Daily Reading (20th April)

[ironed_orchid]

What have you been reading lately? Everything counts, from the user's manual to the back of the cereal box!

Comments

[ironed_orchid]

I finished Ninefox Gambit and skimmed some documents for work that I need to edit.

[joancrawford]

I read a companion piece to You Must Remember This' current season, "Dead Blondes."

I also did a book trade with my best friend so I've got two new books (The Witches of New York by Ami McKay and Behind Closed Doors by B.A. Paris) to dig into once I'm finished my current read.

[ironed_orchid]

\o/

[hardboiledbaby]

Yay, a YMRT fan! One of my favorite podcasts :)

[nou]

The Witches of New York sounds really interesting, thanks! I’ve added it to my to-read list.

[joancrawford]

Well, I'll thank my best friend for you! She's the one who gave me the book, I don't think I ever would've picked it out on my own. ;)

[nou]

Yes, please do pass on my thanks!

[dhampyresa]

I finished Vercors' Les Animaux Dénaturés -- I believe the English title is You Shall Know Them.

[ironed_orchid]

Nice!

[nanila]

I read installments of my Serial Reader books: The Secret Garden and Anne of the Island.

Serial Reader has been brilliant for keeping me reading.

[ironed_orchid]

I'm glad you found something which works for you.

[hardboiledbaby]

Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon. I've been trying to get through at least five pages on my ereader every night, and I manage it most nights. About halfway through. Plus some fanfic squeezed in, here and there.

Also, hi! *waves* New to the comm, looking forward to the posts :)

[ironed_orchid]

Welcome!

I hope you're enjoying Hammett. I'm more of a Chandler fan, but I did enjoy The Maltese Falcon when I read it about 100 years ago.

[hardboiledbaby]

Thanks! I do loves me some Chandler too, yes :)

[nou]

Welcome to the community!

[hardboiledbaby]

Thank you :)

[nou]

Since last report, I have read:

• Cargo of Eagles by Margery Allingham. I quite enjoyed her short stories in Mr Campion and Others, but really wasn’t all that keen on this one. It took me several tries to get started, and then I found myself alternately bored by the storyline and annoyed by the way the main characters treated women. I gave up about 15% of the way through.
• The Good Immigrant edited by Nikesh Shukla. I’ve been making this one last, reading one or two essays at a time, but have sadly finally reached the end. Thoroughly recommended.
• Whispers Under Ground, Broken Homes, Foxglove Summer by Ben Aaronovitch. Third, fourth, and fifth in the series, still enjoying them.
• No Longer At Ease by Chinua Achebe. Still working my way through the Nigerian classics. This is sort-of part of a trilogy, and all three novels have depressing endings in very different ways. I’ll likely re-read all three though.
• Tempest In The Tea Room and Too Many Coins by Libi Astaire. These were OK. I liked that they were set in a Jewish context, but I did feel that the clue to the resolution of the mystery in Tempest In The Tea Room was made really really explicit over and over and over again, to the point where I wondered if it was going to be a red herring. I also found the conversational language very stilted. I probably won’t read more in the series, unless someone makes me a very enthusiastic recommendation.
• Brother’s Ruin by Emma Newman. I enjoyed this one, though I did feel it might have been better as a novel rather than a novella — it seemed to stop fairly abruptly, and since there’s clearly going to be more in the series, why not give us a bit more of the story?
• Savant by Nik Abnett. I really wanted to like this one, but there are not enough SF trappings in the world to make me enjoy a book about an inept-at-life mathematical genius and the selfless woman who teaches him how to love.
• The Corporation Wars trilogy by Ken MacLeod — well-written but not really my thing. I slogged my way to the end of the first book, made a start on the second, then decided life's too short.
• Various things with a polar theme: White Fang by Jack London, A Negro Explorer at the North Pole by Matthew Henson, and South! by Ernest Shackleton. I also re-read “Scott and Scurvy” at Idle Words (there’s a bunch more stuff there about Antarctica too).
• Lion’s Blood by Steven Barnes. Got about a third of the way through but wasn’t finding it particularly interesting, so stopped.
• Players by Paul McAuley. As above, except I only made it a quarter of the way through this one.
• In Order To Live by Yeonmi Park. This was OK, I suppose, but I wouldn’t see any need to read it again. It’s the memoir of a North Korean refugee who ended up in South Korea after some time in China, which could have been interesting but it was quite blandly written, pretty much just a recitation of “this happened, then this happened, then this happened”.

(Sorry this is so enormous! I will try to check in more often so things don’t pile up quite so much.)

[ironed_orchid]

I love The Rivers of London series! Although still haven't read The Hanging Tree, might have to borrow a copy if I can't wait for the paperback to come out.

Also heard good things about The Good Immigrant, might have to stick that on a wishlist.

Never apologize for reading!!! We'll just have to post more prompts so your lists don't build up ;-)

[nou]

<3

[momijizukamori]

I started in on The Goblin Emperor, which I bought ages ago, got busy, and completely forgot I had until it came up in a conversation on the last [Bad username or unknown identity: dw_news"] post. I'm enjoying it so far, though lunchtime reading means I'm not far in yet.

[ironed_orchid]

I've heard good things about it. Hope you get some time to read.

[nou]

I enjoyed The Goblin Emperor so much that I re-read it again from the beginning immediately after finishing it. (It’s not the first book I’ve done that with, though certainly the first in a couple of years.)

[momijizukamori]

That's a promising endorsement :)

[kitcatwoman]

Earlier this week I started reading 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami, but i had to stop. Just when things seemed like they were going to pick up, the story would slow down. Then, the process would repeat itself. maybe one day I'll give it another try.

I'm currently reading Celebrity in Death by J. D. Rob. I'm not a huge fan of murder mysteries like i used to be, but i will always have a soft spot for Eve Dallas. :)

Anyway, I'm new to the community, so I just wanted to say hi. I look forward to lots of discussions with all of you.

[hardboiledbaby]

Hi, fellow newbie! :)

[ironed_orchid]

I have that same issue when reading Murakami. Once I finish his books I usually find them worth the effort, but there have been a few that were a real struggle to keep going.