Now I'm reading "The inner level: how more equal societies reduce stress, restore sanity and improve everyone's well-being". I'm loving it so far.
this post was submitted on 19 Nov 2024
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I'm a little way into The Cassini Division by Ken McCleod. I think Mr McCleod might be a socialist, because at the moment the characters are literally touring the last capitalist town and laughing at the locals' funny little ways.
I'm on my first read through of the Witcher. I've stalled on the tower of swallows though.
It's almost cyberpunkesque in how much the world hates it's inhabitants. Which was interesting when it followed cyberpunk themes of "forget thriving, the goal is to survive this world".
But, the players are in bigger arenas now, so the world is just a shit place to be. I find myself struggling to care about the politics, or follow who's who. The early books geralt is so apathetic it didn't matter which kingdom or who's the prevailing lord. So I ,like geralt, just didn't care. Now I'm supposed to, good development for geralt. I just don't want to suddenly learn the names of 40 kingdoms, their kings, recent history etc...
The prevailing magic seems to be the vow, you're fucked in a fucked world if you break one. Cool concept, I like it, but it does get watered down because the world wants to grind you down anyway. Breaking a vow is just another excuse for the universe to hurt you. I'll probably push through this and decide if I want to keep going.
That's an interesting way to look at it.
I don't recall there were too many names you had to remember for the story, but I read Witcher quite a while back, and didn't read all the novels, so could be forgetting it.
I liked Geralt though, and the games, so going to go back to read them all.
The early books the gang is quite small easy to follow and I enjoyed them enough to continue.
But later the cast balloons quite heavily. I did play the games and thought that would be enough, but I'm god awful names at the best of times. So scene with sorceress #15 and Lord #16 in kingdom #4 is usually me thinking "who's any of that again?"
Partly, it's because I'm reading by audio in situations where I can't easily pause and consider. Partly, because the author just spent 3 books telling me these are Eldrich forces for geralt to avoid as best as possible, so why would I try understand them. Partly, because the stories are less interesting to me now as previously mentioned.
Ah okay.
I actually have the same issue with names. I have started Silmarillion multiple times but always get stuck on all the names and who is who. Plan to start it again but make a genealogy chart as I go along to remember all the names.
I'm on the 4th book in the James S. A. Corey series The Expanse: Cibola Burn
Decent series. It always has me wanting to read another chapter before bed.
I just finished Terry Pratchett's "Feet of Clay" and it was great.
I have been doing a run on Malazan book of the Fallen series. Currently going through "Dust of Dreams". It's really dark and sad right now. Seriously thinking about taking a break from it. Maybe a Pratchett book?
Pet Sematary and it's so creepy.
1964 Hugo Winner - Way Station
A man born in 1840, back in the Wisconsin boonies, is chosen to run an intragalactic stopover station for aliens moving about the Orion Arm. Earth is a new expansion, but we're not invited to the alien fraternity. Yet. Oh, the guy only ages when he leaves his house (aliens converted it to receive travelers) so some are taking notice that the guy is 120+ years old and looks 30.
Has a more modern feel to it than most golden age sci-fi. Little slow up front, but it's a short book.
I’m wrapping up Oathbringer by Brandon Sanderson. Making my way through all of his books currently, it’s been a real treat! I haven’t been this excited to read books since I was a kid. Nice to see other fans around!
Yeah, there are lots of Sanderson fans here. Which of his books have you read yet and which ones are remaining?
