What books are we reading at the moment ?

[ElyDave]

I quite enjoyed Kraken, just an increasing need for suspension of disbelief.

I since read Embassytown which I thought was significantly better.  Kraken did feel like he rolled a dice every chapter for a new denoument and new factions/characters - there was too much and the story was very muddled.  Embassytown and The City & The City were both much better structured with a clearer narrative that actually built well together.

I've only read a couple of his, Perdido Street Station and Kraken, saw the TV adaptation of The City and The City which I thought quite good.

[fd3]

In unconventional fashion I have not read Perdido, because my library doesn't have it.

[Mr Larrington]

Yay! Another gory killin' Albeit in flashback

Yay!  Another stiff

Edit: two, in fact, but one was an accident.  Although the victim did get partially et by kittehs.

That all got rather silly in the last hundred-odd pages

Currently doing Charlie Stross' Escape From Yokai Land wot is a novella and approximately volume 7.5 of The Laundry Files.  Won't take long.

[ravenbait]

Just finished the Fitzgerald translation of the Iliad, narrated by Dan Stevens on audible. Absorbing and delightful. I could listen to him all day. Now onto the Odyssey while I ponder which of the Posthomeric translations to acquire.

Sam

[Mr Larrington]

Quantum Of Nightmares, the second in Charlie Stross' “Tales Of The New Management” series.  Not at all influenced by Mary Poppins, oh no.  Feature a Several of the characters from Dead Lies Dreaming and, er, some new ones.  Not a Laundry File in spite of what the publisher has seen fit to put on the cover.

If disgraced former International Development Secretary Piggi Patel ever read these books we are doomed.  OK, MOAR doomed.

[Mr Larrington]

I came here to berate the Rivers Of London graphic novel series for spoiling the pictures but they’re actually pretty close to the ones in my head-branez.  Though “graphic short stories” would be a more accurate description.  Now I'd better get back to Waterloo Sunrise before Professor Larrington duffs me up or infects me with Teh Plague.

[Quint]

Duncton Wood, it's very good

[rafletcher]

The Dark Flood the latest Benny Griessel from Deon Meyer.  A run of the mill police procedural, but interesting to me for it's window into South Africa.

[rafletcher]

Yay! Another gory killin' Albeit in flashback

Yay!  Another stiff

Edit: two, in fact, but one was an accident.  Although the victim did get partially et by kittehs.

That all got rather silly in the last hundred-odd pages

I didn’t last nearly that long (and 400 plus pages was too long to sustain that style of prose anyway). First one of his I haven’t finished. Oh well.

On to Overboard, the new V.I. Warshawski from Sara Paretsky.

[andrewc]

The Dark Flood the latest Benny Griessel from Deon Meyer.  A run of the mill police procedural, but interesting to me for it's window into South Africa.

The last South African police procedural I read was by Tom Sharpe…….   I believe it got him deported.

[TheLurker]

Just given up on, "Operation Pedestal" by Max Hastings.  Suggest you save your pennies for something else.

[Mr Larrington]

Too late.  It’s up there \\\\ on the Unread Shelf ov Shame.

[TheLurker]

Too late.  It’s up there \\\\ on the Unread Shelf ov Shame.

Leave it there. That, or tear the pages out and stick 'em on the nail in the door.

[IanDG]

Into the Remote Places by Ian Hibell

I can no longer consider avoiding broken glass and dog turds along the disused railway path out of town a challenging bike ride.

[FifeingEejit]

Dad's Army
About the village cricket team including the head of PE at school wot won some cup at Lords in 1985

I was shit at cricket at school, and rugby which was his other sport, and hockey and football that were only in the curriculum so that the pitches wouldn't get trashed in spring and the AstroTurf could be justified.

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[rafletcher]

Having finished (and enjoyed) Emma Viskic’s fourth Caleb Zelic (Deaf white PI with an indigenous wife) outing Those who Perish I’ve just collected the latest Mick “slow horses” Herron, Bad Actors

[Mr Larrington]

o goody, sa mr larington, there is a new mark bilingham out

The Murder Book.  And it’s a a pukka Thorne too, not one where he pops up anonymously on p374.

[rafletcher]

Well the Slow Horses were their usual selves, with the added bonus that they ended with the same number as they started (and apparently are being depicted in an Apple TV+ drama for good measure). No onto Barbara Nadel’s latest Ikmen story Bride Price. (And the Billingham is likely to be waiting for at the library soon. I do hope it’s better more to my taste than some of his recent oeuvre).

[Nuncio]

Well the Slow Horses were their usual selves, with the added bonus that they ended with the same number as they started (and apparently are being depicted in an Apple TV+ drama for good measure).

I'll not take that as a spoiler given that the number may be the same but the names might not be.

[Mr Larrington]

o goody, sa mr larington, there is a new mark bilingham out

The Murder Book.  And it’s a a pukka Thorne too, not one where he pops up anonymously on p374.

Finally started this while waiting for an interminable search to finish hunting through a bazillion small text files for a string which, as it turned out, wasn’t there anyway

Starts with a nice DETHY killin' which is always a good sign.

[FifeingEejit]

Having battered through "when you dead, you dead" by a former 24hr mtb race foe (his best result 1st, mine 29th...)

I've gone and picked up some book called endless perfect circles by some ultra runner nut who suddenly switched to cycling.

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[fd3]

Just finished the latest rivers of London (speedy delivery by the library of Birmingham).  It were okay, more of the same which I guess is what you should expect at this point.
Back to balancing a couple short story books, including the awesome le Guin (I could read it faster but I’m taking my time so it lasts).

[andrewc]

Just started “Parable Of The Sower” by Octavia Butler.  Well written, but I’m getting the impression it’s not a feel good book.

[pcolbeck]

I have just finished James Holland's latest opus "Brother in Arms" which follows the Sherwood Rangers from D-Day to VE-Day.
A gripping and detailed account of tank warfare and the way it affected the crews. All those idiot politicians who keep harking back to WWII as our glory days can f**k right off it was a completely horrific for those who took part.
Good book but I do have to take issue with his conclusion that they were extraordinary men, they weren't, I think the point is that they were ordinary men asked to and in the most part accomplishing extraordinary things at great personal cost.

[rafletcher]

I have just finished James Holland's latest opus "Brother in Arms" which follows the Sherman Rangers fro D-Day to VE-Day.
A gripping and detailed account of tank warfare and the way it affected the crews. All those idiot politicians who keep harking back to WWII as our glory days can f**k right off it was a completely horrific for those who took part.
Good book but I do have to take issue with his conclusion that they were extraordinary men, they weren't, I think the point is that they were ordinary men asked to and in the most part accomplishing extraordinary things at great personal cost.

My uncle was a tank driver in North Africa. Just an ordinary guy. You might like to watch “Lebanon”, a film from the POV of an Israeli tank crew during the 1972 Israeli-Lebanon conflict. Compared to Das Boot. And if you like books about the realism of warfare, try “Send Down a Dove” by Charles McHardy, about an British submarine at the end of WW2. My (submariner) father was impressed by its accuracy.