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

[Renate]

Originally Posted by issybird

The Passenger by Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz, a contemporary novel about a Jew on the run in 1938 Berlin and all too prescient.

It's driving me batty because I know that I read that but can't seem to find it in any of my library lists. Der Reisende

I just downloaded the history in all my OverDrives as .csv file.
It's ~700 books, which makes me a slacker to some of the folks here.
I do read a lot of Project Gutenberg too.

[nana77]

Originally Posted by nana77

Now on "The Grocery", by Guillaume Singelin (paintings and colors) and Aurélien Ducoudray (story), on a translated version I couldn't be able not to buy, [...]

Nice, although the PEGI is like...plus 18: too many violence for nothing, get to annoy and bother.
By thinking the project started on 2011, within a mail send to Singelin while he was doing a stage work on Label 619, and the director saw the excerpt just as casually, and did decided to give it a try..
The whole volume is a one piece 400 pages, and it looks as sometimes the plot was missing (repleaced within shoots at kids, etc...), the characters are nice, ofc, the puppiest puppies, but though, them just gets shoots around all around the book.
Btw, in 2026 and thinking at the world around, them critic.

"The Starmen" by Brackett was great, as all the others from her.

I'm trying "The best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2024", edited by Hugh Howey; so many thanks for the suggestion onto the bargains' sections; and also so glad that I feel I can read it (there are all short stories, and it feels nice starting to get easy to read it in english).

Frontiere, by Singelin, seems 150% cute and visually hearted.

Did also read the latest translation for "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep", re-loved it again.

Edit: forgot to mention, Frontiere is a kind of those "perfect paperback", the pages' edges are also rounded cut:

[DiapDealer]

I recently finished Patricia Cornwell's first Scarpetta novel Postmortem. It may have been engaging in its day, but not so much today. It read (or listened actually) like several long infodumps on ancient technology occasionally interrupted by a bit of plot. Many of those ancient technologies were only tangentially related to forensic science. Utterly lacking in any of the psychological suspense that was attributed to the book in various descriptions.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I recently finished Patricia Cornwell's first Scarpetta novel Postmortem. It may have been engaging in its day, but not so much today. It read (or listened actually) like several long infodumps on ancient technology occasionally interrupted by a bit of plot. Many of those ancient technologies were only tangentially related to forensic science. Utterly lacking in any of the psychological suspense that was attributed to the book in various descriptions.

I think that with long series you can be better served by starting with the second or third book, in hope the author has found his/her feet. Especially with a popular series -- there has to be some reason people like them! It may not be to your taste at that, and some series don't age well, but at least you'd have given it a fair shot.

I can't tell you how many popular series I was one and done with after starting at the beginning. Bruno Chief of Police and Inspector Ganache come to mind but there were many more.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by issybird

I think that with long series you can be better served by starting with the second or third book, in hope the author has found his/her feet. Especially with a popular series -- there has to be some reason people like them! It may not be to your taste at that, and some series don't age well, but at least you'd have given it a fair shot.

I'm not sure I can do that. It's definitely a me problem, but if it's a series, I HAVE to start at book one and read it in published order. I've tried jumping in at later installments (with other series) and I always felt icky enough when doing it that I had to stop and go back.

I DID like the TV version of The Body Farm (had no idea it was based on a book, let alone part of Cornwell's Scarpetta series). So if I can manage to briefly quell the inner ickiness, maybe I'll give a book after that a shot.

[Karellen]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

It's definitely a me problem, but if it's a series, I HAVE to start at book one and read it in published order.

You are not alone. I cant start in the middle of a series. But I tend to read in storyline order if that is different from published order.

Have been too busy the last couple of months to read, but I did just finish Keeper of the Lost Cities by Shannon Messenger. I am a fan of Harry Potter (yea, don't laugh) and this series is promoted as "for Harry Potter fans". It is more of a direct rip-off of Harry Potter. Changed the character names, change wizards to elves, and there you have a new story.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/...he-lost-cities
It seems her style is to take existing stories, twist them into a new rewrite and publish.

Now gone back to something familiar for a reset - Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton

[Solitaire1]

Karellen wrote the following as part of a post:

Originally Posted by Karellen

You are not alone. I cant start in the middle of a series. But I tend to read in storyline order if that is different from published order.

For me, I think it depends on the specific story/series. If it is part of a long-established story then I can jump into it and just pick up what I need to know by reading. An example of this are long-running comic book series like Legion of Super-Heroes which had been around for almost 20 years when I started reading it. Despite being around for so long I was able to get into it, and it became my favorite comic book. Sadly, I stopped reading it because of how badly it has been damaged by forces outside of the Creative Team's control.

