What Are You Reading?

The White Feather · 09-01-2021 7:03pm

I finished Gardens of the Moon recently and am now reading the next book in the series, Deadhouse Gates by Steven Erikson

Thargor · 09-01-2021 9:09pm

shootermacg wrote: »

Hammered through the Cradle series, I had great fun. Moved on to the House of Blades. He seems to be primarily influenced by anime / manga for his characters, which is fine by me.

I never read a series as fast as Cradle, I read a book every 2-3 days until all 8 were gone.

RMDrive · 11-01-2021 10:27am

Thargor wrote: »

I never read a series as fast as Cradle, I read a book every 2-3 days until all 8 were gone.

Yeah, I'm in exactly the same boat (half way through book 8). Sometimes I don't know whether I am enjoying it or not, but I can't put them down. I feel like I'm partly in a computer game or an anime program.

seagull · 11-01-2021 5:19pm

The Chronicles of Morgaine has been rereleased in a single volume, and I'm busy reading that. It must be about 40 years since I first picked up the first book in the series. I can't remember if I ever managed to get my hands on them all.

Tristram · 11-01-2021 9:58pm

bluewolf wrote: »

I'm a massive Hamilton fan in general but have been struggling with the last in the salvation - dying to know what happens but it's so broad or something
Am on the last book of will Wight's elder empire series - brilliant stuff. He has a number of typos I haven't encountered in his other books but doesn't detract much

Stick with it if you can, I think it comes together well at the end. I finished The Neutronium Alchemist the other day and confess I found parts a bit of a slog. So many characters on so many worlds, many of them seemingly peripheral, that it's hard to keep track/care about them all. Hoping it all comes together now in The Naked God.

mcgovern · 12-01-2021 9:32am

Finished Salvation Lost and it was ok. I'll finish the series but will wait for the final book to go on sale.
After that I read The Bone Ships by RJ Barker. Its mostly set at sea, where boats are made out of the skeletons of now extinct dragons. It's an interesting world, very harsh but quite unique. It was good enough that I pre-ordered the sequel halfway through. That has since released and I'm currently reading it (Call of the Bone Ships). So far so good, expanding a bit on the world, though there seems to some fairly important character developments in the first one that I missed or forgot about...
After The Bone Ships it was Limited Wish by Mark Lawrence, second in his Stranger Things inspired time travel series. They are good, short reads.
Then it was Stormblood by Jeremy Szal. A sci-fi book set after a war, where some of the soldiers had been injected with alien DNA which made them stronger, faster etc, but also addicted to addrenaline. The universe is a bit like Mass Effect (it's set on a asteroid which is a capital 'planet', mostly inhabited by humans but with lots of Alien races around too), but without the Biotic powers. It's darker/grittier than Mass Effect though, torture etc abound. Would recommend it.

fenris · 12-01-2021 10:56am

Just got around to starting the Three Body Problem, I had kind of avoided it for a while, having worked for a Chinese tech company.
I am enjoying it while trying not to hear the parts where the party officials are trying to put people under pressure in a Monty Python "people's front of Judea" or constitutional peasant voice, it's a real problem :-)

Tristram · 12-01-2021 3:58pm

fenris wrote: »

Just got around to starting the Three Body Problem, I had kind of avoided it for a while, having worked for a Chinese tech company.
I am enjoying it while trying not to hear the parts where the party officials are trying to put people under pressure in a Monty Python "people's front of Judea" or constitutional peasant voice, it's a real problem :-)

Absolutely loved this. Don't remember what prompted me to pick it up but was blown away by it.

shrapnel222 · 15-01-2021 2:03pm

finally finished the tyrant Baru Cormorant, third and final book in the masquerade trilogy.

Book 1 was excellent, book 2 was great, book 3 is just good tbh. It's a real shame as was expecting this series to finish with a real bang. Very good series overall nonetheless, and the world building and characterisation are fantastic.

megaten · 15-01-2021 3:39pm

shrapnel222 wrote: »

finally finished the tyrant Baru Cormorant, third and final book in the masquerade trilogy.

Book 1 was excellent, book 2 was great, book 3 is just good tbh. It's a real shame as was expecting this series to finish with a real bang. Very good series overall nonetheless, and the world building and characterisation are fantastic.

