July 2017: What are you reading?

[biodroid]

Had a fantasy slump, so I just finished Memory Man by David Baldacci, was pretty good. Going to continue with Elfstones of Shannara.

 

[Paul_C]

Binti 1&2 finished and enjoyed. It's beginning to feel like a serialisation of a bigger novel which I'm buying at £2.22 a time - not a bad business model ?

The Stars My Destination waiting to be started tonight.

 

[Randy M.]

Is that real? Awesome bit of trivia there.
I wonder which producer thought that one up "We make more money with a H title"

It's something I heard years ago, but whether it's true -- and it seems plausible for Hollywood -- or not is anyone's guess.

I finished The Moving Target over the weekend. It's a fairly early novel in the series and I think I still detect it's Chandlerian roots with Archer closer to the typical private eye of the era than he would be in Macdonald's '60s novels. But there's the writing. Macdonald was just a good writer, and the phrasing and similes, the observations and tone of the writing make it a pleasure to read.

Still in a mood for mysteries and after watching a piece on her on a Sunday morning news show, I've started Louise Penny's Still Life. A tonal change from the hard-boiled novels I just finished.

Randy M.

 

[Martin Gill]

but do his books need to be so long?

I loved two thirds of Seveneves. The last part (no spoilers) after the Big Crunch moment was just, whatever. A bunch of random sci fi ideas tagged together with no coherent reason or story. I thought the whole current timeline, hard rain and ark sections were brilliant. In hindsight it was like he'd written that to create his crazy future races, but then had no story to tell when he got there. I'd recommend it, but I'd seriously recommend stop at the end of the second section, it's a much better book that way.

 

[Martin Gill]

I started the third book in the Wool trilogy last night and I'm curious if anyone else noticed. I loved the first one and liked the second. I thought the first was excellently written, tight, stylish and well executed. The second chapter of the third book is awful. Slack writing, passive voice, duplication, like it hadn't been edited. Then on chapter 3 he's back on form, really tight and precise. And actually the story really starts at chapter 3, so it left me wondering if the second chapter was thrown in as an afterthought based on last minute feedback.

 

[Paul_C]

I loved two thirds of Seveneves. The last part (no spoilers) after the Big Crunch moment was just, whatever. A bunch of random sci fi ideas tagged together with no coherent reason or story. I thought the whole current timeline, hard rain and ark sections were brilliant. In hindsight it was like he'd written that to create his crazy future races, but then had no story to tell when he got there. I'd recommend it, but I'd seriously recommend stop at the end of the second section, it's a much better book that way.

I got a fair way through Reamde before giving up when yet another thread was begun, it seemed to me that if he thought of something that might work in the book he threw it in, no matter what, no matter when.

I really enjoyed both Snow Crash and Diamond Age, and Anathem was generally good (I've read Cryptonomicon but found it hard work), but I doubt I'll be reading anything else of his.

 

[Danny McG]

The Sparrow by Mary Daria Russell - wasn't keen.

Ditto - it set off ok with the world and culture building but then got a bit 'draggy' and I ended up where I couldn't have cared less about the Jesuit's fate

 

[tobl]

I got a fair way through Reamde before giving up when yet another thread was begun, it seemed to me that if he thought of something that might work in the book he threw it in, no matter what, no matter when.

I really enjoyed both Snow Crash and Diamond Age, and Anathem was generally good (I've read Cryptonomicon but found it hard work), but I doubt I'll be reading anything else of his.

i really liked Cryptonomicon. as for the others... not so much

 

[Parson]

i really liked Cryptonomicon. as for the others... not so much

Agree with this....

Picked up Desperate Fire by Christopher Nuttall and Awakened by Ell Leigh Clark and Michael Anderle. I'm worried that Awakened might turn into a crash and burn with too much Fantasy and too much romance.... But I'll see.

 

[Danny McG]

Agree with this....

Picked up Desperate Fire by Christopher Nuttall and Awakened by Ell Leigh Clark and Michael Anderle. I'm worried that Awakened might turn into a crash and burn with too much Fantasy and too much romance.... But I'll see.

I saw this and took a good look at Christopher Nuttall's website. He has a section titled 'free books' and there is a good selection of his early work available for download. NOTE: He also has a section titled 'tip jar' if you feel like contributing after downloading.
I transferred a fiver in but got a bit greedy and took all his freebies, thinking I might go back and stick another fiver in

 

[D.A. Xiaolin Spires]

keep a list-- I finished reading twenty SFF short stories in July so far.

Short Stories:
My favorite so far is “All that Robot sh*t” by Rich Larson (Asimov’s). (Came out much earlier than July.) Straightforward language, but incredibly beautiful. Also, I liked being placed into that setting of the robot village, seems quaint. I'm biased though-- I'm a big sucker for good robot stories!

I just finished reading "Forever Bound" by Joe Haldeman (Clarkesworld, July), an interesting ride where I'm not entirely sure if he's talking about binding humans together (like a more intimate three-legged race) for fighting or if it's really about three-somes and sex. Then, I realized it's both, but does veer to this sensual/sexual/intimate experience.

