Disappointed - this has a lot of stuff I usually like (stupid levels of pretentiousness, small group of friends, murder mystery, American College experience mixed with a sense of being out of time) but the characters are not only so unlikeable yet also so stupid that I spent a lot of time eye rolling at the decisions they were making. It also ends fairly suddenly for a very long book - I would rather have had less unimportant character building (particularly where the characters' actions don't always make any sense) and a better ending.
I just got myself this chunky tome. Called S. or Ship of Theseus or both. Got it mainly due to its strange format.
Anyone in here who have read it? I feel like it makes most sense to just read the commentary alongside the story.
(Not my pic.)
Anyone in here who have read it? I feel like it makes most sense to just read the commentary alongside the story.
(Not my pic.)
I just got myself this chunky tome. Called S. or Ship of Theseus or both. Got it mainly due to its strange format.
Anyone in here who have read it? I feel like it makes most sense to just read the commentary alongside the story.
(Not my pic.)
Yes and I really liked it. It's a good story and parts of it feel like you're solving a mystery. I used to love reading notes in philosophy books at uni and remember seeing some conversations ongoing in the margins and this scratched that same idea.
The way I read it was to do a whole section, then back and read margins - it's not the most complex of writing styles so it should be okay to keep track of it
Great to hear. I kind of like that approach. Sounds like it provides a more cohesive read of the story while still keeping it fresh in mind for the commentary.
Today I finished
It was okay, a good and entertaining read, but also quite forgettable. I've enjoyed all of Tudor's books so far, but I'd say this was my least favourite of her's, although it did have a good twist at the end I didn't see coming so I'll give it that.
It's about a priest who moved to a small village in the English countryside, and of course there's secrets abound, including why the last priest killed himself, and who exactly are the burning girls etc
It was okay, a good and entertaining read, but also quite forgettable. I've enjoyed all of Tudor's books so far, but I'd say this was my least favourite of her's, although it did have a good twist at the end I didn't see coming so I'll give it that.
It's about a priest who moved to a small village in the English countryside, and of course there's secrets abound, including why the last priest killed himself, and who exactly are the burning girls etc
Good but didn't really tell me anything new - basically that extroverts have a tendency to just plow on regardless of if they have the right answer or not, whilst introverts take more time over things and that we need both to really have a successful world, but the emphasis (in the US mainly as its author is based there) is on extroversion and that can cause issues. I would guess given the forum I'm on that most people here swing towards introversion and so if you've ever been thought of as shy/antisocial this will help explain that you aren't, simply social in a different way.
I continue to really enjoy this series. It's just addictive and keeps going. It's near impossibly not to instantly pick up the next book after finishing one.
Well, it wasn't my least favorite of the new trend of hinging every mystery/thriller on an unreliable narrator. I called the twist pretty quickly simply because the writer was too heavy handed with attempts at foreshadowing.
OP
OP
I continue to really enjoy this series. It's just addictive and keeps going. It's near impossibly not to instantly pick up the next book after finishing one.
Just finished Book 5. Was going to continue but I forced myself to take a break. They are like potato chips.
I think I'd put 5 as my favorite with 6 right behind it right now. They're definitely like potato chips lol
Between how 6 ends and 7 starts. I'm really liking where the series is going.
I will never know if this is a really good book as it is way to close to home but I would recommend reading it to pretty much everyone. Basically there is a plague that kills 90% of men and leaves women alive; the reason that it is unclear if it's good or not is how eerily prescient it is. the author claims to have finished it before coronavirus hit but with editing happening at the time of corona, it must have been tempting to add in a bit extra! Anyway, the book nails the way the world handled the pandemic; people not believing it was happening, politicians making poor decisions/not listening to advice - there's even a section that hints that women have engineered the virus in the form of a conspiracy blog - and the rush to a vaccine. Every page pretty much has a section where you go 'That's what happened' and so it keeps you wanting to turn the page.
Warning - if you have lost ones during the coronavirus or if you don't want to entertain the possibility of what it would be like, there are a lot of scenes dealing with the unexpected, then expected death of people due to the virus.
Last edited:
After forcing myself to finish Murakami's Killing Commodore and growing more and more frustrated with his portrayl of women, I opted to pick up a few books by Japanese women.
I'm halfway through Meiko Kawakami's Breasts and Eggs, which is a lovely novel about three women: two sisters and the narrator's niece. The narrator has a great point of view and voice and the novel balances women's issues with occasionally surreal passages. Really great, so far.
I'm halfway through Meiko Kawakami's Breasts and Eggs, which is a lovely novel about three women: two sisters and the narrator's niece. The narrator has a great point of view and voice and the novel balances women's issues with occasionally surreal passages. Really great, so far.
