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So I searched and didn't find one but if one exists just redirect me there / merge this.

So yeah what are currently reading?

I just started The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury, plan on reading the Game of Thrones series after I am done because the show was bad-fuckin'-ass.

On the recommendation of a friend I'm reading Enslaved by Ducks by Bob Tarte. On a related note, I recently learned my friend has terrible taste in books.

After this I'll resume my quest to read classics and pick up Gulliver's Travels.

Armor by John Steakly.

I'm really digging it so far. I'd love to see the first part, with Felix, turned into a short film or something. The action was amazing and the way that portion ended blew me away. It really felt like a desperate battle.

I might re-read starship troopers after this. Otherwise I've got a book of Assimov stories I want to get through. I was disappointed that the Half Priced Books I got these from didn't have any copies of Dune. I've been meaning to read that for a while now.

I just bought everything written by Brian Sanderson. Starting on Mistborn as of last night. Man, this guy can write!

Been reading "I Will Fear no Evil," the worst Heinlein novel I've ever come accross (extremely disappointing thus far), and "The Portable Atheist," an excerpt book edited by Christopher Hitchens, which is quite thick (seriously glad I have the digital edition, I'm guessing the paper one is a doorstop) but very interesting so far.

I just finished both Dance with Dragons and the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. Good stuff.

I'm currently reading Pillars of the Earth. I'm enjoying it a lot. After watching the series, I bought the book for a few pennies on Amazon. So far (around page 300) I realized they kept about 95% of the storyline about the same as to what was on TV.

After that I'll read the first Game of Thrones book.

Loved pillars of the earth. There's a sequel that came out a year or so ago.

Really now? That's... very interesting. Is it as good?

phil said:

Armor by John Steakly.

I'm really digging it so far. I'd love to see the first part, with Felix, turned into a short film or something. The action was amazing and the way that portion ended blew me away. It really felt like a desperate battle.

I might re-read starship troopers after this. Otherwise I've got a book of Assimov stories I want to get through. I was disappointed that the Half Priced Books I got these from didn't have any copies of Dune. I've been meaning to read that for a while now.

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I love this book for primarily the Felix content. It's great inter-galactic Ant war stuff. The Jack Crow stuff is meh but moves the plot along. Funny link to this book is that Steakly wrote another book called Vampire$, which became John Carpenter's Vampires. I haven't read that one but evidently the two main characters are Jack Crow and Felix.

Currently reading:
Thrall: Twilight of the Ancients (Cause I'm a sucker for WoW lore)
and
my new DC 52 comics.

I know that ain't heavy reading, but I got games to play dammnit!

Jay said:

Really now? That's... very interesting. Is it as good?

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Bear in mind, World Without End takes place a couple hundred years after Pillars.

I started The Devil You Know by Mike Carey. I loved the Lucifer graphic novels, so I figured I'd give his first prose novel a shot. Not too far in, but it's setting up to be interesting, and Felix Castor is likably lazy.

Just finished the first four Ender books, going for something a little lighter now: Grey Seer, the Thanquol and Boneripper spinoff from the Gotrek and Felix series of Warhammer novels. DIE-DIE, STUPID MAN-THING!

Heh, I will admit to having read those as well.....

And currently I am re-reading The Steel Remains. Pretty solid book by Richar Morgan. Right before that I had just finished Nemesis, one of the Horus Heresy series books about the imperial assassins.

Just finished Blood of Elves... just to find out that the next 4 books will take forever to get translated into english... (2012 at the earliest for the next one)... and it actually finishes at what does seem to be exactly 1/5th of the story...

Oh well, i ordered The Last Wish (short story collection), because it is an interesting fantasy world... and i do have the 1st game on Steam... guess it will have to do...
Added at: 23:48

Shegokigo said:

Currently reading:
Thrall: Twilight of the Ancients (Cause I'm a sucker for WoW lore)

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After the 3nd WC book the blurbs just sounded hackneyed to me... how many of them are there now?

EDIT: Wow, they novelised (sp?) the 2nd game and xp:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_of_Warcraft:_Tides_of_Darkness
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_of_Warcraft:_Beyond_the_Dark_Portal

GasBandit said:

Just finished the first four Ender books, going for something a little lighter now: Grey Seer, the Thanquol and Boneripper spinoff from the Gotrek and Felix series of Warhammer novels. DIE-DIE, STUPID MAN-THING!

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What'd you think of the Ender sequels?

Quotemander Prime said:

What'd you think of the Ender sequels?

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An interesting read, not what I expected... the first book was a coming of age sci-fi wunderkind thing... the next three were philosophical treatises on what it means to be sentient. Li Qing Jao irritated me to no end, and I did not appreciate every chapter beginning with a sophomoric quote from her memoir in the 4th book.

Denbrought said:

Been reading "I Will Fear no Evil," the worst Heinlein novel I've ever come accross (extremely disappointing thus far),

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Personally I found "Job: A Comedy of Justice" to be the worst of what I've read. At least, while I was reading it. I found it boring and unfocused. In retrospect, though, I'm wigged-out even reading the Wikipedia entry for "To Sail Beyond the Sunset".

I've been reading the "Wicked" series. The first two books were great, the 3rd one kind of rubbed me the wrong way, but still impatiently waiting for Book 4 now.

Treasure Island. I can't believe I never read this one before. I began to read it out loud to my son, because it's so animated, it almost begs to be read aloud.

Just under half way through "A Dance With Dragons" now. I don't know how I'm going to wait for the 6th book when I'm done.
I also read the first two books in Stephen King's Dark Tower series recently. Still not sure how I feel about that one. Not what I was promised, at all, but I found I still wanted to know what happens next anyway.

@ @Li3n: I honestly wasn't a fan of the pre Knaak/Golden novels. They were "ok" at best, but everything that Knaak/Golden write, gets put into the game or is used/referenced in Wow, so you can actually "see" the storyline's progression and impact on the world after you read the novels.

I'm sure they're no major pieces of work, but it's good reading for me.

GasBandit said:

An interesting read, not what I expected... the first book was a coming of age sci-fi wunderkind thing... the next three were philosophical treatises on what it means to be sentient. Li Qing Jao irritated me to no end, and I did not appreciate every chapter beginning with a sophomoric quote from her memoir in the 4th book.

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Read the Shadow series. From what (little) I know about you you will probably enjoy them a LOT more.

I <3 the Shadow series. Bean is way more interesting than Ender the self flagellant. (Gag Novinha)

I'm glad this thread got started again. I was looking for it for the past few days. I've done a lot of reading this summer. Largely because for the first time since high school, I don't live within walking distance of work, and so I have plenty of time on the bus to read, and also because I actually have the money to buy books again. Since getting out of school in April I've read:
The Hobbit (again)- Love this book. Love it. I'm going to re-re-re-(Not sure how many more "re"s I need)-read this book before the movies come out again.
The Zombie Autopsies- Actually pretty creepy. One of the better zombie books I've read, for sure.
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter-Way better than I expected. I like Grahame-Smith's take on vampires, and even though the vampire to slavery connection is almost too easy, its only because it makes a surprising amount of sense.
Day By Day Armageddon- I read some positive reviews, but the book has many flaws. Its supposed to be a daily journal, but the sentence structure, the analogies used, and the supremely infallible photographic memory all fail to make that premise believable. The only thing that lends believability to it being a journal is the large number of spelling and grammatical errors- which I could have done without, and don't think was on purpose.
The Late Shift- Incredibly engrossing. Obviously I knew how it turns out, but as much as I thought I knew why, I didn't. Its super interesting to see so clearly into the late night comedy world, and I can't wait for his follow-up to come out in paperback at the end of the month. The late night comedy world is very different from 20 years ago, with way more players. How did David Letterman, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel, Craig Fergusson, and Jimmy Fallon fit in to the drama between Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien?
A Game of Thrones
A Clash of Kings
A Storm of Swords
A Feast for Crows These books, holy crap. THESE BOOKS.
The Gunslinger- This is not what Stephen King says it is. Its close, but its not quite. I don't care for the style in which its written either. The Sentence structures are too.... rhythmic? I don't know. They don't flow nicely, they just keep going and the story stays the same pace, and it makes it more boring than it ought to be. It only picks up in 2 places. At least the book is short.
The Drawing of the Three- I liked this a great deal better than the first one, though it is even less like what King seems to think this series is. Its basically a Twilight Zone episode. I read they had wanted to turn this book series into a movie series but the project got canned. I'm glad. This kind of story would not work, I think. If the series continues in the manner of the second book though, a television series could definitely work.
And now I'm on to A Dance with Dragons-
I might have actually mentioned some of these in the old WHYBR? thread, but I don't think so.

checkeredhat said:

Just under half way through "A Dance With Dragons" now. I don't know how I'm going to wait for the 6th book when I'm done.
I also read the first two books in Stephen King's Dark Tower series recently. Still not sure how I feel about that one. Not what I was promised, at all, but I found I still wanted to know what happens next anyway.

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People who love The Dark Tower tell me if you're not with in by the end of book 2, don't bother. So it may be more of the same from there.

Thing to remember is that even by the end of book 4, King still didn't know where he was going with the series, and didn't make a serious attempt to wrap it up until he got hit by a van and realized he could die without finishing the last three books.

At Kati's recommendation, currently reading Dan Simmons' Hyperion. Not sure what I'll read after, dunno what sort of mood I'll be in by then.

--Patrick

On my own time, Demons by Fyodor Dostoevsky. I can't recommend anything by him enough. He is amazing, and everyone should read his work.

School has me reading a bunch of history things: some interesting work on early farming for my Ancient History class, articles on 20th century wars for my Diplomacy & Conflict in the 20th Century class... In English I'm currently tackling Beowulf (translated, we're not doing any Old English/West Anglo-Saxon, etc)

Chad Sexington said:

On my own time, Demons by Fyodor Dostoevsky. I can't recommend anything by him enough. He is amazing, and everyone should read his work.

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My copy of that fell apart before I could finish it. His writing translates amazingly well to a modern audience. I very much enjoyed The Brothers Karamazov.

Quotemander Prime said:

My copy of that fell apart before I could finish it. His writing translates amazingly well to a modern audience. I very much enjoyed The Brothers Karamazov.

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It's very dark and touches on a lot of themes that Karamazov does as well. I'm nearly done, but school has delayed my progress! (Karamazov remains my favourite novel by him, however. How could it not!)

Shegokigo said:

@ @Li3n: I honestly wasn't a fan of the pre Knaak/Golden novels. They were "ok" at best, but everything that Knaak/Golden write, gets put into the game or is used/referenced in Wow, so you can actually "see" the storyline's progression and impact on the world after you read the novels.

I'm sure they're no major pieces of work, but it's good reading for me.

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Eh... what pre Knaak/Golden novels... Day of the Dragon (1st book ever) was Knaak and Lord of the Clans was Golden... only the Last Guardian was by someone else. (and there was that e-book, but whatever)

Then they went all time travel on it...

The books about the 2nd game do sound interesting though... do you know if they retcon a lot?

Dei said:

I <3 the Shadow series. Bean is way more interesting than Ender the self flagellant. (Gag Novinha)

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Bleah, yeah, don't get me started on that whole family. Definitely couldn't stand Quara or Novinha, but I guess that was the point wasn't it. I just can't stand characters like that, with stupid-blinders on.

PatrThom said:

At Kati's recommendation, currently reading Dan Simmons' Hyperion. Not sure what I'll read after, dunno what sort of mood I'll be in by then.

--Patrick

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That's a fantastic book. It has that weird sci-fi feel that Dune had.

Dei said:

I <3 the Shadow series. Bean is way more interesting than Ender the self flagellant. (Gag Novinha)

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They are totally different books though so it's hard to compare. The Ender series is far more philosophical, and while some of it is fantastic (most of the Speaker for the Dead for instance), a lot of it is a little up it's own tail-pipe (also Ender is such an emo bitch "oh I killed a species boo hoo".)

The Shadow series, on the other hand, is far more political. There's really no high minded ideals or whatnot, it's just a VERY convoluted web of politics that Peter and Bean sort through all the while dealing with some very real and very dangerous personal demons.
Added at: 16:44

Quotemander Prime said:

People who love The Dark Tower tell me if you're not with in by the end of book 2, don't bother. So it may be more of the same from there.

Thing to remember is that even by the end of book 4, King still didn't know where he was going with the series, and didn't make a serious attempt to wrap it up until he got hit by a van and realized he could die without finishing the last three books.

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I loved the first 3 books, immensely. They were dark and spoke to me at very deep and very frightening levels. Then you get to the 4th book and I started getting the "wait a second...." feeling and by the 6th book there are cyber werewolves fighting vampires with light-sabers. Read the first 3 books then don't read any more.

Necronic said:

That's a fantastic book. It has that weird sci-fi feel that Dune had.

They are totally different books though so it's hard to compare. The Ender series is far more philosophical, and while some of it is fantastic (most of the Speaker for the Dead for instance), a lot of it is a little up it's own tail-pipe (also Ender is such an emo bitch "oh I killed a species boo hoo".)

The Shadow series, on the other hand, is far more political. There's really no high minded ideals or whatnot, it's just a VERY convoluted web of politics that Peter and Bean sort through all the while dealing with some very real and very dangerous personal demons.
Added at: 16:44

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Cool, thanks for the reassurance. Will probably read those when I'm done with Grey Seer.

Ready Player One

And holy fuck is it awesome and fun. Look it up. if you like fantasy, sci fi, video games, or MMOs, or 80s pop culture...it is right up your alley

Nobody here is into any of those things. Those things are for nerds.

This weekend:
Agatha H and the Airship City
A Medieval Reader
Elizabeth I
I Am Legend
Sex Before Dawn

Emrys said:

This weekend:
Agatha H and the Airship City
A Medieval Reader
Elizabeth I
I Am Legend
Sex Before Dawn

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Slow down there girl you're gonna hurt something.

Tomorrow on my commute to work, I will be beginning "The Name of the Wind" by Patrick Rothfuss. I know literally nothing about it, my brother told me it was good and leant it to me. I finished A Dance with Dragons today, so here we go, I guess...

Dr. Faustus by Christopher Marlowe
The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Like a million books on the Iran-Iraq War for a paper
Like a million books on Indo-Pakistani relations for another paper

Panzer Leader, by General Heinz Guderian

Finished The Name of the Wind last night. Pretty good. Its no ASoIaF but its good. I definitely need to read part two of the Kingkiller Chronicle. Stupid brother, introducing me to another series without telling me it hasn't been finished yet...

Today I'm starting on a book I've been wanting to read for a year or so, but have been waiting for paperback: The War For Late Night. I read the Late Shift earlier this summer, and this promises to be more of the same. But the late night comedy world is so different now from what it was when Johnny Carson retired, I'm really excited to see how Fergusson, Kimmel, Stewart, Fallon and Colbert all fit into the story of what happened between Conan and Jay Leno.

Just started on the latest installment of Dan Abnett's 40k saga Gaunt's ghosts, Salvation's Reach.

Pretty gripping so far and it feels good to be with the Tanith again.

Something Wicked This Way Comes, which has brutally reminded me how good writing can be. I'm trying to rush it so I can get The Woman in Black in before Halloween.

Fun Size said:

Something Wicked This Way Comes, which has brutally reminded me how good writing can be. I'm trying to rush it so I can get The Woman in Black in before Halloween.

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Forget that. Do Ray Bradbury's The Halloween Tree... or better yet, if you can find a copy, watch the awesome cartoon version they did that was narrated by Leonard Nimoy.

