. So much hate for Robert Jordan...

Yet, the amount of talk about the Wheel of Time that I run into on the Internet (haphazardly even) would fill volumes.

Glad to say that I never read it.

That revelation was on page 28, so I don't think I'm spoiling much.  At best, you're an "ex-Jordan fan" after reading eight of his fucking 3 pound dissertations. 



Why are you glad to say you never read it?  That speaks to the same hate for Robert Jordan that you supposedly don't get. 

Yep, don't deny that fact. I'm still very curious as to what all happens. I liked it all a lot through book 7. Book 8 was really slow and tortuous. I think I got 70 pages into book 9 before just throwing it down in frustration.  I hope the bastard gets to finish this whole series up before he croaks.

Still, if I do read it; I'll know in the back of my mind that some jackass I don't remember currently, dies on page 28 of book 12.  :x 

My bad.

No biggie, someone spoiled the ending of Minority Report for me once by putting the end in a thread title.  Didn't really end up caring much, I'm assuming this would be pretty much of the same feeling.

Of course, people better keep tight lipped when Feast For Crows come out.  It might be safer to just deploy the "Harry Potter strategy" and just stay the fuck away from the internet until I'm done.

I think the reason for the hate is that the first few books of WoT were really, really good.  Good story, interesting characters, nice plot progression that moved along at a good pace.  They were really good books and a lot of people enjoyed them.  Then they started to suck, and just got suckier.  And that made a lot of people angry, because something that was so good became so crap.  If they had have started crap, noone would have cared in the first place.  But the fact they were so good and so popular, and then became crap, has instigated the enormous amounts of gnashing and wailing that you see on the Internet.

What I don't "get" is that people hate the shit out of the Wheel of Time series, yet talk about it incessantly.

"I'm glad I never read it" because I haven't had to deal with that myself.

Anyways, as for the "new" book releases:

New Rules: Polite Musings from a Timid Observer (Bill Maher) (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1594862958/102-0351103-6390555?v=glance&n=283155&s=books&v=glance)

The R. Crumb Handbook (R.Crumb) (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1840727160/102-0351103-6390555?v=glance&n=283155)

A comedy book and a comic....But that's all I've got for now (new at least). Anyone who likes Bill Maher will know what to expect from the first, and ditto for Crumb.

I really should have read the series again before the new one came out. I got a couple of chapters in and realised I didn't have a clue who was who. Time to restart again.

I think the hate for Jordan comes from wasting a good plot and world he built.  The first 5-7 books set up a great world with a great setting.  The systems put in place wouldn't be too bad for a MMOG IMO too.  I think most people reading it got pulled into this world and then got let down when every book afterward slowed way down and didn't seem to go anywhere.

We are all looking for answers, but Jordan just keeps heaping more questions on us.  He has been introducing more and more characters without resolving anything for the old ones.

As mentioned before, the frustration comes from knowing there is something good to come from all of this, but we are constantly waiting for it.  We feel we need to get a conclusion to the whole works since we have so much invested into it.

I didn't read the last novel, but I have it waiting to listen to on my commutes.  I'll pace it so I finish it just in time to buy the paperback a year from now.

Robert Jordan is the Everquest of fantasy novels.

People hate him because the first book, or first few books were so good, and there was only supposed to be like 3-6 books total in the series. He starts making serious bank on it and suddenly we have a 12-book opus of monstrous individual proportions, many of which can be summed up by

Bitch tugs on her braid
Calls men woolheaded
Second different yet indistinguishable bitch agrees
Men do something woolheaded

Book threads should implicitly prohibit any Jordan talk, which should be segregated into it's own thread. Like the fucking plague, he is.

How about a MUD, or a few dozen of them.  WoT was the second-most popular setting when I was heavily into mudding. Some of the systems were brilliant and make MMO mechanics that much more depressing.

There was that WoT PC game out awhile back .. played the multiplayer demo for awhile. Seemed ok but nothing too special. Of course, the "special" parts are the parts that don't translate into a video game very well.

Until Jordan remembers how to write an interesting novel, he should not be mentioned in these forums again. Those in concurrence, say 'Aye'.

Nay!  Sorry, I like the WoT world setting too much to stop now.  Besides, I need closure damnit.

So far, at least he has stuck to the major characters and there is some sense of movement forwards.  One battle to speak of thus far, and as usual, way way way too many words devoted to clothing, haristyles and descriptions of furniture.

Xilren

And meals and food.  You forgot those.  4 pages on turnips and their purchase in a 15 page chapter.. wtf.

Some people like Buffy, some people like Robert, let's call the whole thing off.

Ten pages of Jordan = one page of Hubbard.. something something.

So far, the book is a mangle of crap, same as same.  To be honest, the wheel of time is like watching/reading Jordan have a mental breakdown as his story seems to be eating him alive.

This just in, the entire book is very skippable.  Some minor things happened, but no major ones.  Color me unsurprised.

Xilren

Lets go back to talking about books and leave the vomit-on-a-page for later discussions.

Thank you.  I was getting an itch to go pick it up in hardcover, now I feel like I can wait to bum it off a friend in paperback a couple of years from now.

A Feast for Crows though is going up next to my hardcovers of the first three.

Any thoughts on those Dark Elf books? I totally missed the bus on them, and I saw some nice bound versions of each trilogy (or whatever) when I was at Northshire in Vermont. Being a library-type, I jotted the ISBNs down in case they are worth getting. There were like four series iirc.

My girlfriend just took over fiction for our library and I'm pushing for the entire catalog of Black Company stuff :)

I like Salvatore's writing, so I like his whole work so far; and the only real complaint is that the teen geek squad spuged all over his Drizzit work.  His Cadderly books were more entertaining in my opinion, and I think are his best work to date.

I agree on the Cadderly series.  Great books and a good character over all, even if there's some lines that can drawn between him and  Drizzt.

The Drow books are all pretty good.  I enjoy the earlier stuff more than the more recent stuff, if only because it seems like Salvatore is starting to get wrapped-up in the Drizzt mythos the teenybopper assclowns have built-up.  Early on you felt there was some sense of danger and risk, now it's just down to 'how do they get out of this one' that's so common in any long-running fantasy series. 

Another good series, set-up by Salvatore but authored by others has been the War of the Spider Queen. Each book is written by a different author, so it can feel a bit disjointed going from one book to the next as you acclimate to the new style, but the characters and story are consistent because they'd been fleshed-out beforehand. Kind of reminds me of the way the original DragonLance books worked, but with Drow. (good and evil)

Go get Rammer Jammer Yellow Hammer by Warren St. John.

The author joins the Alabama Crimson Tide motor-home fans for a college football season. It's great for any sports fan as it's part travel book and part analysis on the nature of sports fans.

