October 2017: Reading thread.

[dask]

Finally slogged my way through "The White People" by Arthur Machen but what a chore. Big payload with no payoff. Not wanting to get burned twice I set aside the next story in the collection The Great God Pan and started Washington Irving's "The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow". Just a few pages into it but what a turn around, what a joy to want to read again. I know the story in general but am fuzzy on the particulars. Doesn't matter though. Right now it's just enjoyable.

 

[chlorine]

Just finished Grace of Kings by Ken Liu. Starting We Are Legion (We Are Bob). I've heard great things about it.

Grace of kings is on my radar since I've read The Paper Menagerie. What did you think of it?

 

[Vertigo]

For We Are Many by Dennis E Taylor - a great follow on from the first book in this series. More here. (By the way @Dennis E. Taylor you do realise that "For We Are Many" is an unworkable search on Chrons...)
The Fall of Chronopolis by Barrington J Bayley - a great if slightly mind-blowing time travel adventure. More here.

 

[Parson]

Finished listening to A.I. Assault by Vaughn Heppner -- He has an interesting style. I'm not sure how I can categorize it, maybe something like "unflowery, plain and interesting?" It's more like spinning a tale around a campfire than literary fiction. --- Plain old me, liked it quite well.

Started reading (actually nearly finished with) Angel's Deceit by our own A.J. Grimmelhaus. (This is a first for me. I'm reading book 2 of what is largely a Fantasy, but has some S.F. in the mix.) I've moved back into the mystery/thriller column by beginning to listen to Poison Feather by Matthew Fitzsimmons.

 

[AndrewT]

Just started my first David Gemmell, Legend. Been meaning to read him for years. Very fun and fast. Think I will move right on to The King Beyond the Gate. Nice omnibus version that is sadly out of print.

 

[Connavar]

It's been a long time since I read "Howl" but I recall enjoying it in spite of its sometimes antique phrasing -- nothing more dated than yesterday's vernacular. But it is powerful, and in much the way some of Faulkner is powerful, the long sentences seeming to gain momentum as they progress, the effect indeed like a howl.

Randy M.

I enjoyed Howl, the few poems after it in the collection because as you say its so powerful, the longer poems keep growing as they go on word by word.

I have known, enjoyed some poetry with similar style, phrasings so i feel like i chose well in Ginsberg. I wonder how different Howl is compared to his other poems, it was somewhat oldish phrasing at times. I do have a weakness for emotionally strong poetry when they have something real, more personal they want to tell.

There is also danger in that i adore to bits fav poets like Sylvia Plath who is like that so mentally i compare similar strenghts of certain poems.

 

[Danny McG]

Having a go today at classic literature.
The Iliad by Homer.
This is a Penguin edition and has several very tedious and long-winded introductions by learned Greek scholars.
Obviously I skimmed the first intro and then totally bypassed the others to get into the action
Written in a very different style but, so far, a gripping epic.

 

[Caliban]

I just finished Oliver Twist. I found the first half better than the second but overall I enjoyed it. I was going to read some Sci Fi next but seeing as it’s coming up to Halloween I decided to pick up the collection Nightmares and Dreamscapes by Stephen King.

This evening I will probably finish off Voices in the Street by PKD on my kindle and I will begin The Parasite by Ramsey Campbell.

 

[Caliban]

I just finished Oliver Twist. I found the first half better than the second but overall I enjoyed it. I was going to read some Sci Fi next but seeing as it’s coming up to Halloween I decided to pick up the collection Nightmares and Dreamscapes by Stephen King.

This evening I will probably finish off Voices in the Street by PKD on my kindle and I will begin The Parasite by Ramsey Campbell.

The font in my copy of Nightmares and Dreamscapes is tiny so I switched to The Centauri Device - by M. John Harrison

 

[Toby Frost]

Telling Tales by Ann Cleeves. This is a downbeat and fairly slow crime novel set in Yorkshire, England. A detective investigates the ramifications of a murder ten years ago in a small, bleak village. I like Cleeves' writing, which is simple and clear. The detective is so antisocial and ugly that there is no chance of her ever having a family (at least, she thinks so) and the idea of her investigating a close family is therefore quite powerful. Recommended.

 

[Danny McG]

Next up and starting now is The Goddess Project (nuff said!)

This was good and I recommend it a lot, I had it as eBook for several weeks before it worked it's way up my tbr list.

It's been reviewed plenty in Chronicles already..
The Goddess Project by Bryan Wigmore

 

[williamjm]

I finished Ann Leckie's Provenanve. I'm not sure this is really the book I was expecting. I thought Ann Leckie's Ancillary series was an excellent space opera so I was looking forward to another book set in the same universe (there aren't any characters in common with the Ancillary books but the events at the end of Ancillary Mercy do have some impact on the plot).

