What book are you reading, ιf' - Iff you read books

[EgonSpengler]

The Refrigerator Monologues (2017) by Catherynne Valente was superbly written, and her homages to/satires of comic-book characters were great. It turned out to be a series of short stories rather than a novel, with the only throughline being "misogyny bad." Still, even if it didn't really add up to much, and even if it was kind of 'baby's first feminist parable', it was entertaining as heck to read. I might look for one of her novels someday.

The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet (2014) by Becky Chambers was a hoot. It's light sci-fi about the multi-species crew of a small "tunneling" ship that constructs stable wormholes for other ships to travel between star systems. If you're into tv shows like Firefly and Farscape, this could be your thing. Well-written, goes down smooth, and fun. I'm definitely going to read the next one, whenever I get 'round to it.

A Terrible Fall of Angels (2021) by Laurel K. Hamilton is... okay. I read the first 8 or 9 of Hamilton's "Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter" series years ago, and I saw that Angels was the start of a new series, so I thought I'd give it a try. Technically, I haven't finished it yet, but it would have to end with a real bang to improve my opinion of it dramatically. I'm almost finished, and I'm kind of looking forward to it ending. It's been a little bit of a slog. It takes place in a version of contemporary Los Angeles, in a world where the religious mythologies & traditions are all real and people have magic powers resulting from their connections with various divine beings (gods, totems, spirit animals, whathaveyou). The main character is a police detective who used to be an "Angel speaker" for a big Christian church. A couple of characters are wiccans, and there's a voodoo/vodou priest. None of the Asian religions have been touched on yet. Saving those for subsequent books, I suppose. I was thinking this is almost a great novel to recommend to D&D players who can't figure out how to play a Cleric other than as a healer-who-smites, except that I haven't played D&D in years and don't have any prospects. But, as I say, it's a bit of a slog. It was clearly written as the first in an ongoing series, and like a television 'pilot' episode, it introduces a lot, with little depth, and sets up what could be some interesting stories... later. (If you're familiar with Hamilton's work, this book is not erotica, and is safe for all audiences. I have to admit, I was hoping there might be a little angel-[hugging], but oh well.) I won't commit to reading the next one, which hasn't been published yet, but maybe.

 

[Kyriakos]

The Man in the Case.
It's a short story by Chekhov. Not particularly interesting. Reductionist, almost a caricature.

 

[Synobun]

The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet (2014) by Becky Chambers was a hoot. It's light sci-fi about the multi-species crew of a small "tunneling" ship that constructs stable wormholes for other ships to travel between star systems. If you're into tv shows like Firefly and Farscape, this could be your thing. Well-written, goes down smooth, and fun. I'm definitely going to read the next one, whenever I get 'round to it.

The next one is a pretty big shift, but it's still decent.

 

[Smellincoffee]

The next one is a pretty big shift, but it's still decent.

I liked her Monk and Robot stories, so I'm planning on reading more of her.

Currently reading Dune, having broken the ice by reading the graphic novels. The third one covering Prophet hasn't come out yet, but it's imminent.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

How 26 Lines of Code Changed the World (ed. Torie Bosch, ill. Kelly Chudler) is a collection of short essays about various pieces of software presented in rough chronological order that have impacted the world significantly. The title is a bit misleading as some pieces of software covered, like COBOL and Telegram, are far larger than a single line of code. While important themes such as the importance of trial-and-error in coding are discussed, the work commits the cardinal sin of attributing human behavior to code (e.g. linear programming seeks to influence human behavior?). Quality can be inconsistent, with some sections being more substantive than others.

 

[Ordnael]

Resumed reading the Dune prequels, started House Harkonnen yesterday!

 

[Smellincoffee]

Lawless Republic, an ARC about Cicero's legal trials and their connection to Rome's fall from Sulla to Caesar.
ST The Higher Frontier, Christopher L Bennett

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

In between reading Swann's Way, I finished reading The Man Who Was Thursday by G.K. Chesterton. TMWWT is a masterpiece, a breathless thriller rife with allegories and beautifully poetic writing. It runs the full gamut of Chesterton's writing techniques: grotesqueness, paradoxes and ordered chaos freely abound. I would say it's C.S. Lewis meets Alfred Hitchcock, but even better. Finished it in two days.

