A community for all things related to Books.
Community icon by IconsBox (from freepik.com)
Soviet-era sci-fi, The Final Circle of Paradise (Хищные Вещи Века) by Strugastky brothers.
It's really weird. MC poses as a writer in a peaceful resort town while investigating a case, but the townsfolk are just strange and unpleasant. There is a conflict between "intels" (high society type of people) and regular people, but it is still unclear if anyone is in the right.
Sharp Ends by Joe Abercrombie, and Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett.
Joe Abercrombie is where I'm headed once I finish the expanse. I read the First Law trilogy and loved it and haven't stopped thinking about it, so I want to read more of his writing.
The Heroes and Red Country were my favourite so far, so at least in my opinion you have the best to come. Red Country was a 5/5 for me.
Missed you! Read the stainless steel rat series by Harry Harrison up to "The stainless steel rat for president". Started reading "Der Jesus-deal" by Andreas Eschbach, but didn't get far, it's on the "didn't finish" pile. After the first chapter it sidetracked to "religious conspiracies in the USA" and I've read plenty of those, though Eschbach probably did a better job than some others I've read.
Now reading "A death in Cornwall" by Daniel Silva. This one's been on the shelf for some time, I never started it because this series is centered around some Israelian super spy, and earlier installments tended to glorify Israel. However, this is just a nice detective story so far, I'm about 2/3 through and no Israelic involvement.
Enshittification by Cory Doctorow
Oh! It has been on my “maybe” reading list for a bit! Can you give a review? Is it worth a read?
I’m not that far maybe the first third.
So far it’s mostly exposing the concept and the forces at play. For me it’s mostly things that I already know
It’s ok. It’s worth a read. It’s very US centric.
It’s worth a read (just finish it), his ways to force de-enshitication are uplifting. I hope there’s a bunch of politicians reading him
I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy. So far so good, though I’m only 100 pages in. It’s been an interesting and valuable perspective into what it’s like living with a hoarder as a child and what Hollywood is like for a child. While the writing is nothing special, I admire McCurdy’s juxtaposition of levity and sadness.
Brief Interviews with Hideous Men by David Foster Wallace. This one’s a tough one. The stories in this collection discuss very tough topics through the perspective of your average alpha male. While it’s obviously a critique of that archetype, DFW does not go out of his way to paint them as fools and dirtbags. Instead, he does the opposite: carefully structured arguments for misogyny, some truly horrid rape scenes, detailed breakdowns of employable manipulation tactics, all presented to the reader raw. DFW does not criticize these men, he merely presents them, and I would be gravely concerned about the damage this could do to the reader’s thought process if his readers were not so fucking weird and discerning. The verbosity of his prose acts as a sort of filter, ensuring that for the most part these stories are only read by people that understand the books premise, that these men are HIDEOUS.
History of Puerto Rico by Fernando Pico. The subtitle for this one is A Panorama of its people, and yet half way through I’m still forced to read about colonial conflicts and the actions of the elite. Demography and social sentiment are touched on, but it’s tricky because pretty much all of the sources on Puerto Rico’s pre-colonial history were destroyed and pretty much all of the sources on Puerto Rico’s colonial history are from the perspective of the colonizers. Definitely a dry read so far, and I’m sick of reading about imperial atrocities.
I really liked McGurdy's book. Her mother was a piece of work, but it's obvious she's done the work and is in a better head space now. Good for her. And yeah, the writing isn't exactly complex, but it gets the point across.
I finished The Book of Dust series by Philip Pullman. I really enjoyed it, however, I think the History Dark Materials trilogy was better. I preferred the world hopping in HDM and there wasn’t as much of it in TBoD. Still a good trilogy and I’m happy I read it.
I just finished Star Trek DS9 Bloodletter by K.W. Lee. It’s a book that takes place early in the tv series, so Bashir is still pretty cringey and Kira is a hot head. It was a fun story though, got to see more interactions with the wormhole aliens and some of Kira’s past.
Currently reading Star Trek TNG Fortune’s Light by Michael Jan Friedman. I was kind of feeling like reading more of a romance novel, but I wanted a shorter quicker read. A story about Riker being very Riker and flirting with everyone was a good balance for me.
I have one more Star Trek book that I picked up from a thrift store, then I think I’ll tackle my next series read. I’m thinking one of these:
His dark materials is so good!
Jean M Auel - The Earth's Children, volume 4 (The Great Journey), book 1/2.
An adventure in the Europe of 30,000 years ago
I finished Mans Search for Meaning.
I grabbed a 1968 copy of Herman Melville short stories an essays.
I started reading it, and the first story (c1799) begins with a slave ship thats in tough shape rolling up on the coast somewhere. Idk if imma finish it.
Hard to follow up on Mans.. Meaning. That book is so profound. I want to carry Braiding Sweetgrass, but its massive and wont fit in my purse. idk.
I’m currently reading book 8 of the Star Wars XWing series “Isards Revenge”. It takes place immediately after the Thrawn trilogy and brings back Isard who was supposed to have been dead. She took over the Emperors “role” after he was killed.
