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I am going to read 17 books this year to make up for falling short last year. Will it work? Probably not, but it's worth a try.
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Jan 5, 2014 05:50
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| # ¿ May 15, 2024 17:37 |
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In January I read: 1. Dust of Dreams by Steven Erikson 2. Vulcan's Forge by Josepha Sherman and Susan Shwartz
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Feb 7, 2014 03:18
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apophenium posted:In January I read: Whoops, forgot about this thread! 3. Harbinger by David Mack 4. The Crippled God by Steven Erikson 5. Consider Phlebus by Iain M. Banks Finally finished the main Malazan series! It was an excellent ride. Definitely going to be reading more from Mr. Banks. I'm taking a short break from the Malazan universe with Masters of Doom and then I'm going headfirst back into Blood and Bone and Forge of Darkness. After that I'll probably return to the Vanguard series or more Culture.
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Apr 15, 2014 22:12
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apophenium posted:1. Dust of Dreams by Steven Erikson 6. Masters of Doom by David Kushner 7. Summon the Thunder by Dayton Ward and Kevin Dilmore I haven't read a ton of non-fiction, but I thought Masters of Doom was very impressive and tastefully done. The story has a great pace and wide enough appeal where knowing about Doom or videogames in general isn't totally necessary to enjoy the ride. Summon the Thunder was a decent continuation of the Star Trek: Vanguard series that started with Harbinger. Very pulpy, but fun enough. I've now begun Ian Cameron Esslemont's latest Malazan book, Blood and Bone. I'm feeling pretty good about hitting my goal this year! apophenium fucked around with this message at 07:01 on May 14, 2014 |
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May 14, 2014 06:58
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1. Dust of Dreams by Steven Erikson 2. Vulcan's Forge by Josepha Sherman and Susan Shwartz 3. Harbinger by David Mack 4. The Crippled God by Steven Erikson 5. Consider Phlebus by Iain M. Banks 6. Masters of Doom by David Kushner 7. Summon the Thunder by Dayton Ward 8. Blood and Bone by Ian Cameron Esslemont 9. Player of Games by Iain M. Banks 10. The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch 11. Reap the Whirlwind by David Mack Blood and Bone was fine, Player of Games kicked rear end, Lies of Locke Lamora kicked an incredible amount of rear end, and Reap the Whirlwind was pretty dull. Lamora was so good I'm strongly considering reading the others in the series, despite hearing mixed things about em. I don't want to get ahead of myself, but I think I'm on a pretty good pace so far this year. Much better than last year. Pretty optimistic about finishing my goal. 
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Jul 28, 2014 04:01
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apophenium posted:1. Dust of Dreams by Steven Erikson 12. Use of Weapons by Iain M. Banks 13. Every Love Story is a Ghost Story by D. T. Max 14. Open Secrets by Dayton Ward 15. If on a winter's night a traveler by Italo Calvino 16. Blindsight by Peter Watts 17. The State of the Art by Iain M. Banks Woo! That's 17 books finished in 2014, which incidentally was my goal. I've atoned for my sin of falling short last year. I'm not going to bump up my goal, but instead am going to see where I end up so I have an idea what my goal should be next year.
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Sep 7, 2014 19:34
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| # ¿ May 15, 2024 17:37 |
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I'm calling it for the year, not gonna start anything new til 2015. Here's what I ended up reading, with a few thoughts. 1. Dust of Dreams by Steven Erikson - I didn't write a review for this one and it's been a year almost since I read it. I remember feeling kind of cheated by the cliffhanger ending, since most of the other books in the series had a conclusion of sorts. 2. Vulcan's Forge by Josepha Sherman and Susan Shwartz - A continued look into the Star Trek novel universe. It was paced well and felt very focused. 3. Harbinger by David Mack - I think I may end up regretting starting this series. You'll see why in my comments about the other books in the series. But this first book was pretty solid. The original characters are interesting, and the TOS era of Trek is my favorite. Seemed like a natural fit, something I'd like. 4. The Crippled God by Steven Erikson - Thus ends the Malazan Book of the Fallen. A hard series to write an ending for, but I think Erikson did a fantastic job the whole way through. Kind of wary of starting a new fantasy series as big as this one. 5. Consider Phlebus by Iain M. Banks - Oh boy, my first foray into Banks's works. Decided I'd read the Culture stuff before his non-M. stuff since it seemed more up my alley. It was a ton of fun, pop-corn sci-fi type stuff. Would make an excellent movie. 6. Masters of Doom by David Kushner - One of only two non-fiction books I read. Easily the better of the two. Kushner did a great job of keeping the narrative of id games interesting. Highly recommended, even if you've never played Doom or Quake. 7. Summon the Thunder by Dayton Ward - I don't really remember much about this. The writing was slightly worse than the first book, cause of different authors. Pushed the plot forward a smidgen, but not enough to be super engaging. 8. Blood and Bone by Ian Cameron Esslemont - Probably Esslemont's best entry in the Malazan universe. Or at least my favorite. Jacuruku was a really interesting place, even if the Crimson Guard weren't that interesting. 9. Player of Games by Iain M. Banks - Holy crap this book rules. Reveals more about the Culture proper than Consider Phlebas and really shows what Banks is trying to say with his series. 10. The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch - The first fantasy book I'd read outside of the Malazan universe in quite some time. It was definitely the right book to read. Tons of fun. Still not sure if I want to read the others in the series. 