November Reading Thread

[Omits]

Reading Gabriella by Carl Facciponte (Amazon download). About a (indetectable) human AI. Rather a lot of religious narrative but interesting read though.

 

[hitmouse]

A Pelican at Blandings (1969) PG Wodehouse. One of the later novels. Perfectly good fun, but lacks that magical sparkle which makes prime Wodehouse so sublime.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

One of the later novels. Perfectly good fun, but lacks that magical sparkle which makes prime Wodehouse so sublime.

Yes! His early novels lack something and so do those he wrote near the end of his life. But there was a long, long period in between where everything he wrote did have a sort of magical sparkle. Books and short fiction from that period are so very re-readable. But the later books don't have that whatever-it-was, and tend to disappoint.

 

[Galactic Bus Driver]

I'm reading The Chanur Saga by C. J. Cherryh, a space opera saga. The 700-page book is composed of the first three novels of the series (The Pride of Chanur, Chanur's Venture, and The Kif Strike Back). So, yes, I'm reading all of them.

Basic premise is how a feline alien race stumbles upon a political situation when a captured human, fleeing from an insidious alien group, came to them for aid. I don't know where that goes, but I'll find out soon enough.

I read that omnibus and it is frustratingly incomplete. There is a fourth book, "Chanur's Homecoming." Great series, and one I re-read every few years.

There is also a single spin-off novel, "Chanur's Legacy," featuring Pyanfar's niece captaining her own ship. This one is the only Cherryh book I've only read once.

My current read is "The Lightning Rod," the second Zig and Nola book by Brad Meltzer. If it's as good as the first, it'll be a pretty good political thriller.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

I just finished rereading The Crystal Gryphon, by Andre Norton. This was a great favorite of mine, fifty years ago. I liked the setting and the plot, but most of all I loved the characters. The question in my mind was how well I would like it a half a century later. It held up well, again mostly because the characters were so appealing to me.

Now rereading The Year of the Unicorn, another Norton that I loved in my youth.

 

[Elentarri]

Re-read of The Auronaut's Windlass by Jim Butcher.

 

[Dave Vicks]

LIFE AFTER LIFE, 1979,Raymond A.Moody jr. About N.D.E.'s.
I've heard 3% to 5% of the World's population has had them.

 

[Dave Vicks]

THE Witchcraft of SALEM VILLAGE,1956,Shirley Jackson.

 

[Parson]

Yep, it might be worth re-reading this now. I read it aged 18-20 with dogged persistence but found it boring beyond belief. Most of the characters, concerns, corporate shenanigans and machinations were beyond me then - late developer. What age were people when they read & enjoyed TFT?

Hm, Parson tries to get the creaky old brain to conjure up a memory. I believe I was in my early 30's and I loved them. But I haven't read them since.

 

[Dave Vicks]

Brian Greene, LIGHT FALLS, Audio play about Albert Einstein.

THE INIMITABLE JEEVES,By PG Wodehouse.

 

[Elentarri]

Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Philips
A light, mildly amusing, fluff piece involving the Greek Gods living in 21st century London.

 

[Bick]

Yep, it might be worth re-reading this now. I read it aged 18-20 with dogged persistence but found it boring beyond belief. Most of the characters, concerns, corporate shenanigans and machinations were beyond me then - late developer. What age were people when they read & enjoyed TFT?

I first read the Foundation books in my late teens, and loved them. Re-read then in my thirties and loved them, and recently re-read them again in my fifties and found I was more discerning and judged them more dispassionately, but still enjoyed them very much. I think I marginally prefer the Elijah Bayley books. I actually think the Foundation sequels and prequels written in the 80s are possibly superior novels, though they are of course less genre-defining and ‘classic’.

 

[Vertigo]

I first read the Foundation books in my late teens, and loved them. Re-read then in my thirties and loved them, and recently re-read them again in my fifties and found I was more discerning and judged them more dispassionately, but still enjoyed them very much. I think I marginally prefer the Elijah Bayley books. I actually think the Foundation sequels and prequels written in the 80s are possibly superior novels, though they are of course less genre-defining and ‘classic’.

