What Are You Reading Right Now 2.0

[JME2]

Currently working on the (for now) final X-Wing novel, Mercy Kill.

It's another fresh reminder of how much the EU has lost with Aaron Allston's death.

Only Allston could open a Star Wars novel with a jaunt into a Gamorrean strip bar...

[Ahriman238]

Less than a hundred pages into the Mote in God's Eye and I'd like to apologize to David Weber for every snide thing I've said or thought about his compulsive need for infodumps.

Oh yeah that one really is Horatio Hornblower in space, I kept expecting them to lower a rope to measure how many fathoms above the planets surface they were.

The Mote in God's Eye? Did we read the same book?

[Elheru Aran]

Less than a hundred pages into the Mote in God's Eye and I'd like to apologize to David Weber for every snide thing I've said or thought about his compulsive need for infodumps.

Oh yeah that one really is Horatio Hornblower in space, I kept expecting them to lower a rope to measure how many fathoms above the planets surface they were.

The Mote in God's Eye? Did we read the same book?

Perhaps he's mixed David Weber up with David Drake? Drake does have that "Lt Leary" series which is very Hornblowerish...

[Ralin]

Currently working on the (for now) final X-Wing novel, Mercy Kill.

It's another fresh reminder of how much the EU has lost with Aaron Allston's death.

Only Allston could open a Star Wars novel with a jaunt into a Gamorrean strip bar...

It was weak compared to the original Wraith trilogy, but it had such potential

[JME2]

Currently working on the (for now) final X-Wing novel, Mercy Kill.

It's another fresh reminder of how much the EU has lost with Aaron Allston's death.

Only Allston could open a Star Wars novel with a jaunt into a Gamorrean strip bar...

It was weak compared to the original Wraith trilogy, but it had such potential

It's definitely alright, though weaker as you state. And it's not an easy act to follow considering Iron Fist is now in my top 5 favorite EU books.

At least he gave a cameo to Elassar 'Master of the Universe' Targon.

[Crazedwraith]

I realised I never gave Mercy Kill review here when I read it. It's quite good but as said not as good as the original Wraith Trilogy. (and even further behind Starfighters Of Adumar, possibly my favourite SW novel) I think its biggest Strength and biggest weakness is that it concentrates mainly on Piggy. He really holds the book together and allowed Alston to fill in the details in the gaps in the Wraith's history but in the same time I think it left the generation of new Wraiths sadly underdeveloped. (mostly legacy characters ie related to the original wraith) They're fun and have wraith like banter but they aren't much more beyond that.

It's double sad because it would have been a cool bridging novel to have more novels that were focused more on the new guys like the original trilogy changed focus each time. And put Piggy and Face in a more Wedge/Janson/Ackbar type roll. Of course that will never happen now. :'(

[JME2]

I'm also about 60% through and I agree with all your points.

I want to go back and reread Enemy Lines now; I hadn't read the Wraith books at the time and I'm sure they'll play differently given I'm now familiar with Face, Piggy, and Elassar.

But instead I'm holding off until next year. I plan on doing a re-read of the NJO to celebrate the 15th anniversary.

I do like Mercy Kill's flashback to the Vong War. I still firmly believe there's plenty of room for untold stories of the NJO-era and it's a nice lost mission -- or at least up until...
Spoiler

Runt's death. No wonder Piggy hates the Vong -- and Scut -- so much.

[dragon]

I am now reading Space Mission Analysis and Design. I found which books are needed for the Ph'd program I'm gonna enter and figured I'll get an early start on the book. It's a thousand pages thick gonna take a bit to digest

[Ahriman238]

Taking a beak from Niven/Pournelle. Because I've heard good things, most recently from JME, I'm halfway through Redshirts and having a blast.

[JME2]

Heh, glad to hear it.

I can't watch TOS the same way now since I imagine this is what everyone one of those poor saps must have been thinking...

[Ralin]

I realised I never gave Mercy Kill review here when I read it. It's quite good but as said not as good as the original Wraith Trilogy. (and even further behind Starfighters Of Adumar, possibly my favourite SW novel) I think its biggest Strength and biggest weakness is that it concentrates mainly on Piggy. He really holds the book together and allowed Alston to fill in the details in the gaps in the Wraith's history but in the same time I think it left the generation of new Wraiths sadly underdeveloped. (mostly legacy characters ie related to the original wraith) They're fun and have wraith like banter but they aren't much more beyond that.

