New generic book thread
What are you reading?
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Dimrill wrote:
If you haven't already, read the Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb. Some of the best books I've ever read. Blarted like a twat at them, too.


:this: And the follow-up books too, the Tawny Man trilogy.
Started reading At the Mountains of Madness.

It's good!

ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
They've discovered... Something. It's hotting up! He's bloody good at building tension, isn't he? I was falling asleep after I hit around 20% according to the Kindle, and I dreamed some pretty frightening dreams. Fuck you, Lovecraft.
Craster wrote:
Dimrill wrote:
If you haven't already, read the Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb. Some of the best books I've ever read. Blarted like a twat at them, too.


:this: And the follow-up books too, the Tawny Man trilogy.


:this: And then the follow ups to these, The Liveship Traders and The Rain Wild series
Werl, Liveship was wrut between the two Fitz trilogies. Hence The Fool being a character in there and whatserface being in Tawny for a couple of chapters. :nerd:
Am currently enjoying Brandon Sandersons books, working my way through his Mistborn series at the moment.
Has anyone read the Hunger Games trilogy? It's actually very good, I couldn't put them down and read each one in either one or two days.
I can't remember which book I've got lined up next but my weekend starts tomorrow so I'm sure I'll read something. Must remember this thread, looks like there are some good recommendations in here. With this thread and the whisky thread giving my ideas I think I'll have a good few days off :D
This bloody Lovecraft book has me shitting my pants. I'm going to finish it off later today. Balls to reading it in bed again.
Gilly wrote:
Has anyone read the Hunger Games trilogy? It's actually very good, I couldn't put them down and read each one in either one or two days.
I can't remember which book I've got lined up next but my weekend starts tomorrow so I'm sure I'll read something. Must remember this thread, looks like there are some good recommendations in here. With this thread and the whisky thread giving my ideas I think I'll have a good few days off :D


The wife loved them, but said I might not like them as much.

In happy news, though, the studio making the Hunger Games movies are also making movies of the Chaos Walking trilogy, which are super awesome. That's 'The Knife of Never Letting Go' and sequels, with the talking dog and 'Noise' and whatnot.
Gilly wrote:
Has anyone read the Hunger Games trilogy? It's actually very good, I couldn't put them down and read each one in either one or two days.


I've got about 10% of the first book to finish reading before seeing the film. I like the world the book is set in, maybe more than the lead character. The leanings towards its teenage girl target audience is very obvious.

ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
I guess I was expecting more "Can I actually kill someone?" rather than "I hope that boy at home don't mind me kissing this other boy".


And for a book called "The Hunger Games", they talk a lot about eating food.
I can't really get over this bit:

Quote:
The Hunger Games has been criticized for its similarities to the 1999 novel Battle Royale. Although Collins maintains that she "had never heard of that book until [her] book was turned in,"


Yeah, but I bet you've seen the fucking film! How could you not have heard of Battle Royale?
If you've never heard of Battle Royale, I neither want to read your book not watch your film.
Well that were good. Ta for the recommendation Dimrill. Gomna do Call of Cthulhu next seeing as it's nice and short.
You want to read Herbert West: Reanimator too.
See also: The Colour Out Of Space and The Shadow Over Innsmouth. You can get some dead cheap collections, like.
YOG wrote:
See also: The Colour Out Of Space and The Shadow Over Innsmouth. You can get some dead cheap collections, like.

Yeah, someone should mention that. :attitude:
WTB wrote:
I can't really get over this bit:
Quote:
The Hunger Games has been criticized for its similarities to the 1999 novel Battle Royale. Although Collins maintains that she "had never heard of that book until [her] book was turned in,"

Yeah, but I bet you've seen the fucking film! How could you not have heard of Battle Royale?

Quite easily, I'd wager. I'd not exactly mainstream.
WTB wrote:
I can't really get over this bit:

Quote:
The Hunger Games has been criticized for its similarities to the 1999 novel Battle Royale. Although Collins maintains that she "had never heard of that book until [her] book was turned in,"


Yeah, but I bet you've seen the fucking film! How could you not have heard of Battle Royale?

yeah, yeah... And J K Rowling had never heard if The Worst Witch...
Mimi wrote:
WTB wrote:
I can't really get over this bit:

Quote:
The Hunger Games has been criticized for its similarities to the 1999 novel Battle Royale. Although Collins maintains that she "had never heard of that book until [her] book was turned in,"


Yeah, but I bet you've seen the fucking film! How could you not have heard of Battle Royale?

yeah, yeah... And J K Rowling had never heard if The Worst Witch...