Need a good thriller recommendation. A sci fi/speculative twist would be welcomed but it's not mandatory
What's the problem with Murakami and women? I read some GR reviews on his latest short story collection, and there seem to be several people criticising his portrayal of women.
I almost started Killing Comm. some months ago. But I realised that I remember almost nothing from the three books of his that I've read. Seems like a waste of time to me 😄🤷🏻♂️
On a different note: I'm almost halfway through The Master & Margarita. Liking it so far. The story is quite fragmented between a bunch of characters, but I have a feeling that it will all come together nicely in the end.
The Anarchy: The Relentless Rise of the East India Company
Interesting but a lot more about the military history of India than it was specifically about the East India Company. I looked on Goodreads and there's a lot of people mad at the author, but that might just be a reflection of popularity, since this was on one of Obama's reading lists and any interpretation of history, at that point, is going to get flak. That said I do think it is a bit sweeping with its generalisations, but it overall seems to come out with the take that all sides are greedy bastards but here's the ones that actually won (i.e. history).
Honoured Enemy
I hadn't read this since high school and on reading it again you do recognise that it is, sort of, pretty generic with good bits, if that makes any sense. I love the original Riftwar Trilogy and the Empire Trilogy mainly because of the Tsurani, which are a very asian fantasy culture that is in my mind much preferable to the more dung-ages generic fantasy of the main series proper, and this has a great 'odd couple' premise except the odd couple is two whole battalions of soldiers being forced to fight a greater evil. Anything to do with the culture clash is really fun, but there's still a chapter of two of absolutely turgid prose for whatever reason where characters kind of inartfully explain their own motivations to nobody in particular, one of the villains does something absolutely stupid it makes no sense to do except to let the audience know what's going on, etc. Still, I enjoyed the read and basically devoured it in a day, so it's still decent by my standards.
It's short-yet-long list, to be honest.
*Women who exist mostly to talk about sex/have sex with the narrator. (In Comm, a young girl the narrator teaches, and he paints a portrait of, keeps talking about her breasts to him.)
*Women who behave irrationally. (In Comm, the narrator's wife leaves him because she's incapable of not having sex with whoever she finds most attractive at that time--just completely compelled to do so.)
*Women who narrators describe sexually/intimately (in the case of Comm, a sister character who dies and the narrator links her age and adolescence to her undeveloped breasts.)
*Women who exist in the story just to leave the narrator.
*Women who suddenly return to the story for no reason, just to meet back up with the narrator. I.e., women's arcs are almost never a developed part of the narrative, just something that happen externally to, and for, the narrator.
--There are probably a few other tendencies I'm forgetting, especially since it's been ages since I read a short story collection of his.
A lot of it works "thematically," but all of the themes are at the behest of the narrator's perspective and never really respect the women's.
The title makes it sound like a short story collection, but it's actually two novellas written four years apart by Isherwood based on his experiences living in Berlin in the late Weimar Republic -- Mr. Norris Changes Trains, published in 1935, and Goodbye to Berlin, published in 1939; in 1945, they were published together for the first time, and would go on to be the basis for the musical Cabaret. They share a general setting and some themes, but they're quite different. Mr. Norris stars a version of the Bradshaw character (an Isherwood stand-in) as he gets involved in a somewhat screwball-ish plot involving a somewhat eccentric British man (the title character) and the leftist/Communist circles in Berlin. Goodbye, on the other hand, just stars a fictionalized Isherwood, is overall a lot darker, and is the one that features Sally Bowles (though Sally is largely confined to one chapter of the proceedings, contrary to what you might think based on her ending up the lead character of Cabaret). Neither novella is particularly plot-heavy, but there's lots of interesting atmosphere and historical detail. It's also really interesting to look at how Isherwood alludes to the Berlin gay community without getting too explicit about it (seeing as he was publishing these in the 1930s).
Read the Berlin Stories a few years back and loved it, always meant to read more of Isherwood following it but still haven't gotten round to it.
Finished The Kingdoms the other day
A time-travel romance story (and it totally is a romance story, bizarre that it hasn't been tagged as that in GR) that I ended up jumping into blind, just picked it randomly from GR's recent blog post about new scifi and fantasy books (LINK).
I really enjoyed it! I thought the first third was by far the strongest, with some mysterious world-building almost reminiscent of China Miéville (a bit) going on and some wonderfully melancholy moments with the main character grappling with amnesia and ghost memories and sudden bouts of "epilepsy hallucinations". After that the stakes get MUCH higher with a plotline about changing the course of a major war and, er, future history? by messing about in the past which didn't particularly appeal to me, and I feel like a lot of the fantastically quiet and contemplative atmosphere was lost with that shift, but it still had a lot of great character moments and characters here and there and some pretty intriguing driving mysteries that made it absolutely worth reading all the way through.
