[December] What are you reading?

[Wombat]

You find it an amusing holiday read. :\ Or am I just being dense and missing your sarcasm?

Sorry for the misunderstanding -- I thought the parenthetical comment covered the irony aspect. Nope, this is an amazingly disturbing book, though admittedly I am more worried about Brave New World coming true than most of the other dystopias I have read. With each passing year, BNW seems more and more plausible, a truly ill-making thought.

 

[Erik Mona]

I'm reading "The Anubis Murders" by Gary Gygax and "Almuric" by Robert E. Howard.

The first, while not perfect, is every bit as entertaining as the Gord the Rogue books and displays a novelist more comfortable with the craft than is evidenced by his earlier series.

"Almuric" is Howard's only novel, and allegedly the later bits show evidence that it may have been finished by another author (probably Otis Adelbert Kline) after his suicide. So far it is _considerably_ better written than the Burroughs novels that clearly inspired it, and is at least as good as any Kline I have read.

Otis Adelbert Kline was last published in the 1960s, and is all but forgotten today. But he was Robert E. Howard's agent and a member of the original editorial staff of Weird Tales. Like Burroughs, he wrote books set on Venus and Mars (ERB's "Carson of Venus" was a direct response to Kline's "Planet of Peril," itself a response to the John Carter of Mars books).

I've been on a bit of a Kline kick recently, and even discovered a complete novel ("The Secret Kingdom") written by Otis Adelbert and his brother Allen in three 1929 issues of "Amazing Stories" we happen to have in the office.

It's nice to have a complete archive of one of the greatest sf magazines in history thirty feet from my desk. I need to make better use of that...

--Erik

 

[Celtavian]

re

Yearly reading of Lord of the Rings. Just finished Desperation by Stephen King.

Alot of non-fiction on various medieval and religious topics.

 

[Chaldfont]

Just finished Celestial Matters by Richard Garfinkle and Draco Tavern by Larry Niven. Both were so fun I read them in a matter of days.

I just started Vernor Vinge's A Deepness in the Sky. I really liked A Fire Upon the Deep, but this one is starting a little slow. But it could be that I'm coming off two fairly short, fast-paced books.

 

[RaceBannon42]

Finished up Blindsight by Peter Watts last week. Very good, hard-sci fi mixed with some philosophy. Its a first contact story and should be a front runner for a hugo next year.
my review here

I thought I'd finish up the year reading some John M. Ford, so I am reading my very first Star Trek book, The Final Reflection.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

My sister lent me her copy of Shadow Dance: A Novel (Julie Garwood). I am thoroughly enjoying it.

 

[GrendelKhan]

Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman.