What are you reading?
Re: What are you reading?
Though I don't read nearly as much as an adult as I did when I was younger, I'm still surprised by how few of those books I've read. At a glance I think it's only Brave New World, 2001, and Rendezvous with Rama.
Frelga's opinion that Le Guin writes beautiful does make me think I should give her a shot at least. What's the best place to start with her?
Frelga's opinion that Le Guin writes beautiful does make me think I should give her a shot at least. What's the best place to start with her?
I wanna love somebody but I don't know how
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
- elengil
- Cat-egorical Herbitual Creativi-Tea
- Posts: 6248
- Joined: Thu Dec 01, 2005 11:45 pm
- Location: Between the Mountains and the Sea
Re: What are you reading?
I confess I read little sci fi. Though I do love Rendezvous with Rama and Sphere. I think it didn't capture me quite the same when I was young and I kinda never got into it later. Love watching it, but...
Sweetie has the Mars trilogy, haven't read them yet but at least I have them.
Sweetie has the Mars trilogy, haven't read them yet but at least I have them.
The dumbest thing I've ever bought
was a 2020 planner.
"Does anyone ever think about Denethor, the guy driven to madness by staying up late into the night alone in the dark staring at a flickering device he believed revealed unvarnished truth about the outside word, but which in fact showed mostly manipulated media created by a hostile power committed to portraying nothing but bad news framed in the worst possible way in order to sap hope, courage, and the will to go on? Seems like he's someone we should think about." - Dave_LF
was a 2020 planner.
"Does anyone ever think about Denethor, the guy driven to madness by staying up late into the night alone in the dark staring at a flickering device he believed revealed unvarnished truth about the outside word, but which in fact showed mostly manipulated media created by a hostile power committed to portraying nothing but bad news framed in the worst possible way in order to sap hope, courage, and the will to go on? Seems like he's someone we should think about." - Dave_LF
Re: What are you reading?
Dispossessed.yovargas wrote:Though I don't read nearly as much as an adult as I did when I was younger, I'm still surprised by how few of those books I've read. At a glance I think it's only Brave New World, 2001, and Rendezvous with Rama.
Frelga's opinion that Le Guin writes beautiful does make me think I should give her a shot at least. What's the best place to start with her?
'You just said "your getting shorter": you've obviously been drinking too much ent-draught and not enough Prim's.' - Jude
Re: What are you reading?
Dispossessed is a poli-sci based story about an anarchist society built on the Moon. It's a beautiful human story, being Le Guin, and the politics of it are nuanced and dimensional, but to me it is not a "typical" Le Guin. Still worth a read.Inanna wrote:Dispossessed.yovargas wrote:Though I don't read nearly as much as an adult as I did when I was younger, I'm still surprised by how few of those books I've read. At a glance I think it's only Brave New World, 2001, and Rendezvous with Rama.
Frelga's opinion that Le Guin writes beautiful does make me think I should give her a shot at least. What's the best place to start with her?
Arguably, Left Hand of the Darkness is her masterpiece, and the exploration of gender roles through a society where genders do not exist is fascinating.
The Earthsea trilogy is more of a traditional fantasy story. If you are looking to explore Le Guin as a writer, I'd go Earthsea, Left Hand, Dispossessed, as those show three very different sides of her talent.
PS: Bradbury wrote Martial Chronicles in the 50s, and his writing is intoxicating. Although he shades farther into horror than I can deal with right now.
If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life.
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Re: What are you reading?
I had thought about mentioning Bradbury as an exception to my observation about poor writing in the genre. He writes beautifully, and Martian Chronicles is an all time fav.
(Duly notes ULG advice.)
(Duly notes ULG advice.)
Last edited by yovargas on Fri Jan 22, 2021 7:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I wanna love somebody but I don't know how
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
Re: What are you reading?
An unexpectedly good author is Louis L'Amour. I'm not into poetry at all, but some of his descriptive prose reads almost like poetry. He was VERY good with words, especially considering the genre (mostly Westerns).
- elengil
- Cat-egorical Herbitual Creativi-Tea
- Posts: 6248
- Joined: Thu Dec 01, 2005 11:45 pm
- Location: Between the Mountains and the Sea
Re: What are you reading?
Thanks to Impy, I have just started on A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking. I was hooked on page 1.
The dumbest thing I've ever bought
was a 2020 planner.
"Does anyone ever think about Denethor, the guy driven to madness by staying up late into the night alone in the dark staring at a flickering device he believed revealed unvarnished truth about the outside word, but which in fact showed mostly manipulated media created by a hostile power committed to portraying nothing but bad news framed in the worst possible way in order to sap hope, courage, and the will to go on? Seems like he's someone we should think about." - Dave_LF
was a 2020 planner.
