April's Anticipated Ascent of Aspiringly Artful Words

[Diggler]

I'm reading The Unteleported Man by PKD. Which, just like all other PKD works, I'm thoroughly enjoying!

Other books I read this month were:

Vampire Apocalypse: A World Torn Asunder by Derek Gunn

Pulpy but enjoyable vampire apocalypse actioner.

Monster Island by David Wellington

Surprisingly good zombie apocalypse novel set on Manhattan Island

Night of Power by Spider Robinson

I had really high hopes for this one. A future America where race relations have strained to the point of breaking. With Manhattan as the setting, I was left wanting as the book was not only badly dated, but quite dull as well.

 

[Extollager]

I've been home yesterday and today with a cold and not feeling up to any terribly challenging reading. This 1887 travelogue about Mt. Athos has been just right. It has quite a few nice engravings from photographs, it's chatty about meals (often spoiled by rancis oil or butter), bedbugs/fleas, and so on, with glimpses of rare manuscripts, beautiful vistas and church interiors, etc. I wanted to read about Mt. Athos in connection with Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov, which mentions it and has a strong theme relating to Orthodox monasticism. The travelogue gives an English traveler's perspective on Russian shenanigans: the Russian monks "colonizing" Athos are real monks, and there are more devout Russian pilgrims to Athos than Greek ones, but the Russian government is also playing a political game there having to do with extending its influence in the Mediterranean. The author is a bit of a reactionary, seeing the tsarist government as, in theory, the best in Europe!

(images not from the book) He ponders the ossuaries...

 

[nomadman]

Im also reading a slim Collected Poems book by Chinua Achebe. I felt for poetry and thankfully his poetry language,prose is very fine,more stylised than his novel prose style. Quality poetry is much more effective than prose to me, a single line can say so much,so powerfully that would take many pages in a novel.

Also fun to read african fruits, culture elements you wouldnt see in poetry by a western author.

That sounds good. I've only read Achebe's House of Hunger collection, which was some pretty harrowing and powerful stuff, cut very close to the bone.

 

[Talysia]

Just picked up Toby Frost's God Emperor of Didcot. I've been looking forward to reading this one for a while!

 

[Connavar]

That sounds good. I've only read Achebe's House of Hunger collection, which was some pretty harrowing and powerful stuff, cut very close to the bone.

I dont see a collection named like that by Achebe. Did you mix the title or the author ?

 

[nomadman]

I dont see a collection named like that by Achebe. Did you mix the title or the author ?

Ach, sorry, was thinking of Dumbudzo Marechera. A very different writer.

 

[Connavar]

Ach, sorry, was thinking of Dumbudzo Marechera. A very different writer.

Hey you made me look up the book and write down another african author i might try, i dont mind

He sounds good with avant garde writing as the critics calls him. You havent read Achebe yet ?

Things Fall Apart is not overrated as a literary masterpice, it was my first book of him and he is rated highly on my best books list. I didnt have time to read the other two books in the series why im reading the poetry collection.

I hate reading though how Achebe founded African Literature like its a a catogery in western literature......

 

[hitmouse]

I seem to be purchasing books by the foot at the moment.

This month

A Talent for War & The Engines of God by Jack McDevitt. My new discovery for an undemanding hard SF fix. Have Polaris lined up next.

Diamond Dogs, Turquoise Days Alastair Reynolds. So so.

Galapagos Kurt Vonnegut. Reread after about 20 years. Not his best.

The Golden Shadow Leon Garfield and Edward Blishen. This is a book I last read in my early teens in the 1970s. Sequel to the fabulous God Beneath the Sea. Essentially the life story of Hercules (Heracles.) The prose style really grabbed me as a youngster, and it is still very impressive. GBTS is about the Titans, and Zeus, and is mainly told from the point of view of Hephaestus: not your cliched retelling of the Greek myths but a spellbinding and beautiful novel.

A Billion Days of Earth Doris Piserchia. Half way through this. Pretty good so far. Piserchia is quite obscure, but highly rated in some circles. Thought I would give her a go.

Illywhacker Peter Carey. Brilliant writer, very good book.

To read:
The American Future Simon Schama
Enchanted Pilgimage Clifford Simak. Found in Oxfam. Not heard of this one. Quite partial to a bit of Simak.
Drood Neil Gaiman. Found in a remainder bookshop on Park St, Bristol alongside the Reynolds, Vonnegut, and Carey mentioned above.
The Wierdstone of Brisingamen Alan Garner. Cannot believe I have never read any Garner. Got this for myself and for the kids.

