What are you reading in 2023?

Eyes of Nine · Oct 25, 2023

Ralif Redhammer said:
Now I'm reading Pat Pulling's The Devil's Web: Who Is Stalking Your Children for Satan? Hoo-boy.

Ooof. Power to you, and thank you for "knowing your enemy". I just don't have the spoons to read something like that these days...

Ralif Redhammer · Oct 25, 2023

Eyes of Nine said:
Ooof. Power to you, and thank you for "knowing your enemy". I just don't have the spoons to read something like that these days...

This is my second attempt. I picked it up last month and couldn't get more than a few pages in. Not just the propaganda and blatant wrongness of it got to me, but also Pulling's very real pain and loss.

Zaukrie · Oct 25, 2023

You Are What You Watch

I'm only 60 pages in. First, the font is tiny. Like, yikes, tiny. Second, parts are well written, and parts are a bit dry. And, frankly, not sure what to make of the battle plans from various movies....

Anyway, I get Numlock News every day, figured I should read this and support the author. So far, worth it, but we'll see....

Ralif Redhammer · Oct 30, 2023

I finished reading Pulling's The Devil's Web. It's a book filled with both fear and grief. It's easy to see how rotten the foundation of it is now; so many discredited incidents (McMartin Preschool) and individuals (Thomas Radecki) are cited. But one cannot forget that Pat Pulling caused real harm in perpetuating the Satanic Panic.

Now I'm reading Michael Moorcock's The Bull and the Spear.

overgeeked · Oct 30, 2023

Finished Mushoku Tensei Vol 6…and I’m not diving right in to Vol 7. The end of V 6 feels like a good place to stop for now at least. Several major plot threads were resolved. The will-they-won’t-they between two of the major characters was resolved. Many characters parted company. And a few lingering questions were answered. Almost too much was resolved. What’s left is more a question of when rather than if. Sure, new complications and new characters will pop up, but this feels like the end of a major arc.

With the PDF release of Monty Python’s Cocurricular Mediaeval Reenactment Programme I’m in the mood for some comic fantasy. I might give Pratchett another go, try an old Xanth novel or two, or hit one of my other comic fantasy standbys Tom Holt, Christopher Moore, or Robert Rankin.

Whizbang Dustyboots · Oct 30, 2023

I'm reading a biography of Doc Holliday, written by his family members, with information that was previously exclusive to them. It's honestly pretty tough sledding, because the family feels compelled to say everything that was going on with even fairly distant cousins during the Civil War, when the future "Doc" was still a young boy. And there's a definite Confederacy and even slavery apologia vibe running through these chapters, which is pretty gross. Ready for them to get to the point where he moves west to deal with his tuberculosis already.

Nellisir · Oct 31, 2023

overgeeked said:
Finished Mushoku Tensei Vol 6…and I’m not diving right in to Vol 7. The end of V 6 feels like a good place to stop for now at least. Several major plot threads were resolved. The will-they-won’t-they between two of the major characters was resolved. Many characters parted company. And a few lingering questions were answered. Almost too much was resolved. What’s left is more a question of when rather than if. Sure, new complications and new characters will pop up, but this feels like the end of a major arc.

With the PDF release of Monty Python’s Cocurricular Mediaeval Reenactment Programme I’m in the mood for some comic fantasy. I might give Pratchett another go, try an old Xanth novel or two, or hit one of my other comic fantasy standbys Tom Holt, Christopher Moore, or Robert Rankin.

I'd like to submit Jasper Fforde for consideration as well.

overgeeked · Oct 31, 2023

Nellisir said:
I'd like to submit Jasper Fforde for consideration as well.

I am familiar with his work. Thanks for the rec though.

Ralif Redhammer · Nov 3, 2023

I finished Moorcock's The Bull and the Spear. It spent more time on building its melancholic atmosphere, whereas many other Moorcock tales of the time are full speed ahead.

Now I'm reading JRR Tolkien's The Return of the Shadow: The History of The Lord of the Rings, Part One.