The library system has finally proffered up Who Wrote the Bible?, which will be the last (for now) in the series of Comrade Samnell recommendations.
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I'm feeling like I need to re-read Castenada pretty soon. Unfortunately, the only one I own is The Teachings of Don Juan (Matus, not De Doodlebug).
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Sounds like very informative reading.
HTFAM-&MHKY! is extremely informative; it recommends going out and pushing around a goldfish tank on a trolley as a way to meet men, and also starting conversations by going up to prospective partners and saying, "Hello, sailor. New in town?" And buying your boyfriend porn mags, which I don't actually believe any woman has ever done, even in 1978. Very spiritually uplifting.
I will say that the pushing a goldfish tank on a trolley probably would work as a conversation starter.
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Yes, but I'm bored of all my conversations starting with, "What the **** are you doing with that goldfish?!"
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Still beats, "What an ugly baby - but at least it looks just like her dad."
I like how the Paladin is more like a magus, or maybe 3.5 martial adepts from the Book of Nine Swords.Just finished Daniel O'Malley's The Rook and am about to start Tim Aker's The Horns of Ruin, a steampunky sword & sorcery tale about Eva, the last paladin of the dead god Morgan.It's good. I've gotten through a couple of chapters, and I like it.
It does have that feel to it, as if the author used a couple of different inspirations for the character. It makes me appreciate it all the more, because the character doesn't end up being one-dimensional.
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If a woman ever said to me "Hello, sailor, new in town?" I just might die of excitement then and there.
Well, I take it back, then - sounds like Tracy's onto something, judging from Kajehase and Doodlebug's reactions :)
Just finished Year of the Unicorn, by Andre Norton - nice change from Conan, and I'll be looking out for more Witch World novels in future, I think...
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I loved the first five Witch World novels -- the writing style is wooden and somewhat sleep-inducing, but the ideas and the storyline were far beyond anything I would have expected. The next few, including YotU, were cool, too. Eventually, though, sometime in the '80s when she was an old lady, Andre Norton opened up the franchise to any fans who could operate a typewriter, and it went downhill from there.
Witch World Series:
1. Witch World
2. Web of the Witch World
3. Three Against the Witch World
4. Warlock of the Witch World
5. Sorceress of the Witch World
Trey of Swords
Ware Hawk
The Gate of the Cat
The Year of the Unicorn
The Jargoon Pard
Zarsthor's Bane
Horn Crown
Were-Wrath
The Crystal Gryphon
Gryphon in Glory
Gryphon's Eyrie*
Songsmith*
Silver May Tarnish*
The Key of the Keplian*
The Magestone*
The Warding of the Witch World*
Ciara's Song*
The Duke's Ballad*
* Co-written with random people
The library system has finally proffered up Who Wrote the Bible?, which will be the last (for now) in the series of Comrade Samnell recommendations.
This Who Wrote the Bible? shiznit is as good as all the reviewers say it is. It's a bit older than The Bible Unearthed and accepts that whole "David-ruled-a-united-kingdom-that-split-in-two" agitprop, but it gets way more into other things like D&Desque internecine church politics with the Aaronids and the Shilonites squabbling over high places and statues. Way cool.
Whizzed through the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society in a couple days (alternately hilarious and sad). Now forging through The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. Three-fourths of the way through, my overwhelming impression is that while every development makes sense, collectively they add up to enough slight left turns that I do not know where this train is going anymore. But I really want to know!
I was amused when I noticed from Kirth's list above that the Andre Norton book I got at the Worcester Public Library for free was the one that comes after the Andre Norton book that Comrade Longears is reading.
[Shrugs]
I'm easily amused.
Limeylongyears' post got me re-reading them. I'm on Ware Hawk now.