During the hiatus I read a few of the other XWing books and the entirety of the Remembrance of Earths Past (3body problem) by Cixin Liu. Wonderful read, and gave me a few new perspectives about the universe.
I just finished Thrawn (the prequel not the trilogy) and it was every bit the one-dimensional schlocky romp that I had hoped for. Marc Thompson does some p entertaining voice work.
Ah man, I forgot to specify this is legends! My brother enjoyed the new trilogy, not as much as legends though.
The Thrawn trilogy was my first foray into the SW/Legends book universe, from there I’ve been reading all the legends books in chronological order. So this puts me around 70 or so. My brothers collected them all used and I’m borrowing them.
Queen Witch by Martha Wells, second book of the Rising World.
I knew her from the Murderbot series (amazing) and lately decided to read most of her books. Demon King (book 1) was really enjoyable and the beginning of Queen Witch seems to keep up with it.
Micky 7 books (2 released so far; basis for the Mickey 17 movie), both wildly entertaining in a sassy sci-fi way
Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel. Tight little time travel tale with a tidy, satisfying conclusion
Termination Shock by Neil Stephenson. Decent ideas, characters a bit 2-D for a book that long but their unexpectedness kinda makes up for it? Exhillerating moments for an existentially depressing subject.
Nice that the weekly thread is back 🙂
Since the last one I finished Roadside Picnic. It was good. Still have to watch the movie though.
After that I tried reading Duin, the Dutch translation of Frank Herbert's Dune, but I stopped reading after about a third of the book. The translation wasn't good, so I thought about reading it in English, but ultimately the story was annoying me.
Then I read Holly by Stephen King and his The Outsider after that. They were fine. Just fine, nothing more. Not really interested in reading more by him. It was nice to read something better after Duin though.
Then I read The Road by Cormac McCarthy, which I had wanted to read for years already. It was heavy and the world he describes is very bleak, but the book is beautiful and so well-written. I highly recommend it.
And now I'm reading A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood. A few months ago I saw the movie and I can already say the book is so much better.
I started Oathbringer the other day, the third Stormlight Archive book. The first two were okay but I had issues with the bloated word count to actual story ratio, so I don’t expect to finish the series. The ends always seem to get me to start the next one even though I start regretting it half way through. I like the world and story but man they should not be that long and seriously need an aggressive edit pass.
The Devil’s Candy.
It is an account of the making of the movie, The Bonfire of the Vanities.
The book was a huge success. The movie was an utter flop. The books focuses on the absolute madness that goes into making a movie. For example a single simple scene of the main character walking out of his apartment building in the rain requires 150 cast members, 2 100 foot tall cranes and three days of shooting and costs close to 500,000 dollars. Such a simple inconsequential scene that if done incorrectly could ruin the entire movie.
I’m just on to book 6 (Eye of the Bedlam Bride) of my Dungeon Crawler Carl Audiobook (re)read before the next book comes out in May.
This is my 1st time through the audiobooks and while I am typically not an audiobook person (I get distracted and lose my place or I can read faster on my own); I am vey much enjoying Jeff Hayes work. I get similar vibes to when I would watch Orphan Black and forget that Tatiana Maslany was 3/4th of the cast alone. It’s almost like listening to a full cast recording.
Too busy for recreational reading, but I've gotten into the habit of listening to books while mowing the lawn. Right now I'm in the middle of Moving Pictures by Terry Pratchett. My lawn is pretty small though, so it's taking a while.
I paused 1984 about 2/3 of the way through due to finding it too depressingly close to reality, but I'll go back to it once I finish A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Bachman in a day or two.
Read:
Renowned detective Hercule Poirot investigates the death of a rich man in a small village.
Since I'd heard this was one of Christie's best, I decided to read it before I watched the adaptation (I've been slowly re/watching Poirot this year). Pretty par for the course til the reveal, which... well, I didn't figure it out. I'd call it cheap, except they go through exactly which clues I missed, so I can't actually be indignant about it.
About half way through Willie, Willie, Harry, Stee
Enjoying the humour in learning that all of England's Kings and Queens were a bit of a bunch of arses.
They should give this book to English school kids. They might actually enjoy their History lessens then.
Since I enjoyed Relic last year, I decided to read the next two Pendergast novels, Reliquary and Cabinet of Curiosities since my last update here.
I’m on Book 2 of 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami having finished Book 1 a couple weeks ago. I lost some of my reading momentum during my kid’s March Break, but I’m slowly getting back on that reading horse.
After my trip to the gulags, I hopped back in to The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan with the eleventh book, Knife of Dreams. It's the last book he wrote before his death. I actually liked the previous - tenth - book, though it had very little plot. I think maybe two chapters in the whole book moved the story along, so practically you could skip the whole of it and not miss much. Luckily the one I'm currently reading actually starts moving things towards the climax. As ever, I am terribly conflicted with Jordan's writing.
I also some time ago watched the movie The Death of Stalin and quite enjoyed it, so inspired by that I picked up the original comic book by Fabien Nury and Thierry Robin. It was a good comic book, though perhaps somewhat more sombre in tone than the film. I heartily recommend both though.
