What surprised me about this book’s twinned narratives was how boring the psycho killer narrative was compared to the World’s Fair narrative. The author just didn’t have enough meat to the former story to make it interesting, IMO, and so he had to go into sheer speculation a lot, and the speculation was really lame.
I’m currently reading A Spy By Nature, a great spy novel in the Le Carre mold, which means awful things will happen. I read the sequel awhile back, though, and remember just enough that the twists won’t surprise me.
Finished Demon In The Freezer. It left me feeling like there should have been more to it: the author started telling about a couple of incidents, then just left them hanging with no apparent resolution having been reached. Just started Fatal Shore, by Robert Hughes, and will spend 600 pages getting all knowed up about our Aussie friends.
I finished A Clash of Kings a couple of days ago and have moved on to the third book in the A Song of Ice and Fire series, the 1,100-plus page A Storm of Swords. I didn’t enjoy the second book as much as the first, but still thought it was plenty good to continue along with the series.
The good news is that George R.R. Martin announced a couple of days ago that the fifth book in the series, A Dance with Dragons, now has a hard publication date of July 12 of this year. That means that I shouldn’t have more than a two- or three-month wait from the time I finish the fourth book.
The bad news is that I assume there’s going to be a loooooooong wait before books six and seven ever hit the shelves. shakes fist
Although I am super-psyched for the new Rothfuss book, work has been nuts and I wanted to read it when I could take my time. So: I just finished River Marked the newest in the Mercy Thomson series by Patricia Briggs. I enjoyed it - Briggs departed a little from the werewolves, vampires and Fae mythos to involve us in an story steeped in American Indian legends. Since Mercy is a skinwalker whose shape is a coyote, Coyote of course makes an appearance.
Although it started a little slowly as she set up the story, the pace was fast and it was a good light read.
I can’t decide if I will start the Rothfuss book or not - I have a work colleague in from the UK and the next 3 weeks will be hectic.
I did glance at The mystic arts of erasing all signs of death and it looks like it may be good if I can get past the writing style.
Nearing the end of Gödel, Escher, Bach. I kept expecting the next page to be the one that zoomed right over my head, but Hofstadter has been able to drag me along nicely.
Also reading the suspense novel Black Rainbow, by Barbara Michaels, an historical mystery (that I won from Goodreads!) Instruments of Darkness, by Imogen Robertson, the very funny Virgins, by Caryl Rivers, and non-fiction Packing for Mars, by Mary Roach, and Interracial Intimacies: Sex, Marriage, Identity, and Adoption, by Randall Kennedy.
Yeeeeeeeeah right. Don’t bet the mortgage money on it.
Have to admit, The Fatal Shore bored me to tears when I tried to read it not long after it was first published, and I put it down unfinished. I love history, but that book dragged badly, I thought. Battle Cry of Freedom, on the other hand, is IMHO one of the finest one-volume histories of the American Civil War ever written, and richly deserved the Pulitzer Prize it won for its author.
Just finished Star Trek: Myriad Universes: Echoes and Refractions, a collection of three ST alternative universe stories that was… disappointing, overall. Far from the best Trek fic I’ve ever read.
I just finished Justin Cronin’s The Passage today. I downloaded a non-fiction book relevant to my job called Readicide just now onto the Kindle, but I’m seriously thinking about A Game of Thrones. I’d like some fiction for spring break next week, but I’ve been away from fantasy since I was a skinny teenager. I trust y’all, but… man… fantasy? Didn’t I outgrow that?
I’m still thinking about it. $9 to get it on the Kindle… hmm…
I think the reason I haven’t read if before now is because I’ve already read at least a dozen other histories of the war - I figured that it was only going to be stuff I already knew.
But I picked up a used copy last week and I haven’t read any Civil War history in the last year of two, so why not retread some old ground?
As I said, I’ve already read a lot on the subject so I’m not really looking for more. Lately I’ve been reading a lot of Early American history (1750-1825) but I think I’m starting to get burnt out on that subject which may be why I decided to read the McPherson.
I read a lot of fantasy when I was a kid, but I had completely given up the genre until I read Game of Thrones. I had just read and loved another of Martin’s novels (Fevre Dream) and I had heard so much about his series on this board that I decided to give it a try.
It was my first fantasy novel in over 10 years, and it thoroughly sucked me back in. I’ve discovered that I really like the new darker fantasy of Martin, and Scott Lynch and Joe Abercrombie, but I’ve even dipped back into some more traditional stuff lately, like Robin Hobb’s books.
Currently working my way through the Culture novels again. I’m in the middle of Look To Windward right now. This weekend I stopped by the Tattered Cover in Denver and ran across this little gem from the author of “Let The Right One In”. It’s a different look at the zombie phenomenon, concentrating mostly on the psychological effects of the ones who are still alive. Riveting and creepy without being gory. I got through 200 pages last night before falling asleep. I’ll probably finish it tonight.
I also finished The Passage over the weekend, after laying it aside for almost three months–I had a trade paperback version that was too unwieldy to lug around and then shelled out four bucks for a remaindered mass market paperback. What did you think? I thought it was rather good, up to the end. The postscript seemed gratuitous, though.
Other things I finished: Dying to Live, by Kim Paffenroth. Interesting take on the zombie. Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, by Sherman Alexie. I’m rather ambivalent about this book: it seems to me to waver badly between a “we can all live together in peace and harmony” resolution and the constant reminder that “we Indians have our experiences with broken promises”; and for all that, the story was a bit sappy. But it was a quick read!
Currently, I’m reading E.L.Doctorow’s Ragtime (which is quite interesting so far) and various random zombie books…
As I’ve said before, I’m a big Martin fan. His interrelated short-story collection Tuf Voyaging is my all-time favorite sf book, and his novel Dying of the Light, set in the same universe, is also quite good. Ditto Sandkings, a multiple-award-winning novella, which you can find in the short-story collection of that name. All wonderful, and highly recommended.
I just finished The Clone Codes. Decent young adult sci fi that ends a little too quickly, imo. I just saw on Amazon that there’s a second book out now.