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The library system has finally proffered up Who Wrote the Bible?, which will be the last (for now) in the series of Comrade Samnell recommendations.This Who Wrote the Bible? shiznit is as good as all the reviewers say it is. It's a bit older than The Bible Unearthed and accepts that whole "David-ruled-a-united-kingdom-that-split-in-two" agitprop, but it gets way more into other things like D&Desque internecine church politics with the Aaronids and the Shilonites squabbling over high places and statues. Way cool.
Circa 2002, I was talking to a Jehovah's Witness about how the different accounts of the plague in Kings and Chronicles tell a really interesting story about the evolving theology of the day. As I get about these things, I was quite excited. I mean, it's HISTORY!
He took extreme offense at the idea of theological diversity in his holy book and so spent half the time griping at me and the other half just staring blankly. I'm reasonably sure that his brain inserted Chronicles' additions into the Kings version and just ignored the rest. Bummer.
Just got Jacqueline Carey's latest, Autumn Bones, the second in her "Agent of Hel" series. I'm re-reading the first one before I dive into #2.
Just got Jacqueline Carey's latest, Autumn Bones, the second in her "Agent of Hel" series. I'm re-reading the first one before I dive into #2.
I didn't know that was out yet! Awesome! Can't wait to read it.
I just finished The Horns of Ruin by Tim Akins.
I just started The Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin "the Paladin" (not really) Ahmed.
Just got Jacqueline Carey's latest, Autumn Bones, the second in her "Agent of Hel" series. I'm re-reading the first one before I dive into #2.I didn't know that was out yet! Awesome! Can't wait to read it.
I just finished The Horns of Ruin by Tim Akins.
I just started The Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin "the Paladin" (not really) Ahmed.
That's on my ever-expanding list. Let me know what you think of it, would you please?
So far, so good. Only 2 or 3 chapters in, but they're laying on the characterization and exposition really thick without it being burdensome, which is pretty hard to do.
So far, so good. Only 2 or 3 chapters in, but they're laying on the characterization and exposition really thick without it being burdensome, which is pretty hard to do.
Cool beans! I'll definitely keep it on the list. Thanks!
+1 @ Cool beans! :-)
Just read something in Who Wrote the Bible? that made me want to come in here to gloat and express my feelings of vindication.
A bunch of months back, when I was in the Books of Moses, I was in another thread and I wondered wtf? about that whole Moses striking the rock with his staff thingy. Well, someone answered back all snooty and I retreated under the sting of public chastisement, but now I read:
"The main thing is that hitting the rock was good in Exodus, and it is bad in Numbers. It was an act of obedience in Exodus. It is ultimate disobedience in Numbers. It is Moses' worst offense. His punishment is presumably the worst thing that could be done to him: he is not to live to bring the people into the land....Theological interpreters have pondered this passage for centuries, trying to understand just what the nature of Moses' offense was. Was it that he struck the rock instead of talking to it? Was it that he called the people 'rebels'? Was it that he said 'Shall we bring out water from this rock?' instead of 'Shall God....'?"
Next bit is on Moses' Veil which also blew my mind back in the day.
Well, I finished off Who Wrote which makes a perfect three-for-three score on Samnell recommendations.
I am very surprised and somewhat distraught that my interlibrary loan system hasn't spit out that English Civil War history book yet, so I guess now's as good a time as any to get back to War and Peace. Which, at 1,386 pages is much too bulky to read surreptitiously at work, so I've got two weeks to read it in before I get transferred to Sugar Candy Mountain and start devouring endless numbers of fantasy novels on the clock. Thankfully, one of those two weeks I'm on vacation.
Riddle of the Stars
Pillars of the Earth
Games People Play
I admire your dedication in only selecting books whose titles have the exact same length.
I just finished River of Stars by Guy Gavriel Kay (alternate/fantastic history based on ancient China during the (a?) Mongol invasion). Really good stuff with court politics and military tactics and fascinating characters. Just started Scott Lynch's Republic of Thieves.
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Turns out the reason the interlibrary loan system hasn't given up the goods is that the book was an e-book, and I can't access it because a) I don't have an e-reader; and b) I am not enrolled in New England College.
