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What are you reading? (July 2013)
- Thread starter Maklershed
- Start date
Recently I have bought myself a Kindle, so I read quite a bit last weekend.
First up Ender's Game. I have been avoiding this book since it's premise wasn't really appealing. But since the great majority recommends it, I cave in and read it. To me it did not live up to the hype. I don't think it is bad, it's just nothing special for me.
Currently I am at 56% of Stars My Destination and I like it way more.
Additionally started rereading Lem's Fiasco, since I couldn't finish it when I borrowed it from the library.
Of the three I like the last one the most.
Other then the above I am thinking about starting some long reads as well, but I cannot decide which series to start:
1. Malazan
2. Wheel of Times
3. The First Law
4. Culture series
Any pointers?
First up Ender's Game. I have been avoiding this book since it's premise wasn't really appealing. But since the great majority recommends it, I cave in and read it. To me it did not live up to the hype. I don't think it is bad, it's just nothing special for me.
Currently I am at 56% of Stars My Destination and I like it way more.
Additionally started rereading Lem's Fiasco, since I couldn't finish it when I borrowed it from the library.
Of the three I like the last one the most.
Other then the above I am thinking about starting some long reads as well, but I cannot decide which series to start:
1. Malazan
2. Wheel of Times
3. The First Law
4. Culture series
Any pointers?
Read one of Iain Banks' Culture books. They're all standalones so you can pick one up and have a really good time. TFL is a trilogy and the other books are huge multi book series.
Mackenzie 92
Member
That is interesting, so the read order does not matter at all?
I know that Malazan and especially the WoT are huge, but if any of them comes close to SOIAF then I wouldn't mind getting into it. Though I read to many negative opinions about the later WoT books. One of the main reasons I am uncertain about it.
sparky2112
Member
Finished this. It was okay - certainly moved along at quite a clip. It's a farce on what happens when government more or less goes away and corporations have free reign. Like Nike kills 14 kids while they're buying Nike's new shoes, in order to give the shoes additional 'street cred'. And the NRA becomes a private army-for-hire. It was light and went by quickly.
AngmarsKing701
Member
First Law
Maklershed
Member
Ohhh thanks for all the suggestions. Coincidentally I just purchased Pillars of the Earth this morning (despite already having seen the mini-series).
*scratches The Killer Inside Me off of list of things to bug Cyan about*
BenjaminBirdie
Banned
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1594746370/?tag=neogaf0e-20
I am almost tempted to buy it just for the sheer absurdity, lol
Yeah, I'm definitely curious about the rest of his writing. I'm probably going to continue onto the rest of his the serial killer/John Cleaver series pretty soon.
Iain m Banks. the books aren't long and pretty stand alone reads. First law isn't really long either.
I also enjoyed The Passage! Looking forward to the final book in the series. I read the second one and some parts weren't as enjoyable to me, but it was still good.
shawnlreed
Member
I have never read a Brandon Sanderson book until now.
I read lots of Fantasy novels but I've just never gotten around to his works.
Recently I learned about a novel he's writing that comes out in September called Steelheart.
The prologue is online to read, and it really captured my interest, so I bought an ARC of the book.
I finished the book today and it's really good.
Highly recommended.
I read lots of Fantasy novels but I've just never gotten around to his works.
Recently I learned about a novel he's writing that comes out in September called Steelheart.
The prologue is online to read, and it really captured my interest, so I bought an ARC of the book.
I finished the book today and it's really good.
Highly recommended.
that sounds fantastic.
Wings 嫩翼翻せ
so it's not nice
1984 by George Orwell.
I finished reading Waiting for Godot today. Honestly, I didn't really get the point or the message of the story. I do appreciate the way it was written even though I'm not really used to reading plays. Outside of the few Shakespeare ones at high school, I haven't read any other plays. Trying to correct that by searching more for other plays to read, the one that seems the most interesting is the Theban plays.
Started reading The Scar now. Not that far in it so I don't have much to say for now.
Started reading The Scar now. Not that far in it so I don't have much to say for now.
I swear, these threads present me with new and unimaginable ways to become livid.
Tragicomedy
Member
WARNING: I'm about to gush. This is easily the best thing I've read in quite a while. There's a reason it was nominated for The National Book Award, etc.
I just want to say that I LOVE YOU for recommending this book. Just finished it tonight and it was absolutely glorious. So many damn sentiments I can relate to, such great characters, and so many damn feels reading this book. Total masterpiece, and easily the best book I've read all year. ★★★★★
As a military member who has served in both Iraq and Afghanistan, I've got to say Fountain really nails the dynamic of how surreal it feels to return home. People always thank you and congratulate you for your service, but it's not something that feels right to be thanked for, if that makes any sense. People want to touch you and be associated with you in hopes of something rubbing off on them. Truthfully, most of the guys I know who are combat troops carrying out offensive operations are hesitant to call themselves heroes, or necessarily be proud of all their actions. War sucks, and folks who have experienced it don't understand some of the bloodlust that some people get.
TestMonkey
Member
Found the trilogy at a used book store. Thought I'd give it a whirl. After I finish the trilogy no more zombie books for a while.