I thought the Dark Elf Trilogy was boring and poorly written.  I was surprised because all I've ever heard led me to believe Salvatore was the greatest author of our time.  But whatever, I was surprised to see so much hate for RJ here too, although I think that's partially due to a rebellion against how popular he is with the mainstream fantasy fan.

It's all about what you're looking for.  Salvatore's characters are better and boader than Jordan's and I find them on the whole to be more believable.  They also don't turn into different hair-colored version of the same whiny indecisive puss with the stoic mug or bitchy high-handed female who just wants to melt at the touch of "Mr. Right."

  However, Salvatore's fight scene writing leaves much to be desired and often I have to read and re-read the scene to figure out what the fuck he's trying to convey is going on.  Even then I'm sometimes left thinking "well that couldn't fucking work" or "meh that was overwhelmingly convoluted and badly paced."   Jordan, on the other hand, writes fight scenes and particularly battles that you can practicaly FEEL.  That's traditionally why the latter third of his books have saved the previous boring slog through the first 2/3, and why I still enjoy readin Lord of Chaos just for the Dumai Wells bit.

Sky - The series in written order are: (numbers are chonological order)

(2)The Icewind Dale Trilogy: The Crystal Shard, Streams of Silver, The Halfling's Gem
(1)The Dark Elf Trllogy: Homeland, Exile, Sojourn
(3)Legacy of the Drow: The Legacy, Starless Night, Siege of Darkness, Passage to Dawn
(4) Hunter's Blade Trilogy: The Thousand Orcs, The Lone Drow, The Two Swords

There's also an offshoot called "The Paths of Darkness" which cover some of the ancillary characters a bit more, while still including Drizzt and fit in somemwhere between and around the Legacy set and the Hunter's Blade set. . Books are The Silent Blade, The Spine of the World, Servant of the Shard, Sea of Swords.

Really, the best ones are the IWD and DE trilogys. Rather than buying 'em just harass whoever has them checked-out at the library until they return 'em.  They're quick reads, maybe a weekend.

Sky,

And well everyone I guess, though I think this author's work should be listed in the annuals of just damn good fantasy, is Robert Asprin's Myth series.  He starts to go nuts with them around book 7 or 8, but the first few books are just gold.  The Phule books are also good, but damn his Myth series is just like a good ice cold beer after a hot day and damn quick reads.

Since apparently a couple of you have read the Drow books, I'll ask a couple questions. What age level of audience is it aimed at? Considering we are talking about what is supposed to be an inherently evil race, how edgy are the stories? I fear that I'll find the books to be: Look at us cool Drow! We are evil cause we talk mean and stuff and wear black clothes!

I'm looking for a decent fantasy (or even sci-fi) series written for a mature audience. Mature doesn't mean it has to be Hugo award level technobable/philosophical writting, just that the stories deal with characters and subject matters that aren't aimed at the Harry Potter crowd.

As big a flaws Jordan's books have, they do hit on a few things I enjoy - mature subject matter, shades of grey characters, things like that. I really don't think I could bring myself to read the latest one though

Hell, that last stuff I read series wise was Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake books. They have plenty of thier own problems, but at least it was a refreshing change from the typical PG at best rated stuff I'd been reading.

Look around at everyone named some form Drriz't on an MMOG and you should be able to answer these questions yourself.  I wondered what all the fuss was about a few years back and couldn't even begin to get into those books they were so derivative, my personal optinon was that he had cut and pasted some of the better bits out of more interesting books and then did a find and replace on the names while loosly stringing together disparate passages.

YMMV.

I work at a library ;) They aren't in the system, just a few books here and there. I was thinking of getting the compilations. Thanks for the info everyone.

Fargull - read the first few Mything books of Aspirin when I was a kid, he had just written the first iirc and I read a couple more as he wrote them before I got out of fantasy for a few years.

I really wish I could just find something better than the Black Company :P (since I've already read that about a hunnert times)

Murg's point is blunt, but it's true.  If all you enjoy reading is more adult fare and artistry, don't bother.  Salvatore is a fantasy pulp writer, like all of the D&D book authors.  You read them because you enjoy the setting, the world and possibly the characters, you don't read them expecting good literature. I got into them because my wife had the books when we were dating and I wanted something to read.  

They're aimed at older teens.  There's some sex, blood and evil machination but it's all as deep as the rest of the D&D lore. The edginess is there - mainly in the Legacy and Dark ELf series -  but it's not anything R-rating level.  If you're wanting G.R.R. Martin level of adult fare, skip 'em.  They fall between the last 2 Potters and Martin on the 'edginess' scale.


I know, that's why I suggested harassing whoever had 'em.  Of course if they're not in the catalogue that's a bit problematic.

I will echo what's been said about Salvatore.  I enjoyed it in high school, I don't know if I still would.  Regarding how evil the Drow are... they're pretty evil.  Aside from the standard slave ownership and such, their entire society in based on a strict hierarchy and an "it's only wrong if you get caught" rule.  One noble house ambushing and completely annihilating another noble house to get just a bit more status is reasonably common- if they do it well, there will either be no survivors or any survivors will have switched sides.  If they don't do it well, and there's a single loyal member of the family left to tattle, the attacking house is annihilated.

But will you see truly awful stuff, like stuff you'd find in "Saw"?  No.  It's still a series for teens.

Now, if you can appreciate it for that, you may still enjoy it.  Salvatore has some other non-D&D books, some good some crap.  I enjoyed the Crimson Shadow series, but again I was in high school during this period.  I don't know if I'd still enjoy them.

Has anyone else actually picked up the City of Heroes book?  It was released early this week, I've been enjoying it so far.  Didn't really care for the first chapter introducing the Dark Watcher, but otherwise it's kept me interested.

I don't know what to suggest as far as "mature" Sci-Fi/Fantasy really (still need to check out Black Company!), but the last Dune trilogy was really good (The Butlerian Jihad). You'd probably have to be familiar with the original Dune books to get full enjoyment out of them, but they can still be read on their own as well (it's like 10,000 years before "Dune" anyways, so....).

Lots of grey/amoralism, and depth to a good number of the characters.

Slight Spoiler: Especially "Erasmus" (the android who ends up being a precursor to the Mentats).

Most of the story takes place on battlegrounds and within military conflict though, so like 2/3rds is "action paced". Deep character portraits, but not necessarily deep writing (but fast and fun).

I'm in the beginning stages of writing a cookbook. Or rather, a collection of recipes with hilarious anecdotes about my childhood and current experiences with food and cooking. Wish me luck! I figure it's easier (and WAY cheaper) than trying to start up a catering company.

