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Corsair by Jack Du Brul on behalf of Clive Cussler

to be followed by

Corsairville by Graham Coster which is about flying boats and their history, primarily around Africa it would seem. A fortuitous find that cropped up in the same library catalogue search as the above book.

I also have:

The Losers - the new version, not the old "Ghost Tank" one, queued up and ready to be read.

I just finished reading the autobiography of Fanny Lewald (translated from German, obviously). Fucking fascinating; a great read. She was a middle-class Prussian Jew in the 19th century who became a self-supporting writer. She also witnessed an amazing amount of history. Professor Kant walked by her house and waved to her dad every day on his philosopher's walk, for instance. Way cool.

Absolution Gap by Alastair Reynolds and The Last Hero by Terry Pratchett.

I've been reading the Tales of Alvin Maker by Orson Scott Card and the Song of Fire and Ice by George R. Martin.

The Blind Watchmaker by Richard Dawkins

After finishing American Gods I felt compelled to re-read my Sandman collection.

Kodiak wrote:the Song of Fire and Ice by George R. Martin.

Nitpick; It's Ice and Fire by George RR Martin.

I've been re-reading my Culture books. 'Consider Phlebas' and 'The Player Of Games'

Before that I read Stephen King's The Gunslinger. Which I found a really weird book. I read it described as dream like, which is really quite accurate. I felt entirely detached from the book and characters. I did like the flashbacks to Roland's gunslinger training but the rest of it? Not so much.

Would it be adviseable to try and read more of The Dark Tower series? Or is it more of the same?

Crazedwraith wrote: Before that I read Stephen King's The Gunslinger. Which I found a really weird book. I read it described as dream like, which is really quite accurate. I felt entirely detached from the book and characters. I did like the flashbacks to Roland's gunslinger training but the rest of it? Not so much.

Would it be adviseable to try and read more of The Dark Tower series? Or is it more of the same?

They change, but for the worse. I didn't read past book 3 or 4 or so (and I really liked the first and second books). A definite overall decline. You might want to give the comic series a go, they're all in Roland's past so far, and they're quite good.

Currently reading: "Best Served Cold", Joe Abercrombie. Author of "The first law", lots of mercenaries and betrayals so far in the first 10 pages .

Crazedwraith wrote: Would it be adviseable to try and read more of The Dark Tower series? Or is it more of the same?

Yes, it is worth it to read some more, and no it is not all the same. In fact, books two, three and four are quite different from the first book or from the last three and are very good reads. Books 5 and 6... not so much. Book 7 is pretty good, but the underlying themes of the book are a slap in the face to longtime fans, and the continuity leaves something to be desired. Personally, I think your best bet is to read books 2, 3 and 4, and then just leave the rest up to your imagination.

Just read The Diary of Ma Yan, a look into the life of a very poor Chinese farmer girl. Well, poor until her diary got published, anyway. It was all right, and a quick read. Pretty enlightening, sometimes horrifying. It was a little dull, though.

Julian, by Gore Vidal.

If you haven't already, go read it immediately. One of the last great historical novels.

I just finished The World Without Us by Alan Weisman. It rambles, but the territory it rambles over is absolutely fascinating. I must visit Cappadocia.
Next up is Bonk.

I picked up a used copy of Flight: The Complete History by RG Grant for spare change a few days ago. It's currently my take-anywhere book to read in fits and starts whenever I have five minutes, and it's really quite good. The formatting is a bit haphazard but there are many good photos with call-outs in the style of the Eyewitness books (unsurprisingly, also by DK), short pilot bios, and the text is an easy read.

I'm re-reading "The Naked Ape" by Desmond Morris

and re-reading L. Frank Baum's "The Wizard of Oz" for the political intrincacies.

and something called "Sartre and existentialism" by some author, obscured by the editors, to help me get reacquainted with real existentialism (the real deal, not the posing-pretentious "I'm not part of anything" kind of stuff).

Currently reading: "Best Served Cold", Joe Abercrombie. Author of "The first law", lots of mercenaries and betrayals so far in the first 10 pages

Man, that book is seriously dark and cynical, even more so than the First Law Trilogy.

Guardsman Bass wrote:

Currently reading: "Best Served Cold", Joe Abercrombie. Author of "The first law", lots of mercenaries and betrayals so far in the first 10 pages

Man, that book is seriously dark and cynical, even more so than the First Law Trilogy.

Oh yeah. He's being pretty damn brutal with the characters so far, the first book just had the Cripple being, well, crippled (and without using any "magic solutions" for it), so far there have been eyes bubbling a plenty . I'm enjoying it, Abercrombie can write nasty characters pretty well (that was the best part of The First law), and this book has a lot more of them

Just finished The Player of Games a week or two ago, and plowed through Jhereg on wednesday while sick. I have Yendi on order and The Domino Men, which is kind of a sequel to Jonathon Barnes The Somnambulist. And The Somnambulist was fucking awesome.

Going through the CAT C15 engine manual, the Cummins ISX engine manual, and the Peterbilt 367 Owner's Manual. I finished the transmission manual earlier. I'm just re-reading all of them, so it's not really new for me.

I tried starting The Odyssey (Oxford Classics edition), but I fell asleep before I cracked the cover. Been sitting in the "To Read" pile for two years now, I think.

Just finished reading The Grey Knights Omnibus by Ben Counter. That is one hell of a triology..

Before that I read through By Heresies Distressed by David Weber. I love the mix between fantasy and science fiction that he is combining in the Safehold series. It is also very interesting how he is presenting religion in this series. Would definitively advice people who like scifi/fantasy mix to check out the first book Off Armageddon Reef.

The Summer Tree by Guy Gavriel Kay. Interesting, so far, or at least poetically written.

Just finished Diplomacy by Henry Kissinger. Interesting look at history, even if his whining about Nixon being misunderstood is hilarious. Ultimately, though, it's better as a book about how diplomacy works than it is as a history. Which, um, given the title isn't surprising, I guess.

Fuck, I went batshit at a bunch of Borders and B&Ns on my U.S trip. Got everything from Brandon Sanderson to Richard Dawkins to plow through.

I've just discovered Brehm's "Animal kingdom" book in my library. Fascinated, I found that it is now public domain.

I know he's not very scientific, but that's actually a bit of a charm: he doesn't try to make big, educated guesses, he just writes down what he knows. I wonder what the board's biologists would have to say about him.

-The Darkness that Comes Before by R. Scott Bakker, on a friend's recommendation.
-Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett for the obvious reasons.
-The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynche, for a local book club.

Faqa wrote:The Summer Tree by Guy Gavriel Kay. Interesting, so far, or at least poetically written.

Just finished Diplomacy by Henry Kissinger. Interesting look at history, even if his whining about Nixon being misunderstood is hilarious. Ultimately, though, it's better as a book about how diplomacy works than it is as a history. Which, um, given the title isn't surprising, I guess.

Fuck, I went batshit at a bunch of Borders and B&Ns on my U.S trip. Got everything from Brandon Sanderson to Richard Dawkins to plow through.

Were you in California? Orange County, specifically? In either case, I'm sure you saved a lot of money because of the exchange rates.

I'm reading Nightworld, Cadian Blood and a book about Mythology currently. It's a lot of fun.

Reading Trudi Canavans Black Magician trilogy, after that I'm going to try Larry Bonds Dangerous Ground and then see what else I can try, maybe reread Feists Magician.

Don Quixote by Cervantes. I'm up to chapter 15.

Is it bad that the most interesting part of the book so far was the short bio of Cervantes in the front of the book?