Had a pretty busy week and didn’t get to read anything.
What about all of you? What have you all been reading or listening to lately?
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Just finished The Inspector Bordelli series by Marco Vichi.
Really enjoyed it.
There are 6 books in the series that are translated to English but apparently there are more in the series that haven’t been translated.
But don’t be put off. The 6th book really feels like a proper and satisfying ending to the series.
It’s set in 1960’s Florence. It’s heavily character driven with multiple characters appearing throughout the series. But that isn’t to say the plots are weak - they’re not.
The first book (Death in August) is a basic whodunit, but introduces you to characters the you’ll experience and see grow through the series.
Thoroughly enjoyable.
I am reading how to ADHD by Jessica McCabe. Very insightful for me. Not all struggles I can relate to: I sleep like a baby, but most hit quite painfully home.
And still reading Path of Daggers by Robert Jordan. The aim is to finish this book before the end of the year. Problem is also that there are so much other books I want/have to read for my studies. It’s a good problem to have. Read on!
Just about to finish Master and Commander. 19 more books in the series to go!
I am reading Accelerando by Charles Stross. It is simultaneously very cool and very boring. It reminds me a lot of Stephen Baxter and Greg Egan.
Burned through two slim paperbacks last weekend: A Little Lumpen Novelita by Roberto Bolaño and The Tunnel by Ernesto Sabato. On my e-reader (which I use mostly for older classics), I just finished The Fortune of the Rougons, the first of Émile Zola’s Rougon-Macquart cycle, and am partway through the introduction for The Kill, the second.
My slower, long-term reads currently include re-reading Moby Dick, which I feel I didn’t absorb too well on the first read (a quarter of a century, ago as a middle-schooler), a huge collection of short stories by Anton Chekhov, another huge collection of short stories by Guy de Maupassant, and Proust’s masterpiece, In Search of Lost Time (two volumes down).
Snow crash
First time? Enjoy!
I’m slowly getting through Anna Karenina by Tolstoy, having taken a short break to read something else for my book club last week. I’m really enjoying it but the pacing can be slow at points and it requires a certain level of concentration. I think it’s one of those books where, once I’m finished, it’ll leave a bit of a gap in my life!
Almost finished Carl’s Doomsday Scenario by Matt Dinniman. I’m intentionally dragging out the last few chapters because it’s so good.
Also, still working my way through Want Submitted by Anonymous Edited by Gillian Anderson. Fantastic book!
I am currently obsessed with DCC as well. It is impossible to put it down!
I’m about to finish the book, actually I did just have the bonus material to reads
It’s so good! But I want to savor its deliciousness.
Ooohh what bonus material? Is this outside the books? Or do you mean the epilogue?
I’ve been out of work sick, so it has been difficult to contain myself and not read all day.
It’s outside of the Epilogue. The versions of the first 2 books I read have parts of a bonus story called “Backstage at the Pineapple Cabaret”.
I totally get you! If I was sick, I’d probably do the same lol
Oh cool! What version of the book do you have? I have to looks for those.
I picked it up at Barnes and Noble. ISBN is 978-0-593-82026-1
The story is Backstage at the Pineapple Cabaret, maybe it’s online somewhere too.
Thanks!
I’m partway through the mainstream published version of There Is No Antimemetics Division by qntm. The original was one of my favorite reads from 2024 bingo, so this kinda-reread is really comfy. I can’t say I’ve noticed any big changes, outside of removing all mentions of SCP and reordering some chapters, but I also don’t usually remember stuff in detail, so it’s hard to say. I did flip back and forth between the two versions briefly at the start, and the part I was reading had definitely been rewritten, but it seemed to be mostly superficial differences rather than content.
(If your interest has been piqued by seeing other people in here read it, the original is still available here for free; just read the qntm-authored stories in order, including all of Five Five Five Five Five.)
I read the first series from that on the wiki a while ago, and recently went back and read Five Five Five Five Five. I absolutely love the ideas behind antimemetics, this kind of eldritch horror and how to deal with it. I was slightly disappointed towards the end,
ending spoiler
the SCP seems to be portrayed as existing in conceptual space, an antimeme that prevents information about it existing while somehow being a self-sustaining idea? It’s referred to as a “meme complex” on the 3125 page. But at the end it’s portrayed more like a god acting in mysterious way, talking to the protagonist, existing in a way where it can be harmed with a gun. Not killed, but actually permanently injured?
Still a great story either way, and a good read for free, I had no idea it was published independently, have look into it!
Thanks for sharing the OG version, that’s really cool. Looking forward to reading it based on all the recommendations here!
Almost done with Hollywood, Ending by John Green
Not what I’d normally read, but i liked Greens writing in The Anthropocene Reviewed and wanted to give his fiction a shot. I am enjoying the book, which is mainly about two young Actors who meet during shooting a Movie about Andy Warhol, which puts them in the spotlight of media outlets and lands them their next role in a major Blockbuster Movie.
Both of them had traumatizing things happening to them in their childhood, which now comes into focus during the presstour for the Warhol Movie.
I’d guess the book is mainly about how past trauma still influences those who endured it and a bit about the conflict between industrialized entertainment and the work of creating art itself and the effects that industry has on the artists.
overall: good book, glad i left my fantasy comfort zone for a bit.
Currently mostly focusing on The First Socialist Schism by Wolfgang Eckhardt and although I’m still not quite halfway through I would highly recommend it. It’s a primarily sourced based book about the ideological differences and figures that led to the breakup of the First International as well as the development of ideology’s like Marxism, Anarchism and Social Democracy emerging form it.
I haven’t started them, and it might be a while before I do so, but I did just get used copies of Donald Knuth’s books on TeX and typesetting.
Knuth is an elderly computer science better known for his more-general algorithms work, but I’ve been interested in pen plotting recently. Most modern font formats define areas to fill in, whuch doesn’t map well to plotting. I recently discovered that MetaFont, TeX’s native font format, is based on pen strokes and defining a variable width on those strokes, which is more similar to pen plotting.
Kinda dry and older books, but I’ve been pretty fascinated by some of the pen plotter art on Reddit, and have been looking into what the current limitations are.
I’ve been reading Ordinary Saints by Niamh Ní Mhaoileoin.
It’s about a young woman who’s lesbian who grew up in a very Catholic family and moves away to England to run from it all. It’s a story about revisiting her past and facing her family.
There are a lot of Irish sayings and Catholic references, but the author works it in to the book really well so you don’t have to stop the flow of reading to research any given topic to understand the context.
The most trouble I had was pronouncing some of the Irish names. Had my +1 to help me with that one, but that’s me wanting to learning what they sound like. It doesn’t take away from the book if you “pronounce” them in English.
Fantastic book. Would recommend.
I finished Limitarianism by Ingrid Robeyns, which was a nice encapsulation of some ideas on how to make things more equal for all of us. Unfortunately unlikely to be implemented, but great thought experiments. Also continuing my Culture re-read. Look to Windward this week, and wow what a ride this one is. Loved it.
The Complete Chronicles of Conan. I am re-reading it actually.
I highly recommend it
https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/828878.The_Complete_Chronicles_of_Conan
