Fourth Quarter 2021 Reading

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

It took me nearly six months to read The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. Granted, every chapter is broken up into numerous sub-sections, so you can just read a bit at a time, and I'll glad I didn't try to rush through it. I cannot recommend it strongly enough.

I finally got my hands on a copy of The Promises of Giants a few weeks ago and am going to start it later tonight. It's a book on leadership written by a clinical and occupational psychologist, John Amaechi, and I'm confident it's going to be excellent, as is everything that man does outside of his NBA career. One thing about it though that I'll never understand is why release dates are scheduled so far apart based on location. I believe it was released everywhere in Western Europe several months ago. Probably should have just asked one of you to buy it for me and send it over, lol. 

[aceluby]

Just finished book 5 of The Cradle series by Will Wight.  Super fun, easy reads.  Also recently finished Rhythm of War, Dune, and The Last Wish.  A nice end of the year push after a 2020 where I didn't finish a single novel.

[Peadar]

On 12/13/2021 at 11:34 PM, LongRider said:

I finished that one yesterday and enjoyed it overall.   Did think it was a fairly short book for him.

How  he joined the two story lines was OK but I feel that I should have figured it out earlier.

Still reading. But slooooooowly. I'm enjoying it for the most part.

[Astromech]

Finished Andro Linklater's An Artist in Treason. Very interesting read about General James Wilkinson and the early, formative years of the American Republic.

[Fragile Bird]

I've been meaning to post here for ages (the quarterly threads) but just haven't gotten around to it. A number of people have mentioned here and in other threads that 2020 was a crummy year for them in terms of books read, and 2021 has been much better. It's true for me as well. But my problem started earlier. I've had a real problem reading the past couple of years, I pick up books and just lose interest. I have so many unread books on my shelves. I started buying books on cds because a discount bookstore had them. Listening to ASOIAF after having read the books was a real pleasure (I got most of them at a deep discount) and then I finally got a library card and started borrowing audible books. My big, big boost has come from the fact that I switched apps from Overdrive to Libby. The app first offered was Overdrive, but for some reason Overdrive wouldn't load books on an iPhone, just audible books, and the library was missing so many audible versions. For months and months I kept getting messages to switch to Libby, and I finally did it in the summer, and good grief, I could finally download written books as well as audible ones. What a difference that made.

I think my problem may be rooted in the fact that my eyesight is getting worse. The eye doctor says I'll likely need cataract surgery (ah, the golden years!) within five years, and I think my worsening vision made me give up on doing a lot of reading. Reading on the lit background of my phone is so much better. I did buy Kindles over the years, but perhaps I didn't set them up properly? Dust collectors.

Anyway, Werthead had posted a few lists on Facebook in the summer, as have others, and as a result I've found all kinds of authors and books that have been totally new for me. In these last two quarters I have fallen madly in love with Martha Wells' Murderbot Diaries. I've read all the novellas and the full-length novel and both of the short stories. I am especially fond of the very short story that happens just after Murderbot hacks its governor, the one written for Wired, for their nature of work series. You can find it here: https://www.wired.com/story/future-of-work-compulsory-martha-wells/

That led me to reading other Wells books, The Wizard Hunters, The Ships of the Air and the Gate of the Gods. I plan to try some of her others as well. I gather from interviews I've read that her career had pretty well petered out 6 or 7 years ago, people having lost interest in her series, and then she wrote All Systems Red and wham, everything changed. She's signed a 4 book contract, 2 more Murderbot books and 2 others.

I've also really gotten into Lois Mcmaster Bujold. I've read five of her Vorkosigan saga books, the first 3, the 10th or 11th, where Miles launches his marriage campaign, and the standalone book involving the all-male planet, where the men fear and demonize women (reading the library summary made be blink a few times, lol). But I've since been totally absorbed by the books that occur in the World of the Five Gods. I love the Curse of Chalion and have read all the Penric and Desdemona series, just waiting for the 2nd last in the series, the most recent not being available at the library yet.

A friend suggested I try Sherwood Smith, and I've read almost all of the books involving the world of Marloven Hess and its neighbors. He suggested I start with Inda, his favorite actually being the second book, The Fox, and then not so much King's Shield and Treason's Shore. If you don't know the books, Marloven Hess is a country of warriors, sort of 16th or 17th century, and Inda joins his brother at the military academy at the age of ten, but the terrible politics of the kingdom forces a decision to spirit Inda out of the academy two years later and place him on a naval ship (because someone at court is going to murder him otherwise, because of his friendship with the heir to the throne). He gets kidnapped by pirates and The Fox follows his years at sea. Sherwood Smith's description of life in the academy is absolutely wonderfully written and my favorite section of the books. I have only skim-read the last two because I found them rather traumatic. Smith is definitely anti-war, and her descriptions of battle injuries, tactics of war, betrayal, lost love, lost lives, and PTSD, is pretty harrowing. Or at least it has been for me. Oh, and then there's the element of magic and and the mysterious land of Norsunder where evil mages reign and who have kidnapped warriors from various nations over the centuries (yes, centuries) and they live eternally, ready to come back and attack the various kingdoms in the world. Far more enjoyable for me has been Stranger to Command, which takes place 400 years after the Inda books. The king allows a non-Marloven student into the academy, and once again Smith writes an absolutely terrific description of student life in a tough military academy.

