March 2021 Reading Thread

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Stephen Leigh
Amid the crowd of stars
(A sci fi about alien and Earth bacteria cross contamination)
 
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read all three michael mammay books... i guess i was not in the right mood for them. they are interesting however
 
Later by Stephen King. It's a quick, fun read. I'm trying to actually make it through Leviathan Wakes after giving up on it twice. I'm at the halfway point and this is the furthest I've ever made it. I'm pretty sure I'll finish it this time.
 
Continuing a run of starting books without finishing others first, with The Philosopher's Stone by Colin Wilson. It's supposed to be Lovecraftian but I haven't seen much evidence of that so far. Very readable, though.
 
I'd Rather We Had Casinos:And Other Black Thoughts. Audio book by Larry Wilmore.
 
Slow month for me, but I'm reading Seeds of Yesterday by V.C. Andrews, The Celts by Duncan Norton-Taylor, and Amethyst of the Fringe by Anna Kathryn Davis.

No matter how many books I read, I keep finding more on my shelves that are unread.
 
I've been reading a lot of regency era books (the Girl meets Duke series etc...). Also had a good binge read of Karen Rose's romance-thrillers
 
alexvss said:
It depends. I don't enjoy experimentalism per se, nor do I instantly hate it when I see. I really enjoyed the ones in this issue though. Check out "Comments on Your Provisional Patent Application for an Eternal Spirit Core". It's, like, a 10-minute read.
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Ooof. That was a great story! Thank you for sharing.
 
One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson - this really is a strange book, full of grotesque characters in a plot that doesn't feel farcical enough for them. A road-rage incident at the Edinburgh Festival ends up drawing in various bystanders, including a former detective, a Russian prostitute, a troupe of actors and a novelist with a guilty secret. It's not a great crime novel, although it's very entertaining, and there is an excellent surprise at the end. As with her earlier novel Case Histories, I feel that Atkinson really wants to use the crime novel format as a way of writing a set of character studies.
 
Noumenon Ultra by Marina J Lostetter - the final book in a hugely ambitious and largely successful debut trilogy. More here.
The Long Mars by Stephen Baxter and Terry Pratchett - I'm not sure about continuing with these. Vary episodic. More here.
Axis by Robert Charles Wilson - though they have some very obvious flaws I am enjoying this trilogy. More here.
Lost in a Good Book by Jasper Fforde - more absurd fun from Fforde. More here.
The Letter of Marque by Patrick O’Brian – Another solid offering in this generally excellent series; lots of excellent action and redemption for Aubrey. My only doubts about this particular volume were Aubrey’s extraordinarily successful naval actions. They felt to me a little too perfect, a little too much achieved at very little cost, and I can find no references to them being based on genuine historical actions taken from real life (as is often the case with O’Brian’s work). Maybe I’m just being too much of a sceptic. 4/5 stars
 
Ian Fortytwo said:
I'm currently reading The Fellowship of the Ring, by J. R. R. Tolkien. I am planning to read all of The Lord of the Rings.
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I don't know if it's just me, after watching the films I think the books are harder to read. It's as though as soon as you use your imagination to travel through the books the films actors take over and spoil your enjoyment and experience. I suppose that could be said for all films made after a book.

WHY??? I am angry now. :mad:
 
Ian Fortytwo said:
It's as though as soon as you use your imagination to travel through the books the films actors take over and spoil your enjoyment and experience.
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Funnily enough I said the same recently:

HareBrain said:
Finished The Fellowship of the Ring. It's the first time I've read it in ages, and what surprised me was how intrusive my memory of the films have become on my reading. Boromir "was" Sean Bean, Legolas "was" Orlando Bloom (which annoyed me, as I think he was terrible casting and didn't fit the book character at all). Same with Aragorn and Gimli. But oddly, Frodo and Sam were only ever played by Ian Holm and Bill Nighy from the BBC radio series. Elijah Wood, you clearly made no impression on me at all!!
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Toby Frost said:
One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson - this really is a strange book, full of grotesque characters in a plot that doesn't feel farcical enough for them. A road-rage incident at the Edinburgh Festival ends up drawing in various bystanders, including a former detective, a Russian prostitute, a troupe of actors and a novelist with a guilty secret. It's not a great crime novel, although it's very entertaining, and there is an excellent surprise at the end. As with her earlier novel Case Histories, I feel that Atkinson really wants to use the crime novel format as a way of writing a set of character studies.
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I knocked through the first three in that series a few weekends ago — agree totally that she is fascinated by character study. I also appreciate the kind of kaleidoscopic effect of her stories — the way she trusts the reader to start to make connections without over explaining them (thought that was especially true in Case Histories).
 
I've got the third one to read next - I was going to read some Stephen King, but I can't find the book - and I'm interested to see how it goes. I've got a feeling that they're going to become less and less like standard crime novels as they go. I still find it odd how farcical the characters are, and I wonder if her "literary" novels are as cartoony. I do quite like the way that the characters come together. She reminds me of a less-genre-ish version of Anne Cleeves.
 
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