I finally finished Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. It must have [del]brainwashed[/del] enchanted me, because now I want to back its ass up and start it all over again. Halp!
Heh, one of my favorites. ‘Say what you will, a tower of impenitrable darkness simply does not bode well …’ or something like that. 
I know just what you mean! Try Clarke’s The Ladies of Grace Adieu if you want some great short stories set in the same universe, but don’t necessarily want to re-read JS&MN.
Finished Lansdale’s The Magic Wagon. It did turn out to be a Western and I enjoyed it well enough. My son started reading it over my shoulder and took it from me when I was finished, so I guess that proves it to be interesting.
Next I read Lansdale’s Freezer Burn. This is a story about a poor loser who gets involved with a traveling freak show. I usually don’t have any trouble with Lansdale’s gore and over-the-top style, but this book didn’t seem to have any redeeming qualities. Sad and icky!
Fortunately, I was picking over someone else’s bookshelves this weekend and discovered The Best Book of Mystery Stories edited by Pauline Rush Evans, published 1958. Among others, it contained The Open Window by Saki, The Purloined Letter by Poe, The Perfect Maid by Agatha Christie, something by A.A. Milne, Miss Hinch by Henry Sydnor Harrison, Forgotten Island by Elizabeth Coatsworth, and The Blast of the Book by G.K. Chesterton.
Currently reading A Fine Dark Line, another Lansdale. It’s set in the 50’s, about a boy trying to solve an old murder mystery, and it’s pretty good so far.
Finished Echo Park, by Michael Connelly. Possibly my favorite so far in his Harry Bosch series. Detective Bosch is now in the LAPD’s elite Open-Unsolved Unit and haunted by the unsolved disappearance of a young woman 13 years before when he was in Hollywood Homicide. No body was ever found, but all evidence pointed to murder rather than someone simply disappearing on her own. Now a serial killer popped red-handed for two murders offers to come clean to several others in exchange for avoiding the death penalty, Bosch’s old case among them. He even claims he can lead police to the body. But something about the confession just doesn’t seem quite right to Bosch.
Next up is the next in Michael Connelly’s Harry Bosch series: The Overlook.
I have the first Bosch on it’s way to me. I shall read it soon (but not before the first Iron Druid book).
Thank you! Next up after Parade’s End. 
Hope you enjoy it.
Thank you! I hope so too!
Doomsday Book is one of my all-time favorite books (and Connie Willis one of my favorite authors), but I have to tell you that if you mean Blackout and All Clear when you say “recent books” you’ll probably be disappointed re: repetitiveness.
Finished The Overlook, by Michael Connelly. Another solid entry in the Harry Bosch canon. In this installment, a medical physicist is murdered, his body left at a Mulholland overlook. And a bunch of radioactive cesium, enough for a dirty bomb, that was in his charge is missing.
Next up is the next in Connelly’s Harry Bosch series: Nine Dragons. I believe this one may take Bosch to Hong Kong. And I know the term “nine dragons” is the literal translation of Kowloon, which is the mainland portion of Hong Kong immediately bordering the harbor. The nine dragons are the eight mountains surrounding the territory plus the Chinese emperor.
Yes, those and To Say Nothing of the Dog. I’m 3/4 finished with Doomsday Book and it feels like some kind of plot is finally developing. Willis’s story telling has nearly bored me to death, but I’ll finish the book. Of course a character with key information has been drifting in and out of consciousness just enough to let on that they *have *key information without actually delivering it. Ugh.
I also love Connie Willis, but I would guess that you aren’t going to like the rest of her work any more than you like this one. Her style is pretty consistent. However, To Say Nothing of the Dog is a comedy, so you may find that her style works better for you in comedy.
I shouldn’t even be posting here, I suppose, given that I never read the stuff I’m claiming to be going to be reading! Anyway, I finished The Midnight Mayor. I liked it!
So it’s very much in the same vein as the previous book: surprise set up in the beginning, slowly being explained, introduces a couple of new, and I thought very creative features, and generally keeps both Matthew and the angels on this side of believability. Good points, as before: lots of the people who’re involved die; good points that were new: such a mundane solution to the problem, really. Quasi-symbolic, perhaps? Bad point: not sure what exactly Oda was pissed off about at the end, but that’s maybe my reading (which skips over the sometimes overly elaborate descriptions Griffin puts in there…)
Instead of the things I meant to read, I finished Jasper Fforde’s newest Thursday Next novel, finally out in massmarket paperback. Great stuff! Much improved over the kinda rambling and weird last one.
And I’m reading Eric Foner’s quite good The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery. I want to say it’s got no info on Lincoln’s stance toward slavery that I’ve not read elsewhere, but if you’ve not yet read anything, it’s a great place to start. Well-written, too.
Finished with A Shortcut in Time (re-read) and A Family in Time by Charles Dickinson. I like Dickinson and have read all of his books, but I hesitate to recommend Family. His characters aren’t behaving rationally, and there’s a rather silly subplot with a time-traveling wolf that’s killing dogs and DNR enlisting the help of some men (loser types) who dress up like ninjas and hunt the wolf with crossbows.
After that I wanted more time travel so I read/skimmed The Man Who Folded Himself by David Gerrold. I didn’t care for it. I like time travel for the fish-out-of-water aspect, people going back and forth in time and adapting. In this book, Gerrold philosophizes about the ramifications, how the ability to change history and change your life affects your psyche.
Now reading The Burning Man – forgot the author’s name, it’s an Amazon Prime loan, about a LA K-9 cop and his partner Sirius. Liking it.
I just finished the *Metrozone trilogy *(aka the Samuil Petrovitch novels) by Simon Morden which I thoroughly enjoyed - if you like near future/post-apocalypse sci-fi then I would recommend you pick these up…while I agree that at points you think ‘seriously? what else can happen to him’ it still makes for an enjoyable read. Before that I read The Teleportation Accident by Ned Beauman which I also tremendously enjoyed…I think I might have actually heard about both authors through this monthl thread.
At the moment I have started reading the Gormenghast trilogy by Mervin Peake - is that considered a classic in the realm of ‘Songs of Ice and Fire’?
Thanks for the feedback! I’ll give it another try.
I’ve been under some sort of book curse since reading the really good and unusual Silently and Very Fast in November. Nothing of any depth seems to be hitting the spot for me, and I’ve abandoned 2 books since then, most recently Deathless, by the same author, sadly. Going with the “and now for something completely different” philosophy, I’m reading Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk and really enjoying it so far. The Amazon review that hooked me was from an old woman, older than I, who said she had no particular interest in sports or war, but she adored the book.
Tried and choked on The Color of Magic, so I moved on to Wool and I’ve been rapt ever since. I’m part way through part 4 now. It’s been twenty years since I read any Bradbury, but isn’t it awfully similar to his themes and style and pacing?
The Color of Magic is NOT one of his best works sadly. So don’t feel too bad.
I would start with Guards Guards or Mort for the earlier stuff.
Gormenghast is a classic (just read the first two, though) - but it is nothing like ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’.
Gormenghast is a true oddity, and is most certainly not for everyone. Personally, I think it is pure genius. But don’t feel badly if you don’t like it. A Song of Ice and Fire is like the history of the Wars of the Roses set in a fantasy world. Gormenghast is more of an exercise in the grotesque - like ordinary fantasy on really, really bad drugs.