Fourth Quarter 2020 Reading

[Starkess]

I finished Ireland: A History. It was slow to read, as I'm not a particularly avid non-fiction reader, but I did quite enjoy it. The author (Thomas Bartlett) had a big task in covering the entire history of the country in a single volume, so obviously there wasn't a lot of depth. But it was great for someone like me who knew only the vaguest bits of Irish history. It also helped me understand my Irish heritage a bit more (e.g. the sustained emigration flux to the US and the strong ties that remained).

I'm pretty far into The Girls and I think it's good. I would say "enjoying" it is the wrong word (there have been several explicit rape scenes so far), but it's really fascinating and an interesting way of trying to examine the complexities of humans.

I also finally picked up The Dark Forest again after a rather long pause. I'm actually enjoying it a lot more now--feels like the pace is picking up a bit and things are going to start moving. I hope, as this has been lingering far too long and clogging up my TBR pile!

[Inkdaub]

I finished McGuire's Middlegame and I enjoyed it for the most part.  I liked the ideas and the villains were almost great.  I couldn't enjoy it as much as I hoped to because...

Spoiler

I hated Roger.  The reasons why are even addressed in the story but I just couldn't get on board with that character.

...and that sort of put a damper on things.

Now I am reading Ward's Legacy of Ash.  So far it's pretty good.  We'll see.   

[VigoTheCarpathian]

Finished “Autonomous” by Newitz, and “The Long Ships” by Bengsston in the past two weeks.  The first was a good/great sci-fi “airport book” - I thought it was interesting and immersive and I tore through it in a couple of long reading sessions, but I dunno, it felt like it wanted to be taken more seriously than I was willing to (discussion questions at the back of the book that wasn’t a textbook? Is this a new trend?).

The second I really loved, it hit a lot of notes for a great book - it was humorous and violent and lots of odd characters and woven into known history.  I wouldn’t be surprised if “Lonesome Dove” lifted inspiration from this book.

Reserving a bunch of Mary Karr poetry and Eckhard atolls/Thich Nat Hanh for a weekend getaway, and am trying to get “The Trouble With Peace” before we leave.

[Plessiez]

Sorry to hear about your dad, dog-days.  Hope reading's still helping, as much as it can.

On 12/13/2020 at 1:25 AM, Starkess said:

I also finally picked up The Dark Forest again after a rather long pause. I'm actually enjoying it a lot more now--feels like the pace is picking up a bit and things are going to start moving. I hope, as this has been lingering far too long and clogging up my TBR pile!

I can't remember if I said this earlier, but I think The Dark Forest is definitely the strongest volume of the trilogy. I'm not sure I'd call it my favourite as such, because it's pretty depressing: it's definitely not something I'm in any hurry to reread.  But I do think it's worth finishing.  (I think the third book is quite a bit weaker though.)

8 hours ago, VigoTheCarpathian said:

Finished “Autonomous” by Newitz

This reminded me that I read Autonomous myself two or three years ago.  Although I remember liking it at the time, I realise now I have almost no memory of the plot.  (I'm not sure if that's evidence of a failing with the book or just my own faulty memory.)

Has anybody read Newitz's more recent novel, The Future of Another Timeline?

[Jaxom 1974]

I'm finishing Hymn, Book Five of the Psalms of Isaak...

Next I've got The Trouble With Peace lined up...

After that, I was recently mesmerized by something called Captain Moxley and the Embers of Empire and had to pick it up and put it in the cue to likely finish out 2020...anyone ever hear of this one...? Dan Hanks is the author and it appears to be his first book...?

[TheLastWolf]

Reading the (cough) Holy Books of The Big Four. Sry Agatha. 

The Bible. Both testaments 

Bhagavad Gita. Along with the Mahabharata. If i include Ramayana, too darn big

Quran

EDIT

Fourth is nihilist book. Nothing 

[Samsaptakas]

6 hours ago, TheLastWolf said:

Reading the (cough) Holy Books of The Big Four. Sry Agatha. 

The Bible. Both testaments 

Bhagavad Gita. Along with the Mahabharata. If i include Ramayana, too darn big

Quran

EDIT

Fourth is nihilist book. Nothing 

Gita is part of Mahabharata. It took me two years to read the big epic and I had to skip some  sections entirely.

