Terxpahseyton
Nobody
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- Sep 9, 2006
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- 10,759
Started reading the Bible. A very dense read... hard to stomach
What Book Are You Reading XV - The Pile Keeps Growing!
- Thread starter Ajidica
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EnglishEdward
Deity
Yesterday I finished reading a book I bought (likely half price as second of two) from Waterstones
Master of The Revels
by
Nicole Galland
which is a continuation of the book she co-wrote with Neal Stevenson about D.O.D.O.
It is all about time travel, witches, cross dressing and alternate reality strands.
Told me quite a bit about Shakespeare's King Players at the court of St James doing MacBeth.
Slightly annoyed by its inclusion of a couple of manuscript letters which I, at my age, found impossible to read.
Probably not an issue for most younger readers here. I might contact her and ask for large format version.
Master of The Revels
by
Nicole Galland
which is a continuation of the book she co-wrote with Neal Stevenson about D.O.D.O.
It is all about time travel, witches, cross dressing and alternate reality strands.
Told me quite a bit about Shakespeare's King Players at the court of St James doing MacBeth.
Slightly annoyed by its inclusion of a couple of manuscript letters which I, at my age, found impossible to read.
Probably not an issue for most younger readers here. I might contact her and ask for large format version.
Last edited:
I liked To Sleep in a Sea of Stars.
Dressmakers was awesome. It was a very narrow look at a specific group of women who ended up working as dressmakers to Elite SS officers wives. The story starts before deportation and ends post war. It is an up close and personal look at their Auschwitz experience. Just excellent!
I read it earlier this year and really liked it. It was a fun read and the nontraditional format worked very well.
Interesting Book review
In the rural Britain of the 1980s, two inspired outsiders spark the world’s imagination with a hoax so elegant one could call it art.
THEIR NAMES are little known, but two of the most important artists of the 20th century are Doug Bower and Dave Chorley, who in 1991 revealed that they were responsible for hundreds of the crop circles that had appeared in the fields of western England since the late 1970s. Working at night and using only rope and planks of wood for tools, the pair had developed a sensational new visual medium that not only spawned copycats throughout the world but gave rise to an entire field of so-called circle scientists who attributed the phenomenon to paranormal activity. The beauty and seeming mystery of the designs gave them a folkloric staying power remarkably at odds with the fragile nature of the form, and these qualities have been nicely conjured in Benjamin Myers’s novel “The Perfect Golden Circle” (Melville House, 211 pages, $ 27.99), a sensitive fictionalization of their making.
Mr. Myers’s version is condensed into a single summer in 1989. His duo of crop circlers consists of Redbone, a “crustpunk” hippie who dreams up increasingly complex geometric patterns, and Calvert, a severely traumatized veteran of the Falklands War who does the legwork of finding usable fields. The odd couple is united by a complementary hatred of England and love of its land and roots. Begun as a lark, the crop circles provide them a lifeline. Their shared code is to “fuel the myth and strive for beauty.”
The contrasting public and private aspects of the stunt are shown in parallel. In the background, through invented newspaper clippings, we read of the growing media sensation surrounding the crop circles, the mass pilgrimages by UFOspotters, and the farmers who make a mint charging for access. But Mr. Myers focuses more on the creative act itself. The chapters chronicle each midnight mission in the fields, depicting both the challenge to remain undiscovered and the illicit thrill of completion. Anonymity and secrecy are key to the work but also a source of deep melancholy, and the novel uncovers a plaintive connection between artistic transcendence and personal loneliness. The controversies attached to crop circles ultimately fade out behind the touching individual quests for meaning. “The next one is always a beacon,” the outcast artists think, “beaming hope across the strange and haunted landscapes of their solitary existences.”
In the rural Britain of the 1980s, two inspired outsiders spark the world’s imagination with a hoax so elegant one could call it art.
THEIR NAMES are little known, but two of the most important artists of the 20th century are Doug Bower and Dave Chorley, who in 1991 revealed that they were responsible for hundreds of the crop circles that had appeared in the fields of western England since the late 1970s. Working at night and using only rope and planks of wood for tools, the pair had developed a sensational new visual medium that not only spawned copycats throughout the world but gave rise to an entire field of so-called circle scientists who attributed the phenomenon to paranormal activity. The beauty and seeming mystery of the designs gave them a folkloric staying power remarkably at odds with the fragile nature of the form, and these qualities have been nicely conjured in Benjamin Myers’s novel “The Perfect Golden Circle” (Melville House, 211 pages, $ 27.99), a sensitive fictionalization of their making.
Mr. Myers’s version is condensed into a single summer in 1989. His duo of crop circlers consists of Redbone, a “crustpunk” hippie who dreams up increasingly complex geometric patterns, and Calvert, a severely traumatized veteran of the Falklands War who does the legwork of finding usable fields. The odd couple is united by a complementary hatred of England and love of its land and roots. Begun as a lark, the crop circles provide them a lifeline. Their shared code is to “fuel the myth and strive for beauty.”
The contrasting public and private aspects of the stunt are shown in parallel. In the background, through invented newspaper clippings, we read of the growing media sensation surrounding the crop circles, the mass pilgrimages by UFOspotters, and the farmers who make a mint charging for access. But Mr. Myers focuses more on the creative act itself. The chapters chronicle each midnight mission in the fields, depicting both the challenge to remain undiscovered and the illicit thrill of completion. Anonymity and secrecy are key to the work but also a source of deep melancholy, and the novel uncovers a plaintive connection between artistic transcendence and personal loneliness. The controversies attached to crop circles ultimately fade out behind the touching individual quests for meaning. “The next one is always a beacon,” the outcast artists think, “beaming hope across the strange and haunted landscapes of their solitary existences.”
