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May Reads


Garett Hornwood

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Finished reading Rogues by GRRM and Gardner Dozois. There were some real good stories in there.  

I also read/re read the illustrated edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone Loved it like always - really love that it is illustrated now. 

Still reading Mostly Harmless by Douglas Adams and The Bazaar of Bad Dreams  by Stephen King. Started reading George's Marvellous Medicine by Roald Dahl because I always seem to need to read a kids book. And started reading Reading Magic by Mem Fox 

 

 

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2 hours ago, Darth Richard II said:

...no?

That was sarcasm ;)

I think it was you who in some random thread, bashed his first  fantasy book for being too grimdark for Grimdarkness' sake. Also bashed another book ( forgot the name)  by Harper Voyager for the same reason.

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I read Elektrograd by Warren Ellis in a sitting.  Not a brag, of course; it probably tips the scales at about 30-35 pages but I really liked it.  A near future crime story, i guess, is what it is.  It reads a bit like a procedural ep. which usually wouldn't be enough for me but I've always loved an Ellis yarn.  Worth your time; considering how little of it will be required.  The afterward hints at possible future visitations to the realm but it was published in 2015 so :dunno: 

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Adrian Tchaikovsky's Spiderlight was a fun satirical swords-and-sorcery adventure, very much a D&D campaign / quest fantasy parody and quite funny in places, but with just enough character depth and drama to also serve as a satisfying version of the things it mocks.

 

Foz Meadows' An Accident of Stars I also found enjoyable as a semi-deconstruction of a subgenre -- in this case portal fantasy -- that also served as a good example of that subgenre, a book that takes a type of story and points out the problems with it, but repurposes the type's appealing ingredients and rebuilds them into something cooler rather than just setting fire to the whole thing. It's a debut novel and has some shaky pacing, and the writing ... this is hard to express: I don't think the writing's "bad," at all, it's only that the story tries to depict the characters feeling some pretty sophisticated, complicated emotions and Meadows' very good prose is maybe sometimes not quite practiced enough to capture these feelings without clunking now and then. What problems the prose has are down to the story's ambition. A book not without problems, but a very positive reading experience; there's a sequel and I'll certainly read it.

 

Now it's on to Palmer's Seven Surrenders! And, during breaks from that, to Juliet Marillier's third Blackthorn and Grim novel Den of Wolves, and to feeling cranky that this is probably the last book featuring these characters because sometimes the book gods are unjust creatures.

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Started reading The Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks she was a African American woman who died in the 1950s from cancer. Her cells were taken from her before she died and they have been very important to science and medicine. Her cells are called HeLa, and they have helped create some important treatment for medicine like the polio vaccine, chemotherapy, vitro fertilization, etc...  Her cells are also very important for knowing how cancer works and suppressing it, and helped develop drugs for treating lukemia, herpes, Parkinson's disease, STDs and so much. Her cells are harvested around the world today and continues to grow. Sad thing is is that Henrietta Lacks gets no acknowledgement and her family didn't even know that her cells have been harvested until a few years ago. It's a really good book. 

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On 5/21/2017 at 8:13 PM, Triskan said:

Every regular visitor to the lit forums knows that Darth Richard's favorite author is Stanek.  

 

Making my way though Dark Tower Volume II, and I have to say that I've concluded that King is a good writer for no reason other than coining the term "lobstrocity."  

You know whats sad? I've read some professionally published authors who i think are actually worse than Stanek in every respect. Some of them insanely popular too.

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1 hour ago, Knight of Ashes said:

Black House by Stephen King and Whitley Streiber.  Despite mentions of "the Beam", it took quite a few pages for me to realize that this story is connected to the Dark Tower's world.

Aren't all of King's books? :P 

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On Invalid Date at 9:00 AM, Jo498 said:

I am not even sure I ever finished that (could there be an edition without all the soap opera?) I also found it a mixed bag and disappointing later on.

It was very unusual. I would have to conclude that I liked it a lot, but its abrupt transition into romance and then war story a la The Red Badge of Courage sure is strange.

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