I discovered quite a few great books & authors on the What? Are You Reading? thread on the Slorum.

Currently reading: Loren C. Eiseley's All the Strange Hours The Excavation of a Life .

/hope the tags don't mongle, as Preview didn't preview :-\

Dune; Tender is the Flesh (dystopian book about cannibalism, so far it’s good); Death Note series. I like to be overwhelmed by stories to prevent acknowledgment of reality.

The Magicians book two of three
There's also a 2015 tv show that went on for 5 seasons

Anyone seen Volshebnik?
She posted quite a few very worthwhile books & authors.

Nearly finished Eiseley's All the Strange Hours: The Excavation of a Life.

Finished Eiseley's All the Strange Hours The Excavation of a Life, took a while, since I read at night, before going to sleep.

It's an oddly unconventional memoir of an Anthropologist, with a collection of memories that drift in & out of the narrative.

Currently reading Cory Doctorow's Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It

Probably won't finish it, seems like the whole screed could be boiled down to a substack column.

porn

The Magicians book three of three

qntm: There Is No Antimemetics Division

in spite of Previewing OK, tags got mongled. :-(

Been totally into Keith Pearson's books lately, but my favorites of his are the ones with his character Clement. Clement is/was a fixer from the 70s, sort of a gangster. He was killed but his spirit is in sort of purgatory, and he can't get on to wherever he's going until he helps someone out without killing anyone. So, he keeps getting sent around in time to help people out of their problems, unfamiliar with the future. Definitely fun stuff, but I've honestly enjoyed almost all his books.
https://amzn.eu/d/9BFqAOi

of course, there is also my newest one. I can't recall if I talked about it before the slorum shut down, but here it is again.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FBNK9H83

Its a long read and its really a good one

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-frontiersmen-allan-w-eckert/1100394768

back in september i preordered some new editions of 3 bolano books that are releasing december and just got an email they shipped

Buddy super hyped up dungeon crawler Carl to me
so I read it today and did not really enjoy it.
Lots of annoying family guy or borderlands style humor.
Story was fine and engaging
just lots of dumb style stuff.

I enjoy how the actions inside the dungeon interact with the world outside of the dungeon.
The writing does get better but the humor stays the same as the series goes on.

About 1/3 through The Hercules Text, by Jack McDevitt.
It's a bit of a slog so far, but it was recommended on a reddit science fiction thread.
It was McDevitt's first novel, and could have used a stricter editor.

Took a break and re-read Abandoning a Cat, by Haruki Murakami.

finished the sot-weed factor and enjoyed it immensely; the author does such a good job connecting events and characters but what i enjoyed the most were the hilarious and entertaining slang filled conversations between characters
the main character is such a dork and yet. . .
an excellent satire and "fast" read for such a brick

up next i have either V. by pynchon (his first novel) or bomarzo by manuel mujica lainez
also started the skating rink by roberto bolano last night

^anyone else get the urge to check out books mentioned in this thread?

/just me?

//forever alone.

i forgot about permutation city that was mentioned in the old thread by way and i think you as well phapster

it's sitting underneath all these books but i think i will move it to the front of the queue, get back to some scifi

I finally finished The Hercules Text, by Jack McDevitt. Would not recommend, a very poorly written first effort in desperate need of a sterner editor.

The Professor on GoodReads said:

[...] As for the prose, sorry Jack but it’s sludge and we’re in Repetition City.
Here’s what happens when I put the word “steak” into the search function of my ePub reader:

Page 44: a steak for Gambini, roast beef for Harry
Page 70: They ordered drinks and steaks
Page 145: While they grilled steaks and baked potatoes
Page 195: The steak was delicious
Page 236: …indulged in steaks

…and I list just the one steak reference for each juicy steak-related scene. I won’t start listing all the dead sentences or we’ll be here when the Altheans arrive.

Before I read that review I was tempter to Ctrl + F steak, as it kept popping up every few chapters.

On to To Say Nothing of the Dog, by Connie Willis.

The Murderbot diaries, A country to die for, The alchemy of fate

https://wanderinginn.com/ The Wandering Inn

I've just started this. What is considered the longest fantasy novel series ever.
And growing at roughly 40,000 words a month.

I've been on reading (listening to) a lot of Stephen King recently. I had tried reading The Stand when I was young and couldn't get into it. Just people talking endlessly! Now I get it. His ability to bring characters to life is exceptional. People say his plots are mediocre and his endings are poor, but I don't even really care about that.

My favorite audiobook of all time is It, read by Steven Weber. He does an incredible job.

The Shining was good but the narrator was super dull. Doctor Sleep was a better book and had much better narration by Will Patton. Now I'm listening to the Bill Hodges trilogy (Mr. Mercedes, Finder's Keepers, and End of Watch), also read by Patton. I hadn't expected detective stories from King, but they're enjoyable enough. Again, it's the characters that make it.

I hear people give high praise to Misery and Dolores Claiborne, so those are probably next.

What's everyone's favorite King novels, if you have one?

DNF To Say Nothing of the Dog, by Connie Willis. I dunno, just couldn't get into the story.