F!@%in' bullshiznit, is what it is.
Welcome to the twenty-first century, Doodlebug; I like like books because because I heat my house with a wood stove, and books are good for burning. :P
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A book about the Jacobites which, despite being very short, packs in a lot of info. Now very much looking forward to Jason Goodwin (who does a decent line in historical detective novels)'s history of the Ottoman Empire.
Tried to order Saladin Ahmed's book through my local library, but their book buying budget has been frozen for the year. I blame Cameron.
If you can find room for it in your own book-budget I'll recommend it. It's nothing earth-shattering or revolutionary, but a really well told story is always worth the price of a trade paperback.
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After my October horror streak (Needful Things and a handful of short stories), I have started reading The Sun Also Rises by Hemingway. Actually I'm almost done with it.
I like the characters, which keeps me interested. I find the prose challenging. The sentence structure reminds me of the way children write. What is up with that? After reading a bunch of his contemporaries (i.e. Fitzgerald, Steinbeck, and Faulkner) it's actually rather jarring to me. Maybe it will grow on me if I read more of his work.
I also have a collection of poems by e.e. cummings that is entertaining me. I always thought his poetry was so cute and wholesome. Au contraire. It is at times brilliant and at other times remarkably raunchy. Kudos to cummings for brightening my commutes with garbled lower-case free-verse poetry about vaginas.
Well, I finished off Who Wrote which makes a perfect three-for-three score on Samnell recommendations.
I am very surprised and somewhat distraught that my interlibrary loan system hasn't spit out that English Civil War history book yet, so I guess now's as good a time as any to get back to War and Peace. Which, at 1,386 pages is much too bulky to read surreptitiously at work, so I've got two weeks to read it in before I get transferred to Sugar Candy Mountain and start devouring endless numbers of fantasy novels on the clock. Thankfully, one of those two weeks I'm on vacation.
Uh...Sugar Candy Mountain?
Also:
A bunch of months back, when I was in the Books of Moses, I was in another thread and I wondered wtf? about that whole Moses striking the rock with his staff thingy. Well, someone answered back all snooty and I retreated under the sting of public chastisement, but now I read:
Heh. I once made the horrendous mistake of trying to point out something about the experiences of the Romani during WWII in a college seminar, and got slapped down so hard I bounced.
What's on your fantasy list? Aside from 100 Places for Goblins to Do It, and don't think I can't see that smirk.
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After my October horror streak (Needful Things and a handful of short stories), I have started reading The Sun Also Rises by Hemingway. Actually I'm almost done with it.
I like the characters, which keeps me interested. I find the prose challenging. The sentence structure reminds me of the way children write. What is up with that? After reading a bunch of his contemporaries (i.e. Fitzgerald, Steinbeck, and Faulkner) it's actually rather jarring to me. Maybe it will grow on me if I read more of his work.
I also have a collection of poems by e.e. cummings that is entertaining me. I always thought his poetry was so cute and wholesome. Au contraire. It is at times brilliant and at other times remarkably raunchy. Kudos to cummings for brightening my commutes with garbled lower-case free-verse poetry about vaginas.
she being Brand new (crappy video quality)
---
I have a love-hate relationship with The Sun Also Rises. But the third time I read it, it was for a junior-level English course on American literature and I read it directly after The Portrait of a Lady. Never appreciated Hemingway's simple, uncomplicated prose so much in all my life.
A book about the Jacobites which, despite being very short, packs in a lot of info.
Uh...Sugar Candy Mountain?
Spoilered for length and boringness:
So, I go to work early in the morning at UPS where I load the trucks that deliver to the Burlington Mall. Towards the end of the year, which most of you call "Christmas" or "the holiday season" but which we refer to as "peak," the volume gets so heavy that a) it doesn't fit into what most of you call "trucks" but what we call "package cars"; b) the packages clog up the very delicate system of conveyor belts and carousels that are the lifesblood of UPS.
