What have you read lately?

[Parasaurolophus]

Hmm. Looks like I haven't posted an update since the end of June, when I made my last post to the old thread. Henceforth, I'll aim for more of a monthly roundup (at the end of each month). Here goes, then, another massive update. I'll try to remember my impression of the things I read:


Alastair Reynolds – Shadow Captain: I loved Revenger. This sequel is fun, though not as much fun as its predecessor—probably because the world isn't as new, and so the world-building just isn't the same. Still, I enjoyed it, and look forward to the third installment in the trilogy.

Michael Crichton – The Eaters of the Dead: Took me a while to find this one in a book box, but I finally did. It's a fun re-telling of Beowulf, and representative of Crichton at his best. Honestly, he should have stuck to historical fiction—he did a great job whenever he did.

Michael Crichton – The Great Train Robbery: Vintage Crichton: as I said before, he's often at his best writing historical fiction, and that's true of this, too. I'm not at all a fan of the period, but it was a gripping story and well-told.

Michael Crichton – The Terminal Man: So boring. So, so boring. Dull. Ugh.

Michael Crichton – State of Fear: A long, long Gish Gallop against climate change. I think this is the last Crichton novel I had left to read, apart from his pseudonymous medical thrillers. Half of it was super boring, the other half okay (in particular, the brief chunk set in Antarctica). It's all-in on climate change denial and it spends hundreds of pages justifying itself—poorly, I should add, and with reams of dodgy science, misleading graphs, and half-truths. Not a winner.

Karl Schroeder – Lady of Mazes: I read this on the strength of a friendly acquaintance's recommendation. Meh. It was pretty slow and dull for most of its runtime, though punctuated with interesting sequences. The plot is relatively complex, but IMO that's mostly because the story is poorly told, and the revelations aren't managed well. Lots of telling, not enough showing.

Ann Leckie – The Raven Tower: This was my first proper fantasy novel in years, and it was fantastic. I really enjoyed it, right down to the Pratchett-style take on gods. Telling the story from the point of view of a stationary god is also a neat little trick. I really enjoyed it, and look forward to the sequel. Leckie's performed a fantastic genre pivot.

Mira Grant – Feedback: I love Feed. Feedback is fun, but really, it's just Feed retold and, as such, it really lacks the original's punch and imaginative world-building. It's a competent novel, but ultimately it's so similar to the source material that it can't help but be a little disappointing.

Mira Grant – Rise: The Complete Newsflesh Collection: This was better. It's a bunch of short stories, some of which are quite powerful (most notably the San Diego ComiCon story, and the Florida one), and others of which are a little dull (e.g. the Australian story, where nothing at all happens). It made for a nice last taste of the Newsflesh world, though.

M.R. Carey – The Girl With All The Gifts: This was a fantastic read, and another great take on the zombie novel (unfortunately, it totally scooped me on the origins of the zombie plague). This was one of my favourite reads of the year, and telling it mostly from a little girl's perspective was genius. I totally believed the peril, and I nearly wept at how well-executed one of those early scenes was. It makes a few false steps, but it was fantastic nonetheless. A totally unexpected hit.

M.R. Carey – The Boy On The Bridge: This is a surprisingly good sequel (well, prequel) to The Girl With All The Gifts. It's not as good—the element of surprise is gone—but it manages to tell an interesting story, even if we already know how it's going to end. A pleasant surprise.

Naomi Klein – The Battle for Paradise: Puerto Rico Takes on the Disaster Capitalists: Short and sweet, a compelling piece of reporting on the climate crisis from Puerto Rico. I learned a lot, especially about Puerto Rico.

Naomi Klein – On Fire: The Burning Case For A Green New Deal: A collection of Klein's climate change reporting, essays, and speeches. Again, it was totally compelling and I learned a lot (even if I'd read most of the original reporting before). It's wonderful to have all these pieces collected together. Klein really is a national treasure.

Lois Lowry – Gathering Blue: I don't remember much about The Giver (to which it's a sequel, of sorts), except that it was stridently anti-communist. Gathering Blue, however, is stridently anti-capitalist, and it was a fantastic and utterly compelling short piece of teen fiction. I loved it.

