November 2022 Reading Thread

[Vertigo]

I’m starting The Reefs of Time, by the criminally under-appreciated Jeffrey A. Carver. This is the first in a duology (the Out of Time sequence), which make up books 5 & 6 in the Chaos Chronicles. Carver had to self-publish the duology, which reflects much more on current publishing than it does on Carver’s books.

Regarding "the criminally under-appreciated Jeffrey A. Carver" I think I agree, certainly with regard to this series, but, inspired by these, I recently decided to try his very first series, Star Rigger, so back to his very first book, Seas of Ernathe, and whilst I can see the promise there in his ideas the execution is massively flawed. But it is his first book so I shall probably persist but it does seem to drift into a slightly science fantasy area (complete with dragons existing in the 'flux' of hyperspace), which is a rather long way from his extreme but essentially hard science of the Chaos Chronicles.

 

[Danny McG]

Regarding Jeffrey A Carver books, I've had an ebook of his in my TBR file for a long time, I'm now inspired to try it, cheers.

Reading now
The Rapture Effect

 

[Vertigo]

Regarding Jeffrey A Carver books, I've had an ebook of his in my TBR file for a long time, I'm now inspired to try it, cheers.

Reading now
The Rapture Effect

I'll be interested to hear what you think of it! It's a fairly early book of his but still 11 years and 4 books after his first so probably more mature in his writing style. I did wonder whether to go for his two standalones first before embarking on his debut series.

 

[The Judge]

I just read Georges Simenon's Pietr the Latvian, which is the first of his Maigret novels. I saw the French film Maigret, starring Gerard Depardieu, a few months ago as part of Auckland's French film festival, and enjoyed it very much. Inspector Maigret is older in the film than in this book, but I still had a picture of the blunt, hulking, Depardieu as the title character in my mind as I read it. The book was good, though it took me a little while to get into its pacing and the way Simenon tells a story.

I read that and the next three in the series in 2019 when the new editions/translations came out. I was a tad disappointed by Pietr the Latvian as there was a lot of atmosphere but not much real detection, less a murder mystery of the Agatha Christie solve-the-puzzle type, and more a police procedural perhaps, and wholly reliant on a confession at the end. I found the same with the third book, The Hanged Man of Saint-Pholien. Book two, The Late Monsieur Gallet worked better as a detective novel for my taste, with clues and a good resolution, and the same for the fourth, The Carter of La Providence, though that one was lacking in other ways, not least some errors I picked up. All very atmospheric, though.

I've not seen the Depardieu Maigret, but after the books we got hold of the 1960s BBC TV version with Rupert Davis, which was very enjoyable -- though part of the fun was spotting bit-part actors who were later to be famous.

 

[AE35Unit]

I will have to look up Jeffrey A. Carver on FF

 

[Randy M.]

Have you read much Dorothy Parker? She's someone I feel I ought to have read. I'm not especially a poetry reader, but I've heard good things about her short stories.

I've poked through The Portable Dorothy Parker now and again over several years, but only just a couple of stories, more for the poems and book reviews included. Since this is no longer in copyright, I'll post one of my all-time favorite book reviews, by Parker under the byline, Constant Reader:

“The more it
SNOWS-tiddely-pom,
The more it
GOES-tiddely-pom
The more it
GOES-tiddely-pom
On
Snowing.

“And nobody
KNOWS-tiddely-pom,
How cold my

TOES-tiddely-pom
How cold my
TOES-tiddely-pom
Are
Growing.”

The above lyric is culled from the fifth page of Mr. A. A. Milne’s new book, “The House at Pooh Corner,” for, although the work is in prose, there are frequent droppings into more cadenced whimsy. This one is designated as a “Hum,” that pops into the head of Winnie-the-Pooh as he is standing outside Piglet’s house in the snow, jumping up and down to keep warm. It “seemed to him a Good Hum, such as is Hummed Hopefully to Others.” In fact, so Good a Hum did it seem that he and Piglet started right out through the snow to Hum It Hopefully to Eeyore. Oh darn—there I’ve gone and given away the plot. I could bite my tongue out.

As they are trotting along against the flakes, Piglet begins to weaken a bit.

“ ‘Pooh,’ he said at last and a little timidly, because he didn’t want Pooh to think he was Giving In, ‘I was just wondering. How would it be if we went home now and practised your song, and then sang it to Eeyore tomorrow—or—or the next day, when we happen to see him.’

“ ‘That’s a very good idea, Piglet,’ said Pooh. ‘We’ll practise it now as we go along. But it’s no good going home to practise it, because it’s a special Outdoor Song which Has To Be Sung In The Snow.’

“ ‘Are you sure?’ asked Piglet anxiously.

“ ‘Well, you’ll see, Piglet, when you listen. Because this is how it begins. The more it snows, tiddely-pom—’

“ ‘Tiddely what?’ said Piglet.” (He took, as you might say, the very words out of your correspondent’s mouth.)

“ ‘Pom,’ said Pooh. ‘I put that in to make it more hummy.’ ”

And it is that word “hummy,” my darlings, that marks the first place in “The House at Pooh Corner” at which Tonstant Weader Fwowed up.

 

[Randy M.]

