A community for all things related to Books.
Community icon by IconsBox (from freepik.com)
I just picked up a nice edition of Robin Hood by Henry Gilbert, which I'm somewhat ashamed to admit that I did not realize had been adapted from all the old ballads into an actual novel (in 1912!)
Weird Gutennberg has his King Arthur book but not this...
I'm reading The Wax Child by Olga Ravn for next episode of the podcast. We found out after choosing it that it was longlisted for this years Booker Prize and to be honest, I can see why, it is utterly brilliant and, as athesitic Satanists, right up our street as its a re-telling of a 17th century Danish witch-burning - based, as they all were, on bullshit, lies and the male religious zealots hatred of women. Not a happy story but it is wonderfully written.
I'm also reading Kit Whitfield's In The Heart of Hidden Things which is the second in her Gyrford Series - if you like fantasy novels set in a rural, agricultural alternative England in which the Fae are an everyday thing (not tinkerbell type faries, I mean proper morally ambiguous Gaelic/Celtic type faeries) then this series is for you.
If there is another book that's more aligned with fediverse values, I'm not sure what that is.
The Faith of Beasts!! Just showed up on my doorstep.
It’s book 2 of The Captives War from James S.A. Corey, same author(s) as The Expanse. One is George R.R Martins understudy.
It’ll help keep my mind off my mothers death.
My guy, I’m sorry for your loss.
Thank you, it’s just life though.
Loved the first book, but the short story that came out after it made me mad. I really hope it didn't spoil the identity of the great enemy.
Reading: The Frugal Wizard's Handbook for Surviving Medieval England
Listening to: The Eye of the Bedlam Bride
"People have bones for a reason, Carl"
Enjoy the book!
I just started book 6 too!
I enjoyed the Wizard's Handbook. I kinda want more stories written in that world.
Bit of a slow year for me, but currently reading Eric by Terry Pratchett.
I'm reading Dungeon Crawler Carl and listening to the complete Sherlock Holmes (I have no idea what's going on in the latter, I keep falling asleep).
I finished There Is No Antimemetics Division by qntm last night. While the science fiction was cool, I had some difficulty because the timelines appeared to be jumping around. I guess it was thematic in the sense that our memories are/were incomplete similar to how a character might experience them in-story. I don’t read a whole lot of cosmic horror stuff, so the grandness of some of the descriptions felt different as though I were watching someone else play Shadow of the Colossus.
I’ve had 1Q84, Book 3 sitting on my desk begging and taunting me to finish it, so I might just get to that once and for all.
I also just read There Is No Antimemetics Divison and absolutely loved it. I get what you mean about the timelines but as an avid SCP content consumer I was pretty comfortable with it. It's worth noting that the book is pretty much a compilation of what was originally a more serial publication so that probably contributed to the breaks.
I'm reading The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune. This covers my last bingo square: Cozy. I'm still early on but I'm really enjoying it so far. It's fun, not too serious, and exactly what I need right now.
When the Moon Hits Your Eye - John Scalzi
Thr Fifth Elephant - Terry Pratchett
And re-listening through the Dungeon Crawler Carl series in anticipation of the new book releasing May 12
Oh no, more time without reading for you :(
I'm still working my way through "The Remaining" books. I finished book 4 yesterday and then did the two nouvellas today that sit in the middle, then straight away started book 5.
To begin with I enjoyed it but thought it was a bit mid, I didn't really like the hooraaa, US of A patriots vibe that I thought was going to be a lot more prominent throughout to begin with. Thankfully as it has gone on it hasn't been too heavy with that shit, a little bit of flag worship or how this country used to be so great bits here and there but I have found that it is easy to ignore and the story going on has been worthwhile to ignore that stuff.
I think I realised I was enjoying it more than I thought i was when I got a bit choked up at the scene where his dog was trapped up on the roof of a building and he was struggling through bouts of unconsciousness trying to get back to the dog and I really felt the emotion in that. And I'm a cat person!
So yeh, looking forward to continuing these books!
The Remaining is on of my favorite series! I've read the first 6 books at least 3 times each, and then reread the second set of 6, plus the 4 add on novels after that. I love me some post apoc fiction. Also, DJ Molles finds a nice way to make the characters a little more introspective than other series do, which I appreciate. Hope you stick with them!
Oh yeh, I love some post apocalyptic stuff too, I mean I'm nearly 200 books deep into the Deathlands series of books which says it all really xD
I will definitely stick with it for a while, my list only has 11 books on it though including the two novellas trust and faith. I know there is another series of books about Lee that I haven't looked into yet, I was going to see how I felt at the end to see if I wanted to pick those up.
I haven't heard of Deathlands before. 200 books might be a bit beyond my attention span haha. As for the Remaining, there are the 6 books, 2 novellas, the prequel (Project Hometown), then the follow on Lee Harden series that has 6 numbered books and 4 other novels interspersed in the timeline.
The official list is here. Enjoy!
Reading "Venomous Lumpsucker" by Ned Beauman. I'm about 50% through and I like it.
Reading "Mansfield Park" by Jane Austen ! I'm going through everything she's written, I finished Pride & Prejudice a few weeks ago and I just got this one !
Currently rereading the "Children of Time"-Series by Adrian Tchaikovsky because the fourth book was just released and I really like to experience the first three again.
I'm a sucker for good Sciency Science Fiction and this series ticks practically all boxes of my special interests.
Also listening to the Warhammer 40k Series "Ciaphas Cain" by Sandy Mitchell, because it's funny and relaxing.
