November 2009

[dalThor]

Well. I had to read Twilight as we are giving it to our students for their Christmas holidays book and it wasn't abysmally horrible as I had anticipated - provided you overlook the fact that girls are completely and totally helpless beings that require constant oversight and protection.

I'm now reading the second book in the Discworld series which I hadn't read prior. I'm looking forward to it as Rincewind (and of course the Luggage) are among my favorite characters there.

[pat5150]

Just finished John Twelve Hawks' The Golden City, and it's a decidedly lackluster ending to the series. After the quality and the intrigue of the first two volumes, this one was a bit of a letdown. . .

Check the blog for the full review.

Patrick

[beniowa]

I started reading Naked by Sedaris, but for some reason I couldn't get into it. I've decided to set it aside for now. I'm now reading Eon: Dragoneye Reborn by Alison Goodman.

[Peter Irving]

The Killer Angels.

[MaesterLuwin]

I have Stephen King's Under the Dome sitting on my desk right now (nine dollar hardback from Amazon!), but suddenly I felt guilty that I have had another epic King novel, It, in my pile of paperbacks to be read. It's been there for years. So I'm going to try and plow through It first.

[BookWyrm]

ML, It is a fantastic book imo.

I just finished The Haunting of Hill House, and I'm very impressed. Compared to Matheson's novel, it glows - I think Shirley Jackson was a lot more cunning with her methods than Matheson. Jackson successfully made her story disorienting, calm and quiet. Since she didn't quite put a face to the evil, it remained elusive and mysterious, ever unpredictable. I'll stand by my earlier thoughts that Hell House is a good book, but it gets blown away by The Haunting of Hill House. After such a successful introduction to her, I'm certainly going to pick up her other works.

[mashiara]

I read East of Eden by John Steinbeck and loved every minute of it. The characters were just leaping out of the pages for me, I don't see how some people call Steinbeck boring *looks at husband*.

I also read The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai. I had a hard time getting into it but it won me over and it left me profoundly sad. A book that deals with many issues, from the differences in wealth and caste in post-collonialism India to the things illegal immigrants in the States have to deal with. A well written book with startling images at times.

Next up is Perdido Street Station by China Mieville.

[delete this account pls]

Glad you liked East of Eden mash. I really loved it as well, even though I was promised it had asplosions, which turned out to be untrue.

I finished A Betrayal in Winter by Daniel Abraham. It was enjoyable enough, but I had a few complaints. The characters feel a bit distant for one, I never really felt fully engaged by any of them - with the exception of the andat, who I found pretty fascinating. The plot was interesting enough, but it never really quite grabbed me either. Not a bad book by any means, but it never really took off either.

Next up - The Big Nowhere by James Elroy.

[blackstormdragon]

Just started Ship of Magic

[Procrastimancer]

Currently reading:

Jeff Vandermeer's City of Saints and Madmen - First couple of pages of the first story, Dradin in Love, had me irritated, but I quickly fell into the style and am enjoying it thus far. Still, for some reason it feels as though it is teetering on the edge of my patience, as if the basis of the story, no matter how much I enjoy reading it (because I love the prose), is pure annoyance.

Warren Ellis' Shivering Sands - A collection of essays and such that Ellis recently self-published as an experiment through Lulu.com. I'm a fan of Ellis and love reading his writing, no matter if is comics, prose, or non-fiction, so I am definitely into this book. Also beginning to realize that Ellis is an inspirational bastard, with most of these writings having a tinge of "Get the fuck out there and create" running through them.

Steve Erickson's The Sea Came in at Midnight - Nothing to rant or rave about so far. Only about sixty pages in, but it is a short novel. Interesting story, decent writing (I haven't been wowed by it), and I have no desire to put it down and shuffle it to the bottom of the stack, so all is good.

To be honest though, I am going to sit all of these to the side just as soon as The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart arrives.

[Deornoth]

Finished reading Elizabeth Bear's 'By the Mountain Bound', prequel to the post-apocalyptic 'All the Windwracked Stars'. 'By the Mountain Bound' suffers from some of the same issues as it's predecessor (it takes a while to get going for starters!) but ended up being a far superior read that has got me looking forward to more books in this series. My full review is over Here. I'm now well into Sarah Pinborough's 'Feeding Ground'...

[BookWyrm]

I just finished the first story in Songs if the Dying Earth, The True Vinatage of Erzuine Thale, and WHOA! Are all of Robert Silverberg's works this nice? I feel like I've been missing out on a lot now. I sincerely hope that the rest of these Vance tributes keep up to this standard.