[Wilbur]

This past weekend I finished up Conn Iggulden's The Falcon of Sparta, which is a retelling of Xenephon's Anabasis.  It was fine, with no serious flaws, but I think that I would have liked it better, perhaps, as a teen.  It lacked the societal insights into ancient Greek and Persian cultures with which other authors succeed in spicing their narrative.

In general, the story could have taken place in Meso-America or Africa or Southeast Asia during the same time with some simple name-changes.  Nothing really made it feel very deep.

[TheLastWolf]

2 hours ago, Samsaptakas said:

Gita is part of Mahabharata

IK. Just that I'm rereading them together separately. Oxymoron? Paradox? Nah, just me. 

2 hours ago, Samsaptakas said:

It took me two years to read the big epic and I had to skip some  sections entirely.

Whoo. Phew. I didn't take as long without skipping coz was a bedtime read and made it a habit. 

[Zorral]

9 hours ago, TheLastWolf said:

Reading the (cough) Holy Books of The Big Four. Sry Agatha. 

The Bible. Both testaments 

Bhagavad Gita. Along with the Mahabharata. If i include Ramayana, too darn big

Quran

EDIT

Fourth is nihilist book. Nothing 

Nothing of Confucious?

[Starkess]

On 12/13/2020 at 9:28 PM, VigoTheCarpathian said:

Finished “Autonomous” by Newitz, and “The Long Ships” by Bengsston in the past two weeks.  The first was a good/great sci-fi “airport book” - I thought it was interesting and immersive and I tore through it in a couple of long reading sessions, but I dunno, it felt like it wanted to be taken more seriously than I was willing to (discussion questions at the back of the book that wasn’t a textbook? Is this a new trend?)..

Yeah, they do this for books that they want to advertise to book clubs. So I wouldn't take it as a sign of a book trying to be taken seriously, exactly. More like trying to have a broad appeal. I think this is most common in women's lit (as book clubs tend heavily to the female), but I've seen it with some others as well.

[Iskaral Pust]

41 minutes ago, Starkess said:

Yeah, they do this for books that they want to advertise to book clubs. So I wouldn't take it as a sign of a book trying to be taken seriously, exactly. More like trying to have a broad appeal. I think this is most common in women's lit (as book clubs tend heavily to the female), but I've seen it with some others as well.

Yes, I’ve noticed it in a lot of recently published literary fiction.  I find it annoying because the questions are so foundational and/or saccharine.  It really seems to be patronizing the reader.  But pop culture references suggest that most book club members don’t actually read the books they purportedly discuss.

[TheLastWolf]

15 hours ago, Zorral said:

Nothing of Confucious?

I think you are confuCed. Jokes apart, i view religion, spirituality and philosophy differently and am reading the Analects

[VigoTheCarpathian]

12 hours ago, Starkess said:

Yeah, they do this for books that they want to advertise to book clubs. So I wouldn't take it as a sign of a book trying to be taken seriously, exactly. More like trying to have a broad appeal. I think this is most common in women's lit (as book clubs tend heavily to the female), but I've seen it with some others as well.

Ah, I suppose that makes sense - it didn’t have any denotation like “book club edition”, but if it’s a marketing tool, I won’t hold that against the author. Thanks for context.

11 hours ago, Iskaral Pust said:

Yes, I’ve noticed it in a lot of recently published literary fiction.  I find it annoying because the questions are so foundational and/or saccharine.  It really seems to be patronizing the reader.  But pop culture references suggest that most book club members don’t actually read the books they purportedly discuss.

Agreed - this being my first encounter with these, and the book being a sci fi look at autonomy, there were a lot of basic questions about the concept, and then a bunch of specific character-related questions that I took to be leading and kind of patronizing (“here’s the theme!”, “here’s two places we showed you the theme, through these interactions - did you see any other things about the theme and/or how did this make you feel?”).  But if they’re supposed to be shortcuts for discussion, sure...

