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

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Which was an average issue.

Next up: Undercity by Catherine Asaro. A recent Baen Purchase

Which was very good.

Next I read the afterword in Redliners, 2nd Edition by David Drake. Added to allow the 1st edition to stay in the Baen free library, it really doesn't add much.

And now I'm reading 1636: The Chronicles of Dr Gribbleflotz by Kerryn Offord and Rick Boatright, which is simply excellent.

I'm about half-way through and it's a proper novel, not just a collection of short stories. Highly recommended.

[seanyyz]

Just finished Adam Haslett's Imagine Me Gone which was incredible. The best book I have read in a very long time. I was surprised it was passed over for the Booker longlist. Speaking of the Booker I am celebrating Booker season by reading a past winner rather than a current nomination, A S Byatt's Possession.

[Rumpelteazer]

Last night I finished Raymond Khoury's The Last Templar, the first book in his Templar series. I found it okay, a great start, then a slower bit and it picked up towards the end. I found the ending a bit underwhelming and more could have been with the actual last Templar. Good, but probably not good enough to continue with the series with.

[ATDrake]

Finished Ursula K. Le Guin's non-fiction collection A Wave in the Mind: Talks and Essays on the Writer, the Reader, and the Imagination which was a library book. This was a little lighter and, despite being grouped into reasonably distinct categories, felt a little more disjointed than some of her other stuff that I've read. Possibly this was due to most of the pieces being assorted short presentations and "leftover" works from throughout the decades, rather than more formal pieces that were intended for print publication from the beginning.

There's a range of topics which is restricted in its breadth but not its depth, with reminisces about her childhood as the daughter of famous anthropologists and meeting people who are apparently famous in anthropology and the love of literacy instilled by the people around her, and the bulk of it going on to her own experiences and insights as a writer and on the writing business, plus some thought-pieces on unquestioned cultural assumptions* and challenging them, and even a few poems.

Probably the most interesting were the various pieces (there were several of them) about the use of rhythm in both poetry and prose and how it affects the perception of the language used in particular novels, including works by Austen, Tolstoy, Twain, Tolkien, and others. We also get her opinion of the LOTR films, which she liked even as she lamented that the action blockbuster style didn't really lend itself to the true strengths of the story and its narrative, as a postscript to her dedicated essay on Tolkien's use of rhythm.

Mild recommend if you're interested in what writers think about writing, or Le Guin's outlook on specific things in a more general sense. This doesn't have all that much which is specific about the sfnal genre or her own work which might be a draw to particular fans of those worlds and which are probably covered better by one of her other essay collections, but there's some interesting tidbits scattered throughout, which make it worth a look if you want to see them.

* I appreciate that the author took the time to write out a correction and apology for something she herself got wrong about one of those, and put it up on her website right on the bibliography page. Hopefully the magic of e-books means that particular mistake can now be corrected as she would like (although it probably hasn't been, given how lax about these things publishers can be).

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

And now I'm reading 1636: The Chronicles of Dr Gribbleflotz by Kerryn Offord and Rick Boatright, which is simply excellent.

Now finished, and my opinion hasn't changed. Except in one small detail - there isn't really a conclusion to the story. It just sort of stops. I suppose that's inevitable in this kind of series.

It's also readable for those who hasn't read lots of previous 1632 stuff, since it's mostly concerned with Dr Gribbleflotz. Highly recommended.

Next up: Time Gate by Robert Silverberg. A collection of shorts. The first one is interesting so far.

[mewmartigan]

Finished up the Empire from the Ashes trilogy by David Weber. It was good and as a bonus, I got to see the entire Safehold storyline in one book, haha. Honor Harrington I love...Safehold I didn't go past book 3.

I am now starting The Dagger and the Coin series by Daniel Abraham. Book 1 is so far, so good.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by mewmartigan

Finished up the Empire from the Ashes trilogy by David Weber. It was good and as a bonus, I got to see the entire Safehold storyline in one book, haha. Honor Harrington I love...Safehold I didn't go past book 3.

