What are you reading? — Page 6

I wanted to share my thoughts on a couple of recently finished books.

Dune - Finally finished this.  I can't read as much lately due to my far busier schedule.  I really enjoyed most of it, but was disappointed with a couple of parts.  The rich culture Mr. Herbert can create is very fascinating, and I really found much of the supernatural elements of it to be interesting and believable (such as the Bene Gesserit mastery over their autonomic nervous system, etc.  The concept of a feudal empire in the distant future is quite fascinating to me, and the complications resulting from the political tripod.  It all worked well.  However, what I didn't like was the excessive prescient abilities given by the melange (it made Paul seem less unique in his abilities), the particular telepathic abilities of the water of life, the passing of knowledge from reverend mother to reverend mother, the subsequent changing of the toxic nature of the water of life (seems outside the realm of believability, given the type of universe you feel was already set up and the suspension of disbelief you've already established).  The subsequent Fremen group orgy because of their partaking of the water of life was just weird to me.  Finally, I found the ending disappointing.  I know it was a setup for sequels, but I'm already hesitant to read the sequels, as I've heard they are far inferior.  Paul seems to lose his likable traits and merely becomes an arrogant punk.  I won't spoil too much for those who have not read it, but I simply found the ending to be a letdown, and I can overlook probably every other gripe except that, especially given my hesitancy to continue in the series.

The Silver Chair - I got around to finishing the fourth book in the Chronicles of Narnia.  I was nervous about this one because we lost all the Pevensys as protagonists, and now had to rely on "Scrubb" and "Pole."  I actually liked this book quite a lot, and really enjoyed their, uh, optimistic travel companion, Puddleglum.  That character really added a lot of charm to the story.

I began The Horse and His Boy, but I really felt like jumping to a different series again, so I will finish it later.

I am currently rereading The Hobbit in anticipation of the upcoming movie.  This is a very enjoyable story, but I know I don't have to say much about it to anyone else.  I look forward to reading The Lord of the Rings, which I must confess I've never actually read the trilogy.  I will definitely do it this time.

Finally got "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children."

About halfway through... loving it!

We Can Remember It Wholesale and Other Classic Stories by Philip K. Dick.

Thumbing my way through Arguably essays by Christopher Hitchens, just reading the ones that interest me. A friend of mine keeps nagging me to read Howl's Moving Castle, and she even went so far as to loan me her copy of it, I just need to take the time to sit down and start on it. The Anthologist by Nicholas Baker is also high on my pending reads list. 

<<<WARNING: Bioshock ramble to follow. All persons who have a tendency not to care about Bioshock are advised to stop reading.>>>

I never did finish that Bioshock book I was so excited about... I was REALLY enjoying it, but kept tripping over parts where I felt the author completely misunderstood the source material, or wrote major players completely out of character.

Another annoying habit the author had was forcing direct long stretches of quotes from the game into his dialogue. Tannenbaum, a character who speaks with broken English in the game, is a good example of this. At one point in the book she is in the middle of conversation with another character, speaking in the style the author writes her in, where her English is considerably less broken than in the game, then suddenly for a few sentences the author has her quoting some of her dialogue from the game verbatim and her English gets more broken, once she is done quoting herself her English immediately improves. All this in the course of a single paragraph. Little things like that happened a lot. I eventually couldn't take it anymore. I guess I should appreciate the authors attempt at trying to include as many references and nods to the source material in his book as possible, but I honestly think he took it to an exhausting length. So what if Bridget Tannenbaum doesn't have exactly the same style of broken speech as in the game? I really don't mind, hardly a big deal at all to me. However, once you start having her randomly feel the necessity to start quoting her audio diaries from the games and mixing the two different speech styles within the same sentence, you have something that will pull you right out of the book. It would be like mixing quotes from OT Yoda with quotes from PT Yoda, the result would feel really uneven.

In the game there is an audio diary by Eleanor Lamb, it has her as a child playfully carrying on a conversation with the tape recorder, like a little girl might do with a doll. Eventually she tells the tape recorder that she is going to take him apart, but not to worry, because she will put him back together again. In her mock tape recorder voice she protests, ending in a drowned out "Nooooooooo..." The audio diary went a long way in telling us that Eleanor had a pretty lonely childhood, and also that she was an extremely curious child who liked to take things apart to figure out how they worked.

John Shirley decided to include this scene in his book. He quotes the whole audio diary verbatim, then ends it with Sophia Lamb staring in horror as she watches her little girl start hacking the tape recorder to pieces by stabbing at it with a screwdriver. It make Eleanor come off as kind of a psycho child, rather than lonely and curious.

End overly nerdy nitpicking rant.