"Does anyone ever think about Denethor, the guy driven to madness by staying up late into the night alone in the dark staring at a flickering device he believed revealed unvarnished truth about the outside word, but which in fact showed mostly manipulated media created by a hostile power committed to portraying nothing but bad news framed in the worst possible way in order to sap hope, courage, and the will to go on? Seems like he's someone we should think about." - Dave_LF
Re: The Happy, Happier, Happiest Place
I've never heard of it but the title alone is worth a read.
If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life.
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
- elengil
- Cat-egorical Herbitual Creativi-Tea
- Posts: 6248
- Joined: Thu Dec 01, 2005 11:45 pm
- Location: Between the Mountains and the Sea
Re: The Happy, Happier, Happiest Place
That was my thought as soon as Impy suggested itFrelga wrote:I've never heard of it but the title alone is worth a read.
The dumbest thing I've ever bought
was a 2020 planner.
"Does anyone ever think about Denethor, the guy driven to madness by staying up late into the night alone in the dark staring at a flickering device he believed revealed unvarnished truth about the outside word, but which in fact showed mostly manipulated media created by a hostile power committed to portraying nothing but bad news framed in the worst possible way in order to sap hope, courage, and the will to go on? Seems like he's someone we should think about." - Dave_LF
was a 2020 planner.
"Does anyone ever think about Denethor, the guy driven to madness by staying up late into the night alone in the dark staring at a flickering device he believed revealed unvarnished truth about the outside word, but which in fact showed mostly manipulated media created by a hostile power committed to portraying nothing but bad news framed in the worst possible way in order to sap hope, courage, and the will to go on? Seems like he's someone we should think about." - Dave_LF
Re: What are you reading?
Putting it on my list!
I found three short stories of Jemisin’s set in the world of the “inheritance” series. So I am now re-reading the inheritance series. She’s really an amazing writer. Post Covid I’m hoping to get to her at a book launch or something.
I found three short stories of Jemisin’s set in the world of the “inheritance” series. So I am now re-reading the inheritance series. She’s really an amazing writer. Post Covid I’m hoping to get to her at a book launch or something.
'You just said "your getting shorter": you've obviously been drinking too much ent-draught and not enough Prim's.' - Jude
Re: What are you reading?
Maria, if you like Louis L'Amour, give Jack Schaefer a try! His Monte Walsh is an all time favourite of mine! I also have a collection of his very excellent short stories, plus several other novels he wrote, especially Mavericks, a story about an old man who loves mustangs. He is, of course, best known for Shane.Maria wrote:An unexpectedly good author is Louis L'Amour. I'm not into poetry at all, but some of his descriptive prose reads almost like poetry. He was VERY good with words, especially considering the genre (mostly Westerns).
Neither of the two film versions of Monte Walsh came even CLOSE to doing the book justice, even though both had major stars (Lee Marvin, Tom Selleck) in the title role. It's magnificent!
Here's my favourite passage from Mavericks. God, can this man WRITE!
P.S. My brother has every Louis L'Amour book ever written... I've read most of them but they didn't grab me the way Schaefer's work did.Old Jake Hanlon sits on the mesa edge and puffs slowly on a crusted bowl pipe that fouls the air above it as the smoke drifts upward….
Below him on the great expanse of plain, out of distance to the east, into distance to the west snaking between the tall buttes, runs the new highway….
Still and quiet he sits and watches. And now the pipe has gone out and he does not know it. He stares down at the flowing traffic and he does not see it. His old eyes are brighter than before and they look on the big dual highway but they do not see it. For him it has faded away into the mists of long ago and there where it snakes its way between the tall buttes is only the thin tracery of an ancient trail. That murky veil hanging over the highway to the westward is not the gray reeking fumes of a battery of big trucks hammering the hard pavement. It is a rising cloud of clean sweet dust, golden in glancing sunlight, raised by thousands of hooves drumming the good earth in the clean, sweet beat of freedom.
There they come, hooves thundering, manes flying, heads tossing , with the look of eagles in their eyes! The wild horses, the mustangs, the broncos, the broomtails!
Out of the west they come in numbers past counting. Descendents of the gallant Barbs with the blood of Arabia in them brought from the pains of Cordoba in far-off Spain by the Conquistadors full four centuries ago. Home again in the land where the first horses evolved eons ago in the youth of the American continents and from there spread into Asia across the Alaskan land bridge before the ocean rose and rolled between. Home again in the land where their remote ancestors came into being and then, in some cataclysmic shift of conditions as the years in their millennia swept past, dwindled into extinction. Home again in the land of their primal birth, the land that was ready to receive them again when the conquistadores brought them from Spain and they escaped to run free once more.
