I misread the title of the Drinks! thread, and decided to take it as inspiration.
Currently I'm rereading John Varley's "Titan". I didn't remember how much gratuitous sex it contained. I'm also working on the collected volumes of the comic book "Invincible". And at some point I will likely also start in on Jim Butcher's "Fool Moon".
"I'm starting to feel comic books lack realism."
"Master of Understatement: Level Up!"
--Two nearly-consecutive (in the other order) quotes from the webcomic "Grrl Power".
I'm finally getting around to reading Gödel, Escher, & Bach. It's been sitting on my shelf for ages, taunting me.
Twitter: imprimis5. Follow away!
Just finished rereading Carol Deppe's Breed Your Own Vegetable Varieties: The Gardener's and Farmer's Guide to Plant Breeding and Seed Saving, in preparation for creating my own mutant pea army. With a scalpel.
Just assume I'm always doing that.
Damn it, Ronway!
Decided to go back to some classics. Just finished Neuromancer, and Stranger in a Strange Land before that. Probably done reading for a while, unfortunately - other projects are taking priority right now.
Wow - haven't read that since college. First read it in high school. Barely remember it...
"See, this is another sign of your tragic space dementia, all paranoid and crotchety. Breaks the heart." - Mal
Unicode U+24BD gets us Ⓗ. (Thanks, Godai!)
I read A Cake for Herbie, A Home For Hermit Crab, Goodnight Moon, and Babytown Express (3 times) tonight. I think I might rehash some Fancy Nancy books, or maybe Berenstein Bears tomorrow, but I know I'll be reading Babytown Express and Goodnight Moon, probably multiple times each.
I feel like that about some of the Munchkin's favorites - she turns 4 tomorrow.
For myself, I'm about 80% of the way through The Monkey's Voyage, a nonfiction popular science title. I've got the sixth of the Iron Druid Chronicles checked out for after that, and then I'm going to start working my way through The Hobbit & Lord of the Rings for the first time in several years (with an interruption in May/June for Skin Game), including a promise to myself that it will include reading the appendices for the first time ever.
Rather you than me...
I'm currently very near the start of Iain M. Banks' Consider Phlebas; given Banks' general reputation and having read The Player of Games, I have high hopes.
“You gotta have blue hair."
-Reckless
Ahah, another Culture fan! Sadly Phlebas is the first of the books, and is generally not said to be as good. PoG is almost certainly the best; out of the five I've read, I would recommend Inversions most after PoG (it's only barely a culture book, but the philosophy is woven throughout in a really compelling way), followed by the Hydrogen Sonata, Excession, and Use of Weapons. I have Phlebas but haven't gotten to it yet.
"I'm starting to feel comic books lack realism."
"Master of Understatement: Level Up!"
--Two nearly-consecutive (in the other order) quotes from the webcomic "Grrl Power".
Currently re-reading Harry Potter (for the first time since reading the final book, thus now being able to retrospectively realise all the tiny little hints and stuff that get dropped about various characters and their actions throughout the entire series), just started Half-Blood Prince yesterday. After that I have a random trilogy of books that I picked up at a second-hand shop a week or two ago. After that, erm...not sure. I keep running out of books and I would buy a load more but I keep running out of space in my room as well ;).
I am the Wordweaver...
Basically, I like writing stuff ;)
Getting a Kindle helped for me. I downloaded hundreds of books I'm not physically attached to and stored the paper versions away, leaving more space for new acquisitions including board games! I'm down to four bookcases which contain everything except recipe books which are in the dining room, and RPG stuff which lives in the two bookcases where most of the boardgames are.
Just assume I'm always doing that.
Damn it, Ronway!
Hehe, I thought someone would mention e-readers at some point. I can see the convenience but I've never been remotely tempted to get one. I prefer actual books, I'm afraid ;).
I am the Wordweaver...
Basically, I like writing stuff ;)
Me too, absolutely.
But if the choice is don't get any more books, or archive some and have them on the ereader and get more books, I'm going to go with the second option.
Just assume I'm always doing that.
Damn it, Ronway!
I just need to get a house or a flat or something, and then I'll have more space rather than just my bedroom and can get a bunch of bookshelves and stuff ;).
I am the Wordweaver...
