What books are we reading at the moment ?

[andrewc]

Halfway through “Inhibitor Phase”, the latest volume of Alistair Reynolds “Revelation Space” series .   


Desperate battles, unstoppable enemies, moral quandaries and Pigs In Spaaaace …. 


https://revelationspace.fandom.com/wiki/Hyperpigs

[Mr Larrington]

Have now finished Professor Larrington's latest opus and have acquired much kudos for knowing about Led Zeppelin, Point Rosee and its lack of Norse colonists and Jarlin J Jarlinsson (teh Colombian Viking).  Next up is probably “1979” by Val McDermid.  First in a new series, it sez 'ere.  Expecting killin's and most likely lesbians, since the latter have been conspicuously absent from the Karen Pirie series.

[T42]

Babel 17 was my first Delaney and I think my favorite.

Didn't like it. Delaney's style has not aged well.

---o0o---

Finally got round to The Crook Factory, Dan Simmons's FBI opus centred on Ernest Hemingway. Early days but fun so far.

[nobby]

Ian Ross' Imperial Vengeance
No. 5 of 6, I believe (I hope).

[citoyen]

Queen Lucia by EF Benson - an audiobook to accompany my long bike ride yesterday, borrowed from the local library. I often find audiobooks difficult, due to very low tolerance of irritating voices, but got on with this one very well.

I’ve read the all the Mapp & Lucia books before but very much enjoyed being reminded how funny they are. Lightweight but comforting. Unfortunately the library doesn’t have the rest of the series. Chiz.

[rafletcher]

S.A. Cosby’s Razorblade Tears.

[fd3]

Babel 17 was my first Delaney and I think my favorite.

Didn't like it. Delaney's style has not aged well.

Won't argue much with that.  I did think it was better than Nova or Dhalgren though.

[T42]

Babel 17 was my first Delaney and I think my favorite.

Didn't like it. Delaney's style has not aged well.

Won't argue much with that.  I did think it was better than Nova or Dhalgren though.

I read and liked a lot of his stuff back when it came out.  B-17 felt a bit too shallow for my taste these days.

[spesh]

The only Delaney I've read is Trouble on Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia¹, which was apparently written as a response to Ursula Le Guin's The Dispossessed.

The problem a lot of readers, myself included, have had with it is that the central character Bron Helstrom is such an arse that exasperation with his self-absorption and other flaws tends to get in the way of understanding the points Delaney was making about utopian societies. If you haven't read it or not read it for a while, it might be worth reading the two reviews on Tor's website and a Q&A session between Delaney and students at Concordia University² before plunging (back) in. Caveat lector, because there are minor spoilers, though:

Tor.com - Heterotopian Choices: Samuel R. Delany’s Triton

Tor.com - I am a Reasonably Happy Man: The Trouble with Trouble on Triton

On Triton and Other Matters: An Interview with Samuel R. Delany


¹ The earlier editions were published as Triton.
² Just to confuse, the interview's posted on the SF pages at an Indiana-based university's web site.

[Legs]

I'm most of the way through The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead.  Highly recommended.

[fd3]

The only Delaney I've read is Trouble on Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia¹, which was apparently written as a response to Ursula Le Guin's The Dispossessed.

I would find that a really hard starting point, as that book is so awesome that I went and bought a copy to give to someone else and then started reading the rest of the series (yes, Left Hand of Darkness was the second book I read).

[Mr Larrington]

Have now finished Professor Larrington's latest opus and have acquired much kudos for knowing about Led Zeppelin, Point Rosee and its lack of Norse colonists and Jarlin J Jarlinsson (teh Colombian Viking).  Next up is probably “1979” by Val McDermid.  First in a new series, it sez 'ere.  Expecting killin's and most likely lesbians, since the latter have been conspicuously absent from the Karen Pirie series.

(click to show/hide)

Now halfway through and while the lesbian is almost certain to turn out to be the character who was my initial suspect no-one has been even remotely killed to DETH.  This, frankly, is Not Good Enough.