Smallish and thin and bony, stunted through the years and the generations by subsistence on the scant but hardy forage of the semiarid Southwest. Much of the Barb beauty gone, the noble head, the arched neck, the straight back, the full-fleshed swelling hips. Hardly a one that, stopped and standing still, would attract a second look from an eastern horseman used to the big, carefully bred, carefully fed horses of racetrack and show-ring. But in motion, wild and free, eating the wind, swallowing distance, the very symbol, the concentrated essence, of the wide stripped barren land and the great open spaces.
Smallish and stunted, grass bellied, cat hipped. Almost everything splendid gone – everything except the sprit and the hardihood.
And the stubborn clutch on freedom. Bred by adversity to the single purpose – survival in a land where only those fitted to it can survive. Honed by summer drought and winter storm and the fangs of the wolf pack and the claws of the mountain lion to the knife-edge of ultimate endurance. Motion the very meaning of their existence Mighty lungs in the smallish bony bodies, and strong hearts, and steel springs in the thin legs and rock-hard hooves, and buried deep in the lean taunt flanks the ability to gallop to the edge of eternity and back.
When the night has been too lonely, and the road has been too long,
And you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong,
Just remember in the winter far beneath the bitter snows,
Lies the seed, that with the sun's love, in the spring becomes The Rose.
And you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong,
Just remember in the winter far beneath the bitter snows,
Lies the seed, that with the sun's love, in the spring becomes The Rose.
Re: The Happy, Happier, Happiest Place
elengil wrote:Thanks to Impy, I have just started on A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking. I was hooked on page 1.
I think there's a Wizard of Id cartoon about this somewhere...Frelga wrote:I've never heard of it but the title alone is worth a read.
When the night has been too lonely, and the road has been too long,
And you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong,
Just remember in the winter far beneath the bitter snows,
Lies the seed, that with the sun's love, in the spring becomes The Rose.
And you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong,
Just remember in the winter far beneath the bitter snows,
Lies the seed, that with the sun's love, in the spring becomes The Rose.
- RoseMorninStar
- Posts: 12950
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Re: What are you reading?
I just finished reading 'The Lost Jewels' by Kirsty Manning. I enjoy historical fiction and the book is based on the true story of the Cheapside jewelry hoard found buried in London in 1912. The chapters jump in time from roughly present day when a jewelry historian finds that a story she is commissioned to write intertwines with her own family history. Other time periods are 1912 (that of her great-grandmother) and the 1600's, likely when the jewels were mined, collected, and buried. The historian and the photographer assigned to the job travel from Boston to London, to India, Paris, etc.. in search of answers. It intertwines a personal journey with that of the harsh conditions others endured in pursuit of all that is precious.
My heart is forever in the Shire.
- Impenitent
- Throw me a rope.
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Re: What are you reading?
I'm pleased you're enjoying. It's just romping good fun.elengil wrote:Thanks to Impy, I have just started on A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking. I was hooked on page 1.
Sent from my SM-G965U1 using Tapatalk
Mornings wouldn't suck so badly if they came later in the day.
Re: What are you reading?
I just finished the first Earthsea book and very much enjoyed it! A lovely, wonderful book, and she is indeed an excellent writer.Frelga wrote: The Earthsea trilogy is more of a traditional fantasy story. If you are looking to explore Le Guin as a writer, I'd go Earthsea, Left Hand, Dispossessed, as those show three very different sides of her talent.
I would like to read more but sadly that's all my local library has from her so not sure if/when I'll get the chance to try her other books.
I wanna love somebody but I don't know how
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
Re: What are you reading?
Do you have a kindle? Or kindle app? I can see if I can loan mine to you.
'You just said "your getting shorter": you've obviously been drinking too much ent-draught and not enough Prim's.' - Jude
Re: What are you reading?
Ooh, yes I do, is that a thing you can do? I didn't know that!
I wanna love somebody but I don't know how
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists
Re: What are you reading?
You can, although not every book can be loaned. At least, not through official channels.
Some libraries also will loan ebooks. Or order a book from another library for you.
Some libraries also will loan ebooks. Or order a book from another library for you.
If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life.
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
- RoseMorninStar
- Posts: 12950
- Joined: Fri Dec 14, 2007 11:07 am
- Location: North Shire
Re: What are you reading?
I'm not sure how it works in other states or your particular library yov, but our library is part of a consortium that has options for ordering books to be checked out online or brought in from (something like 30) sister libraries. It really expands what is available.
My heart is forever in the Shire.
Re: What are you reading?
Also, if you don't mind giving money to Amazon, Dispossessed is 5.49 on Kindle. It's a very different story from Earthsea, but much more brilliant, imo.
The first Earthsea story is about the only one of Le Guin's books that could be mistaken for something written by a man. Also IMO, of course.
The first Earthsea story is about the only one of Le Guin's books that could be mistaken for something written by a man. Also IMO, of course.
If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life.
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!