What Are You Reading?

shootermacg

Buford T. Justice VI wrote: »

Just finished Priest of Bones and the last 40% absolutely flew by. Just bought the sequel, Priest of lies, now. I'm upping the rating to 8/10

I's good, but all I see is Thomas Shelby. It's such a blatant rip-off.

Thargor

Hmmm, struggling to get into the Three Body Problem tbh.

Buford T. Justice XIX

shootermacg wrote: »

I's good, but all I see is Thomas Shelby. It's such a blatant rip-off.

I've only ever seen one or two episodes of Peaky Blinders so I don't have that to compare to and against.

shootermacg

Buford T. Justice VI wrote: »

I've only ever seen one or two episodes of Peaky Blinders so I don't have that to compare to and against.

You should watch it, it's quality and gets better every season.

Xofpod

Thargor wrote: »

Hmmm, struggling to get into the Three Body Problem tbh.

I found it pretty dull I have to say

smacl

Xofpod wrote: »

I found it pretty dull I have to say

The same, found it all a bit slow going and disappointing though couldn't figure out why. Decent plot, well written but just didn't click with me.

pixelburp

I'm another person re. Three Body Problem: I started it but couldn't get going. Wasn't a fan of the prose & pacing, finding the whole thing a bit dull. The breathless hype, like is often the case, didn't help things either as it was only ever going to disappoint and leave me confused.

ixoy

I gave 'The Three Body Problem' a solid, unspectacular, 3* on Goodreads. It's a little dull and the prose somewhat stilted. I preferred the second but it certainly won't change your mind. Was not much of a fan of the third and some of the cultural differences come through there - I thought the female characters were particularly poor. An overrated series IMO.

Blowfish

I'm another with pretty mixed views on the Three Body Problem series. I did read them all and there are some interesting concepts in there, but the execution was poor. I struggled with pretty much all of the characters really, some were just bland to the point of forgettable, others just seemed to react in particularly odd ways sometimes with random overblown outbursts of emotion that made them just come across a little unhinged. I genuinely just couldn't identify with any of them.

The overall arc also didn't seem to flow particularly well either, it's like the author came up with a few concepts and was determined to squish them all into the 3 books, regardless of whether it made sense to have them all together or not.

Mr Meanor

Found the same problem with most of his books, I don't know whether its the translation or cultural references or maybe both.
The Wandering Earth really annoyed me both the book and the film (I'm a glutton for punishment) for the fact that moving the earth had been written and filmed before!
Check this out https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0056709/ Gorath (1962) A.K.A Yôsei Gorasu
Here's the summary from one reviewer, remind you of anything?

In 1980, a giant planetoid named Gorath is discovered to be on a collision course with Earth. Even though it is smaller than Earth, its mass is huge enough to crush the Earth and destroy it. A mission sent to observe Gorath is destroyed after all the orbiting ships are drawn into the planetoid. A later mission is sent to observe and the crew barely leaves before suffering the same fate. However Astronaut Tatsuo Kanai is left in a catatonic state due to his near death experience. The Earth's scientists then come up with a desperate plan to build giant rockets at the South Pole to move Earth out of Gorath's path before it is too late.

Great film even has the obligatory Japanese rubber suit scene, give it a go!

ixoy

Finished a couple recently:

'The Fell Sword' by Miles Cameron, the second book in his Traitor Son cycle. On the positive side, it's got some good world building, an interesting magical system, and Cameron deftly wielded multiple plot strands together to bring a strong climax. On the negative side though, it felt quite padded and could have been a fair bit shorter without losing anything. And I know Cameron is a big fan of medieval reenactments and history, but he goes a bit overboard showing off his knowledge of the various pieces of armour and old titles for army formations, leaders, etc. Still more than enough for me to read the next book.

'Station Eleven' by Emily St. John Mandel - This is a well written but pretty slight read. It's a post-apocalyptic tale told by jumping back and forth between characters before and after the events. The world building here isn't up to much and I don't think Mandel really put much thought into how a world would actually cope post-apocalypse. The novel also relies a bit too much on coincidence. It's easy to read but I am a bit puzzled as to its popularity and why on earth this particular novel is being made into a TV show when there's little substance to it.

Manach

Relaxing a bit with the audio version of the Belgarion series by David Eddings. Enjoyable and light fantasy fun.

Thargor

The last Lightbringer book is out now.

I had no problem finishing the 3 Body Problem in the end, it picks up a lot once you realise whats happening half way through.

coffee_cake

Thargor wrote: »

The last Lightbringer book is out now.

aw brilliant - got it now. i think i need a recap of the last one!

keane2097

I got a bit bored of the Stormlight Archive stuff after the end of the third book and was about to ask if it's worth carrying on with when I realised the next book isn't out till the end of next year!

I suppose I'll give it a spin at that stage, it is kind of starting to feel a bit drawn out.

Paddy Samurai

Survivors by GX Todd . The Voices Book 3 (Voices 3)

I love this series , as I have said before it reminds me of the video game The Last of Us.

About 3 chapters in and like the way this one has started with a change of pace / setting and timeline.