[Salvatore]

I've just started reading The Leipzig Affair by Fiona Rintoul. Like the author (and Genosse Brymbo otp), I spent a term at Karl Marx Universität in Leipzig. No doubt names have been changed to protect the innocent and guilty, but the first sentence in the book is "You're sitting in a booth in the language laboratory with headphones on and Frau Aner's voice in your ear". Well I remember being in a booth in a language lab and I remember a Herr Aner who taught Landeskunde and much else. A pretty unusual name, so hardly a coincidence. I can see on the third page there a mention of Leipzig's very own Konsument department store - all shiny aluminium cladding much like Birmingham Bullring. I bought a pair of shoes there. Apparently there was such an outcry when it was demolished post-Wende that its replacement is a very faithful replica.

But I digress. I wonder what other memories the book will awake.

Konsument:



and its replacement Höfe am Brühl

[Tom B]

I've just started reading The Leipzig Affair by Fiona Rintoul

I liked this book. See also The Bicycle Teacher by Campbell Jefferys, about an Aussie who goes to live in the GDR (cycling content is minimal - title is the nickname he earned)

[Salvatore]

I've just started reading The Leipzig Affair by Fiona Rintoul

I liked this book. See also The Bicycle Teacher by Campbell Jefferys, about an Aussie who goes to live in the GDR (cycling content is minimal - title is the nickname he earned)

Thanks. Looks interesting from the blurbs I've seen.

I've just seen that one of the characters in The Leipzig Affair has the same address as I had - Tarostrasse 14.

[nobby]

Just finished Slough House by Mick Herron
Wonderful read again. Much death but still open to another follow up.
Jackson Lamb could be the 21st century Uhtred.

[T42]

Chappie in The Crook Factory mentioned Drei Kamaraden by Erich Maria Remarque so I downloaded that and had a wee read until conscience pricked about TCF and I went back to it.  If half the stuff mentioned in TCF really happened then Ernie H. was quite a lad.

[nobby]

Reading 'Deep Country - Five Years in the Welsh Hills' by Neil Ansell
Lovely nature descriptive book to be read in between others.
With that in mind I have eitherAD381 by Charles Freeman or Triumph in Dust by Ian Ross or The Late Roman Army by Southern & Dixon to start this evening or maybe I'll do Sodukos (my spelling!)

[Mr Larrington]

Finally, at 78% of the full race distance of “1979”, a killin'.

I expect the Scotsman did it.

[cycleman]

And so the murders begun...........

[Mr Larrington]

And so the murders begun...........

Sadly not.  I know the protagonist is Filthy Lying Journalist Scum rather than the polis or a criminal profiler but a single killin' is not what we've come to expect from La McDermid.  Still, I was right about the identity of the murderer.

[rafletcher]

And so the murders begun...........

Sadly not.  I know the protagonist is Filthy Lying Journalist Scum rather than the polis or a criminal profiler but a single killin' is not what we've come to expect from La McDermid.  Still, I was right about the identity of the murderer.

But it was I think a lot better written than some of her recent outings, and lacked the radical lesbian content that’s recently been de rigeur in her work or so it seems. Plus I was living and working in Glasgow at the time the book is set, so it evoked a few memories.

[T42]

Saw a reference somewhere to "Oakley Hall's excellent western, Warlock" so I downloaded a sample of the eBook, and excellent is what it is.  What else it is is 17€, a little swingeing but I'll probably make an exception.

Anyway, it's about an 1880 south-western frontier town that hasn't yet received its patent and so remains outside the sway of Unca Sam's Law, meaning that rascals, ruffians and scallywags abound and the peace is kept by a succession of deputies appointed by a citizens' committee having no legal authority.  Between the general lawlessness and rustling Mexican cattle it might have been the inspiration for a number of other works such as Deadwood and Lonesome Dove, which it precedes by about 30 years.

[fd3]

Hyperion II.  Enjoyed it much much less than the original, I won’t be looking to the next books for at least a year, if ever.
While there are some real strengths to it, I felt the story could and should have been told in half the page count.  I also just liked the first book much more for its combination of short story style.
(Read a review online saying that the first book was basically unreadable as it was basically the Canterbury tales, which is illegible, even to English students.  So, each their own, ymmv, etc).

[FifeingEejit]

Theroux's "kingdom by the sea", hot on the heels of tim Moores "you are awful but I like you".


The later's dislike of Harling presumably means he's never recrossed the border, the former is yet to make such terrible faux pas.

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