Our reads in February 2022

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Our reads in February 2022

1dustydigger
tammikuu 31, 2022, 4:14 pm

Another month another pile of books
Tell us your plans for February.

2dustydigger
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 26, 2022, 12:01 pm

Dusty's TBR for February
SF/Fantasy
Roger Zelazny - Creatures of Light and Darkness
Maurice Richardson - Exploits of Engelbrecht
Clifford D Simak - Enchanted Pilgrimage
Mur Lafferty - Six Wakes
Lester De Rey - Mission to the Moon
James S A Corey - Abaddon's Gate
Lester Del Rey - Moon of Mutiny
Neil Gaiman - Season of Mists

the short fiction reads
Joanna Russ - When It Changed ✔
Isaac Asimov - The Last Question ✔
Alfred Bester - Fondly Fahrenheit

Fantasy February
Classic fantasy,pre 1970 : Jack Vance - Dying Earth
Sword and Sorcery : Fritz Leiber -Ill Met In Lankhmar
Dark Fantasy : T E D Klein - The Events at Poroth Farm
Urban Fantasy : Gareth K Pengelly - Brian Helsing : Land of the Rising Damp

3dustydigger
Muokkaaja: tammikuu 31, 2022, 4:29 pm

Viestin kirjoittaja on poistanut viestin.

4ScoLgo
tammikuu 31, 2022, 4:56 pm

>2 dustydigger: I really liked Story of Your Life. Have you watched the film adaptation? I thought it was nicely done.

For reading, I just finished January with Lud-in-the-Mist and am now on to The Sunset Warrior. Next e-read will likely be Interference, the sequel to Semiosis, while the first book is still relatively fresh in mind.

5karenb
tammikuu 31, 2022, 5:54 pm

I'm hoping to finish another book group book, To sleep in a sea of stars. There are aliens (living and extinct), space ships, FTL travel, advanced tech that works like magic, military bureaucracy, and lots of fighting. It's also a page turner. Only 300 epages left to go (of 1500).

(A friend said that Eragon had that too: things that were maybe ridiculous, but you keep reading it.)

6Karlstar
tammikuu 31, 2022, 11:16 pm

>5 karenb: I just finished To Sleep in a Sea of Stars, it wasn't great, but I enjoyed it.

Currently reading Into the Storm, which is off to a great start.

7Neil_Luvs_Books
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 1, 2022, 12:16 am

I just started The Machine Crusade by Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson. I know it hasn’t always received good reviews and I found The Butlerian Jihad to be rather tepid, but I am still drawn to these legends that were hinted at in Frank Herbert’s original six volumes of the Dune Chronicles.

8Shrike58
helmikuu 1, 2022, 7:04 am

Basically starting out with a completion in the form of The Empress of Salt and Fortune. I hadn't gotten around to reading it before the close of the last round of Hugo voting so I was a little surprised that it beat out Ring Shout; I shouldn't have been.

As for the rest of the month I'm going to read The Dark Archive, The Space Between Worlds and The Tiger's Daughter.

9SChant
helmikuu 1, 2022, 9:04 am

Fir a bit of light reading I've got A Master of Djinn by P. Djèlí Clark waiting for me at the library.

10dustydigger
helmikuu 1, 2022, 10:21 am

I am doing a BookTube challenge called Fantasy February. Each week we have to read a short book - max 250pp - with a different theme each week. My picks are as follows,to be squeezed in among all my other reads
Week 1 Classic fantasy,pre 1970 : Jack Vance - Dying Earth
Week 2 Sword and Sorcery : Fritz Leiber - Ill Met In Lankhmar
Week 3 Dark Fantasy : T E D Klein - The Events at Poroth Farm
Week 4 Urban Fantasy : Ben Aaronovitch - Rivers of London

11paradoxosalpha
helmikuu 1, 2022, 11:42 am

>10 dustydigger:

Those are great picks!

12Karlstar
helmikuu 1, 2022, 12:30 pm

>10 dustydigger: Great stuff, looking forward to see what you think of them.

13seitherin
helmikuu 1, 2022, 2:57 pm

Still reading Gemini Cell by Myke Cole.

14AnnieMod
helmikuu 1, 2022, 7:01 pm

I had been catching up with my January reviews in the last two days. The few relevant here:
- Watts' The Freeze-Frame Revolution (which was good)
- Catherynne M. Valente's The Past Is Red - which is a great continuation of the story "The Future Is Blue" which is now the first part of this bigger text
- Nevil Shute's On the Beach - nuclear apocalypse written in the 50s
- Cherryh's Cyteen (reading it for a third time and enjoying it even more this time around).

Plus a novella from a couple of years ago which sits somewhere between fantasy and sf: The Gurkha and the Lord of Tuesday - closer to fantasy for a lot of reasons but there is enough SF-inal things to make one wonder.

Reviews in their work pages. Catching up with a couple of magazines (Lightspeed, January 2022 and Asimov's, January-February 2022) for now before I move to 4 2022 Philip K. Dick Award Nominees I had not read yet.

15drmamm
helmikuu 1, 2022, 8:08 pm

Now about 10% into The Dragonbone Chair. Still a lot of table-setting, but count me intrigued!

16ChrisRiesbeck
helmikuu 1, 2022, 9:34 pm

Finished The Time of the Ghost, about a third into The Paper Thunderbolt which is not SF, but has definite fantastic and pulpish elements to it.

17dustydigger
helmikuu 2, 2022, 8:50 am

Finished a Winston series book,Moon of Mutiny the third of an enjoyable group of 3 linked tales. Del REy has such a good touch with clearly explaining science points,while having plenty of action and sympathetic young characters with real motivations and layered emotions and responses.
Started Jack Vance's Dying Earth , surprisingly influential little book,(only 170 pages)of fix up stories really,but the setting in a world far far in the future with a dying sun really captured the attention of other writers,such as John Brunner,Brian Aldiss,George R R Martin,Michael Moorcock.....oh and someone called Gene Wolfe,wonder what happened to him.......