It is probably more my background/preferences that made me bristle when I read them - I guess  if I had no clue about sci fi and hadn’t read anything about AI or any Philip K Dick or seen the matrix, I would need some kind of a jumping-off point, and it seemed like it presumed no intellectual curiosity of the reader.

[Zorral]

Snow Storm in the offing, They Say.  If so, I've got the perfect novel: the final Saxon Tale, War Lord, the long goodbye to Uhtred, with whom I've shared an occasional existence for lo, these many years!  I'm still marveling that the book appeared at just the perfect day for it to appear.

 

[ljkeane]

Mexican Gothic was ok. It was a bit less Mexican than I expected it to be. I mean it was pretty Mexican being set in Mexico with a Mexican main character but I was expecting it to be based around Mexican culture and perhaps Mexican myths and legends and it's not really. Still, it was enjoyable enough.

Now I'm reading Benedict Jacka's lasted book Forged. His books are usually entertaining quick reads.

[Paxter]

On 10/24/2020 at 3:38 PM, williamjm said:

I finished Susanna Clarke's Piranesi. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell is one of my favourite fantasy books so I was always going to be interested in Clarke's second novel. It's definitely a very different book to her debut, where that was long and packed with detail and a large cast of characters this is a much shorter book (it's a little over 200 pages) which doesn't even feature a single footnote. It's also got a much smaller cast, in one of the early chapters our narrator (who may or may not be called Piranesi) gives a complete list of all the 15 people who have ever lived in the world, 13 of whom are dead. His world is a seemingly endless structure consisting of many huge rooms most of them filled with statues, it's a fascinating setting and many of the journal entries in the book are devoted to the exploration of it. As the book goes on it also gradually fills in the backstory to explain how the lead character came to be there, it quickly becomes apparent that there are many things he is ignorant of.

It may be a very different book to Strange and Norrell but in its own way I think it is successful as the earlier story. The protagonist is a likeable character and his quest to try to unravel some of the mysteries surrounding his existence make for a compelling story and I thought it had a satisfying ending.

This was my Book of the Year.

Maybe waiting for Clarke's next novel for so long has clouded my judgement, but I thought that Piranesi was just perfect. It boasts a mesmerizing, captivating fantasy world, a great (if quite small) cast of memorable characters and villains, and a plot that does just enough to keep you interested, while deliberately taking a back seat to the magical setting. The last time I felt this good about a fantasy novel was Jonathan Strange!

The only question is how she held herself back from those glorious footnotes...

Now reading A Christmas Carol. And slogging through Mirror and The Light. The latter is brilliant, I just find it easier to read Mantel's novels in short bursts over a longer period. 

[Teng Ai Hui]

Recently, I finished Arsene Wenger's biography, My Life and Lessons in Red and White.

Currently, I'm 30% into The Paper Magician by Charlie Holmberg.  Very enjoyable so far.  I'll most likely jump straight into the sequel when I'm finished.

[williamjm]

17 hours ago, Paxter said:

This was my Book of the Year.

Maybe waiting for Clarke's next novel for so long has clouded my judgement, but I thought that Piranesi was just perfect. It boasts a mesmerizing, captivating fantasy world, a great (if quite small) cast of memorable characters and villains, and a plot that does just enough to keep you interested, while deliberately taking a back seat to the magical setting. The last time I felt this good about a fantasy novel was Jonathan Strange!

The only question is how she held herself back from those glorious footnotes...

I saw somewhere that she had another book planned to come out in 2022 (if I remember correctly) so we might not have much time to wait for her third novel after waiting so long for the second. It did not comment on whether it would have footnotes or not.

[Zorral]

I'm enjoying War Lord, particularly Uhtred's recognition that he is an old man and how much his age has slowed him down.  But Uhtred's always had more talent and skill than just his strengths as a fighting man in the shield wall.  Of course he's got the unswerving devotion of a beautiful, much younger woman who was already conveniently on scene in the previous book, as they come togther, his wife conveniently dies, off scene, so the reader shouldn't feel obliged to feel judgmental about Uhtred the Adulterer, who callously hurts his faithful wife.  Like Uhtred, the author's always thinking!

I also like that Cornwell dedicated this last volume to Alexander Dreymon.