The B&B Book Review - The Bear and Badger

Gremill

acemuzzy wrote:

pantyfire wrote:

American War - read that. I remember enjoying it but I can’t actually remember anything about it other than a shed.
My memory for consumables is shot to shit.

The but I'm at involves a shed.

Spoiler:

I'm scared of the shed.

The shed is fine. It's the occupant that's broken.

Raiziel

Flowers for Algernon, which I read recently and can thoroughly recommend, is 99p today on Kindle.

Dinostar77

Life Reset: A LitRPG Novel - Novel by Shemer Kuznits

Not finished this yet, listening as a audiobook. Its really entertaining and has suprised me. If anyone wants it let me know and i will drop it into the dropbox.

After being betrayed and cursed by an extremely rare spell, Oren, a powerful and influential player, finds himself as a 1st level Goblin! Without even a fraction of his previous power, he vows to pull through and have revenge on those who betrayed him.His thorough knowledge of the game's world and his unique ability to immerse himself entirely are his only advantages. But first, he must figure out how to survive long enough playing what is basically a low-level fodder monster!

Nina

Gremill wrote:

acemuzzy wrote:

pantyfire wrote:

American War - read that. I remember enjoying it but I can’t actually remember anything about it other than a shed.
My memory for consumables is shot to shit.

The but I'm at involves a shed.

Spoiler:

I'm scared of the shed.

The shed is fine. It's the occupant that's broken.

What's the shed bit again?

acemuzzy

I have now finished American War.

I thought it was very good indeed.

acemuzzy

The shed bit

Spoiler:

Nina

Ah, I thought you meant

Spoiler:

acemuzzy

Ah yeah true. Maybe that was also in a shed.

acemuzzy

Shedloads of sheds, it turns out

EvilRedEye

The Folio Society are re-doing their edition of The Book of the New Sun in a two-volume set if anyone's interested, £125 down from over £400 for the limited edition 4 volume set: https://www.foliosociety.com/the-book-of-the-new-sun-2-volume.html

hylian_elf

Just came in here to post that I’m about to treat myself to that!

Raiziel

It’s a very good series.

acemuzzy

Not even really heard of them. But that's crazy money.

Raiziel

My brief thoughts on the series from earlier in the thread:

Raiziel wrote:

I finished The Citadel of the Autarch last night, which is the fourth and final book in Gene Wolfe’s The Book of the New Sun. It is, quite simply, one of the strangest, most unique works of literature I think I’ve ever read. It’s dense, philosophical and quite often stubbornly opaque. If you’re up for some bizarre, contemplative sci fi, you could do a lot worse. It got under my skin and into my dreams.

acemuzzy

Hmm. Alas I'm not sure I am up for that in my current mental state. But some time!

Raiziel

Yeah, light reading it is not.

davyK

Some lovely FS special/limited editions. I fancied Dracula but it's sold out. Silly money though.

hylian_elf

acemuzzy wrote:

Not even really heard of them. But that's crazy money.

The limited edition? Author signed copies just before he died. They go for mega bucks now.

EvilRedEye

I have mixed feelings about not going for the limited edition but either it would have been a massive sunk cost if I'd held on to them or I basically would have been a scalper if I'd sold them so...

TBH I suspect this non-limited edition will still be a good investment when it goes out of print.

Gremill

Currently reading 'Bear Head' by Adrian Tchaikovsky, the follow up to the brilliant Dogs of War. It's superb. Like DoW it's chock full of interesting, profound and terrifying ideas about the future of AI, bio-modification, free will and what it means to be sentient. It's so good.

Lord_Griff

Not sure I liked the ending of Gideon.

Also the Author is no Mieville IMO.

tigersgogrrr

I can see why you'd go there. I'd agree, though I think she's very good. I've not read King Rat so don't know how first novels between the two compare?

The sequel is a lot more playful with structure.

Lord_Griff

She created a great character in Gideon. However, I bet the publishers said she needs to flesh out the world and other characters, which lead to the appendices.

davyK

Just completed the 2nd book in the Three Body Problem series. The Dark Forest follows on where the first one left off. I remember feeling a bit cheated when I finished the first one because I didn't realise it was a series and it finished on - not exactly a cliffhanger - but with a situation that demanded further reading.

It's well worth carrying on. I still struggled slightly with the Chinese names, but it doesn't get in the way. This is a rather clever story and is an excellent book. I highly recommend this series. It kind of finishes after this - or at least you could complete this 2nd book and be satisfied. There is a 3rd book and I'll more than likely get that at some point in the future.

The book also has some very pleasing prose - far more so than in the first. Not just in general but there are passages that require it to get the ideas across without sounding corny. Considering it is translated from Chinese it represents quite the achievement and I cannot praise the original author and translator enough.

davyK

Just completed Dragonflight, the first Dragonriders of Pern series by Anne McCaffrey.

I was prompted to do this after an exchange between myself and @hylian_elf in another thread. I remember picking up a paperback in this series many, many , years ago when on holiday. I may have been 12 or 13. I remember liking the premise - a planet , Pern, which is part of a system that includes a planet on a very large orbit, the Red Star, that periodically comes close enough for spores , called the threads, to travel to Pern - destroying organic material wherever it lands. The Pern defence against this consists of an army of dragon riders that organise to burn the threads while still in the air - and there is a whole society built around this which is set in a pre-industrial technology era.

The first one sets the scene nicely. It's a bit po-paced as some of these things can be - but it just about gets away with it - though I did start to tire of the bad tempered atmosphere engendered by the characters.

I enjoyed it enough to say I will be returning to this series.

Gremill

davyK wrote:

Just completed the 2nd book in the Three Body Problem series. The Dark Forest follows on where the first one left off. I remember feeling a bit cheated when I finished the first one because I didn't realise it was a series and it finished on - not exactly a cliffhanger - but with a situation that demanded further reading.

It's well worth carrying on. I still struggled slightly with the Chinese names, but it doesn't get in the way. This is a rather clever story and is an excellent book. I highly recommend this series. It kind of finishes after this - or at least you could complete this 2nd book and be satisfied. There is a 3rd book and I'll more than likely get that at some point in the future.

The book also has some very pleasing prose - far more so than in the first. Not just in general but there are passages that require it to get the ideas across without sounding corny. Considering it is translated from Chinese it represents quite the achievement and I cannot praise the original author and translator enough.

+1 on that, it's a superb book. The third one is just as good as Dark Forest and is pretty mind blowing stuff.

davyK

Folio are playing a blinder at the minute - 4 new books that look have caught my eye..

There a Captain America anthology that looks lush - not my thing - but I can imagine it being a thing for Marvel heads.

There's McCarthy's The Road - I read this in a day - found it equally spellbinding and depressing but I reckon it deserves the Folio treatment.

There's a glorious looking Around the World in 80 Days with a fold out map.

Then...there's the 2 volume version of Andrew Chaiken's A Man on The Moon at £150 that looks bloody lovely.

hylian_elf

I bought 3. Delivered yesterday. The Road, Around the World in 80 Days, and The Plague Year.

Man on the Moon looks good but I limited myself to 3 purchases.

acemuzzy

It's good that you thinned out your overpriced game collection, to allow you to build an overpriced book collection. Well played, sir.

Lord_Griff

Jack Kerouac On the Road is brilliant.

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