 

[nomadman]

Hey you made me look up the book and write down another african author i might try, i dont mind

He sounds good with avant garde writing as the critics calls him. You havent read Achebe yet ?

Things Fall Apart is not overrated as a literary masterpice, it was my first book of him and he is rated highly on my best books list. I didnt have time to read the other two books in the series why im reading the poetry collection.

I hate reading though how Achebe founded African Literature like its a a catogery in western literature......

Not yet. I have a couple of books by him though. The aforementioned Things Fall Apart, and Anthills of the Savannah. My only other experience (well, my only experience) of other Nigerian writers is Ben Okri, who's incredible.

BTW, there are some pretty choice quotes of Marechera's work on the amazon review page of House of Hunger, if you're wondering what he's like.

 

[Grunkins]

Started Rise of Empire by Michael J Sullivan last night. It's his second Riyria omnibus.

 

[gully_foyle]

Drood Neil Gaiman. Found in a remainder bookshop on Park St, Bristol alongside the Reynolds, Vonnegut, and Carey mentioned above.

By Dan Simmons instead? I haven't heard of this title by Neil Gaiman.

 

[Connavar]

Im reading Wise Blood by Flannery O'Conner.

A writer im very interested in, i have heard alot of good things about her from other readers i respect. Plus for some reason when i read general fiction american authors the themes of southern authors interest me much more. Small town mentality,religion,social issues of the stories are more appealing than NYC type stories.

 

[Mangara]

Finished Yellow Blue Tibia by Adam Roberts, it was good to ok, gave it 3/5. The author really needs to do some reading up on anatomy though. The book is carried by Skvorecky, his dialogue is precise and unforgiving.

On to The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula Le Guin. I hear its quite the classic...

 

[hitmouse]

By Dan Simmons instead? I haven't heard of this title by Neil Gaiman.

Yeah Dan Simmons

 

[Hypnos164]

I seem to be purchasing books by the foot at the moment.

This month

A Talent for War & The Engines of God by Jack McDevitt. My new discovery for an undemanding hard SF fix. Have Polaris lined up next.

I'm reading A Talent for War at the moment; I'm finding it a bit dry and very easy to put down.

 

[J-Sun]

I'm reading A Talent for War at the moment; I'm finding it a bit dry and very easy to put down.

I was the other way around - didn't like EoG much at all but liked TfW fine. I intend to get Polaris (TfW sequel) next (even though I don't usually like turning long-standing singletons into series), so long as I don't hate Eternity Road, which is in the TBR.

 

[Randy M.]

The Drowning Girl by Caitlin Kiernan

The subtitle is “A Memoir” by India Morgan Phelps (known as Imp). Imp says she is crazy, a madwoman, as were her mother and grandmother, and she was once diagnosed as paranoid schizophrenic. The Drowning Girl is a story pieced together from fragmented and sometimes contradictory memories merged and stirred with bits of esoteric lore picked up from her mother and grandmother, and a great deal of reading, and inspired or catalyzed or dreamed into by viewing a painting titled “The Drowning Girl.” Here Kiernan is questioning the nature of story-telling by taking on the voice of a young woman who is trying to both find and declare the truth through writing her memoir. It’s an intricate, complex book, a search for meaning and for peace of mind, and it’s lovely in spots and brutal in others. I’m not sure I’m as taken with this novel as was with The Red Tree, but anyone who read that novel would certainly want to read this one. And maybe reread it. I expect in a year or two I’ll consider rereading both The Red Tree and The Drowning Girl, and expect both would repay rereading.


Just started: Deadfall Hotel by Steve Rasnic Tem

Randy M.

 

[Warren_Paul]

Plans for tonight: Start on Anne Lyle's first book, The Alchemist of Souls!


Got both the paperback on order, and the ebook for reading - only a few dollars more - just so I can have a display copy to go on my shelf but still the ease of reading on my Sony Reader.

 

[Connavar]

Im reading The Star Fraction by Ken Macleod because i need more fresh,good modern SF and Hypnos164/Matt's review in Goodreads convinced me try that book.

After 112 pages im starting to enjoy it,easy to read and still alot strong SF ideas,idelogies uses by the author. Im very left wing myself in my ideology and i thought it was cool the author called him self a socialist in the introduction.

If he builds the world well i will enjoy the rest of the book. I like Kohn,Jordan and co.

 

[nightdreamer]

The Mistborn trilogy by Brandon Sanderson, based on a conversation in another thread. Not what I expected, but interesting nonetheless. I think I'm really going to like Vin after she grows past her distrust of people.