Josu
Emperor
Ended A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursuka K. Le Guin
Still deciding which novel starting now
Still deciding which novel starting now
EnglishEdward
Deity
Yesterday I finished
The Space Between Worlds
by
Micaiah Johnson
about a person who travels between alternate probability worlds and encounters herself.
The Space Between Worlds
by
Micaiah Johnson
about a person who travels between alternate probability worlds and encounters herself.
tjs282
Stone \ Cold / Fish
If you liked AWoE, The Tombs of Atuan is the next book in that series. The first time I read it (aged ~9), I was a bit disappointed to find that Ged was only a minor character (and even worse, the main character was a guuuurrrl!
); but this bothered me a lot less on my second readthrough, ~30 years later, as a prospective bedtime story for my own boys.Ged's arc as originally envisaged concludes with The Farthest Shore — though UKL did later write three more Earthsea books, 2 novels and one short-story collection, none of which I have read. The first of those, Tehuan, was published ~18 years after TFS.
Finished reading Eduardo Galeano's Las venas abiertas de América Latina (The open veins of Latin America, 1971), an interestingly-spun tale of the pillage of the American continent by colonial powers.
The book doesn't just condemn but pity the Iberian pillagers, who ended up enriching others and devastating and depopulating their own peninsula for ultimately nought, or the various exploitation mechanisms. Some descriptions of social realities are now invalid, outdated by societal, cultural and/or technological change, and/or by revelations that some of our favourite pretend-rebel dictators actually had CIA support, but still it is a book very much worth reading.
The book doesn't just condemn but pity the Iberian pillagers, who ended up enriching others and devastating and depopulating their own peninsula for ultimately nought, or the various exploitation mechanisms. Some descriptions of social realities are now invalid, outdated by societal, cultural and/or technological change, and/or by revelations that some of our favourite pretend-rebel dictators actually had CIA support, but still it is a book very much worth reading.
I recommend: Te amaré locamente, by Jorge Fernández Díaz, which I've just finished reading.
Josu
Emperor
If you liked AWoE, The Tombs of Atuan is the next book in that series. The first time I read it (aged ~9), I was a bit disappointed to find that Ged was only a minor character (and even worse, the main character was a guuuurrrl!
Ged's arc as originally envisaged concludes with The Farthest Shore — though UKL did later write three more Earthsea books, 2 novels and one short-story collection, none of which I have read. The first of those, Tehuan, was published ~18 years after TFS.
I liked it, but not enough to continue with the series, it is not a book for a 42 years old person.
I finally started Season of storms by Andrzej Sapkowski
Heartstopper, the series of four graphic novels that have now been partially dramatised by Netflix, telling a delightful romance story about two teenage boys at the same school and their cast of friends.
EgonSpengler
Deity
- Joined
- Jun 26, 2014
- Messages
- 12,260
Just started reading Leviathan Wakes (2011) for the second time. I think I read it and Caliban's War back-to-back, and then I had a little wait for Abaddon's Gate, so it must have been 10 years ago. It'll be interesting to note the differences between the book and the show. Some little things already, like Naomi is "almost 2m tall", for example. I remember thinking when the show was announced that it was going to be hard to cast some of the characters. I think the show did amazingly well, in that regard. The performances in the show may prove to be the more definitive or canonical versions of the characters, in my mind, than the ones in the books. iirc, the first season of the show covers the first book. I won't be surprised if I find myself rewatching the show after I finish rereading the book.
Synobun
Deity
- Joined
- Nov 19, 2006
- Messages
- 24,884
This is what I ended up doing. I saw the show first, then read the books, then rewatched the show. There's really no way to cast for the telltale Belter look, and honestly, I'm happy they didn't bother trying with CGI.
EnglishEdward
Deity
Yesterday I finished reading:
Red Moon
by
Kim Stanley Robinson
an adventure story Sci-Fi book with a strong political element regarding China (and the USA).
No sex scenes, but a strange finish with a very dramatic having a baby drama.
If you don't mind that, I'd recommend it to you.
Red Moon
by
Kim Stanley Robinson
an adventure story Sci-Fi book with a strong political element regarding China (and the USA).
No sex scenes, but a strange finish with a very dramatic having a baby drama.
If you don't mind that, I'd recommend it to you.
EgonSpengler
Deity
- Joined
- Jun 26, 2014
- Messages
- 12,260
Very mild spoilers for Leviathan Wakes and for season 1 of The Expanse.
Spoiler :
Mickey 7 by Edward Ashton. Great SciFi story. Quick read (300 pages). Would make a great movie. The perils of colonization in the future.
Josu
Emperor
Ended Season of storms by Andrzej Sapkowski
Starting Sword of Destiny by Andrzej Sapkowski
Starting Sword of Destiny by Andrzej Sapkowski
EgonSpengler
Deity
- Joined
- Jun 26, 2014
- Messages
- 12,260
On Leviathan Wakes and season 1 of The Expanse:
The writing in this book is like butter. Before starting this, I was really struggling to get through Arkady Martine's A Desolation Called Peace. I gave up about halfway, after something like a month. I've skated through half of Leviathan Wakes in, what, a week?
Spoiler :
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