Sarah Vowell – Unfamiliar Fishes: I hated this book so much. First of all, it pretends to be a history of Hawai'i, but spends more time talking about Amrerican missionaries in Connecticut than it does anything Hawaiian. Second, there are long tracts in which Vowell talks about her Cherokee 'ancestors'—but she isn't Cherokee! Like Warren, she has one distant Cherokee relative, and that just isn't enough to make her part of that community. Frankly, it's a fucking disgrace that this book talks almost as much about the Cherokee and the Trail of Tears as it does Hawai'i and the Hawaiian people. Let me be clear: the Cherokee story is interesting and important, and I support the re-insertion of indigenous stories and histories into non-indigenous contexts, since otherwise they tend to get erased. But when you're a white tourist telling an indigenous history, don't fucking mix-and-match your indigenous peoples. To make matters worse, the book is chock full of spectacularly oblivious racism (including a complaint about all the Hawaiian street names!). It's a total This American Life book, complete with useless digressions down obscure, boring, and totally unenlightening tangents (because, you see, this person met that one at Yale, and that other person hung out with them and later played a bit part in My Cherokee Heritage Minute, but also, let's talk about all these mainland white people and their religious beliefs, because there were missionaries in Hawai'i—isn't it a funny American life, after all?). UGH. I can't even begin to remember everything I hated about it.

Bernard Cornwell – Sword of Kings: I love this series, and always welcome new installments. This one did not disappoint.

Marlon James – Black Leopard Red Wolf: A really cool fantasy rooted in... the Malian Empire? Somewhere in the vicinity, anyway. There's lots to like about this book, including the weird and difficult pigeon that made my reading rather slow. It's highly imaginative, and full of colour. Very slow in parts, and fast-paced in others. Quite a lot of fairly graphic sex, including some dodgy stuff. But fascinating all the same. I don't know whether I have the energy for the sequel, once it comes out, but there's a lot here that'll stay with me for a long time.

Terry Pratchett – Faust Eric: Found it in a book box, and since it's been about twenty years since I read it, thought I'd give it a spin. Every bit as fun and original as it was the first time around. Honestly, it makes me feel like I should re-read all the Discworld novels—in order, this time.

Poul Anderson – Hrolf Kraki's Saga: I read the original saga about ten years ago. As far as I could tell, this "retelling" is pretty much just the original, plus an occasional reference to a narrator. The source material is as gripping as it ever was, however, and I'd forgotten all about the Beowulf interlude, which made for a nice little treat.

Jean-Yves Ferri and Didier Conrad, Didier– La Fille de Vercingétorix: I love Astérix, but I have mixed feelings about these new additions. The last Ferri/Conrad book was pretty racist, in a manner that I couldn't reconcile with the originals. This story was OK. A little bit rushed and all over the place, like their others, but on the whole better. But man, I miss the Uderzo/Goscinny originals.

Iain M. Banks – Inversions: I enjoyed this one very much, certainly more than I'd enjoyed most of the Culture novels up until this point. Banks found a great way to write across genres, while maintaining his primary scifi audience. A neat trick, and neatly performed.

Iain M. Banks – Look to Windward: This was another good Culture novel, and I enjoyed it, too. I don't have much to say beyond that, except that the Culture novels get a lot better as you go along. I like the thematic arc in each of these later novels, and the execution is good.

Iain M. Banks – Matter: Another hit. I liked this story a lot, too. It was a good mix of genres, not too heavy-handed, and fast-paced.

Iain M. Banks – Surface Detail: This is one of the very best Culture novels, right up there with The Player of Games, although it's a completely different sort of novel. I was thoroughly gripped by all the different plotlines, including the horrifying one that takes place in the Hells. And the callback to Use of Weapons was great (and subtle!).

Iain M. Banks – The Hydrogen Sonata: A fitting end to this series, even if it wasn't intended as such. I enjoyed the closer look at subliming, and the kind of overview of the series that it provided. I'm sorry that Banks is dead, and that there won't be any more installments in this series—by the end, it got to be a pretty rich universe with lots of really, really cool ideas in it.