Shannow said:

Ready Player One

And holy fuck is it awesome and fun. Look it up. if you like fantasy, sci fi, video games, or MMOs, or 80s pop culture...it is right up your alley

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I liked Ready Player One, but I call bullshit on a pop culture puzzle on the internet going unsolved for 5 years. As long as I blocked that out it was fun.

I have been re-reading the Xanth series by Piers Anthony. I bought them in ebook form and reading them on my iPad. It is VERY nice to read with.

Just got through The Magician and Magician Kings by Lev grossman. Both extremely fun reads. Now getting to Orcs by Stan Nicholls

Just starting Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. I'm liking it so far.

For fun I am re-reading some of the Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser books.

AshburnerX said:

Just starting Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. I'm liking it so far.

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I saw a preview for that one recommended off of Neil Gaiman's twitter. Looked fascinating.

Just finished re-reading Space Viking by H. Beam Piper. Despite the cheezy (yet appropriate) title, it's surprisingly good sci-fi from the early 60's. The covers of the paperback versions, though, tend to be hilarious.

Finished reading Game of Thrones. Switched it up a bit... reading... Zombie Survival Guide.

Don't read it straight though. I made that mistake, and got very bored of it. It's an interesting coffee table book, and fun to reference, but really not made for a straight read through.

Fun Size said:

I saw a preview for that one recommended off of Neil Gaiman's twitter. Looked fascinating.

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Just finished it up. For a first novel, it's most excellent and I definitely see why Mr. Gaiman gave it his approval: It's got a lot more horror in it than other YA fiction, yet still has that sense of wonder and mystery that Harry Potter did. It kinda feels like a more adult version of HP or Percy Jackson, where even the good stuff has some undertones of darkness in it (like the titular house and time loop it resides in). I'm glad Ransom Riggs has already announced he's doing a sequel (he got more photos to use back in August), because I can see this being the next big kid's series.

Also, 20th Century FOX apparently bought the movie rights... so considering the buzz the book is getting, we might be seeing a movie coming as well.

EDIT: Apparently they made a trailer for the book. It's pretty good... it has pictures that show up in the book too.

Started another book today called "Zombies: The Recent Dead". I've read two other anthology books of zombie short stories before, and fully expect this one to be just as bad, but I don't care. So far all I've read is the preface stuff all about the cinematic and literary history of zombie fiction, with a few analytical notes about the social commentaries within (Is there a book thats just on that? I'd love to read that).

@Li3n said:

Oh well, i ordered The Last Wish (short story collection), because it is an interesting fantasy world... and i do have the 1st game on Steam... guess it will have to do...

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I started reading The Last Wish... and now i came here to say this:

BUY THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF THE WITCHER SAGA ALREADY SO THEY CAN GET OFF THEIR ASSES AND TRANSLATE THE REST OF THE BOOKS......

Also, Shegs, you missed this:

Shegokigo said:

@ @Li3n: I honestly wasn't a fan of the pre Knaak/Golden novels. They were "ok" at best, but everything that Knaak/Golden write, gets put into the game or is used/referenced in Wow, so you can actually "see" the storyline's progression and impact on the world after you read the novels.

I'm sure they're no major pieces of work, but it's good reading for me.

Click to expand...

Eh... what pre Knaak/Golden novels... Day of the Dragon (1st book ever) was Knaak and Lord of the Clans was Golden... only the Last Guardian was by someone else. (and there was that e-book, but whatever)

Then they went all time travel on it...

The books about the 2nd game do sound interesting though... do you know if they retcon a lot?

Click to expand...

Love in a Time of Cholera
I Shall Wear Midnight
Edward: A Great and Terrible King

I need to hit the bookstore this weekend.

I've been reading "Soon I will be Invincible," by Austin Grossman. It's a novel about a genius supervillain breaking out of jail for the 12th time and making yet another attempt to conquer the world, but it's told in a similar vein to Watchmen, only not as dark.

While on the whole I do like it, it seems to me it's trying to fit too much into what is, actually, a fairly short novel. They try to touch on EVERY hero's origin story, and intertwine several of them (there's no less than 3 major plot twists), and as a result nothing really gets the depth or detail I think it deserves. It'd make a very good OUTLINE for 2 or 3 seasons of probably the most epic hero-based TV show since Justice League or JLU... but to cram it all into a 280 page novel means so much gets glossed over.

GasBandit said:

I've been reading "Soon I will be Invincible," by Austin Grossman. It's a novel about a genius supervillain breaking out of jail for the 12th time and making yet another attempt to conquer the world, but it's told in a similar vein to Watchmen, only not as dark.

While on the whole I do like it, it seems to me it's trying to fit too much into what is, actually, a fairly short novel. They try to touch on EVERY hero's origin story, and intertwine several of them (there's no less than 3 major plot twists), and as a result nothing really gets the depth or detail I think it deserves. It'd make a very good OUTLINE for 2 or 3 seasons of probably the most epic hero-based TV show since Justice League or JLU... but to cram it all into a 280 page novel means so much gets glossed over.

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I think your kinda missing the entire point of the book. It's a deconstructive look at the concept of Super Teams and Super Villians, with an emphasis on what would motivate these kinds of people. What is going on isn't really as important as why it's happening... half of the book is basically Dr. Impossible looking back at his life and wondering if he's made the best choices he could, until it finally becomes apparent why he does the things he does. I won't spoil the grand reveal, but it's one of the best parts of the book. Your going to be routing for him during the entire climax.

The other half is about Fatale, who basically does hero work to pay for the medical supplies that keep her alive (her immune system would reject her cyborg parts), as she joins a super team in the wake of another hero's death. Her story is more about her teammates, as she examines the kind of people they are when the cameras aren't looking, and Fatale looking at her own circumstances to decide if she's really cut out for this line of work. Her side of things both breaks down and rebuilds the entire concept of Super Teams, going through both the ups and downs of the business.

What you need to remember is that the entire point of the book is to tell both sides of the equation. Where Watchmen failed is that it never really took Villains into the account during it's story, so we never saw them be deconstructed. What Grossman ultimately decided is that Villains are the same as Heroes and that they operate for the same vain, selfish reasons... but that this trait alone does not define them. Throughout his life story, we see that Dr. Impossible is also capable of love, friendship, sorrow, depression, and regret... and that all of these things are what forged him into the driven man he is today. It all comes to a head in the climax though, were we ultimately see what his feud was about.

Honestly, I feel Soon I Will Be Invincible is a better look at the genre than Watchmen, even if it owes Watchmen a great deal. It's one of the most engrossing and intelligent stories I've ever read... but then again, this isn't surprising when you realize that Austin Grossman also wrote the story for the original Deus Ex.

(I've finished the book, so I know what you mean about the "grand reveal.")

I get that the point was deconstruction, I'm just saying that there was actually enough real plot items in there for it to be both deconstruction AND a story in its own right. It was good, but it had the potential to be epic. It just felt like it was rushed. Or perhaps, abridged. I guess I'm just too used to reading 800+ page novels.

GasBandit said:

(I've finished the book, so I know what you mean about the "grand reveal.")

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Honestly, I felt the story was padded in some respects. The entire side story about the former hero that was basically a Take That towards parts of the Narnia series (about how the older girl was dropped for basically no reason) kinda shows that Grossman is better at commentary than actual storytelling.

AshburnerX said:

Spoiler

I have NEVER laughed so hard at a book as I did when Dr. Impossible starts rubbing his identity in the face of Corefire, who sheepishly has to admit that he has NO IDEA who Dr. Impossible is. It stops the entire scene and you can just feel Dr. Impossible's soul leave his body. But then when Lilly points out that he had what he always wanted and lost it because he was a jerk, you really feel for him.

Honestly, it's the best climax in any book ever.

Honestly, I felt the story was padded in some respects. The entire side story about the former hero that was basically a Take That towards parts of the Narnia series (about how the older girl was dropped for basically no reason) kinda shows that Grossman is better at commentary than actual storytelling.

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Rum Diaries.

I know, I know. Sorry.

Finished reading World War Z. Awesome book. probably the most disturbing part of the book was what happened to north korea. *shiver*

I would just like to say that I love this thread for actually giving me ideas for books to read instead of wandering around moaning about how books I want aren't out yet.

Currently reading Dreadnought by Cherie Priest. On occasion she makes prose choices I find a little iffy, but overall I've enjoyed this so far, and Boneshaker before it. The advertising for it is basically that it's a steam-punk driven extension of the American Civil War, and while that's certainly the setting, it's really about a nurse trying to find what home is after her husband's death, and getting roped into different Civil War situations as she goes.

I'm so glad Cherie Priest made the main character a nurse. The first book's protagonist was essentially a housewife who'd had a rough past and so she reacted to all the wounds and death with the panic and upsetting nature you'd expect from someone not used to it. Mercy's been doing hospital work for a long time and so even though she's rattled at times, she's on the job and most comfortable when she's got a bloody mess in her hands that needs patching up. I am so grateful the author gave us someone who can just handle this shit so we don't have to waste time with her coping and can instead keep moving along, while at the same time being impressed with her resolve.

Then there's the little hints harkening back to Boneshaker's "zombie" problem and maybe it's just me, but what's going on with them in this book is far creepier and more insidious than the plight with them in the first novel.

If you choose to read Dreadnought, do not read the back of the book. I didn't until I was halfway through, and it pretty much gave away a large chunk of what I'd already read. Better to discover those things in reading than have the back cover summary catch you up to page 200 before you open the book.

Nearing the end of "Zombie Survival Guide". It's a decent read and awesome for those who love zombie lore.

Contemplating reading World War Z next... or the 2nd book of Game of Thrones.... mmmm

twitchmoss said:

Finished reading World War Z. Awesome book. probably the most disturbing part of the book was what happened to north korea. *shiver*

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I just finished that too!

I loved the part about the guy in Japan escaping from his apartment.

Now I'm reading Darkly Dreaming Dexter. It's been a while since I've seen season 1 of Dexter so I've forgotten a good portion of what happens, and the writing is pretty fun.

Quotemander Prime said:

Currently reading Dreadnought by Cherie Priest. On occasion she makes prose choices I find a little iffy, but overall I've enjoyed this so far, and Boneshaker before it. The advertising for it is basically that it's a steam-punk driven extension of the American Civil War, and while that's certainly the setting, it's really about a nurse trying to find what home is after her husband's death, and getting roped into different Civil War situations as she goes.

I'm so glad Cherie Priest made the main character a nurse. The first book's protagonist was essentially a housewife who'd had a rough past and so she reacted to all the wounds and death with the panic and upsetting nature you'd expect from someone not used to it. Mercy's been doing hospital work for a long time and so even though she's rattled at times, she's on the job and most comfortable when she's got a bloody mess in her hands that needs patching up. I am so grateful the author gave us someone who can just handle this shit so we don't have to waste time with her coping and can instead keep moving along, while at the same time being impressed with her resolve.

Then there's the little hints harkening back to Boneshaker's "zombie" problem and maybe it's just me, but what's going on with them in this book is far creepier and more insidious than the plight with them in the first novel.

If you choose to read Dreadnought, do not read the back of the book. I didn't until I was halfway through, and it pretty much gave away a large chunk of what I'd already read. Better to discover those things in reading than have the back cover summary catch you up to page 200 before you open the book.

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Didn't know this was out yet. TO THE LIBRARY!

AshburnerX said:

Didn't know this was out yet. TO THE LIBRARY!

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Dreadnought's been out for over a year. Ganymede (third book if you don't count the ebook Clementine) just came out this September, so keep an eye out for that too. It's in my closet, but I have some other books ahead in the queue, like Gunnerkrigg Court vol. 1, Song of Ice and Fire 3, and some more Hellboy/BRPD trades.

Just finished Stephen King's On Writing. I laughed out loud at the bit about the farting babysitter. Overall, I liked its honesty and the nut-and-bolts approach of the latter half of the book.

Reading "Out of Oz" (4th book of the Wicked series) at bedtime, and listening to the audio book of Alloy of Law while trying to finish my parent's Christmas present before December. Yes it will take me that long, and I started at the beginning of October. -_- I've been reading through the classic Oz stories too, and basically wanting to smack Dorothy and Ozma through them all, so Maguire's portrayal of Dorothy in "Out of Oz" made me laugh.

Just started the kingkiller chronicle. It's got an interesting hook so far, but it's just the beginning... will see how it turns out.

Terror by Dan Simmons. It's alright but i feel a bit let down

Decided to read The Hunger Games, read through the first book in about 3 hours. I'm really excited about where the next 2 books can go and hope they don't let me down.

The first Dexter book was all around good, though the ending was disappointing. It felt kind of last minute.

Now I'm on to Dune.

Finished: Hyperion - Dan Simmons
Started: Time Travelers Strictly Cash - Spider Robinson

--Patrick
EDIT: 12/10, corrected Dan's last name.

Reveille in Washington: 1860 - 1865

I'm turning into a Lincoln motherfuckin' Scientist

In honor of Anne McCaffrey, I've started Dragonflight again.

Finished Zombies: The Recent Dead last week. Like the other two anthologies of zombie short stories I've read, it was pretty bad. But, it was actually a bit better than those two (It had several stories I had read before in one or both of those, actually). And it was only $5 and I knew what I was getting into. So it was alright, I guess.

I decided to start re-reading the Lord of the Rings, as I found a set identical to the one I had in highschool that got ruined when my roof leaked for $3 a book. Reading through Fellowship of the Ring now. I forgot just how much they really did change for the first film.

Just finished reading "Inheritance" by Chris Paolini finishing out his series that started with Eragon. I was pleased with the conclusion and look forward to seeing how his career progresses from here.

When I have free time, I'm still working on the Dresden Files series.

Bowielee said:

When I have free time, I'm still working on the Dresden Files series.

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I just finished Ghost Story a few days ago. Lovely books.

Picked up Room by Emma Donoghue yesterday. I'd never heard of it until I saw it in the bookstore last night. Apparently it won Best Book Of The Year by New York Times.
Anyway, I've been hooked since the first sentence and I'm almost finished! But while the first sentence had me hooked, it was still a little tough to start reading it's through the perspective of a 5 year old. The grammar is a little weird because of that, but the author does an amazing job of telling the story as a child.

Room was fantastic! Starting The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo now!

Finished: Time Travelers Strictly Cash - Spider Robinson
Started: Mindkiller - Spider Robinson

One of the short stories in TTSC became the opening chapter of Mindkiller, and now I want to see how the rest of the story pans out.

--Patrick

Reading A Christmas Carol.

Then it's back to The Eye of the World.

Finished two books this past week, Inheritance by Chris Paolini and Beauty and the Werewolf by Mercedes Lackey.

Started Scholar by L.E. Modesitt, Jr.

Right now I'm reading Stormrage from the Warcraft series.

Paused: Mindkiller - Spider Robinson
Started: Slaughterhouse Five - Kurt Vonnegut (Jr.)

(Details for the pausing are here)

--Patrick

Just finished: The White Tiger-Aravind Adiga

Looking for: A ginormous book that will help eat up two days as I travel home. Any suggestions?

Just finished the two books of the Kingkiller Chronicle... Probably the most engaging books I've read in a long time. Only problem? Only two of the three books are out... and this author takes FOUR YEARS between books. FUUUUUUUUUUUUU....

Reading the 2nd set of the Percy Jackson series, "Heroes of Olympus" or w/e, because my brother in law recommended them.

PatrThom said:

Good Omens (though it may only take you a day and a half to read).

--Patrick

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I'll have to read it another time. I can't buy it on kobo.

