What are you reading [Apr 2017]?
- Thread starter Elodan
- Start date
DrAlexander
Explorer
David Brin - The Practice Effect
I know it's a bit old but it's pretty interesting and refreshingly light (after some Octavia Butler)
I know it's a bit old but it's pretty interesting and refreshingly light (after some Octavia Butler)
Spiderlight by Adrian Tchaikovsky - an easy read, interesting.
Blue
Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal
I read the first Alex Verus book by Benedict Jacka and liked it. Good but not fantastic, but I'm willing to give a series a book to really get in it's groove. Especially urban fantasy - I enjoy the genre but it feels like gems are harder to come by so I'll hunt them down a bit harder. I went to order the second and it had an "order 2, 3 & 4" at a good price, so I picked them all up. (Woo, D&D 5e slow publication schedule means more money in the hobby budget for fiction!)
I'm half way through the second one and have not been making meaningful progress. I expected as a series the second book to try and expand the world, but so far it looks like (very) unlikely coincidences to involve almost all the same players as the first book. It's building on their relationship in good ways, but it's really stretching the imagination that some are involved at all.
As well I have problems with the consistency of the title character's use of magic, using it one scene to do X, and then another scene completely forgetting it can do X and ruminating that he wished he had a way to do it.
But at other times it's got some great bits.
I haven't been making fast progress through it, but having picked up 2-4 I sort of feel I can't just abandon it. If I stop reading to pick up another book that's probably what I will do in fact, if not intentionally.
The worse part is that I've got two books burning to be read next, actually recommended in last month's reading post here. "Little, Big" by John Crowley and "The Fifth Season" by N.K. Jemisin. I'm itching to read them, and I think that may be part of why I'm not having patience with this book. If it was gripping me a little more I'd be through it, but because I get annoyed at it occasionally I've been putting it down a lot and these other books have been calling to me.
They know my name and where I live.
So I'm trying to power through so that the setup for book 3 (and then book 4) is intact but letting me switch to the other books as next on my list.
I'm half way through the second one and have not been making meaningful progress. I expected as a series the second book to try and expand the world, but so far it looks like (very) unlikely coincidences to involve almost all the same players as the first book. It's building on their relationship in good ways, but it's really stretching the imagination that some are involved at all.
As well I have problems with the consistency of the title character's use of magic, using it one scene to do X, and then another scene completely forgetting it can do X and ruminating that he wished he had a way to do it.
But at other times it's got some great bits.
I haven't been making fast progress through it, but having picked up 2-4 I sort of feel I can't just abandon it. If I stop reading to pick up another book that's probably what I will do in fact, if not intentionally.
The worse part is that I've got two books burning to be read next, actually recommended in last month's reading post here. "Little, Big" by John Crowley and "The Fifth Season" by N.K. Jemisin. I'm itching to read them, and I think that may be part of why I'm not having patience with this book. If it was gripping me a little more I'd be through it, but because I get annoyed at it occasionally I've been putting it down a lot and these other books have been calling to me.
They know my name and where I live.
So I'm trying to power through so that the setup for book 3 (and then book 4) is intact but letting me switch to the other books as next on my list.
I'm about halfway into 'Light' by M. John Harrison, first published in 2002. It's now considered the first part in the 'Kefahuchi tract trilogy'.
So far, I completely dislike it. I absolutely don't get why it received such praise. The 'science' part is effectively nothing but a bit of 'term-dropping', here and there.
It gives me some idea why there are people who dislike a novel based on the number of 'f'-words that are used in it; something that doesn't bother me in the least.
However, this novel features 'sexual intercourse' on about every other page (the author even invents an alien race that seems to find it difficult to engage in anything else for a prolonged time), and this does bother me a bit, mostly because I'd much rather read a novel about science or at least a somewhat coherent story.
There's three equally incomprehensible 'storylines': one set in the current time and two set in the (far?) future. Neither features any likeable characters (well, the protagonists are a paranoid serial-killer, an erratic casual killer, and an addict-turned-killer...).