Finished Mickey 7, by Edward Ashton in 2 sessions. Pretty enjoyable 3/5.
I have never seen the movie, but might check it out now.

i don't think i've ever read anything by stephen king but recently read a high praise blurb about "happyland" or something which was intriguing
for movies i like shawshank redemp but also i think one called dreamcatcher which i think most people thought was bad
langoliers was corny and bad but i liked it
always wanted to see dolores claiborne and needful things but never did

so the novel i want to check out is "joyland" (i just googled that's the correc t title)

I haven't read Stephen King (or his alt, Richard Bachman) in a very long time, but the first was a short story collection, Night Shift.
I remember a few of the stories gave me the late night jibblies.
Off the top of my head also read The Shining, Christine, and The Running Man.

Not sure if I'll finish Fade-out, by Patrick Tilley. It's an alt-history science fiction written in the mid '70s, but in spite of

a few reviewers said:

brilliant bestselling thriller of humanity's first contact with advanced alien intelligence is a high-tension tour-de-force

I'm finding it slow and very dated.
Lots of characters that are all men, women are sprinkled in to provide coffee and breasts, lots of quasi military boners, but after reading a few hundred pages the promised high tension is so far dusty & flabby.

National Lampoon's Doon
It's not funny at all if you haven't read Dune

I haven't read Doon, but if you liked that, give Bored of the Rings a shot.

My nephew gifted me The Name of the wind for Christmas. I don't think he knows we've been waiting 15 years for Rothfuss to finish the trilogy.

Finished Antimatter Blues, by Edward Ashton in 2 sessions.

It's the 2nd in the Mickey 7 series, and is also pretty entertaining. 3/5

Next up, I dunno, maybe a short story collection? Nothing too weighty.

phapster said:

Nothing too weighty.

The Murderbot diaries. I read most of the first volume in one sitting. Easy to read.

listening to (at bedtime so... Falling asleep to) Burn
which seems like something I'd like... dystopian post-fall-of-democracy type thing

but i haven't gotten 8 minutes in before passing out

phapster said:

Next up, I dunno, maybe a short story collection? Nothing too weighty.

I was doing some house cleaning and I found a collection of short stories called CATFANTASTIC II

probably going to be the next thing i read.

I approve.

finished the skating rink
not bad it has its moments and i can't help but enjoy every word he writes
some characters come together for a summer something happens they go their separate ways when summer ends

next up v. or permutation city or bomarzo

started and finished a little lumpen novelita by bolano took about 2 days maybe? not even rushing
this is probably his shortest novella (novelita i guess)
narration was top shelf and there were some gems as always, one of my favourites being a description of a large-sized character as "naked and hulking and white, like a broken refrigerator" in the middle of an otherwise mostly reverent illustration of the man

i have posthumous stories next but am leaning more towards starting another author first

a frogs dreamin said:

phapster said:

Nothing too weighty.

The Murderbot diaries. I read most of the first volume in one sitting. Easy to read.

^that's a great series of fun-to-read science fiction books. I've read most of them, but see there are a couple I've missed.
/will rectify.

Finished PU-239 and Other Russian Fantasies: A Novella and Stories, by Ken Kalfus after getting bogged down in the novella at the end a few months ago.
I liked the mix of short stories the best, the novella seemed to wander around without much purpose.

Finished The Fourth Consort, by Edward Ashton in 2 sessions. 3/5

Probably going to Murdrum: The Probe Begins, by Sohil Makwana tonight.

Interesting stats about reading in the US.
https://today.yougov.com/entertainment/articles/53804-most-americans-didnt-read-many-books-in-2025
I'm in the freak percentile, 100-160 books a year.

I read a lot of indie books, in support of other indie authors like myself, but also because there are tons of them out there. Lots of crap, but plenty that rival anything the traditional publishing industry can deliver. Some are better, and sadly overlooked.
Currently reading Once an Eagle by Anton Myrer. Not far enough into it for an opinion yet.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Once_an_Eagle

For my own work, I'm thinking about running a free promotion soon. Sales have been tough enough, but what I really need is readers.

Leigh Cowart. Hurts So Good: The Science and Culture of Pain on Purpose.

Sex thing, or John Cougar Mellencamp bio?

Finished All Systems Red in The Murderbot Diaries, by Martha Wells in 2 sessions. 4/5

maybe 100 pages into permutation city it's interesting
crazy how in '92 or '93 whenever this was written the author was writing about voice calls where people put filters on their faces; in the novel it's to mask any tells or emotions their expression might betray instead of whatever they're used for today but spooky that he foreshadowed it

Denkar said:

I haven't read Doon, but if you liked that, give Bored of the Rings a shot.

I finally checked out the wiki page and boy does that seem like a lot.

Finished Artificial Condition, Rapport: Friendship, Solidarity, Communion, Empathy, Compulsory, by Martha Wells in several sessions.

Midway through Network Effect.

I finally checked out the wiki page and boy does that seem like a lot.

I'm not quite sure exactly what you mean by that. It's a very short book.

just that renaming all the characters and places seems like a lot to keep track of

Yeah, Dildo and Frito Bugger is a lot harder to remember than Bilbo and Frodo.

We used to have two copies of Ishay Landa's The Apprentice's Sorceror, and they both disappeared.
I have five stages of dealing with things going missing:
- Eerie Zen Calm
- Frenzied Top-To-Bottom Search
- Exhaustion
- Stubbornness
- Acquiescence

Anyway, Ely gave me a new copy for Christmas so I'm going to be rereading that as my facility in quoting it has gotten pretty dusty.