That said, one of those mysteries ended in what I felt like was one of the most contrived reveals I've seen in a time travel story in a while that I just couldn't bring myself to really believe. The story wasn't a particularly happy one to begin with and it felt like it simply existed to make it even more tragic, and while I do love me some fucking gut-wrenching tragedies, this felt a bit weird to me. Not sure how I feel about it.
Also, the main character is a gay man and the romances are between men, and it made me realize this was actually the first of the sort in books for me. I certainly don't avoid them on purpose or anything like that - I guess gay romances are just really rare in fantasy and scifi? At least the bigger, more bombastic stuff I usually tend to read. I don't usually read stuff that's so romance-focused anyway, but this one was very endearing and gentle and I enjoyed it quite a bit.
Decided to stick with the theme and picked up Stephen King's 11/22/63. A couple of chapters in so far and enjoying it. The main character absolutely hyping the fuck out of the fifties early on has been weird, but I'm sure it'll go somewhere interesting.
A time-travel romance story (and it totally is a romance story, bizarre that it hasn't been tagged as that in GR) that I ended up jumping into blind, just picked it randomly from GR's recent blog post about new scifi and fantasy books (LINK).
I really enjoyed it! I thought the first third was by far the strongest, with some mysterious world-building almost reminiscent of China Miéville (a bit) going on and some wonderfully melancholy moments with the main character grappling with amnesia and ghost memories and sudden bouts of "epilepsy hallucinations". After that the stakes get MUCH higher with a plotline about changing the course of a major war and, er, future history? by messing about in the past which didn't particularly appeal to me, and I feel like a lot of the fantastically quiet and contemplative atmosphere was lost with that shift, but it still had a lot of great character moments and characters here and there and some pretty intriguing driving mysteries that made it absolutely worth reading all the way through.
That said, one of those mysteries ended in what I felt like was one of the most contrived reveals I've seen in a time travel story in a while that I just couldn't bring myself to really believe. The story wasn't a particularly happy one to begin with and it felt like it simply existed to make it even more tragic, and while I do love me some fucking gut-wrenching tragedies, this felt a bit weird to me. Not sure how I feel about it.
Also, the main character is a gay man and the romances are between men, and it made me realize this was actually the first of the sort in books for me. I certainly don't avoid them on purpose or anything like that - I guess gay romances are just really rare in fantasy and scifi? At least the bigger, more bombastic stuff I usually tend to read. I don't usually read stuff that's so romance-focused anyway, but this one was very endearing and gentle and I enjoyed it quite a bit.
Decided to stick with the theme and picked up Stephen King's 11/22/63. A couple of chapters in so far and enjoying it. The main character absolutely hyping the fuck out of the fifties early on has been weird, but I'm sure it'll go somewhere interesting.
Finished The Toll (Arc of a Scythe #3)
I already liked the second book less than the first, but because I loved the first one so much, I had to see this through.
It was...disappointing. Thanks to the writing/prose, I never felt like putting it down. But as I continued reading it slowly but surely dawned on me that there was really no way that this would end in a satisfying way for me, given that it is a trilogy. Shusterman introduced quite a few new characters and thereby really put the established characters on the sideline.
I'd still recommend the first one to anyone who doesn't outright hate YA novels, but obviously the trilogy itself isn't exactly getting a glowing rec from me.
I already liked the second book less than the first, but because I loved the first one so much, I had to see this through.
It was...disappointing. Thanks to the writing/prose, I never felt like putting it down. But as I continued reading it slowly but surely dawned on me that there was really no way that this would end in a satisfying way for me, given that it is a trilogy. Shusterman introduced quite a few new characters and thereby really put the established characters on the sideline.
I'd still recommend the first one to anyone who doesn't outright hate YA novels, but obviously the trilogy itself isn't exactly getting a glowing rec from me.
Damn, I was planning to read this eventually.Finished The Toll (Arc of a Scythe #3)
I already liked the second book less than the first, but because I loved the first one so much, I had to see this through.
It was...disappointing. Thanks to the writing/prose, I never felt like putting it down. But as I continued reading it slowly but surely dawned on me that there was really no way that this would end in a satisfying way for me, given that it is a trilogy. Shusterman introduced quite a few new characters and thereby really put the established characters on the sideline.
