November 2018 Reading - remember, remember the blade of Ember

[john]

I’ve also recently finished Derfel’s Resurrection Men. It’s well written, plotted and structured. Very impressive. I liked the Glasgow locales and patois but if you’re not into that there’s also abundant dark conspiracies, vampire lore and Victorian melodrama. Thoroughly enjoyable.  Amazon review is upcoming.

Next I’m going to finish up Jasper Fforde’s Early Riser.

[Derfel Cadarn]

5 hours ago, john said:

I’ve also recently finished Derfel’s Resurrection Men. It’s well written, plotted and structured. Very impressive. I liked the Glasgow locales and patois but if you’re not into that there’s also abundant dark conspiracies, vampire lore and Victorian melodrama. Thoroughly enjoyable.  Amazon review is upcoming.

Next I’m going to finish up Jasper Fforde’s Early Riser.

Thanks!  

I had to ease up on the Glaswegian. A: I don't know how to write like people spoke back then, and B: If I did, very few would understand it. It would make Trainspotting look like Jane Austen.

Curious if anyone spotted the two ASoI&F nods in the book.

[Lord Patrek]

Just finished Steven Erikson's Willful Child: The Search for Spark. Things sometimes feel a bit rehashed, but it's as fun and entertaining as the previous two volumes.

[Peadar]

Just starting Bernard Cornwell's War of the Wolf.

[ljkeane]

On 11/28/2018 at 8:20 PM, Peadar said:

Just starting Bernard Cornwell's War of the Wolf.

Same here.

I had a couple of train journeys last weekend so I read Lies Sleeping.  I'm not quite sure how I feel about it. As a book it's pretty good, I enjoyed it anyway, but as a conclusion to most of the overarching story that we've been following for 7 books it's a little underwhelming I think.

Before that I read Brandon Sanderson's Skyward which is basically Top Gun in space with added Sanderson tractor beam thingies.

 

[Hello World]

A few chapters into Revelation Space, this setting is so good. This might turn out as one of the best Sci fi books I've read yet.

[williamjm]

3 hours ago, ljkeane said:

I had a couple of train journeys last weekend so I read Lies Sleeping.  I'm not quite sure how I feel about it. As a book it's pretty good, I enjoyed it anyway, but as a conclusion to most of the overarching story that we've been following for 7 books it's a little underwhelming I think.

I just finished Lies Sleeping as well. I liked the book. I might have to think a a bit more about how well it works as a conclusion to the story arc you mention. I think it is good that some plot threads are definitively tied up rather than just dragging on forever (I was a bit worried a couple of books ago that might happen).

In the previous books Martin Chorley has been built up as such a great threat that there's a slight anticlimax that he's essentially defeated by Peter accidentally knocking them both off a roof. It does seem odd that such a meticulous planner (who had not just one but two spare bells built for his plan) doesn't have anyone guarding him and Lesley when they start the final ritual. The earlier bit where they got caught in the underground car park was also clumsy (I'm a bit vague about what they were even doing there).

Having written the above I've also just realised that Chorley's contingency planning may have helped catch him, since if the Whitechapel Bell was originally one of the spares then constructing let the police find out what he was plotting.

I did like the dynamic earlier in the book where Chorley has many advantages in terms of resources and the police not knowing what his plans are, but still having to be cautious because for all his power he can't risk a direct confrontation with Nightingale. I guess Aaronovitch felt that Peter had to take him down on his own since he was his protagonist, but it might have made more sense to have a Lies of Locke Lamora-style plotline where Peter's role is just to keep Chorley busy until Nightingale shows up.

One thing the end did well was that it perfectly summed up the similarities and differences between Peter and Lesley. I think she's probably right that Chorley could never be contained safely in a prison, Peter probably realises this is true as well but he could never be ruthless enough to do what she did.

I always enjoy the supporting cast in these books. The Foxglove and Molly subplot was one of the highlights.

It'll be interesting to see what the story arc is for future books in the series. I'm sure Lesley will show up again, and Mr Punch seems to be on the loose again (if I'm understand the Londinium scene correctly). The legacy of the WW2 Nazi magicians buried in the Folly's cellars was brought up again, I'm assuming that some day that will be more than just a piece of background worldbuilding.

Next up I think I'll get started on GRRM's Fire and Blood.

[RedEyedGhost]

I read Seed by Ania Ahlborn.  It was pretty good, but not terribly scary and a bit predictable. 

Now I'm about halfway through Fellside by Mike Carey.  It's also not that scary, but is definitely unpredictable.  Really enjoying it so far.

Up next will be Lies Sleeping by Ben Aaronovitch.  Looking forward to it very much.

[Ormond]

I'm a little more than halfway through Deadhouse Gates, the second book in Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen series.

I read Gardens of the Moon, the first book in the series, years ago and remember liking it better than this one. I don't know if Erikson is having a problem with characterization, but it's hard for me to keep many of the characters separate in my mind and most of the incidents in the book, no matter which of the groups who are wandering around this huge desert area are being focused on, seem to be the same thing over and over again. The only two main characters I really like are the two historians, Duiker and Heboric (though Duiker's bodyguard Cpl. List has gotten a few good lines.) But I will keep reading if just to see what happens on the southern half of the map, which we haven't gotten to yet.

[Garett Hornwood]

I finished up November by completing Iceberg by Clive Cussler, the third Dirk Pitt book though second published.  While it was a quick paced book, it was a adventure/thriller book of it's time (the mid-1970s) and so a lot of things didn't age well namely something of things Pitt thinks, says, and does.  Honestly I'm not expecting much from these early books in Cussler's Dirk Pitt series so I wasn't surprise at the issues and the fact that Pitt was jerk (though less of one than in The Mediterranean Caper).

