So what are you reading this year 2021?

[Ralif Redhammer]

Finished T. Kingfisher's (Ursula Vernon) Nine Goblins. Completely charming and wholesome.

Now I'm onto Moorcock's The Queen of the Swords.

 

[KahlessNestor]

I'm holding off for the moment only because I might already have some of the books in the unread boxes. I estimate I've got about 30 boxes of books and 10-15 of them are unread books. The trouble is I don't have shelf space to get them out. I haven't read it earlier because I'm leery of starting a mega-series until it's at least a few books in. Sanderson does have a really good track record though, so I'm willing to give it a whirl.

Well, Rhythm of War (the latest book) is the 4th book in the first 5 part series. The second half (books 6-10) will happen after a time jump. So it's nearly the end of of the first series. Sanderson keeps people up to date with his State of the Sanderson blogpost every December, if you're worried he won't finish.

 

[ShinHakkaider]

I'm reading/have read:

CASTE by Isabel Wilkerson,

THE SUM OF US by Heather McGhee,

MEDIOCRE by Ijeoma Oluo,

SHOW YOUR WORK by Austin Kleon,

THE COLOR OF LAW by Richard Rothstein,

and HITLER'S AMERICAN MODEL by James Q. Whitman.

 

[Zaukrie]

I understand why, and it is well written, but Hero of Ages is depressing so far....... I think I'm done with part one or two..... It's an interesting experience, as I contemplate the tone of a book I'm writing....

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Finished Moorcock's The Queen of the Swords. Still quite good, but it felt a little more traditionally "Moocockian" than the first Corum volume. Also read Harry Harrison's The Misplaced Battleship. The short story moves fast and snappy - there's little time for worldbuilding, but it is clever and enjoyable.

Next up is Burroughs' At Earth's Core. I've long been a fan of his Barsoom stories, but have never read any of the Pellucidar series.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

Finished Moorcock's The Queen of the Swords. Still quite good, but it felt a little more traditionally "Moocockian" than the first Corum volume. Also read Harry Harrison's The Misplaced Battleship. The short story moves fast and snappy - there's little time for worldbuilding, but it is clever and enjoyable.

Next up is Burroughs' At Earth's Core. I've long been a fan of his Barsoom stories, but have never read any of the Pellucidar series.

I loved the Pellucidar series as a youngun back in the 80's. Read at least twice. Tried to re-read recently, and couldn't get past the racism. ymmv.

 

[Richards]

I finished Find Me by Debra Webb and it was no contest - it was nowhere near as good as the novel with the exact same title by Carol O'Connor. The plot was okay - investigative reporter digs around a small town in Maine where there's been a recent murder and a kidnapping, both of which mirror events from 20 years ago - but the main character is such a Mary Sue it's ridiculous. Not only is she right with all of her assumptions (but of course nobody believes her at first), but at the end she's practically put on a pedestal by just about the whole town who line up to visit her in the hospital and sing her praises. And worse yet, about halfway through the so-so murder plot the author decides she'd like to be a romance author as well so from that point on we get a gratuitous sex scene every 40-50 pages or so through the rest of the novel (the worst offense is when they're supposed to be stalking out the house of a suspect from a boat on the water, but suddenly decide nope, it makes more sense for us to boink right now). I think Debra Webb's on my "don't need to read anything else from her" list.

So, next up is another Firefly novel: Generations by Tim Lebbon, in which the crew of the Serenity finds the location where at least some of the Arks used to ferry colonists from Earth-That-Was are parked. Sounds interesting.

Johnathan

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

I'm about a third of the way through and yeah, it's really egregious. I suppose that, coming from the creator of Tarzan, it shouldn't be a surprise. At this point I'm going to try to see it through to the end.

I loved the Pellucidar series as a youngun back in the 80's. Read at least twice. Tried to re-read recently, and couldn't get past the racism. ymmv.

 

[KahlessNestor]

I understand why, and it is well written, but Hero of Ages is depressing so far....... I think I'm done with part one or two..... It's an interesting experience, as I contemplate the tone of a book I'm writing....

The ending is a kicker, and what made me fall in love with Sanderson. Completely out of left field.

 

[Ulfgeir]

I finished reading "The Sisterhood of the Blade". It is an anthology of stories set in 3-musketeeof the era, but all the main characters are women, who serve as the Queen's guards. It is written by a number of different authors (Ed Greenwood being the most famous).

The first of the character is a samurai who had married a Frenchman, and moved to France. He was a spy for the king, but got murdered on a mission. The second is the daughter of a general. She is very good at swordfighting, and likes to drink, fight, and have lots of sexual relations. The third is a dark skinned female pirate, fluent in a number of languages. She too likes to drink, and fight and have sex (with both men and women). All sex is off-screen, and only referred to in off-hand comments.

It is an interesting idea, but the stories are a bit uneven, and would have benefitted from more editing given that some of them have contradictionary descriptions of the characters, and the language/style varies a lot. The three women have frequent fights with the Cardinal's guards. If you like swashbuckling, it is an interesting read.


Currently reading:
A book that is for instructors in archery. Since it is for the international market it's focus is on recurve (olympic) archery.

The expansion book for Good Society - A Jane Austen rpg. I do intend to run a one-shot for it with my gaming group)

Also doing proofreading on stuff for a number of Swedish RPG's.

• A campaign for Kopparhavets Hjältar
• Adventures for Chock åter från graven (Inspired by Chill 1e which was called "Chock" in Swedish. The title translates as "Chock back from the Grave", which is fitting since it has been out of print since the late 80's. Uses a different rule-system)
• Going though the main rulebook for Chock åter från Graven, as they are thinking about doing a 2nd printing, and they felt that the proofreading on the first edition was lacking in quality.
• Adventures for Kutulu. A Swedish Cthulhuesque game with allegedly simpler rules. Have one adventure left out of 4 written by Gabrielle de Bourg, who is one of the more frequent scenario-writers in Sweden, and have written for games like Vaesen, Tales from the Loop, Call of Cthulhu Sverige, and also a scenario for The Troubleshooters which was one of the stretchgoals for that kickstarter campaign.