December 2022 Reading Thread

[AE35Unit]

Well this is odd. I'm halfway through Consider Phlebas and I'm bored rigid. I don't remember much about it since the first time I read it apart from one, gruesome scene. The rest is very meh. Mid as my daughter would say.
I think I'm just bored with sf. Certainly bored with this book!
Charity shop will be getting it...

 

[AE35Unit]

Time to bring out  Hogfather again...

 

[hitmouse]

Time to bring out The Dark is Rising and The Box of Delights.

 

[Danny McG]

Time to bring out The Dark is Rising and The Box of Delights.

I had a try at The Dark is Rising last week, DNF for me

 

[HareBrain]

I had a try at The Dark is Rising last week, DNF for me

Have you read it before? I love most of it, but it probably works best as a nostalgia read. Reading it as an adult, I'm too aware that Will is a passenger rather than an active driver of the story.

 

[Danny McG]

Have you read it before? I love most of it, but it probably works best as a nostalgia read. Reading it as an adult, I'm too aware that Will is a passenger rather than an active driver of the story.

Nah, I watched it being read about 1972/73 on Jackanory, more recently I saw a trailer for the film but never watched it.

Two weeks ago I saw it cheap on kindle so I got it out of curiosity

 

[HareBrain]

more recently I saw a trailer for the film but never watched it

You can count that as one of your better decisions.

 

[williamjm]

I finished Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of Memory. I liked the book, although perhaps not quite as much as the two earlier books in the series. The imaginative world-building of the various non-human civilisations has always been the stand-out feature of the books and here most of the book focuses on a small human colony which doesn't have the same fascination. It does quickly become apparent that things aren't as mundane on the colony as they initially appear and the mystery of what is really going on is intriguing, but it still doesn't compare in scope to seeing the evolution of the spider civilisation in the first book. Liff is a likeable protagonist for this section of the story, although the other human colonists don't get much development. I think the most interesting characters are the two corvids, Gothi and Gethli, and how they interact with the other characters. What counts as sentience is one of the main themes of the story and the question of whether they are truly intelligent or just excellent mimics was the best exploration of this.

I've now started Fonda Lee's Jade Legacy, which so far seems to be a gangster story with some fantasy elements.

 

[Bick]

I finished Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of Memory… it still doesn't compare in scope to seeing the evolution of the spider civilisation in the first book.

I’ve heard from quite a few people that it goes downhill somewhat. Given the first book was a DNF for me, I need not return to it. I felt the same about the Revelation Space books by Reynolds - great invention, but no idea how to finish it satisfyingly. Perhaps this says as much about the series ‘trap’ authors often seem to get into, than the skill of the author per se.

 

[Elentarri]

I felt the same about the Revelation Space books by Reynolds - great invention, but no idea how to finish it satisfyingly.

Thanks for the warning. I found Revelation Space (book 1) at the charity shop and thought I would give it a go. But if the series drags on I'm probably not going to go looking for the rest of them.

 

[Hugh]

Arthur C. Clarke "The City and the Stars"
The City of Diaspar has existed for a thousand million years, its central computer ensuring a stable and harmonious society. Individuals remember many lives, their memories being stored between lives by the computer before they emerge once more in adult bodies in the Hall of Creation. Alvin, however is a unique - he has had no past lives. Perhaps the computer has created him deliberately.
There's a wonderful simplicity about old SF.

 

[hitmouse]

Thanks for the warning. I found Revelation Space (book 1) at the charity shop and thought I would give it a go. But if the series drags on I'm probably not going to go looking for the rest of them.

This rang a bell. I looked back at a comment I made in The best and worst reads of 2017 and found this:

“The worst is easy. Absolution Gap, the third part of Alastair Reynolds' Revelation Space trilogy. He can be a good writer, and the first two books in the trilogy were OK. However, the third was a surprise by virtue of being lazy, and just astonishingly, egregiously crap. I had the feeling that Reynolds had lost interest almost completely and was just taking the michael.”

