Hey!! Let's get some action going! What are we reading?

[ATDrake]

Originally Posted by maianhvk

(I picked Shogun in the first place because it's the most read one in the saga )
You don't suggest the two later ones, Whirlwind and Gai-Jin?

Not the person you're asking, but I've read all of James Clavell's fiction besides Whirlwind because my dad had all the books (I haven't read Whirlwind because neither he nor I have been able to find wherever he last put the paperback). Gai-Jin is an okay tie-in which bridges the Tai-Pan and Shogun branches of Clavell's Asian saga. It's chronologically after those two, but is kind of a fill-in-the-gaps prequel to Noble House, so I'd recommend reading that first if you're still interested. Here's a mini-writeup I did on the various Clavell novels and their tv/film adaptations in a historical fiction recs thread last year if you're morbidly curious.

As for me, no sooner did I enthuse about looking forward to George R.R. Martin's upcoming Dunk & Egg novella and finish reading A Feast for Crows through, than he announces that the latest D&E will not be coming out after all, and he's swapping in some kind of historical prequel story about an old royal conflict in the A Song of Ice and Fire series. I'd have preferred to see D&E, but I like other backstory filler well enough, I suppose.

In the meantime, I have no shortage of convention-twisting fantasy to read, and accordingly I read John Moore's Heroics for Beginners: A Novel, which is a very funny fantasy spoof of fairy-tale tropes in general and the Big Heroic Evil-Thwarting Rescue Which Earns the Princess' Hand in particular, with a touch of the Evil Overlord List thrown in.

Like Moore's other such novels, a couple of which I read around this time last year it turns out to be two years ago, it takes a tongue-in-cheek almost deadpan send up approach to the comedy elements, which IMHO makes things even funnier than if they'd been treated as outright farce.

Recommended if you like trope-satirizing fantasy spoofs (and are willing to track down an out-of-print paperback). I'm impressed by the cover art, which is done by someone who actually read the novel, or at least paid attention to whatever the author suggested in the way of ideas, since it's got a clearly depicted sign of the official Fortress of Doom public opening and closing hours as described in the story (alas, no view of the gift shop).

Also read in paper from the library Mercedes Lackey's latest Valdemar series installment, Redoubt, which is 4th in the apparently open-ended Collegium Chronicles series-within-a-series. The previous volume of this I apparently did read around this time last year.

And it's more of the same, and the same accompanying flaws and frustration. Though it looks like she finally toned down Mags' annoying Funetikally Spelt Aksent a bit.

Once again, there's a long, drawn-out ramble about Mags' living situation and self-doubts (and he has so, so many) and his various mundane Heraldic trainee activities and his friends' personal dramas which are described in a weird level of irrelevant detail which takes the "show, don't tell" convention of storytelling and kind of turns it into a "show and tell", or maybe a "show that you're not exactly telling, but kind of telling that you're showing" thing.

If it all feels like filler, that's because it probably is, because unless you're desperately interested in weddings, polo-playing competitions, other people's family drama (which incidentally was handled in an Idiot Ball fashion which deliberately made the "bad" family members look like exaggeratedly evil total incompetents whom you're amazed managed to ride as far as Haven without falling off their horses while twirling their moustaches), and Mags' really deep thoughts about his new undercover apprenticeship as an aspiring underworld thug as relates to his former mine-slave situation, this story basically goes nowhere.

Okay, near the end, there starts the actual plot which finally provides the requisite story element where something happens which does eventually provide Mags with a tiny Clue as to his mysterious background hinted at over the past 3 books, before the status quo is restored and he can get back to his regular round of polo, personal drama, and musing about Being A Mine-Slave Turned Herald, but it's really too little, too late and probably won't be followed up upon much in the next book, any more than the previous tiny Clues have.

