Super September - What literary offering are you currently reading?

[GOLLUM]

Just finished reading Matthew Pearl's Dane Club. This is more than just a fun read. I really liked the storyline coupled with the characterizations and settings belonging to the period and mood of the time post Civil War.

I've previously read Dante's Infeno but you don't need to have any kind of background knowledge to enjoy this page turner as Pearl explains several of the more salient points relevant to his novel.

It's hard to see how too many people will actually dislike this book. I've no hestiation in recommending it to anyone interested in Dante, Longfellow & co. in 1860s Boston or simply an old fashioned mystery thriller.

Now on to Stephen Baxter's acclaimed sequel to HG Wells classic The Time Machine in the novel The Time Ships a prior recipient of the Philip K. Dick and John W. Campbell awards. Regarded by some illumniaries as being as good as if not superior to the original.

Time (pardon the pun) to find out.......

 

[jenna]

i thought i'd finally start reading A Game Of Thrones, since it's been on my shelf for like 3 years! going pretty well so far...

 

[dwndrgn]

Just finished The Lies of Locke Lamora. Good stuff. It reminded me a bit of a fantasy version of Harrison's The Stainless Steel Rat. Of course, it was much better, at least to me but it did have some of the same type of elements. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Now on to Trudy Canavan's Priestess of The White.

 

[Nesacat]

Just finished reading Matthew Pearl's Dane Club. This is more than just a fun read. I really liked the storyline coupled with the characterizations and settings belonging to the period and mood of the time post Civil War.
Now on to Stephen Baxter's acclaimed sequel to HG Wells classic The Time Machine in the novel The Time Ships a prior recipient of the Philip K. Dick and John W. Campbell awards. Regarded by some illumniaries as being as good as if not superior to the original.

Time (pardon the pun) to find out.......

Glad you like Dante's Club ... it's definitely one of my favourites this year and it made me go back and read Inferno Also means I can now start breathing again. Have ordered The Time Ships and will read it as soon it makes it's slow way here.

 

[Taltos]

Started and finished Peter F. Hamilton's Mindstar rising - which turned out to be a very entertaining reading. Discovered even some personal reading habits of which I wasn't aware before.
Re-started Gregory Benford's Foundation's Fear - which was shelved half way through about a month ago. It was not quite what I expected and it still isn't

 

[Marky Lazer]

The Fast Red Road - Stephen Graham Jones

 

[Dave]

Since the mods here have closed down one of the longest ASciFi threads I'll have to post here instead:

I'm currently reading City of the Beasts by Isabel Allende

 

[Mark Robson]

About to start, Bead's Pickle by Carolyn Hill (aka Brown Rat). Will post a review when I'm done. I've been looking forward to reading this one.

For any who haven't seen a copy, the cover is very smart. It seems that Carolyn is not just a writer, but an artist too! I sometimes wonder why God gifts some more than others ... but then if we could all do everything, wouldn't life be dull?

 

[Carolyn Hill]

(Thanks, Mark, for the comments about the cover. Mostly, I used the "wind" filter in Photoshop, over and over, to get the blue-ice-wave effect. With the right tools, nearly anyone can make cool-looking stuff.)

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

I'm reading Bead's Pickle, too -- in my suddenly not so copious spare time.

 

[littlemissattitude]

I'm just barely into Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon. Not sure what is going on yet (I'm only about 40 pages in and it's over 1100 pages), but I'm entranced.

On the non-fiction side, I'm reading What Liberal Media?, by Eric Alterman, which is making the point that while reporters tend to be fairly liberal socially, they tend to be quite conservative economically, and anyway, the reporters don't have that much control over what goes into news reports and editorials. That's the job of editors and publishers and owners...and the owners, especially, who get final say (since that's what ownership is about) are by and large quite conservative. There is a certain amount of hyperbole in the writing, but a number of the points are valid just the same.

 

[Rane Longfox]

Gone back to "Judas Unchained" by Petert Hamilton which I left half way through back in January when I went to aus. I've forgotten exactly why the characters are doing what they're doing, and it's a complicated book anyway, but i'm remembering most of it again slowly. He's a great writer, thats for sure

 

[iansales]

So there I was in Glasgow visiting friends, and I popped into Borders to pick up something to read on the 5-hour train journey home. I decided to go for Jack McDevitt's The Engines of God. He's no great stylist but his novels are entertaining reads. The train was somewhere around Berwick when I realised I'd read the book before. And now that I'm home, I've checked my book collection and, yup, there's a copy there. Ah well. Annoyingly, Borders had several of McDevitt's novels, so I could have picked one I didn't already have...

 

[jackokent]

Gone back to "Judas Unchained" by Petert Hamilton which I left half way through back in January when I went to aus. I've forgotten exactly why the characters are doing what they're doing, and it's a complicated book anyway, but i'm remembering most of it again slowly. He's a great writer, thats for sure

just finished this and really loved it.

