What are you reading in 2025?

[Ralif Redhammer]

I finished reading Chuck Tingle's Lucky Day. Though there certainly are throughlines with his Tinglers, it's very much a different style. The book is all about how random chance can be horrific, or it can be freeing. Plenty of gore, too.

I re-read Stephen King's Cycle of the Werewolf, for the first time in well over 30 years. Still a solid horror work, with monsters human and inhuman, as is par for the course in King's writing. Reading it on Kindle, though, didn't do the Bernie Wrightson illustrations justice.

Now I'm reading Ray Bradbury's The October Country.

 

[jian]

On something of a superhero comics kick at the moment and am interested to note a couple of new universes that have popped up in the last few years.

The one I'm reading at the moment is the Massive Universe, which is published by Image and mostly written by people who used to write Power Rangers, and it shows - if there's a common motif between our heroes it's that their powers come with helmeted colour-coded full bodysuits (very convenient for secret identities) and enhanced physical traits. The other theme is that our protagonists aren't particularly heroic people and try to work out what to do with suddenly getting superpowers. The ones I've read so far are;

• Rogue Sun: Dylan, a sullen high school bully, discovers that his deadbeat missing dad was Rogue Sun, the hero of New Orleans. He's left the powers in his dad's will and finds that they come with one lecturing and overbearing ghost dad. To his credit, Dylan does his best to be a hero, but is terrible at it.
• Radiant Black: Nathan, a failed writer with massive debts, returns to his hometown and reconnects with his old friend Marshall. He then finds an alien black hole that gives him gravity powers, which he sometimes shares with Marshall. There are other Radiants, and at least one has turned to crime.
• Supermassive: A crossover between various Massive heroes, including the two above but also Dead Lucky and Inferno Girl Red.

There's also Geoff Johns' Unnamed Universe (great creativity there, sport) published via Image again. These are really not particularly connected (or superhero) and are mostly sci-fi stories apparently happening in the same universe, such as:

• Geiger: Radioactive man wanders post-apocalyptic USA. Honestly better than it sounds.
• Junkyard Joe: Basically GI Robot, but well-written and probably the best of the bunch.
• Redcoat: Immortal redcoat (as in British soldier from the Revolutionary War) walks the earth.
• Rook: Bird-controlling sci-fi hero tries to save poorly terraformed planet.

 

[gnarlygninja]

I don't think Rook is part of Unnamed, it's just also part of the Ghost Machine imprint that Johns uses for them. And launched it at the same time. That and the fact that several titles that still haven't been published both really confused me.

 

[jian]

I don't think Rook is part of Unnamed, it's just also part of the Ghost Machine imprint that Johns uses for them. And launched it at the same time. That and the fact that several titles that still haven't been published both really confused me.

It’s honestly hard to know how any of the series join up - Redcoat turns up in a post credit scene (as it were) in Junkyard Joe but that’s about it. There is at least one piece of art with all four characters together, but I can’t see how it would work unless Geiger is immortal too (which he might be, I guess).

 

[HaroldTheHobbit]

I have a hard time enjoying audio books. The reasons are many, let’s just say reading text is an integral part of my reading pleasure.

But I can’t read at the gym, so presto audio books while working out. Currently listening to LeGuins Earthsea books, an old favourite. After that I plan a massive Isaac Asimov spree.

 

[Autumnal]

Thanks for the overview, @jian Do you particularly recommend any?

 

[jian]

Thanks for the overview, @jian Do you particularly recommend any?

All the Unnamed are fine in a straightforward Johns way, I’d probably recommend Junkyard Joe. I’m still getting my teeth into Massive - I do like Rogue Sun more than I thought I would, because while Dylan is a little (naughty word) from the get-go you can see how he got that way - pretty much all the adults are terrible - and there’s hope for him once he strikes out on his own.