Thinking of getting "Shadowmarch" book by Tad Williams. It looks to be a good plane ride killer at the very least.

Evolutions Darling. After reading through Uglies and Midnighters... it's rather more... erotic than I was expecting. But in a weird way. Westerfeld has some weird robot tentacle fetishes apparently.

GasBandit said:

Just finished the two books of the Kingkiller Chronicle... Probably the most engaging books I've read in a long time. Only problem? Only two of the three books are out... and this author takes FOUR YEARS between books. FUUUUUUUUUUUUU....

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I haven't read the second one yet. I'm glad to hear its as engaging as the first one was. I'm borrowing it from my brother when I see him for our family Christmas.

I also got a friend of mine to buy them for her dad for Christmas cause he's a Harry Potter fan and has read all of them. I told her this series was like "Harry Potter for adults" and she was like "Hey, my dad's an adult!"



Just finishing up re-reading The Two Towers. What ever will I read next?

checkeredhat said:

I told her this series was like "Harry Potter for adults" and she was like "Hey, my dad's an adult!"

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That's hilarious.

Currently reading through Gunnerkrigg Court Vol. 1 and I'm loving it. I have to keep reminding myself that sudden narrative jerks between pages are due to the nature of it being a webcomic and that despite how well designed this book is, it'll still a collected webcomic and isn't going to perfectly flow page to page (nor should it). But it's imaginative, cute, and intriguing. I'm glad I know very little about what's currently going on in GK besides "Antimony and Kat are friends" so I'm not waiting for certain story turns.

Sadly, Vol. 2 seems like it's never gonna get reprinted, so I'll have to read that one on the site archives. Eventually, I'll be caught up.

checkeredhat said:

Just finishing up re-reading The Two Towers. What ever will I read next?

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"The Return of the King," maybe? Or you might try to track down a copy of "Bored of the Rings."

--Patrick

Timmus said:

I'll have to read it another time. I can't buy it on kobo.

Thinking of getting "Shadowmarch" book by Tad Williams. It looks to be a good plane ride killer at the very least.

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It's not bad, but I don't know that it's worth picking up. If you've read his other stuff, I might suggest giving it a pass. I read the Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn trilogy along with his Otherland series, and felt Shadowmarch suffered in comparison. Well, then again, if it's just to kill time on a plane, there are worse options.

As an aside to reading the newest Modesitt book, I've started on Vol 3 of the Bloom County Library. This edition has my all time favorite Sunday strip, it's an ad spoof about getting the Banana 6000 self-mobile computer and how if you don't get it for your kids they might end up playing bass in a heavy-metal band like Gene Simmons.

PatrThom said:

"The Return of the King," maybe? Or you might try to track down a copy of "Bored of the Rings."

--Patrick

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I was being sarcastic. Obviously it will be Return of the King.
After that I'll be borrowing my brother's copy of the second book in the Kingkiller Chronicle. After that I don't really have anything particular in mind. What's Bored of the Rings?

checkeredhat said:

I was being sarcastic. Obviously it will be Return of the King.
After that I'll be borrowing my brother's copy of the second book in the Kingkiller Chronicle. After that I don't really have anything particular in mind. What's Bored of the Rings?

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A parody of LOTR.

Quotemander Prime said:

A parody of LOTR.

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Written by the guys from National Lampoon.

--Patrick

Quotemander Prime said:

A parody of LOTR.

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That's what I figured.
I've read the Soddit, I imagine this is similar?

Dunno. Never read The Soddit.

--Patrick

I, for one, found Tim Benzedrine a lot more understandable and a lot less disturbing than Tom Bombadil.

Selected Storied of Fritz Leiber
Snuffed
The Boleyn Inheritance
The Other Boleyn Girl (finished)
Hogfather (rereading)

Rereading the entire Sandman collection while chipping away at The Man in My Basement.

In the last two weeks I've read:
The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Orthodoxy by GK Chesterton
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, which I've read before but we're studying it this semester so I decided to get a little ahead.

And tomorrow I will finish American Lion by Jon Meacham, a biography of Andrew Jackson.

Not a bad two weeks. During the semester I probably won't be able to budget time for leisure reading, which makes me feel a little bit sad.

Frankenstein is one of my favourite books of all time. Think I'll try reading it again this year.

I just finished reading A Hard Day's Knight by Simon R. Green. He's definitely one of my favourite authors, especially for the Nightside series. And I think I broke my record for fastest novel read: less than 24 hours for this one. Started reading it early New Year's Eve. Finished reading it early last night.

Sabriel by Garth Nix.

I read this as a pre teen and remembered it being boring and hard to grasp. As an adult i find it to be thrilling, eerie and an interesting look at necromancy.

Would recommend!

Just started Wise Man's Fear, part two of the Kingkiller Chronicle. Too early to give a real impression of it yet, but part one was a good read, and this one picks up RIGHT where that one left off, so the start isn't as slow I'm used to.

A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore. I'm promising myself that I'll finish it this time, started it a year ago and got halfway through. I do adore his writing style though.

And Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter, second read through. I'm still amazed at how much this book grabs my attention. Granted, my attention span is pretty..sad. But still, throughly enjoying this!

LittleKagsin said:

And Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter, second read through. I'm still amazed at how much this book grabs my attention. Granted, my attention span is pretty..sad. But still, throughly enjoying this!

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I was surprised at how well that premise actually worked.

Just finished up Good Omens and now I'm starting The Rogue Crew, which is the final Redwall book.

checkeredhat said:

I was surprised at how well that premise actually worked.

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Me as well. I didn't want to read it for the longest time, in my mind I was always 'Another vampire book? No thanks...', but I have a friend who loved it and thought why not. Smith's ability to weave fact and fiction together is wonderful. I think he truly is a good, competent writer.

Have you given Pride and Prejudice and Zombies a go?

checkeredhat said:

Just started Wise Man's Fear, part two of the Kingkiller Chronicle. Too early to give a real impression of it yet, but part one was a good read, and this one picks up RIGHT where that one left off, so the start isn't as slow I'm used to.

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I finished that a few weeks ago. It's just as good as the first one. Damn I want the third one out NAOW.

LittleKagsin said:

Me as well. I didn't want to read it for the longest time, in my mind I was always 'Another vampire book? No thanks...', but I have a friend who loved it and thought why not. Smith's ability to weave fact and fiction together is wonderful. I think he truly is a good, competent writer.

Have you given Pride and Prejudice and Zombies a go?

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Having read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies was the only reason I gave Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter a chance. I agree with your assessment, I think Seth Grahame-Smith's actually a very good writer, and if he wants to just play around with these sorts of novelties for now, I'm happy with that.

checkeredhat said:

Having read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies was the only reason I gave Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter a chance. I agree with your assessment, I think Seth Grahame-Smith's actually a very good writer, and if he wants to just play around with these sorts of novelties for now, I'm happy with that.

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Ooh, I'm glad it's good! I'll have to read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies next. I'm curious to see what else he comes up with. (I even have high hopes for the Abe movie...)

Just finished the Copy of Grimm's Fairy Tales I got for Christmas. Twas a a good read. Those fairy tales are fucked up.

They're even better in their original versions. The Grimm Brothers toned them down quite a bit.

The Silmarillion.

I think these may be their original versions. Snow White (or Snowdrop) being Seven when she married the prince blew my frikken mind.

LittleSin said:

I think these may be their original versions. Snow White (or Snowdrop) being Seven when she married the prince blew my frikken mind.

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The Grimms did tone them down though, but I'm pretty sure their Snow White is cobbled from a couple older stories, so you won't exactly find an older version of it.

"Ashputtle" is the earlier name, I think.

For a nifty take on all things Grimm, see if you can find Red as Blood, by Tanith Lee. It's a good one.

Finished: Slaughterhouse Five - Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
(Re)started: Mindkiller - Spider Robinson

--Patrick

Something from the Nightside by Simon R. Green

I couldn't not put this down. It was disturbing in some places with intense imagery but, over all, it was an excellent book.

I picked this one up by chance. I was going to start reading the Dresden Files but they didn't have the first book in stock. The guy suggested this one...and I am THANKFUL.

PatrThom said:

"Ashputtle" is the earlier name, I think.

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That's Cinderella.

More than halfway through A Wise Man's Fear now, and loving it. I really liked The Name of the Wind, but part two, so far, is incredible.

checkeredhat said:

More than halfway through A Wise Man's Fear now, and loving it. I really liked The Name of the Wind, but part two, so far, is incredible.

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Reading these as well. About to finish the first and start the second. Awesome so far!

LittleKagsin said:

Ooh, I'm glad it's good! I'll have to read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies next. I'm curious to see what else he comes up with. (I even have high hopes for the Abe movie...)

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I've never read the original Jane Austen work, so I may not be the best judge. I do have one friend who has read Pride and Prejudice before and when she tried to read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies she hated it. But for my part, I honestly can't fathom how that story can work without the zombies.

Quotemander Prime said:

That's Cinderella.

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That's right.

--Patrick

checkeredhat said:

I've never read the original Jane Austen work, so I may not be the best judge. I do have one friend who has read Pride and Prejudice before and when she tried to read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies she hated it. But for my part, I honestly can't fathom how that story can work without the zombies.

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I think a lot of...people (Okay I'll just say it...women) have nostalgia goggles on when they read that book. Maybe they're offended at the story being changed from the beloved romance to something else. I started the original, but never finished. So either way, it sounds awesome to me! I'm kosher with change.

checkeredhat said:

I've never read the original Jane Austen work, so I may not be the best judge. I do have one friend who has read Pride and Prejudice before and when she tried to read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies she hated it. But for my part, I honestly can't fathom how that story can work without the zombies.

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That's hilarious. I'm sure you could read a dissection of it online, about what was changed. I read one a couple years ago that makes you really appreciate the genius behind the changes.

Plowing through the Dresden Files... Calleja has created a monster by informing me about the series and pimping it so much: I got the complete set on the 5th, and I'm on book 8 now.

...

BRB, reading more.

I'm back to scholarly reading. I'm currently reading a book on influence and persuasion to get ideas for my research project.

checkeredhat said:

More than halfway through A Wise Man's Fear now, and loving it. I really liked The Name of the Wind, but part two, so far, is incredible.

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I'm considering going to the author's house and holding a machete to his throat until he finishes book 3.

GasBandit said:

I'm considering going to the author's house and holding a machete to his throat until he finishes book 3.

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I'll be finished by the end of the week. I did feel like
was given a little too much focus, and compared to the rest of the book so far, it dragged a bit. But even still, this book is awesome. I've been trying to turn more people onto this series. I suspect that might be easier when the third book is finished, since all my fantasy-reading friends are already hooked on aSoIaF and seem hesitant to start another unfinished series.

Next on my list, I'm getting out of the fantasy genre for a bit and reading Searching for Bobby Orr, and then probably Gretzky's Tears.

ugh. Curriculum building, which means I'm going to be balls deep in these chintzy Canadian urban youth books for a little bit. That, and I'm probably going to force House on Mango Street on the little knuckleheads. But mostly because I already have a unit based on that. BOOSH

GasBandit said:

I'm considering going to the author's house and holding a machete to his throat until he finishes book 3.

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Don't you think you're being a little impatient? The second book just came out 10 months ago.

Miss Peregrines Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

I started this about 4:30 today.

I finished it about 15 minutes ago.

I think I enjoyed it! I can't remember who had suggested it in this thread but THANK YOU.

LittleSin said:

Miss Peregrines Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

I started this about 4:30 today.

I finished it about 15 minutes ago.

I think I enjoyed it! I can't remember who had suggested it in this thread but THANK YOU.

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It was me and your welcome. Also, look forward to the movie from FOX... it currently looks like Tim Burton is slated for directing, so it's going to be visually astounding at least.

Quotemander Prime said:

Don't you think you're being a little impatient? The second book just came out 10 months ago.

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After 4 years. When he's already got all three books "written pretty much," he's just massaging and rewriting at this point. Meanwhile I look over at my huge shelf full of Raymond Feist's Midkemia novels, 20-someodd and counting, with a new one coming out every year. Though, in theory, that all stops in 2013...

GasBandit said:

After 4 years. When he's already got all three books "written pretty much," he's just massaging and rewriting at this point. Meanwhile I look over at my huge shelf full of Raymond Feist's Midkemia novels, 20-someodd and counting, with a new one coming out every year. Though, in theory, that all stops in 2013...

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It takes longer to write a good book. Those revisions are probably for the best. And you probably already know that.

Quotemander Prime said:

It takes longer to write a good book. Those revisions are probably for the best. And you probably already know that.

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There's a balancing act though. I can pretty much tell you I've lost interest in ASOIAF because of the time between books, and how it makes me forget who is who and why they're doing what they're doing. The same thing happened with Wheel of Time, even after it started getting good again. I really hope that doesn't happen with the Kingkiller chronicle, and I take some solace in the fact that each book seems to have a semi-episodic beginning, middle, and end - which I think will help reduce the jarring quality of a 4 year pause. This is why I usually wait until a series is finished before I start reading them.

GasBandit said:

There's a balancing act though. I can pretty much tell you I've lost interest in ASOIAF because of the time between books, and how it makes me forget who is who and why they're doing what they're doing. The same thing happened with Wheel of Time, even after it started getting good again. I really hope that doesn't happen with the Kingkiller chronicle, and I take some solace in the fact that each book seems to have a semi-episodic beginning, middle, and end - which I think will help reduce the jarring quality of a 4 year pause. This is why I usually wait until a series is finished before I start reading them.

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Sounds like a good policy. I meant to do that with ASOIAF, but my wife started watching Game of Thrones with her friend and I'm the opposite of Jay; I want to read the book first before I see shows/movies.

I don't think the Kingkiller author is being egregious considering, again, it's only been 10 months since book 2. Even if he'd finished it and handed it in, odds are that the publisher would hold-out on book 3's release for at least a year after book 2. I guess to build suspense? I don't know. Still, this is no George R 5-year-gap R Martin type of situation where he's struggling to write two in-between novels that were never supposed to exist.

Quotemander Prime said:

Sounds like a good policy. I meant to do that with ASOIAF, but my wife started watching Game of Thrones with her friend and I'm the opposite of Jay; I want to read the book first before I see shows/movies.

I don't think the Kingkiller author is being egregious considering, again, it's only been 10 months since book 2. Even if he'd finished it and handed it in, odds are that the publisher would hold-out on book 3's release for at least a year after book 2. I guess to build suspense? I don't know. Still, this is no George R 5-year-gap R Martin type of situation where he's struggling to write two in-between novels that were never supposed to exist.

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It's close though. Wise Man was supposed to come out "next year" for the last 3 years. I hope the last one isn't as delayed.

Quotemander Prime said:

I don't think the Kingkiller author is being egregious considering, again, it's only been 10 months since book 2. Even if he'd finished it and handed it in, odds are that the publisher would hold-out on book 3's release for at least a year after book 2. I guess to build suspense? I don't know. Still, this is no George R 5-year-gap R Martin type of situation where he's struggling to write two in-between novels that were never supposed to exist.

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Probably two years minimum, since a year after would see the paperback release.

The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

This was beautiful. Very short, just under 100 pages if you take out the pictures but it was poignant and written with love. I FEEL better having read it.

Amazon product

God damn I love the was Sanderson writes.

I've been reading a lot of YA books...should I feel guilty?

Perhaps I should read something more mature for my next one.

Quotemander Prime said:

Sounds like a good policy. I meant to do that with ASOIAF, but my wife started watching Game of Thrones with her friend and I'm the opposite of Jay; I want to read the book first before I see shows/movies.

