March Reads

[Kat]

Now on Use of Weapons in my effort to read (well, listen to) the Culture books all before the end of the school year. The drones and ships are my favorite part of this series, and the narrator does the Xenophobe so well. :lol:

Also inspired by True Detective, I'm reading the complete works of Lovecraft. I think I might put it down, though, as one can only take so much horror and madness at once. A little tentacle goes a long way. Also I had a dream last night about an elder god with a prisoner whose mind aged normally but whose body aged in reverse, who would then be eaten once he was too small to resist. <_<

[Guinevere Seaworth]

Just finished The Help. Such a fantastic book, like nothing I've ever read before, and the author's note at the end just topped it off for me. Gave it 5 stars on Goodreads - I think I'll check out the film next.

I feel so lucky to have read so many great books this year. Up next is Burial Rites by Hannah Kent, which looks set to be just as good.

I loved the movie, and now I really want to the read the book because of your review.

Work has gotten in the way of reading lately, but I enjoyed The Weavers of Saramyr by Chris Wooding. Not as awesome as his Ketty Jay series, but a nice solid epic fantasy in an original Chinese inspired world with rifles and gunpowder.

The Skien of Lament, book 2 in the series is up next

[deleted01]

I loved the movie, and now I really want to the read the book because of your review.

Work has gotten in the way of reading lately, but I enjoyed The Weavers of Saramyr by Chris Wooding. Not as awesome as his Ketty Jay series, but a nice solid epic fantasy in an original Chinese inspired world with rifles and gunpowder.

The Skien of Lament, book 2 in the series is up next

I'd say definitely go for it. I found the different chapters really interesting, and I actually thought the author was black while reading it. Being a white woman myself, I don't suppose my opinion holds much weight on this matter, but the chapters came across as very genuine and real. My only "nitpick" is that I really want to know what happened to the ladies afterwards, which is a sign of a good book I suppose :p

[RedEyedGhost]

I've got it on my Kindle. Maybe I'll read it before diving into WoR

I think you'll enjoy it. It might be better to read after WoR, to cleanse you palate from Sanderson's fake cursing.

[Maester Llama]

Undead Martyr, Peterbound, RedEyedGhost: I'm very glad I made Fortune's Pawn sound good! Yeah, the occasional trite or clunky sentence aside it's awesome fun, and I'd join Red EyedGhost in encouraging you to give it a try. Initially I found the alien life in the book's space opera universe somewhat weaksauce -- bird people, lizard people --, but one of the species is much more fully-imagined by the end, so I'm hopeful that this problem will keep fixing itself across the series. It might indeed be a nice post-Sanderson book, because it would wash away the squeaky clean without reversing all the way into grimdark. Devi can swear and commit violence like a motherfucker -- she doesn't always choose to, it's not a showily or gratuitously foulmouthed / gorey book, but definitely many miles from Sanderson's very consciously clean style. I wouldn't say it's at all like, say, Richard Morgan -- Devi's a lot more positive about life and other people, at least some other people, than Morgan's Takeshi Kovacs.

Finally found an excerpt of Smylie's The Barrow, so tore through that in a free moment. Most intriguing. Not totally convinced by the characters at first glance, though most of the ones in this sample chapter appear to be redshirts anyway, with a couple notable exceptions. And this one character's apparent sex obsession had better be going somewhere of use. But the world feels interesting, and there are some nice atmospheric moments that cross swords-and-sorcery adventure with creepiness. Very cautious, but very interested.

SkynJay: Thanks for replying about the Larke book. I haven't read the Stormlord stuff yet, but have heard good things, and if this one works out I'll have to look them up. Definitely very intrigued by Lascar's Dagger.

I'm rereading Ursula Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness. It's a wonderful feeling to read something that is just so surpassingly excellent on a formal level, and I love the world. I'm not sure how well the sf thought experiment about androgeny has aged, but it still contains thought-provoking points. I'm noticing the narrator's sexism / assumptions about gender a lot more this time through -- and I think they really are the narrator's assumptions, and that the book's deploying them very deliberately to highlight the assumptions that the people on Winter don't make, but they read a lot like some of the misogynism in the same author's A Wizard of Earthsea from right around the same time and it's weirding me out. A wonderful book I'm glad I had the chance to go back to.

