Second Quarter 2020 reading

[Zorral]

9 hours ago, The Marquis de Leech said:

I've just finished She (my reading kept being interrupted this past week, so I didn't have enough time to devote to it as I liked). I loved it - an action-packed adventure with some awesome worldbuilding, and mysterious supernatural elements.

I also kept noticing the long shadow Rider Haggard's book casts over the subsequent fantasy genre. I've seen people comparing She Who Must Be Obeyed to Tolkien's Galadriel, though I think that's really the tip of the iceberg. Tolkien's biggest borrowing is that the initial name of the Noldorin city in Valinor was... Kôr. There's also the Bridge over the Chasm scene too. 

(In non-Tolkien influences, the climax of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade clearly owes much to this book).

Then you're really going to want to read King Solomon's Mines and the sequel, Allan Quatermain.  He wrote a whole series of adventures for Quatermain.

 

[The Marquis de Leech]

7 hours ago, Zorral said:

Then you're really going to want to read King Solomon's Mines and the sequel, Allan Quatermain.  He wrote a whole series of adventures for Quatermain.

King Solomon's Mines was a childhood favourite of mine. I have yet to read the sequel.

[Spaßvogel]

It's cool people are enjoying She.  I read it in college in a class called "The Literary Superhero" and enjoyed it tremendously. 

[ljkeane]

Since the last time I posted in this thread I've finished The Empire of Gold which I was a bit disappointed with. Basically a lot of it felt a bit too convenient.

Spoiler

Firstly it was made a bit too easy for Nahri and company because Manizeh's plan to overthrow the al Qahtani's was just pretty rubbish. She's meant to be a genius, Kaveh's supposedly a very capable political figure, they've spent decades plotting and they don't seem to have any plan beyond assassinating Ghassan and killing some of the Royal guard. They haven't even got any of the important Daevas onside? How exactly were they ever planning to hold onto Daevabad?

Secondly, I might be unusual in this but I found most of the action focused bits fairly boring. For me the interesting thing about the series was how they were going to bring all these groups like the Daevas, Shafit and Geziri who hate each other together. I thought the building of the hospital was going to be key to that then Chakroborty just sort of abandons that and just has Manizeh be awful to just sort of skip through and patch things over.

I've also finished up Mark Lawrence's Book of the Ancestor trilogy with Holy Sister which was excellent. I'm glad he's going back that world in his new series and hopefully we get to see more of these characters too.

[williamjm]

I finished reading Charlie Jane Anders' The City in the Middle of the Night. I found it to be one of those somewhat frustrating books which do have some interesting elements but never really seem to develop their full potential. I thought it was an interesting setting, a tidally-locked planet where a human colony exists in a narrow strip between the equally inhospitable regions of constant day and constant night. Much of the story takes place in the two main cities, the rigidly structured society of Xiosphant and the anarchic Argelan. I thought Xiosphant was the more interesting of the two with some aspects that seemed fairly original while Argelan felt a bit more cliched. However, I felt the world-building was a bit shallow and this is particularly true of the third city which gives the book its title and seems potentially fascinating but the book only spends a brief amount of pages there.

I thought the book started off strongly but the pacing seemed to slow once it got to Argelan where it spent a lot of time on subplots that weren't all that interesting (such as Mouth's search for information about her former family). It got more interesting again later in the book but this section felt a bit rushed particularly as it approaches the finale. A major event takes place off-screen and doesn't seem very plausible and the book finishes very abruptly without really resolving its main plot points.

The characterisation can also be frustrating at times. Some of them do get some good character development through but one of them seems to abruptly turn into a Bond villain. It's also a book where the characters spend a lot of time not talking to each other about important things, it's maybe not unrealistic to have characters incapable of having a conversation about difficult topics but it is frustrating.

After that I read Ted Chiang's novella Anxiety is the Dizziness of Freedom. Chiang always comes up with some fascinating premises for his science fiction short stories and this is no exception, focusing on the implications of a technology which allows people to communicate with their own selves in parallel worlds and what they do with that information. Sometimes I feel Chiang's characters aren't as memorable as his ideas but I thought the character development worked well here and it felt like we got a plausible range of reactions to the technology. Overall, I thought this was a very good story.

Now I've started Seanan McGuire's In An Absent Dream.

[RedEyedGhost]

It's been awhile since I posted in a reading thread, but I think the last book I had talk about was The October Man.   After that I rolled into A Little Hatred by Abercrombie.  That was a really good start to the new series, and I think I'm enjoying it more the further I get away from it.  Although the ending was very unsurprising.  Definitely looking forward to the next one.  