I don't think the Kingkiller author is being egregious considering, again, it's only been 10 months since book 2. Even if he'd finished it and handed it in, odds are that the publisher would hold-out on book 3's release for at least a year after book 2. I guess to build suspense? I don't know. Still, this is no George R 5-year-gap R Martin type of situation where he's struggling to write two in-between novels that were never supposed to exist.

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I'm a big fan of the series, and I also read the author's blog -- and he has barely mentioned ANYTHING about book 3, which doesn't make me optimistic that it will be coming out anytime soon. He also has admitted that "already written" means that a patchwork, crappy, first-draft version of the series existed, and book 2 had to go through SERIOUS revisions to get to where was at publication.

Sooo... don't hold your respective breaths. I'd be happy if we got the book sometime in 2014.

LittleSin said:

I've been reading a lot of YA books...should I feel guilty?

Perhaps I should read something more mature for my next one.

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In these days of sex and violence, YA books have gotten pretty hardcore. It seems the distinction between YA and adult novels now is the age of the main character, unless the prose is of the dense lit class variety.

The 5th book of Game of Thrones, Dance of Dragons is it?

I'm 250 pages in, reading a chapter a day.

What a great series.

Quotemander Prime said:

In these days of sex and violence, YA books have gotten pretty hardcore. It seems the distinction between YA and adult novels now is the age of the main character, unless the prose is of the dense lit class variety.

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I have to admit. A lot of YA books are getting darker and darker in tone. My husband gave me Catch-22 for Christmas but I'm not sure I`m ready to tackle that one yet.

I have hundred of books. I can't decide what to read! Maybe the Hunger Games? Red Mars?

LittleSin said:

I have to admit. A lot of YA books are getting darker and darker in tone. My husband gave me Catch-22 for Christmas but I'm not sure I`m ready to tackle that one yet.

I have hundred of books. I can't decide what to read! Maybe the Hunger Games? Red Mars?

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When I get some money, I plan to get and read The Hunger Games. Everyone's raving about it.

Quotemander Prime said:

When I get some money, I plan to get and read The Hunger Games. Everyone's raving about it.

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I liked the Hunger Games a lot. Twilight they sure aren't.

Quotemander Prime said:

When I get some money, I plan to get and read The Hunger Games. Everyone's raving about it.

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They're not bad, I dread to see what they're doing with the movie. I'm still scarred from Eragon.

Watch the D&D movie sometime. Eragon looks much better by comparison.

--Patrick

PatrThom said:

Watch the D&D movie sometime. Eragon looks much better by comparison.

--Patrick

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But with D&D I expected crap, it's such a varied source that it could have gone literally thousands of ways, and of course they went the worst one possible for general consumption. Eragon, has a good single source and they managed to make a movie about something else entirely, just using some names and a few scenes from the book.

Sparhawk said:

They're not bad, I dread to see what they're doing with the movie. I'm still scarred from Eragon.

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Have you seen the trailer? I think it's gonna be pretty good.

I've finally started on my New Year's resolution to read at least 10 classics throughout the year. Starting off with Treasure Island! Yeah!!

You guys should help me come up with my list, I'm having a hard time deciding.

Finished Wise Man's Fear on Thursday and started Searching for Bobby Orr yesterday. I'm only two chapters in, but its pretty good so far. Stephen Brunt does a really good job of explaining the the romanticism of hockey in Canada.
Added at: 18:05

LittleKagsin said:

I've finally started on my New Year's resolution to read at least 10 classics throughout the year. Starting off with Treasure Island! Yeah!!

You guys should help me come up with my list, I'm having a hard time deciding.

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I tried to read Treasure Island in grade 5 for a unit on explorers, and found it incredibly dull. I wound up reading Robinson Crusoe instead. I'd like to take another crack at Treasure Island though. I should add that to my list. Any way, I would definitely recommend Robinson Crusoe.

checkeredhat said:

Finished Wise Man's Fear on Thursday and started Searching for Bobby Orr yesterday. I'm only two chapters in, but its pretty good so far. Stephen Brunt does a really good job of explaining the the romanticism of hockey in Canada.
Added at: 18:05

I tried to read Treasure Island in grade 5 for a unit on explorers, and found it incredibly dull. I wound up reading Robinson Crusoe instead. I'd like to take another crack at Treasure Island though. I should add that to my list. Any way, I would definitely recommend Robinson Crusoe.

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I have to wonder if your memory is painting nice over Robinson Crusoe. I had to read that in my sophomore Lit class in college and found it a real drag.

Quotemander Prime said:

I have to wonder if your memory is painting nice over Robinson Crusoe. I had to read that in my sophomore Lit class in college and found it a real drag.

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I don't know, I liked it a lot. I remember my teacher fought to keep me from switching books because it was so close to the end of the unit she was sure I wouldn't be able to finish it in time, but I devoured it. I suppose its possible that there is a different version published for children, though. I suddenly find myself doubting myself as you're talking about reading a book in college that I'm positive I read when I was 9 or 10 years old.

LittleKagsin said:

I've finally started on my New Year's resolution to read at least 10 classics throughout the year. Starting off with Treasure Island! Yeah!!

You guys should help me come up with my list, I'm having a hard time deciding.

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Well I recommend Dostoevsky to everyone, especially The Brothers Karamazov.

And as I've been thinking about it lately for some reason, I recommend Moby Dick. It has been far too long since I've read that, I think I'll re-read it this summer. When I was younger, I loved 20 000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne, and I'm hoping to re-read that as well when I'm in Hawaii over reading week. I must also bring up A Tale of Two Cities, which is one of my all-time favourite novels.

I read a lot of classics, so I'll stop now

Oh, I really enjoyed Tale of Two Cities as well. I second that one. Had to read it in grade 9, and I think I was the only person in my class who enjoyed it at all (To be fair, there were probably only 3-4 of us who actually read it).

I'll definately add a Tale of Two Cities and Moby Dick to my list, thanks guys!

The name Dostoevsky sounds familiar, but I not as prominent as some others - I'll give it a try.

So far:
Treasure Island
Moby Dick
Tale of Two Cities
The Brothers Karamazov
Robinson Crusoe

What does everyone think of these?:
Catcher in the Rye
Don Quixote
The Great Gatsby
Count of Monte Cristo (unabridged)
The Three Musketeers
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Frankenstein
Anna Karenina

I feel so uncultured....

checkeredhat said:

I don't know, I liked it a lot. I remember my teacher fought to keep me from switching books because it was so close to the end of the unit she was sure I wouldn't be able to finish it in time, but I devoured it. I suppose its possible that there is a different version published for children, though. I suddenly find myself doubting myself as you're talking about reading a book in college that I'm positive I read when I was 9 or 10 years old.

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There actually is a series of classics rewritten for kids to digest. I read that version of War of the Worlds when I was 9 and loved it. Then I tried reading the actual book two years later and couldn't stand it. There were versions of Little Women, Robinson Crusoe, The Time Machine, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Edgar Allen Poe stories, and many more.
Added at: 14:18

LittleKagsin said:

I'll definately add a Tale of Two Cities and Moby Dick to my list, thanks guys!

The name Dostoevsky sounds familiar, but I not as prominent as some others - I'll give it a try.

So far:
Treasure Island
Moby Dick
Tale of Two Cities
The Brothers Karamazov
Robinson Crusoe

Click to expand...

Brothers Karamazov is incredible. I hope A Tale of Two Cities works out for you; I know Dickens can be rough for some (like me).

What does everyone think of these?:
Catcher in the Rye
Don Quixote
The Great Gatsby
Count of Monte Cristo (unabridged)
The Three Musketeers
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Frankenstein
Anna Karenina

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Fixed.

That's probably what I read then. Now I gotta give the actual one a shot.
Added at: 19:21

LittleKagsin said:

I'll definately add a Tale of Two Cities and Moby Dick to my list, thanks guys!

The name Dostoevsky sounds familiar, but I not as prominent as some others - I'll give it a try.

So far:
Treasure Island
Moby Dick
Tale of Two Cities
The Brothers Karamazov
Robinson Crusoe

What does everyone think of these?:
Catcher in the Rye
Don Quixote
The Great Gatsby
Count of Monte Cristo (unabridged)
The Three Musketeers
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Frankenstein
Anna Karenina

I feel so uncultured....

Click to expand...

I've read Catcher in the Rye for school and I really liked it, but that and Tale of Two Cities are the only books on your list I've read. My sister LOVES the Count of Monte Cristo though, so I assume its awesome.

Quotemander Prime said:

There actually is a series of classics rewritten for kids to digest. I read that version of War of the Worlds when I was 9 and loved it. Then I tried reading the actual book two years later and couldn't stand it. There were versions of Little Women, Robinson Crusoe, The Time Machine, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Edgar Allen Poe stories, and many more.
Added at: 14:18


Brothers Karamazov is incredible. I hope A Tale of Two Cities works out for you; I know Dickens can be rough for some (like me).



Fixed.

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That... fixing is perfect. And a Karamazov endorsement? You and me are gonna be friends.

Also I definitely endorse Monte Cristo and Dorian Gray. I'm writing a paper on Frankenstein this semester. It isn't as good as I remember when I read it the first time. It's worth noting that in the 1818 edition, Victor is much more sympathetic than the 1831 edition. So you might want to consider that if you look for it. The '31 edition is the more common one.

Guess my list is larger than 10. It'll be worth it, though, I'm sure. Thanks for all the suggestions and feedback. I'll be sure to update when I finish.

Quotemander Prime said:

There actually is a series of classics rewritten for kids to digest. I read that version of War of the Worlds when I was 9 and loved it. Then I tried reading the actual book two years later and couldn't stand it. There were versions of Little Women, Robinson Crusoe, The Time Machine, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Edgar Allen Poe stories, and many more.

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Are you referring to the Moby Books series? I had that whole series when I was younger and stupidly believed that I'd actually read all those classics until I was in my teens

Bowielee said:

Are you referring to the Moby Books series? I had that whole series when I was younger and stupidly believed that I'd actually read all those classics until I was in my teens

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I don't know the name, but the book spines were red letters on a white background and I believe every other page was an illustration.

Quotemander Prime said:

I don't know the name, but the book spines were red letters on a white background and I believe every other page was an illustration.

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OOHHHHHH I read Robin Hood from that series!

Bowielee said:

Are you referring to the Moby Books series? I had that whole series when I was younger and stupidly believed that I'd actually read all those classics until I was in my teens

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Pfft, I'm 25 and I just found out I didn't read Robinson Crusoe TODAY.
*edit* There were no illustrations in the one I read, as far as I recall. I don't remember the colour of the spine either, but I remember the cover was green.

The Moby Books series were just these little things, probably 5x8 inches, with comic book style drawings every other page.

This was pretty much my bookshelf as a kid.

Mine weren't all colored like the lower ones, but could've very well been the top ones.

I think the top ones were newer editions. I think I rival Dave in the ancient people of the message board category.

All of my set (yes, I had them all) where the white and red ones. It's not a bad way to introduce kids to the classics.

I had the entire set as well. I think the only books that had the original text were the OZ books.

Bowielee said:

I think the top ones were newer editions. I think I rival Dave in the ancient people of the message board category.

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Nah, you're about 10 years younger than Dave, and about 6 younger than I am. There are a couple of other 40ish ages around here also.

Dave is nearly 50?

Lol, he's old enough to have actually owned Disco pants.

I still have a big pile of the comic book classics. Do those count?

--Patrick

Bowielee said:

The Moby Books series were just these little things, probably 5x8 inches, with comic book style drawings every other page.

This was pretty much my bookshelf as a kid.

View attachment 4166

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Holy shit. I had so many of those.

Also, I tried reading Treasure Island again recently too but... Well, see, when I read, I'm also reading out loud, because I'm reading TO the little woman. And she couldn't understand what was going on because of the archaic english (she's originally from Holland). So it didn't work out because I had to stop after almost every line and say "That means ...."

My mother just found these last year in the basement. They are now in my storage shed.

Officer_Charon said:

Plowing through the Dresden Files... Calleja has created a monster by informing me about the series and pimping it so much: I got the complete set on the 5th, and I'm on book 8 now.

...

BRB, reading more.

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YAAY! You're literally my 4th convert to the series, the other 3 are also now addicted and read ALL books in a matter of weeks. Butcher is awesome.

I'm currently finishing up 'Road to Reality' by Roger Penrose (I think I'll need to read it again). Just started "Damned" by Chuck Palahniuk. I'm in the middle of "SAS Survival Handbook" by an ex SAS member named John Wiseman. I'm also in the middle of Full Dark, No Stars by Stephan King (finished two of the four stories).

Reading, in between other things, My Momma is smart. She had me! by John Aten. Collection of anecdotes and stories from a science teacher in our local high school. Basically the title comes from an incident where a pregnant female student accuses him of lying to her about the umbilical cord.

Calleja said:

YAAY! You're literally my 4th convert to the series, the other 3 are also now addicted and read ALL books in a matter of weeks. Butcher is awesome.

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/delurk

5th convert. Just so you know

I drive a ton for work (41k miles in the last 17 months) so I downloaded the Dresden Files audiobooks from the local library and consumed all 13 in six weeks. Soon as my Audible subscription rolls over I'll be getting Side Jobs.

Anybody ever read any Joe Abercrombie? I've heard he's good, but brutal - and I don't think I can handle much more after having finally read GRR Martin up to current.

I feel bad taking a break from Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie, but his writing can really weigh on the reader sometimes and I need to come up for air. (Also, so far not seeing this as his greatest work like everyone says; I'm still holding The Moor's Last Sigh in that regard.)

Was going to download The Hunger Games for my brand new Kindle, but then I did a book preview--it's all in present tense?! How has no one mentioned this before? How can an entire trilogy of 3-400 page novels be all written in present tense? That's... just so annoying. I really wanted to read this, but now I don't know.

Quotemander Prime said:

Was going to download The Hunger Games for my brand new Kindle, but then I did a book preview--it's all in present tense?! How has no one mentioned this before? How can an entire trilogy of 3-400 page novels be all written in present tense? That's... just so annoying. I really wanted to read this, but now I don't know.

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I think I was about two-thirds of the way through Snow Crash before I realized that it was written in present tense. Maybe that was because it was an audiobook, though.

Jay said:

250 pages left to read in Book 5 of Game of Thrones... the feeling of dread starts to rise... when is the 6th book expected to be released?

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Just after the 14th cycle of the Mayan calendar.

Jay said:

250 pages left to read in Book 5 of Game of Thrones... the feeling of dread starts to rise... when is the 6th book expected to be released?

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Every time you ask "When is the next book coming out?" GRR Martin kills a Stark.

I finished Searching for Bobby Orr last Friday and started Gretzky's Tears. So far its a lot less interesting. Maybe I just should have gotten another fantasy novel or something inbetween.

papachronos said:

/delurk

Anybody ever read any Joe Abercrombie? I've heard he's good, but brutal - and I don't think I can handle much more after having finally read GRR Martin up to current.

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Joe Abercrombie might be the one author that rivals GRRM in brutality. Holy shit.

Here's a great summary (ALERT: SEMI SPOILER-ISH KIND OF in a metaphorical way -- if you want to be completely in the dark about the series do not read the following paragraph) from http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/lgrin/2011/02/12/the-bankrupt-nihilism-of-our-fallen-fantasists/:

“Think of a Lord of the Rings where, after stringing you along for thousands of pages, all of the hobbits end up dying of cancer contracted by their proximity to the Ring, Aragorn is revealed to be a buffoonish puppet-king of no honor and false might, and Gandalf no sooner celebrates the defeat of Sauron than he executes a long-held plot to become the new Dark Lord of Middle-earth, and you have some idea of what to expect should you descend into Abercrombie’s jaded literary sewer.”