And while it's interesting to see some more stuff about how the neighbouring country's religion got so corrupt without getting checked in a world where the gods really do exist, the lovely explanation as to why their god didn't step in sooner and strike the corrupting usurping faux-priests down Because of Reasons that the common people needed to strive for freedom and justice and whatever themselves would be a lot more convincing if I didn't know that in the "present" continuity, several hundred years of priestly demon-running peasant-burning oppression were finally overturned by (not really a spoiler, since this first showed up in print some 15 years ago, but in case you haven't read that far in the series and don't want to know)

Spoiler:

a temple coup with very direct and obvious godly backing and interference with "miracles" and striking down of the blasphemers via divine means

. That's a long time to claim Prime Directive motivations before getting fed up and doing an intervention, and I'd drop any god who did that like a sack of easily-droppable things for clearly not providing value for money in the worship/faith department for seven $%^-ing centuries of deliberately-prolonged human misery. Not to mention the regular mini-genocides flushing the useful psychic abilities out of the national genepool.

Not recommended, unless you like me are morbidly curious as to where the storyline's going (nowhere, and in long, drawn-out circles to get there like a dying vulture picking out tiny bones of actual advancement from the scattered carcass). Lackey's writing was considerably better before she started doing long, drawn-out inner monologue character rants (okay, she kind of always did that, but then she started regularly substituting them for actual character insight and development), and her plotting was considerably tighter when she confined each storytelling arc to no longer than a trilogy, with each book-length installment telling a partially-whole story by having something major addressed and resolved in it towards solving the overall arc problem. This ongoing open-ended series-within-a-series thing is really making the quality and enjoyment suffer (besides the other writing issues).

Even though the Collegium Chronicles is kind of marketed as a continuity-free prequel newbie jumping on point for the main Valdemar series, IMHO, you're far, far better off starting at or near the beginning (I recommend picking up the very good Tarma & Kethry stories, which are highly enjoyable) even though the chronology, continuity, and number of books to tie-in/pre-read is more complicated.

[caleb72]

Originally Posted by caleb72

Today I started Mr Shivers by Robert Jackson Bennett. It's one of the many paperbacks in my bookshelf that has sat there unread for quite some time. Anyone read this before?

This was really good. I don't know if any of you have seen the mini-series Carnivale, but this book reminded me a bit of that show. The grim depression; the grim people in the grim depression; the grim adventures of the grime people in the grim depression etc...

There were clearly supernatural elements but you weren't bombarded with them and there was far too much fore-shadowing to say that this book had a twist at the end. Didn't bother me though.

There were a few editing mistakes (more on facts/logic than language), with crochet and knitting used interchangeably and a character suddenly being replaced with another in mid-paragraph. Not sure why errors like that wouldn't be picked up prior to release - but this is the world we live in I guess.

Just like Carnivale, the meaning of what transpires is not always clear, with very deep speeches only hinting at purpose and rather fantastic pieces of narrative whose meaning was sometimes elusive but no less beautiful for that.

I'm now a goodly portion through A Town Like Alice by Neville Shute. I'm very glad this book was chosen by the book club for February. Although the writing itself doesn't inspire me much, it's very easy to get swept away in the story.

[xg4bx]

The Spur:Loki's Rock by Mark Ellis-

''The colony world in the Orion Spur known as Loki wasn't so much lost as forgotten. In the 188 years since a world-wide catastrophe destroyed what passed for civilization there, Loki had become a savage wilderness of strange cultures, as well as being the sanctuary for every bizarre cult, mad sect and outlawed scientific discipline in the Sol 9 Commonwealth. Quentin Crockett, a Colonel in the department of OffWorld Operations leads a team of specialists to Loki to monitor, catalog, and if necessary, eliminate the myriad societies that sprang up in the wake of the global cataclysm. In their armored ACP Ambler, the team travels Loki, searching for the lost Terran Enclave, while fighting off not only wild beasts, and the wilder natives but also the ruthless schemes of a mastermind about whom they know practically nothing. In The Spur: Loki’s Rock, Crockett and his team contend with the bizarre native fauna, but also with resurrected Nazi supermen, flocks of flying piranha, and the denizens of the kill-crazy town of Loki’s Rock, led by the psychotic Django Bonner and his bloodthirsty hench-wench, Pagan.''