My last post I said I was going to be reading The Guide for the Perplexed by Moses Maimonides as my primary read, but after one day of reading it at work I though it would be a better decision to make it my "home" read where I'd get through at least 10 pages a day.  Over the past week I've found this working a lot better as I'm absorbing and understanding more of Maimonides treatise than I felt I was the one day I took it to work to read on my breaks.

[Werthead]

On 11/30/2018 at 10:37 PM, Hello World said:

A few chapters into Revelation Space, this setting is so good. This might turn out as one of the best Sci fi books I've read yet.

It's also probably the weakest book in the setting. Chasm City and the two direct sequels (Redemption Ark and Absolution Gap) are much stronger.

[Derfel Cadarn]

My thanks to those in this thread who read and left a review for Resurrection Men - greatly appreciated. 

Got 5 more Fitz books to go, then planning to re-read Gemmell's Rigante series. I'll also re-read books 1-3 of the Greatcloaks series before reading book 4.

[unJon]

6 hours ago, Werthead said:

It's also probably the weakest book in the setting. Chasm City and the two direct sequels (Redemption Ark and Absolution Gap) are much stronger.

Hmmm. IMO Absolution Gap is a hot mess. 

 

ETA: And yes I read Galactic North  

[Darth Richard II]

4 hours ago, unJon said:

Hmmm. IMO Absolution Gap is a hot mess. 

 

ETA: And yes I read Galactic North  

Yeah I would say AG is the weakest of them all, though I love them all.

[LongRider]

On 11/19/2018 at 12:31 PM, aceluby said:

I'm in the minority, but I really enjoyed the Dragon Keeper series.  First book is slow, but each book is successively better with a lot of backstory on the Elderlings and dragons.  If the lore interests you at all, I'd recommend at least one read through them.  

I read the entire Realm of the Elderlings series this fall and liked all of the series.  Really enjoyed Liveship Traders and although it's not necessary to read before The Rain Wild Chronicles, it does help with insights into the dragons.

 The Fitz trilogies were all good overall a great series with wonderful characters.  Ah the Fool, really liked that character the most.

 

[LongRider]

On 11/21/2018 at 4:55 PM, Darth Richard II said:

I enjoyed them too, particularly the later 2.

 

You push reading Hobbs frequently on these pages and it's because of you and others saying how good she is that I took the plunge (after checking that the library had all 16 books available).

i'm glad I did, thanks. 

[aceluby]

15 hours ago, LongRider said:

I read the entire Realm of the Elderlings series this fall and liked all of the series.  Really enjoyed Liveship Traders and although it's not necessary to read before The Rain Wild Chronicles, it does help with insights into the dragons.

 The Fitz trilogies were all good overall a great series with wonderful characters.  Ah the Fool, really liked that character the most.

 

I enjoyed them more than the Liveship Traders, which while still better than most stories, I enjoyed them the least.  I think it came down to the fact that I could connect with the kids who have nothing trying to make something for themselves more than I could the upper class traders from Bingtown.

[Darth Richard II]

On 11/30/2018 at 5:45 PM, williamjm said:

I just finished Lies Sleeping as well. I liked the book. I might have to think a a bit more about how well it works as a conclusion to the story arc you mention. I think it is good that some plot threads are definitively tied up rather than just dragging on forever (I was a bit worried a couple of books ago that might happen).

 

  Reveal hidden contents

In the previous books Martin Chorley has been built up as such a great threat that there's a slight anticlimax that he's essentially defeated by Peter accidentally knocking them both off a roof. It does seem odd that such a meticulous planner (who had not just one but two spare bells built for his plan) doesn't have anyone guarding him and Lesley when they start the final ritual. The earlier bit where they got caught in the underground car park was also clumsy (I'm a bit vague about what they were even doing there).

Having written the above I've also just realised that Chorley's contingency planning may have helped catch him, since if the Whitechapel Bell was originally one of the spares then constructing let the police find out what he was plotting.

I did like the dynamic earlier in the book where Chorley has many advantages in terms of resources and the police not knowing what his plans are, but still having to be cautious because for all his power he can't risk a direct confrontation with Nightingale. I guess Aaronovitch felt that Peter had to take him down on his own since he was his protagonist, but it might have made more sense to have a Lies of Locke Lamora-style plotline where Peter's role is just to keep Chorley busy until Nightingale shows up.

One thing the end did well was that it perfectly summed up the similarities and differences between Peter and Lesley. I think she's probably right that Chorley could never be contained safely in a prison, Peter probably realises this is true as well but he could never be ruthless enough to do what she did.

I always enjoy the supporting cast in these books. The Foxglove and Molly subplot was one of the highlights.

It'll be interesting to see what the story arc is for future books in the series. I'm sure Lesley will show up again, and Mr Punch seems to be on the loose again (if I'm understand the Londinium scene correctly). The legacy of the WW2 Nazi magicians buried in the Folly's cellars was brought up again, I'm assuming that some day that will be more than just a piece of background worldbuilding.

Next up I think I'll get started on GRRM's Fire and Blood.

 

Any book that has a reference to Sneakers(the film) automatically gets 1 million stars from me.

[red snow]

"heroes"  by Stephen Fry was excellent. Reminded me that the current trend of "gritty"  fantasy heroes is just how the classical world liked them. Most of the heroes featured have more in common with today's anti-heroes and spend as much time settling scores as they do repenting for violent outbursts. And the gods are horny and cruel indeed. I look forward to Fry's spin on the Trojan war and the odyssey which is apparently the final instalment next year.

[Peadar]

I enjoyed reading the most recent Cornwell book, although it really feels like it's running out of steam -- and not just because the character is older now.

I've started Dry by Neal and Jarrod Shusterman. It's very readable so far.