Provenance is a likeable book that has a much lighter tone than the Ancillary books and verges on being comedic at times, it did remind me a bit of some of Lois McMaster Bujold's work, it's got a similar tone to something like A Civil Campaign. It was an entertaining read but it feels a bit slight compared to something like Ancillary Justice. It felt like the story took a while to really get going and to begin with it was a bit hard to really understand why some of the characters were acting the way they did. It did improve as it went along and did have a good climax, even thought I'm not entirely sure I liked the way things turned out in the epilogue. I did like meeting one of the Universe's other alien races in the form of the Geck, and the culture clash that ensues between them and the humans.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

The Silk Roads, Peter Frankopan

 

[ratsy]

I'm 25% through The Naturalist by Andrew Mayne. Maybe not my normal thing, but it was one of those uber poplular things, so I wanted to give it a try. The first person present tense throws me a bit, but I am curious to see where this goes.

Also about a third of the way through Hell House by Richard Matheson, and though the title is a strong one, for some reason, I hadn't expected this book to be as dark as it is. A good read for a chilly October.

 

[Randy M.]

Dark is a good description of Hell House, Ratsy. Without being gory -- at least, I don't think it is; other standards may be sterner -- it is dark because of the claustrophobic situation and how the characters, particularly Ben, are so deeply affected by it. The first time I read it, I was somewhat put off; the second time, a few years ago, I was rather more impressed by how Matheson dealt with the darkness and the way it reflected on his characters.

More on topic: I started Dark Entries, a story collection, but like other Robert Aickman collections I've started I find myself distanced, having to work to stay involved. When Aickman grabs me -- "The Hospice"; "The Inner Room"; "The Fetch"; "The Visiting Star" -- the distancing doesn't matter, but the opening story, "The School Friend," feels like a story better re-read than read. And, no, I can't really explain that much better. I've set the book aside to see if a later mood change makes the collection more approachable.

Ditto Bernard Capes' The Black Reaper, a collection of older ghost stories, that is demanding a level of attention I'm not up to right now for a sentence level extraction of meaning from oddly deployed vocabulary.

And so to Kim Newman's Anno Dracula 1899 and Other Stories. The first, "Famous Monsters," is relatively undemanding at a time when undemanding seems to be what I'm most up for, while still clever enough to appeal to me. What if the War of the Worlds had happened, maybe a couple of times, and Earth won? What happens to Martian immigrants? A frequently funny story first published just shy of 30 years ago, it remains timely in an uncomfortable way.


Randy M.

 

[Parson]

I finished Angel's Deceit by A.J. Grimmelhaus. This is the second in book in the Angel War Trilogy. This is another good fantasy/S.F. book. It really is hard to tell. What magic there is, is in actuality high science. But the tone and the action of the book leave decidedly in the Fantasy realm. On the whole I liked this book less than the first. But this is a result of my preference in stories and not the writing. I was disappointed in the deceit part of Angel's Deceit, (I like my heroes to win through honesty, hard work, and resiliency and this story pulls that desire into question. and I found the sword play excessive and fairly unbelievable.) But the writing was top notch, and I'm left still wondering how it's all going to work out, so book three is likely in my future. I am hopeful that it will be more to my liking.

 

[Connavar]

View attachment 40034 Just started my first David Gemmell, Legend. Been meaning to read him for years. Very fun and fast. Think I will move right on to The King Beyond the Gate. Nice omnibus version that is sadly out of print.

You started with a great choice for a first Gemmell book, i read my first Gemmell in 2007 with Legend, read like 12 Gemmell books in a year.

I joined this great forum because of Gemmell, Drenai series,Legend made me fantasy fan, huge Gemmell fan. Let us know what you think of the Legend, King Beyond the Gate. Will you read the series in order? Gemmell is a master of heroic fantasy, vivid action, great gray heroes.

I envy you that you have the chance to read Waylander, Rek, Druss, Jon Shannow, Connavar( ) for the first time

 

[Vince W]

I've begun The Centauri Device by M. John Harrison. Only about 20 pages in, but it's a solid start with some interesting world building.

 

[Randy M.]

Vince, I'll be interested in hearing your take on The Centauri Device. It's been near the bottom of my TBR pile a lot of years, and as I recall it was controversial when first published. I'm curious how a reader views it now and whether I should push it nearer the top.

Randy M.

 

[Caliban]

Vince, I'll be interested in hearing your take on The Centauri Device. It's been near the bottom of my TBR pile a lot of years, and as I recall it was controversial when first published. I'm curious how a reader views it now and whether I should push it nearer the top.

Randy M.

I’m reading it as well. The author said recently something along the lines of “They got one of the worst books I’ve ever written and published it as a SF Masterwork and my best books are out of publication”. I think the language he used was a shade more colourful though.