 

[Elentarri]

This rang a bell. I looked back at a comment I made in The best and worst reads of 2017 and found this:

“The worst is easy. Absolution Gap, the third part of Alastair Reynolds' Revelation Space trilogy. He can be a good writer, and the first two books in the trilogy were OK. However, the third was a surprise by virtue of being lazy, and just astonishingly, egregiously crap. I had the feeling that Reynolds had lost interest almost completely and was just taking the michael.”

Revelation Space was an impulse buy. I don't usually impulse buy fantasy/science fiction anymore because of the never-ending-really-boring-or-poor-plot-author-doesn't-know-where-they-are-going-takes-too-long-to-publish middle books. The blurb on my copy made it sound like it involved archaeology in space, or hidden cities. It sounded interesting.

 

[AE35Unit]

Arthur C. Clarke "The City and the Stars"
The City of Diaspar has existed for a thousand million years, its central computer ensuring a stable and harmonious society. Individuals remember many lives, their memories being stored between lives by the computer before they emerge once more in adult bodies in the Hall of Creation. Alvin, however is a unique - he has had no past lives. Perhaps the computer has created him deliberately.
There's a wonderful simplicity about old SF.

I need to revisit Diaspar...

 

[hitmouse]

Revelation Space was an impulse buy. I don't usually impulse buy fantasy/science fiction anymore because of the never-ending-really-boring-or-poor-plot-author-doesn't-know-where-they-are-going-takes-too-long-to-publish middle books. The blurb on my copy made it sound like it involved archaeology in space, or hidden cities. It sounded interesting.

I think I enjoyed the first book enough to go on reading. The third in the series was so surprisingly crap that I was actually angry by the end.

 

[Elentarri]

I finally finished Aristophanes: The Complete Plays as translated by Paul Roche.

Read Penric's Mission by Lois McMaster Bujold, also Hauntings and Humbug: a Steampunk Christmas Carol by Melanie Karsak, and The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce, in between the ancient Greek plays.

Last night I finished an anthology of lackluster and unmemorable short stories: Krampusnacht: Twelve Nights of Krampus. I didn't know it was possible to make Krampus bland.

I think I enjoyed the first book enough to go on reading. The third in the series was so surprisingly crap that I was actually angry by the end.

There are apparently 4 novels in the series - according to GR. We will see. It's the next book on the list after my current book.

 

[Vertigo]

Arthur C. Clarke "The City and the Stars"
The City of Diaspar has existed for a thousand million years, its central computer ensuring a stable and harmonious society. Individuals remember many lives, their memories being stored between lives by the computer before they emerge once more in adult bodies in the Hall of Creation. Alvin, however is a unique - he has had no past lives. Perhaps the computer has created him deliberately.
There's a wonderful simplicity about old SF.

That one's coming up on my pile in a few weeks time!

 

[Bick]

I think I enjoyed the first book enough to go on reading. The third in the series was so surprisingly crap that I was actually angry by the end.

I felt the same. In fact Absolution Gap was a DNF for me, and I’ve never read any Reynolds since (nor am I likely to).

 

[Vertigo]

I think I enjoyed the first book enough to go on reading. The third in the series was so surprisingly crap that I was actually angry by the end.

I would agree with that and to be honest I don't feel there's any real need to read the third book. As I recall there's not much of a story arc running through them but more of three books loosely linked in the same universe. To get a flavour of the books I always recommend Chasm City which is a stand alone in the same universe.

ETA: @Elentarri that fourth book only came out recently, so a lot of people still think of it as a trilogy, and is set a VERY long time after Absolution gap but it does sort of pick up a thread or two. And was actually quite good - didn't matter that I could barely remember the previous stuff either.

 

[PadreTX]

Jo's The Wildest Hunt. I just bought it for Nook over the weekend.

Into a Blood-Red Sky isn't yet on Nook, there wasn't a hard copy at the Barnes & Noble store nearby, and I try to avoid Amazon if at all possible.