I think that probably describes my feelings too. Reading them in the last decades I saw their flaws, which was a little disappointing, whilst also seeing how they were so important in their day. Again re-reading the Elijah Bayley books in the last decade I also saw their flaws but also felt they were better quality SF.

 

[Vince W]

Halcyon Drift by Brian Stableford.

 

[Hugh]

Poul Anderson "SHIELD"
I picked this up secondhand only to realise a couple of pages in that I'd read this not that long ago (April 2022). However although I recognised the plot as I continued reading, I never remembered enough to know what happened next.
Perhaps I should have posted this in the "Those moments when you realise how old you are" thread

 

[Danny McG]

Just starting Going Zero by Anthony McCarten - a near future tech thriller

 

[williamjm]

I read Emily St. John Mandel's Sea of Tranquillity. It's a relatively short book but does still manage to fit in half a dozen time periods ranging from early 20th Century Canada to a lunar colony several centuries in the future. Despite that I thought this had a more focused plot than her previous book, The Glass Hotel, which had plenty of good writing but I was a bit unsure about the point of it. This has a much stronger science fiction element than her previous books and although I have seen most of the ideas in here before in books by other authors I thought those elements did work well. Mandel's primary strength has always been her characters and the same is true here where they do get plenty of depth despite mostly not being in the story for very long. I think the one character that didn't really work was Gaspery, who is frustratingly passive on many occasions and is very poor at doing his job.

I think there's some clear autobiographical bits in here with one character being an author who, like Mandel, had come to fame as the author of a novel about a pandemic a few short years before an actual pandemic. Unlike Station Eleven this isn't primarily a book about a pandemic but it is a subject that comes up multiple times throughout the story, I think perhaps the author had some thoughts about the topic she wanted to get out of her system.

I think Station Eleven is still her best book out of those that I've read, but I did like this a lot.

I have now started Martha Wells' new Murderbot Diaries story, System Collapse.

 

[Dave Vicks]

Up next THE SHINNING, by Stephen King.

I liked the film.

 

[Vertigo]

I read Emily St. John Mandel's Sea of Tranquillity. It's a relatively short book but does still manage to fit in half a dozen time periods ranging from early 20th Century Canada to a lunar colony several centuries in the future. Despite that I thought this had a more focused plot than her previous book, The Glass Hotel, which had plenty of good writing but I was a bit unsure about the point of it. This has a much stronger science fiction element than her previous books and although I have seen most of the ideas in here before in books by other authors I thought those elements did work well. Mandel's primary strength has always been her characters and the same is true here where they do get plenty of depth despite mostly not being in the story for very long. I think the one character that didn't really work was Gaspery, who is frustratingly passive on many occasions and is very poor at doing his job.

I think there's some clear autobiographical bits in here with one character being an author who, like Mandel, had come to fame as the author of a novel about a pandemic a few short years before an actual pandemic. Unlike Station Eleven this isn't primarily a book about a pandemic but it is a subject that comes up multiple times throughout the story, I think perhaps the author had some thoughts about the topic she wanted to get out of her system.

I think Station Eleven is still her best book out of those that I've read, but I did like this a lot.

I have now started Martha Wells' new Murderbot Diaries story, System Collapse.

I have that Mandel one coming up in my pile sometime soon and I'm looking forward to it!

 

[Toby Frost]

Dixie City Jam by James Lee Burke.

This is a crime novel revolving around a Nazi submarine that somehow has sunk off the coast of New Orleans, and the violence and intrigue that accompanies its discovery. It's one of Burke's Robicheaux novels, about a reoccurring detective and his large number of problems and family members.

I've read a few Robicheaux novels, and presumably they're all late books. Robicheaux seems to have loads of people around him who all seem rather wacky: a pet raccoon, a daughter rescued from South American gangsters, a friendly old man who believes in werewolves, etc. Having never been there, I can't tell whether his version of New Orleans is accurate, but it seems incredibly concentrated, like those American films set in the UK where everyone is a cockney who lives in Big Ben. That said, the writing is good and the story is quite compelling.