The Books/Reading Thread

[no country for old wainds]

hounds has slowly become very beloved over the years; on the malazan subreddit it ranked 2nd in the last poll they did after MoI. it’s probably the most philosophical and theme-driven one in the series and quite slow-paced which causes a lot of people to reject it at first, but i think it’s maybe the one that benefits most from a reread, so it’s cool you already liked it so much first time around!

p.s. we have the same top 2.

 

[Vegard Pompey]

The TVBB interview with Steve is pretty funny if you haven't heard it. He eviscerates the hosts over their complete misreading of a scene, and he does it in the most Erikson way possible; starting with a long reflection on death of the author before seguing into an articulate takedown of the hosts. I love that he can be so unapologetically confrontational with professed fans of his work.

 

[TageRyche]

I finished reading The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Hard to go wrong with one of the best detective stories of all-time.

 

[Cronopio]

Been dipping in and out of this. Interesting read if you're at all interested in how Europe got to this fucked up state concerning immigration and integration.

 

[Blurry_Dreams]

Took a months-long break in the middle of this one due to school which might not have been the ideal way to experience it. Nonetheless, I thought it was one of the better books so far. Loved the tone of it, loved returning to the best city, the lovecraftian deathcult shit, best narrator, kick open the gates -----, etc etc. I know the book has a reputation for being slow and I'd agree the Black Coral and Karsa stuff took forever go get anywhere, but the Darujhistan story was one massive interlocking tragedy and I was on board from page one. The climax was confusing as fuck but upon reflection it seems to make sense and might be the cleanest of all of Erikson's big convergences so far. Most of the players are given reasons for being in the same place at the same time (assuming some prescience on the part of certain actors but the Deck of Dragons exists and all so) and it doesn't feel so much like things happened just because the narrative ordained it.

Spoiler

The actions of gods have been left so ambiguous in previous books it often felt like they weren't doing anything at all, so it was cool to actually see a bunch of gods plot and execute a grand sacrificial gambit to avert a cosmological catastrophe.

Ranking so far:

1. The Bonehunters
2. Deadhouse Gates
3. Memories of Ice
4. House of Chains
5. Toll the Hounds
6. Midnight Tides
7. Gardens of the Moon
8. Reaper's Gale

...huh, thought I'd rank Hounds higher but the top 4 are all too vivid in my mind to displace. Guess I kinda like this series.

first
a months-long-break?? what the fuck??
if i can't finish a book within 24-hours of reading the first page, i'm gonna have some trouble getting to the end
also
there are a lot of comedy-styled books where if you go to sleep in the middle of reading the book, the joke(s) at the end will fall flat

second
what you put in the spoiler makes it sound like a random person should be able to read this book faster than they would read the other Malazan universe books

 

[no country for old wainds]

first
a months-long-break?? what the fuck??
if i can't finish a book within 24-hours of reading the first page, i'm gonna have some trouble getting to the end

makes sense, i have a hard time believing you've ever read a book with more than 100 pages and no pictures

 

[Blurry_Dreams]

@Vegard Pompey
me reading "fast" started with the phrase "summer-beach-read"
the way that all the Alex Cross books, the Anita Blake books, the Drizzt Do'Urden books were all edited-out to being the same length as each other
with the books of this length being referred to as "great summer beach reads" i had in my head memories of how (before 9-11) people in the DFW Metroplex used to drive down through Houston to the beach of Galveston Texas early in the morning on a day off from work, spend a day at the beach and drive home that same fucking night

so in my head i imagined a "summer beach read" as being the amount of text you read when you
leave the house close to sunrise
then arrive at the beach
then open page 1
then read through the entire book
then go home at night on the same day you arrived at the beach

so i thought "summer beach read" was a reference to the amount of words you would read in a day when you spend that specific day "reading at the beach"
as if, somehow, being at the beach helps you read

it took me a really long time to realize that the phrase summer-beach-read was a reference to students-and-teachers in Minnesota going to Miami "for the summer" where it supposedly takes your entire fucking summer vacation to read a single John Grisham lawyer book