[SIZE=+1]
'Of a piece with Stephen King's The Stand' Independent[/SIZE][SIZE=+1].
[/SIZE]
'Thrilling . . . Todd skilfully captures hope and humanity in the lives of characters whom the reader comes to care about' Guardian

'Compelling, suspenseful, and altogether extraordinary' Lee Child

Xofpod

Finally got around to reading Europe in Autumn, Dave Hutchinson, which had been in my sights for a while. Mostly Alan Furst-y espionage stuff in near-future Europe, until it takes a big sci-fi swerve. Enjoyable enough, and will probably follow up with the sequels at some point but won't be dashing out to get them this morning.

It is bang on trend for Brexity related concerns, though I'm not sure that a massive selling point for too many people at the moment...

Thargor

Struggled with the Three Body Problem but by the time I was halfway through the sequel The Dark Forest I was hooked, it definitely has its flaws, so many metaphors and character interactions that dont quite work and feel like the original Chinese was just run straight through Google Translate but the story carries the whole thing and Ill have no problem moving straight on to the third one, love how unpredictable it is and feels like one of those sci-fis that will stay with you forever.

Sleepy

bluewolf wrote: »

aw brilliant - got it now. i think i need a recap of the last one!

Thinking the same myself, did you find a good recap online?

Fian

just finished Blood Meridian - historical fiction rather than fantasy, by Cormac McCarthy. Easily the most "grimdark" book I have ever read.

Bleak, brutal, violent and horrific. I suppose I should have expected as much from the author of "the road".

Obviously very well written as well.

Not sure what is next but it will be relatively light and frothy after that.

Igotadose

Slogging through "Codex Alera" by Jim Butcher. First 3 done. O.K. light reading, much suspending of credulity at the events.
Now reading "Seven Blades in Black" by Sam Sykes. Much more interesting than the Codex Alera stuff. Bad things happen. People behave badly.
Characters don't seem as generic as in the Butcher novels (which, tbf, is something he does in pretty much everything he writes.)

coffee_cake

Sleepy wrote: »

Thinking the same myself, did you find a good recap online?

Cities skylines ate my life so i didnt get around to it yet. I think i have about 4 brand new books lined up

cdgalwegian

ixoy wrote: »

If you really want hard sci-fi, try Greg Egan if you haven't already. Pick up one of his short story collections, such as Oceanic, to get a taste. The sci-fi is so hard, he publishes papers afterwards based on the theories in some of the works - it's the XXX-rated of hard sci-fi!

Thanks for the recommendation. Well into Diaspora- up to pg 110 now. Really like it, despite the initial first 40 pages of the 'Orphanogenesis'; the accelerated development of an inchoate transhuman mind (gulp). After that, it's been plain sailing, so far .

coffee_cake

Sleepy wrote: »

Thinking the same myself, did you find a good recap online?

wikia actually. bringing it all back now

https://lightbringerseries.fandom.com/wiki/The_Black_Prism
https://lightbringerseries.fandom.com/wiki/The_Blinding_Knife
https://lightbringerseries.fandom.com/wiki/The_Broken_Eye

there's no recap for book 4.
i had a vague memory that

the prison for dazen turned out to be a hallucination and he had actually killed his brother?

someone mentioned there's a recap in the new book itself which i havent opened

Jayd0g

bluewolf wrote: »

wikia actually. bringing it all back now

https://lightbringerseries.fandom.com/wiki/The_Black_Prism
https://lightbringerseries.fandom.com/wiki/The_Blinding_Knife
https://lightbringerseries.fandom.com/wiki/The_Broken_Eye

there's no recap for book 4.
i had a vague memory that

the prison for dazen turned out to be a hallucination and he had actually killed his brother?

someone mentioned there's a recap in the new book itself which i havent opened

Recaps for each of the first four books included at the start of book five. Cracking read, really enjoyed it.

Thargor

Jayd0g wrote: »

Recaps for each of the first four books included at the start of book five. Cracking read, really enjoyed it.

Ah great thanks for letting me know that.

coffee_cake

I dont know if I'd forgotten but he's so waffly. Or maybe it's just this book
What felt like 20 pages of one character talking to themselves!

Still v good and dying to find out what happens

Thargor

bluewolf wrote: »

I dont know if I'd forgotten but he's so waffly. Or maybe it's just this book
What felt like 20 pages of one character talking to themselves!

Still v good and dying to find out what happens

Well the last book felt like about 200 pages of him trying to

force himself into his too-tight virgin wife

so anything would be an improvement over that! :eek:

coffee_cake

Thargor wrote: »

Well the last book felt like about 200 pages of him trying to

force himself into his too-tight virgin wife

so anything would be an improvement over that! :eek:

Ah i read the afterword and thought it was nice he was trying to raise awareness

Finished now... Great conclusion but holy jaysis it got preachy

Sleepy

For anyone else looking for summaries of Lightbringer - here's a chapter by chapter recap of the first four books.

https://www.reddit.com/r/LightbringerSeries/comments/djnua4/read_me_if_you_are_looking_for_summaries_to_help/