What Are You Reading?

[Camo6]

Two thumbs up for grapes of wrath. Don't be surprised if you start talking in an okie drawl when you put it down tho. On holiday and making my way through a game of thrones. Haven't read much fiction for a few years though i think I'll start the dark tower series again. King at his best imo.

 

[browndog]

Recently got through the Game of Thrones series and waiting for the next book. Read all Alistair Reynolds books, anyone read him. He is a mind blowing SF writer. Started on Ian M. Banks series with Consider Phlebas which I found a bit of a let down after Reynolds stuff and now on Suzi Quatro's autobiography.

 

[Mardoo]

Beer Reading: For Love of Hops and The Comeplat Meadmaker.

Fiction: Prince of Ayodhya by Ashook Banker. Great take on the Ramayana.

 

[Mobbee007]

Recently got through the Game of Thrones series and waiting for the next book. Read all Alistair Reynolds books, anyone read him. He is a mind blowing SF writer. Started on Ian M. Banks series with Consider Phlebas which I found a bit of a let down after Reynolds stuff and now on Suzi Quatro's autobiography.

Didn't really care for Reynolds but loved The Skinner by Neal Asher. Actually I haven't read a bad Asher book so far.
Just started re reading Robert G Barretts works after his recent passing. One of the greatest Aussie authors in my opinion. Am also re reading Magician by Raymond E Feist. Just finished The Last Theorem by Arthur C Clarke & Frederick Pohl brilliant book & very sad Clarke is also no longer with us. Also have The World of Null A by A E Van Vogt to start next week
Also hated GRR Martins books so ******* dull that I stopped after 4 books & the tv series is the worst piece of shit I've seen in years imo. Did winter ever come?

 

[browndog]

Didn't really care for Reynolds but loved The Skinner by Neal Asher. Actually I haven't read a bad Asher book so far.
Just started re reading Robert G Barretts works after his recent passing. One of the greatest Aussie authors in my opinion. Am also re reading Magician by Raymond E Feist. Just finished The Last Theorem by Arthur C Clarke & Frederick Pohl brilliant book & very sad Clarke is also no longer with us. Also have The World of Null A by A E Van Vogt to start next week
Also hated GRR Martins books so ******* dull that I stopped after 4 books & the tv series is the worst piece of shit I've seen in years imo. Did winter ever come?

Wow, I just read up on Neal Asher and The Skinner on Wikipedia, looks like my next purchase, thanks RB.

 

[Camo6]

Might have to look for this one too thanks rexbanner. Been wanting a good sci fi read for a while. Got four books into hubbards mission earth decology and got sick of the repetitive crap. God knows how he kickstarted such a global following of fruitcakes. I put magician up there with my all time greatest fantasy along with lotr and the hobbit. Was gonna buy it the other day but saw GOT and chose it cos of how much i enjoyed/enjoying tv series. Can anyone recommend any other good sci fi novels to add to my list?

 

[Mardoo]

Camo6 John Varley's Gaia series and his short stories are a bit of fun.

 

[Mobbee007]

Camo there's heaps of older series that are awesome like the Rama series by Arthur C Clarke (pretty much anything he's written is brilliant) or Foundation by Asimov or the mars series by Kim Stanley Robinson that a mate loves but I found too dry (boring) or Ashers Agentl Cormac series is great. Or the Dayworld trilogy by Phillip Jose Farmer. Or try Forever War by Joe Haldeman. I have about 650 books at home most of them pulp scifi the rest fantasy but most of them are 50s-70s golden era stuff not so much new sorry
Or try Robert A Heinlein nearly all of his tie in at some point but he's not everyone's cup of tea.
The Dune series if you haven't read it? But not the last books that were meant to finish it they were bloody terrible imo
Or for fantasy Feist, Eddings (Redmption of Althalus was freaking great) Piers Anthony or David Gemmel to name a few.
Hope that helps?
Totally forgot Enders Game by Orson Scott Card. It's great but the quality deteriorates the further into the series, again imo

 

[kymba]

I seem to remember the nights dawn trilogy by Peter F Hamilton was a pretty good sci-fi space opera if that's your thing. Mars by Ben Bova was pretty good too. Oh and totally agree with the first 3 or 4 dune books

 

[Bribie G]

i haven't read a real book in a long time, the last one being 'the plague' by albert camus almost 10 years ago


i want a new book...any thoughts on 'the grapes of wrath'?