Hey, I was the guy who recommended Kaiju Preservation Society to you a few months ago! I'm glad you liked it. I personally liked Starter Villain over Old Man's War but you do you
I'm currently reading Artifact Space by Miles Cameron. I'm 70% in and I like that every time it has a chance to go grim and edgelord the characters all go "ew, why would we do that? We're civilized." It does feel poorly edited, with a few misspellings, some odd continuity, and it's a little hard to follow between certain paragraphs. Overall it's a good space opera type with a character who learns to let down walls instead of having to put them up
Just finished: We Have Always Been Here by Lena Nguyen. Man, this book sucked. The main character is unlikable, the story is nonsensical, and it quite clearly is just cobbling together ideas from better Sci-fi series. They had to spend a few pages towards the end of the book explaining the plot to the main character which is always a sign you didn't tell a good story. Final takeaway being lost and confused is not the same thing as being scared of the unknown
Oh, cool. Thanks for the recommendation! I am going to get his standalone books too, Starter Villain and Red Shirts specifically, but also want to checkout his biggest series.
Artifact Space sounds interesting. Would wait for your 100% finished update.
Would love to get more recommendations 😀
I'm about halfway through City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett. Still finding it an enjoyable read, still mixed on whether the world building is my cup of tea.
Calico by Lee Goldberg
bobiverse series by dennis e taylor. fantastic.
How do you like it? I started the first book a couple weeks ago but just couldn't finish. Sci fi isn't really my thing, although i did like John Scalzi's books.
My reading list right now is:
- Sweet Bean Paste, by Durian Sukegawa
- Legends and Lattes, by Travis Baldree
- Interior Chinatown, by Charles Yu
Making very slow progress through each of them, but I'm still just trying to get into the reading habit again.
The Singing Sword, by Jack Whyte. It’s the second book in a historical fiction take on the Arthurian legend.
Scalzi’s Kaiju Presevation Society is great, his Starter Villain is definitely in the same vein of light and easy and fun.
I made it most of the way through Lud-In-The-Mist by Hope Mirrlees. It holds up pretty well for being almost 100 years old.
I still plan to read Dungeon Crawler Carl next.
I am excited for you, I was hooked on DCC and left feeling so lost when I finished. The audiobooks are worth a listen, it's more of an auditory cinematic than just an audiobook. I got very used to that being the norm that I'm now struggling with regular narration, same actor doing all voices, no sound effects etc.
I thankfully found the Expeditionary Force series by Craig Alanson shortly after from another post on Lemmy. Not quite as cinematic but loving R.C. Bray's performance and the series as a whole.
Finished 6th Dungeon Crawler Carl (haven't started 7th yet) then started Expeditionary Force. Currently on book 16, with 17 having dropped recently, then I'll cycle back for DCC 7 Faction Wars. Then I'll be lost again haha.
Yeah, I took a look at his whole bibliography then went with KPS to check out how he writes, will probably be getting most of his books.
Lud-In-The-Mist looks interesting. Is it linked with any of her previous book?
Redshirts was where I started with Scalzi, one day I’ll get to Old Man’s War.
Lud is a one-off. I added it for bingo because a bunch of authors have listed it as a super formative book. I like her style, but it is a bit more dense than I expected going into it initially.
Trying to read too many books concurrently (at least one on each device):
- Orbital by Samantha Harvey
- Sea of Tranquility by Emily St John Mandel
- Beyond Narrative Coherence by Matti Hyvärinen et al.
- Language in Our Brain: The Origins of a Uniquely Human Capacity by Angela Friederici
- Active Inference: The Free Energy Principle in Mind, Brain, and Behavior by Parr, Pezzulo, and Friston
- Actual Minds, Possible Worlds by Jerome Bruner
- Dreams In Late Antiquity: Studies in the Imagination of a Culture by Patricia Cox Miller
- Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning by Karen Barad
- Historical Explanation: An Anti-Causalist Approach by Gunnar Schumann
- Evolutionary Causation: Biological and Philosophical Reflections by Tobias Uller and Kevin Lala
How to stop worrying and start living by dale Carnegie.
Master and Commander by Patrick O'Brian. This series should keep me busy for a LONG time.
Just started Titanium Noir by Nick Harkaway after several recommendations. Haven't finished ch1 yet but it's entertaining so far.
I just finished this book over the weekend. It was fun.
Mistborn is the book that got me into reading! It's one of my favourite books of all time due to how it changed me haha.
