Hereward Posted January 5, 2007 Share Posted January 5, 2007 Here you go, Race: http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?showt...2014&st=100 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedEyedGhost Posted January 5, 2007 Share Posted January 5, 2007 Hmm, well, my reading of The Blade Itself was cruelly interrupted yesterday at around page 90... I turned the page, and instantly thought "Ouch, that's some bad POV discipline! ...hang on, what's going on? Is this a flashback?" ...it wasn't page 91, it was page 59 all over again; the bastard bookbinders had inserted a duplicate set of pages which meant that everything from 91 to 125 was missing. Now I have to take the bloody thing back to the shop; it was signed as well. Bah. That sucks. I hate it when books get screwed up. I'm about half way through and I'm really enjoying it so far. Glokta is a great character, and Ninefingers is also good as a POV character (I love his sense of humor!). My favorite none POVs at this point are Severard and Ardee. I'm laughing so hard I can hardly type! A locked cabinet? What else was in there? The shards of Narsil? Belgarath's toenail clippings? Does this mean I need to get a safe for my copies of The Blade Itself? Should they be insured? But seriously (well, not that seriously) is this the Forbidden Planet on Shaftsbury Avenue? That's just round the corner from me. Were you going to take it back there? I could maybe drop in and sign you another, if they've got stock. Don't know how many hardbacks are still out there . . . If you want to swing by Denver Colorado and sign my hardcover that would be awesome Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RaceBannon42 Posted January 5, 2007 Share Posted January 5, 2007 Here you go, Race: http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?showt...2014&st=100 Thanks H! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Abercrombie Posted January 5, 2007 Share Posted January 5, 2007 If you want to swing by Denver Colorado and sign my hardcover that would be awesome Or I could leave a signed copy for you on the desk of the Forbidden Planet on Shaftsbury avenue? Though now I think about it - isn't WorldCon going to be in Denver in a couple of years? If you can wait that long . . . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedEyedGhost Posted January 5, 2007 Share Posted January 5, 2007 Or I could leave a signed copy for you on the desk of the Forbidden Planet on Shaftsbury avenue? :cry: Though now I think about it - isn't WorldCon going to be in Denver in a couple of years? If you can wait that long . . . Now that, I might be able to do... and by then book three will be out, right? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
williamjm Posted January 5, 2007 Share Posted January 5, 2007 Hey, welcome to the board, Joe! And you may laugh, but Forbidden Planet even had the signed copy locked in a special cabinet (alongside the LoLL hardcover and other treasures) and they had to summon the Keeper of the Keys so I could buy it... Maybe they thought a signed badly-misprinted book had some rarity value and they were hoping for some interest from collectors I'm laughing so hard I can hardly type! A locked cabinet? What else was in there? The shards of Narsil? Belgarath's toenail clippings? Does this mean I need to get a safe for my copies of The Blade Itself? Should they be insured? This being Forbidden Planet, it wouldn't surprise me at all if there *was* a (cheap Chinese-made replica of) the shards of Narsil in there somewhere. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bellis Posted January 5, 2007 Share Posted January 5, 2007 Last book completed in 2006 - The Kite Runner Khaled Hosseini My parents made me read this. Despite that, it was not a bad book, consistently readable with a bittersweet ending. First book completed in 2007 - My Name is Red Orhan Pamuk. Excellent as should be expected from a Nobel winner. A murder mystery/philosophical treatise set in medieval Istanbul. Refreshing to get the perspective of a Turkish novelist writing quite obviously for a non-Western, Muslim audience (unlike Hosseini who seemed to write with Oprah's book club in mind). Wonderful world immersion, and a multiple POV structure beloved by many of Martin fans (you have to love Esther!). But warning - this book is ponderous on the nature of art and the artist and the divine. I needed several sittings to get through it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pat5150 Posted January 5, 2007 Share Posted January 5, 2007 Well, it is true, the unsigned ones read just as well (or badly, depending on your opinion) as the signed ones. They have a locked cabinet for the Trade Paperback? Looks like I need to invest in some kind of underground vault . . . Holy crap! Joe, how much do you think my signed ARC of Before They Are Hanged could fetch!?! Patrick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yana Posted January 5, 2007 Share Posted January 5, 2007 Bag of Bones by Stephen King. I started it ages ago, but never finished it. I'm planning on doing it now. After that I'm planning on reading something by Guy Gavriel Kay. Never read anything by him. Any suggestions where I should start? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pat5150 Posted January 5, 2007 Share Posted January 5, 2007 After that I'm planning on reading something by Guy Gavriel Kay. Never read anything by him. Any suggestions where I should start? Tigana or The Lions of Al-Rassan would be perfect, I guess. I'm presently reading Kay's upcoming Ysabel myself, and it's great so far. Patrick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Agulla Posted January 5, 2007 Share Posted January 5, 2007 Very long post, sorry. I got carried away with my review-rant of Fugitives of Chaos. I need a blog, I know, I know. Rubicon, by Tom Holland. They say it reads like a novel and they are right: it reads like a novel. I had previously read Persian Fire by this same author and, even though it was a good read, I considered it to be inferior to Peter Green’s The Greco-Persian Wars and Barry Strauss’ Salamis. Rubicon, on the other hand it has a different pace and definitely it’s better. Tom Holland tries to stress those elements that make the roman more similar to our society and yet manages to explain how different their traditions and society were to ours. The downfall of the Roman Republic is one of the most fascinating stories and Tom Holland does a very good job in this account of this period of time. Fugitives of Chaos, by John C. Wright. Fantasy and Science Fiction novels dealing with Greek mythology have been a trend in the last years. Dan Simmons used the Iliad to vent his fears and hates in Ilium/Olympos, Richard Bowes recreated the history of the USA last century and turned the Kennedy’s Camelot into a sort of Arcadia in his great novel From the Files of Time Rangers. And now John C. Wright builds a coming of age story of English schoolboys and schoolgirls around Hesiod’s Theogony. So we have a group of teenage English schoolboys and schoolgirls than instead to solving your usual mystery about a robbery, a smuggler den, a supposedly haunted manor, you know, those things that English kids in groups of five do, well, instead of doing what is culturally expected of them they set upon discovering who they are, why do they have incredible powers, why are they secluded in a very special school and never allowed to leave it and who their teachers are. And John C. Wright does it very well. He manages to recreate the conflict between the Olympic Gods and the Titans and give it a modern and scientific feeling without losing the ancient flavour. We have different paradigms clashing and mixing, intrigues among the gods and the threat of something terrible in the horizon. Fugitives of Chaos is the second book after Orphans of Chaos and it continues the story started there. There are moments when I felt frustrated with the characters endlessly discussing cosmological matters, in some cases in situations that seemed unreal. But my main complain is not this, my main complain is that the author did not develop the main theme of this trilogy enough, yes, those of you who have read the first two books know very well what I’m talking about: Amelia’s kinks! Because let’s get clear once for all: there are moments when I have the impression that this book is not about Olympic Gods and Titans of Chaos, neither about multidimensional beings, nor about a group of youngsters growing up and finding who they are. No, there were moments when I suspected that the point of this trilogy was to see the heroine of the story, the brave Amelia Windrose, tied up, and gagged, and blindfolded and, (gasps) spanked, all of this at the same time and over and over again. Yes Amelia, our dear Child of Chaos should be worried, because friends and foes seem to want the same; spank her. I think that the author should have taken Jacqueline Carey’s path and be done with it, less cosmological chit chat and more kinks. He still has time to steer the story in this direction in the third book; Titans of Chaos. “Amelia dear, you’ve been a very naughty girl...†The Fairy Feller’s Master Stroke, by Mark Chadbourn. A novella about the role of fantasy in our reality. What happens when we try to discover something marvellous in our lives, something that goes beyond the dullness of the real world that surrounds us? This story is about a quest, a quest for a mystery, to discover something hidden, but even more important, to make this secret real, to flesh it, to give it substance beyond our dreams and imagination. I suppose that this is something many are familiar about. Gates of Fire, by Steven Pressfield. I picket this novel last day when shopping; it was a Spanish translation, a paperback. Knowing a few things about the Persian Wars and Greece in V century B.C. I have to say that I started reading this book with historian eyes and soon I found a few nits to pick, here and there, some of them were important, others far less. As I read more and more it didn’t matter anymore, I didn’t care if a character speaks about Athens navy before this city build her navy (Athens was notoriously weak in naval terms until few years before Xerxes invaded), it didn’t matter that there weren’t almost no references to certain disturbing elements of the Spartan agoge. What mattered to me was that the characters were so much alive, what mattered was that the author managed to introduce his great antagonist in the tale in a way that everything turned around him. The antagonist was not Xerxes; the antagonist was Phobos (fear). This novel is about fear and how we react to it, why some stay beside their friends and why others succumb to it. It’s a story of friendship and searching the opposite of fear, the no-fear that one of the characters seeks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Abercrombie Posted January 6, 2007 Share Posted January 6, 2007 Holy crap! Joe, how much do you think my signed ARC of Before They Are Hanged could fetch!?! Patrick Yes, Pat, I have made you a rich man. You owe me BIG. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nyarlathotep Posted January 6, 2007 Share Posted January 6, 2007 Currently wrapping up my first reread of the series. Skipping Dany's chapters this time around - find that it makes the series read a whole lot better, makes it feel more.. consistent. Probably shouldn't be doing rereads when my bookshelves are overflowing with unread books, but ah, such are the horrors of war. Thinking about doing either The Thousandfold Thought (which I finally got around to acquire - was originally planning to pick up the MMPB in June, but I broke down and bought the trade paperback the other day) or The Blade Itself next. Suspect I'll wind up going with TTT since I found the two preceding volumes to be highly enjoyable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ahimsa Posted January 6, 2007 Share Posted January 6, 2007 I just finally got a copy of Layer Cake which I really liked. The movie definitely improved some bits but I like the extra details in the novel. One of the more engaging reads I've had in a while. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Dracarys Posted January 6, 2007 Share Posted January 6, 2007 Sister threw the book Wicked at me and told me to read it, so thats what I've been reading thus far. However, other books to be read this month are: Starship Troopers, The Things They Carried, and re-reading Clash of Kings and Storm of swords. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Werthead Posted January 6, 2007 Share Posted January 6, 2007 Or I could leave a signed copy for you on the desk of the Forbidden Planet on Shaftsbury avenue? Though now I think about it - isn't WorldCon going to be in Denver in a couple of years? If you can wait that long . . . A bunch of us were in the O'Neills opposite Forbidden Planet a couple of weeks back. We'd have invited you over for a beer if we'd known! My copy of The Blade Itself sits on the shelf, awaiting reading. Hell, I'll probably make it my next book once I finish off the last Flashman novel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yrael Posted January 6, 2007 Share Posted January 6, 2007 FINALLY through with The Stone of Farewell. I feel like celebrating!! Seriously, the book could have been MUCH shorter! Jeezum! For once I didn't feel bad skimming most chapters of a book. Up next some mystery: Grave Surprise by Charlaine Harris. Should be light and fun and SHORT. I'm going on a literary diet for the next couple of months. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedEyedGhost Posted January 7, 2007 Share Posted January 7, 2007 FINALLY through with The Stone of Farewell. I feel like celebrating!! Seriously, the book could have been MUCH shorter! Jeezum! For once I didn't feel bad skimming most chapters of a book. Have you picked up To Green Angel Tower yet? If you thought The Stone of Farewell was long then you haven't seen anything yet. Way. Too. Long. I think that entire series could have been about a 1000 pages shorter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Wolf Maid Posted January 7, 2007 Share Posted January 7, 2007 Just finished Swordspoint by Ellen Kushner, looking forward to tracking down Lions of Al-Rassan by Kay. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rooster Posted January 7, 2007 Share Posted January 7, 2007 This isn't really my January reading, but my Christmas & New Year vacation reading. Cook's Sung in Blood was very enjoyable, as has everything I've read by him. The plot was set in a handful of pages and the ass kicking started in another handful, now that's what I call plot development. The end was a bit... Cartoony though. After Cook I made myself finish Harrison's Viriconium cycle, the Pastel City was absolutely dull with only one character (the dwarf) being even remotely interesting. I can't believe I actually read that part the fastest despite the fact I disliked it the most. A Storm of Wings was enjoyable however, again not because of its characters but simply because it was weird in a nice way. In Viriconium and the short stories went by well, and read well but in the end my feelings were pretty much in the "Uh... Okay" category. There didn't seem to be any point in some (or all) of them. All in all a disappointing experience. I couldn't ignore Scott Lynch's Lies of Locke Lamore after all the hype it has got and that happened to be next on my list. A very satisfying read, especially Locke's illicit machinations were a joy. The interludes were interesting but sometimes made the reading disjointed, especially in the beginning. The end was a bit too neat though. Technically an excellent book but I didn't mind putting it out of my way for short whiles which tells a bit. The Falconer was an utterly classy villain though, now there's a man who likes his job. Joe Abercrombie's the Blade Itself was next. Nothing extraordinary but done in such a way that it didn't really matter. I think the humour was what got to me the most, Glokta's monologues and Logen's attitude were great, but when Black Dow hurtled down the hill screaming "Fucking Flatheads!" it was magnificent. I haven't had such a good laugh at a book in a while. Reading about Logen's posse was perhaps the best thing in the book. I'm a bit worried about the next books though, since "the trip" is something that could go so wrong. I finally got my hands on Eve Forward's Villains by Necessity. The beginning is always the hardest and in here I thought the book would suck majorly but 'twasn't so. It expanded on that and while it never really achieved any stellar ground it was fine overall. Wasn't worth what I paid for it but I have no regrets. Finally there's Sean Russell's Gatherer of Clouds, on which I set to immediately despite remembering almost nothing of the earlier book. There were a few easy solutions to some of the problems in the book and a few POV chapters on which I had about as much interest in as putting the Christmas decorations away again, but I felt it succeeded on most if not all points what made me read the books. That's why it was a pity that the last page gave a really sour aftertaste on an otherwise fine novel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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