18Karlstar
helmikuu 2, 2022, 1:03 pm

>15 drmamm: Great series!

19paradoxosalpha
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 2, 2022, 3:44 pm

As promised, I've wrapped up 2001: A Space Odyssey (and posted my review), and started in on Network Effect.

20elenchus
helmikuu 2, 2022, 4:14 pm

>19 paradoxosalpha:

It's also been three decades or more since I read Clarke's 2001, and I think I read 2010 ... but I remember very little apart from it clarifying bits of Kubrick's film. I didn't pick up on any hint the journey was meant to be "homeward", thinking the Odyssey was simply a way of aggrandizing the story, and I certainly have no recollection of any initiatory / hieratic parallel! Are you aware of whether Clarke had any exposure in that? It's not a field I would anticipate for him, but I've never read any biography apart from what might have emerged in review articles here and there.

I'll look forward with interest to your eventual review of later Odyssey books.

21paradoxosalpha
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 2, 2022, 6:05 pm

>20 elenchus: I certainly have no recollection of any initiatory / hieratic parallel! Are you aware of whether Clarke had any exposure in that?

I got a tip from a highly-placed fellow initiate that Clarke's associations in the English expat demimonde of gay intellectuals (e.g. Brion Gysin) might have led him to this sort of material. My familiarity with Clarke's documented biography at this point doesn't exceed what's in his Wikipedia article.

But maybe the esoteric framework was supplied by Kubrick?

22paradoxosalpha
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 2, 2022, 6:15 pm

>20 elenchus:

I just revised my review to include a spoiler quote supporting the "homeward" journey.

23AnnieMod
helmikuu 3, 2022, 9:02 pm

Finished Far from the Light of Heaven by Tade Thompson which was a locked room mystery in space in theory but ended up a lot more fun in an unexpected way. Review in the work.
Next is Bug by Giacomo Sartori

24paradoxosalpha
helmikuu 4, 2022, 12:25 pm

I put Network Effect to bed very quickly, and posted my review. For the next read(s), I'm choosing among these on hand: Flight from Nevèrÿon, Ambergris, The Cleft, and The Overstory.

I also have a little next-in-series "to borrow" list for my public library that will probably determine the book(s) to follow that: 2010: Odyssey Two, Quantum of Nightmares, and of course Fugitive Telemetry.

25dustydigger
helmikuu 4, 2022, 7:02 pm

Thankfully,with relief,I finished Abaddon's Gate. Wont be reading further in that series.Put aside all my planned reads - and there are a lot of them! EEK while sorting out Mr Dusty's trip abroad. Endless hassles and difficulties,but he left tonight.With all the stress I have been reading light stuff,including some Brian Helsing,the Worlds most Unlikely Vampire Hunters. Amusing brainless light fluff to comfort a very stressed out brain.lol.From Monday will get back into my huge TBR,but for now I'll just chill out with guilty pleasure reads.

26elenchus
helmikuu 4, 2022, 10:27 pm

>24 paradoxosalpha:

It's encouraging that you continue requesting Murderbot, but I won't read your latest reviews yet for fear of spoilers. Started Rogue Protocol today, after essentially re-reading Artificial Condition while running to ground a half-remembered quote.

27paradoxosalpha
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 5, 2022, 1:07 am

>26 elenchus:

I do try to avoid (unmasked) spoilers in my reviews, and I think that one's pretty spoiler free, for what it's worth.

28andyl
helmikuu 5, 2022, 8:12 am

Currently finished The Wipe by Nik Abnett. Which is a pandemic novel, not just written in the pandemic, but partially set in a world undergoing a pandemic and partially in that world some years later.

Just started The This by Adam Roberts last night. I woke up with a headache. Apparently there is an audiobook of this and I think I may buy it to see just how it has been done. "You are a farmer" is repeated 130ish times. The second chapter has the main narrative but alongside that in it's own column is a stream of content from a social media platform (including one of Adam's excerable puns).

29Stevil2001
helmikuu 5, 2022, 10:05 am

I've been reading a short story from the somewhat-delayed The Best Science Fiction of the Year, Volume 6 (collecting 2020 stories) every day I eat lunch on campus. Some decent ones so far, but Rebecca Campbell's "An Important Failure" was really moving. As is often the case, I find Clarke's short fiction selections more aligned with my tastes than the Hugo electorate.

30Shrike58
helmikuu 6, 2022, 2:13 pm

Finished The Space Between Worlds and found it to be a quite good work; it certainly had the polish that you'd expect from a person who got their writing training in academia.

31elenchus
helmikuu 6, 2022, 4:02 pm

>27 paradoxosalpha:

I finished last night so wasn't much of a delay in reading your review, despite (as you noted) there being little spoiler content involved. I see your point (shared by others) that this installment was fairly formulaic, but was focused on teasing out some implications in SecUnit's sense of self and its ties to Wells's world-building, so was happy to be carried along by the straightforward plot.

I have been saying that my satisfaction (or not) with the character arc over the 4 novellas will determine whether I proceed with the novel or later novellas. For now, it's definitely binge-worthy material.

32RobertDay
helmikuu 6, 2022, 5:22 pm

Finished Inhibitor Phase - ticks all the boxes of his Revelation Space series, but without seeming too obvious; the book can stand alone even though there are various reveals in it. Many of the characters have pasts that earlier books covered, but it's not necessary to have read those books to enjoy this. Lots of what the Golden Age would have called "super-science", but with Reynolds, there's a reasonable expectation that there's some real world science at the bottom of it all.

33AnnieMod
helmikuu 6, 2022, 11:55 pm

Bug was interesting - in an absurdist way in a few places but somehow the whole thing holds. Review in the work.