I think Allston was in kind of an awkward spot with that book. He had to include older Wraiths, otherwise there's not much point calling it a Wraith Squadron novel. But clearly any of the Wraiths that are still active are going to have gone through a ton of experiences, many of them life-changing, given the time gap involved. I have no doubt that Allston had his own timeline planned of what each of them had been up to in the intervening years, but there's only so much time you can spend in flashbacks and info dumps. As for the new Wraiths, some legacy characters were needed to shore up the aforementioned connection to the original squadron, since he was already going pretty light on old-guard Wraiths. Some of them were likely editorially mandated, like Wedge's daughter, and even if those characters weren't the best fit for this particular story it was probably deemed in the best interests of the line as a whole to give them something to do and flesh them out a bit. And to all that you can add the fact that the Galactic Civil War was over and that there was a whole lot less for the Wraiths to do compared to other periods.

Still, it had promise and it could have found its legs if Allston had gotten the chance.

(Maybe we should take this to the Mercy Kill thread)

[Ahriman238]

I should really get back to the Niven/Pourelle book. Surely it'll get better if I just stick it out?

Ah, Hells with it. Downloaded "Please don't tell my parents I'm a Supervillain" So far I'm 1:1 on superhero novels. Soon I Will Be Invincible was a fun parody, Meta was just dull. I suppose this may be the tiebreaker.

[Torben]

Pratchett's Mort is on Kindle at the moment. Loving every minute I get to spend in Discworld - Pratchett certainly knows how to weave characters and a narrative, plus add in the silliness that life deserves. Also listening to Bloodsucking Fiends by Christopher Moore during the work commute - not the first time through that one, always a pleasure to listen to his works.

[JME2]

Kindle-wise, I just finished Tess Gerritsen's Rizzoll and Isles novel The Silent Girl. Nice blend of Chinese mythology and a 19-year old murder mystery.

Audiobook-wise, I'm doing the rounds through my Star Wars audiobooks. The Cestus Deception is currently up.

[JME2]

Just started Empire of Gold, or Book #7 in Andy McDermott's Eddie Chase & Nina Wilde series.

I keep saying it, but what sets McDermott apart from other writers of the archaeologist/adventurer genre is he's very mindful of the mythology and continuity he's built up.

The prologue's a great example. It's been established since the very beginning of the series that Eddie was an SAS operative who spent time in Afghanistan during the 2000's.

So, here, we finally get to see Eddie's first SAS assignment. The team naturally includes his mentor Mac, but McDermott went even further and included two characters who first appeared (and died) in Book #1:

1. American operative Jason Starkman (he and Eddie are still buds, so they haven't had their falling out at this point in the timeline).

2. Belgian-French operative Hugo Castille (We knew they met on a past mission and now we finally get to see how that friendship got started).

So, I take this as a good omen. Combined with the cliffhanger from Book #6 and this should be a decent yarn.

[Ahriman238]

Most of the way through 'Please don't tell my parents I'm a Supervillain' and it's pretty good. I love how it captures the feeling of being thirteen, with the kids stressing about grades, playing around etc. There are some 'don't think too hard about it' moments like how exactly the kids have secret identities when A.) Penny at least is the daughter of two public identity heroes and B.) all three kids, despite either using a screenname, getting one in the heat of battle or being named by an enemy have supervillain names that include or sound like their real names.

[JME2]

About a 1/3 of the way through Empire of Gold and while slightly formulaic, it's pretty good.

Again, McDermott's really good at utilizing the continuity he's built up since Book #1.

The mystery of the Egyptian statues has been building since Book #5 and now he's tied them back to the discovery of 'earth energy' made during the hunt for Excalibur back in Book #3.

They even go back to Glastonbury Tor to generate a more potent reaction to help track Statue #3 -- and being back in the UK finally allows them to finally tackle a key element of Eddie's backstory since Book #3: His estranged, bastard of a father.

McDermott's also reinterpreting the El Dorado legend, so that's a nice bonus.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

I like mote, but if you're finding it, well, marginal, do not for your sanity' s sake go near the sequel.

Slight rant about Hornblower, too- doesn't anyone realise that he was a misfit, an odd man out- seriously atypical of his time and type and breed? High ability but almost neurotically low self esteem? His best work is done in a spirit of masochistic self denial and the high probability of his own death.

