Hey!! Let's get some action going! What are we reading?

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Next up: The Paladin by C J Cherryh. My oldest unread purchased book. Looking good so far.

Originally Posted by DrNefario

I normally prefer Cherryh's SF, but I seem to remember liking The Paladin.

Like almost all of Ms. Cherryh's books, I enjoyed The Paladin when I re-read it last year. At least I assume it was a re-read, since I can't imagine missing it when it first came out. But it had been long enough, I honestly couldn't remember any of it, so it was much more a read than a re-read. But now I'm looking forward to the next installment of the Foreigner series, due out in a month or so.

[Rev. Bob]

I'm finally starting the HELP FUND MY ROBOT ARMY!!! anthology, made up of 33 stories told in the form of crowdfunding campaign pages. It was, of course, funded by a Kickstarter campaign.

[Luffy]

The Pillars of the Earth (The Pillars of the Earth #1)
by Ken Follett - 4/5

The Pillars Of The Earth is a curious beast. Before writing this review, I read a few reviews others have ge posted, specially those who had rated it one star. This book made me miserable and provided me with a fleeting enjoyment, probably a feeling associated with junkies. Unlike most long books, I can't fault Follet for stretching out his story with filler and padding. In fact, most of my decision for rating the book 4 stars comes from the fact that most chapters feel integral to the book.

The major divergence with many fans is what is balefully called the collateral damage generally, in the book. There is too much suffering. The numbers are only partly the reason for my distaste. It's not also that true justice and ample revenge was late in coming - in my opinion it never did - it's also the senselessness of the violence. The fact that we're supposed to shrug this off and put our onus on the main characters' particular saga against William Hamleigh intensified this malaise. This reminded me of bloody books of the YA genre that I've read. Exampli Gratia would be the 5th Wave, where most of humanity was wiped out in days and civilization was uprooted like that. To temper the blow of savagery, maybe, the character Jack, in the presence of the monk Phillip is made to wonder about reality in the future, where everything would be better. Allow me to scoff.

This book possesses flaws from both the grimmest of realistic books, and the fluffiest of escapist ones. The suffering goes on and on, more than the hanging scenes - or rather scenery - in the Game Of Thrones books. But the invincibility of the main characters in such a feral environment, the serendipitous pairing of the two major personages, Jack and Aliena, the fulfillment of a desperate oath, the selective trait whereby most of the good guys have a high IQ, the parable like twist where the wicked are undone by the very victims they helped populate, all of this result in a book that I don't like. The reasons of my respect for this book are themselves quite unsound. The ease of the writing, the uncomplicated, two dimensional characters, and the suspenseful exposure to danger between such characters are what made me feel hypocritical to rate the book 2 stars. That's a rating I would give, but I cannot ignore the reluctant pleasure the book gave me. It's a book I will never ever touch, as it's one in a long line of disillusionment and disappointments in my recent experiences as a reader. I celebrate, hail, and acknowledge the reviews of people who have rated the book one star, and I envy their immunity to the rural and cynical charms of it.

[Dngrsone]

Originally Posted by CRussel

Like almost all of Ms. Cherryh's books, I enjoyed The Paladin when I re-read it last year. At least I assume it was a re-read, since I can't imagine missing it when it first came out. But it had been long enough, I honestly couldn't remember any of it, so it was much more a read than a re-read. But now I'm looking forward to the next installment of the Foreigner series, due out in a month or so.

I tried reading through the Foreigner series and lost steam somewhere around book six.

I do love the series, though. Perhaps next time I will read something between each installment...

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Luffy

The Pillars of the Earth (The Pillars of the Earth #1)
by Ken Follett - 4/5

The Pillars Of The Earth is a curious beast. Before writing this review, I read a few reviews others have ge posted, specially those who had rated it one star. This book made me miserable and provided me with a fleeting enjoyment, probably a feeling associated with junkies. Unlike most long books, I can't fault Follet for stretching out his story with filler and padding. In fact, most of my decision for rating the book 4 stars comes from the fact that most chapters feel integral to the book.