11. Reap the Whirlwind by David Mack - I was hating this book until the last couple of chapters. It pulls itself out of a funk and ended up creating an interesting plot that I felt more engrossed with than I had in the first two books. 12. Use of Weapons by Iain M. Banks - Easily the best SF book I read this year. The kind of book that you immediately want to re-read after finishing. It covers a lot of ground, but never feels slow. And the twist, my god, the twist. 13. Every Love Story is a Ghost Story by D. T. Max - Highly disappointing. Got this as a gift cause I'm a big fan of DFW. It was well researched, but felt kind of plain. Just a utilitarian telling of a man's life and death. Did make me want to read more of DFW's work, as I've only read Infinite Jest. 14. Open Secrets by Dayton Ward - Hah, I finished this book and nearly gave up on the series as a whole. It goes completely off the reservation and just creates a mess. Halfway through the series. I didn't know how the next book could pick up the pieces. 15. If on a winter's night a traveler by Italo Calvino - Still not really sure how I feel about this one. It's a wholly weird book that I definitely enjoyed. There were large swathes of it that I didn't totally follow, though. 16. Blindsight by Peter Watts - Okay maybe I was wrong about Use of Weapons, this book may have been better. Watts has a really interesting style and vision of the future. Vampires? In space? Sounds dumb, but it worked really really well. 17. The State of the Art by Iain M. Banks - Only really read this for the title story, which made up a bulk of the book anyways. It was... okay. I had high expectations coming off of Use of Weapons. Pretty good premise, but it didn't really do a whole lot with it. 18. Echopraxia by Peter Watts - A very good book that had no chance of living up to Blindsight. Watts still has tons of great ideas, but I didn't think he executed them quite as well as in Blindsight. That said, I still really liked it. I hope he keeps writing. 19. Assail by Ian Cameron Esslemont - A huge disappointment. Assail is a place in the Malazan universe that had been built up over the previous 15 books or whatever in the series. And Esslemont just completely fumbles it. Oh well. 20. A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin - Hey, a new (old) fantasy series! I'd never read anything by Le Guin before, and a friend loaned me a collection of the first four Earthsea books so I figured why not. Not an awful book, and not super amazing either. It moves at a frenzied pace and has lots of nice setpieces, but I didn't come away super impressed. Le Guin's prose kicks rear end though, definitely the high point of the book for me. 21. Star Trek Vanguard: Precipice by David Mack - Holy poo poo, I didn't know how Mack would continue this after the disaster of the previous book, but he actually picked up the pieces in a pretty interesting manner. Still, not without its problems, but much better than Open Secrets. 22. The Tombs of Atuan by Ursula K. Le Guin - I liked this one a lot more than the first one. Arha/Tenar was a little bit more interesting than Ged was in the first book, and the setting away from magic was kind of refreshing. Not as much happens as in the prior book, but it felt a little less hurried. 23. The Farthest Shore by Ursula K. Le Guin - Great followup to Tombs of Atuan. More in line with the first book, but has a lot more to say, I think. Deals a ton with the idea of death, which makes it very engaging and kind of sorrowful. 24. Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang - A bunch of really cool, thought provoking stories. Not a single story in here I regret reading. The title story was probably my favorite, with the one about angels and heaven and hell being real a strong second place. 25. City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett - Whoa, another one-off kind of fantasy book. Enjoyed this just as much as Lies, though they aren't really all that similar. The world Bennett created for this is super interesting, and even though this book had a satisfactory ending, I'd love to see more books in this setting. 26. Tehanu by Ursula K. Le Guin - A whole different kind of book than the previous ones. Focuses on some of the characters from the first three books, but later in their lives. It was kind of slow and brooding, but then had a frenetic climax and conclusion. 27. Excession by Iain M. Banks - Not gonna lie this book was a bit of a disappointment. I didn't like the Mind shenanigans as much I as I was hoping I would. The Excession itself didn't seem particularly interesting to me, so most of the plot was over my head a bit. 28. Tales from Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin - Short stories set in Earthsea. One of them is pretty important for the following book, and was probably my favorite. Death is again a big theme, along with confronting fears. 29. The Other Wind by Ursula K. Le Guin - Here we go, I feel like I read the other 5 books in the series specifically for the payoff The Other Wind provided. Really slammed home the theme of death in a fantastic way. Great conclusion to the Earthsea series. 30. Star Trek Vanguard: Declassified by David Mack - Ending the year on a bit of a wet fart. 4 short stories, and all but the final one are prequels to stuff I've already read in the series. So I already know the outcome or the implications of most of the stories. Nevertheless, the second story was pretty engaging and told in a different style than the others in the series, so it held my interest. The first and third stories were bland and I've already forgotten them. The final story was penned by David Mack, and was pretty good up until the ending. I won't go into it due to spoilers, but it trots out one of my least favorite tropes regarding women. Only a few more books in this series. I guess that's a bright side. I ended up reading 13 more books than my goal of 17. I feel pretty good about that, but I'd feel better if they weren't mostly science fiction and fantasy. Next year I hope to read more non-fiction and more books by female authors. See you all next year! apophenium fucked around with this message at 22:48 on Dec 23, 2014 |
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Dec 23, 2014 22:46
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