Reading When Moon Hits the Eye by John Scalzi.
What about all of you, what have you been reading or listening to lately?
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Finished Iron Council by China Mieville recently. What always does me in with the bas-lag books is how unsatisfying and “unclean” the endings are, and iron council certainly takes the crown.
Now i’ve read pretty much everything by mieville besides his shortstories, and im coming up short on what to read next. Any recommendations similar to mieville?
If you’re looking for more weird fiction, someone created a thread asking for similar recommendations
Thanks mate, looks like a good post to come back to
I’m close to finishing The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. This month has been a bit rough in my personal life and I haven’t, perhaps, been quite feeling it. Luckily, there’s always next year.
I don’t know what I’ll read next.
very recently got an e-reader so that i can get back into reading, i am excited to be able to post something! hopefully i will find some contemporary fiction to read soonish, it’s a bit overwhelming right now so i am just reading stuff that has been sitting in my Calibre library. frankly it has been so long that i am not even sure what i like to read anymore.
anyway, last week i read Concrete Island by J.G. Ballard and now i am chewing through the Standard Ebooks collection of Clark Ashton Smith short fiction. i haven’t particularly loved either but that’s okay!
I’d love to hear your thoughts on Clark Ashton smith if you are up to going into more detail. He’s one of my favorites and I so rarely see him mentioned. He was a contemporary and friend of both Robert e Howard and HP Lovecraft, and I personally found him better at sword & sorcery than Howard and better at weird fiction than lovecraft.
ahh that’s cool that he is a favourite! i did vaguely know he was buddies with lovecraft but that was the sum of my knowledge about him before this.
i have finished the collection now and very much enjoyed his descriptions of settings and objects, so while many of the stories were not quite my jam i did appreciate his prose and would like to explore more! alas i am not a words person (nor a brains one) myself so that is about all the detail i can give. though i may say it started some cogs turning, i would like to start a drawing based on a setting in one of the stories because it became so vivid in my mind.
Welcome back to reading!
If you want any suggestions you can ask here, or just make a separate post.
thankyou! i ought make a dent on my backlog, but once i figure out more about what i might be looking for i will certainly do just that!
Which ereader did you get?
it is a Boox Go, i don’t think i needed the colour but i am not one to complain about such a nice birthday gift!
nice! I was tossing up between boox and kobo when i was in the market for an e-reader, but settled on the kobo. Happy (late?) birthday!
ahh kobos look really nice too! and thankyou, it is definitely late but i will take the good wishes anyway :)
Great that you started reading again! I had also been on a hiatus for a few years and picked it up again last winter. It took me a while to find stuff I enjoy reading and sometimes I still choose books that aren’t right for me, but I’ve learned that it’s okay to just not finish a book. If I’m not enjoying it, why continue? There are so many books out there, there is bound to be a better one.
yeah that’s fair! i don’t mind not finishing things but i have to be having a bad time and feel like i am getting nothing out of it. mostly i can find worthwhile elements in media that otherwise is not my jam, it is kind of a challenge i give myself, to find buried treasure in a way. if something isn’t even fun for me in that way then it is definitely time to hit the bricks tho.
The Anthropocene Reviewed, by John Green
finished it yesterday actually. The Book is a compilation of stories, memories and thoughts of John Green in the form of short reviews. Quick read, some stories had me laughing others are very touching, revolving around the loss of a dear friend or concerning his mental problems, but it’s mostly about how John Green views Humans and Humanity, he appears to be a big fan which is a suprisingly refreshing take.
If you’ve been keeping up with the vlogbrothers videos (as I have) there’s not many stories you haven’t heard before; it’s fine, but I was a bit disappointed.
yeah, i think almost all the stories from the book where part of the podcast by the same name, but i didn’t knew about that before picking up the book. I was vaguely aware of John Green as the author of “the fault in our stars”, which never seemed like my jam, and the only other touchpoint i had was the first epsiode of Hank Greens “Humans”-Podcast, which made me think he might have stories i’d enjoy, which i did.
Reading 1984 rn.
I finished that last, god what a beating my mood took seeing it literally happening around me as I read it.
You know what I’m saying?
It’s the reason I started reading it in the first place. It feels highly relevant now in our western parts of the world, based on what I’d read about it.
I just finished When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead. It’s a wonderful little scifi mystery that just draws you right in.
“Introduction to Mathematical Thinking” by Keith Devlin. Just an interesting (and short) book about the concepts around math.
And I’m slowly getting through a book about the history of Ottawa.
There There by Tommy Orange
On The Calculation of Volume by Solvej Balle
The Ontogeny of Information by Susan OyamaI just started Groundskeeping by Lee Cole. A small town love story about a couple of writers. Really good writing so far (~20%)
Last week I finished King Sorrow by Joe Hill. I think the bones were great, but the author struggled to make the final conflict interesting. Too many threads, not woven together nicely. Still a good read, just didn’t quite land the plane.
I also read We the People by Jill Lepore… a history of the US constitution. Great stuff, fascinating to see the back and forth of parties (and sides of the political spectrum) changing their opinions on amendments. Basically, the party who doesn’t control the supreme court demands amendment and the other party fights it tooth and nail. There were some very sad parts looking at the arguments for (and against) women’s suffrage, emancipation and equal rights. Really gross to look back at the 1850s through 1960s opinion on anyone who wasn’t a white man
Couriers Outbound, Book 19 of “The Wandering Inn” by Pirateaba
I’m only on book 8 does the addiction become more managable?
About halfway through Dungeon Crawler Carl book #5, it’s been hot out, so only working for a little bit and reading a bunch more. Kids are in and out of camps all week anyways, so not much time for anything else.
After this, it’s book one of The Black Fleet Crises, which is a Star Wars legends series. Looking forward to this one after a stint of stand alone stories.
I’ve enjoyed the John Scalzi short stories that I’ve read, he’s on my list of authors to check out at the book fair next year.
East of Eden by John Steinbeck.
It is a bit lengthy, but it seems like each interaction is written around pithy wisdoms interwoven into the lives of interactions of the characters.
Each time it happens, it’s like stumbling upon on a gemstone by a river, and keeps me anticipating the next unfolding of the plot.
Oh, that’s a great book! A heavy read for sure. A friend aptly called it ‘nourishing’, which is true of most Steinbeck. Just one of his books sates you for quite a while. I’m glad to hear you like it!
Gonna stop at the store on the way home today and pick up Event Horizon - Dark Descent
It’s a graphic novel prequel to the film. It goes over what happened to the original crew. There’s also a sequel to the film coming out this year also in graphic novel format that I am excited for.
I am also still working through Echopraxia by Peter Watts, love it so far.
I just started The Muderbot Diaries by Martha Wells.
Enjoy, that series is a treat!
Started “The Faith of Beasts” by James S.A. Corey, book 2 of The Captives War. It’s okay. Kind of dark though. Less fun than the Expanse.
Last week read “Darksight Dare”, book 16 of the Penric & Desdemona series, as well as “Out Law”, by Jim Butcher, book, uh, 18.5 of the Dresden Files. The former was fluffy and cozy but also somewhat simple; the latter wasn’t bad at all, and I’m curious to see where the setup goes.
I enjoyed the book and series so far, it’s definitely tackling different topics though. Less politics, more bureaucracy, and it’s about space (the universe), not about being in space, so no epic space battles or anything.
I like it for what it is, but people should not be going in expecting The Expanse 2.0
I’ve read everything in the captive’s war series so far. It’s good, but not great overall. The novella Livesuit was something else though.
Agreed, Livesuit was very memorable, and as I’m on the opening third of Book 2, I’m waiting for that plot thread to start showing up