34andyl
helmikuu 7, 2022, 4:04 am

I've finished The This after the shock of the more experimental features of the first two chapters it settled down to a rather good mosaic novel shuttling us between a very near-future, very recognisable, Earth and a future war in the solar system.

35vwinsloe
helmikuu 7, 2022, 7:46 am

>27 paradoxosalpha: and >31 elenchus: I read Murderbot for the same reasons and with the same enthusiasm as SecUnit watches "Sanctuary Moon."

36paradoxosalpha
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 7, 2022, 10:11 am

>35 vwinsloe:

I think that's a big part of the point of the books (seeing ourselves as sf readers in Murderbot as a soap opera addict). And that there can be some positive psychological and moral consequences to such diversions.

37vwinsloe
helmikuu 7, 2022, 10:14 am

>36 paradoxosalpha:. Agreed. Wells is quite clever in that regard, I think.

38Neil_Luvs_Books
helmikuu 7, 2022, 10:43 am

>22 paradoxosalpha: Great review of 2001. I really enjoyed reading it. I wasn’t thinking Homer’s Odyssey when I read this way back in my university days but I can understand the parallels you note. Thanks for writing that. I look forward to your review of 2010!

39AnnieMod
helmikuu 7, 2022, 2:11 pm

>34 andyl: I am glad to hear that. The Kindle sample is the first chapters and I was wondering what is going on and if I care to read a whole novel like that...

40dustydigger
helmikuu 8, 2022, 4:58 am

Finished Zelazny's most over the top work,Creatures of Light and Darkness. Despite having a fairly good grasp of egyptian mythology this was very confused and confusing but I still enjoyed it,and will definitely reread it sometime.I'm sure it will make more sense then. Still great fun.
Also completed Neil Gaimen's fabulous Season of Mists #4 in the Sandman series.Rich,dark,complex and spooky.Loved it!I read all the rest of the series several years ago from the library,and this volume was missing,presumably stolen.So glad to finally fill the gap. I see why this is probably one of the most popular in the series. Not so keen on some of the artwork,but the storytelling,plot lines,characters and pacing are all spot on.
About a quarter of the way into The Dying Earth Gene Wolfe acknowledged Vance's influence on his own Book of the New Sun.Intriguing.
Also reading Maurice Richardson's marvellously bonkers Exploits of Engelbrecht.I only read one of the exploits at a time,to savour it fully.
Looking over my reading I see a preponderance of fantasy at the moment,rather unusual for me. :0)

41ChrisRiesbeck
helmikuu 8, 2022, 12:04 pm

Finished The Paper Thunderbolt (silly re-titling) -- SF in the Bondian super-villain plot sense -- and decided to stick with offbeat mystery, with The Devil In Velvet -- murder mystery + time travel + deal with devil.

42haydninvienna
helmikuu 8, 2022, 12:09 pm

>40 dustydigger: I think you got me right between the eyes with The Exploits of Engelbrecht.

43ScoLgo
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 8, 2022, 1:42 pm

Recently completed...

The Sunset Warrior. . A re-read that did not hold up as well as I had hoped. I still plan to read at least the original trilogy. If it doesn't get better after that, I will likely abandon the idea of reading the full series.

Interference was a decent follow-up to Semiosis.

Currently really enjoying The Killing Moon. About 2/3 through and this one looks to be headed for at least .

44dustydigger
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 8, 2022, 12:45 pm

>42 haydninvienna: - Its a hilarious, totally off the wall book about Engelbrecht,the surrealist dwarf boxer.Apparently it is a rare book,out of print. Copies on amazon are around £29. but you can read it free on Kindle unlimited,which is great.
I was ignorant of this book,but a member of our SF group on WWEnd is called Engelbrecht,and his icon is a small man dressed for huntin',fishin' and shootin' and I was curious about it.So I am reading it and loving it.:0)

45haydninvienna
helmikuu 8, 2022, 12:53 pm

>44 dustydigger: I may have been subconsciously looking for a book more bonkers (sakerfalcon’s description) than The Hearing Trumpet, by Leonora Carrington. If so, I’ve found it.

46seitherin
helmikuu 8, 2022, 3:56 pm

Finished Tooth and Claw by Jo Walton. Still a favorite read. Added The Last Best Hope by Una McCormack to my rotation.

47Maddz
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 9, 2022, 1:45 am

The Apple-Tree Throne. Odd. I've categorised it as Alt Hist, but there's a strong thread of Magical Realism and an undercurrent of Weird Fiction.

The Last Tsar's Dragons. A fun romp.

The Scholarly Magics series - read in chronological order, starting with When the King Comes Home, A College of Magics and A Scholar of Magics. Re-reads, but still as good as I remembered. Hmm, I must re-read The Glass Magician; I wonder it's related to that series.

Now onto the Damar series. I've finished A Pool in the Desert which I don't recall reading before.

48Sakerfalcon
helmikuu 9, 2022, 7:11 am

>44 dustydigger:, >45 haydninvienna: Uh-oh, I may have been grazed by that bullet too.

49Stevil2001
helmikuu 9, 2022, 11:14 am

>47 Maddz: The Hero and the Crown was one of my favorites as a kid, and I found it really held up when I assigned it in a YA lit class a few years back.

50seitherin
helmikuu 9, 2022, 11:14 am

Finished Gemini Cell by Myke Cole. When I first started the book, I expected it to be military SF. What it wound up being was a military urban fantasy horror romance...I think. Definitely not for everyone.

51Sakerfalcon
helmikuu 9, 2022, 12:54 pm

I'm reading The fallen, sequel to The outside. I really like this mix of SF and Lovecraftian weirdness.

52Maddz
helmikuu 9, 2022, 4:06 pm

Forgot to mention Roma Aeterna in my earlier post and finished The Glass Magician.

