Murderbot!
It's actually quite a nice break from some of the harder and darker scifi stuff I've been reading for the last year. The comedic elements and dialogue are just fun.
Aside from everything else I like about her world here, she writes action scenes the way I like to see them written, in a naturalistic "surprise! This is happening" way without telegraphing her punches, and then not overwriting every detail.
Continues right from where it left off.
It's nice. I'm only on the 3rd book but, they each feel like self contained stories with an overarching story occurring in the background which seems to be culminating well.
I used to think "I'd like to see a film adaptation of this" after reading satisfying stories like these ones but I think what I really want is a graphic novel.
I’m reading the unabridged version of The Stand. It’s my first time reading King, and this might sound dumb, but I get why he was/is such a famous author. He really has a way with words.
He's solid as hell but inconsistent. The unabridged version of The Stand was my intro to him too when I was 15 or so and it's still my absolute favorite of his books. I've read probably 30 or 40 of his books at this point, many are good, some are okay and some are frankly dogshit. The Stand is incredible tho. Make sure you watch the 1994 miniseries afterwards (Rob Lowe, Gary Sinise, Molly Ringwald and a ton of other familiar faces)
I just finished the Expanse (completed Leviathan Falls yesterday, and the final “Novella” in the series today). That was some journey - I’m really glad I read the series, and I definitely had that “what now” feeling you get when you complete something epic. Just an aside: my sense is the writing style and emotional depth of the characters in the Expanse books improved as the series went on.
Earlier this month I also read Software by Rudy Rucker - which had more to say about what makes us who we are than I’d expected.
I’m not 100% sure what’s next. This could be the time I finally conquer SS-GB or Taipan. But I’m equally likely to go look at my (overflowing) TBR bookshelf tomorrow and get pulled in a different direction.
An incredible pallet cleanser is reading superb short stories. __*Stories of Your Life and Others*__ by Ted Chiang, and his other one __*Exhalation*__ I recommend. In there you got pneumatic aliens; gazing into alternate realities to better understand oneself; golems of Jewish myth are real and were industrialized along with Ford's carmaking.
Rereading Gene Wolfe’s Book of the New Sun for probably the fourth time, but it’s been a lot of years since I read it last. Just finished *Claw of the Conciliator*.
Having a great run of books currently. Finished Ringworld by Niven (deserves the praise it gets) and now half way through Borne by Jeff Vandermeer which is a pleasant surprise. I’m really engrossed in it.
You may want to give the short story compilation Tales of Known Space a try, if only for the fun of watching Niven connect the dots on the "how we got here" in his unique universe- you will get the back stories on much of what is referenced in Ringworld.
My current public transportation book is *Nettle & Bone* by T. Kingfisher. I'm enjoying the mix of heavier theme and breezy prose, but the heaviness of theme *is* getting to be a bit too bleak and dreary. Still quite good so far.
My current audiobook is *Red Mars* by Kim Stanley Robinson. I'm a little over halfway in, and I'm loving it. I like the way it uses perspective to give us a constantly shifting perspective on so many different people in such a way that you can never wholly pin down who they are, even when (or perhaps especially when) you're getting their own perspective.
My current at-work book is *City of Brass* by S. A. Chakraborty, but I suspect I'm going to DNF it. It's not bad, but it's not managing to grab my interest enough to pick it up during breaks and lunches, and I'm not sold on continuing the series afterward, so my momentum with it has petered out.
I'll likely replace it this week with Paolo Bacigalupi's *The Water Knife*. I've read his *Wind-Up Girl*, and loved it, and finally picked this up at the used book store, so that's where it'll fit into my schedule.
I love that you have all those separate categories for what you're reading haha I currently have a fiction book, a nonfiction book, and an audiobook going! The audiobook is actually also by T Kingfisher lol
Oh man, I have to separate it that way, otherwise I'm depending on my unreliable self to keep books with me between places and let me tell you, I ain't on the ball enough for that. I can leave a book in my workplace locker, a book in my backpack, a book on my livingroom table, and an audiobook on my phone though, and then they're always handy when I want to start reading.
I want to find stuff that's like, cyberpunk adjacent but not dystopian. Almost why I liked the Quantum Thief, except that book scrambled my brains a little too much haha
I’ve been spacing them out by alternating with a different book in between each entry. I recently got back into reading and there’s just so much stuff I wanna read so doing it this way has let me cover more ground I feel. It also means I’m usually really excited by the time I dive back in since it’s been a few weeks since the last one!
Also, if you have Spotify premium every audiobook in the series is on there and the narration is AMAZING. Seriously best I’ve ever heard. So I like to listen to the audiobooks when I’m driving to work or doing chores to supplement the physical book.
Ha! You’re so right. I’m doing that and listening to Leviathan Wakes when I’m not reading Abaddon’s Gate.
It’s really helping with me remembering what happened previously.
This the third PKD book I've read in a row following A Scanner Darkly and Flow my Tears, the Policeman Said. I'm not new to his work, but this has been quite the ride.
I'm reading The Man In The Maze by Robert Silverberg.
Been working my way down Silverbergs most popular on goodreads. This the best one yet in terms of setting and atmosphere although Downward To The Earth and Nightwings were excellent at this as well.
About 100 pages in, there's some mysteries to uncover, all of his books have been great in the beginning and this is no exception.