That being said, it was a fantastic series. I enjoyed the hell out of it. It's definitely in my top 10, maybe even top 5, favorite fantasy series ever -- but it takes a lot of the fantasy tropes and completely twists them into something soul-crushing and awful.

So... just finished the 5th book of Game of Thrones... a huge void is in my heart... for thy ending was harsh.... and the wait even harsher... for thy expectancy will be probably in 2015.

Next book.... World War Z.

Not too thrilled with Hellboy volume 7. Usually I really love the short story/issue collections, but half of these have pretty much ended with "and then the sun came up". Great ideas being completely wasted left and right just so Hellboy can punch more things. I really think he needs to be back with the group, because I'm enjoying BPRD a lot more (just finished volume 5 of that).

Also just started The Hunger Games this morning. I stopped noticing it was present tense after a page, so that's a relief. I like how much detail about this world's situation came through in just a few pages without much of an exposition dump. I have a 10-hour round trip this weekend, so I expect I'll get through quite a bit of this in that time.

"How Suspicion Mitigates the Effect of Influence Tactics"

Gripping stuff, i tell ya.

Peter and The Starcatchers:

It's a children's book for sure, but I had so much fun reading it! It's an origin story of Peter Pan, in case anyone was wondering. I quite liked it, it's a fun, easy, read. If you're looking for a silly adventure book, I would definately recommend this. With Dave Barry co-writing, it's going to be a winner. It's got some pretty funny moments and the 'how' is pretty interesting as well. Since it's just the first book in the series, I'll definately be picking up the others.

Thanks to long bus trips, I finished The Hunger Games in about two sittings technically, maybe three. For the most part, it was pretty good. I was hoping for more of a post-apocalypse feel and less dystopian, since that's how everyone describes it, but it went fine. I had to laugh at the author's vision of the future--it was very reminiscent of how 50s sci-fi expected the future to be, with lots of buttons that could make anything happen, rather than realistic expectations we've grown accustomed to with how modern day tech has turned out with touch screens, voice commands, etc.

My only real complaint was how long it dithered on a certain sub-plot, and I'm very concerned about how the movie is going to be. A lot of what Katniss does is for the sake of the people watching the Hunger Games, be it her family she loves or the Capitol people she despises, but we can only get that because the narrative is her voice. In the movie, we will be people watching the Games, and so I'm not sure how they'll get that stuff across without either crappy voice-over monologues or having Katniss visually betray her real motives/feelings, which undermines the intelligence and calculating nature of her character.

That said, while I felt that certain sub-plot dragged down the first book, it really shows its impact now that I've started Catching Fire. So bad for the first book, but good for the series. Overall though, I enjoyed the book and I'm enjoying the sequel.

Is Hunger Games as much of a Battle Royale knockoff as everything I've seen or heard leads me to believe?

Frankie Williamson said:

Is Hunger Games as much of a Battle Royale knockoff as everything I've seen or heard leads me to believe?

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That's exactly the impression I had that made me avoid it for the last couple of years, but upon reading it, it's kind of a mish-mash of a lot of things. You can still pick out where different inspirations came from, but they're different enough when piled together that it's not intrusive. There's a culture to the book because of the world it creates that makes it feel more to me sort of like Brave New World meets Fallout.

It reads pretty simplistically, is fairly evidently aimed at a young adult audience, and is (rather distressingly) turning out to have a rather rabid fanbase of Twilight-esque proportions... of which my wife is a member.

For all that, though, it's a decent read, and worth the half a day it takes to rip through the first book. Subsequent re-readings might come up with more detail than that... don't know if I'm going to invest that much effort into it, though.

I feel myself slipping into that fan base, although not in a "Team Favorite Boy" type of way. I actually really like the world Collins has created, even if its pieces are somewhat derivative.

Finished "Rivers of London" . Everybody who say this is like Harry Potter is wrong.

Finished "Gretzky's Tears" yesterday. It got easier to read towards the end, but overall I didn't enjoy it as much as the same author's "Searching For Bobby Orr". While both were focused on the business dealings and the impact the palyers had on the NHL, the Bobby Orr book looked at Orr's career more closely than the Gretzky book. It wasn't until the end, when his trade to LA was finalized and the book began looking at the reprecussions that trade had on the NHL in the United States, that I got really into it.

Not sure what I'm going to read next.

Just bought book one of the Dresden files. Haven't started reading it yet though. That begins on the commute tomorrow.
(I also bough Batman: Year One and The Killing Joke. These are the first Batman comics I've ever purchased)

Dresden Files = Victory. That is all.

As a heads-up, the Dresden Files only really gets going on book 3. If you don't like book 1, or book 2, hang in there and read book 3. It's worth it.

Catching Fire is friggin' nerve-wracking. Though I enjoyed The Hunger Games, I think I prefer the sequel. Hard to stop reading.

Yeah, I agree... she really seemed to hit a good stride with that. Mockingjay has been sort of... I dunno... the tempo seems a little off for the events that she's writing about, and almost a little gimmicky, but I'm digging the direction the characters seem to be going. Just about done - just couldn't finish it last night. Passed out. *wry grin*

Read Hunger Games in one sitting on Tuesday (first book of the year! /lazy) and finished Mockingjay yesterday. I couldn't put these books down for long. Holy crap, SO MUCH HAPPENED! Mockingjay left me pretty upset in a few parts. Okay, more than a few parts. (I'm not one to cry while watching movies, but I have a feeling the last movie will have me bawling.)

I have started reading The Color of Magic and...I'm...pretty disappointed. It's well written, clever and witty. Yet I just can't get into it.

What the hell is wrong with me?

Judge not the Discworld by Color of Magic. That book is almost a parody of fantasy books of the time and doesn't really capture what becomes great with the series. I recommend the watch series which starts with Guards! Guards! or the Death series which technically starts with Mort, but gets better with Reaper Man and on. The witches can be fun too, but start with Wyrd Sisters as Equal Rites is still an early book and only has Granny Weatherwax in it.

How the hell do you end a book like that?

I'm glad I bought the trilogy so I can start Mockingjay whenever I want.

Little over halfway through Storm Front now. Its so far been pretty predictable, and screams of self insertion like a friggin' Star Trek fanfic.

And yet its an incredibly fun read. I'm enjoying it immensely.

Gryfter said:

Judge not the Discworld by Color of Magic. That book is almost a parody of fantasy books of the time and doesn't really capture what becomes great with the series. I recommend the watch series which starts with Guards! Guards! or the Death series which technically starts with Mort, but gets better with Reaper Man and on. The witches can be fun too, but start with Wyrd Sisters as Equal Rites is still an early book and only has Granny Weatherwax in it.

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Going Postal isn't a bad place to start either, if you want to get a look at his much later works.

Finished Storm Front, starting on Fool Moon.

Yyyeah... that self-insertion vibe tends to fall off a bit, later, if only because of how... well... yeah. Just keep reading.

Alternately: It may be self-insertion, but it's not Gary-Stu, IMHO.
Added at: 22:30
Also: Mockingjay - pacing was a bit off, felt a bit forced, some of the stuff left me going "Really? Why would you even...?"

And then out of nowhere, a single line about two pages from the end hit me between the eyes like an axe handle.

*golfclap* Not bad...

Catching Fire

Holy crap, I'm not the only one reading The Hunger Games stuff? Awesome. I'd read the first one earlier this year, but decided to go for broke and just order the box set off Amazon. I'm already halfway through it in a matter of days. What is it about these books that's so hard to put down? I can't put my finger on it. As addicting as they are, though, I find the writing to be, well, clunky at times. There's a lot of awkward sentences I find myself tripping over. It's not enough to ruin my enjoyment of the book, but it makes me think, "Hell, if you'd just written it this way, it would sound much better."

The Unwritten, Vol. 5

Oh man, this series just gets better and better. Anyone out there who's a literary buff like me would love the hell out of this comic.

Resurrection Man, Vol. 1

Some minor complaints aside about the book's formatting (the covers are all at the back of the book as a gallery, not dividing each issue/chapter), this is a great book. Lacking a better term, it's superhero fiction. And hot damn, it's great. I literally couldn't put the damn thing down because I wanted to see what they'd do next. Great stuff for a really underappreciated series in the late nineties.

On my "To read..." shelf: Major Bummer (another forgotten comic book gem), Mockingjay, Preacher Vol. 5 (re-buying the series in the new hardcover releases), and The Complete Maus (used to own the two volumes separately).

Anyone ever read the Wild Cards series? "Suicide Kings" was on the discount table for $5 last time I went to the book store, so I picked it up, but I'm not sure if its the kind of book I can jump into or if I have to have read the entire series up to that point, or if I just need to pick up Inside Straight and Busted Flush first.

"Fool Moon" is so far much less predictable than "Storm Front" was.

I bought some of them ages ago. I wasn't crazy about them, but I'd like to give them another try some day.

I figured for 5 bucks it'd be worth it regardless.

Heh, yeah, pretty much. Sometimes you find some gold among cheap books like that. It's how I discovered The Plutonium Blonde by John Zakour.

Couldn't finish Revenge of the Dwarves. The Dwarves and War of the Dwarves were good... but the author suddenly makes the protagonist act VERY out of character in the third book, and so many important things happen/people die BETWEEN BOOK 2 AND 3 that it feels like the actor who played so-and-so got fired between seasons of a TV show, and when the next season starts up "Oh, soandso died 4 years ago." THIS IS A BOOK, YOU CHOWDERHEAD. TELL THE STORY OF HIS DEATH, DON'T JUST START REFERRING TO HIM IN THE PAST TENSE LIKE A FIRED ACTOR!

Anyway, reading "I am Legend" now. It's going REALLY fast, it's a lot shorter than I thought it would be. The zeerust factor is hilarious. It was written in the 50s about the 70s, and yet in the book cars are still rare and difficult to operate (and still have a manual choke that has to be operated separately from the gas pedal).

Been Reading Brandon Sanderson's the Mistborn series and I am liking it so much that I actually want to read his wrap-up trilogy of the Wheel of Time series (something I thought I would never give another chance).

Finished Mockingjay last night. I didn't mean to, but anyone who's been reading these books knows how well stopping goes...

Anyway.


Probably the weakest of the series, but still good.

Dracula, Journey to the West, Discworld: The Color of Magic, and my essential Sherlock Holmes.

Quotemander Prime said:

Finished Mockingjay last night. I didn't mean to, but anyone who's been reading these books knows how well stopping goes...

Anyway.

Spoiler

Holy shit, that was harsh. So many people died. Sober, brutal... I had really hoped Katniss would have a chance to get over all this, but from the epilogue, it seems she stays broken. Realistic, but sad.

Probably the weakest of the series, but still good.

Click to expand...

Just finished it, myself. I couldn't put Catching Fire down. In fact, as soon as I finished the last chapter of it, I was like "NO! Come on! You can't end a book like that!" I stormed into my living room, put CF back in the trilogy box and immediately pulled out Mockingjay, reading the first chapter or two. Holy crap, are these books impossible to put down.

Okay, putting the rest in spoilers, including responding to the Quotester here:




But yeah, overall, I thought this was no stronger or weaker than the other two. Of course, I read it and Catching Fire in a frigging whirlwind, so they kind of mesh together for me. It's sort of like ploughing through a season of 24. You don't remember which episode was which at times.

Damnit you guys I made the Hunger Games thread for this ):

Anyway, I just got my hands on Dance with Dragons yesterday, and am about a fifth through already. Let's see if I can finish it before season 2 starts.

Finished "Fool Moon" this morning.
Also finished Batman:Year One last night.

I have a 6 hour bus ride to Ottawa on Sunday and all I have to read is Batman: The Killing Joke, and "Suicide Kings", which looks like its the third book in a trilogy and I should probably hold off on it.

I may have to head to Toronto early so I can stop into the book store on my way to the Greyhound station.

GasBandit said:

Couldn't finish Revenge of the Dwarves. The Dwarves and War of the Dwarves were good... but the author suddenly makes the protagonist act VERY out of character in the third book, and so many important things happen/people die BETWEEN BOOK 2 AND 3 that it feels like the actor who played so-and-so got fired between seasons of a TV show, and when the next season starts up "Oh, soandso died 4 years ago." THIS IS A BOOK, YOU CHOWDERHEAD. TELL THE STORY OF HIS DEATH, DON'T JUST START REFERRING TO HIM IN THE PAST TENSE LIKE A FIRED ACTOR!

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I've been meaning to pick up this series. I haven't read ANYTHING about it, but I saw the first book at Indigo last year and made a mental note to come back for it when I finished.... whatever it was I was reading at the time. But now everytime I enter a bookstore, they only have the second or third book. Never the first. (First world problem.)

checkeredhat said:

I've been meaning to pick up this series. I haven't read ANYTHING about it, but I saw the first book at Indigo last year and made a mental note to come back for it when I finished.... whatever it was I was reading at the time. But now everytime I enter a bookstore, they only have the second or third book. Never the first. (First world problem.)

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Who "enters a bookstore?" Psf.

The first book is rather elementary. I get the feeling it's the fault of the translator (it was originally in german). The second is a much more robust read. The third just starts making shit up and having people (mostly dwarves) act in completely disjointed ways from previous books... which is something I have a hard time believing of dwarves. Dwarves, even in these books, are well known for their unchanging ways. Not that I want to spoil anything, but


Between that and all the loose ends left carelessly yet intentionally dangling, I can't recommend the third book, no matter how interesting and novel the bad guys in it are. Couldn't even bring myself to finish it, though I got most of the way through it.

I like bookstores.

ThatNickGuy said:

Just finished it, myself. I couldn't put Catching Fire down. In fact, as soon as I finished the last chapter of it, I was like "NO! Come on! You can't end a book like that!" I stormed into my living room, put CF back in the trilogy box and immediately pulled out Mockingjay, reading the first chapter or two. Holy crap, are these books impossible to put down.

Okay, putting the rest in spoilers, including responding to the Quotester here:

Spoiler

-I liked the sober, realistic ending. It was a war, after all. No one walks away from a war like that unbroken. It was a bittersweet ending. I knew she'd wind up with Peeta in the end, but really didn't expect their reunion with his hands around her throat! Goddamn these books and their cliffhangers!
-I was nearly in tears when she broke down yelling at Buttercup near the end.
-Thought for sure Finnick was going to make it to the end. Of the group, I figured everyone but him, Katniss, Gale, and Peeta would survive. Everyone else may as well've been wearing red shirts.
-Still trying to work out her reasoning for killing the new president. I guess it was the whole, "We don't lie to each other" line from Snow? I'm still a little unclear.

But yeah, overall, I thought this was no stronger or weaker than the other two. Of course, I read it and Catching Fire in a frigging whirlwind, so they kind of mesh together for me. It's sort of like ploughing through a season of 24. You don't remember which episode was which at times.

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You what book I read a while ago in high school? Brave new world. Man...that was some deep ass satire. Anyone else read it?

Yoshimickster said:

You what book I read a while ago in high school? Brave new world. Man...that was some deep ass satire. Anyone else read it?

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It was okay. Lots of interesting ideas, but Huxley didn't really tell a story with it, so it was more of "Here's this world" than 1984's "Here's this world and the people to whom it does horrifying things."

Quotemander Prime said:

It was okay. Lots of interesting ideas, but Huxley didn't really tell a story with it, so it was more of "Here's this world" than 1984's "Here's this world and the people to whom it does horrifying things."