Trying to use him as a model, with the inevitable adaptation exaggeration (there must be a trope for it), results in expies even further from well adjusted until I wonder not only what they are doing in a demanding, volunteer service, but what they are doing outside padded walls. Of course, authors who think they can make up for the outrageous things they let their characters away with by making them torurously unhappy in their private lives don't help.

Anyway, recently finished the four volumes of Chris Wooding's Tales of the Ketty Jay , a which one reviewer compared to a steampunk/ magitechFirefly, and actually quite good.

Oh, and some stuff about tanks.

[Simon_Jester]

I like mote, but if you're finding it, well, marginal, do not for your sanity' s sake go near the sequel.

Slight rant about Hornblower, too- doesn't anyone realise that he was a misfit, an odd man out- seriously atypical of his time and type and breed? High ability but almost neurotically low self esteem? His best work is done in a spirit of masochistic self denial and the high probability of his own death.

Trying to use him as a model, with the inevitable adaptation exaggeration (there must be a trope for it), results in expies even further from well adjusted until I wonder not only what they are doing in a demanding, volunteer service, but what they are doing outside padded walls. Of course, authors who think they can make up for the outrageous things they let their characters away with by making them torurously unhappy in their private lives don't help.

Honestly, I think the Aubrey-Maturin stories are a better model. One reason Drake's Lt. Leary novels hold up well, they try to capture that in a spacegoing setting, not Hornblower.

[JME2]

Just finished Empire of Gold and...holy shit.

Despite some formulaic parts, the cliffhanger ending easily puts Books #3 and 4's endings to shame.

A good chunk of the supporting cast has been wiped out and the status quo has been completely upended:
Spoiler

Eddie's Grandmother: Dead of Natural Causes.

Mac: Dead, shot in the back in order to save the Atlantean statues by...

Kit Jidal: The Interpol agent gets thrown into an exploding gas tank by...

Eddie: The ex-SAS operative realized Kit betrayed them. He's now wanted by Interpol for killing one of their officers and can't prove it was self-defense. He's going after Kit's real bosses, the Group, as one of their leaders has been revealed to be...

Sophia Blackwood: Eddie's first wife did indeed survive her plunge off a cliff back in Book #4 --but barely.

And top of all of this, Nina believes Eddie's just as guilty of murder and that he's suffered a mental breakdown due to the back-to-back deaths of his grandmother and mentor.

I'm so seriously tempted to check out the next book right now because I'm completely reinvested in where the series goes now.

[Ahriman238]

Back on the shelf with you, Mote! Guess who just got all the remaining Dresden Files books through Changes?

About halfway through White Night after Spoiler

Harry's flashback to New Mexico.

...and so far I'm really enjoying myself.
Spoiler

Watching Harry mentor Molly is just too cute, even his keeping Bob away semi-protectively.

I shared Harry's certainty that the killer wasn't Thomas, I just expected that thread to stretch out longer.

And my, Harry really has gotten a lot better at fighting (and is more heavily armed) than he was in the first book.

[JME2]

Currently working on KJA's novelization of Clockwork Angels. It's based off a progressive rock album by the band Rush.

Not bad steampunk sci-fi. Kinda curious about the album now.

[orderud]

The Last Colony, John Scalzi. Third book in the "Old Man´s war"-series.

[JME2]

Currently working through Susannah Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell.

Wasn't sure about it at first, but now I'm hooked.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

Lots of strange mil- SF, and I have to say about infodumps, they are a fairly bad solution to the problem of letting the reader know what is going on; apart from most of the others. If you actually can open in media res and have the reader grasp what's happening, the chances are it's because the story is ordinary and mundane with only a gloss; cowboys with ray guns.

I tried Ann Leckie' s ancillary justice, and for want of background and context, concluded that it consisted of damaged people doing stupid things to each other in a screwed up situation, so what was the point? As social science fiction it might be worth something, but that would be a warning not to let the future get that bad to begin with.

Outside SF, the four (so far) volumes of J.D. Davies' historical fiction on the Restoration period RN were a pleasant surprise, largely made by the central character, Matthew Quinton, who we first meet as very definitely a gentleman in the controversy between the two halves of Charles II' s navy, but willing to learn, and to turn a witty and cynical eye on the society he lives in. There are a thousand potboilers along the same lines and few do or deserve to stand out, but these do.

That and a classic, Henri Barbusse's Under Fire. A good thing to read in 2014, this is the raw and open wound in all it's truth and its' price.