Book 2 really soured me on finishing this series. If I was really disappointed in book 3 is the last one worth it.

shrapnel222 · 15-01-2021 4:18pm

megaten wrote: »

Book 2 really soured me on finishing this series. If I was really disappointed in book 3 is the last one worth it.

probably not if i'm honest. book 3 is closer to book 2 than to book 1

Thargor · 19-01-2021 12:18am

I devoured Cradle but The Elder Empire is not doing it for me at all, think Ill give up after the first book, its just not grabbing me.

Trojan · 19-01-2021 2:20pm

Been a while since I updated here...

I've needed some light reading given the grimdark reality out there, so I tend to like easy reading fantasy.

I read a few web series like The Wandering Inn, and some others I tested and moved on.

Andrew Rowe released The Torch that Ignites the Stars (Arcane Ascension Book 3) so I re-read that series, this is one of my favourite progression fantasy series.

After that I re-tried Cradle (I abandoned after book 1 previously), and this time devoured the entire series in a couple of weeks.

I re-read the Wax & Wayne books from Mistborn, love that series. I think the 4th book is coming out late 2022.

Paddy Samurai · 21-01-2021 3:39pm

Post apocalyptic settings are my Jam.Only started this one and I am liking it so far.Reminds me a little bit of Snowpiercer.
It wont win any awards for the writing but after only 50 pages I love the idea/setting of this book and would love to see Netflix make it into a series.
Time will tell if it meets my expectations.

More than two centuries after World War III poisoned the planet, the final bastion of humanity lives on massive airships circling the globe in search of a habitable area to call home. Aging and outdated, most of the ships plummeted back to earth long ago. The only thing keeping the two surviving lifeboats in the sky are Hell Divers—men and women who risk their lives by skydiving to the surface to scavenge for parts the ships desperately need.
When one of the remaining airships is damaged in an electrical storm, a Hell Diver team is deployed to a hostile zone called Hades. But there’s something down there far worse than the mutated creatures discovered on dives in the past—something that threatens the fragile future of humanity.

aismac · 21-01-2021 3:57pm

Paddy Samurai wrote: »

Post apocalyptic settings are my Jam.Only started this one and I am liking it so far.Reminds me a little bit of Snowpiercer.
It wont win any awards for the writing but after only 50 pages I love the idea/setting of this book and would love to see Netflix make it into a series.
Time will tell if it meets my expectations.

Sounds great. What’s the name?

aismac · 21-01-2021 3:59pm

Paddy Samurai wrote: »

Post apocalyptic settings are my Jam.Only started this one and I am liking it so far.Reminds me a little bit of Snowpiercer.
It wont win any awards for the writing but after only 50 pages I love the idea/setting of this book and would love to see Netflix make it into a series.
Time will tell if it meets my expectations.

Sounds great. What’s the name?

aismac · 21-01-2021 4:00pm

aismac wrote: »

Sounds great. What’s the name?

It’s ok - found it!

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28464896

Trojan · 27-01-2021 9:51am

I'm slowly re-reading Edgedancer and watched a few Cosmere videos (there's some amazing stuff on YouTube) to get myself back in the frame for the recently published Stormlight.

I also started "The Goblin Emperor".

smacl · 27-01-2021 10:01am

Slightly borderline for sci-fi and fantasy but listened to a couple of audio books over the last while that I've enjoyed. Struggling to find time to read but have audible on for jobs around the house, workouts etc....

Circe by Madeline Miller is a retelling of Greek myth from the perspective of the daughter of Helios. I'm a sucker for Greek mythology and loved it, have added The Song of Achilles by the same author to my list for the near future. Beatifully read and one for mythology lovers.

Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami is an odd one with what seems to be two separate stories that take some time to come together. Really enjoyed it as an audiobook but reckon I would have struggled with it as a read. For those the liked The Three Body Problem, it had a similar vibe for me. Downside was an American narrator reading Japanese characters was a bit offputting at first though I stopped noticing pretty quickly.