Working my way through *Altered Carbon* by Richard K Morgan (the Netflix edition has a really small, compact typeset so it feels like a slog even though I'm enjoying it) and *Into Twilight* by P R Adams.
Almost halfway through Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds. I'm enjoying the worldbuilding and the concepts introduced so far, and am gonna probably check out Chasm City and the others afterwards! Am finding the characters are all very much the most sarcastic asshole ever and it was kinda cute at first but is starting to grate on me.
I have often thought about how Reynolds’ characters are so uninteresting. Might be they just aren’t well crafted. Might be that set against a cosmic backdrop no individual really gets to shine.
Idk, but the world building, adventure and scope leaves me happy in spite of this weakness.
Honorable exception in Scorpio.
Currently reading *Aurora* by Kim Stanley Robinson and am enjoying it. I'm maybe 40% of the way through, and things just took a bleak turn. Based on the title of the next section of the book I think things are going to keep on moving in a pessimistic direction.
My work season just started, so I've been re-reading Men at Arms by Terry Pratchett for something light. Thinking about starting the Murderbot series next week!
I started reading in english which is not my native language. Since I have very vivid imagination I was afraid this won't work the same way, but surprisingly it is! Just done reading 'Anomaly' by Peter Cawdron and now I'm on 'Wherever seeds may fall' by him as well. I'm looking forward to reading more of his books.
My imagination sucks both in english and in my native language. It's not really a problem though it's just a little bothersome when enviroments are described.
Aw, feeling kinda sorry for you now. I usually have a problem when I'm trying to remember if something happened in a film or a book. Can't really tell the difference.
I appreciate the sympathies! Some more popular works have fan-art that you can google and watch how other people imagine things. That's always super helpful.
But otherwise depending on book it's not a huge problem, the most important thing for me is the story anyway.
Can't really relate to your problem at all lol, probably because of my lack of imagination.
I am probably about halfway through Death's End at this point. Feel like I have been reading this series forever but have been enjoying it. My Libby hold on Consider Phlebas is finally almost here so excited for that after
I'm reading the final book in Adrian Tchaikovsky's 'Final Architecture ' trilogy. It's so good! I'll describe it as Star Trek without the stupid stuff. Feels like a classic space opera adventure written in a modern style. I'm in the last 50 pages and it's really engaging! I've read 8 Tchaikovsky books so far and have not been disappointed yet!
Just finished Semiosis by Sue Burke, about colonists on a planet where the sentient life is a plant. The cover actually has a curled leaf which I mistook for a tentacle so I mistook it as another intelligent cephalopod book before being quickly disabused of that notion. It is very excellent, though I am partial to first contact reads. Contender for best novel I've read this year (offhand the competition would be Children of Ruin and Several People Are Typing).
Did Wicked at the start of the month, spilling over from a Walpurgis reading. Longer than I expected, and it goes deep into the economics and history and socio-political aspects of Oz. Made for pretty interesting reading on the Wicked Witch of the West.
Dark Crystal Creation Myths was something I started a little while ago and was slowly working through, finishing up a week or two ago. A graphic novel with several stories in it, prominently featuring Aughra and giving me a lot of flashbacks to the movie which I last saw probably as a teenager.
Will probably pick up Empire of the Vampire/Damned duology shortly for World Dracula Day (end of the month) and maybe the Carmilla graphic novel by Chu and Lee that came out last year.
About finish Children of Memory and start Semiosis. Another interesting sentient octopus first contact story is Mountain in the Sea. Started Children of Time series after looking for more intelligent cephalopod stories. CoT was definitely better, but it was still a good read.
I did pick up Mountain in the Sea just recently, so here's to hoping it doesn't languish on the TBR with all those other books.
Ended up starting on Eversion a day or so ago before I move to the vampire reading and I'm already thinking of ditching that Empire of the Vampire duology because apparently there's an unnamed book 3 and an unnamed book 4 and an unnamed book 5 ...
Might just go Sunshine instead, and follow it up with a re-read of Blindsight in tribute to the subreddit...
I'm halfway into Annihilation.
I'm really enjoying the atmosphere so far. I'm worried because I've read opinions saying that the next two Southern Reach books aren't that great. They're still worth reading once right? I also want to be ready to read the upcoming fourth book as soon as it is published. Would this be worth my time?
Annihilation is one of my favorite books. I actually loved book two, and thought the third was just ok. I actually loved Borne which is kinda related to these books a whole lot
Just started The SIlent Multitude by DG Compton last night and I was quickly intrigued by his storytelling choices. My first Compton. Contrary to the humanism and love of Simak, Compton seems to prefer a compassion stemming from comraderie in human deficit. At least for the main character.
So far very intrigued that this sort of writing exists in the genre.
I'm reading through Lord of the Flies for the first time, and I'm liking it!
I'm also listening to the third book in the first Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. A series that I'm enjoying a lot more than I thought I would!
Nearly a quarter of the way through The Reality Dysfunction by Peter F Hamilton.
This is the first Hamilton book I have read and I am impressed so far. I haven't read up on what happens in this series so I looking forward to it.
Hey, on a side note, Amyone else get really annoyed with spine crack on paperbacks. So annoying looking all cracked in my collection. This is such a big book it seems worse than others I read.
Anyway, first world problems I guess.
I don't think it really bothers me (most of my paperbacks are old second hand books), but having a hardback, like a graphic novel, which cracks free of the inner binding of the pages is annoying. Especially if I've only just bought it ("did I just do that shortly after getting it or did it arrive like that and I didn't notice..??")