Then I went back to Aaronovitch with his latest book - False Value.  I liked it, but didn't love it.  Probably the least engaging of the series for me.  I know it was supposed to feel smaller, after the end of the previous book, but that definitely led to that lack of engagement.  I actually preferred The October Man - the smaller scope just worked better there.  

Next up was City of Blades by Robert Jackson Bennett.  I was thinking it would be the same protagonist as in City of Stairs, and didn't care too much for Mulagesh at the beginning of the story, but wow, what a journey that was.  Really enjoyed that one.

I also read the latest Alex Verus novel - Fallen.  Blazed through this one, after the first 40% was feeling like more of the same, it really kicked off in a big time way.  Very glad I started taking a bit of time in between the latter books of the series, as now I don't have to wait quite so long before the next one is released.

Saturday I finished Nightfall by Asimov and Silverberg.  This one took quite awhile to get through.  It's a novel expanded to a full book from an Asimov short story, and I think it was just too much.  I had a couple of points were I was really interested (right before the titular event and right at the very end), but mostly it couldn't hold my interest as I had a very hard time ignoring how ridiculous the psychology of it all felt.  The astronomy of when night actually fell didn't work that well either, as well as the biology of their eyes.  

Spoiler

I mean, if the stars are so bright and close, shouldn't they be visible during normal daytime?  Maybe I'm underestimating how bright it is there during day, but if that is the case their ability to dark adapt would be nonexistent.  So if the stars were unable to be seen during the day their vision would be so bad as to render them invisible in the dark...

Now I'm starting a full reread of The Dresden Files.  Will probably be skipping the short story collections though.

[ljkeane]

Trying to stick with making an effort to reread more of my old books I reread Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel's Scion. It's been a while since I read these books and I remembered the general outline of what happened but I'd forgotten quite how out there these books are. I enjoy them but I've got no idea how the first series in particular got published 20 years ago. Can you imagine going to your boss and giving a general outline of the first book and suggesting a big international release?

[IlyaP]

Having waited months for it to be released, I eagerly snapped up Stephanie Kelton's new book The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and How to Build a Better Economy, which explains in beautifully clear and understandable English what modern monetary theory (MMT) is all about, how it works, and why it's relevant (TL;DR: MMT seeks to explain how economies work in observed practice rather than in theory). Have blasted through half the book within a few days. Highly interesting book thus far, with many interesting observations and ideas. 

More spec-fic related, I've learned a new Tolkien book is coming out. Huzzah! 

[Underfoot]

Picked up the Inheritance trilogy by N.K. Jemisin and just finished the first book. Wondering where the story goes from here. It's a very self contained first book and the later two must have a very different set of characters / storylines. 

I guess...

following Itempas through his mortal journeys? Seeing more of the world, now changed and chaotic?

[Wilbur]

I finished Christian Cameron's final book in The Long War series entitled The Rage of Ares (2016).  All six books were a pleasure to read, and the conclusion of this story with the Battle of Mycale set a nice capstone on the story of Arimnestos of Plataea.  Well-written, well researched, well plotted, it was all high quality stuff.  Thank you to this thread and the poster therein that recommended it to me.

Probably the highlight for me was the manner in which the author portrayed the divide between the Ionian Greeks and the Attic Greeks, both in terms of culture and wealth.  He also did a nice job of explaining the political pressures that the Ionian Greeks faced from the Persians due to the land border in Asia that the Greeks on the Peloponesse were free of because of the Aegean Sea.  And he did so within the lives of the characters rather than in a didactic chunk of text.

Finally, all six books are framed by the device of Arimnestos, now an old man, telling the stories in the evenings leading up to his daughter's wedding.  This is very effective both from providing an avenue for after-the-fact commentary and to humanize the characters, as the reader begins to realize who is who in the main story and within the framing device of the wedding feast.  Also, the story teller is able to inject some good sarcasm by saying things like, "And so I was killed and went down to Hades.  No, of course not, don't look like that, I am reclining right here."

[HexMachina]

19 hours ago, Underfoot said:

Picked up the Inheritance trilogy by N.K. Jemisin and just finished the first book. Wondering where the story goes from here. It's a very self contained first book and the later two must have a very different set of characters / storylines. 

I guess...

  Hide contents

following Itempas through his mortal journeys? Seeing more of the world, now changed and chaotic?

