Finished What If? by Randall Munroe.
Highly recommended for people who like science, and fun.
What about all of you? What have you been reading or listening to lately?
For details on the c/Books bingo challenge that just restarted for the year, you can checkout the initial Book Bingo, and its Recommendation Post. Links are also present in our community sidebar.
I just finished an audio book version of The Hollow Places by T. Kingfisher.
I’m in the middle of reading The Vanished Birds by Simon Jimenez.
How did you like The Hollow Places?
Loved it. It was actually a re-read for me, but felt like a good choice for the season.
I’m nearing the end of Changes by Jim Butcher, and since I didn’t really like the following book all that much I thought I’d take a break to finally read the Lord of the Rings series. I got a nice clothbound set of them to match The Hobbit I already had (though for some infuriating reason The Hobbit is half a centimetre taller) and I grabbed The Silmarillion this morning in the same style. I’ll probably never get around to reading that one but my gf is way into these and she’s wanted it for ages.
Edit, pic because they’re really nice
They look great!!
They are very nice. And now I am realising that I don’t actually have a copy of the Lord of the Rings series. Time to look these up!
I have just started The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison. It’s a bit more on the demanding side in the beginning, as it doesn’t follow a linear story but loosely related episodes in a life very different to mine. But I think I’m in the flow now.
One of Toni’s greatest books. It’s also incredibly wrenching. It’s not a book for the faint of heart, and great on ya for tackling it.
Just finished The Lies of Locke Lamora. Enjoyed it! On to the Expanse book 5.
My friends and I all loved Lies of LL. The second book is a lot worse, and the third book was a dud from page 1.
Yeah, I was looking stuff up about it last night. Seems like people were really divided on the pirate stuff, and there’s a sense that the third book might be okay in context when the next book comes out but by itself is “fluff.” I’m fairly content to let it be until he has more stuff out. I don’t waste time anymore on authors who stop writing series after cliffhangers. I’m glad Lies works as a standalone, at least.
I’m about halfway through the Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb. It has a vibe similar to the Kingkiller Chronicle but it has an actual conclusion to the story. So far it’s been very entertaining with a story full of medieval fantasy court intrigue, a mystery of raiders turning their victims to sociopaths, and a light sprinkling of magic.
I’m jealous that you get to read them for the first time. Phenomenal series, might be my favorite. I love the jumping back and forth between the storylines. The story from Fitz’s point of view is so dark, and then you go to the traders and it has such a different vibe.
If you carry on past the first trilogy (which I highly recommend) prepare to have your heart ripped open and stamped on. No spoilers, but that boy suffers.
These aren’t happy books, and things become worse with time, I am glad I didn’t continue the series. :-(
They’re not happy its true, but they’re still excellent reads and there’s enough light to make them not be morose :)
No argument that they are great reads, at least the first trilogy, haven’t read anything after that.
You gotta finish! They can’t all be happy. The conclusion … exists! It really is a great story, so expansive.
Hmm… so there is hope. I’ll look at some non-spoilery info and then decide.
Guards! Guards! By Terry Pratchett
Part of a recent habit of reading to my wife in the evening while she plays Luanti to relax before bed.
Earth’s Children, book 3 ! “The Mammoth Hunters”. It’s fantastic. Very grounded in paleontology, yet profoundly spiritual. A couple of seriously intriguing esoteric moments too (as with the first book).
I read What If some years ago, speculative science can be so satisfying. There’s a second one now I believe
Yeah, second one has been out for a while too. Have put it on my wishlist.
The Marriage of Roman Soldiers (13 B.C.-A.D. 235): Law and Family in the Imperial Army
Very fascinating!
Ahan, interesting. Would to hear its summary / some interesting bits when you are done.
I actually had a whole long writeup but a power outage wiped it all out and now I’m sad 😭
Long story short, I found some conclusions in Chapter 11 questionable, but on the whole it was a great read. Much of the book was detail-oriented in terms of qualifying what distinguished soldiers’ unofficial marriages from official/sanctioned marriages. I had a good overview of marriage of Roman soldiery before going in, but I learned a lot of the nuances that I didn’t know before.
For example, I understood that bastardy was pretty low-priority for Romans - whether someone was born out of wedlock was not a huge deal. Finding out, though, that the only Roman legal disability from being a bastard was that if your dad died without a will, you wouldn’t automatically inherit from him, was interesting. That a Roman jurist specifically justifies the lack of legal disabilities with the argument that people shouldn’t be punished for qualities that are no fault of their own was doubly interesting.
On the other hand, Greek cities, including at the time, still regarded being a bastard as disqualifying even just for citizenship, much less higher participation in civil society.
Human beings are funny. Cultures, doubly so.