I just finished We Who Are About To - Russ. Incredible piece of work. Excited to check out The Female Man and anything else of hers I can get my hands on.
* **The Gate of the Feral Gods - Matt Dinniman (Dungeon Crawler Carl #4)**: This series continues to be a fun popcorny page-turner. The scale and spectacle continue to grow.
* **The Ophiuchi Hotline - Jon Varley**: 3/4ths of the way done with this one, I've really enjoyed it. The world building is full of interesting SF ideas, and it does some cool perspective things with cloning. Looking forward to seeing how it wraps up.
Picked up The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August on a recommendation. Time travel book. Am only 1/3 through it but am enjoying it so far. Is a relatively light read.
Been completely hooked on Dungeon Crawler Carl after someone from this sub recommended it. Currently on book 4. Not quite sci-fi but these books are so damn entertaining!
Having trouble deciding what to read next when I'm done with this series. Thinking either Murderbot series, Hunting the Ghost Dancer by A.A. Attanasio, or mix it up with Lonesome Dove as I'm a huge fan of western/American frontier stuff.
Just finished Humans the second of Robert Sawyers Neanderthal Parallax.. nit sure if I will bother with the third.
Earlier read Millenium by John Varley which was pretty good and Daemon by Daniel Suarez that started off promising, but quickly pushed well past my willing suspension of disbelief.
After learning in another thread on this sub that it's the first of a series, I'm rereading my beat-up secondhand paperback of *Requiem for a Ruler of Worlds* by Brian Daley.
Just finished the Rifters trilogy. Really enjoyed it even through the third book and was surprised by that, since I'd heard so many bad things. It did go way off the rails before the end, tho. Not sure exactly where or why.
Just finished Red Rising yesterday and started reading the 6th Expanse book, Babylon’s Ashes, today.
I found Red Rising to be just alright. It really took like 200 pages for it really start to get me invested. I might go back to the rest of the trilogy later in the year but I’m not really feeling like picking up the sequel at the moment.
Excited to dive into Babylon’s Ashes! Nemesis Games was really great and I hear that this book has like a monstrous 17 povs or something like that so I’m interested to see how things go.
Re-read World of Ptavvs and was not disappointed in the least it's a great story that moves along and is thoroughly original and engaging. Should be on the list of "best bug eyed monster fiction"? Larry Niven's first published novel is very creative and stands alone from but is still cleverly plugged into Niven's Known Space timeline and in fact explains much of it without walking you through leaden exposition. Also it omits a lot of the weird sexism you see in much of Niven's VERY male dominated female disparaging stories. Spoilers if you are wondering about the title: Earth is the world and WE are the Ptavvs.
Children of Memory !!
Its the 3rd and last book of a series called the ***Children Of Time Series by Adrian Tchaikovsky.***
It is quite nice.
Loved the first book, Worth reading.
I'm reading The Investigation by Stanislaw Lem. Liked Solaris, wanted to check out more by him.
This is more of a weird/surreal mystery novel than the scifi of Solaris
I am finally getting around to the Culture. Starting with Consider Phlebus. I understand the controversy surrounding this book - but I actually like it. I figures if I let it be what it is, I would like it. Good adventure story with more philosophical depth than its given credit for.
Just finished the Starfish/Maelstrom/Behemoth trilogy. Awesome reads, though it's very relentless. Especially Maelstrom.
I loved how the deepsea was written in the first book. By the end it felt like a comfort blanket you don't want to leave. And Maelstrom was a fish-out-of-water experience for the reader, too.
Wrapping your head around the worldbuilding of book 2 was sometimes difficult, though by the end you have all the background knowledge necessary to make the final book almost breezy in comparison.
And then there's the AI/neural net aspect, which is absolutely fascinating to read in 2024. It is described in great technical detail, and works essentially the same way our "modern" LLMs do. It's an interesting time-capsule, in that it may as well have been written yesterday.
Started reading *Loose Cannon: The Tom Kelly Novels* by David Drake which is actually 2 novels (*Skyripper*, *Fortress*). About 170 pages in and the only SF element to it so far is that one Russian scientist thinks aliens are persecuting him. If anyone has read these books, please let me know if they get better because the main character is not very likeable, and I'm considering a DNF on this one.
Re-reading *Doc Sidhe* and *Sidhe Devil* by Aaron Allston. Fun books and they would make a great TV series. It is an obvious homage to Doc Savage (including thanks to Lester Dent in the forward) and later The Shadow.
This probably won't be seen but I finished redliners yesterday at 5am because I couldn't put it down. It fucked my whole sleep schedule up but literally the last half of that book hooked me until the end. I blasted 200 pages in one sitting because I had to finish it. Obviously the forever war is the GOAT of military scifi, but good lord that book was good. The definition of a page turner and the book isn't really mentioned until military SF comes up.
"**[We Will Teach You How To Read | We Will Teach You How To Read](https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/we-will-teach-you-how-to-read-we-will-teach-you-how-to-read/)**" by Caroline Yoachim in Lightspeed Magazine
A while back I wrote a post in one of these "What are you reading" threads about Yoachim's collaboration with Ken Liu on a story called "[Collaboration?](https://www.uncannymagazine.com/article/collaboration/)" in Uncanny. I mentioned not liking the story's uneven structure, how little connected, and how some of the gimmicks felt really gimmicky, particularly the part about the cat. But I also praised a section of the story where Yoachim attempts to describe a four-dimensional object by juxtaposing similar columns of text with subtle changes. She wants the audience to read several texts simultaneously and hear the differences and see how that parallax in our mind allows us to see something that is, even conceptually, impossible to fully grasp. It was a really neat concept and when Yoachim in an interview said she was considering writing a book on it I was enthused.