Basically, I like writing stuff ;)
I just Started reading the Innocent Mage by Karen Miller
Fancy
I have been on a non-fiction kick lately, reading a bunch of political science and geology books. Most recently, I finished Political Institutions under Dictatorship by Jennifer Ghandi and After the Ice Age: The Return of Life to Glaciated North America by E.C. Pielou, and am now working on Why Nations Fail by Daron Acemoglu. They have all been really good so far.
“Many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view.” ~Obi-Wan Kenobi
I've been wanting to read that one.
I read a number of papers by Acemoglu in grad school, and so far it is a more detailed re-framing of stuff he's been working on for over a decade. It is quite good.
“Many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view.” ~Obi-Wan Kenobi
Read some excerpts of his in undergrad. Where you econ? I was Polysci, but went for international economic policy as much as I could.
My BA is PolySci, and my MA is in Public Policy and Political Economy. I think that international economic (in particular monetary) policy, and autocratic institutions, are both super fascinating.
“Many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view.” ~Obi-Wan Kenobi
I've got Pratchett's new Discworld book coming in tonight, and the library has the entire Sandman series on hold for me. I just finished reading warren Ellis's "Gun Machine", which was quite good if you like detective stories laced with counterculture, weirdness, and a fair bit of violence.
Gah! I'm two books behind on Discworld now, and it's killing me. But I just can't get into the fiction vibe right now.
Twitter: imprimis5. Follow away!
Snuff is skippable. I'm only about 1/3 of the way through Raising Steam, but it's pretty good so far.
I'm going through Invincible so fast that I've had to start glomming volumes of Fables too. What can I say, while text has its charms, comics are so much faster for me to read. (Now if only some whiz will invent software that lets us post to message boards in pictorial format, creating a properly expressive image in less time than it takes to type a thousand words.)
Well, that's not ominous at all...
"I'm starting to feel comic books lack realism."
"Master of Understatement: Level Up!"
--Two nearly-consecutive (in the other order) quotes from the webcomic "Grrl Power".
Lately I have been rereading some favorites (Tolkien, Bradbury, King), but have started the Hitchiker's Guide series. After grad school, it has been hard for me to get into any serious history or philosophy aside from the occasional autobiography.
BuddaBuddaBuddaBuddaBuddaBuddaBudda
“Heh, pow. Sound effects are the best.” –The Idealist
I recently picked up Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson (as per recommendation from this other Off-Topic thread) and am almost 200 pages in. So far I am loving it. It's not overly convuluted when it comes to detail, and I actually appreciate that. Sanderson guides the reader with a "need to know" approach, never going overboard with stuff you know nothing about just to fill pages. Everything is straight to the point and the pages just fly by due to that. His action writing is also fantastic.
This is acting as a break from Stephen King's The Dark Tower series, to which I am 3 books in (out of 7). I highly urge people to try it, though the first book can be an extremely slow start.
A non-fiction recommendation, if folks don't mind reading about science: Read at least 3 chapters of a book called Napoleon's Buttons. Interesting mix of chemistry, history, and maybe even a bit of economics.
I'm getting ready to start book 2, but the pace of The Gunslinger has made me push it back a bit on the list.
BuddaBuddaBuddaBuddaBuddaBuddaBudda
“Heh, pow. Sound effects are the best.” –The Idealist
I've been greatly enjoying the Dark Tower Series. I just finished the fourth book, Wizard and Glass. I'm taking a break from that and am trying to read some Cyberpunk. I'm reading Altered Carbon right now. That is an interesting book.
Good ideas are usually just bad ideas a stubborn person eventually fixed.
I've been reading "The Name of the Wind" by Patrick Rothfuss to learn more about this Kvothe Six-String fellow.
It's definitely worth your time, friends.
Ra, God of the Fun
Draw, God of the Sun
The Matriarch's Psychic damage is her forcing a gratuitous amount of Snapple facts about birds into a hero's brain.
Now I'm a Fool for the Moon.
"I'm starting to feel comic books lack realism."
"Master of Understatement: Level Up!"
--Two nearly-consecutive (in the other order) quotes from the webcomic "Grrl Power".
A new Terry Pratchett...and I didn't know. I am so ashamed of myself.
"Deja-fu? You've heard of that?"
- Lu Tze, Sweeper, Thief of Time by Terry Pratchett
Book 2 books up extremely fast. Within the first 60 pages you'll be flipping through it, whispering "WTF" to yourself over and over. The Gunslinger is an extremely slow start, especially because it drops you into this world you know absolutely nothing about and starts conversing about it as if you've been standing there the entire time.