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That's a good analyzation of the story to tell you the truth. Plus I did find one character's sudden character change weird. But hey, he ended having "sex-hormone" chewing gum so I at least had a good laugh.

The Discworld books are one of those things where I totally would love to read them, but there's just so much out there that it's extremely intimidating to a new reader.

Bowielee said:

The Discworld books are one of those things where I totally would love to read them, but there's just so much out there that it's extremely intimidating to a new reader.

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It's much easier to divide it up into various "series". It helps you keep track of certain characters.

Bowielee said:

The Discworld books are one of those things where I totally would love to read them, but there's just so much out there that it's extremely intimidating to a new reader.

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You can start anywhere. It does not matter. You can pick up any book and you'll be okay. Pick one that sounds interesting and go with it.

If you MUST read things in order, use this. Pick one of the series and grab the first book on the left for that series. But honestly, these are silly books. While there is character development and stories that carry between books, each one's overall plot and humor is pretty self-contained. This is not a world where you're expected to soak up lore and remember it for later events in another book. Pratchett's been writing these for many years--he probably doesn't feel like memorizing that shit and doesn't expect us readers to do so either.

Example, Watch novels: I read Guards, Guards! which is the first of them. Then, not knowing what was next, I read The Fifth Elephant. I could tell some things had happened to the characters between, but overall things didn't feel too different. Then I went back and read Men at Arms. I felt I had all the pieces between Guards, Guards! and The Fifth Elephant, not even realizing that there were three novels between those books, not one.

Hell, I started with the third Death book. Didn't feel I missed anything. In fact, some people will tell you to avoid some of the early novels because Pratchett hadn't gotten into form yet.

So just look at summaries, pick something that sounds neat, and read that. You can branch out from there.

Bowielee said:

The Discworld books are one of those things where I totally would love to read them, but there's just so much out there that it's extremely intimidating to a new reader.

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I can understand that, with the way we've been trained by LOTR, Wheel of Time, Pern and so many other "serious" series. This is a comedy series, that's delved more and more into social commentary (but that's fine), that honestly the rules don't even stay the same from book to book. Pick a title that sounds interesting, or is just there right in front of you, and start reading.

Let's be honest, it's a world that is flat, riding on the backs of 4 giant elephants that are standing on the back of a giant turtle traveling through space. Have some fun.

Each book has a map of Discworld. It has some lines of longitude and latitude, which are then carved out by a white blob and text that informs the reader that you can't map a sense of humor.

Bowielee said:

The Discworld books are one of those things where I totally would love to read them, but there's just so much out there that it's extremely intimidating to a new reader.

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Go buy Guards! Guards!. Start there.

I know this thread is more about books and not graphic novels/ comics, but I read through The Killing Joke yesterday. Not as good as everyone would have me believe. It was kind of anticlimactic I felt. I guess its more of an amazing arc within a larger story than it is its own standalone story.

Other people have been listing graphic novels here.

checkeredhat said:

I know this thread is more about books and not graphic novels/ comics, but I read through The Killing Joke yesterda. not as good as everyone would have me believe. It was kind of anticlimactic I felt. I guess its more of an amazing arc within a larger story than it is its own standalone story.

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That is literally my favorite Batman story ever written...

The resolution of that story fully encapsulates the relationship between Batman and the Joker.

I'm pretty much speechless that you don't like it.

checkeredhat said:

I know this thread is more about books and not graphic novels/ comics...

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As long as it's the written word, I think it's fine for this thread.

Bowielee said:

That is literally my favorite Batman story ever written...

The resolution of that story fully encapsulates the relationship between Batman and the Joker.

I'm pretty much speechless that you don't like it.

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*shrugs* Only two Batman comics I've ever read, both in this past week, have been Batman Year One, which was EXCELLENT, and The Killing Joke, which was okay. I can only assume that its a much better story when you're more familiar with the history of the two characters, as its more of an analysis of their relationship than an actual story really, but as a standalone, not so much. I never said I didn't like it, but with all the buzz around it, I expected a hell of a lot more from it.

Had to grab a book last minute before boarding a bus to Ottawa. Wound up grabbing Can You Survive the Zombie Apocalypse?
Its a choose your own aventure zombie story. I haven't read a choose your own adventure since I was like 9. This one's slightly more adult, but its obviously not a very invested read. PERFECT for a 5hour bus ride. Very fun read.

Bowielee said:

That is literally my favorite Batman story ever written...

The resolution of that story fully encapsulates the relationship between Batman and the Joker.

I'm pretty much speechless that you don't like it.

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Same here! The flas-back, the dark coloring, the way it delves deep into the psychological aspects of both Bats and the Joker is just awe-striking!

You want a really good Graphic novel, read Ronin. You thought Akira was a cyber-punk mind-fuck? THINK AGAIN!

Trying to read Stories, a short story collection which got attention because it's edited by Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantino.

I've read eleven stories. Three were good (and one was by Gaiman, so it's cheating), a couple were alright, but largely these have either fallen flat or dithered away pointlessly. Much as I love Gaiman's work, I don't think we're into the same fiction.

Gotta love Gaiman's attempts to help out struggling writers though.

AshburnerX said:

Gotta love Gaiman's attempts to help out struggling writers though.

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Most of them seem to be established writers though. Peter Staub, Diana Wynn Jones, Michael Moorcock.

One of the good stories was actually by someone for whom this was her first publication, whereas long-time writers like Straub turned in... garbage. I have to wonder if some novel writers have forgotten the art of the short story since they haven't had to write them to get their feet in the door in years.

checkeredhat said:

*shrugs* Only two Batman comics I've ever read, both in this past week, have been Batman Year One, which was EXCELLENT, and The Killing Joke, which was okay. I can only assume that its a much better story when you're more familiar with the history of the two characters, as its more of an analysis of their relationship than an actual story really, but as a standalone, not so much. I never said I didn't like it, but with all the buzz around it, I expected a hell of a lot more from it.

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Yeah, I can see where if you're not familiar with the characters at all that it may put a damper on the story. It's entirely about the Joker and what his fundamental disconnect in understanding what makes a good man a good man. He believes that he can make Gordon just as crazy as he is by just giving him as bad a day as he had. In the end, Gordon proves that he will not break. If anything it's the Joker's story and a character study on him. Of course, being that the Joker is my favorite villain of ANY media, I'm probably biased.

For the record, i'm still pissed as hell that they gave Barbara Gordon the use of her legs back. It totally takes away some of the punch of this story.

Scudd the disposable Assasin. This...is probably the GREATEST independant comic to come out of the 90s. The pop-culture references, the crazy action, I loved I loved it I LOVED IT!

On to book 3 of the Dresden Files.

I've given up on Stories. I read one more good one and then three more terrible ones. My wife told me to just stop, that this wasn't doing me any good.

So right now I'm reading more of my Hellboy and BPRD trades while waiting for her to finish the Hunger Games trilogy. Then I can read the novel I wanted and have my fairy tale references at my disposal once more.

Quotemander Prime said:

I've given up on Stories. I read one more good one and then three more terrible ones. My wife told me to just stop, that this wasn't doing me any good.

So right now I'm reading more of my Hellboy and BPRD trades while waiting for her to finish the Hunger Games trilogy. Then I can read the novel I wanted and have my fairy tale references at my disposal once more.

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I got the first 3 TPBs of Hell-boy. The continuity feels a bit confusing in them sometimes.

Yoshimickster said:

I got the first 3 TPBs of Hell-boy. The continuity feels a bit confusing in them sometimes.

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They did not compile them well at all. Some events in volume 3 stories take place between volume 1 and 2, but you're expected to know them going into volume 2. Then others in volume 3 take place after volume 2, so you can't read them first without events from volume 2 getting spoiled. It's a real mess.

Quotemander Prime said:

They did not compile them well at all. Some events in volume 3 stories take place between volume 1 and 2, but you're expected to know them going into volume 2. Then others in volume 3 take place after volume 2, so you can't read them first without events from volume 2 getting spoiled. It's a real mess.

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I knew it! No wonder it was confusing as hell. When I make TPBs for my comics, I'm puttin' em in correct from start to finish.

As I Lay Dying
Shogun
How to Lie with Statistics
Ferrets for Dummies

Emrys said:

As I Lay Dying
Shogun
How to Lie with Statistics
Ferrets for Dummies

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Heh, ferrets are cute. And illegal in California for retarded reasons.

Had to put Spider Robinson on hold long enough to start/finish the copy of Watchmen I borrowed. Found it very ... Heinleinesque in character.

--Patrick

The Elder Gods by David and Leigh Eddings

Kovac said:

The Elder Gods by David and Leigh Eddings

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Stop now. Seriously, just stop. You are going to get so pissed by this series. It is mostly written by Leigh, not David, and just does not live up to the expectations of earlier works. Honestly, one book in this series looks at the same events from like 7 different points of view, and just stop reading this now.

Gave up on Super Sad True Love Story and moving on to I Found This Funny.

Just got my first Tankobon of Monster. Surgical drama plus psychological horror all rolled into one! HEIL DR TENMA! Whose name is a weird Astro Boy reference.

Adendum: Tankobon is the correct term to call a manga volume. Gonna start callin' em that now.

Sparhawk said:

Stop now. Seriously, just stop. You are going to get so pissed by this series. It is mostly written by Leigh, not David, and just does not live up to the expectations of earlier works. Honestly, one book in this series looks at the same events from like 7 different points of view, and just stop reading this now.

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:\

Unfortunately I have already paid for it and being a kindle book it can't be returned.

Kovac said:

:\

Unfortunately I have already paid for it and being a kindle book it can't be returned.

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I have a "thing" where once I start a book I can't NOT finish the book. Only once in my adult life have I put down a book and not finished it, Wheel of Time being the culprit. The first book isn't bad, it sets up an interesting world and what could have been a really fun series. But, due to the illness of David, the series just never lived to that potential. Leigh did most of the writing of the majority of the series and you really see what she was responsible for in his other work and really understand by the end of it that David was the imagination behind all of it and Leigh helped with fleshing out his ideas. They were a good team.

Sparhawk said:

I have a "thing" where once I start a book I can't NOT finish the book. Only once in my adult life have I put down a book and not finished it, Wheel of Time being the culprit. The first book isn't bad, it sets up an interesting world and what could have been a really fun series. But, due to the illness of David, the series just never lived to that potential. Leigh did most of the writing of the majority of the series and you really see what she was responsible for in his other work and really understand by the end of it that David was the imagination behind all of it and Leigh helped with fleshing out his ideas. They were a good team.

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Man, I got the opposite problem. I start a book and then put it off til months later. Than I read it again and all is right with the woooooooooooorld.

Yoshimickster said:

Scudd the disposable Assasin. This...is probably the GREATEST independant comic to come out of the 90s. The pop-culture references, the crazy action, I loved I loved it I LOVED IT!

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I could never get into Scudd. I liked the first few comics, but as it became increasingly obvious that the author was just making stuff up as he went along, I lost interest.

I considered picking up The Whole Shebang to give it another shot, but I couldn't justify getting something with that photo of Rob Schrab displayed so prominently on the back. I don't like being shallow or judgmental, but the photo just made me uncomfortable .

Dude, I assure you that it's a good read. Plus I laughed my ass off after I realized he was the guy who played "Miniature Cofee" on the Sarah Silverman program.

To Kill a Mockingbird

I had read this once in High School and always intended on returning to it in my adulthood. I recall really enjoying it back in the day, both the movie and the book. And I had purchased a copy of it while still living Toronto, but never got around to reading it.

Now, I'm halfway through it and absolutely engrossed in it.

It's funny. The last book I read was the third Hunger Games book, Mockingjay. And I'd mentioned that the prose was clunky or awkward at times throughout the series.

But Mockingbird? Wow. The prose just flows like quicksilver. Aside from a very rare moment where I personally think a comma might belong (say, in a list of things, where there should be a comma before "and"), it's just such a pleasurable read. Plus, the characters - especially Atticus Finch, of course - are engrossing.

Even though I'm only halfway through it, I've already firmly decided that this is going at the very top of my favourite pieces of literature.

I hate how violence=adult and awesome in some peoples minds.

I can;t stand Alan Moores From Hell. I like the movies okay (I know, I know) so I picked up the graphic novel and the whole thing left me feeling ill.

Mark Millar's probably the worst offender of that, too, Sin. Both Kick-Ass and Wanted (the comics, anyway) felt like they were written by a 12-year old who suddenly realized they could write whatever they wanted. I'm still amazed by how well done the movies were in comparison.

Finished all my available Hellboy trades. I'm irritated that the last story volume ends on a cliffhanger after so much build-up, but volume 12 is apparently out to finish things, so I'll see to that when I get the chance.

Honestly, after having read 10 trades, and reading BPRD on the side (just finished volume 8, so still lots to go), I feel like Hellboy is the least interesting part of his universe. His backstory and his role in events are engrossing, but his personality often leaves a lot to be desired when he's not around his friends, and unfortunately he hasn't been around them since the start of BPRD.

I also don't like how sometimes Mignola has a great concept going and then just cuts it off suddenly to bring in another one. Joss Whedon has had that problem in the past. Very frustrating. The books are still great and I love the universe, but I think Guillermo del Toro made some important changes when he did the movies. Fortunately each medium of Hellboy can be enjoying on its own merits.

Not sure what to read next. Possibly Anansi Boys.

Although Hellboy's one of my favourite comic characters, I've grown disinterested in both his title and BPRD. I used to love both of them, but for Hellboy, you're right. He's more interesting when he's with them. My problem with both, honestly, is the "shit just got weird" factor happens a lot that it's sometimes hard to really understand what's going on. Abe's origin, for example, still confuses the hell out of me. As a writer myself, I feel the "keep it simple, stupid!" motto should always apply, but it just doesn't for these titles.

Honestly, aside from the movies, my favourite medium to read Hellboy stories are the prose novels. Most of them are written by Christopher Golden, and I've always enjoyed them for being great, self-contained adventures within the Hellboy universe.

That's something that also annoys me; sometimes it feels like the actions dictate a monster be in a certain role, but it hardly matters what the monster is, because the rules get made up almost on the spot, and/or whatever the specific method is for killing it was given just an issue earlier by a deus ex machina dream character.

I still love the books and will continue reading the trades; I am interesting in the overall story, the characters, and the imagination present. But I feel the fiction is only good when the stories are at their opposite sides, either something to do with the major arc with the Ogdru Jahad, or something entirely self-contained. Anything between those and we hit narrative problems. Darkness Calls, for example, didn't feel like anything mattered despite three or four long-running villains in the series being killed or made irrelevant during its chapters. On the other hand, Conqueror Worm was a fantastic long story, while stuff like The Crooked Man was a good stand-alone.

I've not really had many problems with BPRD. Even The Universal Machine, which in the long run seemed like it accomplished nothing, was still a decent character bit.

Also, as best I can glean for Abe's backstory:

Actually, that's a lot simpler than the books present it once it's written out. Huh.

Just finished the latest Riftwar book.

Feist needs to fire his editor, or start self-policing a whole lot better. Continuity errors, missing words, typos, and erroneous homonyms galore. A moat in his eye? Really? The story has its gripping parts and it's dull parts... but the lack of competent editing along with a MASSIVE continuity error (Pug and Magnus go to a city in an early chapter, and then in chapter 15 Magnus teleports back to tell Pug about the city since he didn't go with him and then takes him to the city where the inhabitants meet him again for the first time) and several medium ones (like referring to a character as "the elf" who is NOT AND NEVER WAS AN ELF NOR IS THERE EVEN AN ELF PRESENT at the time)... just make it seem rushed and crappy.