...of course, I'm sure whatever it is I end up doing will have already been done, but if that one bitch can get a best-seller writing about how she followed some Julia Child recipes, fuck, anyone can write a goddamned cookbook.

Then I'd recommend the Sun Sword series by Michelle West, the Reality Dsyfunction by Peter Hamilton (i think), and the Dresden files by Jim Butcher.  

I really like the Dresden files for modern fantasy compared to the Anita Blake books; she just took a nose dive straight into wierd S&M sex with various monsters after like book 4.  Like I really want to read about how the main character practiced deep throating on one werecriiter so she could do it for the other eleventy billion things she sleeps with.  Oh look, yet another sex trio with a vampire, werewolf and the main character.  Yawn.

Xilren

Yea, that pretty much sums up what happend to Anita Blake.

(http://www.antoniogenna.net/doppiaggio/anim/thundarrilbarbaro.jpg)

I still quite enjoy Wheel of Time game from time to time. That offensive/defensive choices make it a constantly interesting challenge when playing against other people.

I enjoyed Weiss and Hickman's Death Gate Cycle.

I'll never forgive them for pretending to kill Tas. Chicken feathers indeed.

Yah, pretty much.

The Anita Blake novels,  much like Jordan's, have devoled into author wish fullfillment as far as relationships go. 

There also a fairly strong tendency for some female authors to churn out what's basically "romance novels with dragons". 

@ Sky:

Supposedly from the interview with Cook I linked on the first page,  the Sci Fi Book Club is compiling and reissuing his less popular works.  The "Dread Empire" books are getting the treatment,  and the "Garret" books have already been compiled and reissued.

"Dread Empire" is GOOD.  And impossible to find without splurging at online resellers.

"Garrett, PI" series is excellent.  Noir detective fantasy, the back drop is a generations spanning war.  Cook really has emphasized the tensions between the native human population,  and the immigrant other races who have moved in to the city to take over jobs left idle by the drafted humans.  Sometimes just as brutul, if not more, than the Black Company.

One novel,  literally every character dies except for Garrett,  and he's left as an emotional mess.

Check out Gardens of the Moon and Deadhouse Gates by Steven Erikson.  Cook was a big influence on Erikson,  and there are plenty of homages.  The Chain of Dogs in Deadhouse Gates is amazing writing.  Really hit on something epic there.

This isn't exactly "new" (reprinted 2002), but I finally picked it up last night:

The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345461517/103-7028126-9823060?v=glance&n=283155&n=507846&s=books&v=glance)

It's a compilation of all of Howard's first Conan stories (in the order they were written...not necessarily in the order of Conan's timeline), and it is the shit. I've read Conan the Conqueror, some of the stories contained in the above, some comics, I'm a fan of the first film, but never delved into Howard's stuff quite enough (except the first two mentioned). Besides the comics, I've never read any "pseudo-Conan" literature (And don't plan to, because only Robert E. Howard really knows Conan enough to write about him).

Even so though, Conan has always been the "standard" in fantasy for me (Lord of the What? J.R.R Who?). And it's not just for the barbarian themes (which definitely appeals to me), but REH's prose. Even if he came from a pulp background, he makes most subsequent fantasy novelists look like they're writing for juveniles (and they are, for the most part). He's a great writer first and foremost, not just a guy who writes great Sword and Sorcery. He deserves to be recognized beyond this genre that he helped springboard and create (just as much as that Tolkien guy).....But probably never will (but the character he created still lives on, so I guess it's not a bad deal).

Anyways, just wondering if anyone has it as well.

I also picked up Dhalgren (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0375706682/103-7028126-9823060?v=glance&n=283155&s=books&v=glance) because I've heard so much about what a "classic" it is. Will see...

I'll second the Howard recommendation.  There are two books out now,  with a third compilation due out on November 29 of this year.  It always amazes me that people like Howard and Lovecraft (contemporaries who corresponded quite a bit) were struggling pulp writers.

I also have a copy of Dhalgren I've been meaning to get into.  It's probably sitting in a pile with my copies of Pliny, Lilith, and Perdido Street Station...

You might want to find a copy of Dilvish the Damned.  It's Roger Zelazny,  set up as more of a loose compilation of short stories.  Zelazny is the man.

I'd put Salvatore in the same genre as Gemmell.  Pulp fantasy, churned out regularly.  Fairly entertaining.

I was another person that enjoyed it in high school,  but don't really feel the need to revisit it now.

I was going to pick up one of his instead of Dhalgren, but decided against it (for no reason really). So far I've read the PKD/Zelazny collaboration (sort of a collaboration) Deus Irae (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0385045271/103-7028126-9823060?v=glance&n=283155&v=glance), but nothing by Zelazny per se.

My dad has all the Howard Conan stuff. Howard's Conan is great. The sad fact about fantasy is, most of it is not fantastic of mysterious or really interesting in any way. Fantasy as a genre is no more fantastic than by-the-numbers crime novels. The great thing about Conan stuff is it really does capture a sense of awe, foreboding, wonder and the like. Rather than shit which is basically "I roll for saving throw against Orc bash" translated into novel form.

And the stories can definitely be appreciated by adults. If you look at a story like The Frost Giant's Daughter, it is very adult themed. (In a good way)

Edit: Let me also say that the main reason I am totally disinterested in Robert Jordan is the wretchedness of his Conan stories. If Howard was an 8 on the sacle of 1-10 Jordan is hovering around -13 or so. The man is not a good writer at all. It's like when I re-read some Hickman and Weiss books - they are shockingly bad. I mean incredibly, amazingly, horrifically bad, to the point of pure embarrassment. Reading clearly 3rd-rate authors does not interest me.

How is your writing career coming along Paelos, btw?

Go for the Amber books, Lord of Light, or This Immortal.  And Dilvish.  Solid works, all.

Hmmm,  according to the Fat Man, Jim Butcher's "Dresden Files" have been picked up for a pilot on sci fi.  With Scifi's track record,  I'm not sure if that's a good thing. 

Article (http://www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=21629)

Zelazny's Amber series is pretty solid.

I am shocked and dismayed to see all the Salvatore love. I think the man is the biggest hack on the planet. I am reasonably certain that he spends his non-writing time vigorously masturbating over character sheets for Drizz't and Wulfgar and the rest of his impossible puissant heroes.

I am about 3/4 of the way through book 11 of WoT. Not a ton has happened, but it seems much more interesting this time around. Maybe it is because he is actually dealing with the main characters instead of a host of tertiary characters.

I read that Rand is getting very minimal time in this book. Any truth?

He got a couple of chapters so far. Not much is happening, other than preparing for Tarmon Gai'don (or Armageddon, if you prefer). Matt and Egwene are getting most of the ink, with a couple of interminable Elayne chapters thrown in. I get the feeling that something will happen with Perrin and Faile before the end of the book as well.