So, the Burlington Mall, and I, are moved to an external wall of the building and I load the packages into the trailer of an 18-wheeler, which is then dropped off in the Mall parking lot.
Management calls this the "128 Door" but I call it "Sugar Candy Mountain" because the work becomes easier and, more importantly, there is next to no supervision. Which I take advantage of to build walls with boxes behind which I can: hide; hang out with the other Sugar Candy Mountain occupants; smoke cigarettes; and, most importantly, read fantasy novels at overtime pay.
So, the best books to read at Sugar Candy Mountain are slim paperbacks of about 150 pages (for easy hiding) with lots of short chapters (for easy digestion in between being deluged with boxes full of shopping bags). Plays and poetry also fit the bill, but this year I'm focusing on fantasy novels.
What's on your fantasy list? Aside from 100 Places for Goblins to Do It, and don't think I can't see that smirk.
[Smirks]
Well, the rest of the Fafhrd and Gray Mouser tales would fit the bill, but, alas, I have them collected in a hardcover volume. And the rest of the second volume of Corum would also fit the bill, but those were stolen when I went camping this summer. I'd try the rest of Gaskell, even though they're a bit long for primo Sugar Candy Mountain reading, but I don't have them.
Instead, I am looking at [Grabs books off shelf]:
Spoilered for boring listiness:
The Jewels of Aptor by Samuel R. Delany
The Gates of Creation by Philip Jose Farmer
A Difficulty with Dwarves by Craig Shaw Gardner (looks fun)
Allan Quartermain by H. Rider Haggard
The Door into Summer by Robert Heinlein
The Space Trilogy by C.S. Lewis (Actually, I read Out of the Silent Planet a peak or two ago at UPS, but then I lost the next one at work)
The Riddle-Master of Hed by Patricia A. McKillip
and, not sf/f but it's short and pocketbook-sized:
Elvis, Jesus and Coca-Cola by Kinky Friedman
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Doodles, I don't mean to give you a homework assignment while you're shirking your duties at SCM, but if you're going to read The Riddle Master of Hed, you owe it to yourself to get ahold of the next two books in the trilogy, those being The Heir of Sea and Fire and The Harpist in the Wind.
A Difficulty with dwarves
Doom! :D
Doodles, I don't mean to give you a homework assignment while you're shirking your duties at SCM, but if you're going to read The Riddle Master of Hed, you owe it to yourself to get ahold of the next two books in the trilogy, those being The Heir of Sea and Fire and The Harpist in the Wind.
No worries, mon frere, I've got 'em.
Although, I looked a little closer and it looks like the Farmer is a second volume and the doomed DwD is the first book in a follow-up series, but I'll give it a despite that and the not terribly glowing reviews on goodreads.
Loved the riddle-master trilogy as a kid -- re-read it more recently, and liked it better, if anything. The only let-down was that the cartographer they got to draw the map in the frontspiece was geographically illiterate (Hint: rivers do not flow across a continent, connecting two oceans together. How is that supposed to work?)
Re-reading James Ellroy's verbless L.A. Quartet, or, more accurately the Dudley Smith Trilogy (I didn't really groove on Black Dahlia so I'm omitting it this time). Great prose about some seriously f---ed up shizznit!
Loved the riddle-master trilogy as a kid -- re-read it more recently, and liked it better, if anything. The only let-down was that the cartographer they got to draw the map in the frontspiece was geographically illiterate (Hint: rivers do not flow across a continent, connecting two oceans together. How is that supposed to work?)
Kirth, which edition do you have? The map in my edition (Riddle-Master: The Complete Trilogy, 1999 Ace Fantasy) just shows the western coast of the continent.
Seriously dude? The rivers flow the wrong way across the continent? Only a hydrogeologist would even care . . . :P
The L.A. Quartet, though. I read it after seeing the movie adaptation of L.A. Confidential, and went from being super entertained by the movie to having stress-dreams and nightmares about 1950s L.A. as portrayed in the books. That is indeed some great prose about seriously f---ed up shiznit.