Since I got my Kindle I admit to having pirated a few books. Usually when I got a sudden urge to read or thumb through a book I just heard about, but don't have time to drop by the library to check it out. Or, when the book I want to read doesn't have an official e-edition (not a very mainstream reader, so this is more often than not the case).

althor1138 said:

I'm about due for another read of rendezvous with rama.  Might start it tonight actually.  Anybody who hasn't read it definitely needs to.  If you like sci-fi that is.

Read Rendezvous With Rama earlier this year. Finished it in a single Sunday, I couldn't put it down. I was hard to avoid reading the sequel, but my cousin BEGGED me not to do it, lest its "awfulness" pale the beauty of Rendezvous.

Finished The Hobbit and Thursday and I'm finally reading Fellowship.  I began once many years ago and never finished.  This time I'm determined to do it.  I have to say, in the intervening years between their separate releases (I think18 years), Tolkein's style drastically improved.  He's also certainly quite a bit wordier--I don't think I've ever read a longer set of introductory sections before getting to the first chapter of the actual novel.

I do recommend continuing the Ender series.  It gets kind of weird, but I find it interesting.  Though Frink was less interested, you may want to do the Shadow series about Bean as well.

darth_ender said:

Finished The Hobbit and Thursday and I'm finally reading Fellowship.  I began once many years ago and never finished.  This time I'm determined to do it.  I have to say, in the intervening years between their separate releases (I think18 years), Tolkein's style drastically improved.  He's also certainly quite a bit wordier--I don't think I've ever read a longer set of introductory sections before getting to the first chapter of the actual novel.

Every film takes artistic license, but I didn't realize just how drastically the film diverged from the novel.  The movie creates a far more immediate sense of impending danger.  Right now in the book I'm at the point where the four hobbits meet a chap named Tom Bombadil.  Wow, we got none of this in the movies.  I understand that you can only transfer so much of a book to the screen, and don't get me wrong, I love the movies.  I just am surprised at how thus far much of the plot is unrecognizable to what I'd already familiarized myself with.

I think Jackson and his co-writers did a great job of cutting a bunch of crap out of the novels.

^ This is exactly why tv and movie people should not read books. It'd keep a lot of crap off bookstore selves too.

For those of you who are interested, I am just finishing up this outstanding nonfiction book called the Emperor of all maladies. It is an outstanding book.

Since I havent been around much over the past 4 years or so, some of you might not know that I have dived fully into medicine. Over the past 3 years I have been working at the BC Cancer Research Center and the book was recommended to me there. 

As I was saying the book is outstanding the author who is an Oncologist himself, makes the book very easy to ready. There isn't a ton of medical jargon, and he does an outstanding job of explaining all of the complex ideas that come along with cancer, in regular everyday english. Book covers a vast array of time as well. At the start he talks about some of the earliest known cases of cancer(some dating back 3 or 4 thousand years ago), the then talks about advancements in various treatments. What makes the book truly interesting though is not only the science but the history, and social implications surrounding cancer. From radical therapy, to how cigarette companies marketed there products in the 50s and 60s. Through to today and the various targeted therapies that are being developed.

Anyway I really can't say enough good things about the book it really is fantastic. If you ever had even a mild interest in cancer or diseases in general, I highly suggest picking this book up.

anyway thats all for now guys

shimy 

georgec said:

TV's Frink said:

I think Jackson and his co-writers did a great job of cutting a bunch of crap out of the novels.

I haven't read LOTR but everyone I know who has read them says the same thing.

 After getting through Tom Bombadil, the story has taken a much more familiar direction when compared to the movies.  It took me a long time to finish this, but I finally got through Fellowship.  I'm certain a number of people do not enjoy the various aspects of the story that give it depth and history, such as the many songs and mythologies, but I really do enjoy this.  In my opinion, the best change made by the film is increasing the menace of the Ringwraiths.  Overall, though, both stories are enjoyable and I can appreciate their differences.  Now to start The Two Towers.

Started reading Let the Right One In last night, now I am one fifth of the way through the book and running a couple of hours short on sleep for the day.

Kind of wish I hadn't seen either of the movie adaptions before I started reading this. So far, the movies are extremely close to the book. Still really getting into it though.

asterisk8 said:

I'm reading:

It's three novels in one book, I think it's fantasy although I don't know much about it. I only started a couple nights ago. I picked it up used, and I liked the first couple pages so I bought it.

Still reading this. :/

I put it down for several months, only recently picked it back up. I'm enjoying it alright, Peake was an incredible wordsmith, he really made language sing. But it hasn't totally grabbed me to the point where I have to read it every day. Even 133 pages into the first book, it still feels like the introduction.