I'm tired of Faile and the Shaido and all that. Very tired of it.

I'm on page 450 something, and Rand got like 4 chapters in a row.  Chapters with Rand/Mat POV are the only things I enjoy lately. 

I must say I enjoyed it, even the Egwene parts that normally I flip through. As for not much happening, compared to how Jordan normally writes this book is like a whirlwind. We have resolutions to the Matt, Perrin and Elayne storylines that have been going on for books now, armies marching to the final battle and the decks cleared for the Seanchan to ally with Rand.

Now if he could only write women without resorting to them going 'stony faced' whenever the least little fucking thing doesn't go their way, and 10 pages of descriptions about Elayne being pregnant ( drop the fucking sprog woman, christ almight ) I wouldnt need to go to the dentist for all my ground down teeth.

Sorry, cant quite work out spoiler tags!

TOMORROW. YAY YAY YAY.

"Tomorrow" what?

Book releases for the week of November 7 include

"Are Men Necessary?" By Maureen Dowd

"A Salty Piece of Land" By Jimmy Buffett

"Japanese Women Don't Get Old or Fat" By Naomi Noriyama

"Memoirs of My Melancholy Whores" By Gabriel Garcia Marquez (first book in years!)

"Talk to the Hand : The Utter Bloody Rudeness of the World Today, or Six Good Reasons to Stay Home and Bolt the Door" By Lynne Truss

Among other things...

What could you possibly be that excited about?

A Feast of Crows, I'm sure. I lost interest about halfway through book 2.

And yet you're a Jordan'o'holic.   :-P I'm not sure how you could lose interest midway though 2, I'd figure at the end or midway through 1 you'd have a sense for the series enough to formulate an opinion and decide if you'd want to continue.   

And yes, Feast For Crows. My favorite character won't be in this one, but it should still be a hell of a read. 

This is more exicting for me than Harry Potter.  WOOT WOOT WOOT.  :rock: :rock_hard: :hulk_rock:

I haven't even bothered picking up or reading the newest WoT book.

FWIW, the newest WoT book was better than the past 3 or 4. Not up to par with the early books, but at least he spent the lion's share of time dealing with the main characters (the Two Rivers crowd +  Elayne).

I am eagerly anticipating AFfC. Although I am trying to reconcile the title with the fact that the events in the North are being pushed to another book... :?

Damning with faint praise, but true.  Stuff actually happens, and it makes me all the more angry that the previous 3-4 books were such wastes of wood pulp.  The guy still has a fetish for women's clothing though.

Looking for Jake (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345476077/102-5087448-1806522?v=glance&n=283155&n=507846&s=books&v=glance) is good.  Miéville, with one very short, and not exactly new, New Crobuzon story in there.

I got the last copy of A Feast For Crows at the Round Rock, TX Barnes and Noble. There were a bunch reserved behind the counter.

Hmm,  2/3 of the way through it.  No spoilers.

It's good.  I'm liking it more than the other books,  but I was kind of lukewarm on some facets of the series.  No need to clutter up the thread with shit I've said before.

I like the Cersei perspectives.  Especially because she's a paranoid, crazy bitch.

I'm liking Margarery Tyrell (sp?  Mace Tyrell's daughter,  widow of Renly and Joffrey).  No perspectives from her,  just interesting when contrasted with Cersei.

I'm even liking Sansa Stark more,  and I really hated her perspectives. 

Got my copy at lunch yesterday, and finally cracked it open this afternoon. The first 4 pages have been interesting  :-D

I picked it up tuesday but I'm still only about 100 pages into it (simply due to lack of free time).  I like it so far but I think maybe he has too many POV's going now.

Picked up a Ravnica Bundle this past weekend and included was Ravnica : City of Guilds (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0786937920/104-4336288-7609504?v=glance&n=283155&v=glance) and suprising the novel was an interesting read.  Some of the plot is way the hell to contrived, but overall I like how the world was presented.  Enjoy the damn cards too, which is an addiction I don't need to restart.

Did you pickup on the name of the guard who found Tywin Lannister dead in the privy?


Lum

Seemed a poetic comentary on something somehow. :-p

Xilren

I am now putting "A Feast..." down and re-reading the prior book. Martin does not do fluffy exposition of the last book, and I am having a very hard time remember just who the hell all these people are.

Heh,  I missed that at the time and only caught it from the Corp thread.

Finished last night.

My no spoiler opinions:

I liked it more than either of the first two books.  The fact that most of the psychopaths are either dead or out of the way now helped.  Never had much use for most of the Starks other than Arya.  I didn't like Catelyn at all,  and Robb was just uninteresting.

The Cersei viewpoint was great.  She's a vain, nasty, arrogant retard.  And you can tell she's going to reap a whole lot of personal and family pain from it.

I still have a problem with the way Martin portrays so many of the non-main characters.  They just come off as arrogant, overopinionated morons.

This book redeemed Sansa for me.  The whole plot thread with her and Littlefinger in the Vale is pretty good.

Cersei is definitely crusing for a bruising.  The minor figure I find most intriguing is Qyburn...that is one sick fuck.  SPOILER AHEAD....

























































The part of the book I am most intrigued about is Cersei and Qyburn's "unbeatable champion".  There was only that one reference plus the reference to the armor "too large for anyone to wear".  Even if Balon Swann did get sent to Dorne with Ser Gregor's head, I'm laying even money that Gregor is still "alive"  :evil:

Don't need to to that. I found a great site that has chapter summaries of all the previous books.

http://members.aol.com/vbkorik27/summary/AGOTspoilerfree.htm

Clikcing "return to summaries homepage" will lead you to the other books. Took me less than 2 hours to "re-read" the whole series enough to feel back up to speed.

I'll be throwing up a list of release dates for new books over the Thanksgiving weekend.  Some good stuff now has release dates,  including new Erikson, Brust (weee, new Vlad!), Bakker's "Prince of Nothing" series, and others.

The Warrior Prophet,  by Bakker, is now available in trade paperback.  Good series,  Dune meets Crusades,  with an underlying plot about an ancient evil.


Next Tuesday,  the next trade paperback collection of Conan short stories hits books stores.  Stray and Margalis should both pickup,  or they are no true Conan fans.  :wink:

Right now,  I'm reading a non-fiction book drawing a link between H.P. Lovecraft and the "alien astronaut"/other wacky exterestial theories/conspirices.  A pretty good debunking of the Chariots of the Gods crowd,  and intesting reading.

That,  and reading the Bernard Cornwell "Sharpe" historical fiction.  It's okay;  not really in the same league as the Hornblower or Maturin stuff.