Rug Monkey
Member
Yeah. I read the book in about a day, nothing really grabbed me and made me very interested in later books or the universe.
Malazan. I'm about to finish the 6th book. Sooo good.
Every book seems to top the last book one way or another.
Anything in the Asian Saga by James Clavell. (start with Shogun)
sparky2112
Member
You, sir, just made my day. Rock on, brother...
BenjaminBirdie
Banned
omfggg 33% into The Passage my heart is breaking aaaaaaaaaa
dark_prinny
Banned
I've enjoyed your taste in books, and this is pretty high praise, so I think I'll try and check this out sometime soon.
Jag
Member
I just finished it as well and really enjoyed it. I'm also recommending it to others.
So I've been listening to this as my first novel audiobook as I walk to and from the subway to work.
The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
Zafon's prose is just as beautiful as it was in Shadow of the Wind. His world and atmosphere building is also just as outstanding. I'm almost finished Act 1 now and the story is quite depressing. I miss the comic relief and lightness brought on by Fermin in the first book. The plot is also much slower; it seems like all of Act 1 is a gigantic prologue.
The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
Zafon's prose is just as beautiful as it was in Shadow of the Wind. His world and atmosphere building is also just as outstanding. I'm almost finished Act 1 now and the story is quite depressing. I miss the comic relief and lightness brought on by Fermin in the first book. The plot is also much slower; it seems like all of Act 1 is a gigantic prologue.
I finally finished the last book of the Wheel of Time. It's been an amazing 20 year run for those books in my life, and I'll miss my old friends Rand, Mat, and Perrin. Brandon Sanderson did such an amazing job on the last books that I instantly purchased all his previous works and I am now going to be a lifelong fan.
I'm currently reading this:
I'm currently reading this:
Really good read so far. For those who live a portion of their lives on message boards, much of the content will be familiar in one way or another. What's valuable, however, is that this book crystallizes these concepts and provides scholarly studies proving the existence or effectiveness of some persuasive/propaganda tactic. If you frequently find yourself on one end of an e-argument, this book will arm you with a bevy of citations with which you can pick apart the rhetoric and hyperbole of your opponent.
(Fortunately, I am above such petty and meaningless debates, so my enjoyment of this book is purely intellectual.)
I finished Meg Wolitzer's, The Interestings, a couple of days ago. The book is about a group of people who meet and become friends at a summer camp for the arts, and how the dynamics of that friendship change over time. Wolitzer does a reasonable good job of tackling the themes of envy, jealousy, love and loss that are at the core of novel, which spans over 30 years.
Where I think The Interestings falls apart is ironically in it's ability to tell an interesting story. There are not many memorable scenes in the book, and even when events happen that should be memorable, they are not particularly well written. I was never overly excited to read the book. The writing is at all times competent, but it had the feeling of an MFA student who was trying really hard to get an A an their final. There aren't any moments I can point out as egregiously bad, but there no stand out scenes here like the halftime show of Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk, nor is there brilliance in the sentence-to-sentence moments like there is in the book I'm currently reading, Portnoy's Complaint.
This book is getting a slew of good reviews, and is on a couple of "best-of" lists that have come out in the last couple of weeks, so perhaps it's just a miss for me and not for someone else. I'd like to hear the opinion of someone else on this forum who has read the book.
Where I think The Interestings falls apart is ironically in it's ability to tell an interesting story. There are not many memorable scenes in the book, and even when events happen that should be memorable, they are not particularly well written. I was never overly excited to read the book. The writing is at all times competent, but it had the feeling of an MFA student who was trying really hard to get an A an their final. There aren't any moments I can point out as egregiously bad, but there no stand out scenes here like the halftime show of Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk, nor is there brilliance in the sentence-to-sentence moments like there is in the book I'm currently reading, Portnoy's Complaint.
This book is getting a slew of good reviews, and is on a couple of "best-of" lists that have come out in the last couple of weeks, so perhaps it's just a miss for me and not for someone else. I'd like to hear the opinion of someone else on this forum who has read the book.
Pacific Rim: The Official Movie Novelization by Alex Irvine
Basically the movie sans the bad acting and awesome action. Did have some nice fluff between chapters to better round out the world so there's that much.
Tonight, I finally finished:
Lyonesse book 1: Lyonesse (aka Suldrun's Garden) by Jack Vance
This was a slow read, not because it's bad but because it jumps around, back and forth, between a very large number of characters, and the sections almost feel like little self contained short stories. I had a tendency to read a section, feel very satisfied by it, and then put the book down for a while before picking it up again. In the end it all comes together very nicely, and I feel invested enough in several of the characters that I'm going to start the next book immediately.
The plot is mindbogglingly complex. If it were written in a different style you could probably get three or four books out of it. Vance uses a very old fashioned omniscient writing voice in this book which lets him quickly summarize a lot of events in just a few paragraphs whenever he takes a notion. Still, it feels like a much longer book than it actually is because of the massiveness of the plot. In fact, the plot actually might be a little too complex. It almost feels like there is too much stuff going on at times, and that is my only serious complaint.