And I knew that Roman soldiers were allowed to make simplified wills that were harder to contest, but I didn’t realize just how often ordinary wills were invalidated in Roman law over fairly petty matters. Given that wills in the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries in the West were invalidated for extremely petty matters, though, perhaps I should have guessed that a legalistic peoples like the Romans would have similar problems, lmao.
On a darker note, I knew that slaves freed for the explicit purpose of marrying received normal (freedman) Roman citizenship, but I didn’t know it came with the legal disability of being unable to initiate a divorce with their husband/former master. 😬
That’s pretty interesting. Thanks for the writeup!
Any examples of petty matters that invalidated wills? My knowledge of law is mainly from some Police procedural books and TV shows.
Using phrases slightly wrong was a common one - Roman wills had to be extremely formulaic, or they were invalid. Not mentioning someone who might inherit. Not giving relatives enough of a share of the inheritance. Mistaking someone’s legal status, even if their legal status did not directly impact the inheritance.
Ah, like finding any loopholes or minor mistakes. Seen that enough times in movies!
Finished Dogs of War by Adrian Tchaikovsky - it was an enjoyable read with some interesting ideas about intelligence and freedom which it explored to their logical conclusions. The pacing was a little odd at times and it was more political than I was expecting given the synopsis but I’d recommend it.
I’ve just started Dark Matter by Blake Crouch. Halfway through chapter 2 and I have no idea where it’s going, but I’m gripped so far!
I recently got Dark Matter, it’s on my TBR pile, now it depends on your review if I’ll start it sooner or later 😀
I am reading The Last Argument of Kings by Joe Abercrombie, booked 3 in The First Law series. I’m maybe 40% through. Definitely liked the first two better, and book two was fantastic, but it’s 3 of 3 here, so I need to see how it concludes.
Before this series was The Passenger by Cormac McCarthy, and after I’m thinking about The Expanse. I’m mainly fantasy, then sci-fi, then some Blake Crouch for when I need a book to fly by.
Heh, that’s a good combo, I am similar, but with some Crime/Mystery in place of Blake Crouch.
The Expanse won’t disappoint. It’s a massive space opera but it’s written so tightly that it reads more like a fast paced adventure. You’ll hardly notice going through all nine of the main books in the series.
Currently reading Cathedral of the Drowned by Nathan Ballingrud, sequel to last year’s Crypt of the Moon Spider that I liked so much.
__
Finished The Works of Vermin by Hiron Ennes (weird fantasy with body horror elements) | bingo: different continent, minority author, orange, x of y, LGBTQIA+, new
In a glamorously tattered city, a debt-ridden exterminator hunting a dangerous bug and an ailing perfumer in upper-class society each navigate a season of political and cultural revolution.
The setting of this reminded me vaguely of the Cemeteries of Amalo series: steampunk-ish but not (and plant- and bug-based in Vermin), low magic, large class divides, lavish fashion, and a focus on opera. Vermin is, however, much less soft and gentle: violent regime changes are practically expected every generation; character deaths on stage are real, not simulated; and poor people being exploited is par for the course. Even the perfume is laced with a reality-warping toxin that, in strong enough potencies, can remodel entire buildings or cause terrible mutations.
The blurb for this made me expect the bug extermination would be the main plot (with much more emphasis on horror), but that’s actually just a small piece of a grand epic with two alternating story lines. I wish I had known better what I was diving into, and that it was less slow-paced, but I liked it.
Still reading “Service model” by Adrian Tchaikovsky. A little over 80% through, it’s a great book, but I still don’t have the time to read a lot. I’ll probably finish it before the weekend. Next are some books by David Hewson, I’ve read some of his books about 20 years ago, so there’s som catching up to do. If that doesn’t work out I’ll probably go for some of Charles Stross’ SF works, I liked his laundry files books. So I guess I’ve got a to do pile right now, with little time.
Don’t try to rush through, enjoy your time with what you are reading. We will never be able to read everything we want in our lives, so better to pace ourselves and enjoy what we do read.
Oh I definitely won’t rush it, it’s a problem of luxury.
Pynchon’s new one, “Shadow Ticket.”
Really enjoying it so far. Throwback to then crazy shenanigans of “Crying of Lot 49” and “Gravity’s Rainbow.”
Just finished A Clockwork Orange, and Coraline. Just started Fahrenheit 451. I’m trying to read as many banned books as possible!
A Clockwork Orange is such a good book, though it was damn near impossible for me to read without making a dictionary as I went. The ending was also much better than the movie, which omitted the last chapter. The movie felt incomplete, because it was.
Way better than the movie! The last chapter really did change the story. Although, I did read the whole thing in Malcolm McDowell’s voice. I did have to look up several words but for some, the context was enough to get the meaning.
The historian. The suspense is incredible.