Roma Aeterna is a series of linked stories spanning the history of an alternate Roman Empire to roughly the present day (when the book was written). Not bad, but I think I would have preferred longer stories; the short form factor meant the story wasn't long enough to develop the characters and the moment in history. Harry Tutledove did it better in Agent of Byzantium; again short stories, but here the book was fixed on a single character and point in time.

I'd read The Glass Magician before, and was only re-reading it to remind myself of the story after finishing the Scholarly Magics series. Although superficially similar in terms of the dateline of the story (Gilded Age New York), it is in fact a completely different universe with different rules of magic.

>49 Stevil2001: Yes, I'm looking forward to re-reading them.

53Shrike58
helmikuu 10, 2022, 7:39 am

>51 Sakerfalcon: I'm a fan of these books too, and look forward to how the author wraps it up (I'm presuming your basic trilogy).

54andyl
helmikuu 10, 2022, 8:27 am

I finished Universal Language by Tim Major last night. A novella which is a locked-room (an air-locked room) mystery set on Mars.

55dustydigger
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 10, 2022, 1:49 pm

Wow. I found Chip Delany's The Star Pit amazing,intricate,sad and downbeat,though it may have smidgen of hope at the end. Densely written,oblique and masterfully constructed it has several themes,but particularly the desperate frustration of not gaining freedom and the sadness of being refused the chance to get away from the confines of society's restrictions.Delany was this brilliant young writer in his early twenties at the time,and to us the enormous difficulties of his life as a man both black and gay shouts out to us today,but all can relate to the disappointments and failures of life.And the worldsetting,the outer reaches of our galaxy,is fascinating.I definitely felt the urge on finishing the tale to begin a reread at once.
I have been putting off reading Dhalgren,after several aborted attempts,but my interest in Delany has been piqued,I may try yet again to read this book.
Back now to Engelbrecht,and then Clifford D Simak's The Enchanted Pilgrimage

56RobertDay
helmikuu 11, 2022, 6:33 am

Now started my re-read of The Claw of the Conciliator.

57Shrike58
helmikuu 11, 2022, 8:48 am

The more I get into The Tiger's Daughter the more I want to get out of it; good high concept, kinda meh execution. That it's a book club choice is the only reason I'm persevering at all. Particularly since it's getting in the way of me reading a novel I really want to read!

58anglemark
helmikuu 11, 2022, 8:58 am

>57 Shrike58: This is why I have stopped doing book clubs. I love the concept, but they interfere with my reading list.

59paradoxosalpha
helmikuu 11, 2022, 10:51 am

I'm still in the early stages of The Overstory, but I picked up Fugitive Telemetry yesterday and read it last night (review posted). I also received Quantum of Nightmares from the hold fairy.

60elenchus
helmikuu 11, 2022, 12:34 pm

>57 Shrike58:
>58 anglemark:
>59 paradoxosalpha:

It's interesting when reading gets in the way of reading! Snark aside, it's a real consideration for me, and it's not always a bad thing. I've learned to accommodate "impulse reads" similar to >59 paradoxosalpha: -- such as reading a quick selection despite already in the midst of another book. My recent example was also Murderbot while in the middle of Pynchon, not because I wanted to get out of Mason & Dixon, but because Pynchon was a deeper, slower read and Murderbot was fun.

But sometimes, it's just a signal to myself that I should stop reading the book that's not satisfying me, and take steps to avoid that happening in future. My parallel to >58 anglemark: wasn't book clubs, but requesting books from Early Reviewers. I still do on occasion, but it's much more targeted than it once was.

61Shrike58
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 11, 2022, 8:04 pm

>58 anglemark: I've basically finished it but I was just not moved in the end, even though I can recognize the author's ambition.

62seitherin
helmikuu 12, 2022, 3:29 pm

Finished The Last Best Hope by Una McCormack. Very reminiscent of our times.

63pgmcc
helmikuu 12, 2022, 3:47 pm

>58 anglemark:
It is a key reason why I am contemplating withdrawing from a book club I have been in from the start of the pandemic. I ignored the books for the last meeting and am reading anything other than the books to be read for 24th February. I have already left in spirit.

64haydninvienna
helmikuu 13, 2022, 8:38 am

>40 dustydigger: >44 dustydigger: See what you did? I bought the Savoy Books version of The Exploits of Engelbrecht. But you didn't mention the illustrations—maybe the kindle version doesn't have them? The book has just arrived, and flipping through it I saw that some of the illustrations looked like the result of a cross between "Alice in Wonderland" and Molesworth. And of course one of the illustrators turns out to have been Ronald Searle.

65Shrike58
helmikuu 13, 2022, 10:36 am

>63 pgmcc: A lot of it comes down to how much you like the people in the circle! Frankly, we're more of a supper club at this point in time; the core of the group have been getting together since the mid-1990s.

66karenb
helmikuu 14, 2022, 12:59 am

Just started Battle of the linguist mages, which title sounds like a fantasy novel. It may invoke the advanced-tech-like-magic thing. In the blurb, Charles Stross insists that there's an alien invasion too, so in this post it goes.

67Sakerfalcon
helmikuu 14, 2022, 5:26 am

I'm reading Central station by Lavie Tidhar which is an interesting vision of a future Tel Aviv and its people.

68pgmcc
helmikuu 14, 2022, 5:41 am

>65 Shrike58:
I like the people well enough, but most of the book choices are not books I can get enthusiastic about. My taste in books is slightly different from the other book club members. They are more inclined to pick a recently published literary book. The experience is justifying my scepticism of "literary" books.

Also, I like depth and complexity in books while many of the books chosen are very straight-line A to B.

One of the books was, Klara and the Sun. It is about an artificial friend, an automaton. When I described it as Science Fiction one of the club members, a lawyer, attacked me and said it was not Science Fiction; it was a book about ethics. I asked what he thought Science Fiction books were about and he responded, "They are about spaceships and ray guns."