Who wrote the book and what it's name?


Is it another Howard collection or something else?

I've also noticed a new (well, new to me) series of Conan books titled "Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures". Here's one. (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0441012922/104-1948094-9815968?v=glance&n=283155&n=507846&s=books&v=glance). It's not even about Conan, but various other characters.

I suppose that whoever holds the license to Conan/REH properties is going all out with trying to make a franchise out of it. First these new books about Hyboria, and as we know.....An MMO on the way.

I know it isn't fair to judge something before reading it, but it all sounds kind of lame to me.

At home we have all the Conan stories written by Howard. I think they are all first printings as well, though I may be wrong.

1. The non-fiction book connecting Lovecraft as a cultural inspiration to the Chariots of the Gods/extraterristrial genesis folks:  The Cult of Alien Gods, H.P. Lovecraft, and Extraterrestrial Pop Culture by Jason Colavito. 

The author has some biases of his own (Western world/culture in decline, stuff like that),  but it's pretty interesting.  Touches on the Heaven's Gate people, the Raelians (the guys who claimed to clone a human a few years ago), the whole "aliens built the pyramids" crowd,  and most of the popular New Agey books from the 70s to the present.

2.  On Tuesday,  it's the third collection of Howard's original Conan stories.  Not sure which,  but one of the publishing companies appears to be trying to get all of Howard's stuff back in print.

Alright,  a little late but....   Here's release dates for some authors or series I find interesting:

Steven Brust, Dzur;  August 8, 2006 --  A new Vlad Taltos novel,  in hardcover.  The author has been having some health issues,  so this is his first novel in a while.

Glen Cook, A Cruel Wind:  A Chronicle of the Dread Empire; no release date --  !!!!.  This is showing on Amazon,  and I'm not sure if this will be a reprint of Cook's 80's fantasy series (more or less the direct inspiration for Martin's "Song of Fire & Ice",  Erikson's "Malazan" books,  and most other realist fantasy) or if it's a new novel.

E.E. Knight, Valantine's Rising;  December 6, 2005 -- The latest in a decent pulpy-fun series.  Post-apoctalyptic future,  where you have superscience indistinquishable from magic and trans-dimensional aliens/vampires that have enslaved humanity.

The same author has a new book, Dragon Champion, released the same date.  Fantasy, in trade paperback, and I have no comments.

R. Scott Bakker, The Thousandfold Thought; January 16, 2006 -- The third in the Prince of Nothing series.  Damn good realist/gritty fantasy,  taking place in a setting reminiscent of the First Crusade.  It's fantasy that shows alot of Dune influences:  politics, intrigue, bizarre mental/physical powers.  There's an undercurrent of some ancient evil threat in the background,  that is chortling away as it's two biggest rivals massacre each other.

The Warrior Prophet is now out in trade paperback.

Micheal Stackpole, Cartomancy;  February 28, 2006 -- Second book in a fairly entertaining fantasy series with asian flavors.  I enjoyed the first book.

And....

Steven Erikson, The Bonehunters; April 25, 2006 --  Latest book in the Malazan series.  Very, very good stuff.  Often compared to Martin and Cook.  That's the Canadian release date,  not sure if the Brits have a different one.

Erikson's books are just seeing print in the U.S. now.

All I have for now.  Most of my present reading is a little bizarre.  Non-fiction,  fair amount of Classical Period history. 

I finished Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid  last weekend. 

I may be the first person on Earth to do so - of the three people I've talked to that have picked it up, none have made it more than halfway through.  It's not light reading by any stretch.

For the SF/fantasy fans who want release dates, I assume you know about this:

http://www.locusmag.com/

And most specifically, these sorts of pages within the site:

http://www.locusmag.com/ForthcomingBooks.html

http://www.locusmag.com/2005/Monitor/NewInPaperback11.html

http://www.locusmag.com/2005/Monitor/ClassicReprints10.html

Nice resource.  Thx Raph.

Bah....

With such a resource as common knowledge,  I cannot continue to wax on ponderously on a bunch of books no one else will ever bother to read while pretending that people care.

I'll just haunt Religion threads now.

Stray that Conan book you linked to seems to be an obvious ramping up for the Funcom game.  The title + font is the same as for the game, and Coleman is a freelancer who did allot of hit/miss beer & pretzel sci-fi for the Battletech universe under FASA and Wizkids.

Finally finished A Feast For Crows. I really enjoyed it, even though it felt very different from the other books. Maybe it was meta-knowledge at work, but I felt like I was only seeing part of the picture, especially with characters allegedly dying 'offscreen'. The note at the end was encouraging though- be nice to see another book at this time next year if possible.

Now reading "One of a Kind"- a biography about Stuey Ungar, who may very well be the best card player (gin, poker, pinochle, you name it) that ever lived. Fascinating and deeply flawed dude.

http://asoiaf.westeros.org

The forums here have a lot of interesting discussion/spoilers/predictions about the R.R. Martin books.

I really enjoyed reading through the Feast for Crows forum picking up on lots of plot points I missed the first time around.

"So you have to ask yourself, 'Do I feel lucky?' Well do ya punk?"  ;)

(http://www.thailandoutdoor.com/Gun/gunofpetch/pistol/Dirty_Harry2.jpg)

Hey, that's my line. (Look left)

When I die I want to be reborn as Dirty Harry.  Or was it Deborah Harry.  Dammit...

So Xmas has passed and I'm sure I'm not the only one who picks about just under 10 books around this time of year.

I'm currently reading (it was the only soft cover, which is nice for the bus, and from a sibling so who knows how good it is) Ian MacLeod The Light Ages steampunk is nice, but I'm still mired in setting up the world and the main character so no idea where this is going.

But I also got a book I can already tell I'm going to love.

George Packer The Assassin Gate: America in Iraq I found the start where he set up the historical backrounds of neo-conservatives to be worth the book's price by itself.  But I'm not very well educated these days and I loved Black Hawk Down so much I cried when Clinton released all the prisoners at the end so YMMV.

Anyways, wondering what else people got.  Now that I'm suddenly single I think I'll have much more reading time.

I got a new cookbook: The Gourmet Cookbook (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0618374086/qid=1135806426/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/103-8968466-0423008?s=books&v=glance&n=283155). I'm no gourmet cook, but it's a cool book.

I was gifted with a copy of Freakonomics. I have heard and seen it referenced so often I figured it was time I read it.

Just finished reading Gaiman's American Gods, my first book by him. Not really sure what to say - it's a bit of a sureal read in places, but I enjoyed it. I've always enjoyed mythology tie ins like that though.

On the cookbook front - just gave my Mom Rob Feenie's new book, brilliantly titled "Feenie's". Some damn fine looking stuff in there, and he's been nice enough to tone down recipies so that they don't include too many $400/lb ingredients.

