Super September - What literary offering are you currently reading?

[dwndrgn]

I've been looking for the Riddlemaster Trilogy, it was for sale at the American Book Center in Amsterdam last year... last week I went looking for it, alas, sold out. I did buy 'the forgotten beasts of Eld' and 'Ombria in Shadow' for a really good price. Looking forward to read them!

I had a difficult time finding them as well last year. I finally found some used copies on Ebay.

 

[GOLLUM]

Riddlemaster and Forgotten Beasts are of course avaialble via the Victor Gollancz Orion (UK) Fantasy Masterwork series I've been harping on about of late...

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

There's an omnibus edition of the Riddle Master Trilogy I've seen in stores lately. Don't know whether it's available in other countries or not.

 

[j d worthington]

Started on The Shadow of the Wind, by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. Though less than a quarter of the way through the book, I'm quite taken with it... the writing itself has both charm and beauty, as well as wit; and the mysteries involved are very intriguing.

 

[Scriven]

They teach you Asimov at university?

It's a set book for a basic robotics course.

 

[Wolfeborn]

Just finished otherland city of golden shadow friend lent it to me but doesnt have the rest the pain. nm will get them from library or something, and just started the Historian By Elizabeth Kostova, is certainly interesting and a bit dif to stuff I normally read.

 

[dwndrgn]

Finished Melusine and am glad I perservered, as I really did enjoy it in the end. Next is Juliet McKenna's Southern Fire.

 

[Mark Robson]

Started on The Shadow of the Wind, by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. Though less than a quarter of the way through the book, I'm quite taken with it... the writing itself has both charm and beauty, as well as wit; and the mysteries involved are very intriguing.

I loved that book! It's one of my all time favourites. I'll be intrigued to see what you think by the time you get to the end.

 

[Nesacat]

I'd like to hear what you think about it as well j.d. Shadow of the Wind is one of my best finds this year and is definitely going to be an all-time favourite as well.

 

[Leandra]

I got the Monk by M. G. Lewis in the beginning of September, and opened it just yesterday. It looks very promising so far.

 

[elvet]

After giving Sinner a valient attempt, I put it away for another day and started The Broken Crown (Michelle West). After the first few chapters, I'm still quite lost, but the story is starting to take shape.

 

[j d worthington]

I got the Monk by M. G. Lewis in the beginning of September, and opened it just yesterday. It looks very promising so far.

Hmmm. Now, that book is a thorny problem; certainly it is one of the landmarks of the Gothic; and it has some excellent aspects. But it can drag in spots, and it also depends on the text... I've read both a version taken from a later edition, and one which restores much of the material Lewis had to cut in order to avoid prosecution; oddly, I think the latter version is a bit more powerful and less diffuse. And, if you should ever read Zofloya (by Charlotte Dacre), you'll find that there are tremendous chunks of that which were directly transferred from The Monk -- especially toward the end of the novel -- with very little change; and P. B. Shelley did much the same with his early Gothic tales (Zastrozzi and St. Irvyne). But I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts, especially as I've met very few people who have actually read (though many know about) this particular novel.

 

[Rosemary]

Re-reading The Vacant Throne by Ed Greenwood, while I save up for something new to read!

 

[iansales]

Finished Love in Vain, started Worlds Enough & Time, a short story collection by Dan Simmons.

 

[j d worthington]

Well, I did finish The Shadow of the Wind... And I'd have to put it up there as one of the best books I've read in quite a long time (as far as fiction goes, at least). It works well as a strange sort of thriller, a paean to books, a modern take on the Gothic novel, a love story, and a bildungsroman (with odd twists and turns)... and an ironic novel, all at once. The prose is often lyrical and even dazzling; and there are passages here and there that one only comes across in truly fine literature, things that have a scope far beyond the tale in which they have their home. For example:

"Nothing feeds forgetfulness better than war, Daniel. We all keep quiet and they try to convince us that what we've seen, what we've done, what we've learned about ourselves and about others, is an illusion, a passing nightmare. Wars have no memory, and nobody has the courage to understand them until there are no voices left to tell what happened, until the moment comes when we no longer recognize them and they return, with another face and another name, to devour what they left behind."

This is, indeed, a lovely, lovely book, and one which I will revisit often; of that I am sure.

 

[Nesacat]

Meowrr j.d. I'm glad you liked it too. I've bought copies for all my closest friends and have read it several time too along with Ice Queen and a couple of other books 'discovered' this year.

I hope to see more of Ruiz Zafon in the future.

 

[nixie]

Colleen McCullough's The Grass Crown.

You know after reading her first book in The Masters of Rome series,I've come to realise my knowledge of Roman history is a little lacking.

 

[j d worthington]

Going to be combining non- and fiction this time: H. P. Lovecraft: The Decline of the West, by S. T. Joshi, on Lovecraft's philosophy and how it helped shape the creation of his work (fiction and otherwise); and The Saragossa Manuscript, by Jan Potocki.

 

[murphy]

Reading Glen Cook's The Tyranny of the Night: Book One of The Instrumentalities of the Night. Anyone waiting for the next Erikson book, I recommend this book as a place holder.

 

[ravenus]

I read Clive Barker's short story collection The Inhuman Condition. The title story was quite awesome, about one of a gang of youths who finds a cord with a set of knots from an old man they rough up. He is drawn towards unraveling the knots but finds that unraveling each of them unleashes a monstrosity that proves murderous. Lovely story told with taut precision.

The Body Politic which looks at the possibilty of individual apendages of the human body revolting against the central mind is quite enjoyable in a campy vein, as are Down, Satan (about an industrialist who builds a literal Hell to tempt the devil) and the concluding story The Age of Desire.

The one clunker in this collection is Revelations, which is a none-too-interesting extremely predictable tale with no real compensations.


I also read a few plays by Girish Karnad, a brilliant Indian playwright who often draws upon fantasy and mythological elements in his morality-centered plays. I seriously recommend looking at his work if you get books of his plays.