Cixin Liu – The Three-Body Problem: Boring. I mostly enjoyed the parts set in Three-Body, but the rest was dull as rocks. It's all telling, and almost no showing. Doubtless translation didn't help, but honestly, I don't think there's much for it to have been unhelpful about. All tell, no show.

N.K. Jemisin – The Fifth Season: I heard about this years ago, but put off reading it because I thought it would be bad. Man, was I wrong. This is one of the most exciting novels I read in all of 2019. It's a really cool, original premise, fantastic world-building, and it's clearly influenced by Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time (my favourite fantasy series, featuring my favourite system of magic), especially his Aes Sedai. This is a brilliant novel, and I can't recommend it highly enough.

N.K. Jemisin – The Obelisk Gate: This is the sequel to The Fifth Season, as it's just as brilliant. There's no step down, here: Jemisin has succeeded in writing a novel that's every bit as good as its predecessor. A rip-roaring read that left me in awe of the work she's done.

[ab_grp]

I'm so glad to see you're back with more reviews! They always inspire additions to our to-read list, and the only ones we've read in the current review list are the Jemisin books (agreed, excellent), so lots to consider.

We finished Cryptonomicon, finally.  I hadn't read it in years and thought it took off slowly (too much math, ironically, given where life has taken me since I first read it).  Once it got going, though, I fell in love with it again.  Plenty of hilarity and interesting history.  One aspect that annoyed me was the belaboring of what seem like very obvious or easy to understand aspects while blowing past more complicated but important pieces (e.g., military strategies).  In any case, we both found it delightful again and thoroughly enjoyed rereading it.  Now our arms can have a break from holding that enormous book up all the time.

I started to read At Swim-Two-Birds (Flann O'Brien/Brian Nolan), which I had previously read for book club.  I had really enjoyed the quirky writing style (at least the outer story).  It's a bit of a challenge to read out loud at times, and life has been stressful, so we switched to Recursion (Blake Crouch), which was one of the new sci-fi books I picked up last summer.  I don't think the writing is excellent, but the story has some promise.  It has to do with memory and manipulation thereof.  An interesting premise, so we'll see how the story works out.

[Parasaurolophus]

Haha, well, I'm glad my lists contribute to more than just my post count!

[archaeo42]

I'm so glad to see you're back with more reviews! They always inspire additions to our to-read list, and the only ones we've read in the current review list are the Jemisin books (agreed, excellent), so lots to consider.

We finished Cryptonomicon, finally.  I hadn't read it in years and thought it took off slowly (too much math, ironically, given where life has taken me since I first read it).  Once it got going, though, I fell in love with it again.  Plenty of hilarity and interesting history.  One aspect that annoyed me was the belaboring of what seem like very obvious or easy to understand aspects while blowing past more complicated but important pieces (e.g., military strategies).  In any case, we both found it delightful again and thoroughly enjoyed rereading it.  Now our arms can have a break from holding that enormous book up all the time.

I started to read At Swim-Two-Birds (Flann O'Brien/Brian Nolan), which I had previously read for book club.  I had really enjoyed the quirky writing style (at least the outer story).  It's a bit of a challenge to read out loud at times, and life has been stressful, so we switched to Recursion (Blake Crouch), which was one of the new sci-fi books I picked up last summer.  I don't think the writing is excellent, but the story has some promise.  It has to do with memory and manipulation thereof.  An interesting premise, so we'll see how the story works out.

Hahaha I was going to ask if you plan on reading any other Neal Stephenson soon. I do love The Baroque Cycle books...and Anathem.

[ab_grp]

Haha, well, I'm glad my lists contribute to more than just my post count!

If post count were your focus, of course you could always split your review posts up into one per book! Seriously, though, I really appreciate hearing about what you've been reading.