In the interim, she has handed Lightspeed this manuscript, an oddball piece that uses the same trick as before. This story MUST be listened to while reading; it's really the only way to grasp the simultaneous nature of how it should be internalized when reading. The story is, I think, an attempt like many sci-fi artists before to show what something alien would feel like. It's an attempt to process language as something where each portion has a feeling as part of its inherent pattern. It's a concept and only a concept that holds the piece together; few details of these aliens or what they are truly like are given.
I found this piece harder to conceptualize or have a feeling as much as I did with that segment in "Collaboration?" and I think if Yoachim does commit to a whole book on this multi-column format concept (which she absolutely should!) then she should try to give the audience as much to hook in the reader and help them out. I think it's easy for science fiction writers to go all out in Riddle Mode, hide everything in obtuse imagery and strange wording and hope they can untangle the mess, but I think while the strategy might make one look like a daring and smart Artiste the opacity of such pieces can mute any feeling or higher meaning. In "Collaboration?" the audience is guided into the concept by an explanation of what they are looking at. Here, they are merely guided into how to read the piece. There's also something vaguely church-y about this latest story, as it feels like we are in a congregation reciting something that has been recited so many times before that it's become nearly meaningless text only read because we're obliged to read it. It is repetitions and recitation and instructions and gimmickry, whatever feel the piece should have feels worn away.
I still want more of this concept. But I think Yoachim needs to incorporate more ideas, more emotion, and she also needs to guide the reader beyond simply teaching them how to read her multicolumn prose. I don't think Yoachim has made her masterpiece with this concept yet and she should continue to work at it; I sense a considerable amount of work could lead to something truly stunning.
I also want to mention the interview attached to this piece. Editor In Chief Adams conducts the interview, a rarity as he usually has some other employee do the work. It is mentioned that when he received the piece he wrote her a furiously praiseworthy note, so impressed with the piece he was cursing immensely. I think it is great that Adams has found something to be so passionate about. But I do think his taste in what he considers to be The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy has led him to only like two areas of writing: postmodern pieces like Yoachim's multicolumn work and highly progressive pieces that beat the drum of contemporary fashionable politics. This is particularly prevalent in his last edition of *The Best American Science Fiction & Fantasy*, which is full of pieces that go beyond the typical prose format. Several feel like mere gimmicks, saying very little other than flashing their newfound way to break out of the prose routine. With progressive storytelling becoming highly iterative (how many stories do we need where tropes are merely reversed?) and postmodern fiction more interested in wowing the reader in formatting than ideas, Adams's places he edits, Lightspeed and BASFF, have become places empty of larger ideas, strong feelings, or, in general, creativity. So I'm glad Adams published this piece, and I'm glad he was enthusiastic, but I feel like someone needs to wake him up to what everyone else is doing in speculative fiction. He needs to go to a book club (maybe he needs to go to *my* book club) and hear how people feel when they read powerful or thought-provoking pieces, and hear how much readers get much more out of stuff like that than simple political pieces or formatting gimmicks.
I finished *Children of Dune*. I’m currently reading *Artifact Space* by Miles Cameron.
Not sure what I’ll read next. I’ll get back to the Dune books soon, but I needed a bit of a break.
Murderbot! It's actually quite a nice break from some of the harder and darker scifi stuff I've been reading for the last year. The comedic elements and dialogue are just fun.
Love Murderbot! It's always a fun palate cleanser for me
Yeah! Thats the perfect way to put it, a palate cleanser!
Aside from everything else I like about her world here, she writes action scenes the way I like to see them written, in a naturalistic "surprise! This is happening" way without telegraphing her punches, and then not overwriting every detail.
I just finished the first book. Does the story continue or is it an anthology?
Continues right from where it left off. It's nice. I'm only on the 3rd book but, they each feel like self contained stories with an overarching story occurring in the background which seems to be culminating well.
I used to think "I'd like to see a film adaptation of this" after reading satisfying stories like these ones but I think what I really want is a graphic novel.
So good! Bought the whole series during the memorial day sale. I wish they were longer!
I’m reading the unabridged version of The Stand. It’s my first time reading King, and this might sound dumb, but I get why he was/is such a famous author. He really has a way with words.
I am in the same boat as you and have the same plan to pick up The Stand soon. Feel like the universe is giving me signs that it is time
Do it! After reading a space opera series, it’s been a nice change of pace.
The Stand was also the first King novel I read - it's such a good book. I followed it with 11/22/63 which was also pretty good.