[Multaniette]

Maester Llama,

here is an interesting article by Maya Jaggi, with recollections from le guin herself, touching upon the themes you were kind of ruminating over

"The germ of The Left Hand of Darkness was a society that had never known war. But the inhabitants are androgynous ("the king was pregnant"). "I eliminated gender to find out what was left," she later wrote. Some feminists carped at her use of the pronoun "he" of her androgyns. But the writer Sarah LeFanu sees the questioning of masculinity and femininity as prescient: "She was asking how we live now, and how we might live. She writes wonderfully about what it means to be human."

Girls were barred from the Earthsea school for wizards. "While in science fiction I was destroying gender, my imagination in fantasy was more traditional." She found herself "reborn slowly, over 15 years; I evolved with second-stage feminism"

[MisterOJ]

Look out, I'm on a Sanderson bender. :drunk:

I finished Steelheart last night. Picked it up off Amazon a week or two ago for $5. It was a good deal and a good book. I enjoyed it quite a bit and it left me wanting more of that series. So, good job Brandon.

And, with that out of the way, I started Words of Radiance. Just made it through the prologue before getting too sleepy to carry on, but it was a good beginning. I really like what he did with it. This is going to be another fun read, I think.

[ljkeane]

I just finished Santa Olivia by Jacqueline Carey which was really good. It's sort of a strange mix of post apocalyptic dystopian sci fi, slightly odd paranormal romance and Rocky but it works.

[peterbound]

Undead Martyr, Peterbound, RedEyedGhost: I'm very glad I made Fortune's Pawn sound good! Yeah, the occasional trite or clunky sentence aside it's awesome fun, and I'd join Red EyedGhost in encouraging you to give it a try. Initially I found the alien life in the book's space opera universe somewhat weaksauce -- bird people, lizard people --, but one of the species is much more fully-imagined by the end, so I'm hopeful that this problem will keep fixing itself across the series. It might indeed be a nice post-Sanderson book, because it would wash away the squeaky clean without reversing all the way into grimdark. Devi can swear and commit violence like a motherfucker -- she doesn't always choose to, it's not a showily or gratuitously foulmouthed / gorey book, but definitely many miles from Sanderson's very consciously clean style. I wouldn't say it's at all like, say, Richard Morgan -- Devi's a lot more positive about life and other people, at least some other people, than Morgan's Takeshi Kovacs.

Finally found an excerpt of Smylie's The Barrow, so tore through that in a free moment. Most intriguing. Not totally convinced by the characters at first glance, though most of the ones in this sample chapter appear to be redshirts anyway, with a couple notable exceptions. And this one character's apparent sex obsession had better be going somewhere of use. But the world feels interesting, and there are some nice atmospheric moments that cross swords-and-sorcery adventure with creepiness. Very cautious, but very interested.

SkynJay: Thanks for replying about the Larke book. I haven't read the Stormlord stuff yet, but have heard good things, and if this one works out I'll have to look them up. Definitely very intrigued by Lascar's Dagger.

I'm rereading Ursula Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness. It's a wonderful feeling to read something that is just so surpassingly excellent on a formal level, and I love the world. I'm not sure how well the sf thought experiment about androgeny has aged, but it still contains thought-provoking points. I'm noticing the narrator's sexism / assumptions about gender a lot more this time through -- and I think they really are the narrator's assumptions, and that the book's deploying them very deliberately to highlight the assumptions that the people on Winter don't make, but they read a lot like some of the misogynism in the same author's A Wizard of Earthsea from right around the same time and it's weirding me out. A wonderful book I'm glad I had the chance to go back to.

Eta: it sounded mean. Suffice to say REG recommending had a lot more to do with me picking it up than your rec.

[Alytha]

Words of Radiance has landed. Nice brick :)

Have to finish Kushiel's Dart first though.