About the only thing I found interesting was a discovery that is hinted at in the beginning of the modern-day storyline: while attempting to build a quantum computer, a scientist stumbles over something that looks like an explosion of fractals and incites an interesting reaction in their cats. Unfortunately, it takes half a novel until it's picked up again only to be dismissed as a 'glitch' (at least initially). Yeah, well, need I say more?
At this point I consider it highly unlikely I'll bother to read the other two installments in this 'trilogy'.
So far, I completely dislike it. I absolutely don't get why it received such praise. The 'science' part is effectively nothing but a bit of 'term-dropping', here and there.
It gives me some idea why there are people who dislike a novel based on the number of 'f'-words that are used in it; something that doesn't bother me in the least.
However, this novel features 'sexual intercourse' on about every other page (the author even invents an alien race that seems to find it difficult to engage in anything else for a prolonged time), and this does bother me a bit, mostly because I'd much rather read a novel about science or at least a somewhat coherent story.
There's three equally incomprehensible 'storylines': one set in the current time and two set in the (far?) future. Neither features any likeable characters (well, the protagonists are a paranoid serial-killer, an erratic casual killer, and an addict-turned-killer...).
About the only thing I found interesting was a discovery that is hinted at in the beginning of the modern-day storyline: while attempting to build a quantum computer, a scientist stumbles over something that looks like an explosion of fractals and incites an interesting reaction in their cats. Unfortunately, it takes half a novel until it's picked up again only to be dismissed as a 'glitch' (at least initially). Yeah, well, need I say more?
At this point I consider it highly unlikely I'll bother to read the other two installments in this 'trilogy'.
trappedslider
Legend
Reading 13 Reasons Why by Jay Asher,while also watching the series on Netflix. This is one book that IMO should be assigned reading instead of some of the "classics" due to it's subject matter.
Ralif Redhammer
Legend
It definitely takes turns following, playing with, and satirizing epic fantasy tropes, which kept it interesting for me.
Ralif Redhammer
Legend
There’s something gloriously primal about Jack London’s stuff. And I definitely see an influence of his writing on R.E. Howard.
I finished book 1 of the Iron Druid series.
Then things get Small World interesting.
I met author D.L. Young at a WriteFest writer's convention last month. He was promoting his books, and the first in his Dark Republic series Soledad.
I bought it last night on Kindle to read, and it's preface says it is based on his short story called The Reader. Which, after I read the the first few pages, I recognized reading last year in an anthology my friend was published in (that I bought so I could read her work).
So small world. My friend's piece is connected to a book I'm reading in a Kevin Bacon kind of way.
So, to sum up: I just started reading Soledad. It's about a world AFTER the state of Texas re-cecedes from the Union, and Pancho Villa like businessmen raid each others cities to take control of oil production and stuff.
Then things get Small World interesting.
I met author D.L. Young at a WriteFest writer's convention last month. He was promoting his books, and the first in his Dark Republic series Soledad.
I bought it last night on Kindle to read, and it's preface says it is based on his short story called The Reader. Which, after I read the the first few pages, I recognized reading last year in an anthology my friend was published in (that I bought so I could read her work).
So small world. My friend's piece is connected to a book I'm reading in a Kevin Bacon kind of way.
So, to sum up: I just started reading Soledad. It's about a world AFTER the state of Texas re-cecedes from the Union, and Pancho Villa like businessmen raid each others cities to take control of oil production and stuff.
innerdude
Legend
Still in the midst of a foray into Guy Gavriel Kay --- just finished Song for Arbonne. Was not nearly as compelling as Tigana or Under Heaven. I'd rate it 3.5 or 3.75 stars out of 5. By comparison, I thought Under Heaven was a tremendous, runaway 5-star effort, and even calling it a "tremendous, runaway 5-star effort" undersells it by half.
Also started reading some of the Harry Bosch novels. Now in the middle of the fourth book, The Last Coyote. Been enjoying them.
Also started reading some of the Harry Bosch novels. Now in the middle of the fourth book, The Last Coyote. Been enjoying them.
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