Delirium by Lauren Oliver. I've read it before, but the second book is coming out in a few weeks, and I've been dying to sink my teeth into it for a year now. I like to get reacquainted with the first book, so when I dive into the next one, I'll be... right where I was before, forgetting nothing.
Requiem for a Wren, by Neville Shute.
I'm also struggling through IT by King, although at 1400 pages I'm not making much headway.
for lack of anything better....the tommyknockers, by king. just got my tax refund a couple days ago, though.
so i'll be hitting 1/2 price books this weekend. haven't a clue what all i'll pick out.
I just finished reading 'Till We Have Faces' by C.S.Lewis. It's a retelling of the myth of Cupid and Psyche, and it explores different forms of love and how they can be both beautiful and viscious. I would definitely suggest it.
Syrn by Agnie Sage, fifth book in the Septimus Heap series. Brilliant, enjoyable fantasy.
Sleep is for the weak, or sleep is for a week.
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I write about anime and internet culture at Hidden Content
I've just read The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes. I bought it on the strength of its winning last years Booker Prize and it didn't disappoint. In short its a first person novella with themes of time, memory, regret, and guilt wrapped up in the life story of the narrator.
I'll be reading more of Barnes' stuff. I've wanted to read his England, England for a while now.
"I think a life is a plot. It's probably the elementary plot. I came across a quotation of Patrick White, the Australian writer, just about the time I needed it. He said he never bothers with plot. He just writes about life 'limping along toward death.' That made me feel much better, to keep this in my mind."
Carol Shields.
Holy Fools by Joanne Harris......25% of the way through the book and loving every word!!! Really feeding my my ravenous imagination, a veritable bounty of "bounce off the page" characters and images. A delight, truley magical.
Originally Posted by Bilston Blue
I read that last week, I enjoyed it as well. I was surprised to see the mixed reviews on Amazon.
Just finished Knife of Dreams by Robert Jordan. 11th book in the Wheel of Time. I've heard criticisms about the series. Some were legitimate. He does tend to go off on tangents and it can get a little dry. But I wouldn't be on to book 12 if I didn't care about the characters he's so painstakingly developed.
Also reading Necroscope by Brian Lumley. It takes place during the cold war and has to do with supernatural agencies on both sides of the iron curtain. Without spoiling anything, he has interesting takes on vampires and necromancy I've never read before.
Light by M John Harrison.
I really must stop reading authors who are just that little bit too dauntingly good.
Also half-way through Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. An antithesis to Harrison, but in a nice, hamburger-with-fries-after-a-week-of-fine-dining kind of way.
EDIT: Actually, having finished Ready Player One, I'm left disappointed. The second half kills the story: a plot that the writer doesn't know how to structure with any nuance (as linear as the retro gaming it espouses) and that suffers horribly from invincible protagonist syndrome; any whiff of peril is handily dealth with via a handy deus ex machina or ten.
There's little or no attempt at foreshadowing, so when an obstacle needs to be overcome, a preceding paragraph or two describing how the main character knows everything there is to know about <insert uber-geek reference> is clunkily exposited. Need to play a perfect game of Pac-Man (only ever been done a handful of times in seventy-odd years)? No problem! Give our hero a few hours - y'know, so he can get in the zone - and it's job done.
Need to re-enact every scene - with dialogue - from Monty Python and the Holy Grail to progress to the next level? Easy! Our guy here, we learn just before he has to perform this feat of savantry, has fortunately seen the film one-hundred and fifty-seven times. Honestly.
It's so brazen I have to almost give the writer credit for chutzpah.
The nostalgia, then, is revealed as distraction; a gimmick to hide an inability to formulate plot. Not good for a plot-driven narrative.
What makes it worse is the sheer amount of retro boutique he throws at you: the nostalgia becomes cloying rather than decorative, derivative rather than honorific. As a thematic tool, the hearkening back to an earlier era is entirely superficial, which, given the dystopian near-future setting in which half the world is addicted to virtual reality, is definitely an exploratory opportunity missed.
Still, never mind all that, wasn't War Games just neato!?
Last edited by Chaeronia; February 23rd, 2012 at 11:24 PM.
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