Book thread: what are you reading?

[denj]

Susan Choi’s Trust Exercise. I had mixed feelings about it. It started off fine, but once the second part started large portions of the novel devolved into uninteresting ramblings about dictionary definitions and semantics. Still, I’m glad I read it.

[marklaspalmas]

Just finished book 16 of the Aubrey-Maturin series.

I only have four more left having started in July 2021, alternating with other books.

My temptation is to race through the last four as they are so engrossing, but I ought to make them last.

Terrific series of books.

[Les Tonks Sidestep]

30 minutes ago, marklaspalmas said:

Just finished book 16 of the Aubrey-Maturin series.

I only have four more left having started in July 2021, alternating with other books.

My temptation is to race through the last four as they are so engrossing, but I ought to make them last.

Terrific series of books.

I'm half way through the first, although I've not been as quick having started it about a year before you!

[Phil]

Glue by Irving Welsh, follows the friendship of a group of men from childhood to maturity.

A couple of characters from Trainspotting make cameo appearances.

One or two fairly gruesome scenes but well written and well observed.

[marklaspalmas]

1 hour ago, Les Tonks Sidestep said:

I'm half way through the first, although I've not been as quick having started it about a year before you!

Keep going. This is my second run at this series. About 10 years ago I read the first three or four books then stopped. This time I've found them to be utterly engrossing even though the naval jargon sails (pun) over my head.

[The Hallucinating Goose]

1 hour ago, marklaspalmas said:

Just finished book 16 of the Aubrey-Maturin series.

I only have four more left having started in July 2021, alternating with other books.

My temptation is to race through the last four as they are so engrossing, but I ought to make them last.

Terrific series of books.

As you know, I finished them earlier this year and they instantly became my favourite series ever. I've never been able to find the words to truly reflect how much I love these stories.

Reading them certainly did change my life to a small degree. I rediscovered my love of reading. In the preceding 10 years or so I'd maybe read about 2 books a year at most. I'd really stopped caring about reading despite never having a book or a pen out of my hand when I was a kid and a teenager. I read all 20 Aubrey-Maturins in approximately a year and since finishing them a couple of months into this year (if I remember rightly), I've read the first 15 Sharpe novels.

I'm reading a book every 2 weeks or so and it's all because of Patrick O'Brien and his scintillating stories that I could just not put down. So keep going Mark because I've read about 20 books in the period between you reading just a few of these!  

(I know you said you were reading other books between the Aubrey-Maturins!)

[Les Tonks Sidestep]

16 minutes ago, marklaspalmas said:

Keep going. This is my second run at this series. About 10 years ago I read the first three or four books then stopped. This time I've found them to be utterly engrossing even though the naval jargon sails (pun) over my head.

I am actually enjoying it, I just tend to have reading binges rather than a 'steady' reading regime and at some point will likely read the rest in a couple of sittings - annoys the heck out of Mrs S that I can go to bed and sleep without reading at least a few pages!

PS we're currently moving our bookcases to a different room and I've come across 2 other books that are also only half read, one started around 1974 and the other on holiday in 1989. Might have to start them again......

[marklaspalmas]

9 minutes ago, The Hallucinating Goose said:

As you know, I finished them earlier this year and they instantly became my favourite series ever. I've never been able to find the words to truly reflect how much I love these stories.

Reading them certainly did change my life to a small degree. I rediscovered my love of reading. In the preceding 10 years or so I'd maybe read about 2 books a year at most. I'd really stopped caring about reading despite never having a book or a pen out of my hand when I was a kid and a teenager. I read all 20 Aubrey-Maturins in approximately a year and since finishing them a couple of months into this year (if I remember rightly), I've read the first 15 Sharpe novels.

I'm reading a book every 2 weeks or so and it's all because of Patrick O'Brien and his scintillating stories that I could just not put down. So keep going Mark because I've read about 20 books in the period between you reading just a few of these!  

(I know you said you were reading other books between the Aubrey-Maturins!)

Super stuff. What are you reading now? Are you tempted by the Flashman series? 

[marklaspalmas]

9 minutes ago, Les Tonks Sidestep said:

I am actually enjoying it, I just tend to have reading binges rather than a 'steady' reading regime and at some point will likely read the rest in a couple of sittings - annoys the heck out of Mrs S that I can go to bed and sleep without reading at least a few pages!

PS we're currently moving our bookcases to a different room and I've come across 2 other books that are also only half read, one started around 1974 and the other on holiday in 1989. Might have to start them again......

Slowly but surely.

[The Hallucinating Goose]

13 minutes ago, marklaspalmas said:

Super stuff. What are you reading now? Are you tempted by the Flashman series? 

Like I say, I've read 15 of 22 Sharpe novels so I've got them to finish off, should be done in the next couple of months and a 23rd one of them is being released next year! 

After that I've got the Kingsbridge Quartet and the Milennium Trilogy by Ken Follett ready and waiting to go and they'll collectively take me about a year seen as each book is about 1,000 pages. So that's 2023.

And I'm currently searching charity shops for the Railway Detective series and the Domesday series both by Edward Marston so that's another year of two. So that's 2024/25.

I'm also considering the Hornblower novels. I haven't looked into Flashman as of yet but that's not because I don't fancy reading them, more cos I've already planned way ahead as you can probably sense!

Edited October 27, 2022 by The Hallucinating Goose

[marklaspalmas]

2 hours ago, The Hallucinating Goose said:

 

I'm also considering the Hornblower novels. I haven't looked into Flashman as of yet but that's not because I don't fancy reading them, more cos I've already planned way ahead as you can probably sense!

Ah, interesting. I've given some thought as to whether I'd try the CS Forrester series or not. I'm undecided.

I loved Flashman,  I think there are 12 novels in total.

