Jump to content

February 2012 - Leap Year Reads?


jdiddyesquire

Recommended Posts

Up next -- I can barely wait -- Nick Harkaway's Angelmaker.

Oh you son of a... soon as I saw this, I tried to buy the ebook but it won't let me buy from Amazon UK. Have to wait till March 20th, here. [grumbles]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Finished Kitty and the Midnight Hour in one night. For as much as I like the series, I forgot how mediocre the first book was. Kitty is actually a pretty weak character early on. Reading the second one now, which my memory says is one of the best.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The Last Werewolf by Glenn Duncan. Decent story with a sense of humour but spoiled somewhat by rather pretentious narration.

Started Books of Blood volume 1 by Clive Barker. Pretty solid so far.

Considering a number of novels to start now, Rendezvous With Rama by Clarke, The Hammer by KJ Parker, The Sister Brothers by Patrick Dewitt or The Tigers Wife by Tea Obreht.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Now on to Life and Times of Michael K by J. M. Coetzee.

I'd be very interested to hear what you thought of this one. It's probably the Coetzee book I've read I've had the hardest wrapping my mind around as I read it but the one that I remember the most. I honestly don't know if I liked it or not.

Finished Richard Dowden's Africa: Altered States and Ordinary Miracles, it read a little bit like Ryszard Kapuscinski's Shadow Under the Sun, though no where near Kapuscinskis breathtaking talent for explaining and describing. I enjoyed it, the last chapter especially is about the chinese presence in Africa and their quite extensive expansion. Some reservations about it too, which was very interesting since I feel like a lot of what I've heard from some African leaders has been overly optimistic.

Finished Molefi Kete Asante's A History of Africa even the Mugabe and Gadaffi apologeticism aside it was bad. Seeemed like half the references were from his own previous works and the utter bias was palpable.

Also read a detailed account of Fritz Haber's Nobel prize in Chemistry by James Cavallie. The statements of the academy at the time, the press reactions and the statements and reactions of Haber himself. This one was very controversial in sweden due to the fact that all nobel prize winners within science that year (1918) were german and Haber's influence on gas used in battle.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Finished The Devil's Graveyard by Anonymous, the third of the Bourbon Kid books. It was just about on the edge of still being ok, but pretty flat in terms of plot. Lots of splatter though, if you like that kind of thing.

Now most of the way through Heirs of the Blade by Tchaikovsky, which is pretty good. Poor Tynisa :(

The Life and Times of Michael K is about the book I hate most in the whole wide world, which is the result of having to read it in the class of the biggest arsehole ever to call himself an English teacher, and the protagonist being an absolute idiot. (to the eyes of an 18-year-old anyway.) I almost burned my copy afterwards, but settled on giving it away.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm glad no one tried to get between me and The Iron Dragon's Daughter this last couple of days.

Poor Jane. She's just, you know, trying to get ahead and go to college and stuff.

Last book finished was Empire in Black and Gold by Adrian Tchaikovsky, and it was was interesting, with its guild-like societies, but these people are identified as bug-kinden. Spider, Scorpion, Mantis, Moth, and so on. The Wasps are the bad guys. Make of that what you will, LOL. It doesn't come off as just Elves and Dwarves by other names.

I am forcing myself to finish several scifi and fantasy series. I'm currently on the endless To Green Angel Tower, by a master of bloat who ranks with King and Jordan and the best of them, Tad Williams, and that is followed by the ambiguously fey duo of Damien and the Hunter in C. S. Fredman's Coldfire trilogy. It is intriguing to read, because Friedman has no clue how men think, does she? :P This is like lite Harlequin slash, anticipating the whole Vampire fad. Deep into bad fantasy at the moment.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

i had some free time this morning and i was away from the kindle so i picked up The Life of Pi on a lark. i haven't been able to put it down. i usually juggle a couple of books at a time but i'm fairly certain, at this point anyway, that i'm sticking with it until the end.

a truly wonderful read so far. :cheers:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

i had some free time this morning and i was away from the kindle so i picked up The Life of Pi on a lark. i haven't been able to put it down. i usually juggle a couple of books at a time but i'm fairly certain, at this point anyway, that i'm sticking with it until the end.

a truly wonderful read so far. :cheers:

I agree. I loved 99% of it, but there was one scene about halfway through or so that literally made me want to vomit. Why he put it in there was beyond me. It did nothing for the story, IMO.

Btw, Ang Lee is directing the movie adaptation. Hopefully he won't keep that foul scene in there. And hopefully the animals won't be all cgi.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I agree. I loved 99% of it, but there was one scene about halfway through or so that literally made me want to vomit. Why he put it in there was beyond me. It did nothing for the story, IMO.

Btw, Ang Lee is directing the movie adaptation. Hopefully he won't keep that foul scene in there. And hopefully the animals won't be all cgi.

Interesting. I found Life of Pi to be an easy read but pretty average in terms of content and theme, didn't do much for me though I think I can see why it became so famous.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I agree. I loved 99% of it, but there was one scene about halfway through or so that literally made me want to vomit. Why he put it in there was beyond me. It did nothing for the story, IMO.

Btw, Ang Lee is directing the movie adaptation. Hopefully he won't keep that foul scene in there. And hopefully the animals won't be all cgi.

Been some years since I read it so I'm a little fuzzy on which scene you're talking about. Wanna put it in spoiler tags for me?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Been some years since I read it so I'm a little fuzzy on which scene you're talking about. Wanna put it in spoiler tags for me?

Been awhile since I've read it too. If memory serves, it's

when Pi eats or at least considers eating Tiger poop.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Took a break from some 'real reading' to read Transmetropoliton Volume 1. It was good, very funny sometimes though I'm not sure if I want to invest any more money just for the humor. Also, I finished reading Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad, which I hadn't read since High School. It was good, I definitely enjoyed it more this time, despite the writing being very accurately described as '95 pages of drunken rambling.'

Well, back to juggling The Idiot and The Hunger Games.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...