What Are You Reading Right Now 2.0

[Crazedwraith]

Interesting, Dartzap. Do you mind saying which characters you find so unlikable and why?

I've never seen Breaking Bad, but its the 'hero is cooking up crystal meth' show, right? i'm having trouble placing, Harry and Murphy, good people who help defend the innocent against marauding evil forces as being on the same level as criminal low lifes.

Not trying to attack anyone for not liking DF here, just curious.

[TimothyC]

Ignition! An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants by John D. Clark

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

PDF version?

There are, after all, some chemicals that explode shatteringly, some that flame ravenously, some that corrode hellishly, some that poison sneakily, and some that stink stenchily. As far as I know,though, only liquid rocket fuels have all these delightful properties combined into one delectable whole.

oh yes, fun.

I'm working through the Atomic Rockets' reading list, and can make the following recommendations.
Craig Alan's "Here be Dragons" is fairly good, but probably more of a profound reading experience if you're Jewish;
Mark Kalina's "Hegemony" has something of the same theme of loyalty to odd convoluted future societies that hold out little for the merely human, and some high energy zapping- quite good;
John Lumpkin's "Through Struggle, the Stars" and "The Desert of Stars" are probably not the board's thing- the only capsule description that comes to mind is quite cruel, they read like a Baen book that's actually been intended for mature adults;
Chris Robertson's "Further; Beyond the Threshold" was meant to be the first of a saga set around a timelost deep space explorer plunged into the post- Singularity, good idea but all of the other characters were too post- human to care about and I skimmed most of it;
AJ Stoner's "Iceni Queen" is a space pirate tale, that being the name of the ship, which considering who it makes out to be the good guys and who it makes out to be the bad guys would probably suit SDN very well.

[Dalton]

Kindle Matchbook is live - anyone who bought hardcopy books off Amazon should see if they can get a cheap eBook copy.

[Enigma]

Finished I believe last week reading "Mind Pool" by Charles Sheffield and I am currently reading the Sam Gunn Omnibus by Ben Bova.

[Vanas]

Just started reading Harry's War. It's just come out, a diary of a WWI soldier, Harry Drinkwater. Unlike most WWI diarists, he's a decent writer and notably not only survived the war, having signed up on day 1, but went back to his diaries after the war to tidy them up. Not got far in it yet, but it's already fascinating, especially as he is a member of one of the ill-fated Pal's Batallions.

I'm currently on Ch2: The Somme and later on there's a chapter just called Passchendaele.

[JME2]

I'm working my way through Kevin J. Anderson's The Edge of the World.

He's not among my favorite writers, but I enjoyed The Saga of Seven Suns enough to give his Terra Incognita trilogy a try. It's not too bad, actually.

The style's similar, spanning the viewpoints of multiple characters across multiple cultures. Unlike Saga, it's doing multiple time-jumps in just the first volume as opposed to the five-year skip between Saga #1 and #2.

[Darth Nostril]

Just finished Equoid - a Laundry novella.

Dammit now I can't wait for the next full novel but it's not due til next year! #firstworldproblems

[Ahriman238]

Going out of order with the Dresden books now, picked up Blood Rites at a secondhand book store for $3. And greeted with demon monkeys throwing flaming poo.

[Ralin]

Going out of order with the Dresden books now, picked up Blood Rites at a secondhand book store for $3. And greeted with demon monkeys throwing flaming poo.

In the RPG sourcebook Harry finds out that was represented mechanically as a breath weapon. He was not amused.

[aerius]

Under a Graveyard Sky by John Ringo. Ringo writes a book about the zombie apocalypse.
Surprisingly, it's pretty good, except for a couple parts which are so bad that they're good.

[Ralin]

Going out of order with the Dresden books now, picked up Blood Rites at a secondhand book store for $3. And greeted with demon monkeys throwing flaming poo.

Also Dresden Files really isn't a series you want to read out of order.

[Ahriman238]

Going out of order with the Dresden books now, picked up Blood Rites at a secondhand book store for $3. And greeted with demon monkeys throwing flaming poo.

Also Dresden Files really isn't a series you want to read out of order.

Not a lot to be done now when I'm halfway through. So far I'm not having trouble keeping track of who everyone is and what's going on. Well, I don't know about Kincaid, but I get the feeling he's supposed to be mysterious at this point. I also don't know if one of the books I skipped has the incident Harry mentioned where he was the victim of an entropic curse and someone else had to die in his place. But again, I feel like the essential details were communicated so it's not substantially different from Harry's backstory in the first book.

[Ralin]

I also don't know if one of the books I skipped has the incident Harry mentioned where he was the victim of an entropic curse and someone else had to die in his place.

Okay, you REALLY don't want to miss that book.

[JME2]

I'm working my way through Kevin J. Anderson's The Edge of the World.

He's not among my favorite writers, but I enjoyed The Saga of Seven Suns enough to give his Terra Incognita trilogy a try. It's not too bad, actually.

The style's similar, spanning the viewpoints of multiple characters across multiple cultures. Unlike Saga, it's doing multiple time-jumps in just the first volume as opposed to the five-year skip between Saga #1 and #2.