Jill Murphy attended the same school as Mummy Afterthought. Ursuline convent School in Wimbledon. She was a couple of years above Mummy Afterthought. This came to light after attending a talk JM was giving, and her telling of how she based the characters on teachers from her school. "Hmm" thought Mummy Afterthought, "this sounds awfully familiar".
GovernmentYard wrote:
Ice and Fire's quite rapey too, I suppose. It's not entirely without purpose, for that is the sort of world it's set in, and the punishment for those not of noble birth caught at it is knob off or go to serve at the Wall. Plus certain interventions in said circumstance serve to effectively redraw characters and add depth. Mostly it's (mostly) women being threatened with it... and I suppose that makes a better dramatic tension ratcheter than yet another 'certain death' peril scenario. Plus you've got flaying, beheading, burning, drowning etc so it's just one of the many horrible colours Martin paints with.


I find his writing about things like that excruicatingly painful. Especially the "...and then they had lesbian sex" bits. it seems to exist purely to attract teenage boys to the series. I find it quite unnecessary. It seems he feels the need to stick sex of some kind in it every so often just to keep them reading.

EDIT: For instance, tehre's a whole chapter in one of the books about some bloke being on a boat and the various sexual stuff he has done to the captaibn's daughter. It didn't really advance any plot, in any way at all, and was, to boot, shitly written.

EDIT 2: This isn't me banging my "Martin can't write books for shit" drum, it's a common problem I have with books. iain M Banks is also guilty of this.
MaliA wrote:
"...and then they had lesbian sex

Yup. Keep going!
MaliA wrote:
EDIT 2: This isn't me banging my "Martin can't write books for shit" drum, it's a common problem I have with books. iain M Banks is also guilty of this.


Have you ever read Eddings? Not in the same league explitness wise due to the main audience of his books, but he has literally no ability to write any scene that involves a woman. At 12yrs old, I even noticed it, it is that bad.
Trooper wrote:
MaliA wrote:
EDIT 2: This isn't me banging my "Martin can't write books for shit" drum, it's a common problem I have with books. iain M Banks is also guilty of this.


Have you ever read Eddings? Not in the same league explitness wise due to the main audience of his books, but he has literally no ability to write any scene that involves a woman. At 12yrs old, I even noticed it, it is that bad.


No, I haven't. I think one of the reasons I dislike it so much; is that you're being drawn into the writer's sexual fantasies. Which is creepy, when it's a late middle aged man with a beard sat at a typewriter, his fingers going tap tap tap rhytmically on the keys, pecking out a pulsing beat to which see, you get the idea, don't you?
Goodness me, that's why Stieg Larrsssson is so unreadable to me. Every single woman from the ages 17-70 turns up at fantasy Larrrrrssssson's door saying 'let's f**k!'

Just ruins the book, and is one reason the film is actually superior to his dross.
<reconsiders sending Mimi the draft of his autobiography>
Trooper wrote:
MaliA wrote:
EDIT 2: This isn't me banging my "Martin can't write books for shit" drum, it's a common problem I have with books. iain M Banks is also guilty of this.


Have you ever read Eddings? Not in the same league explitness wise due to the main audience of his books, but he has literally no ability to write any scene that involves a woman. At 12yrs old, I even noticed it, it is that bad.


Valid point, but the thing that realy put me off Eddings was his need to stereotype everyone in his books

ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
All Drasnians are pointy nosed Spies who pose as merchants.
All Alorns are beardy berserkers who love beer.
All Sendars are boring normal types.
All Algars sleep with their horses..... found his writing very meh


He does it to a lesser degree in his Sparhawk series also and i gave up entirely on the new books which his wife has helpped make even worse.
MaliA wrote:
<reconsiders sending Mimi the draft of his autobiography>


:DD
Eddings is my go-to author for mindless brain massages. At least for the Mallorean and Belgariad. The rest of his stuff is unreadable boredom.
Well, Slaughterhouse-Five was excellent. So excellent that I powered through it in two days. Might be time for Game of Thrones finally!
Image

Episode 1, series 2 airs 1st April.
GovernmentYard wrote:
Image

Episode 1, series 2 airs 1st April.

lol jk
Amazon are having an ebook spring sale, and Book 1 of the Farseer Trilogy is in it.
Dimrill wrote:
Amazon are having an ebook spring sale, and Book 1 of the Farseer Trilogy is in it.