Also finished A Prince of Swindlers by Guy Boothby, story of the escapades of high-society gentleman thief. It was good at the start, but got boring because every plan of the protagonist goes without a hitch, so there's no tension at all, and it becomes predictable, though the plans themselves are audacious and sometimes even ingenious (though (again) the protagonist benefits from good luck and a virtually endless supply of money).

Coming back to Swann's Way. I am at the part where Swann (who was just one more of the cast in the previous part) is now the protagonist. Curiously enough, the narrator is the same, though the story is told in omniscient third-person, down to other character's inner thoughts and motivations being described as well. This story takes place before the previous part, which if you remember was about the (still unnamed) narrator's childhood at Combray.

I have no idea how old Swann is supposed to be in both stories. In the first part I assumed he was young, or at the most in his late 30s or early 40s, about the age of the narrator's parents. Yet the second story takes place before the birth of the anonymous narrator, and even then Swann is implied to be past his first youth.

Unlike the previous part, which was a semi-descriptive semi-narrative account of life at Combray, this one is more narrative-focused. We have the hero, the love interest, the ambiguous rival, and a bunch of caricatures for the rest of the cast. Swann is madly in love (as we could have surmised from the title, Swann in Love) yet refrains from committing himself. The love interest herself seems not too keen on escalating things. Swann, who was in favour with the love interest's little circle, the hosts and guests at the Verdurins' house-parties, has now been excommunicated from the 'faithful' (as the cohort of regular guests is repeatedly described). Swann is trying to pry Mme. la Love-Interest from the clutches of her circle.

Overall still a very good book, just dreadfully slow.

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

Started yet another book in parallel with Swann's Way: The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo. The opening was great, the way Hugo so deftly and vividly paints a picture of Paris and sets up the story is simply masterly. But by around the Book III or Book IV he's taken to describing the Notre Dame and the city of Paris, its history and layout. It completely spoils the momentum of the story, like the narrator in Moby Dick going off on tangents to wax loquacious on the history and the techniques of whaling. One chapter Hugo devotes to just railing against the "architects" and "artists" who've spoiled the cathedral with their fashionable designs.

But who has thrown down the two rows of statues? who has left the niches empty? who has cut, in the very middle of the central portal, that new and bastard arch? who has dared to frame therein that commonplace and heavy door of carved wood, à la Louis XV., beside the arabesques of Biscornette? The men, the architects, the artists of our day.

And if we enter the interior of the edifice, who has overthrown that colossus of Saint Christopher, proverbial for magnitude among statues, as the grand hall of the Palais de Justice was among halls, as the spire of Strasbourg among spires? And those myriads of statues, which peopled all the spaces between the columns of the nave and the choir, kneeling, standing, equestrian, men, women, children, kings, bishops, gendarmes, in stone, in marble, in gold, in silver, in copper, in wax even,—who has brutally swept them away? It is not time.

And who substituted for the ancient gothic altar, splendidly encumbered with shrines and reliquaries, that heavy marble sarcophagus, with angels’ heads and clouds, which seems a specimen pillaged from the Val-de-Grâce or the Invalides? Who stupidly sealed that heavy anachronism of stone in the Carlovingian pavement of Hercandus? Was it not Louis XIV., fulfilling the request of Louis XIII.?

And who put the cold, white panes in the place of those windows, “high in color,” which caused the astonished eyes of our fathers to hesitate between the rose of the grand portal and the arches of the apse? And what would a sub-chanter of the sixteenth century say, on beholding the beautiful yellow wash, with which our archiepiscopal vandals have desmeared their cathedral? He would remember that it was the color with which the hangman smeared “accursed” edifices; he would recall the Hôtel du Petit-Bourbon, all smeared thus, on account of the constable’s treason. “Yellow, after all, of so good a quality,” said Sauval, “and so well recommended, that more than a century has not yet caused it to lose its color.” He would think that the sacred place had become infamous, and would flee.

And if we ascend the cathedral, without mentioning a thousand barbarisms of every sort,—what has become of that charming little bell tower, which rested upon the point of intersection of the cross-roofs, and which, no less frail and no less bold than its neighbor (also destroyed), the spire of the Sainte-Chapelle, buried itself in the sky, farther forward than the towers, slender, pointed, sonorous, carved in open work. An architect of good taste amputated it (1787), and considered it sufficient to mask the wound with that large, leaden plaster, which resembles a pot cover.