It was very funny in places, in a droll kind of way, and had plenty of shocking/adult elements that pop up unexpectedly and put the whole story in a different light.
I really liked what was revealed of the magic system. It isn't really explained very much, but wizards seem to rely mostly on "apparatus" which are essentially like bizarre futuristic pieces of technology. Some of the best parts of the book involve wizards and magical creatures and I hope they play a bigger role in the rest of the books. I've heard that the Dying Earth books have a similar magic system, and they seem to focus exclusively on wizards, so I'm very curious to read them as well.
Lyonesse book 1: Lyonesse (aka Suldrun's Garden) by Jack Vance
This was a slow read, not because it's bad but because it jumps around, back and forth, between a very large number of characters, and the sections almost feel like little self contained short stories. I had a tendency to read a section, feel very satisfied by it, and then put the book down for a while before picking it up again. In the end it all comes together very nicely, and I feel invested enough in several of the characters that I'm going to start the next book immediately.
The plot is mindbogglingly complex. If it were written in a different style you could probably get three or four books out of it. Vance uses a very old fashioned omniscient writing voice in this book which lets him quickly summarize a lot of events in just a few paragraphs whenever he takes a notion. Still, it feels like a much longer book than it actually is because of the massiveness of the plot. In fact, the plot actually might be a little too complex. It almost feels like there is too much stuff going on at times, and that is my only serious complaint.
It was very funny in places, in a droll kind of way, and had plenty of shocking/adult elements that pop up unexpectedly and put the whole story in a different light.
I really liked what was revealed of the magic system. It isn't really explained very much, but wizards seem to rely mostly on "apparatus" which are essentially like bizarre futuristic pieces of technology. Some of the best parts of the book involve wizards and magical creatures and I hope they play a bigger role in the rest of the books. I've heard that the Dying Earth books have a similar magic system, and they seem to focus exclusively on wizards, so I'm very curious to read them as well.
Mackenzie 92
Member
Pacific Rim: The Official Movie Novelization by Alex Irvine
Basically the movie sans the bad acting and awesome action. Did have some nice fluff between chapters to better round out the world so there's that much.
Hmm.. might check that out. There's not enough books out there about robots kicking monster ass.
Finished The Aleph which still stands firmly as my favourite short-story collection.
Started Bonjour Tristesse by François Sagan and I'm enjoying it thusfar. It's been a couple of months since I've read anything in French and this seems to be a nice way to brush up on my language skills before tackling the longer French novels I've recently bought.
Started Bonjour Tristesse by François Sagan and I'm enjoying it thusfar. It's been a couple of months since I've read anything in French and this seems to be a nice way to brush up on my language skills before tackling the longer French novels I've recently bought.
Maklershed
Member
sparky2112
Member
It is. It's overly long, but that seems to be Simmons's pattern lately.
BenjaminBirdie
Banned
Wait, Simmons is good? I trust your taste, sparks but last thing I read by the dude was when I was like 11 and, yeah. No good.
He's gotten better?
Finished:
As much as I enjoy the series, it is time for me to take a break from it. Though I'm not sure what I'm gonna read now. I bought Redwall when it was free some days ago and I still have the Dragons Path that came with Leviathan Wakes. I'm also considering a re-read of Wheel of Time since I still need to read the last five books or so...if I just hadn't read the first five or six books like five or six times already when I was younger.
Then I still have all that stuff from the first Humblebundle though I'm not sure which of them I might like, but I probaly should read them sometime. Descisions, descisions...
As much as I enjoy the series, it is time for me to take a break from it. Though I'm not sure what I'm gonna read now. I bought Redwall when it was free some days ago and I still have the Dragons Path that came with Leviathan Wakes. I'm also considering a re-read of Wheel of Time since I still need to read the last five books or so...if I just hadn't read the first five or six books like five or six times already when I was younger.
Then I still have all that stuff from the first Humblebundle though I'm not sure which of them I might like, but I probaly should read them sometime. Descisions, descisions...
BenjaminBirdie
Banned
Shiiit it was like a hundred years ago.
Huh. lol I just checked Amazonk and realized I was thinking of Brian Lumley.
I'll give Simmons a shot!
This sounds pretty interesting.
I'm currently torn on my opinion of Old Man's War as I near the end. I love the characters and tech and the science fiction aspects, but I'm finding myself getting bored with the actual "War" part of it, so I'm basically just skimming those parts it seems.
haha I had the exact opposite feeling. I didn't care about the characters but didn't mind the action/race interaction
sparky2112
Member
I'll tell ya - the guy has a TON of range - sci-fi, horror, his Dickens/Collins book Drood, etc.
But, yes, I liked The Terror and Drood both, but they were far too long. It's not a huge issue, but I find tedium in an otherwise good book especially annoying.
anonymous_abc
Member
my first novel by Robert Crais, my dad really digs them so I was told to give them a shot.
fun, exciting and entertaining so far.
fun, exciting and entertaining so far.
Mackenzie 92
Member
Pretty confident you'll enjoy it. Like Sparky said, it is pretty lengthy, but I never got bored. I loved the atmosphere, the real life history aspect and just the eeriness of it.
Sounds kinda cool. Added to the backlog.