danjuno
Cole Phelps, Badge 1247
Read Kite Runner in school, grabbed ATSS later on. Hosseini really is a talent.
bene_legionary
Believes in love
One Hundred Years of Solitude is definitely a long-haul book. I enjoyed the fantastical descriptions that were portrayed without any suggestion that they were out of the ordinary. Especially later on during Macondo's decline.
It might seem to be that sort of book which is aimless, and I guess it lacks traditional narrative arcs for its characters; it just flows from one part to the next, a little like Catch-22 if Catch-22 was chronological and was more about Pianosa than Yossarian and Snowden. You're reading the story of Macondo, not necessarily just the Buendías.
And, uh, I am reading The Fellowship of the Ring for the first time.... I was recently recommended a whole lot of science fiction novels; as soon as I am done with exams I'm going to go out and look for them. Dan Simmons, Charles Sheffield, and Alastair Reynolds was among the authors mentioned. And I was also encouraged to take a look at Iain M. Banks again.
It might seem to be that sort of book which is aimless, and I guess it lacks traditional narrative arcs for its characters; it just flows from one part to the next, a little like Catch-22 if Catch-22 was chronological and was more about Pianosa than Yossarian and Snowden. You're reading the story of Macondo, not necessarily just the Buendías.
And, uh, I am reading The Fellowship of the Ring for the first time.... I was recently recommended a whole lot of science fiction novels; as soon as I am done with exams I'm going to go out and look for them. Dan Simmons, Charles Sheffield, and Alastair Reynolds was among the authors mentioned. And I was also encouraged to take a look at Iain M. Banks again.
The Expanse by James S.A. Corey is superb. (8 books) Get started now.....
tjs282
Stone \ Cold / Fish
Re. Simmons, I re-read Hyperion quite recently, and would recommend it, but with the caveat that it ends very abruptly -- so you might want to have the sequel(s?) handy or you may feel a little cheated (I don't, so I did!). I also read another of his, unconnected to Hyperion, called Ilium, which was good fun (being at least passing familiar with the Iliad is helpful, but not essential; Wiki says there is also a sequel).
Don't know Sheffield at all, but have read 4 or 5 of Reynolds' books, and enjoyed all of them.
Second this wholeheartedly. I generally preferred his sci-fi (books with the M) over the 'straight' fiction (without M), but of the latter I did love The Crow Road, Whit, and Espedair Street (and Banks himself was most proud of The Bridge).
At least with the Culture (SF) novels, I'd suggest reading broadly in order of publication if you can swing that. The later ones, though mostly not direct sequels per se, do increasingly refer back to (events in) the earlier ones.
Of the non-Culture SF, I liked The Algebraist the most (which I suspect might put me in a minority), but Against a Dark Background is also good (if bleak). Feersum Enjin is hard work to start with, but fun once you get into it. The only one of Banks' SF that I wasn't particularly impressed by was Transitions.
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Just finished The Presidents and the Pastime, a history of US presidents and baseball. Enjoyable, though in DIRE need of editing and organization. Learned a few things: both Nixon and Bush had the opportunity to be MLB Commissioner, and Nixon was a huge baseball fan. Found an interesting recording of him talking to broadcasters during an Angels game. Clinton also once disrupted an interview because he was so captivated by a play-in-progress that he started yelling and cheering.
It's that everything is disreputable and insignificant - and then characters appear to acquire traits which were incongruous with what they were before. I am not at all sure that I can stomach 350 more pages of this.
bene_legionary
Believes in love
Are you sure you're not just mixing up all the Aurelianos with each other? It does get confusing. The family tree at the start of the book pretty much tells you what you're in for. (Uh, yes, including the very last two members of the Buendía family.)
I am talking about the main character, Aureliano (the colonel). How did he get to father half a village when he was a mouse up to 1/4 of the book ^^
But I am also finding it very grating that virtually all of the characters are something out of Kusturica's Time of the Gypsies (obviously heterochronism, but still). I expected something a little more high-brow.
The book doesn't have any psychological depth in the characters, although that's not itself a death-sentence (clearly it's extremely popular and important for latin american literature) it is vast chasms away from the literature I am into.
In general, I am ok with lowlife literature, but not if it is the actual centerpiece and without any contrast to its opposite. Plenty of lowlives in De Maupassant, but there is still elegance there and contrast, not a wall painted with chicken entrails.
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I’m reading the Dragonlance Destinies trilogy, the most recent Dragonlance trilogy and the first new books in the series in a long time.
I don’t think it’s much of a spoiler to say that this trilogy changes things in a major way. You find out from the back of the book that the story features Tas and the time traveling device - again.
In fact, Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman are retconning the whole series so that the past thirty years of Dragonlance publishing history didn’t happen and everything after the Legends trilogy just doesn’t exist.