Now half way through Angela's Ashes.

 

[j d worthington]

Well, I've just finished Fudoki, by Kij Johnson. And once again I owe you a debt, Nesa, for bringing this beautiful book to my attention. Not only is it elegantly written, with language that is a sheer joy to read, but it is richly textured, multi-layered, and extremely poignant; time and again I found myself catching my breath at the sheer beauty of it, with the incredible and incisive insights into life, and the understated naturalness of the world presented. This is what fantasy can be at its best, when it simply transcends all generic boundaries and becomes Literature, but literature devoid of all the tedium, instead tied intimately to an understanding of the joys, sorrows, triumphs and tragedies, large and small, which make up living. This is simply, on many levels, a lovely book, and I highly recommend it to anyone who loves either a good tale or a rich experience in reading. Thank you again, Nesa.... You've not steered me wrong yet, Cat.

And now back to Washington Irving, and completing that first volume of his collected works, with Bracebridge Hall and Wolfert's Roost....

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

"Bracebridge Hall" is something I like to read at Christmas time -- along with the Dickens Christmas stories. You might want to save it for the winter, JD.

 

[j d worthington]

Thanks for the information, Teresa. Normally, I'd take your advice, but it fits in perfectly with other things I've read recently or will be reading very soon, so I'll go ahead with it for now... but it may well become a Christmas favorite. I like the idea. Thanks for bringing it up.

 

[Karsa Orlong]

^Wow, guess I'll have to read that Johnson book.

I'm in the middle of A Cavern of Black Ice, and I'm enjoying it. Jones is a little more conventional than my absolute favourite authors, but she's built a fairly complex, original world, soaked with an unusually grim atmosphere. She unfolds the story gradually, making great use of silence between characters amongst other things, and in doing so, builds tension that's almost unparalleled in fantasy - this is I feel her main strength. Characters, although occasionally straying a little too near stereotypes for my liking, possess enough depth to stay interesting and, for the most part, unpredictable. The same can generally be said about the plot. I wouldn't call this first tier stuff thusfar, if only because it's not quite unusual or unpredictable *enough*, but it's definitely recommended, and has plenty of potential.

 

[LauraJUnderwood]

Finished Hilari Bell's YA fantasy THE WIZARD TEST and was a tad let down with the ending, which is sad since I usually like her stuff. A little rushed, I thought.

Still working my way through SONG FOR THE BASILISK by McKillip. It's a slower read for me, but then, it's a savor read as well, so I don't mind.

For a distraction, I am reading a mystery novel, DEATH OF A BORE by M.C. Beaton.

Oh, and I have started reading Ellen Kushner's THE PRIVILEGE OF THE SWORD.

Of course, I really should be finishing a couple of my own projects since I have proofs to look over for BAD LANDS and am looking at getting some final local publicity stuff done for the novel coming out on the 20th of this month.

Still, I like to read...

Must be that librarian thing I do...

Laura J. Underwood
Author of DRAGON'S TONGUE and THE HOUNDS OF ARDAGH

 

[Karsa Orlong]

And, I promised I'd give my thoughts on Russell's The One Kingdom - I think it gets rather more stick than it deserves:

Sean Russell - The One Kingdom - 78%

After Donaldson calling this author a "master of intelligent fantasy", I had to pick this up, and whilst I don't share such a glowing opinion, this book was nontheless an enjoyable page-turner with its fair share of strengths, and potential for more. The world created is quite typical, and there's a largely medieval cast including knights, princes and the like, which is always going to be limiting from my perspective. Other borrowings from generic fantasy, such as a set of youthful characters journeying south for adventure, have a similar effect.

Still, the way Russell writes this world into being makes it more interesting. Nature is a focal point around which the book's mood generally revolves, with beautiful descriptive passages subtly shaping the atmosphere, often with metaphorical purposes bubbling under the surface too. This is a book about the stories written into the world by men and women, each a tiny piece of a greater puzzle, as this cover-quote suggests: "As lightning, men flicker into being, cut a single stroke into the Earth, and are gone. A brief instant to find one's place in a story that may last a thousand years." The river, a central focus for the majority of the novel, is a current of history, representing the winding lives of all who have sailed down it - events of long ago linger in the water and its surrounding lands as stories and feelings. There are a few well-conceived, fresh ideas here, even if it isn't exactly *new*.

The mythology created seems quite unique, and the characters avoid being especially stereotypical. The plot is full of mystery and revelation (by one character in particular), passion and treachery, with all the characters converging upon one another in a somewhat unresolved climax. Whilst this is hardly massive in scope, it certainly has enough depth and intrigue to stay engaging. All in all, I'm fairly pleased I read this one, and I've bought the sequel though I'm in no hurry to read it.