GasBandit said:

Just finished the latest Riftwar book... Feist needs to fire his editor, or start self-policing a whole lot better.

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What's the title?

Emrys said:

What's the title?

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A Crown Imperiled.

Still reading Grave Peril. I haven't had time to do any reading in a long time now, or I'd have been done 3 weeks ago. This is seriously hurting my goal of finishing 30 books this year.

I broke my Kindle. :'(
Waiting for Amazon's replacement to get here.

mr_thehun said:

looking for books to read. What kind of sci-fi fantasy would you guys recommend?

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It helps when you specify the kind of stuff you're into; sci-fi and fantasy have a huge breadth to each of them.

Reading Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman at the moment. I'm in a weird way with it, because on the one hand, it's taken over 150 pages for the story to really feel like it's coming into anything, yet on the other hand, I've been oddly captivated by what's going on. My resistance to it might be from its structure, which Gaiman calls "movie-shaped," which doesn't always work in a novel. But I've still got half the book to go and I'm looking forward to seeing if everyone can come out okay on the other end of all this. Plus, seeing if something from American Gods that seems inconsistent here will come to be explained at all.

I don't know much sci-fi, but as far as fantasy goes, I'll continue to recommend Patrick Rothfuss' "The Name of the Wind" and "A Wise Man's Fear". Not enough people are reading the Kingkiller Chronicle.

checkeredhat said:

I don't know much sci-fi, but as far as fantasy goes, I'll continue to recommend Patrick Rothfuss' "The Name of the Wind" and "A Wise Man's Fear". Not enough people are reading the Kingkiller Chronicle.

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Waiting for it to finish. I think I can actually do that this time.

mr_thehun I'll second Kingkiller. And even though I grumble about the latest few, the FIRST 20 or so riftwar books by Raymond Feist are good fantasy reading (starting with Magician: Apprentice).

As for Sci Fi - I expect to get pelted with wadded balls of paper from all directions for the transparent libertarianism, but If you haven't read The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Heinlein, you should. An old favorite of mine for light sci fi reading is Crashlander by Larry Niven. Old Man's War by John Scalzi is pretty good and more recent, and the next two sequels are pretty good but I lost interest in the 4th book as it's just a retelling of the third from another character's viewpoint. If you like cynical superhero/superscientist villain stuff, Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman is a fun read. I'm having a hard time thinking of a whole lot else good in the way of Science Fiction written later than 1980.

mr_thehun said:

I want to get into honor harrington. is it any good?

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Hell yeah it is, son, although it can get sorta crunchy during the combat sequences when he starts throwing math around (MATH MAKE JARHEAD BRAIN HURT! ) And the later descriptions of the political interplay, while necessary, can get very.... viscous, for lack of a better word. I've not read his last two offerings, by simple virtue of not having picked them up yet (working through other series.) I will be remedying this in short order, however.

tl;dr, yeah, I'd recommend them for a read.

I just read Night by Elie Wiesel from cover to cover in one sitting. Couldn't put it down. To think this stuff really happened. The truth is more horrible than fiction.

checkeredhat said:

On to book 3 of the Dresden Files.

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I recently started reading this series. I finished book 6, but I'm not sure if I like it enough to continue reading them.

WasabiPoptart said:

I recently started reading this series. I finished book 6, but I'm not sure if I like it enough to continue reading them.

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I'm still on book 3. Part of it is that I don't have much time to read anymore, but it's also that I'm kind of getting a little sick of it. I'm definitely going to need to take a break from the series and read something with a little more .... weight? You know what I mean?

Reading... a very un-engaging book. Kinda pissed that it's so bland, when I was expecting an epic, but at least it was only $3. I'm a little put off by this and probably won't start reading another book until next week.

Quotemander Prime said:

Reading Anansi Boys

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Ever heard about Gaiman's story the time Hollywood wanted to adapt it? I'm paraphrasing here. They had three "small" things they wanted to change:

1) Not have any scenes, mention, or origins of Africa.
2) No mention of gods.
3) Could the main characters be white?

Gaiman turned them down in a heartbeat, of course. He asked, "Why would you even call it Anansi Boys, then?"

ThatNickGuy said:

Ever heard about Gaiman's story the time Hollywood wanted to adapt it? I'm paraphrasing here. They had three "small" things they wanted to change:

1) Not have any scenes, mention, or origins of Africa.
2) No mention of gods.
3) Could the main characters be white?

Gaiman turned them down in a heartbeat, of course. He asked, "Why would you even call it Anansi Boys, then?"

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Yeah, I did hear about that, and I kept meaning to write a tweet about it, so thanks for reminding me.

Having finished it, I can't say it was as fantastic as American Gods, but it would make a good movie. It feels like it was written for people not familiar with Gaiman's usual themes and such, so there wasn't a lot new. But it was still very good.

checkeredhat said:

I'm still on book 3. Part of it is that I don't have much time to read anymore, but it's also that I'm kind of getting a little sick of it. I'm definitely going to need to take a break from the series and read something with a little more .... weight? You know what I mean?

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Yes I do know. Dresden was ok when I didn't have much time to read because I could pick it up before bed as an easy read. Now I have a bit of extra time since I won't take classes until fall. The story itself is getting tiresome and I could use a book I can really get lost in.

Just finished Reveille In Washington. About halfway through New Kings of Nonfiction. Bitchinnnn

Did a little nerd shopping at the local games/comic book store.

Just finished Walking Dead #16: A Larger World, now reading Zombie Survival Guide and peeking at World War Z. Also reading A Game of Thrones, but pacing it more slowly. Jeeves short stories are currently on hold.

On my waiting-to-be-out list: a pocket book version of City of Dragons by Robin Hobb.

Reading Dust by Arthur Slade.

For a story that begins with a child abduction, it's kind of weak. It's bad for the same reasons it's good--much of the book is told from the POV of the abducted kid's brother, who has an imagination so vivid that he's often distracted from the world around him, which makes for a lot of colorful descriptions and enjoyable scenes. However, most of the book is padded with these daydreams and I feel like it this story were told straight, it would be less than a quarter of its current length (and it's already a short book). Plot moves like a snail. I suppose this works for me since I'm too busy to read a really involving book right now, but I can't exactly recommend it unless you're looking for a book that considers story to be something you eventually get around to, and only briefly then.

I decided to torture myself with Temple of the Winds (book 4 in The Sword of Truth series).

I barely made it through book 3. I couldn't think of anything else I wanted to read, so picked that up just to have a book.

mr_thehun said:

just wait until it's a couple hundred pages about the evils of communism and charity. While I can agree with a lot of what he says, it doesn't make for the most interesting fantasy series.

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It's not interesting when the characters put the brakes on the progress of the book just so that they can get up on their soapbox and rant about something which has been gone over before many times in great detail.

But i'm a bit slow so it took me until book 6 to realise...

Just finished the first 6 books of the Dream of Eagles saga by Jack Whyte and posted reviews of them in the book section.

Dave worked hard on that section, jus'sayin'.

re-reading part 6 of the Trilogy. Still enjoyable, but noticable it's a different author. Probably like it better than part 5 though

All my reading is currently on hold due to either time pressures or the shiny-of-the-day.

--Patrick

Rereading Interesting Times. Still like it.

Next up: the World according to Garp. I've read the book probably 1 times and still've never seen the movie; maybe I should get around to that some day.

Bubble181 said:

Rereading Interesting Times. Still like it.

Next up: the World according to Garp. I've read the book probably 1 times and still've never seen the movie; maybe I should get around to that some day.

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I dunno, watching Garp after reading it... it made me feel the same way I felt watching Breakfast of Champions after reading it.

Nothing. All books on hold.

--Patrick

This might sound strange, but it's comforting for me to sit down and read a Stephen King book. I think it's been three years since the last one, Cell. I finally picked up Four Past Midnight, wanting to take a look at some novellas besides The Mist.

All reading projects still on hold. Dividing my time up between work, life, and video games, no more reading for now.

--Patrick

FINALLY finished reading the King of Plagues this morning. It took me forever to get into. Shortly after I started it my work schedule got crazy, then I just lost interest. I read like, 100 pages of it over about 3 months, and the remaining 340 pages of it yesterday/ this morning. Turns out, it's a good book.

Tried rereading "Time Enough For Love" by Heinlein. Look, I'm a Heinlein fan, safe to say, but this book is ridiculous. EVERY WOMAN HE MEETS WANTS LONG'S BABY. Strangers. His hospital nurse. Even those descended from him. Even those arguably closely related. Even his mother. EVEN PRETEEN FEMALE CLONES OF HIMSELF. And they put it in so many words. "Impregnate me! I want your child!" Come ON man, what in the actual hell?

Yeah, and the chapter where he spent 10 pages describing, in stultifying detail, the process of trying to determine the chances of extra-tard babies from a brother-sister coupling was just beyond belief. Hard to believe this is the same author who wrote The Moon is a Harsh Mistress and Starship Troopers.

Have you made your way through "I Will Fear No Evil" yet? It's the first Heinlein I ever picked up and read, and still holds the WTF* crown for me.

--Patrick
*by which I mean "I'm not sue this would really happen that way..."

PatrThom said:

Have you made your way through "I Will Fear No Evil" yet? It's the first Heinlein I ever picked up and read, and still holds the WTF* crown for me.

--Patrick
*by which I mean "I'm not sue this would really happen that way..."

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No, I hadn't even started that one yet. And now I'm not sure I want to.

I haven't finished TEFL yet (though I have a copy), so I can't compare. Given a choice between the two, I would say "Friday" is a better story than IWFNE, and "The Number Of The Beast" better than both.

--Patrick

PatrThom said:

I haven't finished TEFL yet (though I have a copy), so I can't compare. Given a choice between the two, I would say "Friday" is a better story than IWFNE, and "The Number Of The Beast" better than both.

--Patrick

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I think Friday will be next on the list, my pops often tells me I should read it.

Friday is pretty good, really enjoyed NOTB. My two favorites are The Moon is a Harsh Mistress and Starship Troopers, with a close third place of Stranger in a Strange Land.

Sparhawk said:

Friday is pretty good, really enjoyed NOTB. My two favorites are The Moon is a Harsh Mistress and Starship Troopers, with a close third place of Stranger in a Strange Land.

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Those last 3 were all great and I prefer them in that order as well - and they raised my expectations a great deal, which I think is why TEFL is so disappointing. I mean, I felt like I was reading some sexually frustrated biology grad student's erotic fanfic about how everyone "in the year one million, after the ninth nucular world war", even his sisters and mother, wants to get pregnant by him, and he (sometimes reluctantly) plays along. I don't know about the rest of you, but "reluctance" is a difficult emotion for ME to translate into a stiffy, even where incest ISN'T a factor.

No kidding. You might just want to avoid "To Sail Beyond the Sunset," it's Lazarus Long's Mom's point of view and sexual escapades memoir. Seems the older that RAH got the more he focused on writing about sex.

Just finished The Scottish Prisoner by Diana Gabaldon. I am a complete sucker for her Outlander series and this is actually an offshoot from those novels. I also read Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights (yuck), and Great Expectations over the summer break. I was on a classics kick for a while.

Welp, I'm officially no longer a Heinlein fan. See, I'd read the Rolling Stones as a kid and Starship Troopers as a teen and I absolutely ate up The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. Stranger in a Strange land was ok, in that "it's a classic so you GOTTA read it" kinda way. But these last three books I think are gonna have me setting him aside til further notice. As noted above, Time Enough for Love triggered my "WTF" senses, and I was shouting OH COME ON halfway through it. Never finished.

At this point, I should probably point out, that when I talk about "reading" a book, 9 times out of 10 I'm reading it out loud to the little woman. I think I've mentioned this before, but it's probably been a while.

So I try reading Friday, and right out of the gate there's a gang rape the protagonist tries to pretend she's enjoying. And that's the end of that book. As a last hail mary, I grab the next one in line, Number of the beast. It starts out kind of jarring, but piques the curiosity and then BAM an incest reference and 10+ pages of everybody trying to convince themselves that it's perfectly ok to be naked around everybody else, in a very "methinks the book doth protest too much, what is this, elizabethan ankle porn?" kinda way. That was the last of both of our patience. So now she's headed off to bed, and I'm trying to pick the next book to read and now I do a little research to try to avoid any more such literary potholes. The Cat Who Walks Through Walls sounds like a snorefest, but at least it doesn't have much of the aforementioned problems, unlike it's sequel To Sail Beyond the Sunset. I Will Fear No Evil is also setting off all kinds of alarms, and I hear bad things about Job: A Comedy of Errors.

It's disheartening. Like dropping by a friend's house and finding out he's not there, he's gone to a klan rally.

Well, I dunno what to read next. The Forever War maybe.

GasBandit said:

It's disheartening. Like dropping by a friend's house and finding out he's not there, he's gone to a klan rally.

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By the sounds of it, it's more like he went to a Furry Con.

AshburnerX said:

By the sounds of it, it's more like he went to a Furry Con.

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Yeah, Starship Troopers was the klan rally...

GasBandit said:

I dunno what to read next. The Forever War maybe.

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Heinlein is one of the 'controversy is good' authors. You either put up with it or you don't read Heinlein. Kati related a quote to me about Heinlein which goes something like, "Heinlein writes sexual situations which Heinlein himself would never have gotten into, even on a dare."

You're probably also going to want to skip on Piers Anthony, Harlan Ellison, or any of the Witch World books.

How about you both take in some Pratchett or Stasheff, instead?

--Patrick

Wait, do you mean Harlan Ellison's writings are controversial? I know he's infamous for being an asshole, but none of his writing seemed all that outré. Although, admittedly I've only read a smattering of his total output.

Piers Anthony is MOSTLY alright during his Incarnations of Immortality series, though even On a Pale Horse (the one I've read) had a bit of it. Stay the HELL away from the Xanth series. It goes weird places.

I also recommend staying away from anything by Laurell K. Hamilton too (or at least anything she wrote after her divorce). She basically turned her supernatural detective series Anite Blake into something where sex is more important than just about anything else (the titular character literally has powers fueled by it at this point...) and where Anita is basically the cause of 90% of her own problems, yet refuses to change the underlying cause of this. She's not a terrible writer but she definitely changed after the divorce.

Heh, I read some Anthony when I was a kid, these days I steer clear of it for other reasons. The writing just... doesn't seem up to par. And for the record, I'm not a-scared of sex in my books, even wierd sex. It's just constantly having incest and rape dumped over my head over and over again like so many buckets of icy, smelly water just got too much there.

Decided it's been a while since I added to my zombie library, so went looking for a new zombie book. Chapters and Coles, the only two close by, were pretty barren as far as zombie books go, but I found Dead of Night by Jonathon Maberry. Same guy that wrote The King of Plagues that I just finished (Actually, the first book in that series, Patient Zero was the zombie book I was most interested in picking up but couldn't find).
Going to start reading it tomorrow.

And yeah, yeah, "Why not go on amazon?"
Well, I will. But I wanted a book for TOMORROW, dammit. I had thought I'd give reading that Wild Cards book a shot, but by like 17 pages in, I had realized that is not a series I want to pick up in the middle.

checkeredhat said:

And yeah, yeah, "Why not go on amazon?"
Well, I will. But I wanted a book for TOMORROW, dammit.

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Overnight shippin', yo.

AshburnerX said:

Overnight shippin', yo.