The major divergence with many fans is what is balefully called the collateral damage generally, in the book. There is too much suffering. The numbers are only partly the reason for my distaste. It's not also that true justice and ample revenge was late in coming - in my opinion it never did - it's also the senselessness of the violence. The fact that we're supposed to shrug this off and put our onus on the main characters' particular saga against William Hamleigh intensified this malaise. This reminded me of bloody books of the YA genre that I've read. Exampli Gratia would be the 5th Wave, where most of humanity was wiped out in days and civilization was uprooted like that. To temper the blow of savagery, maybe, the character Jack, in the presence of the monk Phillip is made to wonder about reality in the future, where everything would be better. Allow me to scoff.

I was interested to read your views of this. I think it's a wonderful book. Yes, it's a brutal portrayal of life, but for most people at that time life was short and brutal, with an average life expectancy of less than 30 years. I don't personally feel that Mr. Follett has introduced too much gratuitous "suffering" into the book at all. He writes from a knowledgeable position: he is an expert on the time period and its architecture.

Guess it shows that we all see these things differently.

[DrNefario]

Originally Posted by Dngrsone

I tried reading through the Foreigner series and lost steam somewhere around book six.

I do love the series, though. Perhaps next time I will read something between each installment...

I completely lost my place in the Foreigner series. There were so many books with similar titles that I couldn't remember which ones I had read. When I get some time, I need to go through it and figure out where I got to.

[Luffy]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I was interested to read your views of this. I think it's a wonderful book. Yes, it's a brutal portrayal of life, but for most people at that time life was short and brutal, with an average life expectancy of less than 30 years. I don't personally feel that Mr. Follett has introduced too much gratuitous "suffering" into the book at all. He writes from a knowledgeable position: he is an expert on the time period and its architecture.

Guess it shows that we all see these things differently.

There are a few readers on Goodreads who feel Follet doesn't use the research he undertakes for his books. I read Fall Of Giants and there he bent History just for kicks. The life expectancy is so because of high mortality rate among babies.

[CRussel]

Having them come once a year is about right, I suspect, though I know I'm always left wanting more NOW. Usually when there's a new one, I re-read the last couple in the series to orient myself, then jump on the new one. That re-read I usually do as audio books, since the Audible versions are excellent.

[MickeyC]

Just finished Suspect by Robert Crais and it was excellent. I expected this to be a typical Crais mystery with Elvis Cole and Joe Pike but it featured an LA K9 cop and his dog Maggie. Very interesting insight into the dog's senses and feelings. A great read.

Next up All The Light We Cannot See which has been on the NY Times best seller list for 40 plus weeks. Was going to borrow it from my local library but there were 140 holds against the eBook version.

[WT Sharpe]

I'm reading two books at the moment. One is one of the books in the MobileRead Book Club March runoff vote, Lost Horizon by James Hilton. The other is What I'd Say to the Martians: And Other Veiled Threats by Jack Handey. I'm enjoying both.

[Dazrin]

I am about 1/2 way through Timeline by Michael Crichton which was nominated for the March book club, although not a finalist. After this will be either Peter and the Starcatchers by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson or The Innocent by David Baldacci both of which came in yesterday from my library.

My wife is just starting Peter and the Starcatchers, both for herself and to gauge whether it would be appropriate for our daughter, so reading that with her has some draw.

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

I'm reading two books at the moment. One is one of the books in the MobileRead Book Club March runoff vote, Lost Horizon by James Hilton. The other is What I'd Say to the Martians: And Other Veiled Threats by Jack Handey. I'm enjoying both.

Your edit makes much more sense than what you originally had there. I was about to check if there is a different definition of "routing" than what I am familiar with.

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by Dazrin

...Your edit makes much more sense than what you originally had there. I was about to check if there is a different definition of "routing" than what I am familiar with.

Skype is a great way to "type" on tablets and cell phones, but some of it's choices for word substitutions leave a bit to be desired. Why it thought I really meant to write "routing" rather than "enjoying" will always be one of life's mysteries. That being said, Skyping is much better than typing. It allows me to make errors much faster than I ever could if I simply relied on typing and autocorrect alone.

[Dngrsone]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Skype is a great way to "type" on tablets and cell phones, but some of it's choices for word substitutions leave a bit to be desired. Why it thought I really meant to write "routing" rather than "enjoying" will always be one of life's mysteries. That being said, Skyping is much better than typing. It allows me to make errors much faster than I ever could if I simply relied on typing and autocorrect alone.

Is that Skyping... or Swyping? I get them cornfused.

[ATDrake]

Originally Posted by CRussel

Yes, I remember watching it on PBS, and then again on Amazon Prime. Sadly they only did 5 episodes, so far as I can tell. It was a series that I thought had a lot of potential to go further, but apparently ITV didn't agree.