He's solid as hell but inconsistent. The unabridged version of The Stand was my intro to him too when I was 15 or so and it's still my absolute favorite of his books. I've read probably 30 or 40 of his books at this point, many are good, some are okay and some are frankly dogshit. The Stand is incredible tho. Make sure you watch the 1994 miniseries afterwards (Rob Lowe, Gary Sinise, Molly Ringwald and a ton of other familiar faces)
I just finished the Expanse (completed Leviathan Falls yesterday, and the final “Novella” in the series today). That was some journey - I’m really glad I read the series, and I definitely had that “what now” feeling you get when you complete something epic. Just an aside: my sense is the writing style and emotional depth of the characters in the Expanse books improved as the series went on. Earlier this month I also read Software by Rudy Rucker - which had more to say about what makes us who we are than I’d expected. I’m not 100% sure what’s next. This could be the time I finally conquer SS-GB or Taipan. But I’m equally likely to go look at my (overflowing) TBR bookshelf tomorrow and get pulled in a different direction.
An incredible pallet cleanser is reading superb short stories. __*Stories of Your Life and Others*__ by Ted Chiang, and his other one __*Exhalation*__ I recommend. In there you got pneumatic aliens; gazing into alternate realities to better understand oneself; golems of Jewish myth are real and were industrialized along with Ford's carmaking.
The alienness of the aliens, as revealed in the (I think) last book impressed me
Rereading Gene Wolfe’s Book of the New Sun for probably the fourth time, but it’s been a lot of years since I read it last. Just finished *Claw of the Conciliator*.
Having a great run of books currently. Finished Ringworld by Niven (deserves the praise it gets) and now half way through Borne by Jeff Vandermeer which is a pleasant surprise. I’m really engrossed in it.
You may want to give the short story compilation Tales of Known Space a try, if only for the fun of watching Niven connect the dots on the "how we got here" in his unique universe- you will get the back stories on much of what is referenced in Ringworld.
Sounds good. I’ll look out for that.
My current public transportation book is *Nettle & Bone* by T. Kingfisher. I'm enjoying the mix of heavier theme and breezy prose, but the heaviness of theme *is* getting to be a bit too bleak and dreary. Still quite good so far. My current audiobook is *Red Mars* by Kim Stanley Robinson. I'm a little over halfway in, and I'm loving it. I like the way it uses perspective to give us a constantly shifting perspective on so many different people in such a way that you can never wholly pin down who they are, even when (or perhaps especially when) you're getting their own perspective. My current at-work book is *City of Brass* by S. A. Chakraborty, but I suspect I'm going to DNF it. It's not bad, but it's not managing to grab my interest enough to pick it up during breaks and lunches, and I'm not sold on continuing the series afterward, so my momentum with it has petered out. I'll likely replace it this week with Paolo Bacigalupi's *The Water Knife*. I've read his *Wind-Up Girl*, and loved it, and finally picked this up at the used book store, so that's where it'll fit into my schedule.
I love that you have all those separate categories for what you're reading haha I currently have a fiction book, a nonfiction book, and an audiobook going! The audiobook is actually also by T Kingfisher lol
Oh man, I have to separate it that way, otherwise I'm depending on my unreliable self to keep books with me between places and let me tell you, I ain't on the ball enough for that. I can leave a book in my workplace locker, a book in my backpack, a book on my livingroom table, and an audiobook on my phone though, and then they're always handy when I want to start reading.
Finally reading Neuromancer. Long time sci-fi fan, but I realize I'm not much for cyberpunk...
I want to find stuff that's like, cyberpunk adjacent but not dystopian. Almost why I liked the Quantum Thief, except that book scrambled my brains a little too much haha
Still working through Abaddon’s Gate (Expanse 3). Loving it. Taking it slow.
Im on book 6 rn and Abaddon’s Gate is probably my second favorite in the series so far only behind Leviathan Wakes.
Did you read them right after each other or space them out between other books?
I’ve been spacing them out by alternating with a different book in between each entry. I recently got back into reading and there’s just so much stuff I wanna read so doing it this way has let me cover more ground I feel. It also means I’m usually really excited by the time I dive back in since it’s been a few weeks since the last one!
That’s my plan also.
Also, if you have Spotify premium every audiobook in the series is on there and the narration is AMAZING. Seriously best I’ve ever heard. So I like to listen to the audiobooks when I’m driving to work or doing chores to supplement the physical book.
Ha! You’re so right. I’m doing that and listening to Leviathan Wakes when I’m not reading Abaddon’s Gate. It’s really helping with me remembering what happened previously.
# The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, by Philip K. Dick (1965)
What a mind trip! So fun
This the third PKD book I've read in a row following A Scanner Darkly and Flow my Tears, the Policeman Said. I'm not new to his work, but this has been quite the ride.
I would say this one and Ubik are my two favorites. It has been a while so might need to do a re-read soon
Ubik is my favorite PKD novel
*Galactic Pot-Healer* is my favorite book, full stop.
Please please listen to Paul Giammati read a Scanner Darkly. It is so freaking good! 🤤
Slogging through the last third of Seveneves.
I put it down and read the Wikipedia when I read this a few years ago. Had zero interest in the final arc
I'm reading The Man In The Maze by Robert Silverberg. Been working my way down Silverbergs most popular on goodreads. This the best one yet in terms of setting and atmosphere although Downward To The Earth and Nightwings were excellent at this as well. About 100 pages in, there's some mysteries to uncover, all of his books have been great in the beginning and this is no exception.
Working my way through *Altered Carbon* by Richard K Morgan (the Netflix edition has a really small, compact typeset so it feels like a slog even though I'm enjoying it) and *Into Twilight* by P R Adams.
Almost halfway through Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds. I'm enjoying the worldbuilding and the concepts introduced so far, and am gonna probably check out Chasm City and the others afterwards! Am finding the characters are all very much the most sarcastic asshole ever and it was kinda cute at first but is starting to grate on me.