Archaeo42, we have read a few other Stephensons, some of which were (thankfully) a bit less hefty to wrangle.  We read or reread Snow Crash and Zodiac within the past year or so, and we've each previously read The Diamond Age.  Spouse loves, loves, loves Anathem.  I read it and enjoyed it but felt that I was not "getting it" completely.  Again, ironically, I didn't think I was getting the math in particular.  Maybe my mind just resists reading what I have to read at work all day! I would like to reread that one.  Spouse and I both tried to read The Baroque Cycle but didn't get too far, though we have all the books and should probably take a crack at those again (they are big, though!).  He also read Seveneves and found it to be interesting but a bit ponderous in the details at times.  I attempted to read The Mongoliad but didn't get so far with that one, either.  Stephenson seems to have a couple different types of books, some easier to get into than others, but I have enjoyed all of the ones I've finished, even if I have not loved all of them.  Have you read others of his? What did you think?

[archaeo42]

Haha, well, I'm glad my lists contribute to more than just my post count!

If post count were your focus, of course you could always split your review posts up into one per book! Seriously, though, I really appreciate hearing about what you've been reading.

Archaeo42, we have read a few other Stephensons, some of which were (thankfully) a bit less hefty to wrangle.  We read or reread Snow Crash and Zodiac within the past year or so, and we've each previously read The Diamond Age.  Spouse loves, loves, loves Anathem.  I read it and enjoyed it but felt that I was not "getting it" completely.  Again, ironically, I didn't think I was getting the math in particular.  Maybe my mind just resists reading what I have to read at work all day! I would like to reread that one.  Spouse and I both tried to read The Baroque Cycle but didn't get too far, though we have all the books and should probably take a crack at those again (they are big, though!).  He also read Seveneves and found it to be interesting but a bit ponderous in the details at times.  I attempted to read The Mongoliad but didn't get so far with that one, either.  Stephenson seems to have a couple different types of books, some easier to get into than others, but I have enjoyed all of the ones I've finished, even if I have not loved all of them.  Have you read others of his? What did you think?

I've read all of his fiction, except the short stories.  I found Seveneves really hard to get in to as well -- it's probably my least favorite novel of his. I enjoyed The Mongoliad and the rest of that series but I also really enjoy sweeping, complicated story lines with a lot of detail. I felt like I wasn't quite "getting it" with his recent novel Fall: Or Dodge in Hell. It seemed like there was some background philosophy of science reading I should have done to fully get it. He remains one of my favorite writers because his stories assume the reader is smart and will understand the science and technology concepts he's drawing from.

[apl68]

Currently reading Big History, which tries to cover everything from the Big Bang to the present.  It's nothing if not ambitious in scope!  I'm up through the formation of the Solar System.  Fascinating stuff.  I look forward to eventually getting into the era that covers history as we usually define it.  I actually know enough about that to form an opinion on whether the authors of this book know their stuff.  Until them I'm having to take things largely on trust.

Also recently read Forgotten God:  Reversing Our Tragic Neglect of the Holy Spirit, by Francis Chan.  I found it very insightful.

Also reading Stanley Karnow's Vietnam:  A History, which is widely hailed as a definitive work on the subject.  So far still in the early chapters, which deal with France's colonial activities in Southeast Asia. 

[sprout]

I felt like I wasn't quite "getting it" with his recent novel Fall: Or Dodge in Hell. It seemed like there was some background philosophy of science reading I should have done to fully get it.

Huh.  Well, now I'm way more interested in that one!

I really like Neal Stephenson.  I've read his earlier stuff (Zodiac, Snow Crash, Diamond Age).  I like a lot of his later stuff too - including both Anathem and Seveneves, but feel like it would benefit from a more aggressive editing.  Like, when he was less of a name maybe people told him more firmly to tighten it up.  I will probably never read The Baroque Cycle, just because my reading time is limited and I have too many other books I'd like to get to eventually.

[archaeo42]

I felt like I wasn't quite "getting it" with his recent novel Fall: Or Dodge in Hell. It seemed like there was some background philosophy of science reading I should have done to fully get it.

Huh.  Well, now I'm way more interested in that one!