Book 2 still drops you in the thick of it, but the plot is much less centered on Roland's strange world and more on a strange occurance that you'll figure out soon enough. It's incredibly intense.
For unknown reasons, I've been reading The Name of the Wind. I like it.
You're free to do whatever you want to.
Can't wait, though I was able to pick up 11/22/63 for less than $2 today and have the rest of the Hitchhiker's Guide books to read. Maybe this weekend I will make progress.
BuddaBuddaBuddaBuddaBuddaBuddaBudda
“Heh, pow. Sound effects are the best.” –The Idealist
"Do you not know that a man is not dead while his name is still spoken?"
- Terry Pratchett, Going Postal
You mean like the 6 years between A Feast for Crows and A Dance With Dragons? I firmly believe it only got written because it got optioned as an HBO series.
Heh. I was under the impression was that one of the reasons it took so long is that Martin got mired in dealing with the TV show.
"Do you not know that a man is not dead while his name is still spoken?"
- Terry Pratchett, Going Postal
Book buddies! How far are you? I'm on page 563 in the paperback version.
Ra, God of the Fun
Draw, God of the Sun
The Matriarch's Psychic damage is her forcing a gratuitous amount of Snapple facts about birds into a hero's brain.
Over the past 2 years, I've been reading nothing but exciting works such as Guyton and Hall's Textbook of Medical Physiology, Rubin's Fundamentals of Pathology, First Aid for the USMLE, and other books in the same vein.
...Gosh I miss having free time, lol.
Alright, I was convinced. Started reading The Name of the Wind yesterday afternoon, and I'm a quarter of the way through at the time of writing this. I see the appeal.
Twitter: imprimis5. Follow away!
Not far, sadly--as I was telling Christopher yesterday, all of my free time over the last few weeks has been dedicated to filming. But now I have free time again, and I'll probably blaze through it in a few days.
You're free to do whatever you want to.
I don't doubt it. It has maintained my attention throughout. I can't really recall a chapter where I was particularly bored or uninvested in what was happening.
EDIT: I breezed through "The Name of The Wind" (no pun intended) a day or two after posting this and devoured "The Wise Man's Fear" in about a week. This is an incredible series. TWMF drags a bit compared to TNoTW, in my opinion, but I still enjoyed them immensely. I can't wait for the third book to be released!
Ra, God of the Fun
Draw, God of the Sun
The Matriarch's Psychic damage is her forcing a gratuitous amount of Snapple facts about birds into a hero's brain.
Have you all figured out who Kvothe's mother is yet?
It's been a fairly long while since I've read them, and I didn't pick up on this myself, but friends pointed out that there was a person mentioned (but not introduced as an actual character) who fit the description of Kvothe's mother's appearance and history. I'm obviously trying not to post an actual spoiler for that, but is that who you're talking about?
I occasionally go to the forums for Jim Butcher or Brandon Sanderson to see reader theories on the author's easter eggs or foreshadowing, but I haven't done the same with Rothfuss.
Arg. Be very careful with spoilers, please. I say this not as a mod, but as someone reading the books. Lol
Twitter: imprimis5. Follow away!
I didn't figure it out on my own, but I read the TVTropes pages and a small chunk of the wiki.
No spoilers, folks, but it's pretty awesome.
Ra, God of the Fun
Draw, God of the Sun
The Matriarch's Psychic damage is her forcing a gratuitous amount of Snapple facts about birds into a hero's brain.
All I'll say is that if you're not sure of your guess, you're missing something. PM me if you want more hints.
I didn't figure it out from reading the books, but having seen the theories, I agree. The clues are subtle, but pretty irrefutable.
"Do you not know that a man is not dead while his name is still spoken?"
- Terry Pratchett, Going Postal
I though Doc knocked water over it making it hard to read?
Fancy
I just finished Ender's Game and starting on the next in the series as soon as I can get a copy of it >.>;
My favorite Hero is Agrent Adept. My favorite villian The Matriarch.
Um. Well. Since that is one of my favorite books, I am really glad to hear that you enjoyed it so much that you're looking forward to the others.
Having read some of the others, I am hopeful that you will not let them degrade the memory of Ender's Game.
I know a lot of people enjoyed the Shadow books more than Speaker for the Dead and Xenocide. While I didn't care for them, I do recognize that they are at least a different option for sequels.
Unasked-for two cents.
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