What are you reading right now?

[SckizoBoy]

Ooh! The Windup Girl! That's one of my all-time favorite books!

Calm down dear chap, you're getting hysterical! =P

How do you like it? I don't normally read science fiction, but what I loved about The Windup Girl is that Bacigalupi's vision of the 23rd century Bangkok is so complete and so exotic to my own realm of experience that it's just as compelling as a good fantasy.

I like it quite well, thank you. I do read sci-fi quite a bit (more a fantasy reader, personally, though I write more sci-fi... weird...), though I've heard this book described as 'biopunk'(!) Anyway, wrt sci-fi, I prefer space-opera/cyberpunk, but here, it's got me quite intrigued because of the concept of 'natural food' that brings a certain rough-around-the-edges feel, and yet it's handled very well ('real' for a lack of a better way of putting it).

If you like it, try Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi. It is less fantastic, but nevertheless it is the depth of the vision which makes it worth reading. Hehe, funny thing about Bacigalupi's writing is that he loves writing miserable stories of human suffering in apocalyptic-dystopian futures caused by our environmentally unsustainable practices. Did you know he was raised by hippies?

Interesting... strange choice of genre for a hippy raised author to write...(!) What you mentioned about 'human suffering in apocalyptic-dystopian futures' reminded me of Ian Irvine (his Three Worlds series in particular), man can he make a reader on edge and miserable as hell...

I have an enormous vocabulary and haven't had to use a dictionary when reading a novel in probably close to a decade, but this one sent me to the dictionary several times within the first few pages. And it's usually worth knowing what the words mean since most of the book is written with very figurative language such that it's hard to know what's going on if you're missing pieces of her analogy and metaphor. Luckily, I've been reading it on a Kindle, so that's made it somewhat easier.

Huh... may I take this opportunity to use this for once:

Seriously, though, I find that swamping the reader with ordinarily incomprehensible language is somewhat flow-breaking. Judging from your descriptions... I'm both curious... and wondering what she was attempting to achieve...

EDIT:

At the moment I'm reading Magician by Raymond E. Feist, it's the first book in the Riftwar trilogy. The book is incredible thus far, perhaps the best book I've ever read (I might be enjoying Magician even more than The Hobbit).

*random exultant shouting*

I'll be honest, I re-read Magician much more than LotR. Such a damned good book, just more exciting a journey, I think...

 

[Truniron]

Bones of the hills, by Conn Iggulden. Brutal and awesome. A little heavy at times, but gives one hell of a payoff at the best moments.

 

[Nexoram]

Well, I just the latest Skulduggery Pleasant book Death Bringer a week ago. Pretty awesome book, funny and full of action. Also, I realized I bought it the DAY it came out in Australia. I haven't even bought a game on release day.

 

[Caliostro]

Just finished Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere, and just started Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged.

 

[LadyTiamat]

"The Female Man" by Joanna Russ

A sci-fi feminst novel about what happens when 4 alteratve selves from different universes meet, each universe is different in regards with woman's place with man. Joanna= our world, Jeannine= a world where WW2 ever happened, Janet= a world where all the men died 1000 years before (reproduced with combining ovums), and jael= final war between man and woman (the part im just getting to). Its a facinating story on the hypocracy and inequality of women in gender roles and I think is still relevent today (celebs like Jodie Marsh and Jordo...oh wait Katie Price comes to mind and the celeb worship culture that comes with it)

 

[LadyTiamat]

Two books at the moment.

Steven King's "The Stand" and Deus Ex: Icarus Effect.

Both are pretty damn good.

The Stand is one of my favorate books of all time!

 

[llama32]

Terry Pratchett's Mort. After finishing that, will be moving on to Mogworld

 

[Sniperyeti]

The Man Without Qualities, that's going to take me a while to get through.
Man reading through this thread makes me jealous, all these good books I've already read that I wish I could start over again for the first time.
You can reread books but getting into good new one is intense.

 

[k-ossuburb]

Necronomicon: The Best and Weird Tales Of H.P. Lovecraft Commemorative edition.

I'm up to "In The Vault" so far and there's still a load more to go. I've also noticed that "Call Of Cthulu" isn't his best work, it's pretty average in comparison to "Herbert West: Re-animator" and "The Lurking Fear". Don't get me wrong, it's good and very atmospheric, but I'm more fond of his other work.

 

[Moonlight Butterfly]

A History of the World in 100 Objects by Neil MacGregor. I got a signed copy from the British Museum Really enjoying it so far!

 

[Shodan1980]

Like so many others I'm reading "A Dance with Dragons" after picking up "Game of Thrones" cause I felt I really should. I normally hate fantasy but A Song of Ice and Fire is just incredible. George R.R. Martin is like a fantasy Peter F. Hamilton; great characters, epic stories and great dialogue.

Also just finished re-reading Order of the Stick book 4, "Don't Split the Party". Love it.

 

[Mrselfdestruct]

The Hobbit. Best book I've ever read methinks.

 

[General Vagueness]

what I'm typing

Two books at the moment.

Steven King's "The Stand" and Deus Ex: Icarus Effect.

The Stand is really good, but I say that with a caveat-- it will mess you up, not from the horror but from other stuff, at least/especially if you read the unabridged version.

 

[Lokithrsourcerer]

I'm currently swapping between

"Why Does E=MC²? (and Why Should We Care)" by Prof. Brian Cox and Prof. Jeff Forshaw

and "The Silmarillion" By J R R Tolkien

Both can be challenging at times but for different reasons so I find its good to swap over now and then while I digest the information.

I HIGHLY recommend both of them

 

[Lokithrsourcerer]

good choice

I recently bought "Good Omens" by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchet, along with a few Discworld novels, as I'm trying to broaden my horizons a bit...

love Pratchet only 8 books left till i finish them all

The Commander Vimes books are my fave closely followed by the death books (reaper man is particularly good)

 

[Delock]

The entire Death Gate Cycle. Currently waiting for the final book to arrive.

It's actually a really interesting series that plays around with the standard Tolkien fantasy setting to produce several different worlds. It does fall into an annoying habit about halfway through of having terrible cliffhangers (yes, up until that point the protagonist was still on his journey between worlds so it was still a cliffhanger, but these ones started to end more mid-action).

 

[ruben6f]

Nothing right now but I want to read S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Southern Comfort, just need to buy it and find the time to read it.

 

[schmoke]

The Autobiography of Mark Twain.
really really good.

 

[Slash Dementia]

I'm reading The Golem's Eye, by Jonathan Stroud. It's pretty good, but I'm reading it very slowly.

 

[Chased]

Needful Things by Stephen King. Only 60 pages in, seems decent so far. It'll be interesting to see how the plot develops to take up all 731 pages.