What book(s) are you currently reading or listening to? September 16
Still reading Whispers Underground by Ben Aaronovitch. Book 3 of Rivers of London series.
Though, technically I hadn't read anything last two weeks to it's more of "got back to reading".
It's still book 3, but I found it interesting how different it is from Dresden Files. There is no forces of nature with personal enmity with the protagonist (yet), it's just (magic) crimes being solved by (magic) police. More of a police procedural then whatever genre Dresden Files is 😀
What about all of you? What have you been reading or listening to lately?
For details on the c/Books bingo challenge that just restarted for the year, you can checkout the initial Book Bingo, and its Recommendation Post. Links are also present in our community sidebar.
About two thirds of the way through A Wizard of Earthsea.
I adore this book.
Almost finished 'Les entretiens' de Confucius (in French, because, well, I'm French). Started today: 'Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave'.
Work of fiction waiting to be started: Mary Shelley's 'Frankenstein', J.M. Barrie 'The complete Peter Pan'.
Lots of classics! Have fun!
Thx.
Yep, a lot of classics indeed. Moving back to print from ebooks a little over a year ago was also an opportunity to (re)read a lot of them as they can be found for dirt cheap, on the used market.
The Douglass one was annotated by the previous owner (I don't mind that, provided that doesn't make the page unreadable) and the funny thing is that their notes so far are really not focusing on what I'm getting out of this very unsettling text. In its own way, next to the text itself, this person's notes are another enriching encounter.
That's interesting. A luck find, I would say.
Depends the kind of book you read and the shop you're visiting but it can be relatively frequent, and sometimes it's more interesting than the others.
Ahan, I am apparently going to wrong bookshops.
My French is very limited - probably straddling the border of upper beginner or lower intermediate - but I read through Barjavel's La Nuit Des Temps and it was fuckin awesome.
I don't know whether it's because it made me spend more time on each word, or whether translating it made me put my own spin on the story and made it more personal to me. Who knows. Banger of a book.
Nice! It is a great book and, if one excepts Jules Verne, it also was the very first French science fiction author I ever read. The book made a huge impression on me too. So much so that I then read all of what Barjavel wrote, SF or otherwise.
BTW, I would not consider anyone capable of reading a novel in a foreign language a beginner, even a 'upper' one. That too is awesome, if I dare say so ;)
Cheers friend. I follow a lot of Olly Richards' stuff - a British polyglot - and got the idea from him after he recommended some books for learners of the language. I'm still not great - the lack of opportunity means I can't really sharpen my skills - but I'm getting there. I read the French version of Twenty Thousand Leagues to my young son at bedtimes - and told him the story in English. I'm not sure whether it was the fantastic story that sent him to sleep or the frequent "ummmm" and "errrr" while I thought of the same expressions in English!
I'm rather hoping to pick up Le Grand Secret soon, I'm not really a SF person but his writing is very good!
That's so great and nice :)
You put a (happy) smile on my face for the rest of the day and it's 8AM here.
The Rivers of London books are fantastic, and keep getting better.
I've literally just finished reading the latest one, Stone and Sky.
Nice. It's good to know that it keeps getting better.
This series keeps popping up on my To-Read list! Might do it after Wind and Truth.
The Left Hand of Darkness - I read most of it a few years ago, never finished it. On my way to finish it in a few days!
About 20% into Nietzsches Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Not an easy read but fascinating.
Nearly done with Project Hail Mary, Andy Weir! It's quite good, and I'm glad I'd read somewhere here to go in with zero context. Would highly recommend.
Continuing to listen my way through the Otherland series by Tad Williams. Currently in book two, River of Blue Fire. It seems to me that he wrote all four books as one book and was told that was ~3000 pages wouldn't sell well. I'm very much enjoying it. Williams writes in a detailed pace, which can seem slow at times, but I love his use of 20th century literature as the basis of all the VR worlds. They're never the same as their origin and are wonderfully permuted.
I went into Project Hail Mary blind too, and it was very interesting to see how things unfold.
Someone else mentioned Otherland series in the same thread. Have never read it, but I remember loving Memory, Sorrow and Thorn (though I don't remember a single thing from that), so will check it out.