I just read Georges Simenon's Pietr the Latvian, which is the first of his Maigret novels. I saw the French film Maigret, starring Gerard Depardieu, a few months ago as part of Auckland's French film festival, and enjoyed it very much. Inspector Maigret is older in the film than in this book, but I still had a picture of the blunt, hulking, Depardieu as the title character in my mind as I read it. The book was good, though it took me a little while to get into its pacing and the way Simenon tells a story. Now I've read one, and 'get' the style, I expect I'll enjoy a return to these books in future. This will be easy, because I found 3 other Maigret books at a used book sale last week for $2 each.

I read that about three years ago. I've read a couple of other Maigrets in the past. I read them wanting to like them, but for some reason Simenon doesn't much excite me. Oddly, I do like books by writers I'm positive were influenced by him, like Per Wahloo & Maj Sjowall, who wrote the Martin Beck series, and I think Louise Penny and Donna Leon, each of whom has written a long mystery series, tap into what Simenon was doing.

 

[Vertigo]

I will have to look up Jeffrey A. Carver on FF

I seem to remember you read the first two of the Chaos Chronicles a while back; I seem to recall you liked the first but thought the second a bit too weird (I'd agree it does move into a whole new level of weirdness compared to the first one!). A brief discussion around that time is what got me looking at them. I think it might have been a couple of years ago.

Edit: I may have that wrong; a quick search doesn't seem to reveal any comment from you but searches on here can be a bit hit and miss.

 

[Danny McG]

I'll be interested to hear what you think of it! It's a fairly early book of his but still 11 years and 4 books after his first so probably more mature in his writing style. I did wonder whether to go for his two standalones first before embarking on his debut series.

I got about seventy pages in but DNF - I can't put my finger on exactly why but I found the writing style annoying and the plot a bit tedious and "ho hum, who cares what happens next? Because I don't"

 

[Vertigo]

I got about seventy pages in but DNF - I can't put my finger on exactly why but I found the writing style annoying and the plot a bit tedious and "ho hum, who cares what happens next? Because I don't"

That's a bit like I felt about the debut book I read. I might give his early stuff a miss. I think there might be an element of late '70s to early '90s tree hugging'ness about them which can be very off putting!

 

[AE35Unit]

I seem to remember you read the first two of the Chaos Chronicles a while back; I seem to recall you liked the first but thought the second a bit too weird (I'd agree it does move into a whole new level of weirdness compared to the first one!). A brief discussion around that time is what got me looking at them. I think it might have been a couple of years ago.

Edit: I may have that wrong; a quick search doesn't seem to reveal any comment from you but searches on here can be a bit hit and miss.

No, not me

 

[Danny McG]

Now reading Severance by Ling Ma.

So far it's a post apocalyptic plague story, a handful of survivors have joined up and are making their way from New York to the Great Lakes area.

However they are surrounded by sort of zombies that are known as 'the fevered' but these victims are non violent and seem to carry out a shadow of their former lives.
I e. Watering unweeded flower beds with empty watering cans or playing vinyl records on dead turntables.

The survivors stalk these fevered and raid their houses for supplies, when they do this they usually kill the fevered to put them out of their misery, I think otherwise they're slowly starving to death but don't realise.

I also think it's a fungal thing that's doing it to them, but I haven't read far enough yet to confirm

 

[Bick]

Also now reading through Discovering Chess Openings by John Emms. Basic opening theory, much of which I know in theory, but as I'm rubbish at chess and would like to get better, its a good refresher, and reminds me of exactly why certain positions and strategies are good, as opposed to simply half remembering various chess truisms. For anyone looking for an entry level book on chess openings, its very good. Emms is a British GM.

 

[Ian Fortytwo]

I'm currently reading Colditz, by Ben MacIntyre. It's a brilliant read, giving both sides of the story.

 

[Danny McG]

And now I reread one I haven't looked at in decades:-
Stephen King's Christine

 

[Dave Vicks]

Another THE SHADOW comic book anthology. By Matt Wagner.

 

[Danny McG]

And now I reread one I haven't looked at in decades:-
Stephen King's Christine

Thanks to my starting this book I've now downloaded a book mentioned in the story.
Once an Eagle by Anton Myrer - this'll be my next read.

(I've noticed a few times in Stephen King books he refers to other writer's stories)

 

[Hugh]

Richard Brautigan "Trout Fishing in America" (1967)
It's taken me almost fifty years to read this book. It was recommended to me in the early seventies by someone I occasionally bumped into in cafes and for some reason the recommendation remained etched in my brain, as has the Collis-Browne cough medicine habit of the recommender - he used to drink a bottle a day - one day he left it in one of those little paper/plastic cups a bit too long and the mixture ate its way through the cup and went all over the table. Anyway, I finally picked up a copy a few weeks back. The book itself I found almost completely underwhelming, but back in the day it sold over four million copies worldwide. It took a while, but I've finally ticked that reading box.
This edition also contains two other Brautigan works, both of which I enjoyed rather more...
"The Pill versus the Springhill Mine Disaster": it's rare for me to read poetry but I rather liked some of these, perhaps because many of the poems are less than ten lines long and a tad quirky.
"In Watermelon Sugar": a strange post-apocalyptic work made up of the bizarre day to day happenings in some form of commune as described by the narrator.

 

[Elentarri]

Orfeo by Richard Powers. I liked the concept behind the novel more than the actual novel. The plot is thin, but the prose involving music is beautiful. And I've come to the conclusion I do not like Powers' style of writing novels.

 

[svalbard]

Just finished a second reading of Rhyming Rings by David Gemmell. First published 11 years after his death it is a crime novel set in 1980s London. And it is a tremendous read. Has all the Gemmell tropes and they sit quite nicely in a non fantasy settings.