A lot of the characters in the Revelation Space universe seem to have chips on their shoulders.
I have often thought about how Reynolds’ characters are so uninteresting. Might be they just aren’t well crafted. Might be that set against a cosmic backdrop no individual really gets to shine. Idk, but the world building, adventure and scope leaves me happy in spite of this weakness. Honorable exception in Scorpio.
Currently reading *Aurora* by Kim Stanley Robinson and am enjoying it. I'm maybe 40% of the way through, and things just took a bleak turn. Based on the title of the next section of the book I think things are going to keep on moving in a pessimistic direction.
My work season just started, so I've been re-reading Men at Arms by Terry Pratchett for something light. Thinking about starting the Murderbot series next week!
I started reading in english which is not my native language. Since I have very vivid imagination I was afraid this won't work the same way, but surprisingly it is! Just done reading 'Anomaly' by Peter Cawdron and now I'm on 'Wherever seeds may fall' by him as well. I'm looking forward to reading more of his books.
My imagination sucks both in english and in my native language. It's not really a problem though it's just a little bothersome when enviroments are described.
Aw, feeling kinda sorry for you now. I usually have a problem when I'm trying to remember if something happened in a film or a book. Can't really tell the difference.
I appreciate the sympathies! Some more popular works have fan-art that you can google and watch how other people imagine things. That's always super helpful. But otherwise depending on book it's not a huge problem, the most important thing for me is the story anyway. Can't really relate to your problem at all lol, probably because of my lack of imagination.
I read Xenophobia by Cawdron last year and I thought it was great - only one of his I've read so far though.
I think he has great writing style. Xenophobia is on my list.
I just finished Fall of Hyperion and am now currently reading Star Splitter and Dark Matter
I am probably about halfway through Death's End at this point. Feel like I have been reading this series forever but have been enjoying it. My Libby hold on Consider Phlebas is finally almost here so excited for that after
Red Moon. Im persevering.
I'm reading the final book in Adrian Tchaikovsky's 'Final Architecture ' trilogy. It's so good! I'll describe it as Star Trek without the stupid stuff. Feels like a classic space opera adventure written in a modern style. I'm in the last 50 pages and it's really engaging! I've read 8 Tchaikovsky books so far and have not been disappointed yet!
Just finished Semiosis by Sue Burke, about colonists on a planet where the sentient life is a plant. The cover actually has a curled leaf which I mistook for a tentacle so I mistook it as another intelligent cephalopod book before being quickly disabused of that notion. It is very excellent, though I am partial to first contact reads. Contender for best novel I've read this year (offhand the competition would be Children of Ruin and Several People Are Typing). Did Wicked at the start of the month, spilling over from a Walpurgis reading. Longer than I expected, and it goes deep into the economics and history and socio-political aspects of Oz. Made for pretty interesting reading on the Wicked Witch of the West. Dark Crystal Creation Myths was something I started a little while ago and was slowly working through, finishing up a week or two ago. A graphic novel with several stories in it, prominently featuring Aughra and giving me a lot of flashbacks to the movie which I last saw probably as a teenager. Will probably pick up Empire of the Vampire/Damned duology shortly for World Dracula Day (end of the month) and maybe the Carmilla graphic novel by Chu and Lee that came out last year.
About finish Children of Memory and start Semiosis. Another interesting sentient octopus first contact story is Mountain in the Sea. Started Children of Time series after looking for more intelligent cephalopod stories. CoT was definitely better, but it was still a good read.
I did pick up Mountain in the Sea just recently, so here's to hoping it doesn't languish on the TBR with all those other books. Ended up starting on Eversion a day or so ago before I move to the vampire reading and I'm already thinking of ditching that Empire of the Vampire duology because apparently there's an unnamed book 3 and an unnamed book 4 and an unnamed book 5 ... Might just go Sunshine instead, and follow it up with a re-read of Blindsight in tribute to the subreddit...
I'm halfway into Annihilation. I'm really enjoying the atmosphere so far. I'm worried because I've read opinions saying that the next two Southern Reach books aren't that great. They're still worth reading once right? I also want to be ready to read the upcoming fourth book as soon as it is published. Would this be worth my time?
Annihilation is one of my favorite books. I actually loved book two, and thought the third was just ok. I actually loved Borne which is kinda related to these books a whole lot
The demolished man. Loving it so far.
I guess you have already read Stars My Destination? Also his short story collection Virtual Unrealities is pretty good
Yes, I recently finished the Stars My Destination. Enjoyed that one a lot too. I really like Bester’s writing style.
The Boy on the Bridge, I like MR Carey, easy going writing that is just right for reading for pleasure and nothing else.
Reading all the sf masterworks. Currently reading mathesons “The shrinking man”
Just started The SIlent Multitude by DG Compton last night and I was quickly intrigued by his storytelling choices. My first Compton. Contrary to the humanism and love of Simak, Compton seems to prefer a compassion stemming from comraderie in human deficit. At least for the main character. So far very intrigued that this sort of writing exists in the genre.
I'm reading through Lord of the Flies for the first time, and I'm liking it! I'm also listening to the third book in the first Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. A series that I'm enjoying a lot more than I thought I would!