Just finished the trilogy's second installment, The Map of All Things. It thankfully doesn't fall victim to Second Act Syndrome and keeps the narrative on course.

While there's a 6-year time jump since the end of the last book, it brings the total passage of time since the start of the Tierran-Ureci War to two decades.

It helps KJA's focus on the prominent players on both sides. After 20 years of sustained war, they're grasping that the pointlessness of the cycle of vengeance -- and that too much damage has been done to simply stop.

The mutually assured destruction of both cultures seems unavoidable now. Combined with the wild cards set in motion before the last page, I'm very keen on seeing how this plays out in the final volume.

[Ahriman238]

Finished Blood Rites. Already knew enough about the setting from here and other sources that I went in knowing-
Spoiler

Thomas is Harry's brother and McCoy is the Blackstaff. Was confused about Lanciel til they mentioned the coin under Harry's room. So I guess I get to go back and read about the Denarians.

[JME2]

I'm about a quarter of the way through Andy McDermott's The Covenant of Genesis. It's the fourth novel in his Nina Wilde/Eddie Chase series. These are by no means the best books ever written, but they're overall decent entries in the adventurer archeologist genre. McDermott's humor and pop culture references certainly help.

So far, however, this shaping up to be the strongest entry in the series.

For starters, McDermott's deconstructing the genre as Nina gets held accountable for all the collateral damage and deaths of the preceding books (even if it is being overseen by a political rival). We also have the pair going up against an ancient conspiracy for the first time since Book 1 -- one more massive and dangerous this time around. The Atlantean backstory is also coming back into play for the first time since Book 1 ( barring a brief tie-in during the hunt for Excalibur). Finally -- and most surprisingly -- McDermott's immediately following up on the wham ending of the last book...
Spoiler

...where we learned US President Dalton was backing the Excalibur conspiracy -- and he's wasting no time in revenging himself upon the pair for derailing his false flag operation against Russia.

[Ralin]

Do audiobooks count? Because I started listening to the second Sandman Slim book yesterday.

My god it's the stupidest, most swaggering 'badass' crap I've ever heard, and I LOVE it.

[JME2]

Do audiobooks count? Because I started listening to the second Sandman Slim book yesterday.

My god it's the stupidest, most swaggering 'badass' crap I've ever heard, and I LOVE it.

I count 'em too.

[Ralin]

I started listening to it -again-. I'd drifted away from it before. Damned typos.

[JME2]

Finished The Covenant of Genesis late last night.

Again, it was a serviceable entry in the adventurer archeologist genre. A lot of stuff from Books 2 and 3 was also tied back into the plot.

More importantly, McDermott genuinely surprised me. I was afraid the books were going to stay strictly formulaic ala Cliver Cussler's NUMA series and where the status quo was god.

After the ending of this one, the status quo's now been completely thrown out the window.
Spoiler

Yes, Nina and Eddie managed to destroy President Dalton's career. But he ultimately still won. The IHA is now under the control of Nina's oldest academic rival Professor Maureen Rothschild (who's appointment Dalton backed). She and Eddie have been fired by Rothschild and their reputations are in tatters. The terrorist (and ex-wife of Eddie) Sophia Blackwood is MIA, but they never found the body. So she could come back at some point and now hates their guts even more.

[koputusx]

I'm reading Quantum thief by Hannu Rajamäki. It's bit weird.

[JME2]

Finally starting on the final novel of the Terra Incognita Trilogy.

Again, I'm really keen on seeing how this wraps up. Both Queen Anjine and Soldan-Shah Omra started the Trilogy as well-meaning idealists. But both were forced to ascend to their respective thrones during the War and their respective belief systems have been slowly dismantled over the ensuing years. The never-ending atrocities finally hit critical mass by the end of the last book -- and now both rulers are hellbent on annihilating their opposite culture once and for all.

Such is the danger of the cycle of vengeance.

I'm also curious to see how Prester Hannes factors into the endgame. The fanatical priest is the Trilogy's counterpart to Chairman Basil Wenceclas from KJA's earlier The Saga of Seven Suns. Both men started their respective series as unlikeable conservative pricks and have suffered massive sanity slippage as the narrative has progressed -- slippage which has prolonged the Wars.

[JME2]

I'm about a halfway through The Key to Creation and so far, so good.
Spoiler

KJA's really setting an apocalyptic tone. Both sides have been essentially stalemated for the last 20 years. The approaching Battle for Ishalem is very much the Battle of Cardassia; the outcome will determine the fate of the war.

As expected, I'm also having fun watching Prester Hannes go further off the deep end -- something that shouldn't have been possible, but then I forgot that KJA is the one who gave us Basil Wenceclas. The closer the Dyscovera gets to Terravite, the more evidence the expedition uncovers that the entire gospel -- or at least the creation myth/backstory -- outlined in the Book of Aiden is inaccurate and wrong.

Naturally, a fanatical devotee like Hannes isn't taking this well. He's rejecting reality and given he initiated a mutiny near the end of the last book, I'm very worried he's going to something even more stupid -- and tragic -- before the trilogy ends...

[Darth Nostril]

Just started The God Delusion.