[alansplace]

Originally Posted by alansplace

Well finished up the Nancy Drew Mystery, The Secret of Shadow Ranch and also Jeffrey Deaver's, The Bone Collector and enjoyed them both a lot! Next I'm going to give Lory S. Kaufman's SciFi YA novel, The Lens and the Looker a try and I'm also reading the sixth Nancy Drew Mystery, The Secret of Red Gate Farm.

I read almost 20% of The Lens and the Looker and decided that it wasn't for me or at least wasn't for me, at this particular time. So I picked another book instead, Blood of the Demon, the second of the Kara Gillian novels by Diana Rowland. I was hooked by the middle of the first chapter.

BETWEEN HEAVEN AND HELL, MAN AND DEMON, SHE’S ABOUT TO FACE THE ONE THING SHE MAY NOT BE ABLE TO SURVIVE.

Welcome to the world of Kara Gillian, a cop with a gift. Not only does she have the power of “othersight” to see what most people can’t even imagine, but she’s become the exclusive summoner of a demon lord. Or maybe it’s the other way around. The fact is, with two troublesome cases on her docket and a handsome FBI agent under her skin, Kara needs the help of sexy, insatiable Lord Rhyzkahl more than he needs her. Because these two victims, linked by suspicious coincidence, haven’t just been murdered. Something has eaten their souls.

It’s a case with roots in the arcane, but whose evil has flowered among the rich, powerful, and corrupt in Beaulac, Louisiana. And as the killings continue, Kara soon realizes how much there’s still to learn about demons, men, and things that kill in the night—and how little time she has to learn it.

[alanHd]

I'm 20% into 11.22.63 - Stephen King and it's shaping up to be one of the best books i have read in ages.

[Stitchawl]

Originally Posted by maianhvk

So... that's definitely not the publication order, then But I trust you, so I'll follow your recommended order (if I ever finish this thousand-page book to continue another thousand-page one... )
(I picked Shogun in the first place because it's the most read one in the saga )
You don't suggest the two later ones, Whirlwind and Gai-Jin?

I simply could NOT get past the first 100 pages of Whirlwind, and I had to force myself to keep reading Gai-jin, although it was a very accurate portrayal of the times. It just kept bogging down!

Not so with 'most' of the others in the Asian Trilogy, though 'Tai-pan' was not nearly up to the quality of 'Shogun' or 'Noble House.' Yet, it was still a good read, just somewhat shallow in comparison. 'King Rat,' on the other hand, keeps you riveted though each page, and the ending just smacks you upside the head! The same happens in 'Noble House,' but there are a so many 'sub-plots' going on in 'Noble House,' so you get that head slap a dozen different times!

Originally Posted by alanHd

I'm 20% into 11.22.63 - Stephen King and it's shaping up to be one of the best books i have read in ages.

I think that's going to have to be my next read. So many have recommended it.


Stitchawl

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Next: Sunset of the Gods by Steve White. One of my recent Baen purchases, the second in a series that starts with Blood of the Heros, which gets recapped quite well in the first chapter or two.

Well, it's OK. Readable, and quite interesting in the historical bits of it, but the characters themselves are uninterestingly depicted, and I didn't find that I really cared much about them one way or another. That's probably why the previous book hasn't stayed with me.

Next up: Ivory by Mike Resnick. I bought this one back in 2005!

[DrNefario]

I just finished The Adamantine Palace by Stephen Deas, the first in a fantasy series I can't remember the name of - ah, Memory of Flames, thanks, google. I enjoyed it a lot. It's not your usual quest fantasy, it's all politics and backstabbing and affairs and poisoning and fun stuff like that. And dragons with an interesting twist that looks like it will run through the series. All of the characters are flawed but somehow still not wholly unsympathetic.

