It's September - what are you reading?

[psikeyhackr]

Worlds Within Worlds: The Story of Nuclear Energy, (1972)
Volumes (1,2 & 3 of 3) by Isaac Asimov
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/49819
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/49820
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/49821

This just showed up in PG. Most of the science stuff in Project Gutenberg is so old it is ridiculous. Who cares what they knew about bacteria in 1899? It shows its age by not specifying the deaths of famous physicists. Heinsenberg died in 1976. I don't see why the people at PG don't update stuff like that.

This should probably go with it:

Omnilingual (Feb 1957) by H. Beam Piper
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2012/03/scientific-language-h-beam-pipers-qomnilingualq
http://www.feedbooks.com/book/308/omnilingual
http://librivox.org/omnilingual-by-h-beam-piper/

Show the entanglement of science and science fiction to kids at an early age.

psik

 

[Allegra]

I've started Bill Bryson's One Summer: America 1927. So far, it's terrifically entertaining. But then I'm a sucker for Bill Bryson, having read all his major work. I recall buying his 'Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid' and finishing it the same day. If you're ever travelling to Australia, you have to read 'Down Under' on the plane over...

It's my turn to 'what ho!' - big fan here. Really enjoy his vivid descriptions of places and people, his often offbeat interesting information, his adorable self-deprecation and what not. He's got a sharp eye, sharp pen and a wicked humour. I've read most of his travel books except African Diary. Please let us know what you think about this book afterwards, it's been staring at me on my bookshelf for some time.

 

[tobl]

It's my turn to 'what ho!' - big fan here. Really enjoy his vivid descriptions of places and people, his often offbeat interesting information, his adorable self-deprecation and what not. He's got a sharp eye, sharp pen and a wicked humour. I've read most of his travel books except African Diary. Please let us know what you think about this book afterwards, it's been staring at me on my bookshelf for some time.

read his story of everything and it was very interesting

 

[Allegra]

read his story of everything and it was very interesting

Yep that's a good read, though not as funny as his others, excellent nonetheless.

 

[Vertigo]

Tamaruq by E J Swift - the last book in the Osiris Project Trilogy a post global warming SF story. This trilogy was Swift's debut (outside of shorts) and I feel deserves a little more attention than it appears to have had. More here.

Now half way through Hamilton's Great North Road my first Hamilton door stop for a while; I'm thoroughly enjoying it despite some niggles.

 

[cgsmith]

Decided to read all the Hugo award winners by year recently, starting with 1953. So far I've read Alfred Bexter's The Demolished Man, Daniel Keyes' Flowers For Algernon and Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451.

Unfortunately I totally get my lists and even which award I was supposed to be reading and I was only supposed to have read The Demolished Man and then read on to They'd Rather Be Right (The Forever Machine) by Mark Clifton and Frank Riley - although to be fair Fahrenheit 451 was a great book and so was Flowers for Algernon so I am glad I made the mistake.

Currently reading Scot Westerfeld's Uglies because i have no cash to buy my next book

 

[Brian G Turner]

Now reading The Mediaeval Traveller by Norbert Ohler, as I figure I'm behind on research. Much more preferable to the other travel research book I bought, Jewish Travellers in the Middle Ages, as that reads far too Biblical, with very little living history detail I can use. The Norbert is easily better.

 

[tobl]

now Reading alex verus saga. i like it so far. read the first two and start considering:wouldn't a crossover with jim butcher series be fun?

 

[Bick]

I'm still reading Bryson's One Summer, but I like to have some fiction on the go as well when I'm reading non-fiction, so I have started a novel: Alan Furst's first book in his historical spy sequence, Night Soldiers, which is so far excellent. Furst has been likened to Greene and Le Carre, and it's easy to see why - there's depth and integrity to it, and the writing is very good.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

I have started The Early Short Stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald (2015), edited by James Daley. The stories were originally published from 1917 to 1922. The most famous, because of the recent film, is his fantasy "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button."

 

[Extollager]

I'm still reading Bryson's One Summer, but I like to have some fiction on the go as well when I'm reading non-fiction, so I have started a novel: Alan Furst's first book in his historical spy sequence, Night Soldiers, which is so far excellent. Furst has been likened to Greene and Le Carre, and it's easy to see why - there's depth and integrity to it, and the writing is very good.

Maybe you can say more about this book as you continue with it... I've wondered about maybe trying this author.

 

[J-Sun]

I was only supposed to have read The Demolished Man and then read on to They'd Rather Be Right (The Forever Machine) by Mark Clifton and Frank Riley

I finally read the Clifton/Riley just recently. Like you, I had a project to read all the Hugo-winning novels but gave it up at the Harry Potter fiasco. Still, of the novels from 1953-2000, I had somehow managed to read all but Connie Willis' To Say Nothing of the Dog (which I have a copy of despite not caring for Willis) and that one. It's infamous for being the worst Hugo winning novel of all time or variants on that description. I think that reputation is undeserved. It was undeserved even up to the mid-80s but is certainly so based on most of the stuff that's won since then. I think it's just an overreaction based on the facts that (a) it is indeed ridiculous that it beat Mission of Gravity, The Caves of Steel, or Brain Wave and (b) it's not a "great" book that makes you think "Hugo winner" (based on what that used to signify). But just taken as a book, it's pretty good in ways and I'm glad I read it. The book's reputation will probably never recover, though, as people (as in the link given) just repeat the conventional "wisdom" without actually reading it. Thus it probably is the most obscure Hugo-winning novel of the last millennium. Anyway - don't know if you knew this or had any trepidation about reading it, but it's pretty neat and I hope you enjoy it.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Looking over the list of Hugo-winning novels, it seems I have read all of them from the first (1953) to 1981 (The Snow Queen by Joan D. Vinge) with the exception of Clifford Simak's Way Station. (I should do something about that.)