I think I'm enjoying Otherland more than Memory, Sorrow and Thorn! They're both following many of the main tropes of their own genre, cyberpunk, and fantasy respectively, but I think Otherland is more unique of an entry. MSaT possibly would have hit harder had I read it as a teenager.
I did read it as a teenager, maybe that's why I remember liking it so much.
Will add Otherland to my list, but I have his Shadowmarch series in my TBR pile, so will prefer to read that before getting anything else.
About halfway through Roman Sexualities. I know the broad concepts, but the details elaborated on are fascinating.
Finished Roman Sexualities, very good but typically dry and academic in prose; moving on to Thomas Sankara: A Revolutionary In Cold War Africa.
ahem Any interesting tidbits?
Sure thing! It's noted, for example, that scratching one's head with one finger was considered a 'dainty' affectation and potentially indicating a passive homosexual - likely in relation to the connection Romans saw between vanity and passive homosexuality, with scratching one's head with one finger being to minimize mussing one's hair (Julius Caesar, famously handsome and vain, was noted by Cicero to scratch his head with one finger).
Another is that Romans considered a man performing oral sex on a woman to be more degrading than a man performing oral sex on another man, or receiving anal sex from another man. This is largely because the Romans didn't conceive of sexual relations in the form of their partner's sex, but in what acts were performed on who. Some men in Roman history are noted as liking men or liking women, but what defines their sexuality is not that, but rather whether they 'give' or 'receive'. The former is entirely normal for a RESPECTABLE citizen; the latter is proof of some inherent servility and disreputability.
During the Principate, sexual and gender boundaries weakened with the rise of the autocracy of the Roman Emperor disrupting traditional social divisions. Part and parcel with this was a spike in concern from moralists about the decline of 'traditional' Roman morality. Nowadays, all the men are going down on girls, marrying boys, and worrying about their appearance! O TEMPORA! O MORES! 😭
Regardless of whether that kvetching represented an actual increase in such behavior (it likely did, to some degree), it gives insight as to how the Romans perceived sexuality as part of the broader social structure, not just a private matter. It was not that transgressing it made you 'bad' or adhering to it made you 'good', unlike later Abrahamic notions of sexuality; it was that transgressing it was a challenge to the social order of inviolable citizens who could 'defend' their liberty and their self from 'intrusion' of others. The worrying, thus, was connected to the worry that the autocracy of the Roman Emperor was stripping Roman citizens of their liberty-oriented mindset, and creating a more 'servile' citizenry and social order.
That's actually pretty interesting.
Thanks for the detailed response.
I just finished Fahrenheit 451. It was pretty decent but the ending was kind of a letdown.
Now… I’m searching for a new book and don’t know what to read.
The ending is kinda not amazing but it's the rest of the book that's worth so much. He was so spot on on so many things.
Also from Bradbury, have you read his Martian Chronicles? My favorite between the two ;)
I feel like Fahrenheit 451 and 1984 go hand-in-hand if you haven't read it already.
Yeah, I have read 1984 a while back ago. Was a really good book. I still think about Winston and o’Brain with the … scene.
I freaking dislike how Lemmy does the spoiler tag. So I will avoid what, I wrote previously.
Yeah. The spoiler tool is a little janky.
I haven’t read that book in so long, I can’t clearly remember what happens but I do remember it left me feeling rather hopeless.
Oh yeah, the book does give that kind of feeling. Especially the ending. However, I have decided to pick up Before Your Memory Fades by Toshikazu Kawaguchi. It's the third book in the series of ''Before the Coffee Gets Cold'' and I do highly recommend the books.
I'm 90% of the way through The Master and the Margarita. It's a completely surreal plotline and I think it'll help if I do some reading into the background (both the setting and the author's writing process) once I've finished. It's made me laugh a couple of times though, in particular: ::: spoiler spoiler the scene in which the theatre accountant is desperately trying to deposit some cash, only to witness a group of employees involuntarily bursting into a sea shanty. :::
"Many critics consider it to be one of the best novels of the 20th century, as well as the foremost of Soviet satires."
Looking forward to your review!
one of my faves!
Great book. I hope to read it again, one day.
Gender Identify and Faith, by Mark A. Yarhouse and Julia A. Sadusky.