Also includes all five crab recipies he used to kick Morimoto's ass.

Just started reading Bob Woodward's (yes, that one) Veil, a book about the secret and not so secret CIA covert wars from 1981-1987. It's a damn good book, and it makes me like my government even less.

Hoax:

What are your particular likes in fiction?  Give me some specifics, and maybe a couple authors you like, and I should be able to give you some decent recommendations.

Bunk:

I like Gaiman.  Slightly surrealist, fablish quality to his story-telling.  Try Neverwhere,  or one of his books of short stories.

An interesting thing about Gaiman is how he can deal with social/cultural observations without ever drawing attention to it.  I didn't realize the amount of material in Anansi Boys really dealing with racism/ethnocentrism until I finished the book, sat back,  and thought about the ethnic/cultural backgrounds of the characters.

Gaiman isn't one to hit you with a hammer when he makes a point on society.  He also tends to deal with homosexuality well,  without writing stereotypes.

Way:

Freakonomics is great.  One of those accessable books that derive most of it's material from solid theory application and regression work on studies.  It's a great read if you only can grab 10 or 15 minutes here and there.

The economics of drug-dealers and the chapter on abortion and crime are very thought provoking.


For myself,  I've been alternating between fun pulp reading (William King's Warhammer 40k books) as a stress reliever and a bunch of non-fiction on mysticism, superstition, the formations of religion, and the interconnection with science.  Working on Arcana Mundi now.

Was reading Cromwell's "Sharpe" books but find myself mildly burned out on them.  Good and very gritty historical fiction.

I'm not sure how you people can read any of the political books.  Either left or right,  it's usually someone with their mind made up distorting events to suit their poliitical position.

Black Hawk Down was good, though.  The afterword the author added some years later that takes Clinton to task a bit has been justly criticized for flying in the face of the first couple of chapters laying out the situation.

The real moral of the Somalian story,  from the originally written material, as I remember it: 

You can't have peace unless both sides choose to stop, or an outside force is prepared to impose peace at great cost to themselves.  In Somalia,  both ethno-political factions were locked in a power struggle and wouldn't back down.  And the US cared more about a score or two dead soldiers then it did about imposing order and saving the lives of thousands.

Please, I see the parallels with present situations,  but take it to politics if you feel you must debate.  Or else I'll zombify the dreaded Religion Thread (TM).

The next big thing I think I am going to tackle book-wise is Winston Churchills biography of the Duke of Marlborough.

I leafed through a copy at Borders the other day and got sucked in.  I think that instead of buying it (90 bucks or sommat) I'll go check it out from the library.

Otherwise I am finishing up a re-read of Cook's last one (the Tyranny of the Night?) and will probably re-read A Feast For Crows.

I'm also finishing up Dawkin's Unweaving the Rainbow which got buried under a pile of crap. I love Dawkins. Another on the current shelf is an annoying version of Ben Franklin's autobiography, the annoying coming from the notations. About 10% are useful, and I find myself checking them all the time for that 10% and being annoyed by the 90% of "His father told him this" garbage. My girlfriend snagged the copy of The World is Flat my father is begging me to read...and then she got to reading Generation Rx instead. Dern librarians.

One of the xmas presents was the Anansi Boys referenced later in the thread glad to hear the author has some fans around these parts.  I'll put that 2nd or 3rd in the queue.  :-D

Have read Cook's "Dread Empire" books yet Murgos?

According to Amazon,  A Cruel Wind is due out July 6.  I'm not sure if this is a reprint/collection of earlier Dread Empire books, or a new book in the series.  The last published book in the series was left on a cliffhanger, but discontinued due to poor readership numbers.

Cook didn't really peak until well after the series saw print.

I'd recommend Erikson's "Malazan Books of the Fallen" too.  Erikson draws alot from Cook and Martin to churn out an interesting world,  and very interesting characters.  Gardens of the Moon is the first book,  and Deadhouse Gates (which is amazing) the second.  Try out those two to see if it's your style.

Finished Anansi Boys last week it was quite funny at times although how the book was going to end was obvious from a long way off.  Overall I enjoyed but it was nothing fantastic.

I started Flights which is a fantasy anthology from the guy who put together Redshift which I'm fairly certain I read a year or two ago and enjoyed.  So far there has only been one great story and one good one out of the first 4-5 and the first story was just terrible but all short story collections are a mixed bag so what can you do?  I left that book at a bar by my work though so I just started another book because I need something to read on MUNI.  I'll pick up the short stories again on Monday which is my typical bar right after work day.

DAM! by John Warfield Simpson this book interests me but I dont imagine it would be that intriguing to most.  It is about the whole Hetch Hetchy situation and the history behind what happened.  For those that dont know Hetch Hetchy was basically a second Yosemite but it is now buried under a shitton of water so the people of the Bay Area have something to drink.  Some attribute John Muir's death in part to the heartbreak and stress caused by loosing the fight to save the valley.  Being born and raised in San Francisco this is a nifty read for me or at least it should be.

Finished Freakonomics. Really enjoyed it, but it was far too short. It needed another 500 pages.

Next up is Next Man Up- Feinstein's book about the NFL. Should be arriving today from Amazon. After that is Stackpole's new series (A Secret Atlas, or something).

If Deadhouse Gates is the one with the Chain of Dogs in it, then yes is fantastic. Erikson is currently working in his 5th book: The Bonehunters, and all the previous ones were definatly worth reading. I like how his books are never direct follow ups and found the sheer scope of the world he creates quite astonnishing.

The standouts in the series were books 2 and 3.  The Chain of Dogs is a fucking experience.  The ending of Memories of Ice is a thing of beauty.

The other books are a good read, and very good fiction.  But they don't reach the level of books 2 & 3.  Had to do some speed reading to get through the those two and go to bed at a decent hour.

Just got my hand on the new Erikson, 'The Bonehunters' an hour or so ago. From the cover sleeve its following Apsalar, Cutter and Karsa Orlong in this book although i'm sure there will be a load of cameos as per the usual.

Damn you.

A further word about Erikson and the Malazan Books of the Fallen:

He's writing epic fantasy, heavily influenced by Cook and Martin.  So it's got that gritty brutalness about it.

The series is slated to be 10 books.  The twist is that he has multiple plot lines going,  with many many major characters,  with an overarching background theme.  On average,  major characters appear in 3 books so you aren't following a couple guys around constantly. 

Basically, the plots are broken up by geography with three plotlines on three separate continents.