I'd still recommend the first one to anyone who doesn't outright hate YA novels, but obviously the trilogy itself isn't exactly getting a glowing rec from me.
Keep in mind, it's not awful or anything. It's just that I had such a good time with the first one and nothing is worse to me than the third installment in a trilogy being my least favorite after already being slightly disappointed with the second part.
OP
OP
Thought this was interesting. I know we have some fans of his work from back in the day. It doesn't really hold up today, but I loved these as a kid.
www.polygon.com
Return to the Underdark with Jarlaxle and Zaknafein Aug 3.
D&D’s Drizzt books were built on racist tropes. R.A. Salvatore wants to change that
‘If the drow are being portrayed as evil, that’s a trope that has to go away’
www.polygon.com
Return to the Underdark with Jarlaxle and Zaknafein Aug 3.
No freaking WAY! I thought no one would have read this book! I am just starting it and it is AMAZING so far. I love this kind of sci fi and it hooked me from the very beginning. I cut your post because I only read this first sentence to save myself from possible spoilers, so Im sorry if Im only responding to the first sentence; but holy man this book is incredible so far.
I had been looking for something else to read after finishing the Hyperion Cantos books, Contact and Dune. I went and read the first Maze Runner book since I liked the concept of the first movie (Don't laugh! Hey I actually enjoyed the book!) but I was desperate for something else to dive into; this book so far is it. Its amazing.
Finished up the second Dresden File book and boy oh boy it was only okay. I'm gonna stick with the series since I've heard so much praise for it, but the second book really did not impress.
Took me like a month but I finished The Count of Monte Cristo. The arrival at Paris near the middle is a huge speed bump since there is so much you need to learn about a large cast of characters, their roles and relationships that results in a couple hundred pages that stretch patience. Thankfully it comes after a fantastic first 400 pages that serves as motivation. I'm torn on it mostly because, even though it's such a satisfying and full story, clearly masterminded to an incredible degree of intricacy, that has a proper conclusion to every thread you would hope to have. It's still hard to not near the end and think "finally".
Torn is a strong word, as it isn't torn between loving and hating. It's a great book, and I think the distinction of whether I love it or like it and respect it a great deal will come with my distance from having finished it.
I haven't posted much recently as I read a lot of either comfort food or books I didn't feel strongly enough about either way to care to have outward thoughts.
Next up I should finally get to Devil in the Dark Water.
Torn is a strong word, as it isn't torn between loving and hating. It's a great book, and I think the distinction of whether I love it or like it and respect it a great deal will come with my distance from having finished it.
I haven't posted much recently as I read a lot of either comfort food or books I didn't feel strongly enough about either way to care to have outward thoughts.
Next up I should finally get to Devil in the Dark Water.
One of my favourite ever books.
I've always found the carnival in Rome to be a bigger speed bump than Paris, because it takea a while for us to recognise any of the characters - but everything comes together well enough to justify it.
Which translation did you read - the Victorian or the modern (by Robin Buss)? I'd say the modern translation makes for an easier read, and it restores a few references that were censored in the original English release.
This year I have been on a relatively good pace for my usual speed, so my goal of 30 books will be easily reached. Though, I do have to admit that the last few have been quite short ones.
Seven Kinds of People You Find in Bookstores - Shaun Bythell (2/5)
A Room of One's Own - Virginia Woolf (3/5)
The Stranger - Albert Camus (4/5)
Diary 1946-1949 - Max Frisch (5/5)
Currently reading a short story collection of Edgar Allan Poe, Ask Iwata and "Insomnia - Nachtgedanken" by Ivo Andric.
Seven Kinds of People You Find in Bookstores - Shaun Bythell (2/5)
A Room of One's Own - Virginia Woolf (3/5)
The Stranger - Albert Camus (4/5)
Diary 1946-1949 - Max Frisch (5/5)
Currently reading a short story collection of Edgar Allan Poe, Ask Iwata and "Insomnia - Nachtgedanken" by Ivo Andric.
Ah yea, the carnival into Paris is the chunk I had in mind. I read the Penguin Classics edition with Robin Buss' translation.
It's hard to argue with the length considering the cast of characters with interwoven relationships and lives. Seeing the extravagancy of their normal lives is absolutely integral to watching it come crashing down. That contrast is necessary, even if it takes time to set up. Knowing what is going to happen after that incredible first 1/3rd makes it really hard to put down even in the slowest of times.
I have a feeling it will be one of those books that sticks in my mind for a long time and when I think back on it the great will overshadow the lulls.
I dropped the series myself, the male gaze was too much for me. There's a lot of praise but also quite a bit of criticism
Recently finished this, which was very good:
I'm blown away by how romanticized Vikings have become, when they were no better than Attila and his Huns. Just going around pillaging and extorting kings for a laugh.