Weis has said that she doesn’t consider Dragons of Summer Flame canon. In fact I read that she and Hickman wanted to write a trilogy and were not allowed to. Then there were the unpopular Jean Rabe books.
Still, Weis and Hickman wrote the War of the Souls trilogy and Weis did the Dark Disciple trilogy on her own so I’m surprised at this development.
This trilogy comes after a lawsuit Weis and Hickman had against Wizards of the Coast to be able to write the trilogy, which WOTC went back on. Hickman called it the capstone of their work which makes me think the Dragonlance timeline won’t go further, that and the fact that they’re just not publishing many books anymore. But Weis and Hickman are going to write another trilogy about Huma and Magius.
This seems a bit superfluous since there already was a book about Huma which is considered one of the better Dragonlance novels not written by the series’ two stars. Weis also said at one point she was going to write a book about one of the new characters in the Destinies trilogy.
With the (over)use of the time traveling device, they can just change what they want in the novels. I didn’t really like the post Legends developments in the series overall but seems a bit wasteful to just ditch the previous three decades of published work, not counting the stuff that took place further back in the timeline.
I don’t think it’s much of a spoiler to say that this trilogy changes things in a major way. You find out from the back of the book that the story features Tas and the time traveling device - again.
In fact, Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman are retconning the whole series so that the past thirty years of Dragonlance publishing history didn’t happen and everything after the Legends trilogy just doesn’t exist.
Weis has said that she doesn’t consider Dragons of Summer Flame canon. In fact I read that she and Hickman wanted to write a trilogy and were not allowed to. Then there were the unpopular Jean Rabe books.
Still, Weis and Hickman wrote the War of the Souls trilogy and Weis did the Dark Disciple trilogy on her own so I’m surprised at this development.
This trilogy comes after a lawsuit Weis and Hickman had against Wizards of the Coast to be able to write the trilogy, which WOTC went back on. Hickman called it the capstone of their work which makes me think the Dragonlance timeline won’t go further, that and the fact that they’re just not publishing many books anymore. But Weis and Hickman are going to write another trilogy about Huma and Magius.
This seems a bit superfluous since there already was a book about Huma which is considered one of the better Dragonlance novels not written by the series’ two stars. Weis also said at one point she was going to write a book about one of the new characters in the Destinies trilogy.
With the (over)use of the time traveling device, they can just change what they want in the novels. I didn’t really like the post Legends developments in the series overall but seems a bit wasteful to just ditch the previous three decades of published work, not counting the stuff that took place further back in the timeline.
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bene_legionary
Believes in love
Colonel Aureliano Buendía isn't the main character, the whole Buendía family is 
besides his part ends halfway through because there's still another five generations of Buendía to come after him.
At least read up to the part where he gets shot! No, I don't mean the very start. (I guess that part being at the start might make him appear to be the main character, but he really isn't the singular main character – I think it's a mistake to assume that.)
besides his part ends halfway through because there's still another five generations of Buendía to come after him.At least read up to the part where he gets shot! No, I don't mean the very start. (I guess that part being at the start might make him appear to be the main character, but he really isn't the singular main character – I think it's a mistake to assume that.)
At this rate it wouldn't make a difference if Pablo Escobar was the main characterColonel Aureliano Buendía isn't the main character, the whole Buendía family is
At least read up to the part where he gets shot! No, I don't mean the very start. (I guess that part being at the start might make him appear to be the main character, but he really isn't the singular main character – I think it's a mistake to assume that.)
I guess everyone has an opinion.
I'm finding that John Updike fits that bill, though many will make the same statement about Updike
Come now, if even you, who hasn't read the book nor are tied to literature by profession can have an opinion, better positioned people would too.
Then again, you tried to speak against another's opinion, when all you had to 'contribute' (apart from the line I quoted) was hastily lift from wiki - so what is there to discuss really.
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I am now almost halfway through the Solitude book, and sadly it all points towards abandonment. I will try to read until he gets shot for real.
Love in the Time of Cholera - which I had started reading in the past - might had been a better choice for me.
Love in the Time of Cholera - which I had started reading in the past - might had been a better choice for me.
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dusters
Emperor
I concur.
I tried to watch the movie and I couldn't bring myself to, despite it being a cult status book. It follow families and houses. Such books are usually for specific type of reader, I guess.
Another issue for me was that the very start was rather misleading - first 50 pages or so focus on Melkiades and the (dated) inventions he brings to the village, but then this gets reduced to a prop.
Of course it would be extremely unlikely that it would receive the treatment similar events do in stories by Borges, but here it simply deflated, as if it was just a colorful vase to be paraded around in the opening scene.
Of course it would be extremely unlikely that it would receive the treatment similar events do in stories by Borges, but here it simply deflated, as if it was just a colorful vase to be paraded around in the opening scene.
bene_legionary
Believes in love
Love in the Time of Cholera is at least chronological, apart from the beginning. Also a good book, both have their weird bits though.
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