Whatcha Readin'?

I’m partway through David Mitchell’s The Bone Clocks, but keep putting it down and reading something else instead. I kind of feel I ought to be liking it (“It’s genre! It’s lit-fic! It’s genre and lit-fic!”) and it’s OK, but it’s not grabbing me that much. Not finding the viewpoint characters very appealing, perhaps. I finished Ancillary Justice a week or so ago - I thought it was a pretty good read, but I don’t get why it’s seen as deserving of either really huge acclaim or huge controversy - and now need to pick up Ancillary Sword and see how that goes.

I got several of the Hugo-nominated graphic novels recently - just read Saga volumes 2 and 3, and finished Sex Criminals volume 1 last night during a bout of insomnia. Saga had me going “Oh hell yeah” repeatedly, while the latter was even weirder than I expected from the premise, and I was expecting weird. I liked it though. Ms. Marvel is up next.

(H. Rider Haggard is a damn good storyteller if you don’t get put off by the period racism. King Solomon’s Mines is a really fun book.)

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I have some Fu-Manchu on my to read pile. I got 2 books recently as I have not read any of them yet and the bookstore had some. Pulp novels are what they are and even the heroes are pretty cardboard cutout stereotypes so I tend just revel in the awfulness of it all. Doc Savage is my guilty pleasure reading.

Haggard though is a lot of fun. I really loved She.

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I just read Vaugn’s Saga (vol 1) and am anxious to read the rest of the series. I HATE WAITING.

Listening to the audio-book of Alastair Reynolds’ House of Suns.

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I will be starting Apex this weekend.

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A week from now, I get to start reading something besides textbooks! Debating on where I should start: Watership Down, The Island of the Day Before, or something else on the never-ending list of books to read. Can’t wait to get Seveneves.

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I’m about to start Thomas Piketty’s Capital, the BB book club’s next choice, and hope others will join us.

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Got two weeks to read The Crow Road before I have to give it back to the library, so going to be reading that and trying to fit in the odd chapter of Piketty.

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It’s been a long time since I read Crow Road but as I recall it’s fairly dark - not as dark as The Wasp Factory, but that’s not saying much.

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I found Rat Queens a disappointment. To me it’s just pandering. “Oh, we’ll create female characters with gigantic boobs and edgy characters.” By gluing on physical and personality traits. “OK, we’ll have a black one, we’ll make the gnome a gay raver, and they’ll talk about how much they like to fuck.” Oh comix, do I expect too much from you?

Yep, it’s Strong Female Characters as per Kate Beaton

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Working my way through the Hugo nominees for this year. Just finished Three Body Problem, just started The Goblin Emperor. Next is Ancillary Sword. I guess I’ll give Skin Game a go, but I haven’t read any Butcher before, let alone the rest of the Dresden books, so I don’t know if I can be fair to it.

I found 3BP to be interesting, perticularly for the insight into the Cultural Revolution, but it’s not exactly an uplifting novel. I’m enjoying GP so far, but I’m only a few pages into it.

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I’ll be interested to hear what you think. I finished Ancillary Sword yesterday and enjoyed it more than Ancillary Justice. I have yet to read 3BP. The Goblin Emperor is by far my favorite of this year’s novel candidates though.

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Oh, yes, I steamed through The Goblin Emperor after reading 3BP in fits and starts. I think it’s a good contender for my favourite, too.

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The Foundation Trilogy - recent; fabulous

Right now: John le Carre, Smiley’s People - I’ve always underestimated le Carre (for no good reason at all). He’s a fabulous read. Doesn’t put a foot wrong.

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Love all that I’ve read of Le Carre. Isn’t there supposed to be a film of Smiley’s People on the way?

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Alternating between Christine Sneed’s Paris, He Said and Doctorow’s With A Little Help for this week. The former reminds me of some of Honoré de Balzac’s work in The Human Comedy, which I’ll admit to reading only “Facino Cane” out of the other stories–I actually mean to finish that selection anthology somewhere down the line. As for Paris, He Said, it’s interesting so far, but have yet to get drawn into the plot, which is essentially a literary romance. Too early for a verdict, but I liked her debut novel though.

I have a personal bias with the latter considering it’s Cory Doctorow. Like what he was trying to do with it.

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REST in Practice and Papillon

The REST book, a good introduction to RESTful hypermedia principles, a little too much Java and .NET so, riffraff aside, a good read.

Papillon, I like the movie, decided to read the book. Its ok.

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ooohhh … gawd … I fear for it. Who can act like that nowadays??!

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I just got done reading The Man of Gold and Flamesong by M.A.R. Barker. They were fun reads, but not the radical departures from fantasy literature conventions I’d originally hoped for.

I’m currently working through Antonio Gramsci: Selections from Cultural Writings, which is pretty good, but not the direct introduction to his concept of hegemony which is what I think I was really looking for. Next on the pile is Selections from the Prison Notebooks.

My partner recommended some Le Carre novels, so I may be reading him soon.

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Of his later, post-Cold-war books, I remember liking The Little Drummer Girl and The Honorable Schoolboy, but the Smiley books are especially brilliant. Don’t miss The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, for one.

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I have been reading to read The Tailor of Panama. Enjoyed the film a lot, but haven’t read the book (I have read Our Man in Havana, which inspired it, I believe).

As mentioned above, I think there’s an adaptation of Smiley’s People coming (or at least Oldman would like to do one) - I read that as with the Beeb versions, they decided that The Honorable Schoolboy would be too expensive so they skipped that one.

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