What Are You Reading 4

[Tonyblack]

I just finished reading Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs?: Big Questions from Tiny Mortals about Death by Caitlin Doughty. This is the second book that I have read by her (first being Smoke Gets In Your Eyes). These books are fascinating look into one of the most natural experience of human beings, that is perhaps the most misunderstood - Death and what comes next.

Now I'm reading "Quartered Safe Out Here" by George MacDonald Fraser (the author of the Flashman books). This is his autobiographical book about his wartime experiences in the British Army during WW2. He was in the war against the Japanese in Burma, which was the same theatre as my dad. So many of his experiences were very, very similar to that of my father. Sadly, I found this book just too late for my father to have read, as I know he would have enjoyed it.

 

[=Tamar]

Burma, now known as Myanmar. Coincidentally, I just read a small book set in 19th century Burma, based on some of their traditions. It's Death by Effigy, by Karen L. Abrahamson. She is from "West Canada", and the book, although published by a UK publisher, is printed in the USA.
The story is a little unexpected to me as a Western hemisphere fantasy reader. There are Burmese nature spirits, and a mystery to solve, but what I had expected would be the primary issues are not changed at all. So for me as a Westerner, there is a behind the scenes tragedy. But as Daniel Hand says at the end of his introduction, this story takes the 'other' by the hand and embraces it.

 

[Who's Wee Dug]

Still on a cyberpunk kick, Just finished The Prometheus Trap: A Cyberpunk Techno Thriller#3 which I thought was really good, I've just bought #4 out of five in the series
From the first one, Attacked and left for dead, she wakes up in a cyborg body, and a corporation is hunting her down.

I will start it after I have read, Neo Cyberpunk Volume 2: The Anthology which has been good so far.

 

[phalarope]

I enjoyed Quartered Safe Out Here, Tony. Have you read Fraser's McAuslan stories? That's how I was introduced to his writing.

I just finished Christopher Moore's Noir and Kevin Hearne's Blood and Paper. Carl Bernstein's Chasing History is next in line.

 

[Tonyblack]

I enjoyed Quartered Safe Out Here, Tony. Have you read Fraser's McAuslan stories? That's how I was introduced to his writing.

I just finished Christopher Moore's Noir and Kevin Hearne's Blood and Paper. Carl Bernstein's Chasing History is next in line.

I read a bunch of his Flashman books and had a compilation of the McAuslan books, but I didn't get around to reading it and have no idea what happened to it.

 

[Quatermass]

I've only read one or two of the Flashman books. I'll be honest, I got more into stories that were basically homages to that series. There's the Ciaphas Cain novels from the Warhammer 40K franchise by Sandy Mitchell, aka Alex Stewart, and the isekai novel series The Saga of Tanya the Evil by Carlo Zen (presumably a pen-name).

 

[=Tamar]

The Post-Utopian Adventures of Darger and Surplus, by Michael Swanwick. it's a collection of short stories, practically vignettes in some cases. I hadn't realized that they were characters in two novels that I haven't come across, Dancing with Bears, and Chasing the Phoenix.

Surplus is a dog-headed humaniform creation, which is not unusual in that alternate universe. (As a New Englander I am mildly amused that he claims to be from the new nation of Western Vermont.)
They are conmen, which is a genre I'm not entirely fond of.

 

[Quatermass]

Alright, so, just to bump this thread a little, I am currently halfway through the very excellent Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell. I just wish it wasn't so long, my attention span isn't good for books in excess of about 350 pages these days...

 

[ThinkingFox]

I'm halfway through the Slow Horses series from Mick Heron about a bunch of Mi5 washouts. The first book has been filmed (cast includes the superb Gary Oldman and Kristin Scott Thomas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slow_Horses ) and is on Apple TV as a series (paid subscription) with the 2nd book filming in the works. If you like laugh-out-loud spy thrillers then you're in for a treat.

 

[Tonyblack]

I'm on the first book of Game Of Thrones.

 

[Who's Wee Dug]

I 'm reading Blades of Glass, book 1of the Splintered lands series.

 

[RathDarkblade]

I just finished reading How To Be A Tudor by Ruth Goodman. Not my cup of tea, since she goes in detail into how Tudor housewives made all kinds of food, and I'm not that good a cook. OTOH, she does go in detail into what Tudor people wore, which interested me more.

Before that, I read Puritans at Play by Bruce Daniels. I enjoyed this one a lot more; it's all about how the Puritan generation in New England (roughly 1621 to 1720) spent their leisure time, and how it changed over that century and into the Revolutionary years. Spoiler: Puritans were not such killjoys as they're usually made out to be.

 

[Who's Wee Dug]

a pre-equal to the cyberpunk series, the back story of how she became an angel.

 

[MaroSpark]

I'm reading:: Why Are You Atheists So Angry?: 99 Things that Piss Off the Godless by Greta Christina. It's very good and very true.
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[Who's Wee Dug]

I'm reading Critical Nexus it's the 4th in the series, about cyber criminals and a local organisations fight against them in the near future but relevant today.

 

[=Tamar]

I'm reading The Untold Story, by Genevieve Cogman. It's the conclusion of the Invisible Library Series. Library travel is a thing that happens...

 

[JubalBarca]

I just read The Old Goat And The Alien by Veo Corva. Can recommend! It's a cute little "alien falls to earth and shenanigans ensue" story except that that it's set on a planet of telekinetic animal-shaped aliens and the "alien" is a human.

It's in the cosy/queer SF bucket, but I think it manages not to have the over-saccharine thing that some cosy fiction does: it's actually really good at showing a "utopian" anarcho-collective world that is both genuinely better than our own and not a secret dystopia, but also still has the real problems of personal issues and bureaucracy and disability that are true of any social systems, and has some of its own issues along the way.

 

[Tonyblack]

I'm currently rereading "Every Man for Himself" - Beryl Bainbridge's book about the Titanic Disaster. It's a great book, but I'm over half way through it, and there hasn't been any real sign of danger yet . . . unless you count the fact that one of the coal bunkers was on fire during the voyage.

 

[RathDarkblade]

... one of the coal bunkers was on fire during the voyage.

Wait, what?

The crossing (IIRC) was supposed to take 10-12 days. And the coal bunker was on fire the whole time?

How did it not explode? How did nobody notice? Why did nobody put the fire out? Major health-and-safety SNAFU.

And I thought the other stuff (lack of boats, locked gates between decks, no-one on watch etc.) was bad.

Mind you, the other stuff was bad enough. "Captain's gone to bed, lads. We're all going to bed. No need to keep watch. Ahhh, it'll be fine. 'Night...!"

Meanwhile, a military-looking gentleman comes on board. "Stand back! It's Major L. Fenn Saftee to the rescue!"

 

[Who's Wee Dug]

Almost halfway through Shinbone Shadowhunter, its Ok but no comparison to Terry's stories.