Of those, I would say that every one is either very good or excellent, with the exception of They'd Rather Be Right. I would call that one fair-to-middlin'. (I also picked up hints that the premise of the book is somewhat similar to the pseudoscience of dianetics, which turned me off a bit.)

After that, I've only read a few of winners: Startide Rising*, Neuromancer*, Ender's Game*, Doomsday Book*, Green Mars, Blue Mars, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. I would call all of those very good to excellent with the exception of the Card and the Willis, which were OK but not great.

I might as well add that I've read all the Nebula-award winning novels from the first (1966) to 1982's The Claw of the Conciliator by Gene Wolfe. The ones I have read after that are the ones that also won a Hugo (marked with asterisk above) as well as Red Mars and Parable of the Talents. Those two I would also rate as very good to excellent.

So, yeah, They'd Rather Be Right is the worst Hugo-winning novel that I've ever read.

 

[cgsmith]

If its on the list I'll be reading it, no preconceptions. Never knew Harry potter got a Hugo, lol. I read it already so that's another checked off the list.

Same with Green Mars and Blue Mars, (and Red Mars) by Kim Stanley Robinson - the books that i discovered the award through. Wonderful reads.

 

[Anushka Mokosh]

If its on the list I'll be reading it, no preconceptions. Never knew Harry potter got a Hugo, lol. I read it already so that's another checked off the list.

Same with Green Mars and Blue Mars, (and Red Mars) by Kim Stanley Robinson - the books that i discovered the award through. Wonderful reads.

I do believe it was Goblet of Fire which was up against A Storm of Swords among other things.

Currently reading Fate of Worlds by Niven & Lerner. Nearing the end of it. I plan on taking up Earthsea by Le Guin after it.

 

[J-Sun]

Looking over the list of Hugo-winning novels, it seems I have read all of them from the first (1953) to 1981 (The Snow Queen by Joan D. Vinge) with the exception of Clifford Simak's Way Station. (I should do something about that.)

Yeah, Way Station is great. I've read that one twice (widely separated). I don't know if it'd be an all-time favorite for you or anything, but I suspect you'd like it quite a bit.

Of those, I would say that every one is either very good or excellent, with the exception of They'd Rather Be Right. I would call that one fair-to-middlin'. (I also picked up hints that the premise of the book is somewhat similar to the pseudoscience of dianetics, which turned me off a bit.)

Fair-to-middlin' is fair. And, yeah, I don't want to spoil anything for cgsmith but the central concept the title is referencing does bear a general similarity to an aspect but I feel like that was probably just incidental contact, so to speak. It's a kind of silly idea in part but not as elaborately silly and I feel like it was just trying to make a general psychological point rather than to be stealth propaganda or anything. SF is full of examples supermen and amazing systems and overcoming limitations and on and on and this is just another one as far as that goes.

I do believe it was Goblet of Fire which was up against A Storm of Swords among other things.

Yep (from sfadb):

Calculating God, Robert J. Sawyer
Midnight Robber, Nalo Hopkinson
The Sky Road, Ken MacLeod
A Storm of Swords, George R. R. Martin

Some other books from that year in terms of Locus finalists:

The Telling, Ursula K. Le Guin
Eater, Gregory Benford
Zeitgeist, Bruce Sterling
The Coming, Joe Haldeman
In Green's Jungles, Gene Wolfe
Look to Windward, Iain M. Banks
Space: Manifold 2 [US title: Manifold: Space], Stephen Baxter
Probability Moon, Nancy Kress
Crescent City Rhapsody, Kathleen Ann Goonan
The Collapsium, Wil McCarthy
Marrow, Robert Reed
The Fountains of Youth, Brian Stableford
Genesis, Poul Anderson
The Fresco, Sheri S. Tepper
Shrine of Stars, Paul J. McAuley
Ventus, Karl Schroeder
Candle, John Barnes
Hunted, James Alan Gardner
Colony Fleet, Susan R. Matthews
Revelation Space, Alastair Reynolds
The Jazz, Melissa Scott
The Miocene Arrow, Sean McMullen
Outlaw School, Rebecca Ore
Mars Crossing, Geoffrey A. Landis
Distance Haze, Jamil Nasir
Ashes of Victory, David Weber
Infinity Beach, Jack McDevitt

 

[Foxbat]

Just started Death's Master by Tanith Lee. It's been about 25 years since I last read this one.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Just started Death's Master by Tanith Lee. It's been about 25 years since I last read this one.

An excellent book, as are all the books in that series. She was planning to revisit the Flat Earth with another novel or two, but I don't know if any of that was written before she died.

 

[j d worthington]

On They'd Rather Be Right (a.k.a. The Immortality Machine)... I think the problem for a lot who have read it is that there is not a great deal of "action" writing in it. It is very much a book of ideas and a rather odd book which almost stands outside the norms of the genre. Personally, I quite like it, and have read it several times over the decades. Not the best of those to win the award, but I certainly don't think it deserves the knocks it has received, by any means.

 

[Foxbat]

An excellent book, as are all the books in that series. She was planning to revisit the Flat Earth with another novel or two, but I don't know if any of that was written before she died.

For some reason, this is the only book I've read in the series so I'll have to track down copies of the other two.

Whilst doing so, I came across this second-hand copy of Night's Master at the most ridiculous price I've ever seen for a book on Amazon.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00DIKYSOI/?tag=brite-21
(my ordered copy cost me £2.99)