At that price, why not!
Dimrill wrote:
Eddings is my go-to author for mindless brain massages. At least for the Mallorean and Belgariad. The rest of his stuff is unreadable boredom.


When I was 12-13 I loved them, but I tried to go back to them a few years back, and just couldn't. Every woman is the most beautiful woman in the world, every soldier is the best fighter in the world etc...

I do get where you are coming from though, they are very easy to read and engrossing if you can get past all that. Unfortunately I can't these days.
Trooper wrote:
Dimrill wrote:
Eddings is my go-to author for mindless brain massages. At least for the Mallorean and Belgariad. The rest of his stuff is unreadable boredom.


When I was 12-13 I loved them, but I tried to go back to them a few years back, and just couldn't. Every woman is the most beautiful woman in the world, every soldier is the best fighter in the world etc...

I do get where you are coming from though, they are very easy to read and engrossing if you can get past all that. Unfortunately I can't these days.



:this: exactly what i was trying to say (badly) above
Tell you what, this Game of Thrones deal is a bit bloody good isn't it? Chuffed that I'm only on the first book. Even more chuffed that I've successfully managed to avoid finding out anything about the plot despite its popularity.
I'm reading Debt: The First 5000 Years, a look at the history of debtors and creditors by an anthropologist (as opposed to an economic hisotrian). So far, it's fascinating. In the first chapter alone, it thoroughly debunks the widely held belief that money evolved to replace the inefficiencies of preceding barter systems, and that debt evolved after money didn't.
I'm reading The Stig's autobiography, which I was given for Christmas. It's not the sort of thing I'd buy myself (I'm not into autobiographies unless I'm really interested in the writer) but it's surprisingly good.
Doctor Glyndwr wrote:
I'm reading Debt: The First 5000 Years, a look at the history of debtors and creditors by an anthropologist (as opposed to an economic hisotrian). So far, it's fascinating. In the first chapter alone, it thoroughly debunks the widely held belief that money evolved to replace the inefficiencies of preceding barter systems, and that debt evolved after money didn't.

Colour me interested!

If early coins were gold and silver, as they appear to have been, then I guess they'd have been useless for everyday commerce, as they'd have been far too valuable to buy chickens and loaves with. Your average Lydian goat herder probably never saw a gold coin.
The ships around here still trade in cowrie shells.
WTB wrote:
Tell you what, this Game of Thrones deal is a bit bloody good isn't it? Chuffed that I'm only on the first book. Even more chuffed that I've successfully managed to avoid finding out anything about the plot despite its popularity.

They are great, however, I am refusing to read them all until he has finished writing them all - if you see what I mean.
I'm gonna space them out with other books, so maybe he'll have finished the next one by the time I get to it... Who am I kidding?
WTB wrote:
I'm gonna space them out with other books, so maybe he'll have finished the next one by the time I get to it...



BUGGER, now need to clean my keyboard, it now has added coffee from me laughing at you bizarre futile hope
"The Book Club" on Sky Arts is generally worth a watch. There was (according to mrsA, as she's sick and tired of discussing it with people) one of the best descriptions as to why eBooks aren't all 50p done by a man.
WTB wrote:
I'm gonna space them out with other books, so maybe he'll have finished the next one by the time I get to it... Who am I kidding?


Loved the first three, but then the massive wait (was it 8 years or something mental?) for the 4th meant I didn't read it as I couldn't remember what was going on.
Grisham's "The Broker" is quite entertaining, albeit silly. Quite the steal at £1.50 from the charity shop.
Zardoz wrote:
I'm currently enjoying this:

Image

http://www.waterstones.com/waterstonesw ... e/6176293/ - £2.99!

Finished now, very enjoyable and just the right length stories for a lunch hour read. Onto my M.R. James collection now.
What are you doing wasting your lunchtimes reading books? You should be off buying more plastic model aeroplanes or paints for your fairies or something, like a normal person.
Snap! I've been revisiting an M.R. James collection myself. "Oh, Whistle" in particular is quite splendid.
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