I'm now reading Viking: The Norse Warrior's [Unofficial] Manual by the same author. I love these series of 'manual' books, the one on the Romans was well written.
After that I can finally watch Vikings and The Last Kingdom.
They were way better than the Huns. Besides what's already been said regarding trade, the marvel of their shipbuilding etc, they became the Normans in France which ended up conquering England, they founded the Kievan Rus that morphed later into Russia, they conquered Sicily, help the Byzantine Emperor and generally had a huge impact in the Mediterranean, they were also influential on the Crusades, on part of the Reconquista... basically on the whole of Europe during all the medieval period, and not only for pillaging kings "just for a laugh".
The settled and assimilated versions of the Vikings eventually became great, yes, but by that point they weren't Vikings were they? 'Vikings' being a verb and all, not the actual name of a people. The early Vikings were the same as the Huns, fatalistic raiders who extorted and pillaged, leaving devastation in their wake. Let me reiterate: the literacy of the British isles plummeted when the Vikings hit their shores. Their lifestyle in early Rus was barbaric compared to their contemporaries, their 'help' of the Byzantine emperor amounted to just being mercs, their impact on the Mediterranean was stilted because of the choke-point of Gibraltar and Muslims not rolling over to them, and I'm sure the Irish did not like them one bit for enslaving them all.
It was only once they were converted and assimilated, setting down roots in places like York, Normandy and Rus did they become something more than rampaging thugs. I recently read the travelogues of Muslim travellers in Penguin's Ibn Fadlan and the Land of Darkness, and the refrain about the Vikings is always the same, a people with a nihilistic worldview that were behind the times of the era. Does that mean they were cavemen? No. They had sophistication in their societies. But they had a predatory lifestyle that continually stifled the progress of kingdoms all over Europe, until they finally put down roots and assimilated, by which point they weren't Vikings anymore.
The stubborn romanticising of them is kind of hilarious. However, I started watching the Vikings show recently, and was actually impressed with the first few episodes for not sugar-coating them for modern audiences. I also liked the little attention to detail of everyone using the same water bowl and flushing their noses into it.
I just finished the third book recently after years away from the series. I think I read books 1 and 2 back to back in 2014 and felt no compulsion to carry on with it at the time. The 3rd book is better but I still wouldn't say it's great. With it apparently being the turning point for the series I'm starting to wonder if it isn't for me. I'll probably give it another book or two before dropping it.
The series definitely progresses past the "I'm a wizard and here's a weird case I've solved" to a more complex narrative with lots of other groups and their politics and scheming being brought into the world, I'd stick with it if you can. One thing that doesn't quite go away is the male gaze stuff, unfortunately, but I do think they're entertaining reads and the story arcs get a lot deeper as you go on.
I don't mind the structure of separate supernatural cases in the first three books. It's just the mysteries themselves aren't particularly compelling so far. If the author is moving away from that I suppose that's a good thing as it doesn't seem to be one of his strengths.
What a ride. One of the best books I read this year. It kept me engaged all the way to the end.
Starting this next.
Starting this next.
I will reserve comment until you are done.
Coming right after finishing 11/22/63 I decided to give this a read since it was pretty short. This novella hit the ground running and never missed a beat. Quite the page turner. The ending left me wanting more and given King's craft, I feel like the story will continue in some way.
I immediately started Project Hail Mary right after and am already enjoying it so much.
OP
OP
Want to make sure to recommend the best book ever written on Vikings
I finished reading Gene Wolf's Book of the New Sun a while a go but I didn't really get it. I did acquire some supplemental materials so I may give it another go soon.
I have Perdido Street Station which I'm considering next and Children of Time has piqued my interest.
I have Perdido Street Station which I'm considering next and Children of Time has piqued my interest.
I've been meaning to check this one out. I always see comments about the series how it's one of those that you need to read two or more times to get and I'm really curious to find out what that actually means.
Children of Time was fucking great, by the way. Definitely recommended.
Pretty fascinating history. 19th century railroads really were among the most quintessentially American, corruption-riddled industries to ever arise in the West. Arguably the most memorable real-life character to emerge from this uber-comprehensive saga of the building of the famed Transcontinental Railroad project of the 1860's was Thomas Clark Durant, one of the primary financiers behind and vice president of Union Pacific's half of the deal, whom could have been Donald Trump's much smarter doppelgänger. (There truly didn't seem to be anyone he wouldn't fleece, betray, bully, or stiff in his hellbent quest for power and personal gain.)