I really like Neal Stephenson.  I've read his earlier stuff (Zodiac, Snow Crash, Diamond Age).  I like a lot of his later stuff too - including both Anathem and Seveneves, but feel like it would benefit from a more aggressive editing.  Like, when he was less of a name maybe people told him more firmly to tighten it up.  I will probably never read The Baroque Cycle, just because my reading time is limited and I have too many other books I'd like to get to eventually.

If you have any sort of interest in the intersection of technology, ontology, and philosophical theology you might really dig it. Also, please please please understand I am using these descriptors with just a very broad, high level understanding of what they may encapsulate.

[ab_grp]

The philosophy of science angle sounds interesting to me, too! And I agree that Stephenson's books are pretty smart and don't tend to overexplain.  I was a little surprised that in Cryptonomicon he seemed to go over and over some of the simpler crypto stuff and modular arithmetic.  At the same time, I wish there were more explanation of some of the more advanced crypto stuff and functions, as well as more info on particular strategic maneuvers that I don't want to spoil here but that involved a particular individual's background expertise coming in handy.  And although I thought the book started off slowly for me this time, the end wrapped up way too quickly! But I love the characters and story. 

The editing aspect reminds me of Hawaii (Michener).  I loved that story as well, but good grief I did not need all of the first 50 pages of it.  During Christmas this year, I found out that my MIL had sent a copy of it to a granddaughter and essentially advised her to skip that part.

[hmaria1609]

Starting the newest "Lady Emily Mystery" In the Shadow of Vesuvius by Tasha Alexander from the library. With this mix of snow and rain we're getting here in the metro DC area this weekend, I'm content with a good novel!  :)

I had the fun of visiting the area during a Mediterranean cruise. I was in college at the time--it was an impressive site!

[monarda]

After hearing a radio show with the authors, I started reading The Public Option by Ganesh Sitaraman and Anne L. Alstott and really enjoying how simple and accessible it is so far. Not at all my field, but it strikes me that it would be a good one for teaching... maybe?

[mamselle]

The philosophy of science angle sounds interesting to me, too! And I agree that Stephenson's books are pretty smart and don't tend to overexplain.  I was a little surprised that in Cryptonomicon he seemed to go over and over some of the simpler crypto stuff and modular arithmetic.  At the same time, I wish there were more explanation of some of the more advanced crypto stuff and functions, as well as more info on particular strategic maneuvers that I don't want to spoil here but that involved a particular individual's background expertise coming in handy.  And although I thought the book started off slowly for me this time, the end wrapped up way too quickly! But I love the characters and story. 

The editing aspect reminds me of Hawaii (Michener).  I loved that story as well, but good grief I did not need all of the first 50 pages of it.  During Christmas this year, I found out that my MIL had sent a copy of it to a granddaughter and essentially advised her to skip that part.

I read several of Michner's books. It sometimes seemed to me as if he were trying to write his way into the story, searching for the thread that would get him through it all.

He also came up with some excellent metaphors in so doing, I thought.

I quoted the one about the vulnerability of moulting shellfish to variations in the salinity of the water (an opening passage in one of the chapters of "Chesapeake") to a friend the other day--it was apt.

So, rewarding in its way.

M.

[ab_grp]

Mamselle, those are good observations about Michener's writing.

We finished Recursion and had mixed feelings.  The premise is pretty intriguing, and I appreciated that the author addressed some of the philosophical, psychological, and scientific aspects of memory manipulation.  At times, however, there seemed to be a good bit of hand waving about how some of this worked.  Some of the dialogue and description was pretty terrible, other parts were better written.  It was a bit uneven.  Still, it's an interesting idea and fairly enjoyable overall.

Now we're reading Clue, the book based on the movie screenplay.  I'm loving it so far, probably because I've watched the movie so many times that I think I could probably act the whole thing out, and this gives me somewhat of a chance to do so.  It's been interesting to see what works better visually and what is funnier when described in words.

[bioteacher]

Boys & Sex: Young Men on Hookups, Love, Porn, Consent, and Navigating the New Masculinity by Peggy Orenstein.

Fascinating and depressing. It pointed out things Biodad and I have done right and where we have fallen short with our kids. I've already sent Bioson an text of the cover and told him I think he should read it, too.