Amph What book are you reading right now?

I've tried (and failed) to make it through a handful of the younger Herbert/Anderson Dune books. They weren't really bad per se, but they lack even a whiff of the profundity of the elder Herbert's work and there just wasn't anything of consequence happening to hook me. That said, I plan to give 'em another go w/The Butlerian Jihad here soon.

Reading; The Ghost Brigades by John Scalzi, the second book in his "Old Man's War" series. Quite a bit different than the first book, this one being told third person vs. the original's first person, and w/a different protagonist to boot.

 

Recently finished reading Yoda: Dark Rendezvous. Excellent book.

Reread Vader Down TPB last night.

Reading YA book Forces of Destiny, Volume 1.

 

I've enjoyed this trilogy so far - it shows the beginnings of the Bene Gesserit and Mentats in the first two books. This does the same for the Navigators..

 

LAJ_FETT I think that I might enjoy stories that flesh out groups and events that are part of the original Herbert books more so than, say, Paul of Dune, which is just sort of filler between Dune and Messiah.

 

If you decide to go for the trilogy you should read them in order since the second and third build on characters and events from the first. Sisterhood of Dune is the beginning, followed by Mentats of Dune.

 

Dune is my favorite novel of all-time, and despite my mixed experience w/the non elder Herbert novels, I always get the itch to explore the universe more, so I'm sure I will check them out at some point. I see that Sisterhood is reasonably well reviewed on Goodreads, as are the sequels.

 

I'm nearing the end of X-wing #6 'Iron Fist' and it has been such a pleasant surprise! Did anybody else notice a huge uptake in quality for this entry in the X-wing series?

 

Still working on The Stand, and have started Phasma.

 

Still working on The Eye of the World. Trying to clear my plate for all the books I bought in DC and Gettysburg.

 

The English Mail-Coach (1849) – Thomas De Quincey

The final stop (sorry) on my trip with the writings of De Quincey is a really fascinating piece. He made drug addiction fascinating. He made sorrow fascinating. Now he’s taking on . . . mail delivery? Well, kind of. This book is focused to some degree on De Quincey’s travels on the, at the time, very new mode of transportation, horse drawn mail carriages and some of the various misadventures he had. There’s a looseness to these sections of the book that really show off his skill as a raconteur and it feels a little less studied than his other stuff. But then the book changes focus to a particular incident, a harrowing near-accident on a night journey and the emotional fall-out from that. He talks at length about how the incident haunted him and recurred in his opium-influenced dreams and this section is frankly more psychedelic than anything in his Confessions because he sort of walks the reader through a couple of really strange, surreal dreams. The work climaxes in a surreal, incredibly powerful dream sequence that is just a master of literature writing at his most elevated levels of prose. It’s hard to even describe, it’s so strange, but it’s incredibly intense writing that involves facing the specter of death and finding, at the last possible moment, as in the case of the accident, miraculous intervention from the divine. Strange to say it, but De Quincey has blown my mind again; in an essay nominally about how cool it is to travel on coaches that deliver the mail, he’s delivered an intense mystical text that just burns with beauty and passion. 4 stars.

tl;dr – De Quincey turns a quiet meditation about travelling into a harrowing, surprising and psychedelic meditation on spirituality & death; mind-blowingly great and utterly surprising. 4 stars.

 

Coils by Fred Saberhagen and Roger Zelazny
I first read this book back in my teens and really enjoyed it, finding it not quite top-tier Zelazny but easily good enough that I never wanted to get rid of the book. Naturally somehow it went missing twenty years ago and I haven't read it since. I suspect I lent it to a friend who never gave it back - never lend out books you want to keep. Anyway, though this is out of print, thanks to the internet I'm re-reading it in the first time in decades and really quite enjoying it.

Plot-wise it's a cyberpunk thriller (though it actually predates Gibson's Neuromancer by two years) about a guy who realises he isn't who he thought he was, and that his memory has been tampered with by a shady multi-national in order to put his special talents on ice until they need them (he can mentally communicate with computers). I'm about four chapters in at the moment and I remember it being pretty short so I'll probably end up finishing it tonight.

 

Still enjoying my Malazan 5 reread. Slow progress since Destiny 2 hit. Only about 260 pgs in. Also rereading Dresden 1 and am liking it all over again though it's strange reading an underpowered Harry for sure. It's a short book so I'm making a lot of progress on it.

 

NJO: "Edge of Victory I: Conquest"

 

Augustus: First Emperor of Rome, by Adrian Goldsworthy. Goldsworthy, an accomplished Roman historian, does a great job of writing a thorough biography of a pivotal figure in history, the man who, beginning as a nineteen-year-old kid who basically happened into prominence in the wake of Julius Caesar's assassination, managed to win a bloody civil war, and then put the long era of civil war and political instability to an end in Rome by unifying the state and governing well, shifting Rome from Republic to Empire in the process. He makes persuasive arguments against a lot of conventional wisdom about Augustus's career, significantly against retroactive arguments that try to turn the principate into more of a deliberate project than an accumulation of responses to shifting conditions. He presents a good case, and offers a really valuable understanding of a thoroughly fascinating career. Great biography.

 

Just finished Death of a Salesman... that one hit close to home.

Now I'm starting 'Trump: The Art of the Deal'

 

Fate of the Jedi: Abyss

I'm back to just concentrating on one book at a time. I'll get back to the Stand at a later date.

 

Gave up on The Worm Ouroboros. That was gonna be a long, slow book. Forget it.

Taking a scifi/fantasy break and reading my very first Clive Cussler book, "Pirate".

 

I thought Clive Cussler was awesome... when I was 14. Read another one of his books a few years ago and barely managed to finish it. And I wished I hadn't bothered. I can't say if his writing has gotten worse or if my taste in writing has changed, but either way, it was not good.

 

Bring up the Bodies

 

Finished with American Assassin. Judging from the trailers, it's not following the book.

Now onto Girl on the Train.

 

Stephen King's It - saw the film yesterday at the local cinema so now I can read the book.

 

This book is utterly fantastic. I have had the 1st ed hardcover since early 00's from a used store and had never read it till the 1st trailer hit. It is so good. Can't wait till I can see the movie.

 

On Top of Concord Hill by Maria D. Wilkes

 

Fate of the Jedi: Backlash

 

I am a few chapters in and what's funny about your statement is that I thought, "This feels like I'm reading a Choose Your Own Adventure book."