However, with that exception I prefer to start reading a series from the beginning and reading the subsequent books in order. I enjoy (and want to) get immersed in that world as I read the story. It also reduces an issue I have when reading: fragmentation. I became so used to reading books in fragments (reading some of a book, stopping, then coming back and picking it up without missing a beat even if there has been a long gap since I last read the book while also doing the same with other books) that at times it is difficult for me to concentrate on a single book and read it from start to finish.

[Karellen]

Originally Posted by Solitaire1

I enjoy (and want to) get immersed in that world as I read the story.

Exactly!!

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Next up: City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Burnett. Looking really good.

Originally Posted by pdurrant

And it was very good indeed. Fun with dead divinities.

Straight on to City of Blades.

In fact, I didn't go straight on to City of Blades, although I intend to read it soon. Instead I read some other books. Or tried to.

I tried Crampton Hodnet by Barbara Pym. I couldn't make myself care about these characters, and didn't find the social manners at all funny. Abandoned at 53%.

Next I read Speak Daggers to Her by Rosemary Edghill. The first of her Bast mysteries.

I finished it, but I don't think I'll read the others. I found the contemporary Wicca stuff just irritating, and there wasn't much mystery, and I found the authorities non-involvement in events unbelievable.

The I got the new ebook of Dreamweaver's Dilemma by Lois McMaster Bujold, even though I have (and have read) a signed first edition hardcover of it. The updated bits were interesting.

And currently I'm reading The Sheep Look Up by John Brunner. It's a near-future dystopian novel from 1972. While I can see that it's very good, as I'd expect from John Brunner, the language is a bit dated, and I'm not finding it a pleasant read. I'm going to abandon it.

So now I am going to read City of Blades!

[DrNefario]

I'm reading Flesh and Spirit (Lighthouse Duet #1) by Carol Berg, a fantasy novel set in a monastery. The pair won the Mythopoeic Award in 2009.

I'm enjoying it, but the OpenRoad ebook is quite bad for scannos. There's a noble title that I think should be "Duc", but it's so consistently rendered as "Due" that I'm beginning to doubt myself.

[DiapDealer]

I started Cruel and Unusual: book four of Cornwell's Scarpetta series. It seems to have gotten off to a better start than book one, but I think I figured out what's bothering me.

Both books have several infodumpy sections where Kay Scarpetta's niece helps her with computer issues. In this one, she walks her aunt through (over the phone) typing various unix commands at a shell prompt. It goes on long enough to make my ears glaze over (yeah, I said it). For one, the sequence is completely irrelevant to the plot. Scarpetta could have simply had her niece tell her what she wanted to know. Two: typing commands at a unix shell prompt is NOT something I need a lengthy refresher course in. The first book had similar sequences related to dumb terminals and SQL commands.

So yeah... it's definitely a ME thing. I know just a bit too much about what Cornwell has chosen to use as filler. There are countless thing she could teach me about forensics and serial killer profiling, but she chose computer stuff instead. Even in the 90s when these books were written, this stuff was like breathing to me.

[Solitaire1]

Originally Posted by Karellen

Exactly!!

I want the experience I had while reading New Teen Titans. Spoilered for those who have not read "The Judas Contract."

Spoiler:

I was reading the story that became known as The Judas Contract. I was completely invested in the story as a new member, Terra, was introduced into the team and became a loved character among the team and with the fans. Then, with one turn of a page, I was completely shocked when it was revealed that Terra was a sociopathic traitor who was planted in the team by one of the Titan's worst enemies to destroy it from the inside and she hated everyone on the team. That destroyed the close-knit family the Titans had become and the team was never the same again.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

<snip>
The I got the new ebook of Dreamweaver's Dilemma by Lois McMaster Bujold, even though I have (and have read) a signed first edition hardcover of it. The updated bits were interesting.

I'm not finding the eBook version of this in North America.

Guess it must be time to do some traveling...

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by CRussel

I'm not finding the eBook version of this in North America.

Guess it must be time to do some traveling...

I think it's only available direct from NESFA

https://www.nesfa.org/book/dreamweavers-dilemma-2-2-2/

$9.95, and I paid full price.

I found out about it because Lois posted about it on the discussion mailing list

https://lists.herald.co.uk/cgi-bin/m...fo/lois-bujold

(I only bother reading her (infrequent) posts to the list.)

[Nephesh]

I'm reading a book by Kader Abdolah, pen name of Iranian, naturalized Dutch, writer Hossein Sadjadi Ghaemmaghami Farahani. I think there isn't an English language edition of the book. Dutch title is Farao van de Vliet literally Pharaoh of the Vliet (canal, creek). I'm reading the Italian edition and title is translated as Il Faraone d'Olanda (The Pharaoh of Holland).