Sigh!

69karenb
helmikuu 14, 2022, 5:56 am

>68 pgmcc: People are weird about reading categories, sometimes!

Perhaps you could suggest In the quick by Kate Hope Day? It's about an astronaut training program, and engineering, and problem solving -- but far more literary than, say, The Martian. (I thought it was okay.)

70pgmcc
helmikuu 14, 2022, 7:28 am

>69 karenb: I think the mention of astronauts and engineering might freak them out. As for problems solving... :-)

71Neil_Luvs_Books
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 14, 2022, 11:28 am

I finally completed Around the Moon by Jules Verne. I started it months ago but was going slow because I would first read a chapter in the original French and then read the English translation. Why was I reading it that way? It was my French homework. I’ve been trying to learn French for years and this was one suggestion to complement my other studies. I successfully finished reading From the Earth to the Moon this way but with only a few chapters remaining in Around the Moon I got impatient and just finished the book this weekend.

I love learning but sometimes I lose patience! :)

Around the Moon was a fine read but I did start to get antsy with all of the by now out of date science talk and data that infuses the narrative. It was interesting to read how the moon was understood back in the 1800s but after awhile I wanted to get on with the story. On the other hand, how much more could Verne have done with this story? Three men trapped in a space can orbiting the moon with very little ability to maneuver themselves.

And for those of you who are wondering… no, I am not yet fluent nor conversant in French. I have a loooong way to go.

72pgmcc
helmikuu 14, 2022, 11:48 am

>71 Neil_Luvs_Books:
When I first read From Earth to the Moon I spotted an error in the kinematics equations. I put this down to its being the current state of knowledge at the time the book was written. That is what I thought until I attended a panel discussion on Jules Verne and H. G. Wells at the 2005 WorldCon in Glasgow. The panel included, amongst others, Brian Aldiss, and a French Science Fiction author. My apologies to the latter for not remembering his name.

In that panel all but one of the panellists said the loved Verne and his works. The French member was the exception. He said he, and many of his compatriots hated Verne, in particular his book, From Earth to the Moon. Apparently it was quite common for French pupils to be told to read From Earth to the Moon and to find the error in the Science. I was wrong. The correct kinematics equations were well known at the time, but Verne made a mistake when writing this book. It was because of French pupils being forced to read Verne for this purpose that many of them have an aversion to Verne in later life.

73dustydigger
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 24, 2022, 3:14 pm

>64 haydninvienna: Oh dear,.I only read the kindle version,no illustrations,but I googled them and saw they lived up to the bonkers book. Which by the way I just finished yesterday!
Its interesting that you mentioned Alice,I was just about to comment on her. Remember in Looking Glass where she read Jabberwocky? (Twas brillig and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe etc).She said
"It seems very pretty," she said when she had finished it, "but it's rather hard to understand!" (You see she didn't like to confess, even to herself, that she couldn't make it out at all.) "Somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas—only I don't exactly know what they are! However, somebody killed something: that's clear, at any rate."
Exploits of Engelbrecht is living in the same topsy turvy surreal world as Alice,but much more bloody..(He is after all a dwarf surrealist boxer! lol.
Each story starts out with a simple premise,a boxing match,a golf tournament,or football match,a hunt ball or a horse race (and dont forget a quiet game of chess). From a simple opening we steadily drift away from any realityI love the priceless satire on the huntin' fishin' and shootin' upper classes,(shades of Betie Wooster and the like),which then spirals out into absolute crazy chaos.
The steady deadpan mundane narration which is depicting absolutely crazy events is a priceless feature too. Definitely my fave read of the month.
Fave exploit? Hard to pick,but the horse race with Engelbert winning the race riding Medusa is just pure gold.

74pgmcc
helmikuu 14, 2022, 12:54 pm

>73 dustydigger: & >64 haydninvienna:

Ok, you two can stop it now. I have acquired the Kindle version. The physical copy will have to stay as a potential future treat.

I looked inside on the despicable website, and even the first paragraph of the introduction by Rhys Hughes had me laughing.

75ScoLgo
helmikuu 14, 2022, 2:56 pm

Nora Jemisin's Dreamblood Duology was an excellent read. I finished book #2 yesterday afternoon and then returned to her How Long Til Black Future Month collection, to read the associated short story, The Narcomancer. This is a beautifully realized world with excellent characters and tight plotting.

Then decided to quickly read Silvia Moreno-Garcia's short Prime Meridian novella. Also an excellent read.

Now on to Uncle Silas which, in the first chapter has already jumped directly into creepy gothic goodness.

76pgmcc
helmikuu 14, 2022, 3:03 pm

>75 ScoLgo:
I will watch your comments about Uncle Silas with interest.

77haydninvienna
helmikuu 14, 2022, 3:37 pm

>74 pgmcc: Crikey, Peter, >40 dustydigger: fires the BB and you get hit by the ricochet!

78pgmcc
helmikuu 14, 2022, 3:47 pm

>77 haydninvienna:
Are denying collusion in this ambush?

:-)

79haydninvienna
helmikuu 14, 2022, 3:59 pm

>78 pgmcc: I think I got ambushed just as much as you, Peter.

80haydninvienna
helmikuu 15, 2022, 4:42 pm

>73 dustydigger: Well, I’ve now read The Exploits of Engelbrecht, and you pretty well nailed it. I don’t know that Alice is much less bloody either—after all, the Jabberwock loses its head. And doesn’t the Red Queen keep shouting “Off with his head!”? One small point—you mentioned Bertie Wooster, but did you notice that “the Oldest Member” turns up a few times? That’s a direct reference to Wodehouse’s golf stories.

As I said, I was apparently looking for something even more bonkers than The Hearing Trumpet, and it was that all right.

