What literary delights are you delving into this December?

Connavar of Rigante said:
Did you enjoy Blood Music? Would you recommend it?

I want to try Bear and thought it sounded a good place to start.
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I'll jump in here and recommend it. I'd actually recommend several of Bear's books: Blood Music, Eon, The Forge of God -- all worth a read.
 
Sorry for the double post, but I figured I'd also list my current/upcoming reading:

Recently finished:
"The Forever War" by Joe Haldeman -- Quite good. I see why everyone (except Haldeman) says it's a response/rebuttal to Starship Troopers, but there's a lot of interesting stuff going on aside from that angle.

Now reading:
"The Diamond Age" by Neal Stephenson -- Hoo boy, this is great stuff. I'm fascinated by nanotech scenarios, and the steampunk setting he wraps this up in is just icing on the cake to my sensibilities. Best book I've read in quite some time; I'm about 300 pages in (out of 500).

Next on the pile:
"Revelation Space" by Alastair Reynolds -- I've read some of his short stories and liked them a lot; looking forward to diving into some novels.
 
Connavar of Rigante said:
Did you enjoy Blood Music? Would you recommend it?
I want to try Bear and thought it sounded a good place to start.
Click to expand...

Interesting attribution ... Locksmith didn't write anything about Bear, but I did in next message :confused: I'll take it as attributed to me (and don't tell me I'm self-centered - I know that already :p)
Actually I have mixed feelings about Bear (with all the books I've read - Eon, Heads and now Blood Music) - some things are very good, technical details and characters - but at some points he tends to dig too deeply into the technical details and there seems to be no more story.
Would I recommend Bear, certainly if you like hard-SF with a lot of technical details and theories - but no, if you are looking for action or light reading
 
Just to add my 2 cents on Greg Bear, I seem to be in the same boat as Taltos, he's one of those writers that I've always found it difficult to decide if I like his works or not. I'd definitely say that Blood Music is a good place to start particuarly if your not a huge Hard SF fan, being an extended short story it's not as daunting as some of his later works and I enjoyed the book a lot. I really wanted to like his Eon series (I love alien artifact type storys) and I did to an extent but in the end I just got too lost in it. His Darwin's Radio and Darwin's Children books are both good without quite being great but by far my favourite Greg Bear is his contribution to fantasy, Songs of Earth and Power.


As for me I'm now well into the first book of Outlaws of the Marsh and am thoroughly enjoying it, even if it does seem like an episode of Monkey sometimes (well actually it's probably because it does ;))
 
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Taltos said:
Interesting attribution ... Locksmith didn't write anything about Bear, but I did in next message :confused: I'll take it as attributed to me (and don't tell me I'm self-centered - I know that already :p)
Actually I have mixed feelings about Bear (with all the books I've read - Eon, Heads and now Blood Music) - some things are very good, technical details and characters - but at some points he tends to dig too deeply into the technical details and there seems to be no more story.
Would I recommend Bear, certainly if you like hard-SF with a lot of technical details and theories - but no, if you are looking for action or light reading
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Heh i didnt even see i qouted the wrong post :eek:


Its almost never im looking for action and light reading in SF.
 
Finished Glory Road last night, a nice easy to read book and i enjoyed it, thought the poetic swordfight in the tower was a hoot.

Now reading Clarkes The Fountains of Paradise.
 
Busy reading Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee. Not exactly SF or F but interesting and worth reading nonetheless.
 
I've just finished Neil Gaiman's 'Fragile Things', which I really enjoyed, and am about 3/4 way through 'Wintersmith' by Terry Pratchett, which is amazing, as always :)
 
I had forgotten about Greg Bear. The first time I tried to read Blood Music I got a bad vibe from it and put it down for many years. I tried again, and absolutely loved it. I am wondering if eventually I will be able to read the Thomas Covenent series as I feel the same bad vibes, but I have tried it about three times and CANNOT get through the first book. The first time I got as far as a rape scene and then put it down in disgust.

Right now I am working through House of Chains, and I have Time Traveler's Wife sitting on my bedside table.
 
So far I've read the beginning of the Von Bek series by Michael Moorcock, and Snorri Sturluson's Prose Edda. And I'm still trudging through Homer's Odyssey.
 
Drawing of The Dark - Tim Powers

Only read a few pages, trying to get used his style of writing.
 
Now rereading Kristine Kathryn Rusch's Consequences. It's the third book in her Retrieval Artist series; a combination of mystery/thriller and science fiction. Very good and engrossing.
 
Finished Watchmen by Allan Moore and halfway through Neil Gaiman's The Season of Mists of the Sandman sequence, aw inspiring stuff. Not at all hard to imagine the latter being inspired by the former.

Cheer's DeepThought
 
My apologies for the double posting :eek:. Thought I was editing and saving the first one...perhaps its because I hadn't had any caffeine in my system ...yet :).
 
Second re-reading of Terry Pratchett's Night Watch. Beyond doubt the best Discworld book.
 
GOLLUM said:
I've read this Conn.

It's really quite good once you get into it.

let us know how you go.

Cheers....:)
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I have got into it and now are enjoying the tale of Duffy :)


All the sword play is fun too :)

For once the blurb on the cover is true, good action,humor and well done characters.

I was looking for other type of fantasy than the most typical type when i decided to try Powers and im getting that!
 
Done with The Season of Mists, started The Blade Itself, by Joe Abercrombie,:) will be recieving Before They Are Hanged a week from now, courtesy of a friend and hopefully by then I'll be done with the first one.


Cheer's, DeepThought
 
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