Also listening to "Sourcery" by Terry Pratchett on my way through the Discworld Series (again)
As always, I've been keeping up with The Wandering Inn, reading the newest chapters as they drop on the website. Other than that I have a a good 8-9 smaller reads on RoyalRoad that I read ongoing as soon as chapters drop. Unfortunately I haven't had the time or mental capacity to continue my "real" (aka physical) book
I'm re-reading the Incarnations of Immortality septology by Piers Anthony. I read them originally as they came out, and I remembered having enjoyed them quite a lot. Upon a re-read, they're not as good as I remembered though certainly not bad. They're also quite a bit more dated than I recalled, but I suppose they weren't at the time of their release. Also IoI is one of Anthony's series with the least amount of his weirdness in it, but it's definitely there.
I also learned that he released the eighth novel in the series in 2007, but reviews are not encouraging so I'll be skipping that one.
I'm reading Inhibitor Phase by Alastair Reynolds. Nearly done with the series. I'm enjoying how the books jump around in time, space, and genre while all living in a basic rule space. Kind of like a less scattered Cosmere.
We’ve got some big projects happening with work that are all coming due at the same time, so I haven’t been doing much reading. I am listening in small bursts to This Inevitable Ruin (Dungeon Crawler Carl) to prep for the book release in May and getting ready for Bingo to start back up on May 1st.
I hope people will be able to join us again! If you have questions, please feel free to ask.
This may not qualify as currently reading - however I just finished Nobody’s Girl by Virginia Roberts Giuffre yesterday. Fantastic and difficult (emotionally) read. Really connects the dots and gives an inside look into Epstein’s world as well as an incredible story of survival and self-empowerment.
I’m also re-reading 1984 by George Orwell. I read it for the first time ~15 years ago and it terrified me, now it’s terrifying in a whole new way.
Gonna need a lighthearted read after this.
I decided it is time to go through Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. This will be the sixth time for me. It is the best of the best.
I recently finished Stephen King's Dark Tower series. I have never had such a rocky reading experience. Over all I enjoyed it but it was a very mixed bag. Some of the books were just okay, one or two were excellent, and at least one was truly terrible.
Recently got to intermediate level with studying Japanese myself for fun, so I've been reading 「魔女の宅急便」aka Kiki's Delivery Service the original 1985 novel.
It's SOOO adorable OMG!!!
I'm almost done with Sadomasochism and the BDSM Community in the United States by Stephen K. Stein.
I'm almost at the end of The Twelves, by Justin Cronin. It's a bit more fast paced than The Passage which is the previous volume of the series that I read just before but a bit less "deep" also. Anyway, this is a very good trilogy so far, really gripping. Of course, once I finish, I will continue with The City of Mirrors.
Currently reading five books:
Half way through This Inevitable Ruin, Matt Dinniman, and loving it as all the others.
Listing to Foundryside, Robert Jackson Bennett, which is a cool concept but I'm struggling with the narration of the audiobook. Good enough to keep at it though! Would recommend it in another medium :D.
Just finished re-reading A Clash of Kings by G.R.R. Martin (A Song of Ice and Fire 2). It's a very cool book, but I didn't find it quite as consistently gripping as the first one. The first just has such incredible pacing imo.
Next one up is Caliban's War by James Corey (The Expanse 2). I have seen the TV show, and really liked the first book as well.
Stardust!
I love this book. Very unfortunate about the writer being a shit.
Currently reading The Will of the Many. It's very decent. Great idea well implemented.
My main gripe is the author definitely used a thesaurus too much. I'm all for uncommon vocabulary (Adrian Tchaikovsky is a master here), it just goes too far on the odd occasion.
Minor gripe though. It's very solid bedtime reading and I've enjoyed it. Nearly finished.
Reading and Listening: "Chemistry 2e" Openstax
I'm currently reading "The Ax" by Donald Westlake. I think it was recommended in one of these threads a few months ago actually.
It's about a paper salesman who murders people with similar resumes to himself in order to open up more job opportunities for himself. Its a pretty interesting perspective on capitalism.
Awee sorry to hear you couldn't get to any reading dresden. Hopefully that changes!
I finished Player One by Douglas Coupland last week, and now felt drawn to read my first ever Terry Pratchet novel - Nation. The writing is superb; the chapter with the milk made me disgustingly laugh. Including Nation, understanding another being seems to be the core theme of my last 3 reads.
On the nonfiction side, finished Metaphors We Live By. It was a lot more academic than I was expecting, aside from that, it was a fascinating and well laid-out argument of the human thinking process based on metaphor. Now gearing up (soon) to read a folllow-up by the same authors, Philosophy in the Flesh. Also finished another one yesterday, which I didn't mention last week (as I tend to bounce between books), Introduction to Design Thinking for UX Beginners by Uijun Park - it was a good refresher and learned some new things. Today, I started The AI Mirror by Shannon Vallor, a solid intro to the subject of AI in our current time.
I just finished Adulthood Rites by Octavia E. Butler. It’s such a good book and the second in Lilith’s Brood (or Xenogenesis trilogy).
To catch a fascist by Christopher Mathias
I'm currently reading Portrait in Sepia by Isabel Allende. I read some books by her years ago, which I loved, so when I saw this one in a tiny library, I had to take it. I'm not far in yet, but it's a great read so far.
I finished both Murder on the Orient Express and Murder on the River Nile by Agatha Christie. They were both fun and well-written, but I don't think detectives are my cup of tea. I may read some more of her work if it's snowing and I'm in front of a fireplace or something. They're cozy to read, even with all the murders taking place.