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What's top of your reading list?

Started by Ed, December 29, 2008, 06:05:13 PM

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starktheground

I couldn't get through the first five pages.

Pharosian

I don't know how many pages I made it through because I was reading on the Kindle, but it wasn't many. But then we saw the movie (the Swedish version) and it was really good. I might give it another go sometime.

starktheground

That's the only thing I can't stand about my Kindle. (That, and it's not waterproof.) I'm so used to memorizing a page number when I put a book down, I still try to do it with the Kindle. Gets me every time!

elay2433

I was so stoked when I listened to the audio version of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo that I bought the next book (audio version) and all three paperbacks for my girlfriend. The second book was okay, but a let down (considering how much I enjoyed the first one). My girlfriend finished all three, but didn't have much to say about the third, so I didn't bother.

I tried watching the swedish version of the movie on Netflix, but didn't make it past the first fifteen minutes. The characters were so miscast (from the ones I'd cast in my minds eye), and the production values were pretty shoddy. Can't wait to see the new one. I'd hoped to catch in theatres, but couldn't make time.

-Jerry

Caz

A dysfunctional bunch of characters, cowards, drunkards, psychos, what's not to love.

Chris Wooding's 'The Black Lung Captain' has got all of the above and more. It took me a while, forty to fifty pages, to get into the story but I'm so glad I stayed with it. This is a rip-roaring tale set in a steampunkish world where double dealing pirates set off in search of lost treasure and find a lot more than they bargained for. There's a real sense of humour running through this story and some great airborne battle scenes - these pirates rule the skies not the waves - where giant dreadnoughts slug it out and fighter craft duck and dive as they fight the enemy without, and for one unfortunate sole the enemy within.
The crew of the Ketty Jay - the starring ship of the tale - all have their own back story, and they become all the more loveable because of it. Every one of them is flawed, at times dangerously so, but I guess that's what makes them seem so real.

And there's a ship's cat too that the reader gets to be in the head of. Real genius there and so funny. Loved it. :afro: :afro:
Some may say slaughtered is too strong a word...but I like the sound of it.

Grillmeat

I reading "The Wise Man's Fear" by Patrick Rothfuss. It is the second book in the King Killer Trilogy. The first one was very slow. I almost gave up about a third of the way thru but hung in there and was well rewarded. Thankfully, the second book has been a much more engaging read. Hopefully, it won't take as long for his third book to come out......
OMG!! Soylent Green is people!!!

Geoff_N

Caz, my SFF reading group is reading one of Chris Wooding's books - Retribution Falls. Have you read it?

Before that I am reading for review a bizarro book by Ira Nayman in his hilariously wicked Alternate Reality News Service, Luna for the Lunies. Fridges that report their owners to the authorities for having out of date food, tracking THE butterfly that will cause a hurricane in the US, and more rib-tickling.

Caz

Quote from: Geoff_N on April 12, 2012, 03:26:30 PM
Caz, my SFF reading group is reading one of Chris Wooding's books - Retribution Falls. Have you read it?



I've not read that one yet though the story line from it is mentioned a lot in The Black Lung Captain. They do seem like stand alone books so I don't think the order they're read in is to important, and I will keep an eye out for it. If it's anything like the second book in the series then it will be a barrel of laughs.
Some may say slaughtered is too strong a word...but I like the sound of it.

delboy

I burning my way through the second of the Millenium Trilogy (The Girl Who Played With Fire). Don't get as much time to read as I like these days (who does?) but these books are simply the best novels I've read in eons. Absolutely stunning. I gather that a lot of folks don't get on with them but there's something that just gels with me - the late Steig Larsson won't be hurried and allows himself to build up character and story and background bit by bit, but there's a 'feeling' to every word (albeit every translated word) that just sits right. The true climax/black moment in book one arrived a hundred or so pages before the end and afterwards we just freewheeled towards the conclusion, but even that free-wheeling was a pleasure.

Before I started on these books someone told me that having read them they now miss them, and I can understand that sentiment exactly. I can also understand why that unpublsihed fourth book is such hot property.

Furthermore, right now in Tesco you can buy all three for under a fiver! That's less than the price of your monthly house/cooking/guitar/computer/photography/dog/film/motorcycle magazine  :tdoff:
"If you want to write, write it. That's the first rule. And send it in, and send it in to someone who can publish it or get it published. Don't send it to me. Don't show it to your spouse, or your significant other, or your parents, or somebody. They're not going to publish it."

Robert B. Parker

Grillmeat

Currently reading "Roadside Picnic" by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky. Had a hell of time getting a copy. Seems they are all over in Europe but finding a copy I could afford in the USA was nearly impossible.....
OMG!! Soylent Green is people!!!

marc_chagall

I love that book! Glad you managed to get a copy despite the difficulties.

Grillmeat

I enjoyed it too. Very short but a lot of interesting ideas and emotions packed into it.
I just started: A Canticle for Leibowitz. A few years back some friends of mine told me that if I enjoyed "On the Beach" (which I did) I might like this as well.
OMG!! Soylent Green is people!!!

delboy

#447
Another vote here for Roadside Picnic. Great book.

I'm struggling this year to get through many books at all - although I have read a couple of 700 pagers and Under The Dome which was 900+ pages IIRC (can't check as I binned it...). But now reading Anything For Billy by Larry McMurtry.
"If you want to write, write it. That's the first rule. And send it in, and send it in to someone who can publish it or get it published. Don't send it to me. Don't show it to your spouse, or your significant other, or your parents, or somebody. They're not going to publish it."

Robert B. Parker

Grillmeat

I read "Under the Dome". Can't say it was one of my favorite reads but it wasn't bad.
OMG!! Soylent Green is people!!!

marc_chagall

I've been reading DH Lawrence's 'The Plumed Serpent' and it's gorgeous textured writing, but I'm on page 160 and the story (if there is one) hasn't yet started. There's this woman called Kate who's been on holiday in Mexico with some people. The people have gone home but she's still there and has moved to a different apartment, near a lake. That's it. 160 pages! Another 300 to go. I decided I needed a break so picked up some Guy Gavriel Kay. Now he knows how to tell stories, particularly in his earlier writing. Such a relief.