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

[Luffy]

Originally Posted by LDB

It's time for the quinquennial reading of The Cuckoo's Egg by Cliff Stoll.

Thank you for bringing this book to my attention.

[Dr. Drib]

Finished Slob, by Rex Miller. (This book was mentioned in a few earlier posts by me.)

I cannot recommend this dated book of a fat, disgusting 450-pound killing machine who spends most of his time in a sewer. But not because of the wonderful premise inherent in the novel! The reason I cannot recommend this story is because the narrative is dated and the emotional HI-JINKS AND CAPS IN THE NOVEL whine for attention, at the expense of a rational plot.

Rex Miller was a writer who fell in love with his characters, but somehow forgot about story and plausibility.

I really love characters who are disgustingly fat, so I think I'll look for that 'Fat Vampire' book by Truant and see if it satisfies my craving for 'obese horror'.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Which was very good, but I was just a tad disappointed with the ending. 4/5

Next up: A random pick, The Collected Stories by Arthur C Clarke. 1183 pages of short stories! I picked this up five years ago, so it's time I read it.

If I get tired, I might pick a quick novel to read as an intermission in this massive tome.

Half way through! And I've picked up some splendid books in the meantime. So I'll take a quick break with Lifelode by Jo Walton.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Half way through! And I've picked up some splendid books in the meantime. So I'll take a quick break with Lifelode by Jo Walton.

A fascinating world with a strange time structure and magic system, and the story architecture reflects that. The ebook formatting should be better. I enjoyed it a lot.

Now continuing the collected stories of Arthur C. Clarke.

[Uncle Robin]

1/4 done with Nobody's Perfect by Douglas Clark, the first in his Masters and Green series. Its listed publishing date is 1969, but given the attitude it displays toward women, I'm assuming they accidentally omitted the "B.C.E" after "1969". As an example a female pharmacist describes feminism thus:

I should have thought you could have told I was a feminist, just from looking at me. It’s a pastime of the not over-intelligent but definitely below-par-in-looks type of woman

[alansplace]

Last week I finished reading Jim Butcher's 17th Dresden Files novel, Battle Ground and as usual with the Dresden series, I really liked it!

I had just received my pre-order of Martin L. Shoemaker's 2nd Near-Earth Mysteries novel, The Last Campaign. I finished it just now and liked it a whole lot!

[zakman]

About to start Leviathan Wakes, first in James S. A. Corey's The Expanse series.

Slightly difficult to settle on a book at the moment, especially since the 'to-read' pile (well, virtual pile) keeps growing and growing. I swear, they must multiply when I'm not looking...

[Uncle Robin]

Reading Gaston Le Roux's The Mystery of the Yellow Room", suppose to be one of the archetypal locked room mysteries. Dense early 20th-Century English prose is challenging enough, more so when it's a translation.

[cc_in_oh]

Originally Posted by zakman

About to start Leviathan Wakes, first in James S. A. Corey's The Expanse series.

Slightly difficult to settle on a book at the moment, especially since the 'to-read' pile (well, virtual pile) keeps growing and growing. I swear, they must multiply when I'm not looking...

Expanse is terrific SF IMO. IIRC I had to restart the first book after 100 pages or so to get the characters and plot straight, then it was a smooth ride. The TV adaptation on Prime is also not bad - I don't like the main cast much but some of the minor characters are excellent.

[ReadingManiac]

I've been really enjoying Incubation by Adrienne Lecter.

It was a freebie first of series indie and I'm getting close to the end and seeing half a dozen books to continue, but I've really been getting into it.

Deadly virus makes some people reanimate and get violent sort of story. The character development is really good.

[bizzybody]

Originally Posted by zakman

About to start Leviathan Wakes, first in James S. A. Corey's The Expanse series.

Slightly difficult to settle on a book at the moment, especially since the 'to-read' pile (well, virtual pile) keeps growing and growing. I swear, they must multiply when I'm not looking...

The Expanse is a very good book series. The 4th book, "Cibola Burn", is pretty long with a bunch of plot threads, despite mostly being set on and around one of the planets in a system accessible through one of the portals.

The 4th season of the TV series is mostly based on the 4th book but cuts out a lot, and weaves in some stuff from the next book. Waiting to see what the 5th season has for us, with the ending they put on the 4th.

[Uncle Robin]

Halfway through David Crystal's Making Sense: The Glamorous History of English Grammar. His love of the living, fluid, and anything but immutable nature of language is always a delight to read.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Now continuing the collected stories of Arthur C. Clarke.

And a good collection it is too, being all his short stories, from the first to the last. There are some brilliant stars in his main period. Some duffers, of course, but few and not terrible. 4/5 overall.

Next up: Tunnel Through the Deep by Harry Harrison. I read this ages ago as "A Transatlantic Tunnel, Hurrah!". It will be interesting to se if it holds up. It might be considered, from what I remember, very early steam-punk, written before that term (or even 'cyber-punk') was coined.

[Padraic73]

I'm on the 4th book, Rise of Endymion, of the Hyperion Cantos series by Dan Simmons. I have 11 books in my waiting to be read collection, so I'm not sure what will be next.

[LDB]

The Dead Daughter by Thomas Fincham. Very engaging. Definitely recommended.