August 2011 reading thread

[bw-]

ah heh. just re-reading name of wind before wise man's fear myself. finished brent week's black prism just before that. and re-reading the preacher comics.

[nickg]

Blasphemy.

My thoughts exactly.

[Grack21]

Finished The Judging Eye, which was freaky. Then read Prince of Thorns, which is awesome. I'm kinda shocked more people here don't like it, it seems like the kind of thing people on this board would love.

[Phoenix]

Because it was trying to be two different books. Once that stopped it sucked me in.

Yeah, I see that.

So, you're telling me it all comes together eventually? Then I'll press on.

[Guinevere Seaworth]

I finished The Desert of Souls by Howard Andrew Jones. It was a pretty fun read. I hope the author returns to the world as I would read more of it. It was a standalone book, but the author left room for sequels if necessary.

Up next is more light and fluffy fantasy, Mercedes Lackey's Magic's Pawn.

[Wormwood]

Just finished The shotgun rule by Charlie Huston and it was totally awesome. :thumbsup:

[Contrarius]

Just finished The shotgun rule by Charlie Huston and it was totally awesome. :thumbsup:

Glad to hear it! I love the Joe Pitt series, but I haven't read his other stuff yet. :)

[Mediumjon Umber]

Currently reading Unseen Academicals (to get my annual Pratchett fix), then it's on to Scott Lynch's books. If I'll finish those in August I'll squeeze in Barker's Weaveworld too, since I've heard it's pretty good.

[jdiddyesquire]

Just finished Blackdog by K.V. Johansen - quite good. Little Malazan flavor I thought. Less esoteric.

Also finished Forever War by Joe Haldeman - awesome obviously given its storied history, but I found the take on homosexuality particularly interesting given its time context.

Not sure what to pick up next.

[Mudguard]

Finished The Magician King by Lev Grossman. Really enjoyed it, probably more so than the first book, which I thought was pretty good.

[RedEyedGhost]

Finished Jim Butcher's Small Favor, book 10 in The Dresden Files. Loved it. Not much else to say other than that thinking about this book and comparing it to book 1, it's amazing how much Butcher has evolved. I want to dive right in and blaze through the next three books, but then I'd have to wait an entire year until book 14 comes out and I'm not quite ready to commit to that just yet so I'll read 4-5 books before I pick up Turn Coat.

I've started The Last Werewolf by Glen Duncan. I'm only a few chapters in, but it's quite wonderful so far.

[Contrarius]

Finished Jim Butcher's Small Favor, book 10 in The Dresden Files. Loved it. Not much else to say other than that thinking about this book and comparing it to book 1, it's amazing how much Butcher has evolved. I want to dive right in and blaze through the next three books, but then I'd have to wait an entire year until book 14 comes out and I'm not quite ready to commit to that just yet so I'll read 4-5 books before I pick up Turn Coat.

IMHO it really is impressive how much Butcher improves over the course of the series.

And incidentally, I think Turn Coat may be my personal favorite of the series. So get busy and read it! :)

[Roose Bolton's Onesie]

Waiting for my copy of Legends II to bloody arrive so that I can continue my ASoIaF fix. :stillsick:

Also, I've just started reading Dune. I usually try to finish whichever chapter I'm on before I put a book down, but finding a place to stop in this book is pretty tricky.

[The Blue Bard]

My current reading consists of:

Jaroslav Hasek's bloated, rambling masterpiece The Good Soldier Svejk, which tells the story of a Czech soldier in the Great War. The novel is over 700 pages long, and contains a plot that meanders all over the place, utterly unnecessary and lengthy attacks on the Catholic Church, and confused stretches written when Hasek was drunk. However, it is brilliantly funny, and contains some of the most vividly realised characters in literature. Its like a modern Don Quixote, a rambling series of inter-connected stories

Mikhail Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita, which tells the story of Satan arriving in Stalinist Moscow with various demons in tow, including a talking cat and a decomposing naked girl. Very funny, sharply written and with a gripping story, hampered only by my inability to remember or be able to pronounce Russian names

Finally, I have a dissertation to write this year, so I get to look forward to lots of reading on Austria-Hungary's reasons for war in 1914. Woo and yay :(

If I ever get time, i mean to finally get round to reading For Whom the Bell Tolls

[Guinevere Seaworth]

Polished off Magic's Pawn by Mercedes Lackey today and on to Magic's Promise.

The girl inside me really wishes that I read these 15-20 years ago when I was mad for all things horses. I'm pretty sure that the Valdemar books would've been my favorite series as a teen. Now, they are just light, but entertaining reads for me. Better late than never I suppose.

[Grack21]

Polished off Magic's Pawn by Mercedes Lackey today and on to Magic's Promise.

The girl inside me really wishes that I read these 15-20 years ago when I was mad for all things horses. I'm pretty sure that the Valdemar books would've been my favorite series as a teen. Now, they are just light, but entertaining reads for me. Better late than never I suppose.

Hey I'm a 32 year old male and I still read them. It's nice to read something that's just weeeee yay fantasy and magic and stuff sometimes.

[Eponine]

Almost finished Dracula - I'm kind of surprised it was mentioned enough to be on the rec list. The attitude toward women is irritating, but interesting in a kind of awful way that that was the common view.

Started The Fencer Trilogy by Parker and I'm liking it a lot- more than any fantasy I've read in quite a while, at least since Thunderer, which it kind of reminds me of in some aspects actually.

Need to plow through some books about natural resources before class starts next week.

[beniowa]

Read a few book since the last time I posted. First was Nights of Villjamur by Mark Charan Newton. Like a lot of recent books in speculative fiction, Nights combines many different elements of the genre and for the most part it works. On the other hand, plotting and characterization felt a bit piecemeal and erratic. I couldn't shake the feeling that the book was just setup. I haven't decided if I'll read the sequels yet.

After reading and loving Lauren Beukes' Zoo City, I picked up her debut novel, Moxyland. I found it to be a quite well written South African cyberpunk. That being said, it's pretty much just South African cyberpunk. It doesn't do anything particularly new. I would still heartily recommend it though.

And finally, last night I finished Fenrir by MD Lachlan, sequel to Wolfsangel. Frankly, I was a little disappointed with this one as I quite enjoyed the first book. Fenrir is a bit more of a straightforward thriller and the mythological component felt too contrived and forced. There was a good deal of confusion regarding character motivation for Odin and Ragnarok. Not to mention the book is about 100 pages too long. I still liked it enough to find out what happens with the third book next year.

Next up is Embassytown by China Mieville.

[Dumas]

Just finished L. Ron Hubbard's Typewriter in the Sky. It's a decent pulp novel and handles the idea of someone being sucked into a fictional world very well. It's also much better than Battlefield Earth or that enormous 10-volume thing Hubbard turned out at the end. Makes you wonder just what happened to him in those forty years.

[SkynJay]

Just finished L. Ron Hubbard's Typewriter in the Sky. It's a decent pulp novel and handles the idea of someone being sucked into a fictional world very well. It's also much better than Battlefield Earth or that enormous 10-volume thing Hubbard turned out at the end. Makes you wonder just what happened to him in those forty years.

He started to take himself seriously. My dad loves his old pulp writings as well.