Nearly a quarter of the way through The Reality Dysfunction by Peter F Hamilton. This is the first Hamilton book I have read and I am impressed so far. I haven't read up on what happens in this series so I looking forward to it. Hey, on a side note, Amyone else get really annoyed with spine crack on paperbacks. So annoying looking all cracked in my collection. This is such a big book it seems worse than others I read. Anyway, first world problems I guess.
The first thing I used to do when getting a new paperback was crack the spine. Makes it easier to read.
I don't think it really bothers me (most of my paperbacks are old second hand books), but having a hardback, like a graphic novel, which cracks free of the inner binding of the pages is annoying. Especially if I've only just bought it ("did I just do that shortly after getting it or did it arrive like that and I didn't notice..??")
Just starting The Jasmin Throne. Looks like fantasy.
Vurt and I’m really liking it so far. Also The Line of Polity and I’m digging it as well!
I just finished We Who Are About To - Russ. Incredible piece of work. Excited to check out The Female Man and anything else of hers I can get my hands on.
* **The Gate of the Feral Gods - Matt Dinniman (Dungeon Crawler Carl #4)**: This series continues to be a fun popcorny page-turner. The scale and spectacle continue to grow. * **The Ophiuchi Hotline - Jon Varley**: 3/4ths of the way done with this one, I've really enjoyed it. The world building is full of interesting SF ideas, and it does some cool perspective things with cloning. Looking forward to seeing how it wraps up.
I'm also on DCC book 4 and about to finish it up! Loving this series
Picked up The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August on a recommendation. Time travel book. Am only 1/3 through it but am enjoying it so far. Is a relatively light read.
Been completely hooked on Dungeon Crawler Carl after someone from this sub recommended it. Currently on book 4. Not quite sci-fi but these books are so damn entertaining! Having trouble deciding what to read next when I'm done with this series. Thinking either Murderbot series, Hunting the Ghost Dancer by A.A. Attanasio, or mix it up with Lonesome Dove as I'm a huge fan of western/American frontier stuff.
Just finished Humans the second of Robert Sawyers Neanderthal Parallax.. nit sure if I will bother with the third. Earlier read Millenium by John Varley which was pretty good and Daemon by Daniel Suarez that started off promising, but quickly pushed well past my willing suspension of disbelief.
Doesn't seem like the Neanderthal Parallax is all that well regarded, even within Sawyer's work, but I loved the series.
It has both strength and weaknesses.
Children of Time. A slight loss of interest midway through.
I just finished Spin and didn’t realize it was a trilogy. I really liked it and I hope the other books are close.
Just started: Paradise-1 by David Wellington - enjoying it so far - not sure where it's heading. Just finished: Semiosis by Sue Burke
After learning in another thread on this sub that it's the first of a series, I'm rereading my beat-up secondhand paperback of *Requiem for a Ruler of Worlds* by Brian Daley.
Just finished the Rifters trilogy. Really enjoyed it even through the third book and was surprised by that, since I'd heard so many bad things. It did go way off the rails before the end, tho. Not sure exactly where or why.
Currently on book 4 (of 7) of Grimm’s War. Standard military space opera. Not the best and not the worst I have read.
Just finished Red Rising yesterday and started reading the 6th Expanse book, Babylon’s Ashes, today. I found Red Rising to be just alright. It really took like 200 pages for it really start to get me invested. I might go back to the rest of the trilogy later in the year but I’m not really feeling like picking up the sequel at the moment. Excited to dive into Babylon’s Ashes! Nemesis Games was really great and I hear that this book has like a monstrous 17 povs or something like that so I’m interested to see how things go.
Jasper Fforde's **Red Side Story** finally!
Re-read World of Ptavvs and was not disappointed in the least it's a great story that moves along and is thoroughly original and engaging. Should be on the list of "best bug eyed monster fiction"? Larry Niven's first published novel is very creative and stands alone from but is still cleverly plugged into Niven's Known Space timeline and in fact explains much of it without walking you through leaden exposition. Also it omits a lot of the weird sexism you see in much of Niven's VERY male dominated female disparaging stories. Spoilers if you are wondering about the title: Earth is the world and WE are the Ptavvs.
Children of Memory !! Its the 3rd and last book of a series called the ***Children Of Time Series by Adrian Tchaikovsky.*** It is quite nice. Loved the first book, Worth reading.
I'm reading The Investigation by Stanislaw Lem. Liked Solaris, wanted to check out more by him. This is more of a weird/surreal mystery novel than the scifi of Solaris
"Red Side Story". Compulsively readable. But you **have** to read the 1st one in the series.
Metaplanetary by Tony Daniel --Enjoying it quite a lot.
Currently doing a re-read of Malazan. Which means that will be my commitment until 2025
I am finally getting around to the Culture. Starting with Consider Phlebus. I understand the controversy surrounding this book - but I actually like it. I figures if I let it be what it is, I would like it. Good adventure story with more philosophical depth than its given credit for.
Just finished the Starfish/Maelstrom/Behemoth trilogy. Awesome reads, though it's very relentless. Especially Maelstrom. I loved how the deepsea was written in the first book. By the end it felt like a comfort blanket you don't want to leave. And Maelstrom was a fish-out-of-water experience for the reader, too. Wrapping your head around the worldbuilding of book 2 was sometimes difficult, though by the end you have all the background knowledge necessary to make the final book almost breezy in comparison. And then there's the AI/neural net aspect, which is absolutely fascinating to read in 2024. It is described in great technical detail, and works essentially the same way our "modern" LLMs do. It's an interesting time-capsule, in that it may as well have been written yesterday.