"We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families"
It's about the Rwandan genocide. Very difficult to get through just because of how horrific what happened was.
Related: Fuck the Catholic church and Madeleine Albright/Clinton
Im coming to terms with the fact I may have ADHD, talking to a psychologist.
So, reading is often nothing or everything, lately it is nothing, but prior to that I was re reading Dune up to Children (I have like 20 pages left to read and I have been at that part for about 5 months )
Today I will revisit Master and Margarita where I have about 100 pages left also have been at thst part for 2 or 3 months.
Prior I read some Spanidh novel about a poor man who went from master to master, each one treating him badly until he was more or less liberated.
I plan on revisiting Don Quixote after....I've resd the first few hundred pages like 6 times and quite liked it...
I may read Amadis of Gaul along with Don Quixote.
Uhh......and there is King Arthur and the Round Table (Mark Twain) thst one I am ln the last 10 chapters or so)
I really hope to come to a solution with this
'Fado Alexandrino' by António Lobo Antunes. Amazing book, I'm sad I didn't read him before he died...
Finished "The Book that Held her Heart" by Mark Lawrence, book 3 of his Library Trilogy. Without spoilers, felt like it was a bit of a mess, especially compared to Book 1. Glad I read it, but glad I'm moving on as well.
Halfway through Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon. Ancient Greece with modern Irish vernacular, about prisoners of war putting on a play. I'm kind of digging it, even if it's not quite as laugh out loud funny as I'd heard
I felt the same way about the Library trilogy. I loved the set up of the first book but was not a fan of where that story went after. It's a shame because I feel like his other trilogies all had much tighter endings.
Glad to see this thread back!
I've been slowly moving toward the finish line on the bingo board. I'm about to finish Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey for the Saddle Up square. It was slow going at first but the second half has me more invested. It's definitely not what I was expecting.
Next up: Paternus by Dyrk Ashton for the Self Published square. Then I'll just need to pick a cozy book and I'll be done!
I've got two novels going for the first time in a while.
Summer by Edith Wharton in the mornings.
All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque (translated by Brian Murdoch) in the evenings.
Not sure if that's the correct way to organize my day.
A Defence of Masochism, by Anita Phillips.
The Strength of the Few by James Islington (Australian author). The first book, The Will of the Many, was awesome. Harry Potter in Roman times, basically. People cede (concede? give?) half their will (willpower, drive, energy) to the people above them. There are 8 tiers. Octavi are below Septimi, Sexti, Quinti, Qua... I dunno. So no one cedes to Octavi, and every Septimi has their will plus half that of all their Octavi, and so on up the chain, and the main guy is basically Superman, never needs to sleep, etc.. So the main guy refuses to participate, has been whipped for not participating, but winds up in this convoluted plot with all kinds of twists and turns. If you can tolerate the bullshit, it's a lot of fun. And the author is almost ChatGPT-like in his overuse of his thesaurus. Any time he could use an ordinary word, he'll use an obscure word that means the same thing. It's crazy. But the twists were fun. The second one — which I'm in the cleanup/epilogue stage of, 21 minutes left in the audiobook — is just hard to follow. Without spoiling the end of the first one, the main guy splits into 3 copies of himself. One stays in res which is the world from the first book. The other two go to alternate/parallel dimensions where things are different, and the three of them don't know about each other. Far fewer twists, and I'm not really sure what happened because the story kept jumping around. The three stories are kinda related, but... I don't know if we should care because whatever the other two accomplish, they can never go back to res. I think they can cede to each other, which makes for some interesting math, but the book never really did it. Maybe the third one will, but I'm not sure I'll be down for a book 3. I might need some clever YouTuber to make sense of all of it for me.
Anyone read the Hierarchy books (what they're called)? Anyone else confused by the second book but loved the first?
Ironically I'm considering reading Hyperion by Dan Simmons next. That's like 7 interconnected stories. I hope my reaction to Strength of the Few doesn't mean I won't enjoy Hyperion. But two different authors, maybe Simmons handles it better than Islington did.
Heh. Just read the two Hierarchy books and now I’m on book three of The Hyperion Cantos.
Hyperion is so good. Fascinating story. The space bits really aren’t that important. Simmons does a good job of not getting caught up in the world building and instead tells a story in a truly bizarre world.
Fall of Hyperion struggled to keep my attention both times I read it.
About 25% of the way through Endymion and I’m having a hard time getting into it. Just finished a long section talking about the MC’s next strategic move… only to then transition to the antagonist having the exact same, mirrored conversation.
I want to finish the series… but it’s been a challenge.
I'm reading Demon Copperhead and listening to Lonesome Dove. Both have been great so far.
Some textbook type book called Methods of Argumentation, it's about formal ways of mapping out arguments. I'm hoping to get some fun ideas/inspiration for software that has to do with debate.
I am working my way through Shadows Upon Time the last book in the Sun Eater series. I am glad I stuck with the series as it seemed to get better as it went.