 

I was puzzling for a while over your post wondering how you reached the conclusion it must be new characters then realised I was thinking of Broken Earth!

I did enjoy the Inheritance trilogy. I enjoyed what she did in the second and third books so yeah I would recommend continuing

[Underfoot]

1 minute ago, HelenaExMachina said:

I was puzzling for a while over your post wondering how you reached the conclusion it must be new characters then realised I was thinking of Broken Earth!

I did enjoy the Inheritance trilogy. I enjoyed what she did in the second and third books so yeah I would recommend continuing

I mean, we never saw Syenite or Damaya again, so.... 

Definitely continuing, will start the second one tonight probably!

[Galactus]

On 6/15/2020 at 1:30 AM, williamjm said:

I did enjoy them both a lot, although I agree that Novik does seem fond of the trope you mention in the spoiler.

That was noticeable, but what soured me was the 

Spoiler

Rather trite "And it was all a misunderstanding" ending, which would be fine, except The Forest was such a menacing presence that it feels like a waste of an amazing villain/threat. 

 

[Inkdaub]

12 hours ago, Underfoot said:

I mean, we never saw Syenite or Damaya again, so.... 

Definitely continuing, will start the second one tonight probably!

Nothing important to add other than you made the right choice.  I loved The Inheritance Trilogy.

[williamjm]

17 hours ago, HelenaExMachina said:

I was puzzling for a while over your post wondering how you reached the conclusion it must be new characters then realised I was thinking of Broken Earth!

I did enjoy the Inheritance trilogy. I enjoyed what she did in the second and third books so yeah I would recommend continuing

I should read the other books in the trilogy sometime. I did enjoy The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms when I read it (even it's not on the same level as the Broken Earth books) but I think it felt like it had a conclusion that didn't demand a sequel and I think that meant I didn't rush out to get the other two books when they were released.

[Starkess]

Finally finished my re-read of Cibola Burn. I don't want to say it's a bad book, but it really is my least favorite of the series. The crises just become a bit implausible, and given that it's a middle book there's a certain lack of suspense since certain characters aren't really going to be killed off. So it just leaves me frustrated as a reader. Plus Murtry is a little too maniacal to be enjoyable to read about. Still, there are some interesting ideas, and it definitely picks up in the second half when things start to actually happen.

Next up I am finally getting to The Three Body Problem, which has been on my TBR list forever.

I'm also still listening to, and enjoying, The Power by Naomi Alderman.

[williamjm]

1 hour ago, Starkess said:

Finally finished my re-read of Cibola Burn. I don't want to say it's a bad book, but it really is my least favorite of the series. The crises just become a bit implausible, and given that it's a middle book there's a certain lack of suspense since certain characters aren't really going to be killed off. So it just leaves me frustrated as a reader. Plus Murtry is a little too maniacal to be enjoyable to read about. Still, there are some interesting ideas, and it definitely picks up in the second half when things start to actually happen.

It's not a bad book, but I think it's definitely a contender for being the weakest in the series. The ending is good but it took a long time getting there.

[dog-days]

Finished the second in Megan Whalen Turner's Queen's Thief series, The Queen of Attolia. Again, read it in German and read it slowly. I found it pretty engaging, but, at the same time, not hugely memorable. 

Also finished A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine. Even though the interior voice of the central character was a little distracting in that it reminds me strongly of the blog entries of LiveJournalers I used to follow, I did enjoy the book. I loved the rendering of the capital of the Teixcalaanli Empire (had to look up the spelling, despite last seeing the word a few hours ago), the interest in language, culture, architecture, and food from the perspective of a newcomer. I also appreciated the rendering of Mahit's divided feelings towards it - the love-hate relationship. 

Given the slightly abrupt ending

Spoiler

to Mahit's career on Teixcalaan and her relationship with Three Seagrass 

I'm not surprised that it's planned as the first of a series. I assume we're going to revisit old characters even if the point-of-view character changes. 

I haven't read the other Hugo nominees, but reckon this book could be a convincing winner judging it purely on its own merits. 

 

[williamjm]

36 minutes ago, dog-days said:

I haven't read the other Hugo nominees, but reckon this book could be a convincing winner judging it purely on its own merits.

I've read four of the nominees so far and I think this is the best of them, although I wouldn't necessarily be upset with some of the others winning.

[dog-days]

33 minutes ago, williamjm said:

I've read four of the nominees so far and I think this is the best of them, although I wouldn't necessarily be upset with some of the others winning.

Which of the others caught your fancy?