I actually have had one of the worst years of my life this year in terms of health, and one of my meds has a side effect of making me feel stronger emotions. I mean, I was crying over Murderbot in Network Effect, for Pete's sake, and after I skim-read Treason's Shore I had nightmares for a week. I would like to finish those two final books in the Inda series, but I just can't. Add to that other books I have tried to read but can't. The day after my best friend's 95-year old mother died, The Book of Lost Things showed up in my book list, and after listening to the first two chapters I had to return it. More recently I was reading Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro, which I decided to borrow because of the issues of humanity raised by Murderbot, and I returned it because it made me so sad. That book is about cloned humans raised to donate organs and then die. Right now I'm listening to Klara and the Sun, and I don't know if I'll be able to get through it. Klara, the AI friend, is about to get purchased and I just know this isn't going to end well, especially since Klara is so perceptive when she sees children walking down the street with their AI friends she can tell just by watching them which relationships are good. Foreshadowing? And the newer models that have arrived in the shop sneer at the older models...

Another boarder was asking for suggestions for books and her friends strongly suggested The Library at Mount Char (Scott Hawkins) as a "positive" book. Crikey, that is one weird book, and it's been a tough slog. I may have to borrow it again to finish it. I'm also reading The Plot, by Jean Hanff Korelitz, which I ordered because I kept seeing it on book lists. I don't think it's that great, but it's funny because the plot of The Plot sort of echoes a real-life controversy written up in various magazines, where a woman who donated a kidney got very angry when a writer created a character using her story. I have too many books open at the same time, so I don't always finish them. Another I'm currently reading is A Master of Djinn by P. Djeli Clark. It takes place in Cairo in the early part of the last century, in a world where Egypt has become a major power. A detective story with the detective being part of the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities. And someone mentioned Brandon Sanderson's Warbreaker, which I'm really enjoying.

I mentioned elsewhere that I've really enjoyed The Goblin Emperor, by Katherine Addison. I'm on my 7th or 8th re-listen. I decide to borrow The Witness for the Dead, just for the hell of it, because I was disappointed her follow-up book centered on the relatively minor character in Goblin tracking down the people who killed the Emperor and his sons. It really reads like the first in a series, with unfinished plot lines and a comment from Thara Celehar that the work is very hard on witnesses and he expects he will burn out in five years. I was pleasantly surprised by the book and really enjoyed it. I also have The Angel of the Crows borrowed, and I may return it because I'm not that into yet another interpretation of Sherlock Holmes. Has anyone else read it? Does it get stronger as it goes on?  I have Abercrombie's A Little Hatred, Melville's Embassytown and Clarke's Piranesi lined up to listen to. And I once again have returned The Priory of the Orange Tree because there's too much on my plate. I'll put a hold on it again. The thing is, it's bloody long.

Oh, and Hyperion. I finally know where Shryke got his board name.

And we couldn't let the quarter go by without more elves and humans, right? My friend's daughter suggested I read the Sarah J. Maas Court books, starting with A Court of Thorns and Roses, now on the second, A Court of Mist and Fury.

Whoo. Too much, right? Next posts will be much shorter, it was too hard to separate the 3rd and 4th quarters. And I haven't even touched on the all the detective stories I read in the first half of the year. I know I've missed a bunch of books. Like How the Word is Passed, which I listened to bit by bit and didn't finish because there was just so much to absorb. I've re-ordered it so I can finish it. By Clint Smith. Smith takes you on a tour across the US of monuments and landmarks related to slavery. Fucking chilling.

 

 

[El Kabong]

Good Lord, someone recommend Mt Char as a POSITIVE book? Are you sure they weren't fucking with you?

And yes, I fricking love Murderbot. I blew threw all 6 in like a month, and now I have to WAIT. Bah!

[dog-days]

2 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

More recently I was reading Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro, which I decided to borrow because of the issues of humanity raised by Murderbot, and I returned it because it made me so sad. That book is about cloned humans raised to donate organs and then die. Right now I'm listening to Klara and the Sun, and I don't know if I'll be able to get through it. Klara, the AI friend, is about to get purchased and I just know this isn't going to end well, especially since Klara is so perceptive when she sees children walking down the street with their AI friends she can tell just by watching them which relationships are good. Foreshadowing? And the newer models that have arrived in the shop sneer at the older models...