Perhaps the best recommendation is that I really want to see what happens in the next book. Which fortunately I already own, but I'm going to make myself wait before starting it.

I'll probably have a go at A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute next, since it has come up for the book club. It breaks my intended pattern of one book for me and one for each of my three sub-challenges, but that was just meant to be a loose guideline. My copy of the Shute looks to be a first edition. I can only hope it holds together, and doesn't make me sneeze too much.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Nyssa

Up Next:

Attempt #2 of Shadow Blade (Shadowchasers #1) and
Book #2 The Guns of Avalon (Amber: The Corwin Cycle).

Stop dilly dallying and get going on the Wool Omnibus.

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Next up: Ivory by Mike Resnick. I bought this one back in 2005!

Ahem.

[Dazrin]

Originally Posted by Dazrin

Not quite the level of Hugh's work, but it was good.

Now onto something completely different. Probably. I really don't know what I am going to read next. I will decide tomorrow.

I have started Lockdown by Sean Black and am about 75% through it after 1.5 workdays of reading, very easy reading. Should be done tomorrow.

Apparently my next book with be Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell which just came available through my library. I reserved it last year for the book club. So, just to be clear, Cloud Atlas is science fiction, right Jon?

I will leave it there for now and decide later if I think it fits elsewhere better.

[WT Sharpe]

Finished two non-fiction books this week. One was A Planet of Viruses by Carl Zimmer. It was a very readable and sound book of essays, but there was little new to even casual followers of recent biological developments. Perhaps the most interesting segment came toward the close of the book where Zimmer discusses how scientists in the past decade have begun to revisit the old question of whether viruses are truly alive and, by extension, what it means to be alive. Should chemistry and biology be seen as a continuum with no tangible line dividing living from non-living matter?

The other book I read this week was Gracie: A Love Story by George Burns. This was a wonderful, well-written, and fascinating tribute to Gracie Allen written by her greatest fan. I highly recommend this one to anyone who ever enjoyed watching the duo's TV show, movies, or listening to their old radio show. There's not a dull moment in this 300+ page recap of their life together. Unfortunately there is no eBook and it's apparently out of print in paper. I had to buy a used hardcover edition. Hopefully interest will pick up in reading about these two now that Antenna TV is rebroadcasting some of the episodes of The Burns and Allen Show. And you young folks out there who have never seen the show, do yourself a favor and tune in. They're wonderful together; she's a riot.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by Fbone

Ahem.

Yes, yes. OK. But I am trying to get through my older titles!

[fantasyfan]

When I was about 13 or so I first read Rip Foster Rides The Gray Planet. I remember that I loved it. It still holds some interest. Goodwin writing under the pseudonym of "Blake Savage" creates an exciting plot which has more of a "science" element in it {at least by 195os standard} and the characters show a wider range of cultural ethnicity than we find in the Tom Corbett series.

Politically, the world of Rip Foster is quite dated. The bad guys are citizens of the "Consolidation of Planetary Governments" . They are usually simply referred to as "Connies". Hmm--I wonder whom we are supposed to be reminded of now. Rip and the rest of the good guys come from the "Federation of Free Governments". When the Connie soldiers are invariably defeated, they itch to defect to the land of their captors.

That said, there's quite a bit of nostalgic entertainment in this little novel.

The book is included in the Kindle Tom Corbett Megapack along with the seven Corbett novels, Star Born by Andre Norton and The Secret of the Ninth Planet by Donald A. Wollheim. This Megapack is well formatted and you get good value for the low price. However, the Corbett Novels are available free here on MobileRead and in Project Gutenberg in editions which include the original black and white illustrations--absent in the Megapack edition. Rip Foster with illustrations is also separately available in PG but the formatting isn't as good as one would expect.

[Dazrin]

Originally Posted by Dazrin

I have started Lockdown by Sean Black and am about 75% through it after 1.5 workdays of reading, very easy reading. Should be done tomorrow.

That was quick. Will start Cloud Atlas this afternoon.