81Shrike58
helmikuu 16, 2022, 7:48 am

>68 pgmcc: You should try Fred Pohl's old line on this person: Science fiction is that, which a person who has read a lot of science fiction, recognizes as being science fiction! Though seeing as this person comes off as being pedantic this might not go well.

82Stevil2001
helmikuu 16, 2022, 10:28 am

>81 Shrike58: I have never heard that line before; I love it.

83paradoxosalpha
helmikuu 16, 2022, 11:07 am

>68 pgmcc:, >81 Shrike58:

In this particular scenario, maybe the most useful thing would be to use an alternate genre name where the reader doesn't already have rigid preconceptions, like "speculative fiction"--leaving aside the fact that it's really just another name for the same genre.

84anglemark
helmikuu 16, 2022, 11:20 am

>70 pgmcc: The Martian Chronicles usually do the trick, if you really want for them to read and appreciate a work of SF.

85pgmcc
helmikuu 16, 2022, 12:53 pm

>81 Shrike58: I think he strives to be pedantic but comes off as petulant.

86pgmcc
helmikuu 16, 2022, 12:56 pm

>83 paradoxosalpha:
I remember the term "speculative fiction" coming into use and someone made the point that, when you get right do to it, all fiction is basically speculative. :-)

Other good terms to fool such people into reading genre fiction include, "post modern" and "magical realism". I tend to refer to those books as Science Fiction's Fifth Column.

87pgmcc
helmikuu 16, 2022, 12:57 pm

>84 anglemark: I have to confess that The Martian Chronicles is a classic that I have on my shelf, but have not yet read. I bow my head in shame.

88ScoLgo
helmikuu 16, 2022, 1:42 pm

>87 pgmcc: No need to bow your head in shame. Lift it up high, pluck the book from the shelf, and begin reading. It's a wonderful collection.

89paradoxosalpha
helmikuu 16, 2022, 3:52 pm

>87 pgmcc:

I was in my late 40s (and well into the 21st century) when I got around to reading it. I'm glad I read an early edition, though. (It got "updated" later to try and keep it credible after history had caught up with it.)

90Shrike58
helmikuu 18, 2022, 7:23 am

Knocked off For We Are Many yesterday evening, Cyber Mage is up next, courtesy of the Library Hold Fairy.

91paradoxosalpha
helmikuu 18, 2022, 10:17 am

I reached a pause point in The Overstory and launched into Quantum of Nightmares, which should be finished over the weekend. The Overstory is very good, but really intellectually and emotionally intense, and if I continue as I have, it looks like I'll tackle at least four other lighter novels in the course of reading it.

92RobertDay
helmikuu 18, 2022, 5:30 pm

Finished The Claw of the Conciliator today. Seeing so much more in these books than I ever did first time I read them, thirty and more years ago. Now taking a break with some non-fiction before tackling something that's been unread on my shelves for possibly longer, the fannish wisdom of the late D.West, Fanzines in Theory and Practice. I appear to be the only LT'er who admits owning a copy; there is one other listed, but it is in the library of a private member....

93ChrisRiesbeck
helmikuu 19, 2022, 6:48 pm

Finished The Devil in Velvet and decided to do one more borderline mystery / adventure, this time Creasey's Prophet of Fire. Coincidentally, Devil, Prophet, and my first book in this detour, The Paper Thunderbolt, were all published in 1951.

94dustydigger
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 19, 2022, 7:32 pm

Six Wakes was a enjoyable mystery in space.Lafferty did a skilful job developing clues and revealing the hidden secrets of the six spacer clones. Good fun,very entertaining,but not really Hugo nomination quality IMO.But the Hugo and Nebula titles have been a bit odd for the last decade! lol.Reflecting the oddity of people today I assume,since awards are usually snapshots of the zeitgeist in some way.
Next up we have androids in Alfred Bester's Fondly Fahrenheit. Will have to sharpen my wits for that one,as Bester usually is a challenging read. Not sure if this one should'nt be catergorised as horror.
Then its The Events on Poroth's Farm,()definitely on the creepy side),
and I need to finish Simak's The Enchanted Pilgrimage and Fritz Leiber's Ill Met in Lankhmar
All that should keep me out of mischief the rest of February. :0)

95dustydigger
helmikuu 21, 2022, 6:35 pm

Wow,Jack Vance's Dying Earth was a fascinating read.Published in 1950 it predates Lord of the Rings by 4 years,and is a very different kind of fantasy to LOTR. It is a series of 5 interlocking stories set far far into the future where the ancient sun is dull red in a violet sky,ruins of cities untold millennia old are scattered over empty wastelands,and humans are decreasing over the world. Technology is forgotten or classed as magic,and for the most part people are mostly cruel,selfish and brutal.I was put in mind of an old illuminated manuscript,it certainly felt mediaeval.
They say good writers borrow from other works,while geniuses steal outright,then transform the theft into something marvellous. Well for sure Gene Wolfe freely admitted that he took over the idea of a dying earth and produced the wonderful Book of the New Sun.
Good stuff.

96Neil_Luvs_Books
helmikuu 21, 2022, 7:46 pm

>95 dustydigger: Vance's Dying Earth is on my TBR list. I have simply read to many reviews indicating this is a must read!

97JacobHolt
helmikuu 21, 2022, 9:38 pm

>95 dustydigger: Excited to read this good review--because my copy of The Compleat Dying Earth was just delivered this afternoon!

98Karlstar
helmikuu 22, 2022, 4:29 am

>95 dustydigger: Thanks for the review, I've read a few Dying Earth stories, such as Cugel's Saga, but I disliked that character so much I didn't enjoy the book, I'll have to give Dying Earth a try.