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For Tomorrow morning's bus ride into Toronto. I won't be home after like 10am.

checkeredhat said:

For Tomorrow morning's bus ride into Toronto. I won't be home after like 10am.

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Get an ereader?

Started Nightworld by Maureen Noel the other day. At first I was into it, and then came a brief segment of awkward flirting--the special kind when you know you're watching a guy completely strike out--and I almost called it quits. Then I decided I was being an ass and pressed on. Glad I did, because I'm digging the weird scenario, the mystery, and the characters. Basic set-up: Whenever Sapphire goes to sleep, she dreams she's another person in another world, some rogue murderer. Whatever happens to her there affects her in the waking world--cuts, bruises, and apparently even getting pregnant. Then it seems people from that other world are coming to the real one to look for her.

I'm about 1/4 of the way through it and enjoying it. Has a fast pace, so I'll probably finish it over the weekend or shortly after.

Enjoying Dead of Night quite a bit. Overall the premise is silly, it's at once the most convoluted, least believable and yet somehow seemingly typical explanation for a zombie outbreak. And most of the characters are sort of caricatures of your typical horror movie characters as well. It's definitely a big love letter to zombie movies. But at the same time it's not poorly written and cheesy like a lot of zombie stories, it's got some great imagery and creepy stuff going on for sure. Definitely glad I picked it up. Actually enjoying it so much I just ordered Rot and Ruin off amazon.

I just read I, Robot to the little woman. And I discovered that nothing makes her giggle more than 50s sci-fi vernacular. "Jumping Jupiter, that's swell!"

Still waiting for Rot and Ruin to arrive. This is already the longest I've ever waited for anything off of Amazon (And only the second longest I've ever waited for anything ordered online. The other being an ebay seller who was trying to rip me off by not actually sending me the item but spamming me with requests to rate my experience and assuring me it was sent out).

Does listening to audio books count as reading?

Because i'm half way into David Copperfield

Hannibal's Children by John Maddox Roberts.

Just finished Preacher volume 1. Garth Ennis is GOD...no wait that's the character in his book.

Who knows what the name of the Sherlock Holmes story is,where it is written by Sherlok instead of Watson.

LordRendar said:

Who knows what the name of the Sherlok Holmes story is,where it is written by Sherlok instead of Watson.

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I've had the entire anthology for years...but I don't know sorry. Hardly put a dent in it, damn those things are wordy!

You've read the first one "A study in Scarlet" right? I freaking love the murderer's motive in that, that took balls to right.

I got the Ebook collection of all the Sir Arthur C. Doyle stories,but a friend of mine told me of this story,where after much prodding on Watsons side,Sherlock decides to write down a story of his own.I need to read this.

LordRendar said:

I got the Ebook collection of all the Sir Arthur C. Doyle stories,but a friend of mine told me of this story,where after much prodding on Watsons side,Sherlok decides to write down a story of his own.I need to read this.

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It sounds awesome. What I've always loved about Sherlock is that from reading his lines that if he existed he would be the most Aspergersy person to ever exist. Hell, in the first book Watson tells him about the solar system and Sherlock says he'll forget it because he only remembers things that are interesting to him! That is sooooooooooo Aspy.

I also finished Discworld book one a while back. That book is a freaking TRIP I tell you what.

LordRendar said:

Who knows what the name of the Sherlock Holmes story is,where it is written by Sherlok instead of Watson.

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The Blanched Soldier and The Lion's Mane are both written from Holmes' point of view.

Thanks Chad.You just made my day.

Anytime.

Re-read Ender's Game and read Speaker for the Dead. I had a totally different point of view on Ender 20ish years after the first read. Card did a great job on this series.

Onward to Xenocide...

Sparhawk said:

Re-read Ender's Game and read Speaker for the Dead. I had a totally different point of view on Ender 20ish years after the first read. Card did a great job on this series.

Onward to Xenocide...

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I have had Ender's game for years and haven't even put a dent in it. Course the same can be said about a bunch of other books I own.

Almost done Rot & Ruin by Jonathon Maberry. Didn't even realize it until I started reading, but I've actually read a good chunk of this before. Excerpts from it were published as a standalone short story in The New Dead, one of the zombie short story anthologies I have. It was actually one of the best ones in that anthology (Like 90% of the short stories in those anthologies are utter crap. but the other 10% is usually very solid). Anyway, story's good. It's written a bit simplistic... it's definitely meant for people like 10 years younger than me, but whatever. I'm going to continue reading this series, I think, after a break.

Next up is book one of John Carter. A friend suggested it to me, and even though I'm not nearly the lover of old pulp science fiction he is, I promised him I'd give it a shot. I mean it's like 200 pages and $4, so I might as well.

The Langoliers: When I watched the Nostalgia Critic's review of the crappy made for TV, I had a feeling there was a good story lost in that padded, slow pile of crap. I'm a bit into the novella now and I feel I was right. Events that take two minutes in a movie take much more here because of what's going on with the characters and it gives the whole thing a different feel. And I can see a lot of stuff that was internal here had to be made into dialogue for the movie, none of which sounded good.

In other words, it's the usual Stephen King book to movie translation conundrum.

Sparhawk said:

Re-read Ender's Game and read Speaker for the Dead. I had a totally different point of view on Ender 20ish years after the first read. Card did a great job on this series.

Onward to Xenocide...

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Obligatory:

Been a while since I posted about any of the books I've been reading.
John Carter part one was good fun, and I'm actualy interested in seeing that movie now. Surprisingly.
Patient Zero was a good one. Definitely want to continue with this series (already read The King of Plagues, part three in this series, but I haven't read parts 2 or 4 yet)
A Game of Thrones was even better on my second read, and I'll probably re-read Clash of Kings soon, go through the whole series again in 2013. At least get through a second read of Storm of Swords before season 3 of the show starts. I'm picking up on stuff I managed to not get the first time around, and a friend of mine has pointed out some things about the Danaerys chapters in Dance With Dragons specifically, that make me want to re-read the rest of the series and see what I missed.

Right now I am a little over halfway through Unholy Night, by Seth Grahame Smith. Basically, it's Biblical fanfiction. In it, the three Wise Men are actually a trio of escaped criminals, led by the infamous "Antioch Ghost", who stumble upon Mary, Joseph and Jesus in the manger by chance as they seek refuge as wanted men, and are then basically given no real choice but to escape to Egypt with them.

Next week, I'm going to re-read The Hobbit.... again. I don't even know how many times I've read that book. This will be my second re-read of the Hobbit this year.

They're school related books, but they are novels and they're good. I'm currently reading:

Heaven's Coast by Mark Doty - A story about the loss of a partner from AIDS
Soft Spots by Clint Van Winkle - A memoir of a marine suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
Narrating the Closet by Tony E Adams - Collection of coming out stories.

Recently finished:
After the Golden Age by Carrie Vaughn - thanks to everyone for gifting this one to me. I enjoyed it a lot. A slightly realistic look at superheroes, but without going as dark as something like Watchmen. I really enjoyed the story.

The first five books of the Wheel of Time series. I've read all of those before, but I'm restarting the series because it's been so long since I last read it, and now it's been finished (I think).

Currently reading:
Thirteen Orphans by Jane Lindskold - I love her writing style so much. I can't believe I went so long without checking for new stuff from her. Anyway, it's a pretty good urban fantasy novel about the descendants of exiles from a magical land. So far I find it highly intriguing, and I'm glad there are more books in the series to follow up with.

Lord of Chaos by Robert Jordan - the sixth Wheel of Time book. I'm kinda slow getting through this one because I'm allergic to something coating my used copy. So I only end up reading on days I've had to take a zyrtec anyway, I'm not about to pop a pill just for a book. I really need to consider getting an eReader just so I have fewer worries about allergies when reading.

checkeredhat said:

Patient Zero was a good one. Definitely want to continue with this series (already read The King of Plagues, part three in this series, but I haven't read parts 2 or 4 yet)

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I really liked that book, too. I had no idea it was a series though! Now I know what I'm going to read during Christmas break. Thanks.

figmentPez said:

Recently finished:
After the Golden Age by Carrie Vaughn - thanks to everyone for gifting this one to me. I enjoyed it a lot. A slightly realistic look at superheroes, but without going as dark as something like Watchmen. I really enjoyed the story.

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I kinda hope we get something else in the same universe. There's a lot of potential in those characters to only see them in a one shot.

WasabiPoptart said:

I really liked that book, too. I had no idea it was a series though! Now I know what I'm going to read during Christmas break. Thanks.

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The rest of them are not zombie related, but yes. Joe Ledger and the DMS return.

Apparently there are even more coming out over the next three years. From Wikipedia:
Joe Ledger Series

• Patient Zero (March 2009)
• The Dragon Factory (March 2010)
• The King of Plagues (March 2011)
• Assassin's Code (April 2012)
• The Extinction Machine (2013)
• Code Zero (2014)
• untitled 7th book (2015)

I wanted to start reading book 12 of the wheel of time but for some reason it is temporarily unavailable (under review) in my region on kindle.

So instead I picked up Redshirts by John Scalzi

Kovac said:

I wanted to start reading book 12 of the wheel of time but for some reason it is temporarily unavailable (under review) in my region on kindle.

So instead I picked up Redshirts by John Scalzi

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Probably a translation thing, ya know, mis-translating the word "color" for "colour."



Yes, I'm trying to be funny. No, don't look at me that way. Fuck you! It was funny!

I'm reading Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality to the little woman. It's really good. If you haven't read it (which is understandable because it's just an alternate-universe fanfic, and it isn't even finished yet), I really do recommend it as a good read. I haven't read a fanfic this good since "The Saotome Gambit," which was a Ranma 1/2 - Battletech crossover.

Whilst visiting my parents I picked up a book they had sitting out on a table, because it looked like it was going to be one of those tails about a hardscrabble life growing up in the rural US and going on to be a farmer's wife (the title was "The Iowa Farmer's Wife"). Turns out it was a murder mystery written by an Iowa farmer, but I needed a break from the fantasy epic I was reading, and I've been known to enjoy a mystery now and again, so I decided to give it a shot. Couldn't even make it through the second paragraph of the prologue. The writer should be banned from ever putting thoughts into print again, the editor should be shot, and the publishing house should be sued for releasing that drivel. There was missing punctuation all over the place, dangling participles everywhere, and the similes used were just horrific. To top it off, the writer (I refuse to refer to that man as an author) couldn't seem to figure out what era he wanted to set the book in, so it had this strange mish-mosh of 21st century technology and 19th century ideals, usually while talking about 20th century pop-culture icons. Sadly, the same writer has two additional books. I can only hope that he's found a new editor.

Just finished the entire Preacher series. DAMN it was good. Also, I am pretty sure that Gunslinger Spawn ripped off the Saint of Killers origin story.

Started reading Alan Moore's run of Swamp Thing. Interesting change in what Swamp Thing is. I was surprised.

Started reading "Magic for Beginners" by Kelly Link, I got it as part of the Humble eBook Bundle. It's a collection of some pretty strange short stories, and so far I'm really enjoying it. It's quirky, and different, and a lot is left ambiguous about exactly what's going on in the two stories I've read so far. I like that, it's about ideas, and evoking emotion, and showing the characters more than the world. This makes me really hopeful for the rest of the bundle.

Oh, and I've been reading it on my new smartphone, which is working out pretty well. I still may try to see if my mom's Kindle is going unused and if she still wants to give me that.

Quotemander Prime said:

Started reading Alan Moore's run of Swamp Thing. Interesting change in what Swamp Thing is. I was surprised.

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I remember reading the first volume of that in Elementary school, great read. I loved how useless the Justice league was in taking out Floronic man, and just talked about what to do the whole time rather than actually help. Total United Nations metaphor and I LOVED it.

STOMP STOMP CLAP! STOMP STOMP CLAP!

The Stuff of Legend

My store had the omnibus on sale, which collects the first two volumes. And I love this series so much. The concept alone is worth the price admission:

It's like Toy Story meets Lord of the Rings. The Boogeyman kidnaps a little boy, dragging him into the darkness of the closet, where all the forgotten toys have disappeared. The toys decide to enter the mysterious, dark world to rescue the boy.

If you're buying this book for any reason, it's for the art. It's all coloured in this sepia-like tone, which puts across the perfect mood for this adventure. Couple that with some surprisingly great characters and a fantasy-like adventure and you've got a great comic. The characters are really interesting. When they enter this different world, they change from toys into kind of realistic or fantastical versions of themselves. The teddy bear, Max, becomes a full-sized bear with a tie. The jester-in-a-box (leaving his box behind in the boy's room) becomes this crazy ninja. It's some really brilliant stuff.

So yeah, BIG recommendation for this from your friendly neighbourhood comic guru. Definitely check it out.

Just finishe "The Boys" volume one. Not Preacher, but still liked it.

I tried The Boys a few years ago and couldn't really get into it.

ThatNickGuy said:

I tried The Boys a few years ago and couldn't really get into it.

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I get ya, its something you either like or don't.

I just finished Soon I Will Be Invincible by acclaimed video game writer Austin Grossman. My one and only complaint is that there isn't more of this book to read, it was amazing.

I highly recommend it. It's a novel set in a world where super heroes and super villains have become common occurances, and follows the doings of Dr Impossible (a man with Malign Hypercognative Disorder, aka Evil Genius Disease) after the disappearance of his rival, the hero CoreFire.

It's got sort of a Dr Horrible vibe to it, if Dr Horrible were actually a genius villain.

Soon I Will Be Invincible is one of those stories where, at the end, your going to be routing for the villain to win just because of the sheer amount of shit he's had to put up with. Dr. Impossible manages to be both sympathetic and menacing the entire story and when he's recounting the reasons why he needs to do this, you really can't help but feel for the guy... even if he's a deranged psychopath.

Ashburner, you tend to give away a lot of stuff without meaning to these days.

Quotemander Prime said:

Ashburner, you tend to give away a lot of stuff without meaning to these days.

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I have no idea how to take that. What did I give away?

AshburnerX said:

I have no idea how to take that. What did I give away?

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There's more to spoiling a story than giving away its events. RavenPoe's was giving an idea, but you jumped right to "here's the deal with the ending and how you're gonna feel about it" type of discussion. And that's before the spoiler tag; can't imagine what's under there.

But in terms of events, there have been a number of times, largely in the video games section, where my reaction to stuff you'd post would be either "if I hadn't already finished that, I'd be pissed" or "I really wish I hadn't read that". Someone mentions they're playing a game and you're suddenly discussing its final hours. I'm not saying you're doing it on purpose; I think that's just how you like to talk about stuff, digging out the details right off the bat. I'm bringing it up because I don't think you're aware of it. Maybe spoilers aren't as big a deal to you as they are to people like me, or you don't see giving away character development/atmosphere the same as plot (although that has happened too), but it just would seem to make sense to me that discussing the ending outside tags isn't fair the instant someone brings up a work of fiction, even if it's so insignificant as a video game or a comic booky-novel.

None of this is meant to come off as antagonistic and I can't control tone of text. In fact, what provoked it coming up was that you used spoiler tags, showing me that you saw some differentiation in it that I wasn't seeing.

I guess there's just a difference in what I consider a spoiler and what you do. To me, specifics are what spoils a story, not details on the tropes involved or it's tone. I guess that comes from years of writing reviews, where I kinda had to break things down enough that someone who wasn't familiar with the work would understand what I was talking about. This case was probably especially bad, as the book has been mentioned MANY times here on the forum so I figured I had more leeway.

And don't worry, I was just kinda confused about what your meaning was. I could tell you weren't being angry about it. I'll see if I can be a bit better about it.

I appreciate your understanding.