I went through a Kazuo Ishiguro phase about twelve/thirteen years ago when I read Never Let Me Go then the rest of his back catalogue. I remember that both NLMG and When We Were Orphans in particular got to me (until I was eleven and changed schools, I had a close friend who Tommy reminded me of, and I never saw him again afterwards). I have both The Buried Giant and Klara and the Sun on my to-read list, but I've been putting them off until I hit the hypothetical point of peak emotional resilience. 

Lois McMaster Bujold is wonderful. Her works have made lockdown so much better. 

[A wilding]

7 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

I think my problem may be rooted in the fact that my eyesight is getting worse. The eye doctor says I'll likely need cataract surgery (ah, the golden years!) within five years, and I think my worsening vision made me give up on doing a lot of reading.

As an aside: If it helps, I know several people who have had cataract surgery and, without exception, their experience was "nothing like as bad as I feared, and WOW I can see again!"

[Fragile Bird]

1 hour ago, A wilding said:

As an aside: If it helps, I know several people who have had cataract surgery and, without exception, their experience was "nothing like as bad as I feared, and WOW I can see again!"

My mom needed cataract surgery years ago, so I know how marvelous the experience can be. And one of my closest friends had the surgery early this year, and was very cheerful about the experience, even though he had to have a second surgery on one eye. The tough part is the time period just before surgery, everyone I know says their eyesight got rapidly worse at the end, and like all other surgeries during this pandemic, there’s a large backlog because of Covid-19. But I think the doctors are fairly good about estimating the timeline, so I should be fine a few years down the road. As my eye doctor said, I could have it done right now if I wanted, but surgery is still surgery and there are risks, so it’s better to wait until it’s needed. He also pointed out that there’s always a possibility that I don’t get worse and don’t need surgery, but I seem to go through everything my mother went through so I expect it’s waiting for me down the road.

[Zorral]

That's a lot of books, Bird!  Library versions of apps aren't all the same, I guess, because i can borrow and read e-books via our system's version of Overdrive.  Not that I have a lot of good to say about any of the variety of apps/programs for either content. or, and particularly, for finding the content unless one is specifically looking for a title and author.  There's so much there we never even know is there and won't ever know about unless we look for it, and without knowing about it, how will one search for it?  The greatest joy of library shelves was just the serendipitous discovery of books, w/in the vicinity of what one was looking for, or just heedlessly browsing.

[Starkess]

Had to DNF Cadwell Turnbull's No Gods, No Monsters. I was both bored and confused, not a good combination, and I'm just not a huge fan of paranormal or urban fantasy so this wasn't up my alley to begin with.

I finished Stuart Turton's The Devil and the Dark Water, which I absolutely loved. Might be my favorite book of the year. It's a long book, and I listened to the audiobook which makes it even longer, but I blasted through it in just 5 days, taking every opportunity to listen that I could. Just really checked all the boxes for me.

Next up I have Matt Bell's Appleseed. Like the others, this is a library audiobook that I really have no idea what it's about, so we're rolling the dice again!

[Teng Ai Hui]

22 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

Anyway, Werthead had posted a few lists on Facebook in the summer, as have others, and as a result I've found all kinds of authors and books that have been totally new for me. In these last two quarters I have fallen madly in love with Martha Wells' Murderbot Diaries. I've read all the novellas and the full-length novel and both of the short stories. I am especially fond of the very short story that happens just after Murderbot hacks its governor, the one written for Wired, for their nature of work series. You can find it here: https://www.wired.com/story/future-of-work-compulsory-martha-wells/

Thanks for the link to that short story about Murderbot.  That opening paragraph was hilarious.  This series is at its best when we get Murderbot’s inner monologue.  Plot doesn’t matter too much.

[Fragile Bird]

27 minutes ago, Teng Ai Hui said:

Thanks for the link to that short story about Murderbot.  That opening paragraph was hilarious.  This series is at its best when we get Murderbot’s inner monologue.  Plot doesn’t matter too much.

Have you seen the longer short story, the one after Exit Strategy? When Murderbot finally gets to Preservation Station? It’s more serious, and is the only story we’ve seen from somebody else’s (Mensa) POV.

[Teng Ai Hui]

1 hour ago, Fragile Bird said:

Have you seen the longer short story, the one after Exit Strategy? When Murderbot finally gets to Preservation Station? It’s more serious, and is the only story we’ve seen from somebody else’s (Mensa) POV.

Yes, I have read Fugitive Telemetry.  It was fun to read, a nice change-of-pace.  As you said, it provided another POV, and the plot was improved in that it was a murder mystery, not just Murderbot fighting against / trying to escape from other robots.