i read "Kiss the Girls" (starring Alex Cross) in a day
i read "The Crystal Shard" (starring Drizzt Do'Urden) in a day
and most of the time i will read an Anita Blake book in a day

the only time it takes me longer than a week to read any of these kinds of books is when i'm reading more than one at once and even then i will be able to read though each book in less that 2 weeks after reading page 1

and i really love the those specific comedy books that are clearly intended to be read in a single day
(the Myth series and the Phule series by Robert Aspirin, and the Xanth novels by Piers Anthony, are comedy where if you don't read the book in a single day the jokes at the end fall flat) and i would even go as far as saying the Arilyn Moonblade books by Elaine Cunningham, and even the book "Servant Of The Shard" by R. A. Salvatore, are books are actually desingned and intended to be read in a single day)

 

[no country for old wainds]

you know what isn't designed to be read in one day?

a 1300 page fantasy novel

so i ask you this: what in the god forsaken living fuck are you talking about?

 

[Bloopy]

comedy where if you don't read the book in a single day the jokes at the end fall flat

Only if your brain is too meth-addled to recollect what happened earlier in the book and get back into that headspace. I almost only read when I go to bed and only if I don't go to bed too stupidly late (but most of the time I do). So I make small progress on a book once or twice a week and it works fine for me.

I'm currently enjoying The Surgeon of Crowthorne. There was about a 3 week gap last month where I didn't read any of it due to preparing to go/being away. No problem. The most unforgettable bit so far was in the early pages where it described Lambeth in London as an exceptionally vile cesspit of din, soot, smut and dog turds. I read that part over 2 months ago and I'm only close to halfway now. And it's only a 200 page book. Savouring it.

 

[TageRyche]

I'm in the midst of reading The White Ghost by James R. Benn. Then I'm going to be working on reading and reviewing a couple of books that I got advance copies of in order to review for Mystery Scene magazine's website.

A couple weeks back I went to a book event featuring three mystery writers. I had a good time, especially since I'm a big fan of one of them. I picked up books by the other two writers and had them signed. Plus, I got all my books that I hadn't yet had signed by the author I knew and bought a copy of the first book in her current series to have her sign and give away at the next meeting of my library's Mystery Book Club.

And I'm having dinner with one of my mystery author friends on Wednesday night.

 

[TageRyche]

Just found out that the dinner with my mystery author friend is going to be TWO mystery authors plus my friend who helped arrange it.

 

[Cronopio]

Just found out that the dinner with my mystery author friend is going to be TWO mystery authors plus my friend who helped arrange it.

That's awesome, babe.

 

[TageRyche]

Thanks, it went very well. 2 1/2 hours of talking all sorts of books, book-related topics, music and more. I had a blast!

 

[no country for old wainds]

RIP cormac mccarthy! unexpected even though he was old af.

 

[Einherjar86]

“When you die it’s the same as if everybody else did too.”

Legend.

 

[TageRyche]

Yesterday was the grand opening of a Barnes and Noble in my town. We haven't had a bookstore in town for years so I was happy to see them bring a store to town.

 

[no country for old wainds]

i wish that would happen here. unfortunately we'll just get more bars, restaurants and charity shops.

 

[TageRyche]

Got two advance copies of books in the mail over the last couple of days.

The first one is by one of my favorite authors. I beta read the manuscript for them and offered some suggestions. I got thanked in the author acknowledgements.

The second one, after some investigation, appears to be my first assignment for another magazine I'm going to be writing reviews for.

 

[TageRyche]

The Youtube series We Are What We Read has posted its 3rd episode.

This series gathers guests from across the mystery community from authors, fans, reviewers, bloggers and more.

Episode 3 features John Copenhaver, Robyn Gigl, Sherry Harris, Grace Koshida, James L'Etoile, Delia Pitts, LynDee Walker and in a bit of shameless self-promotion...me.

You can check it out below. My part begins at about the 34:10 mark.

 

[Cronopio]

Managed to pic this up. Have you read anything by Auster?