IIRC from reading about it well after it was off the air (thank you, library DVDs for letting me discover a whole bunch of stuff long after the fact), they did the filming for Heat of the Sun in Zimbabwe and that was about the point when the political situation was starting to get really unstable.

It's a shame, because I could have happily watched several more years' worth of it if they'd kept the quality up.

Anyway, prioritizing my reading from the stack of stuff due at the library on the possibility that I may not be in a position to easily return it when it actually becomes due.

Accordingly, read Mercedes Lackey & James Mallory's latest collaboration, The House of Four Winds, which is the 1st in their "One Dozen Daughters" series of AU historical-ish fairy tale-ish fantasies which apparently really are going to try for a dozen books to cover each daughter.

This is set in an alternate real-world universe roughly 1700-1800s-ish, where "thaumaturgy" has kind of always had a major influence in things but has recently-ish undergone a church/state separation and become its own Industrial Revolution, or something like it, so our heroine hails from the land of "Albion", where Marlowe wrote plays and Plato was a Magus (not in Albion, though), and there are further-out lands such as "Khemet" (aka Egypt) and "Hind" (aka India).

Aside from that setup, the premise of this is that our heroine, Clarice (a name I can never think of without associating with The Silence of the Lambs), is the eldest daughter of twelve daughters of the tiny impoverished duchy of Swansgard, which cannot afford to support or dower a full 12 princesses, and thus has equipped them to seek out their fortunes and stop being a drain on the treasury which will one day be passed down to their one and only brother, who happens to be the youngest of the lot.

Now at this point, I suspect the Gentle Reader is supposed to go "yay! 12 entire kickass heroines to read about going about seeking out their fortunes on adventures trickled out slowly at the rate of one a year, whee!", but I freely admit to being a bad Gentle Reader and thinking that male-exclusive primogeniture has a hell of a lot to answer for.

You see, neither Clarice nor her sisters can inherit Swansgard at all, even if there weren't a younger brother involved, and in fact it was trying for said younger brother to be heir rather than some distant cousins which produced said 12 daughters to begin with, which seems like a very wasteful thing in terms of human labour and resources, even in a magically-assisted age.

I recently spent a mere two days in hospital with very severe abdominal pain and infection which thankfully turned out not to be the appendicitis I'd been suspecting it was, and that was just a one-time incident which I quite sincerely hope will never be repeated in my lifetime, much less escalated to anything worse, and I had pain-killing drugs for part of it. I'm still on them now, actually, and due to pop in another dose Real Soon Now.

So, purely as an impartial observer to the process, it seems to me that voluntarily undergoing childbirth which would presumably involve approximately 2 days worth of severe abdominal pain in the form of labour (and probably undrugged with anything really effective), not to mention the preceding 9 months of discomfort and the follow-up post-partum recovery, not just once, but 13 entire times, just to provide a direct-line blood heir to your husband who presumably does not come from an evil wastrel family if you married and did not end up killing him, is not a sign of romantic attachment to one's spouse or commitment to one's familial duty or whatever, but rather one of insanity or masochism or some combination thereof.

Seriously, I'd think that after popping out no later than the 4th attempt, all the titled and wealthy childbearing women in the land would band together and either covertly or overtly start pushing for changes to the laws of the land to allow for at least direct-line female inheritance, even if male primogeniture still came first.

It's certainly the sort of thing that I'd be pushing a presumably-loving spouse with law-making powers to do, even if my hypothetical cultural status was no more than the food preparer cum decorative bedmate cum generational incubator that so many pre-Industrial fantasies seem to think that non-Special female characters were relegated to and I'd be more than happy to wield the Frying Pan Of Doom to crush the skulls of my enemies apply persuasive arguments to the opposition, in the service of campaigning for great justice.

But I digress.

Anyway, the backstory of the setting of this novel was actually rather more interesting than the ostensible actual story. I want to find out more about the point-of-departure, the schism in which Church thaumaturgy was declared to be separate from secular thaumaturgy and the Cromwell-esque Reformation temp-ban on the practice that's hinted at, and the greater integration of more foreign lands wielding more autonomy and trade influence and being less colonized, presumably due to their own thaumaturgical prowess.