Genabeckis campaign:  Gardens of the Moon and Memories of Ice

Seven cities sub-continent:  Deadhouse Gates, House of Chains, Bonehunters

Letherii: Midnight Tides

There is no one main character.  Major characters regularly get killed,  and the plot is moving along at a good clip with noticeable major action.  Each book has a different theme,  which the story told relates to.

Other things I've been reading....

Been burning through Heinlein's catalog.  Good,  but you do tend to notice repeated themes and catchphrases (that become annoying) when you go through too many books in close proximity.

Stopped to reread some Zelazny, because he was amazing.

Moderately enjoyed Asimov's Foundation trilogy.  Read one of his followups,  and was bored to tears.  I also felt like I had my intelligence insulted.

Read a shitload of the Pratchett novels.  Love the "Guards" books.

Read Michelle West's book Sunsword, at someone's recommendation (shower elf?).  Thought it was alright,  but not inclined to chase around for more.  The plot was a little slow.

HIGH recommendation for The Dark Chamber,  now in reprint.  It's from 1927,  Lovecraft thought highly of it.  It's horror,  with some mysticism/social psychology, but no supernatural.  Literally,  it's like watching a house full of people go insane or drive each other insane.

The writing comes of as very contempory,  except for some minor things with the clothing.

Not a book per se. Not an audio book either. But today at work I listened to all 7+ hours of I love Bees.

Yes, the Halo marketing tool. Anyway, it was one of the most well crafted things I've ever experienced. It makes the HALO games look like total shit. I mean complete and total shit. I want to give everyone at 4orty2wo presents for crafting that thing. Fuck I would pay so much to see a movie of that made.

I am reading Michael Stackpole's latest series- first book is A Secret Atlas. So far I like it- it has a strange pacing to it, but the world seems pretty interesting. Have the 2nd book (Cartomancy) enroute from B&N Online, as well as Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror, and Goon: The True Story of an Unlikely Journey into Minor League Hockey. How is that for diverse reading?  :-D

Pushing through Jared Diamond's "Germs, Guns & Steel" and looking forward to his "Collapse".  Very well written and accessible and yes, important.

Just finished reading some pulpy stuff, a Warhammer 40k book, the first in the Ciaphas Cain series. I liked it well enough for what it was. I started reading Frederick Pohl's A Year in the City, which is interesting, but dry reading. It seems to be Pohl's experiment in writing a fictional essay: how to "fix" the city of New York from an early 80's perspective.

I thought the subject matter was interesting, but the prose got a bit dry for me in spots. It was very much like reading a textbook.

He gave a lecture last night at the local U on Collapse.  I really wanted to go but prior commitments prevented me.  The guy is 70, probably not going to get a chance to see him in person again.

I just recently discovered Vernor Vinge (Fire on the Deep, Deepness in the Sky).  He's a bit longwinded but that doesn't tend to bother me.

Most recent nonfiction I read was Hillaire Belloc's Path to Rome, which was sufficiently good that I'm reading it a second time.  It also happens to be on Project Gutenberg (http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/7373) due to its US copyright having expired.

My discovery of the Nero Wolfe Mysteries TV series on DVD has led me back to my old habit of prowling the library for Rex Stout books and devouring them in single sittings.  Very satisfactory.

And Something from the Nightside would have been really good if the author didn't feel compelled to end every other sentence with "...in the Nightside".  Those of you who have read it know what I'm talking about.

Check out The Wealth and Poverty of Nations.  Looks at the development of civilization,  but from a more economic/institutional perspective.

Haven't read Collapse yet.  My problem with Germs was the emphasis Diamond put on natural resource allocation, while minimizing institutions. 

Edit:  Has anyone checked out the new Jeffrey Sachs book yet?  I've got alot of respect for the man, so have thought about picking it up.

I forgot I read through the Nightside books (Simon R Green) a few weeks ago until you mentioned it...

It's basically modern serial pulp writing,  broken up into novellas.  Green will repeat lines, as you say,  but it's not bad if you treat it like you would Lovecraft and cyclopean, Stygian, or any of his other buzzwords.  (Robert E Howard and thews, another good example.)

I thought it was pretty enjoyable.  Lot of imagination in some of it.  Something from the Nightside is the weakest of the lot, I think,  because of how poorly it got started.  Some of the names/character set ups are brillant.  Jessica Sorrow, the Unbeliever?  Madman?  Razor Eddie,  Punk God of the Straight Razor?  The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter?  And, of course, Suzie Shooter, better know as Shotgun Suzie or oh Christ, it's her, run!

Martin Scott has been getting a fair amount of awards nominations (World Fantasy Award nominated a few years ago) for his Thraxus books.  It's noir in a magical Greek/Roman city state.  It's also vastly inferior to other authors doing supernatural noir (Butcher's Dresden, Cook's Garret).  I read most of them because I was running out of material.....

The man doesn't write very much which is too bad because he has a lot of imagination; of course if he still believes in his singularity prediction he may be off partying before having to bow to our new AI overlords.

Finished Bonehunters last night.  Fucking 800 page hardcovers during tax season....

Good.  Not at the same level as books 2 & 3,  but very enjoyable.  Liked it better than Midnight Tides.

Less stand-alone then the other books have been.  Plot threads from the separate continents are starting to come together.

Two major characters die.  A swathe of minor characters.  Alot of major characters take some serious physical and emotional damage.  A few more major characters take so much damage,  they seem like they'll be out of the picture for a while. 

We get to see Icarium in action.

Many of the cities/regions we're used to get seriously fucked up.  Seriously, seroiusly fucked up.  Prepare for Doomsday fucked up.

There's another heartbreaking city siege in this one.

I'm in the middle of Martin's Storm of Swords. Thanks for the heads-up, it's a nice diversion from all the nonfic I read.

Also reading an interesting book on guitar, called...Guitar (An American Life) by Tim Brookes, my current cookbook selection is a pair by Jacques Pepin (my new favorite chef). I also have the Culinary Institute's book on the desk and I've cracked it a few times, it's so loaded with info.

Read Cartomancy last week,  and A Secret Atlas back when it was released.

Stackpole is a fun read.  He puts enough imagination in that it's not "generic fantasy world 243",  and has an engaging writing style.  Check out his Dark Glory War.  Great ending.

Gemmel writes some similar stuff.  Fun,  more hack and slash.

I have read DGW and the series after it. I also enjoyed Talion: Revenant. Like you said, Stackpole's worlds aren't just Middle Earth ripoffs- they are at interesting.

O'Reilly has re-released Learning Perl Objects, References, and Modules as Intermediate Perl.  It should do a better job of bridging the gap between Learning Perl and Programming Perl.

I only read technical books.

I'm about 1/3rd of the way through Collapse.  Enjoying it thus far.