99ScoLgo
helmikuu 22, 2022, 12:45 pm

>98 Karlstar: I'm with you on Cugel. I had real trouble rooting for him as a main character. Incidentally, he does not appear in The Dying Earth collection. He is, however, the main character in the middle, (and largest), section of the Tales of the Dying Earth omnibus. I read the omnibus in 2021 and it took me 8 months to get through. I can't say I'm sorry to have read it, but I won't be re-visiting. I was mostly drawn to the book because of the influence on Gene Wolfe, but Wolfe did it all so much better that, at least for me, there is no comparison.

100paradoxosalpha
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 22, 2022, 3:10 pm

Another notable successor to Vance's Dying Earth is Harrison's Viriconium. The characters are not profoundly sympathetic there either, but the literary artistry is considerable.

101ScoLgo
helmikuu 22, 2022, 2:49 pm

>100 paradoxosalpha: Thanks for that. I see my library offers it as an e-borrow. Added to the TBB list.

102Karlstar
helmikuu 23, 2022, 11:29 pm

>99 ScoLgo: I actually enjoyed Songs of the Dying Earth, the Vance tribute collection, which if I remember correctly, was Cugel-free. Good to know he doesn't appear in The Dying Earth.

103ScoLgo
helmikuu 23, 2022, 11:54 pm

>102 Karlstar: Good to know. I bought that collection a year ago but haven't found time to read it yet. It sure does feature some great authors!

104Neil_Luvs_Books
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 24, 2022, 11:03 am

I finally finished The Machine Crusade by Kevin Anderson and Brian Herbert. It was better than The Butlerian Jihad but I still wouldn’t recommend it. The arc of the narrative is interesting but I rapidly became tired of the same characterizations and plot rehashing kept being repeated sometimes in the same chapter. The book needed a better editor. In addition there were some strange incongruities in the use of space and time: sometimes the time it took to travel between star systems was significant and sometimes it felt like flying off to another star system was no big deal depending upon the needs of the narrative. This drove me nuts. There were some other issues but that is enough venting for now. I’ll return to these Dune prequels simply because the idea of them so fascinated me when I read Dune for the first time back in the 1970s. It is an itch I have to scratch. 🤷

105elenchus
helmikuu 24, 2022, 11:40 am

>104 Neil_Luvs_Books: It is an itch I have to scratch.

I've pondered that same dilemma myself on a number of fronts. The primary decision for me, now, is whether to re-read, continue with the series (if possible, including by other authors etc), or find something similar. In my youth I would simply continue with the series, without too much consideration of whether I should. If not possible, I would look to find something that would scratch the same itch. I almost never re-read, but that is an option I'm looking at deliberately now, somewhat ironically given there's less time left for me to read all the unread books on my list.

Another option, actually, is to read reviews of books instead of reading them myself, or have discussions like this one. It helps tremendously, actually. Sometimes the itch is so much less serious than I'd have suspected.

106SChant
helmikuu 24, 2022, 11:45 am

Finished Firefly - Carnival by Una McCormack. The best Firefly novel yet. The voices of the crew were perfectly caught, the plot was gripping and full of twists, and the whole episode felt very much in "the 'verse". My one nitpick is the number of irritating typographical errors that should have been cleaned up in the editing.

107Neil_Luvs_Books
helmikuu 24, 2022, 12:50 pm

108ChrisRiesbeck
helmikuu 24, 2022, 4:44 pm

Finished Prophet of Fire, started Charmed Life.

109Genxer
helmikuu 25, 2022, 4:50 am

I have been getting into indie author Mike Gulickson's "North Star Trilogy". It's a bit slow in the beginning, but by the end of the first volume, it really picks up. It is military sci-fi, near-future stuff, basic as. Still a good read though with a nightmare vision of tech being misused.

110vwinsloe
helmikuu 25, 2022, 7:29 am

I've started the classic The FeMale Man which I missed when it was first published in the mid-1970s.

111dustydigger
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 26, 2022, 2:28 pm

Finished Clifford D Simak's The Enchanted Pilgrimage,a lesser and late Simak work ,and an odd mix of Tolkienesque quest,alternate earths,robots and aliens.I much prefer his straight SF.
Will finish Fondly Fahrenheit and The Events at Poroth Farm,but wont get to Fritz Leiber Ill Met in Lankhmar till next month

112Shrike58
helmikuu 26, 2022, 12:43 pm

Finished Cyber Mage this morning. Was very impressed, maybe a little too much; still deciding what my review is going to look like.

113Maddz
helmikuu 26, 2022, 12:52 pm

>110 vwinsloe: At some point, I ought to re-read this. However, I have a huge pile to read first.

Recent reads:

Reread - Elizabeth Eyre's Italian Renaissance Whodunit series. I always liked these. It's rather fun guessing who the various rulers are based on (and, indeed, some of the minor characters).

Reread - Lucrezia Borgia and the Mother of Poisons. Another mystery set in the Italian Renaissance, albeit with historical characters. Again very enjoyable; I really wish Gellis had written more in the period, but she specialised in 12th century historical romances.

New - Mark Smylie's Blackheart book 3 (Sword & Barrow 2.3) dropped last week (I haven't entered it yet). Must reread the rest of the backstory! The massive cast and complex world-building make it a very challenging but enjoyable read. Funnily enough, part of the action I have maps for - it was released for Artesia: Adventures in the Known World. I am guessing that the next volume will bring us up to the start of the Artesia comic series given the epilogue.

114Stevil2001
helmikuu 26, 2022, 1:58 pm

>106 SChant: Una is a great tie-in author. I don't have any interest in Firefly/Serenity, so I won't pick this up, but I really enjoy her Star Trek and Doctor Who work. Would eagerly snatch up an original novel from her someday.

115rshart3
helmikuu 26, 2022, 10:49 pm

Finished Elizabeth Bear's Machine, second set in her White Space universe. I enjoyed it, though she has some stylistic tics that I don't like: the incomplete sentences I can live with, but the longer statement followed by a snappy one-liner, over & over & over: enough already! Anyway the characters are great, the many alien races are worthy of C.J. Cherryh, the world building is well done, and the plot, while very convoluted, works. This is a good series so far.