[Futtocks]

Philip K.Dick - Clans of the Alphane Moon. Earth re-establishes contact, post-war with a colony where the survivors were all inmates at a mental hospital and who have created a sort-of civilisation where people of similar disorders clan together. Of course, being a PKD book, there's plenty more going on around the main plot thread.

[JonM]

12 minutes ago, Futtocks said:

Philip K.Dick - Clans of the Alphane Moon. Earth re-establishes contact, post-war with a colony where the survivors were all inmates at a mental hospital and who have created a sort-of civilisation where people of similar disorders clan together. Of course, being a PKD book, there's plenty more going on around the main plot thread.

I had a phase about thirty years ago, of reading nearly all of his books. I suspect this is one that would really struggle to find a publisher these days. Whether that's because having an alien slime mould with telepathic powers arrange for a teenage girl to marry a suicidal complete stranger as a very minor side plot would be considered incredibly unrealistic, or just not politically correct, is another matter. 

[Futtocks]

7 minutes ago, JonM said:

I had a phase about thirty years ago, of reading nearly all of his books. I suspect this is one that would really struggle to find a publisher these days. Whether that's because having an alien slime mould with telepathic powers arrange for a teenage girl to marry a suicidal complete stranger as a very minor side plot would be considered incredibly unrealistic, or just not politically correct, is another matter. 

True, but if PDK was born later, he'd have grown up with different sensibilities, in a more modern society. His innate weirdness and creativity would probably have expressed itself in aspects of his fiction other than sexual politics.

[Route66]

On 27/10/2022 at 19:04, Phil said:

Glue by Irving Welsh, follows the friendship of a group of men from childhood to maturity.

A couple of characters from Trainspotting make cameo appearances.

One or two fairly gruesome scenes but well written and well observed.

Love his work can be a bit on the edge but great characters, just read the Young team by Greame Armstrong a stunning book about young lads growing up in the north Lanarkshire schemes 

[The Hallucinating Goose]

19 down and just 3 to go in the Sharpe series. I have now read through 16 years of Sharpe's military career from the Siege of Seringepatam in 1799 to the Battles of Quatre Bras and Waterloo upcoming in the next book. 

[Josef K]

I bought two cheap books today from a chariteee shop “The Stories Of Slang : Language At its Most Human by Johnathan Green”. 
Deserters Of The First World War : The Home Front by Andrea Hetherington”. What i like about this book is it isn’t about those who were shot at dawn, but those hiding in the U.K. who turned to crime. 

[Midlands hobo]

Just finished the Foundation series by Asimov. I'm in a sci fi phase at the moment and trying to read as many Hugo or nebula award winners as I can. Sadly there are about 100 and I'm only a few in. 

I really really enjoyed starship troopers. Great book I go back to again and again. Also the ancillary series about the person who used to be a spaceship.

[Bobby123]

Reading about the Osage tribe of Indians in the USA ( author Grann) Concerns how the government kicked the Osage tribe off their lands in the 17 century little knowing that they had moved them onto the largest oil bearing lands in the country, resulting in the tribe becoming millionaires overnight. This resulted in the government once again attempting to remove the Osage by murder and intimidation, led by Edgar. J. Hoover and ultimately, the death of the tribe. A little known black era in the history of the "proud" USA. 

[Route66]

Love to dip onto this thread to see what others are reading ,the winter brings me plenty of spare time between shifts and the improvement in the Cumbria online ordering process enables me to seek out a wider selection than previously, anyway last couple of weeks read Gabriel krause' Who they was,Dan Dillons the blue hen,Alan Warners Dead mans Pedal and Kerry Hudson's Lowborn.  Just started Above Head Height about 5 a side football by James Brown and got the Laidlaw trilogy on hold

[The Hallucinating Goose]

On 04/12/2022 at 22:34, The Hallucinating Goose said:

19 down and just 3 to go in the Sharpe series. I have now read through 16 years of Sharpe's military career from the Siege of Seringepatam in 1799 to the Battles of Quatre Bras and Waterloo upcoming in the next book. 

The war is over! Napoleon has been exiled to St. Helena and Richard Sharpe has become a farmer in Normandy. 

21 down and just 1 to go in the Sharpe series. This has been a blooming long journey. It seems an age since I first started reading about Private Sharpe in India. I think I started reading this series in January so it will in the end have taken me almost exactly a year to read all 22 novels. 

[Futtocks]

I just read Mel Brooks' autobiography - just as ebullient, fun and full of life and joy as you might expect from the man.

[gittinsfan]

Recently came across two really old paperback books by Leon Uris. Just finished reading Exodus for the umpteenth time.Still a very good read.I'm going to have a short break before another read of Mila 18. I've read most of his stuff 2 or 3 times, but nothing for a few years.I think I'll have to try finding them again.

[Phil]

Mrs Phil always gets me a couple of books for Christmas, I’m currently halfway through The Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith aka JK Rowling.

it’s the first book of the Strike series and I’m really enjoying it so far 

[Moose]

On 17/12/2022 at 18:25, Route66 said:

Love to dip onto this thread to see what others are reading ,the winter brings me plenty of spare time between shifts and the improvement in the Cumbria online ordering process enables me to seek out a wider selection than previously, anyway last couple of weeks read Gabriel krause' Who they was,Dan Dillons the blue hen,Alan Warners Dead mans Pedal and Kerry Hudson's Lowborn.  Just started Above Head Height about 5 a side football by James Brown and got the Laidlaw trilogy on hold

I’m happy to see you’ve got the trio of Laidlaw books by William Mcilvanney available to read and I hope you enjoy them as much as I did. Ian Rankin was allowed by his widow and his publishers to complete his last unfinished novel The Dark Remains which was published last year.