If there's one "big think" work that I'd recommend to you all as absolutely incredible, it'd be The Discoverers, by Daniel Boorstein.  He was the former head of the library of congress, and it was his magnum opus - "A brief recounting of man's journey to know his world and himself", covering everything from geographic to scientific to philosophic discovery through the ages.  Just plain incredible.

Also quite good is Felipe Arnandez-Armesto's Millenium.

And if you'd like a corrective to some of the more Western-centric pap out there (Without any moral relativism bullshit to sort through), Hobson's The Eastern Origins of Western Civilization is incredible.  It makes the case that up until the mid-1800s or so, the West was behind other major centers of the world in every single way, from standard of living to institutions of government to technology.  In fact, it makes the case that the West was so barren by comparison to the East that nearly all of the technologies it used (and eventually dominated with) were created in the East.

Fun fact: Blonde hair?  The reason it evolved only in the West was because Europe was such a comparatively barren place.  Women couldn't subsist based on limited forms of agriculture and herbal lore alone as in other lands, and so they were more dependent on men who had to go on long, arduous hunting trips for scarce game.  As a result, to keep their mate from wandering off, they evolved blonde (and red) hair as a way of making themselves the New Shiny.  Due to today's relative abundance, blonde hair is becoming more scarce, and the last natural blonde ever born will probably come around 200 years from now (Assuming we're not using designer genes by then - in which case, anime haircolors yay!).  Europe's been sucking for a while, now!

Oh, and I noticed singularity predictions mentioned:  If you're interested in Singularity stuff, Ray Kurzweil is the way to go (from a very pro-singularity perspective).

By the way, hilarity ensuing:  Ann Coulter has a new book coming out.  The topic of it is being kept completely under wraps until when it's about to be released.  She promises it'll be the 'single most explosive thing she's ever written'.  The release date? 6/06/06.

If I had to guess the topic, I'd say it'll be entitled "Liberals Hate God And God Hates Liberals".

That's sloppy science. Dawkins would kick you.

Sorry if I summed it up poorly.  I dug up an article: here. (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2058688,00.html)

(The WHO has issued a correction since I first read the article; they are not, in fact, reporting that blondes will be extinct in 200 years.)

Okay.  Just got through reading Dhampir (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0451459067/sr=8-1/qid=1144100718/ref=pd_bbs_1/002-5245994-4174452?%5Fencoding=UTF8) and Thief of Lives (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0451459539/ref=pd_bxgy_text_b/002-5245994-4174452?%5Fencoding=UTF8).  I would have to say that I really enjoyed both books.  Probably because of both the world and characters provided by the authors.  Anyway, if you can catch the first on cheap, give it a look over.

Gave one here too last week; if yours was anything like ours, it was SRO so if you didn't get there early you didn't get in.  Streaming video available here (http://129.101.119.248:8080/ramgen/Borah04/borah-032906.rm?mode="compact") if you don't mind a 150kbps RealMedia file.

Realplayer is satan's media format.

GRR Martin needs to wrap up the new book STAT, just finished Crows over the weekend. He split Crows into 2 (as he says at the end with his teaser about "Meanwhile at the Wall...", so it should be quick, and his website backs that up. Woot and whatnot. That could be a tavern, the Woot and Whatnot. I just need some fiction.

Reading some Jacques Pepin cookbooks and his La Methode, which has some cool techniques (he also wrote La Technique...). His old stuff is funny, cucumber turtles and apple swans, but he's much more down to earth now. Great ingredients, simple recipes.

Reading an interesting book about a guy who had a custom guitar built after his was destroyed in shipping. Guitar - An American Story by Tim Brookes. He wends between the tale of the Vermont luthier building the guitar and the history of guitar in the New World. Some fascinating stuff, and it resounds when reading about the pre-gold rush west juxtaposed over congress making tunnels into the us illegal.

Apparently the new Vlad Taltos book, Dzur, is out tomorrow for any Steven Brust fans out there.  I know I'll be getting it as soon as I can. 

Oooh thanks for the heads up! Time to make a pitstop at Bn.com.

No.  New Brust on August 8th.  As in this summer.  Direct sequal to Issola.  Please.....  would I really let the due date of new Brust pass without informing you all?

New Butcher "Dresden Files" in May, though.

Damn, and I had my hopes up.  That'll teach me to not doublecheck. 

Now I can't remember if I have read Issola. Arrgh.

Im currently reading the Jim Butcher wizard detective series. Its not great, but light, enjoyable readying. Im also reading some of Tom Clancy's books. His stuff makes me laugh some times, just cause he is so crazy. I mean, I read "Rainbow Six" and, I kid you not, the badguys are hippies. You can really tell clancy is a war guy. Right now im reading "Without Remorse" I doubt I will finish it, but I couldnt find anything I liked better. I cant wait for the next RR Martin book, his stuff just captivates me, very good writing IMO.

I was reading the latest book in the "Prince of Nothing" series, but the second half of his latest book is SOOO depressing, and its very hard to relate to any of his characters. I want to take the wizard guy and slap him "STOP YOUR FUCKING MOPING ALREADY" and I want that harlot to die already.

Anything new or upcoming you guys want to recomend?

I think Without Remorse was my favorite Clancy book. Mr. Clark is just kinda scary.

The only really good Clancy book is Red Storm Rising.  A few of the first couple Jack Ryan books are ok, Hunt for Red October for instance, everything since the early 90's though has been crap.  I actually think the vast majority of his stuff has been ghost written for a long time now.

Oh, except for the pure histories, the one where he looked at the regional commander of the first Gulf War was excellent.

He co-wrote RSR with Larry Bond and if you read Bond's other stuff from the same period you will see that it is more similar to Bond's stuff than Clancy's subsequent stuff. I agree with you on the rest of it as I think everything since Sum of All Fears has been pretty bad.  I think it all went really bad when he started licensing his name so that any book with an 's on the end of his name was written by someone else but looks like it is one of his ont he cover art.  I guess when you are that successful and rich it doesn't really matter any more.

Switching gears, since he has been mentioned a couple of times and I like his stuff too, I thought I would put this in here also as Vernor Vinge is releasing a rare new novel in a couple of weeks:

Rainbow's End (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0312856849/ref=pd_nfy_nr_b_15/102-7356257-5164938?n=16272&s=books&v=glance)

It's another Zones of Thought book but is only 20 years in the future. Kinda odd.

Just finished reading A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore.  Like his other books, its clever and funny.  Its about a guy who becomes Death (sort of).

Before that I read/reread all of Chris Moore's books (I had read Lamb and The Stupidest Angel before, those two still remain my favorites of his).  All good books.

Just cracked open Crisis on Infinite Earths by Marv Wolfman.  Novel based on the 1985 comic but told largely from the point of view of Barry Allen.