Instead, I got to read about the swashbuckling adventures of Princess Clarice of Swansgard-in-disguise as "Mr. Clarence Swann", on a trip to gather the reputation to become a great swordsmaster-in-disguise, because of course even with several millenia's worth of the size-and-strength athletic differential between the biological sexes being offset by the levelling equalizer of magic learnable by anybody without any inborn talent needed for it and apparently not gender-restricted educationally, women Still Can't Do Stuff Or Be Taken Seriously When They Try, sigh.

Aside from that, I did somewhat like Clarice as a character, who had an unobjectionable Standard Action Girl sort of personality.

The actual problem came from the villainous setup and their plotty plots that plotted, which were all rather over-the-top. The chief skill of any Lackey villain must be the moustache-twirl, and these were no exception, being Lulzy Evil types that merrily end lives just to feel powerful and see the lowly peons die.

Anyway, as part of her adventure-going, Clarice takes passage on a ship that turns out to be in the thrall of one of said villainous types who of course has a hidden agenda and yadda yadda terrible things occur and there's pirates involved and then there's more villainous types with hidden agendas and more terrible things occur and along the way there's an enchantment that only True Love can break.

And of course you can guess whose True Love is going to be the feature of the curse-breaking, and you can probably guess the faux-difficulties that their current guise is supposed to be causing. (And no, it didn't involve a desparate quest for the seafaring locating of some fava beans and a nice Chianti to supplement a humanitarian meal set as a challenge from the villain to free the captives, which would have been more interesting, IMHO.)

This is what comes of setting your adventure-with-romantic-elements in such a boringly unimaginatively heteronormative societal setting that you didn't even bother to alter the slightest bit for your magical AU.

More than twice (I'd have said "just once", but I actually have seen this happen about twice in fiction that I've read), I'd like to see the Grand Confession Of Our Hero/ine In Disguise's True Gender not being met with relief because Ooh, That Takes Care Of Some Troubling Urges That Had Been Worrying Me, but instead if not outright disappointment that they weren't actually the gender they were presenting as which the prospective beloved preferred, then at least outright indifference because eh, it works out to the same feelings anyway and either way you make a really attractive fill-in-the-blank* so what do mere underwear contents matter when I can see perfectly serviceable fingers and a tongue from right here?

I'm kind of reminded of the remark that people sometimes make that forget dragons and zombies and magic, the real fantasy kicks in when authors start writing about egalitarian treatment for women and minorities and other marginalized groups into their plots, rather than as exotic accessories to the bog-standard protagonist types.

Mild recommendation if you're into AU-ish magical "real-world" universe fairy-tale-ish adventure fantasy with romantic elements, such as Lackey's prior Elemental Masters and One Hundred Kingdoms series, and if you liked those you'll probably like this. It's perfectly cromulent for what it is, and world-building setup unexamined assumptions quibbles aside, the actual adventure story is reasonably solid, if rather conventionally standard, and the faux-historical background of this is just interesting enough that I'd be willing to try further books from the library to find out a bit more.

Quality-wise, it's actually one of the better recent Lackeys that I've read (and she's had some fairly dreadful continuations of her Valdemar series that I've sat through out of sheer morbid curiosity), and relatively low-ish on her more irritating usual writing tics (e.g., the wangsty bullied-by-age-peers outcast teenage protagonist who whines a lot about having great responsibility to go with great power while being enabled and indulged by the Special People Who Matter Who Naturally See And Understand Their Real Worth, the "I'm so evil, watch me eat this kitten" villain internal monologue rants, the griping about the terrible status quo of the almost comically unjust society one is attempting to overturn instead of I don't know, occasionally writing about a society that has become better already and the problems that can still be found there, etc.). I suspect having Mallory as a co-writer helped smooth out some of that, even if the result is a little bland.

* Insert my standard "bisexuals exist, dammit!" rant here.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Next up: The Paladin by C J Cherryh. My oldest unread purchased book. Looking good so far.

And it was OK. I don't remember reading it before, even now having read it. But it's entirely possible that I have read it before, as it's not very memorable.

Set in a China analogue, heroine comes to be trained by exiled warrior. Not really a lot of fantasy elements, apart from being set in (what I assume is) an almost-China. No mythical beasts, no magic.

One might almost describe it as alternate history, if it was set in a recognisable place/era.

It passed the time pleasantly, but not one of her best.

Next up: The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction for March/April 2015.