June 2019: Reading Thread

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Bick said:
Yes, it's relatively high for a short book but its not that much in actual terms is it? A few quid or dollars for decent entertainment. A coffee and danish from a cafe will cost you as much and give much less enjoyment (and you can't drink or eat them again), a cinema ticket is much more and the movie lasts less long. I don't really get it when people wait until a book is 99c on Amazon, to save a couple of bucks. Have we devalued books?
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I think partly we have devalued books (maybe not so much on this forum but certainly at a wider level) but at the same time, it's the sort of series that you want to blast through quite quickly and buying that much at once will be a lot for many people. It's the same reason it's rare for me to buy a full length graphic novel. As much as I think the artist and author are worth their due, if I want to read a few of them at once it's a big portion of my monthly personal budget for half an hour or so at a time of entertainment. I usually stick them on an Amazon wishlist and buy several at once when they're on offer instead.

I like Murderbot and would happily pay full rrp for let's say one full book a year in the series (I know a novel is coming next year). But three novellas at once? And yes I could buy one novella now, but it's competing (in my head) against other books at the same price that will last me much longer. So instead they're on my wishlist until I have a good month financially and/or run out of other things to read!
 
It's nice to see so much support for my view of the 2nd and 3rd in the Murderbot series being a rip off ;)

I finished Mr Penumbra's 24hr Book Store by Robin Sloan last night - I liked it a lot, and may well invest in the prequel at some point.

I followed that by making a start on Infinite Jest, a book I know to be considered both a work of genius and a load of tosh. I've deliberately waited until I'd forgotten anything specific I might have known about it so I can just read it and see how it goes.
 
About to start Nebula Awards Showcase 2017 edited by Julie E. Czerneda.

I have already read all the short stories nominated, which are reprinted here, and the winning novelette, which is the only one reprinted here, so I've about halfway through the book without starting it. The main interest will be in reading the winning novella, and excerpts from the nominated novels.

(Each editor of this series chooses what to reprint, although they always print all the nominated short stories, as far as I can tell. Previous volumes reprinted all the nominated novelettes, for example, but this one doesn't.)

My thoughts on what I have already read are scattered throughout this thread.

2016 Nebula Award Finalists (c.2015 fiction)

FINALISTS: 2015 Nebula Awards (With FREE FICTION Links) (I link to SFSignal only because they have the links) If Martin L. Shoemaker's "Today I Am Paul" doesn't win for short story, it will serve to confirm my feelings about the bankruptcy of the Nebulas. (I did also like Naomi Kritzer's "Cat...
www.sffchronicles.com www.sffchronicles.com
 
Bick said:
I’m not sure I’d care much for novel excerpts. How does that work?
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They just print a few pages from the beginning of each book. I agree that it's the not best way to read fiction, but I suppose they want to honor the winners and/or nominees as best as they can in one volume. Somebody might get hooked on the excerpt and want to read the whole thing. So far, that has not happened to me.
 
Started reading 2014 Pulitzer winner Goldfinch by Donne Tartt, not sure yet if I'll enjoy and finish the 800+ pages. If not, the film will come out in July and it looks very promising:

 
Finished Conception by Laurence P. White --- this one was a serious yawn. Everything that was right in the first book of the "The Alliance" series (Ship's Log) was less right in this one. I found the direction of the plot to be obvious in the extreme. The hero comes off very wooden, and the plot becomes less and less believable. --- So, no, I will not be looking for book 3.

Started The Gordian Protocol by Jacob Holo and David Weber. I find it very interesting that it was advertised as a "stand alone novel." I'm thinking that Weber's history of extremely long series is felt to be a depressing factor on a new book. I've only started it 7% in, but it's pretty clear that Holo is doing most of the writing. It has had quite a bit of political side bar going. I don't believe that it's going to important to the story, but we'll see.
 
I have started 2113: Stories Inspired by the Music of Rush (2016), edited by Kevin J. Anderson and John McFetridge. The volume also contains two previously published stories that, in turn, inspired music by Rush: The very famous story "Gonna Roll the Bones" by Fritz Leiber and the much less known story "A Nice Morning Drive" by Richard S. Foster, which appeared, of all places, in the pages of Road & Track magazine.
 
Starting this:
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So far read The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller, The Wine of Angels by Phil Rickman and The Terminal Velocity of Cats by Carol Westron.
 
Finished Alan Lloyd's The Hundred Years War. Not in-depth, but interesting nevertheless. Starting the first volume of Robert Graves' Greek Myths.
 
Started Drenai #4 "Quest for Lost Heroes" on my five-year Gemmell journey. They get better as his writing matures. Those have a pulpy quality but are still better than average.
 
tried martha wells murder bot series. not quite what i expected. not bad but didn't did it for me. listened to sean parnell man of war. didn't catch me also. i have david wallace infinite jest to take a look at. let's see.
 
infinite jest might be good but didn't catch me. i'm with ASH by luke romyn
 
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