I'm also halfway through Darrell Schweitzer's The White Isle, which is okay, but you can tell it's an early work of his. I feel like he wasn't quite into his grove as a writer when he wrote this.

I'm also planning on starting Bram Stoker's Dracula soon.

[Procrastimancer]

I just finished the first story in Songs if the Dying Earth, The True Vinatage of Erzuine Thale, and WHOA! Are all of Robert Silverberg's works this nice? I feel like I've been missing out on a lot now. I sincerely hope that the rest of these Vance tributes keep up to this standard.

I have only read the first two stories and I liked The True Vintage of Erzuine Thale, but I thought the second story by Matt Hughes was better, so the standard not only continues, but is raised. The only other Silverberg story I've read was from Legends II and I checked the book out a second time about two years after the first time I read it just so I could read that story again. Don't know why I haven't tried any of his other work yet.

[Deornoth]

Finished reading Sarah Pinborough's 'Feeding Ground', a tale of people trying to escape a London overrun by giant spiders... If you blink then you might end up missing the climactic scenes but 'Feeding Ground' is a book that still managed to scare the...erm... stuff out of me. My full review is over Here. I seem to have come out without a book to read on the way home so no idea what I'll be reading next...

[BookWyrm]

I have only read the first two stories and I liked The True Vintage of Erzuine Thale, but I thought the second story by Matt Hughes was better, so the standard not only continues, but is raised. The only other Silverberg story I've read was from Legends II and I checked the book out a second time about two years after the first time I read it just so I could read that story again. Don't know why I haven't tried any of his other work yet.

That's good to know! I'll continue my read today. :)

[Bellis]

That's good to know! I'll continue my read today. :)

The only thing I've read by Silverberg is Book of Skulls, which is an occult/college roadtrip story, and would easily make my top 50 favorite books.

[Cuchulain]

Finished Mark Z. Danielewski's Only Revolutions today. The form of this book is really unique: each page contains 90 words upright and 90 words upside down. The book can be read from two sides, one from a male and one from a female perspective. There's a date on every page with a list of historic events. The publisher's suggests on the cover that you read 8 pages in one direction and then turn the book upside down and read 8 pages in the other direction. The point is that everything turns around and amounts to 360 (degrees), hence the title. The style is also quite unique for a novel: the language is poetic, with a lot of wordplay, rhyme, neologisms, etc.

The content of the book can be described at the hand of a simple abbreviation: WTF. Really, the plot is very vague and every sentence is crammed full of symbolism. Most of it went way over my head. Normally, that wouldn't really bother me with a book like this, as it can be enjoyed for the language and style alone. In this case, however, it does bother me. I have to write a 3000-word review essay about three books (one of which has to be Only Revolutions) connected through a Darwinian theme. :dunno: Any suggestions are welcome.

Edit: sp

[Bellis]

I have to write a 3000-word review essay about three books (one of which has to be Only Revolutions) connected through a Darwinian theme. :dunno: Any suggestions are welcome.

Edit: sp

WHY??? I suggest dropping this class as your teacher is clearly insane.

[IheartTesla]

I am reading two books: What Einstein didnt know, which is a book for the layman that deals with everyday phenomena and Rivers of Gold, a history of the rise of the Spanish empire during the times of Columbus and others.

What Einstein didnt know is a fun read describing many physical phenomena and providing explanations for them that are very accessible. Even though I'm a physicist by training and have a reasonable understanding of these phenomena, I was able to learn new stuff. I am not sure the price is a great deal though ($12.95 for 270 odd pages is a bit steep though I purchased it second hand). My favorite tidbit - you can tell the temperature outside by listening to the number of chirps of a cricket in 15 seconds and adding 40.

Rivers of gold is presumably historically accurate, but I cant shake a nagging feeling that the author (Hugh Thomas) is bringing a bit of PoV into the writing. I wouldnt go as far as to call him an apologist, but some of his justifications of the excesses of the explorers/conquistadors left me feeling a bit uneasy. Anyway, the book deals with a brief period beginning with Columbus's voyage to North America and ends about 30-40 years later. In hindsight this is probable one of the most exciting times to be if you were an explorer.

[beniowa]

Regarding Silverberg, all I've read is four of his Marjipoor books, which started well but got boring, and Roma Eterna, which was good, but not spectacular. Oh yeah, and a couple of his shorts from Legends. Seems a lot of his best stuff is from years ago. I haven't gotten around to picking any of them up yet though.