I've read it twice and it does my head in because it puts you right in your place and teaches you something very disturbing about yourself.

You know what? If you and I woke up tomorrow morning, suddenly transported to the truck with the Joad family heading West - destitute, no mobile phone or credit cards and dressed in farm overalls and boots - Notwithstanding all our vast and superior 21st Century knowledge and education and sophistication, with all we know about Space Travel, the rest of the history of the Twentieth Century and DNA and Facebook and the Internet and LCD televisions and all our practical skills we have picked up ................. There's not one damn fecking thing you and I could do NOT to avoid being inexorably swept along to the same fate as the characters in the novel. Nothing works before its time. What we know would be of no use to us at all.

In fact we would end up worse than the Joads' situation. Steinbeck is brilliant.

After reading the Grapes the first time, after the last sentence of the book I just wanted to go out and bash somebody - which is unusual for me.


Edit: try Tortilla Flat or Cannery Row

 

[Rowy]

I'm a George MacDonald Fraser man myself. His Flashman series is beyond compare IMHO. A great mixture of accurate history and comedy. Also agree with Rex Banner the Rama series by Clarke was fantastic Sci Fi! I'm reading one of my old John LeCarre' at the moment 'The Honourable Schoolboy'. I loved everything he has written other than the 'Constant Gardener' just couldn't get into it.

 

[DUANNE]

going through a heap of louis lamour and zane grey westerns atm. short easy entertaining books.

 

[Camo6]

Thanks for all the suggestions guys. Might have to hit up the book depository when I get back and buy something other than brewing texts. Have read a bit of Clarke and Asimov but prefer more modern sci fi. I find i prefer the more techno/alien/12 parsec side of sci fi and find the older stuff a bit dated. Happy to be proven otherwise though. Infact one of my favourite books on the shelf is Howards chronicles of conan and for something started in the thirties, that shit kicks ass. Loved dune but struggled through second book (dune messiah?). Couldn't get into eddings p.o.p. Does anyone recall a series by David zyndell (i think). Neverfall or something like that. Would love to read that again.
Anyway probably won't have time for reading after holidays. Be too busy brewing to restock the fridge and doing OT to make up for having to buy craft beer in small coastal towns.

 

[Mobbee007]

Love Conan have several different complete collections (different publishers different covers etc) also love Sherlock Holmes the short stories are fantastic. Have a few mates that are into Richard Morgan & China Mieville but I'm not a huge fan.

 

[felten]

Anything by Alan Dean Foster (not that I've read them all), his Spellsinger series of books would have to be my all time favourite.

 

[Truman42]

I'm currently reading Brewing up a business by Sam Calagione, owner of Dogfish Head Brewery in Delaware.

A great read all about how Sam went from a avid home brewer like us to the owner of a microbrewery and brew pub.

Lots of good business advice and I recommend it to anyone who wants to one day do the same.

 

[Florian]

I can use my Galaxy Note as a kindle

Somehow I don't think reading on a non matte display on the beach will be very enjoyable, Bribie, unless it's totally overcast.

 

[Dave70]

Just read- Mortality - Christopher Hitchens.

Just began -The end of faith - Sam Harris.

Looking forward to starting on Errol Flynn's 'My wicked, wicked ways' after squinting through 330 odd pages of Harris's book.

More pages - bigger text, that's the go. **** the trees.

 

[Cube]

Recently Arthur C. Clarke - Odyssey Tetralogy 2001, 2010, 2061, 3001.

For shits and giggles Wil Wheaton - 'Just a Geek' and 'Memoirs of the future'. <----- had me LOL many times.

Second to last book - The life of Galileo.

Re reading Hawkings ' A Brief History of time' and ' A Briefer History of Time'.

Current book - 'Death by Black Hole: And other Cosmic Quandaries' - Neil deGrasse tyson.

 

[kalbarluke]

Reading a few books at the moment.

Boys of Blood and Bone by David Metzenthen. Just finished today. Okay. A good book for teenage boys.

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig: Almost finished it and I quite like it but it gets a bit chewy, sort of like Noam Chomsky but in a different way. Trying to figure out if it's genius or psychobabble.

Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton: Just started it (for about the third time).