I read "Qibla" by Aaron Matthew Walter Knuckey (Daily Science Fiction, June) and it's quite good as flash-fiction, for when you're too pinched on time to commit to a longer short story/novel. I like the imagery of concentric circles of people in outer space, all facing one direction.

Novels:
Seveneves by Neal Stephenson, which could be renamed as Much Ado About Bollides... I jest, but it's kind of true. I like the first 'novel' (of that duology disguised as one novel). A little heavy on the engineering, but some of it was pretty enlightening. The description and premise of the moon blowing is pretty cool. A deadpan, hit-you-in-the-groin first sentence. I also especially enjoyed the Neil deGrasse Tyson character, but also some of the others, too. I don't want to spoil it, but there's a bit of a shocker a half or three-quarters into it, which most people might know already. It really traumatized me. Clever palindrome title.

Currently reading:
Divergent by Veronica Roth, YA novel. The language and pacing is quite good, actually.

Picked up:
Cinder by Marissa Meyer, YA novel, sci-fi retelling of Cinderlla. But, didn't get far into it yet, so can't really comment on it.

Binti 1&2 finished and enjoyed. It's beginning to feel like a serialisation of a bigger novel which I'm buying at £2.22 a time - not a bad business model ?

The Stars My Destination waiting to be started tonight.

I really enjoyed Binti and started Binti 2. Glad you enjoyed them, too! I heard that Nnedi Okorafor had good things to say about Borne by Jeff VanderMeer, so I'm interested in picking that up, too!

I loved two thirds of Seveneves. The last part (no spoilers) after the Big Crunch moment was just, whatever. A bunch of random sci fi ideas tagged together with no coherent reason or story. I thought the whole current timeline, hard rain and ark sections were brilliant. In hindsight it was like he'd written that to create his crazy future races, but then had no story to tell when he got there. I'd recommend it, but I'd seriously recommend stop at the end of the second section, it's a much better book that way.

I agree. I really liked the first 'novel.' The second 'novel' (of the duology) was a bit harder to swallow, I think, in part, because I was traumatized.

Wasn't the Neil deGrasse Tyson character fun? And some of the long spiels of engineering, though sometimes tedious, were at times also enlightening and exciting.

 

[Vertigo]

Agree with this....

Picked up Desperate Fire by Christopher Nuttall and Awakened by Ell Leigh Clark and Michael Anderle. I'm worried that Awakened might turn into a crash and burn with too much Fantasy and too much romance.... But I'll see.

I stumbled on Michael Anderle recently (think it might have been an Amazon recommendation). He seems to be a bit of a publishing machine. He has 16 books out in his Kurtherian Gambit series with the first published in Nov 2015 and the 16th in March 2017!!!! Hmmmm? He appears to have his own publishing 'house' with some other authors all of whom share cover space with his name. Looks like an book factory to me.

 

[Martin Gill]

was a bit harder to swallow

As a stand alone it probably would be OK. Not my thing, and too much time devoted to hang gliding. The major fail for me was the complete shift away from characters you'd grown to be interested in, to a totally new set where I had no investment.

 

[Stewart Hotston]

The Thing Itself by Adam Roberts




OH MY WORD IT IS AMAZING!!!

 

[Danny McG]

The Thing Itself by Adam Roberts




OH MY WORD IT IS AMAZING!!!

I initially saw this and thought I'd never heard of him. A look at his books show I've actually read two of them - Stone & The Snow.
As I recall they were both enjoyable and engrossing so I may well get The Thing Itself

 

[williamjm]

I got a fair way through Reamde before giving up when yet another thread was begun, it seemed to me that if he thought of something that might work in the book he threw it in, no matter what, no matter when.

Reamde was strange, it started off seeming to be an attempt to write a thriller about online RPGs but after a while inexplicably turned into what felt like a plot rejected from the TV series 24. I think it's the weakest of his books that I've read, I through Seveneves was much better although I agree with the comments about it being two stories joined together with the first story being more interesting than the second.

 

[Parson]

I stumbled on Michael Anderle recently (think it might have been an Amazon recommendation). He seems to be a bit of a publishing machine. He has 16 books out in his Kurtherian Gambit series with the first published in Nov 2015 and the 16th in March 2017!!!! Hmmmm? He appears to have his own publishing 'house' with some other authors all of whom share cover space with his name. Looks like an book factory to me.

Sigh! my confidence has now gone down a further notch. But I suppose it's possible he had a lot of the books written or at least outlined before the first one came out.

 

[biodroid]

Terry Brooks is officially a write off for me. So I got Michael J. Sullivan's Age of Myth and it's quite good so far, only 5 pages in but so far is well written and has a nice pace to it. A bit of a modern dialogue to the characters like them saying OK lots but I like it so far.

 

[thaddeus6th]

I'm re-reading (during ad breaks and a page here and there as I work) A Great and Terrible King, by Marc Morris. It's a rather good Edward I bio.

Just before bed, I'm reading Primordial, the Liberator short by Nick Bailey. Only a tiny way in. [I like e-books but because I often read tiny sections at a time, that's why I've got a physical one on the go at the same time].

 

[Bick]

Wells' The Time Machine