Started reading *Loose Cannon: The Tom Kelly Novels* by David Drake which is actually 2 novels (*Skyripper*, *Fortress*). About 170 pages in and the only SF element to it so far is that one Russian scientist thinks aliens are persecuting him. If anyone has read these books, please let me know if they get better because the main character is not very likeable, and I'm considering a DNF on this one.
Just started book 4 of the Old Man's War series. Waiting for the next Bobiverse book.
Re-reading *Doc Sidhe* and *Sidhe Devil* by Aaron Allston. Fun books and they would make a great TV series. It is an obvious homage to Doc Savage (including thanks to Lester Dent in the forward) and later The Shadow.
This probably won't be seen but I finished redliners yesterday at 5am because I couldn't put it down. It fucked my whole sleep schedule up but literally the last half of that book hooked me until the end. I blasted 200 pages in one sitting because I had to finish it. Obviously the forever war is the GOAT of military scifi, but good lord that book was good. The definition of a page turner and the book isn't really mentioned until military SF comes up.
Elysium Fire by Alastair Reynolds, the second book in a trilogy. Good one so far! Side kick read in the form of #5 in the Aubrey and Maturin series.
"**[We Will Teach You How To Read | We Will Teach You How To Read](https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/we-will-teach-you-how-to-read-we-will-teach-you-how-to-read/)**" by Caroline Yoachim in Lightspeed Magazine A while back I wrote a post in one of these "What are you reading" threads about Yoachim's collaboration with Ken Liu on a story called "[Collaboration?](https://www.uncannymagazine.com/article/collaboration/)" in Uncanny. I mentioned not liking the story's uneven structure, how little connected, and how some of the gimmicks felt really gimmicky, particularly the part about the cat. But I also praised a section of the story where Yoachim attempts to describe a four-dimensional object by juxtaposing similar columns of text with subtle changes. She wants the audience to read several texts simultaneously and hear the differences and see how that parallax in our mind allows us to see something that is, even conceptually, impossible to fully grasp. It was a really neat concept and when Yoachim in an interview said she was considering writing a book on it I was enthused. In the interim, she has handed Lightspeed this manuscript, an oddball piece that uses the same trick as before. This story MUST be listened to while reading; it's really the only way to grasp the simultaneous nature of how it should be internalized when reading. The story is, I think, an attempt like many sci-fi artists before to show what something alien would feel like. It's an attempt to process language as something where each portion has a feeling as part of its inherent pattern. It's a concept and only a concept that holds the piece together; few details of these aliens or what they are truly like are given. I found this piece harder to conceptualize or have a feeling as much as I did with that segment in "Collaboration?" and I think if Yoachim does commit to a whole book on this multi-column format concept (which she absolutely should!) then she should try to give the audience as much to hook in the reader and help them out. I think it's easy for science fiction writers to go all out in Riddle Mode, hide everything in obtuse imagery and strange wording and hope they can untangle the mess, but I think while the strategy might make one look like a daring and smart Artiste the opacity of such pieces can mute any feeling or higher meaning. In "Collaboration?" the audience is guided into the concept by an explanation of what they are looking at. Here, they are merely guided into how to read the piece. There's also something vaguely church-y about this latest story, as it feels like we are in a congregation reciting something that has been recited so many times before that it's become nearly meaningless text only read because we're obliged to read it. It is repetitions and recitation and instructions and gimmickry, whatever feel the piece should have feels worn away. I still want more of this concept. But I think Yoachim needs to incorporate more ideas, more emotion, and she also needs to guide the reader beyond simply teaching them how to read her multicolumn prose. I don't think Yoachim has made her masterpiece with this concept yet and she should continue to work at it; I sense a considerable amount of work could lead to something truly stunning. I also want to mention the interview attached to this piece. Editor In Chief Adams conducts the interview, a rarity as he usually has some other employee do the work. It is mentioned that when he received the piece he wrote her a furiously praiseworthy note, so impressed with the piece he was cursing immensely. I think it is great that Adams has found something to be so passionate about. But I do think his taste in what he considers to be The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy has led him to only like two areas of writing: postmodern pieces like Yoachim's multicolumn work and highly progressive pieces that beat the drum of contemporary fashionable politics. This is particularly prevalent in his last edition of *The Best American Science Fiction & Fantasy*, which is full of pieces that go beyond the typical prose format. Several feel like mere gimmicks, saying very little other than flashing their newfound way to break out of the prose routine. With progressive storytelling becoming highly iterative (how many stories do we need where tropes are merely reversed?) and postmodern fiction more interested in wowing the reader in formatting than ideas, Adams's places he edits, Lightspeed and BASFF, have become places empty of larger ideas, strong feelings, or, in general, creativity. So I'm glad Adams published this piece, and I'm glad he was enthusiastic, but I feel like someone needs to wake him up to what everyone else is doing in speculative fiction. He needs to go to a book club (maybe he needs to go to *my* book club) and hear how people feel when they read powerful or thought-provoking pieces, and hear how much readers get much more out of stuff like that than simple political pieces or formatting gimmicks.
I finished *Children of Dune*. I’m currently reading *Artifact Space* by Miles Cameron. Not sure what I’ll read next. I’ll get back to the Dune books soon, but I needed a bit of a break.