As for my little update. I put Morning Star on pause as I feel a bit burned out with the Red Rising series. I'm at the point where nothing really surprises me anymore and I feel that I'm not as invested as I was with the other Red Rising books.
Instead I've jumped back over to doing a Way of Kings re-read. The first time I listened to the audiobook so I'm eager to read it this timearound.
Is it better than the Stormlight Archive? I’m currently off and on trying to slog my way through The Way of Kings, but I’ve made it nearly a quarter of the way through and can’t bring myself to care all that much about the characters or story.
It’s to the point where I’ve put the book on hold twice to read other books that I found more interesting. I wish I liked it more, because everyone says it’s one of the greatest fantasy series ever written, but it’s just not pushing my buttons the right way, I guess.
I assume you mean Stormlight vs Mistborn? If I was recommending between those two, I would go definitely go Mistborn first. Not because I think it's better, but Stormlight is a little difficult to get going with and plans to span 10 books. Given that not a lot happens in the first part due to the world building happening across multiple characters individually, it takes a while for it to feel like it's moving somewhere. Mistborn on the other hand paces itself a lot quicker and the foreshadowing throughout is executed wonderfully.
Thanks, I think I’ll give that a look then. Mind you, I fully intend on continuing the slog through Stormlight, just because everyone assures me it’s worth it, but I listen to these books as audiobooks since I don’t get a lot of time that I’m sitting and can read from an actual book, so if an author uses a whole first volume as world building, that’s about forty hours I have to get through before things start picking up.
Finished Mistborn and most of the Arcanum stories that aren't tied to Elantris. Have that borrowed to read soon-ish, but am reading Warbreaker right now and will probably read the Stephanie Plum book (Now or Never) that released today next.
I couldn't get into some of John Scalzi I tried, but I really liked the interdependency series. It's not a masterpiece but it's a fun ride.
Warbreaker is nice. Very interesting magic, though all of Sanderson books have that, specially the Cosmere books.
I would say the same thing about The Kaiju Preservation Society, not a masterpiece but a very fun ride.
The story is building up towards me being tempted to buy the fancy leatherbound version. The secret archives are kind of in between, and the Stormlight Archives are the ones I'd really want, but I seriously can't justify $250 apiece for those.
That purple is sexy though.
Haha, yeah. To be frank, I am not a fan of the outer cover of these leatherbound versions, I prefer the full-picture cover pages of paper books, but other than that, illustrations, the pages, the writing, the overall quality, they are all so good in these versions!
Too expensive though. Maybe one day.
Oooo I do love Mistborn!
This week for me has been pretty boring to report in this thread but I have exclusively read Deathlands books.
I've read 5 this week and I'm half way through the sixth which is the 32nd book, still enjoying it and just wanted to keep going with the story this week so did!
Book related I'm probably going to start editing the second Underwood and Flinch novel tonight down into a nice audio book experience.
5 books in a week! Nice! How many books are remaining?
Good luck with editing!
I believe number 153 is due to be released next month so a shit ton left and I can't wait! XD
Wow. I guess it's a good thing I couldn't get these, otherwise I would still be reading them in a decade 😀
"Being Henry" by Henry Winkler. Concise and well written about his life growing up and his journey into showbiz. And hitting it big with "Happy Days"
This just reminded me I have yet to watch Happy Days. Have been meaning to watch it for ages. Maybe once I finish my current show.
Ayyyy 👍👍
I finished Educated by Tara Westover. I really liked this book. It gave me a glimpse into an upbringing that is about as different from mine as I can imagine. If you want to get an idea of what it's like to grow up in a distrusts-anything-government, survivalist family, I highly recommend.
Now I've started Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir. I'm still early on but I love how this book started. It instantly gripped me and I can't wait to see how it goes.
Thanks for the info, going to check out Educated.
Loved Project Hail Mary. Enjoy!
JUST finished Project Haily Mary. It's so good 5/5. Curious to hear your thoughts when you're done.