[williamjm]

I finished Ian Esslemont's Blood and Bone. I think it had a lot of good elements although I'm not quite sure they came together as well as they could have done (I could probably say something similar about Esslemont's other books as well). I liked the jungle setting where most of the book was set, it made a nice contrast to typical settings. There seem to be a lot of epic journeys through deserts in fantasy novels (including several of the other Malazan books) but struggling through the jungle seems rarer and it offers a different challenges - too much life rather than too little. The characterisation was fine, but I'm not sure I'd say any of the characters were compelling - while Erikson's characterisation can be very variable, at his best I think he's better than his fellow Malazan author. The individual plotlines were interesting but I think other than the common setting and the fact they coincidentally conclude simultaneously they didn't necessarily interact that much.

Now I've started Neil Gaiman's American Gods. I haven't deliberately chosen to do so but I seem to be reading lots of Hugo winners this year. It's one of those books I feel I should have read already but never got round to, I've heard plenty of good things about it although I think I've noticed a significant number of people didn't like it as well. It seems good so far.

[Maester Llama]

Peterbound: Oh, I certainly assumed your picking it up had more to do with the recommendation of the person who's been here for years, though I can see how my post doesn't make that clear. I was trying to address Undead Martyr, who was so kind as to say my description of the book made it sound cool, yourself and REG at the same time and it didn't really work.

Multaniette: Thanks very much for linking the article on Left Hand and Earthsea. The quote looks fascinating and I'm looking forward to reading the whole thing once I'm through my reread of Left Hand of Darkness.

Nearing the end of said reread. The way the interiority of the characters and the setting work together in the section set on the glacier is still amazingly good. I really really like this book. After Left Hand I'm not sure where I'll go. This Red Rising thing that seems to be getting some buzz just showed up at the library so maybe I'll read that.

[Starkess]

I finished Precursor. Atevi in space! It was interesting but not overly compelling. While I enjoy the atevi books, they tend to be very slow and then have very rushed endings, and this one was no exception. But I did like the expansion of the world and am looking forward to continuing the series. Unfortunately it is not available for Kindle, so I shall have to order another physical book and wait. This was the first physical book I read in ages and it was really annoying. :(

In the meantime, I think I will pick up something by Elizabeth Bear as I have seen her name pop up all over the place lately. Not sure where to start, though. My default is to go by publication order, but are there series of hers that are more compelling to start with?

[The Imperator]

I finished Magnificent Delusions: Pakistan, the United States, and an Epic History of Misunderstanding by Husain Haqqani at the beginning of this month. I enjoyed it a lot.

[King Tyrion I]

I'm still reading Daniel Tammet's "Thinking in Numbers". It's really great.

[deleted01]

Finished Burial Rites today while sitting in the park and enjoying the sunshine. Fantastic novel, unlike anything I've read before - definitely worth a go if you're interested in Iceland in the late 1800's, a real case of murder and the story of Agnes, the last woman to be executed in Iceland.

Not sure what's next, need to check my TRP. I've been reading pretty quickly so far this year, getting through a book in a few days. I need to slow down :laugh:

[Peadar]

I have started Spin Control, sequel to Spin State by Chris Moriarty. Good so far.

[mashiara]

I was not really happy with Emperor of Thorns. While I appreciate what the author was trying to do, it just didn't click for me. I really didn't like how it ended either. I loved the first book in its grittiness and darkness, I enjoyed the second.. this one, not so much.

I made quick work of Pale Demon by Kim Harrison. Fluff, enjoyable most times, but as it happens with every series that long, phrases and actions have become repetitive and you just have to groan and roll your eyes sometimes.

I'm now reading The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller. Enjoying it so far.

[SkynJay]

The Lascar's Dagger by Glenda Larke was intersting but I think it is more of a promising start to a new trilogy than a real good book on it's own, if that even makes since. I loved the age of exploration like setting, and parts of it worked well, but outside of one secondary charater I didn't really click with it like I did Larke's Stormlord trilogy. It was a book that needed more big picture stuff and less focusing in on people I just didn't like in order to work for me.

Yesterday I read Generation V by M. L. Brennan. I read it in one day, and it was awesome. The book has a horrible cover that looks like a CW teen show, a horrible title, but damn was it a hoot. So today I jumped right into it's follow up, Iron Night. And so far, just as awesome.

[deleted01]

Started Affinity by Sarah Waters. So far, it's not what I was expecting, but I'll see how it goes.