116SChant
helmikuu 27, 2022, 7:04 am

>114 Stevil2001: Ooh yes! An original novel would be good!

117pnppl
Muokkaaja: marraskuu 16, 2023, 8:30 pm

Viestin kirjoittaja on poistanut viestin.

118Petroglyph
helmikuu 27, 2022, 9:50 am

I read and enjoyed Ada Hoffmann's The Outside, after seeing >51 Sakerfalcon:. Thanks for the recommendation, Sakerfalcon!

Other than that, I've mainly been comfort re-reading some Jack Vance: The killing machine, The face, The book of dreams, To live forever, The blue world. They are slowly helping me out of this reading slump I've found myself in, and I'll probably work my way through a few more in the next few weeks.

I'm also about halfway through The stone sky by N. K. Jemisin. Things are definitely happening there, but it doesn't feel like the characters are moving forward much.

119seitherin
helmikuu 27, 2022, 4:01 pm

120dustydigger
helmikuu 27, 2022, 4:25 pm

>118 Petroglyph: I have the final book of the Demon Princes on my TBR,maybe April.Actually I feel like rereading the whole series,but no time.
I know Jemisin's Broken Earth series is very popular,winning 3 hugos no less,but I felt the whole thing was a bit dry and cold,and didnt connect too well with the characters. I much prefer the Inheritance sequence. I am reading #3,Kingdom of Gods right now,and love the complex characters,the mythology,so similar to the Greek gods in a way, and the world building.But I regret the absence of Yeine,the protagonist of the A Hundred Thousand Kingdoms.

121dustydigger
helmikuu 27, 2022, 4:41 pm

T E D Klein's The Events at Poroth Farm was a rather creepy mix of gothic merging with weird fiction,with a unreliable narrator who may be a little insane, a creepy cat possessed by something that entered our world through a rent in reality and murder and an ominous feeling that things are going very wrong for mankind soon.Klein goes at a leisurely paced,but quietly ratchets up the tension and unease.A nice tale with many nods to Lovecraft.
Also enjoyed Alfred Bester's Fondly Fahrenheit,the rather bonkers short story about a rich man and his very very expensive robot,which tosses off all of the Asimov robot rules to become a murderer. The owner also becomes crazy and the narration veers between 1st person owner and 1st person robert,often from one sentence to the next. Most strange,but blackly humorous too - and with a very nasty sting in the tale in the last short paragraph.

122karenb
helmikuu 27, 2022, 6:38 pm

>114 Stevil2001: >116 SChant: Well there was that novella The undefeated back in 2019.

123SChant
helmikuu 28, 2022, 4:35 am

>122 karenb: Thanks for that. I will seek it out.

124Sakerfalcon
helmikuu 28, 2022, 7:31 am

>118 Petroglyph: You're welcome! Glad you enjoyed it.

I'm reading Arcadia by Ian Pears with the Green Dragon group here on LT. It is great so far and we're enjoying discussing it.

125ScoLgo
helmikuu 28, 2022, 12:57 pm

>124 Sakerfalcon: I also am reading Arcadia. Currently a little over halfway through and really enjoying it. So many great characters. The way he dovetails the timelines and narratives is a wonder. And the humor. Yes, great read so far.

Last night, I finished The Atrocity Archives, which was a hoot. I did not really get on with my first attempt at reading Stross, (Singularity Sky years ago), but this mashup of a nerdy government agent battling Elder Gods was quite good. I appreciated the comparisons with Declare in the afterword as that thought had already struck me while reading.

About to start on The Future of Another Timeline.

126Stevil2001
helmikuu 28, 2022, 6:05 pm

>122 karenb: Yes, I did read it. But I want a novel from her! A beautiful, original novel!

127Karlstar
helmikuu 28, 2022, 11:27 pm

>117 pnppl: It has been a long time since I subscribed to Analog (probably time again) and I've never subscribed to Asimov's, though I've read a few. Sounds like the covers and interior paper and print are lower quality now, but I'd have to hold one to tell. I do see 60's, 70's and 80's Analogs and Asimov's in the used bookstore, so the old ones hold up. For me the stories were always hit or miss, but generally a little bit better in quality than the average short story anthology.

128pnppl
Muokkaaja: marraskuu 16, 2023, 8:30 pm

Viestin kirjoittaja on poistanut viestin.

129AnnieMod
maaliskuu 1, 2022, 2:43 am

>128 pnppl: Nah, it is the physical magazine - their print is closer to a newspaper than to a book these days. Part of why I switched to digital... the other two reasons are the lack of space at home and the inability of USPS to deliver it without mangling the cover and at least a few pages... :)

130pnppl
Muokkaaja: marraskuu 16, 2023, 8:30 pm

Viestin kirjoittaja on poistanut viestin.

131Stevil2001
maaliskuu 1, 2022, 9:33 am

I haven't been able to subscribe to an sf mag because I never keep up with it, so they just sit unread. I do find, though, that when I read the year's-best anthologies, that the stories I like most typically come from Clarkesworld and Asimov's.

132AnnieMod
maaliskuu 1, 2022, 12:51 pm

>130 pnppl: As long as there are no thorn pages (with missing pieces...) - happened a time or two with the 4 Dell magazines before I gave up on USPS. I used to get these in a better shape when I was in Europe... :) Surprisingly, F&SF never had that issue (but then its cover is a bit more solid and it is a bit smaller - I think that these just fall in a weird space for sorting and end up mangled. Oh well.

133Neil_Luvs_Books
maaliskuu 1, 2022, 7:20 pm

>72 pgmcc: Fascinating! Thanks for that piece of trivia.

134DugsBooks
maaliskuu 1, 2022, 7:29 pm

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