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What are you reading now?


grawk

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I got this on my Audible account and am listening at work... and have a fundamentalist friend supposed to be reading along as well. So far she is 19 minutes in after 3 days.

 

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**BRENT**

 

i have this and have been meaning to read it.

 

total tangent, but this is maybe the best feeling physical book i have.  

the texture and density of the paper, the way the cover folds out  (its orange on the inside of the cover, becomes 4 pages wide).  it's art.

it feels so amazing in the hand.

 

i can totally picture my professors spending an entire class talking about this back at UMBC.

Edited by aardvark baguette
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From Tim Powers' Facebook post:


It is sort of my birthday, or will be in a few hours -- anyway, by tomorrow it will already have happened, kind of. Since I was born on Leap Year Day, I don't actually get another birthday until next year, but at midnight tonight I'll be sixty-three in human years. Ever since I turned eight, and realized that I was at the same time having my second birthday, I haven't felt firmly connected to calendars.

Well that explains a lot.

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  • 3 weeks later...

A kinda interesting "reminder" Longform piece - Solitude and Leadership by William Deresiewicz

https://theamericanscholar.org/solitude-and-leadership/#.VQ2k5h29KJI

"I find for myself that my first thought is never my best thought. My first thought is always someone else’s."

Edited by blessingx
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He's gone full immersive!  Are you going to listen to the Laurie Anderson song as well?  (Kidding.)

 

Me:  Just started and finished Practical Demonkeeping that my sister lent me before I have to return it soon.  I think she accidentally got a first edition of his first novel!  (The back cover says he's working on his second novel and that the movie rights have been optioned for Disney.  Damn, that's something I'd like to see.)

 

EDIT:  ...and she just let me keep it.  W00t!

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I'm reading Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides. I have to read one or two pieces of bona fide literature in a year, despite generally having lower-class taste in books. This one is really good. One hundred pages to go, and then I'm back to my Seanan McGuire binge.

Edited by acidbasement
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  • 1 month later...
  • 2 weeks later...

Found Christopher Moore amongst my Kindle purchases, so started reading Lamb electronically.

 

Stumbled back to Goodreads, so I figured out where I had left off with Dresden files, so I started Small Favor in paperback...and finished it.  Forgot how addictive that shit is, might be worse than Seanan McGuire.  Now starting Turn Coat.

 

Looks like I've got some catching up to do.  Good.

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  • 1 month later...

I know, right?  And it's not like she doesn't know what's going to happen, she's got the basic story lines written out for the next five years:

 


A Red-Rose Chain (September 2015, DAW). Details to come.

Once Broken Faith (September 2016, DAW). Details to come.

The Brightest Fell (September 2017, DAW). Details to come.

Night and Silence (September 2018, DAW). Details to come.

When Sorrows Come (September 2019, DAW). Details to come.

I highly recommend Lost Girl in the meantime, it's vaguely October Daye ish.  Except sluttier.[/Richard Castle voice]  Also?  Best sidekick ever.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Consider Phlebas

 

Banksphlebas.jpg

 

The Culture Series in general and this book in particular came very highly recommend.

 

Honestly, having finished it yesterday, I don't know what to think of it.

 

On one hand its got some great ideas that are as fun to think about as they are to read. A post-scarcity society and their interactions with other civilizations is an awesome concept. Orbitals, Minds, Drones, Sublimated Races, all pretty cool stuff.

 

On the other hand the plot and pacing are seriously all over the place. There are entire sections of this book that could have been left on the cutting floor as they do very little to advance either the plot or ideas. This annoyed the shit out of me for some reason. I put the book down for weeks at a time before coming back and eventually finishing it. Banks is clearly a very smart guy, but IMO he isn't a good enough writer to give meaning and purpose to some of these lesser sections of the book.

 

---

 

I'm pretty torn whether or not I want to continue with the Culture series for essentially the two reasons I brought up above. I'm sure his other novels have great ideas, but I'm worried his writing style may not quite be for me.

 

Has anyone else read these? Any recommendations on another one to try? It looks like there isn't a need to read them in any particular order.

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Based on advice from a friend I started The Martian the other day.

 

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I'm actually listening, rather than reading, and I think this might be the perfect way to experience this book.  There's so much tone and inflection required (the primary narrator/character is a sarcastic sonofabitch) and it is frequently laugh out loud funny.  I'm about 30% in and very interested to see where they take it.  It's being released in film form later this year I think and I can't imagine how they managed the transition.  

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