What book are you reading...

I'm reading Dune again at the moment but I won't be doing my 4th or 5th complete read through this time around. I always like Dune Messiah but God Emperor was always the hardest to manage.
Lol yes, God Emperor was a slog, but I felt it was the first succeeding book that had the grandeur of the original
 
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So i finished The wheel of time series. 6 months isn't too bad for 14 large books.
I enjoyed it more the first time of reading it (obvious) and i doubt will ever read it again.
Its has many good parts but Jordan did have a bad habit and just writing waffle, there are many peaks and troughs but to a new reader, keep at it.
The pacing definitely picks up for the last 3 books by Sanderson.
You reread all of WOT? That's some going! Once was plenty for me. They're fantastic fantasy books but as you say, probably should be half the length!
 
Finished Daevabad trilogy which was brilliant. Had a nice palate cleanser of Rendezvous with Rama which I've read before but is one of my favourites. Had a brief consideration of reading the rest of the Rama books despite their tonal differences and drop in quality but decided against it.

Instead started Priest of Bones by Peter Mclean. Follows a former gangster returning from war and trying to rebuild his crime empire. Basically Goodfellas meets grimdark fantasy like The Blade Itself or Prince of Thorns .
 
Throw us a bone…what did you think of it?
It's excellent. Very cold and clinical. I read it many moons ago and can't remember any of it. Although I do rewatch the movie on a regular basis.

Bateman and his cohorts are empty vessels, so absorbed in externals like appearance, physique, being seen in the best restaurants that they are devoid of any personality. Bateman knows everything about items of clothing or specifications of technology or types of beauty products and can list reams of useless information, but to him it is the most important thing.

In this banal world of constant one-upmanship Bateman is quite clearly gone mad as evidenced by his psychopathic behaviour (although haven't got to a long form grisly scene yet. Only about 70 pages in). My understanding is the book is not as ambiguous as the movie in relation to the crimes of Bateman. I think part of the emptiness Bateman and his peers feel is that no one knows who anyone is all the time. They are all unmoored from reality in one way by that fact. It's quite literally a jungle out there and Bateman is more predatory than most.

It's a gripping read.
 
Pretty much agree with that
It’s the only book I’ve read that made me feel physically sick
There are some great, bizarre, digressions. Like the chapter where he talks about Genesis. V amusing and it cuts against the grain of the expected narrative, leaving you thinking “What’s going on here?”, but of course he’s mad
 
You reread all of WOT? That's some going! Once was plenty for me. They're fantastic fantasy books but as you say, probably should be half the length!
Yeah lol.
I am even thinking of rereading Malazan soon as well.

After finishing a big series i like to do some light reading so i reread Monsoon by Wilbur Smith.
I first read it about 20 years ago and remembered enjoying it.
This time around, not so, found it very formulaic, a little racist in places and with stereotypical characters.
 
Still working my way through Black Hawk Down. I also got Michael Durant's book (one of the chopper pilots) to read as soon as I finish BHD. Then I'll watch the show on Netflix. I get mildly obsessed with certain media niches lol.

On a side note... there's some pretty serious accusations being thrown at Daniel Greene (Fantasy booktuber). I've spent lots of time watching his videos. No response from him yet, but people are already distancing themselves and the allegations seem to have some legs to them :(.
And it's increasingly looking like the accuser is bat poo crazy. The fantasy booktube community is a hot mess right now.
 
Just finished Tiamat's Wrath (Book 8 of The Expanse).... Got a Novella to do (Auberon) and then, sadly, moving onto the final book in the series :(
 
I just finished The 1985 Annual World's Best SF, edited by Donald Wollheim.

This one was barely OK. Of the ten stories, one was decent, two good, and one excellent (John Varley). A few were downright poor.
 
I sometimes read that people in this thread use eBooks, might even acquire them from Amazon. If so be aware of the changes being implemented in how these can be downloaded....


by Feb 26th Amazon will not allow you to download your kindle books to a PC, but only on your Kindle by Wi-Fi.
 
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I sometimes read that people in this thread use eBooks, might even acquire them from Amazon. If so be aware of the changes being implemented in how these can be downloaded....


by Feb 26th Amazon will not allow you to download your kindle books to a PC, but only on your Kindle by Wi-Fi.
Not surprised tbh, its why i use Kobo's and side load my books.
 
Not surprised tbh, its why i use Kobo's and side load my books.

Me too. We first started with Nooks, many years ago. From then it has always been Kobo readers. I would not be tempted to use a Kindle.

In the above video he notes how Amazon changed the front jacket of his earlier bought WOT books, to include promotional content from Amazon, that seems just wrong.
 
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Me too. We first started with Nooks, many years ago. From then it has always been Kobo readers. I would not be tempted to use a Kindle.

In the above video he notes how Amazon changed the front jacket of his earlier bought WOT books, to include promotional content from Amazon, that seems just wrong.
They are actually editing books as well, making them more "pc" without telling anyone
 



Just watched that, oh my. I understand how he can advocate piracy with such restrictions and possible amendments. Some of those terms and conditions that are agreed upon when purchasing / loaning a book, albeit somewhat hidden, are most biased not in favour of the purchaser.
 
In case this is handy for anyone else, I just found an actual use for Gemini.

I was listening to a book at the gym and probably wasn't paying enough attention and got a little lost on a few points. I, erm, happened upon the pdf of the book, copied and pasted the relevant chapter into Gemini (it was 40 minutes, so quite long) and asked it to summarise it for me. It broke it down into the different scenes with bullet points for each. I then asked it some questions about some of the characters and it gave me answers.

REALLY handy to be honest.
 
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