What have you read lately?

[ergative]

Yes, TPOG can be read as a standalone. My experience with Phlebas was that it was pretty much the same from the start, so if you don't like it for the first hundred pages, you may not get any more sucked it. I believe that all of the Culture books work as standalones.

Do let us know how you like the Jemisin! I may well have recommended it; I loved it.

[Parasaurolophus]

I think TPoG is far and away the best Culture novel.

They're all standalone novels, but they benefit a great deal from the rest of the Culture universe. They're much better and more interesting novels when seen in light of one another (I confess to some boredom in my progression through them all). The main exception, to my mind, is TPoG. I loved that one from the start.

[ab_grp]

Thanks to you both! I will report back on the Jemisin short stories and will get a copy of TPoG.

[archaeo42]

I finished The Murmur of Bees last night be Sofia Segovia. It was really lovely. Takes place in Linares around the turn of the 20th century and is about a foundling and the family that takes him in. It was a bit difficult to follow the narration at first (it's told from the point of view of the youngest son) since it does jump back and forth between years at the start. Admittedly the Spanish Flu pandemic chapters were a little....eerie, but I found it hard to put down. It was a nice change of pace from what I usually read.

[apl68]

The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs, by Steve Brusatte.  It's a fascinating history of--well, the rise and fall of the dinosaurs, as currently understood by paleontology.  It's very readable popular science, with vivid profiles of several figures in the field of paleontology, and detailed descriptions of the methods they use to deduce what dinosaurs looked like, how they lived, and how their lineages mapped out.  It's one of those books where the author's enthusiasm for the subject proves contagious.  That's a mark of good popular nonfiction writing.

For extinct creatures, dinosaurs sure have changed a lot in the four decades since I began reading about them as a kid!  Makes me wonder how much of what Brusatte discusses here will be subject to modification in the years to come, due to continuing new fossil finds and methodologies.

[fourhats]

I'm with you on the Harry Potter fervor--I've got the whole series in hardback, the whole series in full-size paperback format (as a boxed set), and several of the volumes in smaller-size paperback format.

If you have these, you need to check out the Juniper Books website! They do wonderful covers, and imaginative editions that look wonderful on the shelf. I bought two sets of books through them. There are multiple Harry Potter sets.

[nebo113]

Skimming another Lee Child.  I can skim as I'm falling asleep since it's so easy to pick up the plot every three or so pages.

[evil_physics_witchcraft]

Currently reading my old college/grad school Physics texts. Good bathroom reading. I may start working problems to keep my mind busy.

[onthefringe]

I'm having a huge amount of trouble focusing on anything, including reading. It's very distressing.

I did make it through "Because, Internet" by Gretchen McCullouch, which prompted some interesting discussions  about texting punctuation and emoji use with my daughter. And "Fated Stars" by Mary Robinette Kowal, which I quite enjoyed.

[paultuttle]

I'm with you on the Harry Potter fervor--I've got the whole series in hardback, the whole series in full-size paperback format (as a boxed set), and several of the volumes in smaller-size paperback format.

If you have these, you need to check out the Juniper Books website! They do wonderful covers, and imaginative editions that look wonderful on the shelf. I bought two sets of books through them. There are multiple Harry Potter sets.

Thanks! I'll take a look at their website.

[statsgeek]

I'm finally getting to Jennifer Chiaverini's Resistance Women.  Her description of the rise of the Nazi party is, in the present climate, terrifying. 

[archaeo42]

I've been reading Marc Levy recently. I finished The Strange Journey of Alice Pendelbury, originally published in France as The Strange Journey of Mr. Daldry. I'm currently reading P.S. from Paris. They're nice brain breaks - something pleasant to read that isn't taxing.

[Parasaurolophus]

Hmm. Haven't posted since February. Kthen, here's my haul for February, March, and April. It's pretty minuscule, for reasons. I'm not happy about having read so little, but there you have. I'ma step up my game now! I'm reading a few concurrently now, and I'm looking forward to a small fortune of books from an order I placed aaaaages ago, so. Plus, more free time!