If anybody is interested, I noticed that there is a second Murderbot short story free online.  It's called Home: Habitat, Range, Niche, Territory.  It seems to be an epilogue to novella #4.

[Fragile Bird]

3 hours ago, Teng Ai Hui said:

If anybody is interested, I noticed that there is a second Murderbot short story free online.  It's called Home: Habitat, Range, Niche, Territory.  It seems to be an epilogue to novella #4.

Yes, that was the short story I was asking you about. It takes place after Exit Strategy (novella #4). I guess my question wasn’t clear!

[Teng Ai Hui]

18 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

Yes, that was the short story I was asking you about. It takes place after Exit Strategy (novella #4). I guess my question wasn’t clear!

Sorry, it was my fault.  I read your previous comment too quickly.  I just now finished reading Wells' second short story.  It was slightly disappointing in that the reader didn't get any of Murderbot's inner thoughts.  However, we gained some insight as to what a SecUnit actually is.

[Iskaral Pust]

I’ve waited too long again before posting an update.

The Royal Baths Murder in J.R. Ellis’ Yorkshire series of murder novels.  Too cosy, I’m finished with this author.

The Tiger’s Wrath is the fifth (?) in Marc Alan Edelheit’s series that places a Roman military fiction in a traditional high fantasy setting.  Perhaps like a toned-down version of the Malazan series.  Pretty good.  I enjoyed the Roman military campaign elements a lot more than the fantasy tropes.

Grimm Up North by David Gatward is another detective novel set in Yorkshire.  A bit too much on the bland/cosy side too.

Punk by Lex Grootelaar was something different: a literary fiction that felt like a blend of Holden Caulfield and Hunter S. Thompson.  I really enjoyed it for a different voice and style.  Recommended.

The Descent by Matt Brolly is yet another British police detective novel.  This one is just too gloomy.  The suicide cult is bad enough but the alcoholic widower neglecting his daughter is just a pointless B plot to add more gloom.

The Long Way To A Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers wants to a funny and slightly wacky SF about a ragtag bunch of weird aliens with hearts of gold.  But the weirdness of the aliens just feels hugely contrived, and that’s all there is to the plot and world building.

The Hippopotamus by Steven Fry is a literary fiction with a self aware and slightly tongue-in-cheek purple prose and grandstanding POV.  Very enjoyable for the panache and wit.

I really need more writing of great style!  Why are books almost always described by their plot, which tend to be repetitive most of the time.  It’s the writing style that really distinguishes a book.

Spoonbenders by Daryl Gregory is a literary fiction about a family of psychics and charlatans to varying degrees.  It has some minor similarity to Tim Powers’ Last Call.  I enjoyed it a lot.

Balkan Glory by Julian Stockwin is an age-of-sail historical fiction.  As so many others, it is set in the Royal Navy during the war with Napoleon.  It tries hard to be like Patrick O’Brian but never captures the quality of his prose, the deep immersion in sailing, nor the distinction of his primary characters.  Even Hornblower was better than this series.

[Ormond]

Just finished David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas yesterday. It was the latest selection of the book club I now attend. This was one of the few times in my life I've seen a movie before reading the book it was based on. 

I really enjoyed Cloud Atlas.  Mitchell's blending of different genres of stories into a larger tale about reincarnation and human values was very well done. I have a few quibbles -- why was one of the stories set in a fictional California city when the rest were set in very real geographic locations with what seemed to be great accuracy? But I really appreciated being prompted to learn about some things I never had heard of before -- especially the genocide of the Moriori people on the Chatham Islands. The Chatham Islands are one of the last places on Earth I knew about -- I think I vaguely knew New Zealand owned something called the Chatham Islands but never knew they were even big enough to be inhabited, much less that they were the site of one of the worst genocidal massacres in recorded history. It was a fascinating book and I'd recommend it to anyone who has the patience to deal with some different dialects and its unusual "Russian doll" story structure. 

[ljkeane]

I've been really struggling to do much reading over the last couple of months so I thought I'd try something quick and easy that I can read a bit of when I've got some time. Brandon Sanderson books usually fit that description so I gave his new book Cytonic a try. I'd borrowed the previous two off my brother and they were entertaining enough but in this one he's gone too Sanderson. His style doesn't really fit with a book that's supposed to be a sci fi in an ostensibly dystopian setting, he managed to keep enough of a lid on it in the first two books but it really didn't work in this book for me.

Next up I'm going to read Knot of Shadows by Lois McMaster Bujold.

[Fragile Bird]

1 hour ago, ljkeane said:

Next up I'm going to read Knot of Shadows by Lois McMaster Bujold.

Is that a new book? My library doesn’t have it. Is it the new Penric?