Iain M. Banks' Matter. It's the second-last Culture novel and I'm sad because I'll be done with them soon. It's also been a pleasant surprise because it seems like a lot of people suggest that the novels drop off in quality, but I've really enjoyed the last couple and this one so far.
I actually read all Culture novels until Matter, but stopped reading that one after a few chapters. I couldn't get into the story, it was too complex for me.
It gets a bit easier a few chapters in once you've got a few of the more annoyingly verbose names committed to memory. There is still one plot thread that throws me for a loop because it only comes up once every hundred pages or something and has no apparent ties to everything else going on, but still, I don't think it's any more complicated than say, Use of Weapons.
I’m still working through Drew Hayes Super Powereds series, I’ve finished book 3 and am reading a spin-off called Corpies that takes place during book 3.
The quality has definitely improved. Still could have benefited from a good editor but not quite as much as before. It’s moved into A tier.
I thought you might give up after the last one. Glad it improved.
Oh, I have finished plenty worse series 😂. I read the first two books of a trilogy that was cancelled because it was so bad once.
lol, don't even know how to reply to that 😀 Have fun, I guess!
Allow me to be clear, I was not aware that it had had been canceled until I tried to find the third book in the series, but when I found out that it had been canceled, I was like, “yeah… That makes sense“. 😂
lol, still not sure if I should be happy for you that you were saved from a bad book, or sad for you that you couldn't finish the story 😀
Still deeply down the TrekLit rabbit hole.
Finished the Star Trek: Destiny trilogy early last week (amazing, BTW) and am now through the first two books of the DS9: Millennium trilogy.
Do let me know for all the "must reads" that you come across. I'll probably never read all the Star Trek books but I can read some of the best ones.
I actually did a post a while back asking for recommendations since, yeah, there's a lot of them and I really only have time for the "must reads".
https://startrek.website/post/28030285
So far, I've read two and 2/3 (one single, one trilogy, and 2/3 of another trilogy). I can recommend them all as "must reads" (unless Millennium falls apart in the 3rd book; just started it last night).
Probably next up is the first in the "Titan" series (as recommended by someone in that post). I only bought the first one in that series. If it's good, I'll buy the rest of them.
Cool, thanks for the list. Will look them up!
I am in a book hole..
I started listening to
About a month ago but put it aside when The Fort Bragg Cartel was released. I finished that an I returned to IT.
I am really struggling with it. I have read a number of King books and after four or five you learn his conventions and tropes. I suspect I would like IT a lot more if I had read it when it was released
It took me a long time to get through it as well. I feel like the book didn't need to be as lengthy as it was. I didn't find a whole lot really happens in the grand scheme of things and there is a notorious taboo scene that made no sense whatsoever plot wise but I guess he just really wanted to write that scene lmao.
All right, well feels good to know that I’m not the only one that struggled/Struggleswith it. It’s a very popular title of his.
I just finished my first ever audio book. Always thought this was not for me because I like reading, you know. Then I gave a try, and that's indeed better than I thought. With audio book I can enjoy literacy while doing activities that never would allowed me to do so, like working (for stuff which do not require 100% concentration) or driving (especially in traffic jams). And I really enjoyed having a story told to me, you know a bit like a madeleine de Proust, something bringing you back to childhood.
So for the first one I choose one in my native language, French. À retardement, by Franck Thilliez. This is a great thriller around topics on psychiatry, psychotic criminals and so on. I thought it was very well written and, knowing a bit of the topic through the stories of my psychologist partner, I think it's very well documented about the illness and management of it in asylums (although there are parts that are pure fictional without any scientific veracity).
I'm also reading to another French novel, Le signal, by Maxime Chattam. This is an horror story, maybe inspired by what Stephen King could have written (but as far as I'm in not as good as King - but ok it's very difficult to reach). One interesting suggestion, in the introduction of the novel, the author suggests some music to listen while reading (horror movies soundtracks), never done that before and this is a very good idea (I don't have the ability at each reading session but when I did it, indeed I enjoyed more the book).
I finished Grendel by John Gardner. There were some parts I really liked and some that were just ok. Overall a decent read.