Fraans de Waal - Are we smart enough to know how smart animals are?: An entertaining bit of popular science, with lots of really interesting and compelling examples. I often gasped at the shoddy experimental design from the past, which is basically what I was looking for when I got it (and which were, in many ways, highly reminiscent of Elisabeth Lloy'd magnificent Pre-theoretical Assumptions in Evolutionary Explanations of Female Sexuality). It was also interesting to have my childhood memories of how we talked about animal cognition confirmed; I'd come to think I must have been misremembering, but apparently not. Wow, have we ever come a long way!

Ezekiel Boone - The Hatching: Found it in a book box. It's almost a competent creature feature, except that the creature apocalypse described doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Too many different points of view, too, which make the story (such as it is--it's pretty cookie-cutter, with some cookie-cutter misogyny) pretty disjointed. It also just... ends. Without ending. It was an easy read that passed time on the bus, back when we could still bus around, but no more than that.

Robert Jordan - Warrior of the Altaii: Since this was his first novel, I didn't expect much. But those expectations were exceeded, and then some! It was a great, rip-roaring read. I wish it had been longer, because the story could have used expansion in places. But it did a great job of building a new world for me, taking me there, and guiding me through it. It was a lot of fun, and it was especially fun to see the seeds being sown for The Wheel of Time. In fact, it made me desperately want to re-read the series again, but it's such an undertaking... Well. Maybe sometime later this year.

Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle, and Steven Barnes - The Legacy of Heorot: Space colony Beowulf, except the colonists are brain-damaged from hibernation. I don't much care for Niven and don't know the other two, so my expectations were low, but I loved the premise so I gave it a go. I really, really enjoyed this. It's a little dated, lightly misogynist (surprise, surprise), and the different writers show through sometimes, but I had a great time with it. Fantastic premise, competent execution, all-around good story. I definitely want more space colony novels, preferably with wildlife (that's always my favourite part).

Jane Austen - Lady Susan: I've never actually read an Austen, although I've been meaning to for a while. Lady Susan is a joy, what more can I say? (And, of course, the film adaptation is fantastic.)

Norman F. Cantor - In the Wake of the Plague: The Black Death and the World it Made: I've had it on my history shelf for ages, and finally decided to give it a go (I'm reading Defoe with my partner, so it's slower, but also way better). It's an OK bit of popular history, but I have complaints. One is that crossbows definitely did not take two people and half an hour to reload, and only shoot thirty yards. Dunno where that came from. Another is that I didn't appreciate the amount of speculation involved, especially with respect to introducing his pet theory that the Black Death was bubonic plague + anthrax, which frankly isn't all that credible. There was some other grandstanding I don't remember, a sentence which seemed to claim that England won the Hundred Years' War but was probably just very poorly constructed, and, well, I just couldn't trust Cantor as a guide through the fourteenth century. Oh, and his focus is almost exclusively on England, which is, well, a bit chauvinist and not as advertised. Overall, not impressed. An easy read, though.

[Parasaurolophus]

Oops, I forgot to ask: what can you guys recommend me by way of space colonies with interesting wildlife?

[sprout]

Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle, and Steven Barnes - The Legacy of Heorot: Space colony Beowulf, except the colonists are brain-damaged from hibernation. I don't much care for Niven and don't know the other two, so my expectations were low, but I loved the premise so I gave it a go. I really, really enjoyed this. It's a little dated, lightly misogynist (surprise, surprise), and the different writers show through sometimes, but I had a great time with it. Fantastic premise, competent execution, all-around good story. I definitely want more space colony novels, preferably with wildlife (that's always my favourite part).

There's a book I remember reading years ago - maybe high school, that has stuck with me, that may in fact be this one.  (I say this after checking out a Wikipedia summary.)  It was definitely a Beowulf in space book, and it fits that the creatures were called grendels.  It stuck with me because of the way the human colonists became prey to this intelligent, learning predator.  It really made me think about human exceptionalism, and how thin the veneer of being the dominant species could get.  Part of the effect may have been the age I read it, but there's not a ton of books that I still randomly think about on occasion, decades later.