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So, I was getting a little ahead of myself there, talkin' 'bout Tolstoy and Sugar Candy Mountain.
Finished off Quarmall (more great shiznit!) and, hence, Swords Against Wizardry today and I think I will cherish the memory of our boys riding off into the horizon with lithe Ivivis and Friska pressed firmly against them as I move off into the Naploleonic winter. Just thinkin' about it makes me shiver.
In other news, thanks to the Advanced Readings in D&D thread, and the high praise of Comrade Longears, I purchased Gardner Fox's Kothar and the Wizard Slayer at the Nashua Public Library for 25 cents while attending the Socialist Meeting. At 156 pages, it is primo SCM reading!!!
Last night, I didn't feel like starting W&P, so, instead I started The Samurai by H. Paul Varley which is also very short (135 pages). I don't know much about pre-20th century Japan so it's pretty interesting. (Of course, I don't really know that much about post-20th century Japan, either.)
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Loved the riddle-master trilogy as a kid -- re-read it more recently, and liked it better, if anything. The only let-down was that the cartographer they got to draw the map in the frontspiece was geographically illiterate (Hint: rivers do not flow across a continent, connecting two oceans together. How is that supposed to work?)
I love seeing stupid maps. It imparts a feeling of authenticity like nothing else. And today, there isn't even a map in most fantasy books. =(
But the best one, bar nothing, is the cutaway view of Cauldron in the SCAP. The ruins in the cave lie well below the crater lake surface... and there is a large lake in the cave, which connects to the crater lake...
But the best one, bar nothing, is the cutaway view of Cauldron in the SCAP. The ruins in the cave lie well below the crater lake surface... and there is a large lake in the cave, which connects to the crater lake...
On a professional level, this hurts me deeply.
Valves! Naturally occurring valves!
Edit: Looking at my post above, do I even know the difference between east and west? No, I do not.
Reading Snuff, by Terry Pratchett.
Came across what I thought was a quote from the movie Tombstone. Then, a couple sentences later, there was definitely another one. That was amusing.
Not my favorite Discworld novel at the two-thirds mark, but still worth reading for a fan of the series.
Loved the riddle-master trilogy as a kid -- re-read it more recently, and liked it better, if anything. The only let-down was that the cartographer they got to draw the map in the frontspiece was geographically illiterate (Hint: rivers do not flow across a continent, connecting two oceans together. How is that supposed to work?)I love seeing stupid maps. It imparts a feeling of authenticity like nothing else. And today, there isn't even a map in most fantasy books. =(
Somewhere in here, there is a post wherein Joe Abercrombie sez that he refused to have maps in The First Law Trilogy because he thought it was an overused trope.
Then, in the first stand alone follow-up, Best Served Cold he's got little maps at the beginning of chapters (or sections, I don't recall now) that focus on the city where the events are taking place, but not any big all-country encompassing map.
Then, in the next follow-up, The Heroes, he had battle campaign maps.
I thought that was pretty clever, but I don't know what, if any, kind of maps are in Red Country.
While I was laid up with a bad back over the weekend I managed to resume Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child's Agent Pendergast series (after a break of several years) and finish The Book of the Dead. Now it's on to The Wheel of Darkness.
Somewhere in here, there is a post wherein Joe Abercrombie sez that he refused to have maps in The First Law Trilogy because he thought it was an overused trope.
Joe's comment makes no sense to me. If the author has a pretty well-defined geography, it's not a "trope" to have a map; it's a convenience to the reader. Then again, if the author sort of isn't too sure where eveything should be, then I can see omitting it.
Joe's comment makes no sense to me.
Well, "refused to have" and "overused trope" might be slightly inaccurate. As in, he didn't do the first and he didn't say the latter.
Rest of the post is accurate, though.