I've started rereading the Lady Astronaut books by Mary Robinette Kowal. They are just as gripping and bingeable as I remember them being. I finished the first one (The Calculating Stars) and am currently on book 2 (The Fated Sky).
Is the series finished? Or atleast have non-cliffhanger ending?
So I've only read the first 3. The 4th just came out recently, hence my reread. Each of the books I've read had a non-cliffhangery ending and was self-contained enough that I'd be satisfied even if the series didn't continue.
Bradbury's, The October Country stories to get a jump on the season.
I finished The Black Tongue Thief a few days ago so I've bounced around a few books. But I seem to have settled on Swords & Deviltry by Fritz Leiber and The Mosaic Effect by McGregor and Mitchell
How are these? Would you recommend any of them?
I enjoyed the light hearted narrator in a dark world aspect of Black Tongue Thief. And I would recommend it, if that is appealing.
I think I'd caution some people on Leiber. He's a good writer, and important in fantasy Canon. And I am enjoying him.
But he is writing during the 1950s to 80s, so there is some inherent misogyny. He tries to make powerful women characters, but it doesn't quite work. I think he was pushing boundaries in the 60s, but a modern reader with modern conceptions may not enjoy his work.
The Mosaic Effect is about the CCP setting up an underground and parallel state in Vancouver/Canada. So if that's your thing, yeah read it.
Thanks for the info!
I'm in the last quarter of Death's End by Liu Cixin, and not really enjoying it. It reads more like a documentary, and the plot seems to rely on people making the stupidest decisions possible. I'll finish it, but I'll be glad to move onto something else when I do.
Just this book, or whole series?
I'm reading "This is How You Lose the Time War" and "His to Be Perfect" currently.
I recommend both of them!
This is How You Lose the Time War is pretty divisive from what I've seen. Unfortunately I fell on the side that didn't care for it.
Oh, I had no idea it was divisive. It won a Hugo, a Nebula, and was Amazon's top seller in sci-fi for a time.
Is it because it's an epistolary novel?
Divisive in the sense that I've found people either love it or hate it. I think people have different reasons. Personally I found the prose way, way too purple to the point of being pretentious. I also found the two characters' voices were practically identical which is extra surprising because they were even written by different people.
I dunno, it was like a 4.5/5 idea to me with a 1.5/5 execution. Just my opinion.
Oh gotcha. I totally agree the two characters voices are so close! I had to go back a couple times in the beginning to recheck who's part I was currently reading.
I’m reading through The Long Walk for a second time, mostly because it seems like they insist on forcing every Stephen King story into a movie, regardless of how little it makes sense.
The Long Walk is bleak. Something tells me the Hunger Games guy can’t hope to deliver nearly the same level of bleakness that the book insists on.
I never finished the Long Walk (had to return a borrowed copy before I was finished). The concept is interesting and hits a personal note as I was forced to walk for long distances throughout my childhood, sometimes to a traumatizing extent.
Apparently there was a screening of the film that required viewers to walk on treadmills at 3mph for the entire length of the movie and if they stopped, they were removed from the theater.
just about finished my current library read The Divinity Student by Michael Cisco. really enjoying the prose and imagery of this gothic horror novella. definitely want to see if i can get a physical copy of this edition with art by Harry Morris.
Right now I'm reading the biography of a Finnish conservationist Pentti Linkola. He was controversial but interesting a character.
I also have City of Darkness on the table, it's about Kowloon Walled City. Both books are great!
I remember learning about that Kowloon city from playing the game Stray, whose setting is heavily inspired by it. While not a book, it might be something you'd be interested in if you haven't already played it.
Omensetter’s Luck by William H. Gass. It was described as a tie for the “all-time best U.S. book about human loneliness” with Markson’s Wittgenstein’s Mistress by David Foster Wallace, so I look forward to it on that endorsement.
Maybe chose something easier to read before jumping into something so dense.
If Audiobooks are your thing, I highly recommend Otherland in audiobook format. It's slow and methodical, but it scratches the same itch Wheel of Time did. Characters that you know you can come back to for a long time. Comforting, even if the content isn't always cozy or nice.
Fair enough! Enjoy your next read :)
It's a horror week for me. Currently reading Shoot Me in the Face on A Beautiful Day by Emma E. Murray and also beta reading a horror novel by someone I know. Quite enjoying them both.