Man really took that personally

 

[Birdjaguar]

Blackcloak: A Man of his Sword

"Bear witness to a psychological vivisection. Blackcloak is the disturbing tale of a fractured, damaged personality set in a land not unlike ancient China. Here, elemental forces are real, dreams can reshape a lifetime and the night is owned by horrifying yet revered entities."

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

I have no idea how old Swann is supposed to be in both stories. In the first part I assumed he was young, or at the most in his late 30s or early 40s, about the age of the narrator's parents. Yet the second story takes place before the birth of the anonymous narrator, and even then Swann is implied to be past his first youth.

Yep, the second part takes place at least 10 years before the first part, where Swann cannot be more than 45 years old, so here he must be 30-35, yet the narrator keeps on mentioning the Swann of 'old days', when he used to be out-and-going in Society, so he must've been in Society since his 20s??

One of [the footmen], of a particularly ferocious aspect, and not unlike the headsman in certain Renaissance pictures which represent executions, tortures, and the like, advanced upon him with an implacable air to take his 'things.' But the harshness of his steely glare was compensated by the softness of his cotton gloves, so effectively that, as he approached Swann, he seemed to be exhibiting at once an utter contempt for his person and the most tender regard for his hat.

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

...on the despicable, enormous staircase which Swann was at that moment climbing, on either side of him, at different levels, before each anfractuosity made in its walls by the window of the porter's lodge or the entrance to a set of rooms, representing the departments of indoor service which they controlled, and doing homage for them to the guests, a gate-keeper, a major-domo, a steward (worthy men who spent the rest of the week in semi-independence in their own domains, dined there by themselves like small shopkeepers, and might to-morrow lapse to the plebeian service of some successful doctor or industrial magnate), scrupulous in carrying out to the letter all the instructions that had been heaped upon them before they were allowed to don the brilliant livery which they wore only at long intervals, and in which they did not feel altogether at their ease, stood each in the arcade of his doorway, their splendid pomp tempered by a democratic good-fellowship, like saints in their niches, and a gigantic usher, dressed Swiss Guard fashion, like the beadle in a church, struck the pavement with his staff as each fresh arrival passed him.

Black is the actual meat of the sentence, brown is the tangent.

The book is full of sentences like these; I keep losing track of the train of thought

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

I am considering joining the Proust fray. That is, if I can re-start my reading habit. Uni and tonnes of writing and editing killed it

That's like someone who's dropped his morning jog considering joining the pole-vaulting fray

 

[EnglishEdward]

I have just finished reading a second hand Sci-Fi Novel

Woken Furies

by

Richard Morgan

copyright 2005

Some interesting ideas and a rapid surprise plot.
Alas the main character is an unlikeable psychopath.

 

[dusters]

Dune by Frederik Herbert
By the way it is written, it seems to be from 1960s or 1970s sci-fi.

Torture scenes could have been edited out.

A friend recommended me this book, I will try to get through the 300 or so pages. So far it is like 3x less interesting compared to Isaac Asimov's stories.
Asimov has some kind of love for humanity and interactions with aliens were portrayed in amicable manner.

Here the houses are almost the same as in Game of Thrones. Blood, incest, marriages for power, all that sinister royal stuff.

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

Dune by Frederik Herbert

Frank Herbert?

Asimov has some kind of love for humanity

Asimov?? (Granted I've only read one of his books)

 

[Darsnan]

3 Body Problem by Cixin Liu. I'm about 130 pages in, but it really hasn't engaged me yet.

D

 

[dusters]

Frank Herbert?


Asimov?? (Granted I've only read one of his books)

Yes, typo on author's name.

Yes, Asimov seemed lovely to me in this regard.

 

[bene_legionary]

That's like someone who's dropped his morning jog considering joining the pole-vaulting fray

Well, I'm reading Love in the Time of Cholera (again?) as a warmup to your marathon- er, decathlon.

The magical realism is more subtle so far than One Hundred Years of Solitude.

 

[bene_legionary]

Asimov certainly has a weird attitude for the fairer side of humanity. I thought the original trilogy of Foundation was better than the last two books, which were... odd. The last one especially. Then again, he wrote them more out of popular demand and money, I think, than desire to continue the series. I guess the overall concept behind the extension was fine (the whole Foundation and Galaxia thing) but it was also getting in the way of the original trajectory of the books in a way.