I've been avoiding Empire from the Ashes. Not because I think I won't like it, but because Weber will get me sucked in again and I won't get anything else read until I finish. Heck, I even read the Safehold series, knowing they're all at least 1/3rd longer than they should be.

Just finishing up Martin Walker's latest Bruno book, Fatal Pursuit. I've been mostly listening to the excellent Audible version, narrated by Robert Ian Mackensie, but also reading it when I had time but listening wasn't appropriate. As always with these Bruno books, I get immersed in the Perigord and the people. I really enjoy this series, and this is another good one. Highly recommended.

[mewmartigan]

Empire from the Ashes was earlier Weber. It definitely moves faster than his current novels and it's an omnibus of the three books....so you know its a complete story, haha!

[Apache]

Originally Posted by CRussel

I've been avoiding Empire from the Ashes. Not because I think I won't like it, but because Weber will get me sucked in again and I won't get anything else read until I finish. Heck, I even read the Safehold series, knowing they're all at least 1/3rd longer than they should be.

Just finishing up Martin Walker's latest Bruno book, Fatal Pursuit. I've been mostly listening to the excellent Audible version, narrated by Robert Ian Mackensie, but also reading it when I had time but listening wasn't appropriate. As always with these Bruno books, I get immersed in the Perigord and the people. I really enjoy this series, and this is another good one. Highly recommended.

If you like Martin Walker's Bruno Chief of Police series then give Jean-Luc Bannalec's Commissioner Dupin Series. So far it is only two books, but both are excellent.
https://www.fantasticfiction.com/b/jean-luc--bannalec/
Apache

[CRussel]

Interesting. But over my new author price threshold. I'll see if they're in the library.

ETA: Not available, but on the list I can recommend. We'll see if they buy it...

[Tenzin_la]

After reading a few heavier books, I'm reading I Am A Cat by Natsume Sōseki. I really wish I read more Japanese! Everything I've read talks about what a challenge it was to translate, starting with the "I" Sōseki used in the title: it's usually the personal pronoun used by royalty. I've done my fair share of translating religious works and have spent days (sometimes) trying to "get" a phrase to a point where it begins to do justice to the original in content and the beauty of the spoken language. (I'm quite odd of a person. I do this knowing it may never be looked at with its original intent, but merely an academic "work", while I hold the passages to be sacred. I still wouldn't trade the opportunity to participate in translating a single word, for gold.)

[Dazrin]

Originally Posted by Dazrin

If I keep saying this it will come true at some point.

If Small Gods doesn't come in this evening I will probably start Fair Warning by George E. Simpson and Neal R. Burger.

Well, it didn't come so I read The Cypher by Julian Rosado-Machain, a paranormal YA book and the start of a new series (Guardians Inc.). It was ok, I probably would have enjoyed Fair Warning more but I have been trying read short and/or fast books so that I am not in the middle of something when SG does come in.

And tonight as I was looking for another book, Small Gods arrived. YAY!!! I have been on the wait list since mid May and there were supposedly only 2 people in front of me, so I have no idea what took so long. Please return library books when you finish them, don't wait for them to expire.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Next up: Time Gate by Robert Silverberg. A collection of shorts. The first one is interesting so far.

Quite fun. Completely implausible, but fun.

Next up: Soldiers Out Of Time by Steve White. Latest in his Jason Thanou series.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Next up: Soldiers Out Of Time by Steve White. Latest in his Jason Thanou series.

Which I'm amused to find contains an obvious homage to Master Li and Number Ten Ox, in alien form.

[drjd]

Originally Posted by drjd

For now, I am taking up an archaeology book, In the Valley of the Kings: Howard Carter and the Mystery of King Tutankhamun's Tomb by Daniel Meyerson.

Which was a wonderful book to read.

Finished one more novel after this, Drop Dead by Swati Kaushal. A murder mystery investigation narrated in modern times. Quite a page turner.

Next up, The Chestermarke Instinct by Joseph Smith Fletcher, awaiting in my TBR since long.