Recently read Albert Camus' The Stranger. That was pretty decent. Think I'll go for one of his nonfictional works soonish, been intending to for a while.
The Stranger is such a strange (ha) book, but what a sense of serenity at the end.
Audio book : First Lie Wins. Just an easy listen.
EBook: My Friends by Fredrik Backman. I already cried and I just started lol
Finished Thomas Sankara: A Revolutionary In Cold War Africa. A very nuanced look at the man. A real idealist bursting with energy, a brilliant man and a visionary, yet inexperienced in politics and governance and prone to misjudging people by assuming (and demanding) the best of them. By nature an improviser, trying to improvise an entire government, and often with a mindset too military for civilian tastes, but too 'revolutionary' for military tastes. It's made me hungry to read more about the situation 'on the ground' during Sankara's administration.
About halfway through Mistborn: The Final Empire.
I just finished this a few days ago. The ending is well worth the bit of sluggish-ness that happens midway through. Enjoy!
Glad to hear I'm not the only one finding it sluggish. Seems it's been so much of telling and not a ton of showing so far.
Just started From Volga To Ganga by Rahul Sankrityayan
I've put the spy thriller I was trying to read on hold for now, since I just haven't been in the mood for it.
Instead, I read:
The Formidable Miss Cassidy by Meihan Boey (cozy-ish historical urban-ish fantasy) | bingo: another continent, award (hard), minority author
A Scottish governess helps out two families with their mundane and supernatural issues in 1890s Singapore.
This was cute, and I'll be putting the sequels on my list of things to read when I need some light fluff. Recommended, but don't go into it expecting the kind of thing that features modern inserts flouting society left and right: the characters generally do what's expected of them, even when they're frustrated by the limitations and injustices of their world.
Interesting. Will take a look.
I am currently reading Legends of Localization Book 1: The Legend of Zelda by Clyde Mandelin as part of a readalong with a friend. It focuses on the first entry in the TLOZ series and I've found it really interesting so far. I hesitate on reading fanmade gaming history books cause I don't trust the information will be accurate or well-written but so far, so good.
I've just started another book (haven't even finished the prologue yet) with another friend called Secrecy World: Inside the Panama Papers Investigation of Illicit Money Networks and the Global Elite by Jake Bernstein. This book got on my radar after I found out the Laundromat film is based on it. I suspect to get mad at rich people's audacity by the end of it.
I need to start a new book, just finished the last one. It was a Sklyler Ramirez book, and I shared in a post this weekend that I strongly suspect him using AI to write. That said, the books are fine if you're in the market for some light scifi reading, I've read most of it in bed before sleeping.
Next will be "This inevitable ruin" by Matt Dinniman. I've read the first five DCC books early this year, and listened to "the eye of the Bedlam bride" this summer, so I'll just complete the series so far.
I ended up tearing through Babel by RF Kuang and finished it today. It was a solid 4/5. I think at times it was very in your face with the anticolonialism and racism but was probably very in line with the time frame. I would have enjoyed some more delving into how the magic system worked/was created as well. But if you can make etemology engaging i feel like you did a pretty good job.
Maybe now i can focus on finishing Lady of the Lake.
I really loved Babel. There is one character that does a quick 180 that I could see being too abrupt but sometimes people are just like that. The book spoke to me most on the level of despair and apathy and hopelessness in the face of a society that is keen on subjugation.
I'm in the middle of the 6th book of The Wandering Inn webserial. I hear it's so long that I may be reading it for the rest of my life.
You'll find many fans for series here.
I just finished Dark Age from the Red Rising series. Started on the Light Bringer audiobook this morning while working! I haven't been this into a series in a long time so I've been blazing through it, though Dark Age was a bit of a slog for me so I'm hoping book six will pick up in pace a bit.
I also started The Colour of Magic last night to give myself a lighthearted option in between the heavier series. I've read more books this year I think than I ever have before thanks to the Book Bingo challenge keeping me motivated! :D
Red Rising gets lots of praise here, should get around to it soon.
I'm currently almost completely through The Capital / Das Kapital by Karl Marx.