Currently about a third into Ysabel by Guy Gavriel Kay. Enjoyable enough but nowhere near Under Heaven which is one of my favourite reads from recent years. Funny enough, this one would probably be better as a read as the narrator doesn't really do it for me.

ixoy · 27-01-2021 11:49am

* Finally, finished "Rhythm of War" by Brandon Sanderson, the fourth in his Stormlight Archive. Despite its mere 1395 pages, it somehow took me some time to read.
On the negative side: It suffered a fair of bloat, where the plot stagnates. There were some very dull flashbacks. The overall plot didn't move greatly until the final 10% with an aside for one big shift earlier. Bit like a middle of a "Wheel of Time" book.
On the positive side: Strong ending. Good insight into the magic systems. Raboniel was a very interesting addition. Sanderson still has a good eye for action.

* "All Systems Red" by Martha Wells, the first book in her Murderbot sequence. An actual short read! The idea of a shy, awkward AI lead is a bit different but the plot itself isn't spectacular. I'll follow up with the rest (as I already have them!) as a sort of palette cleanser.

* "Redshirts" by John Scalzi. This is a book far too much in love with how clever it is following a group of "red shirts" on a ship very reminiscent of Star Trek's Enterprise. It starts out fun when they question why the danger of their roles but then takes a big shift where it becomes far too meta. It won the Hugo award for some reason, although I can but speculate that Scalzi's big role in the organisation helped there.
If you're thinking of this book, watch "Star Trek: Lower Decks" instead or the classic "Galaxy Quest".

keane2097 · 27-01-2021 12:05pm

I'm listening to Anathem on Audible, which is my third Neal Stephenson book after Seveneves and Reamde.

I think Stephenson is probably a genius. The books are really excellent. I think I read that Snow Crash is his best?

fenris · 27-01-2021 12:14pm

Snow Crash and Cryptonomicon are my favourite Stephenson books, Interface is another good one, it is basically about a president who is secretly wired to always do what the polls say is the most popular thing, it is from a few years ago when such scenarios were science fiction :-)

shrapnel222 · 27-01-2021 12:17pm

another vote for cryptonomicon. Definitely the one that stayed with me the most, and i love the blend with the war stories of (in particular) the Japanese.

keane2097 · 27-01-2021 12:24pm

Thanks friends

Trojan · 27-01-2021 1:42pm

ixoy wrote: »

* "All Systems Red" by Martha Wells, the first book in her Murderbot sequence. An actual short read! The idea of a shy, awkward AI lead is a bit different but the plot itself isn't spectacular. I'll follow up with the rest (as I already have them!) as a sort of palette cleanser.

"Palette cleanser" is a great description for that series. I really enjoyed it as a change of pace.

ShooterSF · 30-01-2021 7:02pm

Just finished re listening to the Bobiverse trilogy in prep for the fourth book in the trilogy(?

).
Still some of my favourites even if the first book takes a little too long getting going.

smacl · 31-01-2021 4:40pm

ShooterSF wrote: »

Just finished re listening to the Bobiverse trilogy in prep for the fourth book in the trilogy(? ).
Still some of my favourites even if the first book takes a little too long getting going.

Just finished Ysabel and picked the We are legion (We are Bob). Been eyeing it up for a while a really looking forward to it now. Ysabel was entertaining enough but nothing particularly special. Will probably get back to Guy Gavriel Kay again at some point, but reviews suggest his earlier stuff would be more up my street.

Dades · 01-02-2021 7:27pm

Just finished Ready Player Two.

I was ready for it to end as well. Seems like the first 3rd of the book is just describing what has happened since the end of RP1. Nothing actually occurs. Then when it does, it's just another seemingly endless series of quests, followed by some big boss action.

It was okay, but you really need a vested interest in pop culture or there is nothing to cling to.

Paddy Samurai · 05-02-2021 2:55pm

aismac wrote: »

It’s ok - found it!

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28464896

Overall its a light fun no brain required read but with big potential depending on the rest of the series.First book reminds me a bit of Snowpiercer and Fallout game mixed with Aliens .

smacl · 06-02-2021 5:05pm

Just finished We are legion (We are Bob), a great romp and I'll certainly follow up with the rest of the trilogy over the coming months. Just starting into Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke for something a bit different.

What Are You Reading?

Comments