What are you reading (Mar '08)?

[Wild Gazebo]

'Breakfast of Champions'...never read it before...it's good so far.

 

[Vigwyn the Unruly]

I am listening to Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell on audiobook...

I am, too. It is actually quite good so far. Very imaginative.

 

[Vigwyn the Unruly]

I have Jack Vance's Lyonesse trilogy on my list for a reread sometime in the near future, as well.

Is this any good? I loved Dying Earth, but some of Vance's work is just awful.

 

[Vigwyn the Unruly]

"Wicked: The Life and Times of The Wicked Witch of the West" by Gregory Maquire....so far, this book is far more dark than I was expecting. Almost downright creepy.

It stays that way. I finished the whole thing, but it wasn't really my taste.

 

[Richards]

Brimstone, Dance of Death, and The Book of the Dead by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. Three novels in their series about FBI Special Agent Pendergast, collectively known as the "Diogenes Trilogy." Excellent reading; I'm about a third of the way through the third book, and I just started the first book last Monday. That was one week and about 1,300 pages ago.

Johnathan

 

[Lazybones]

Is this any good? I loved Dying Earth, but some of Vance's work is just awful.

I consider it very much in the vein of The Dying Earth stories. Like a lot of Vance it's very stylized, as though there's a soft filter overlying the setting. Lots of fey encounters, odd magicians, weird magic, etc. But it sucked me in as few of the stories I've read in the last few years have. If you have a decent local library I'd just order the first volume, Suldrun's Garden, through them.

I have got to stop reading series. At the moment I'm waiting on A Dance With Dragons, A Memory of Light, and The Wise Man's Fear (second in Rothfuss's Kingkiller Chronicle). The last two are scheduled for 2009, and I would not be surprised in the least to find ADWD come out then as well.

I did get The Annals of the Black Company (anthology of the first three novels) in from my library's ILL system since my last post. I gave it a good go, as several people have praised it highly here, but for some reason I have not been able to get into anything Glen Cook has written. Something about his style just doesn't jell for me.

 

[Fallen Seraph]

It stays that way. I finished the whole thing, but it wasn't really my taste.

I am still annoyed I missed seeing the musical ><

 

[ShadowX]

Has anyone else read this. I'm only 50 pages in and my literary warning bells have been going off for the past 20 pages or so. I'm not 100% convinced I should continue...

I finished both books and can honestly say they were among the most difficult novels I have ever read for a couple reasons. Obviously, the schizophrenic writing style and blurred timelines contribute and in my opinion added very little to a more traditional narrative. Furthermore, some of the storylines compelled me not at all and others were just retreads of other stories (which, I admit was likely the point) so if you aren't scratching your head your often bored. An underlying main plot dealing with the overthrow of the "angels" shares themes with His Dark Materials and shows a great deal of potential. It climaxes at the end of Vellum and actually incited some anxiousness for the second book to come. Unfortunately, the second book is even less cogent and only tangentially deals with culmination of this plot. I think that was most the difficult part for me; the Vellum and the nature of gods should be fertile ground for an excellent story. Yet, Duncan squanders it trying to write "serious" literature. I don't think I have ever said this about anyone before, but Duncan was definitely trying to hard.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Not reading anything. Between pbp, homebrew and my novel I don't really have time for much else.

 

[Cthulhudrew]

Just finished The Janissary Tree by Jason Goodwin, and am about to start in on Adventures of a Continental Drifter by Elliott Hester.