Back to reading Rosemary and Rue by Seanan McGuire (first book in her October Daye urban fantasy series). Only read couple of pages, but things are setting down so should be getting back to reading more.
What about all of you? What have you been reading or listening to lately?
Official Bingo Turn-in post is live!
Reading The Fall by Neal Stephenson. It’s a sequel to REAMDE, which I really enjoyed reading for the second time this year—the first time being eight years ago (I think?). So far, The Fall is exploring a lot of the same concepts as the animated series Pantheon: life after death, uploaded consciousness (or intelligence), physical reality vs perceived, immortality. The series started production in 2018, and the book was published in 2019; these ideas must have been in the zeitgeist I guess.
Considering the genre of the first book (MMORPG hacker spy international criminals thriller), I’m really surprised Stephenson was able to adapt and develop these characters into a story with this kind of theme. Digging it.
Just about to finish The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden. It’s been good! Very beautifully written and such a unique setting (post war Netherlands). I’ve been reading it for my book club.
I’m thinking on starting The Lies of Locke Lamora next. It’s been on my TBR for a while!
Finished The Cadaver Client by Frank Tuttle. Fantasy PI is hired by a ghost to find his (living) wife. Fun adventure, pretty light; good palate cleanser after 1984.
Currently reading Extremity by Nicholas Binge. I’m a little unsatisfied with it, but I think it’s a me-not-it kinda thing. Maybe the last 30% will change my mind.
Just got caught up with the Dungeon Crawler Carl series and desperately awaiting book 8. I’m not a fan of LitRPG but hot damn it hits different.
Meanwhile I’m working my way through the Sun Eater series. Super morose and way *too full of self-reflection but it’s definitely grabbed my attention. and kept me wanting more.
I just finished The Philosophy of the catcher in the rye - super interesting, really enjoyed it.
Reading; Red Comment, Heather Clark - biography of Sylvia Plath. Thoroughly enjoying it, though “enjoying” feels like the wrong word due to the heavy topics it goes into.
Also reading Animorphs K.A Applegate. Nostalgic read and a nice, easy one to pick up when I need something less intense. Up to the 12th book!
And a couple of poetry books on the go; Beautiful Chaos - Robert Drake (eh, it’s okay), All Dogs Are Good - Courtney Peppernell (fantastic! Will definitely read more of her stuff!) and Ariel - Sylvia Plath (a re-read as I know most of them already but interesting to read with the extra insight of the biography).
I’ve been thinking of doing an Animorphs read again. I read them as a kid and I remember really enjoying them but I haven’t read them since. They were one of the books that made me fall in love with science fiction.
Yeah I remember reading and watching it as a kid but I don’t think I ever read or saw all of it so I’m excited to actually see how it develops beyond what I remember! I’m not particularly into sci fi but I did like the teenage alien invasion era back in the 90s/2000s haha.
I wish I still had the alien story I was writing in old exercise books during class, one of the longest handwritten stories I wrote as a kid and sadly disappeared 😭
I was already interested in scifi shows because my mom is a Star Trek and Star Wars fan, but Animorphs is what really got me more into it. The show was interesting, I remember it being a bit weird, however I am in the process of downloading it to rewatch. I see the books all the time in thrift stores and I’m tempted to start collecting them for a reread, but I’ve yet to find the first one.
I hope you are enjoying your other books too!
Reading: Wandering witch Listening: Vampire Hunter D (dramatized)
I will probably drop the dramatized Vampire Hunter D. I don’t like the narrator’s voice, and it’s difficult to understand.
Still reading “Newtons wake” by Ken MacLeod. It’s okay, sometimes a bit messy to follow. Definitely not as bad as some of the goodreads reviews make it be. It’s my first book by this writer, so maybe I’ll read some more after this one.
Just finished book 2 of the Star Wars Legends series “Jedi Academy”. It’s about Luke trying to start a new Jedi order after the Thrawn trilogy.
So I’ve got a short story collection to read this week. It’s called 50 short science fiction stories, and is actually specifically about “short shorts” they “define” them as stories that took up a full magazine page with a picture.
After, it’ll be book 3 of the Jedi Academy series.
Southern Man by Greg Iles, a late addendum to the Penn Cage series.
It’s risky to infer an author’s political leanings from their fiction, but there are exceptions. This was written and set in the 2024 election season, and is bluntly critical of Donald Trump and his MAGA supporters. No, I don’t think Iles got invited to Trump’s inauguration party.
Finished Kingdoms of Death by Christopher Ruocchio - Best book in the series by a country mile. I’m a sucker for despair and KoD has tons of it.
Currently trudging through Non-Things by Byung Chul Han. I get what it’s trying to say. The delivery is horrible. It’s not even a translation thing. It’s the way he’s presenting his ideas through example after example from other literary works. Tangent after tangent. Such and so thought this and this guy said that but I present this thing and this is because in [X99] we did this. Like whoa buddy stay on track for a second. I do want to finish it. It’s only 100 something pages. It’s feeling like a DNF though.
Started reading Ascendance of a Bookworm
Slogging away at the long non-fiction “The Plot to Kill King” -William Pepper. I say slogging because I only give myself about 15-30 min for reading time each night and it’s a hefty book, appendices and all.
I recently revisited some classic novels:
The Stranger, by Albert Camus Siddhartha, by Hermann Hesse
A lot of meaning flew over my head when I originally read these as a teenager.
I’m listening to Harrow the Ninth. I read a few years ago but I’ve forgotten quite a bit. It’s also fun to take in in audio form. I think there’s a lot I missed in the reading of it.
I’m reading Mossflower because I decided to rectify the fact I hadn’t read the Redwall books in middle school like everyone else (I was a snob).
The Greatest of All Plagues, by David Lay Williams.
