Knights & Knaves Alehouse

rogatny wrote:I'm reading Hawking's Brief History of Time. I recently got his Universe in a Nutshell and realized that I needed to reread History of Time first because my brain leaked out of my ear since the last time I'd read it.

My brain CANNOT wrap itself around the concept of time as a relative rather than fixed metric. Something very primal at the core of my intellect yearns for there to be a stopwatch somewhere in the universe that is the "right" one.

I loved the movie Interstellar for this reason. Solid physics with the trippy consequences.

Out of Body Experiences by Susy Smith
Strange Powers of E.S.P. by Brad Steiger
Adventures into the Psychic by Jess Stearn
How to Make ESP Work for You by Harold Sherman


"'Tis the season to cast mind bondage...Fa-lalalala--lala-la-la..."

Father Christmas blessed me with a copy of The Shores of Tripoli, a new historical novel by James L. Haley set during the Age of Sail covering the nascent US action against the Barbary Pirates. So far, I'm enthralled.
I think we got 30 new books this morning.
We are Book Folk.

My wife got me two new Bernard Cornwell books: The Flame Bearer (latest Saxon novel) and Cornwell's Waterloo (history, not fiction).

Flambeaux wrote:Father Christmas blessed me with a copy of The Shores of Tripoli, a new historical novel by James L. Haley set during the Age of Sail covering the nascent US action against the Barbary Pirates.

That sounds right up my alley.

The fucking obituaries. Hopefully for the last time in 2016.

Philotomy Jurament wrote: The Flame Bearer

I'm about a quarter of the way in, and so far so good. Of course, that means everything is typically fubar for our hero.

Welleran wrote:

rogatny wrote:I'm reading Hawking's Brief History of Time. I recently got his Universe in a Nutshell and realized that I needed to reread History of Time first because my brain leaked out of my ear since the last time I'd read it.

My brain CANNOT wrap itself around the concept of time as a relative rather than fixed metric. Something very primal at the core of my intellect yearns for there to be a stopwatch somewhere in the universe that is the "right" one.

I loved the movie Interstellar for this reason. Solid physics with the trippy consequences.

I grabbed that from Netflix to rewatch recently. We haven't seen it since it was in the theatres, though.

I finished reading The Hobbit aloud with Henry tonight (we'd wrapped it all up last night save the final chapter), after we finished watching the third Hobbit film, The Battle of the Five Armies.

Henry's already interested in reading The Lord of the Rings, so we bridged the gap by reading "The Quest for Erebor", and will start in on "A Long-expected Party" tomorrow night, I imagine

Just started in on Gene Wolf's first Book of the New Sun, Shadow of the Torturer. I tried to read it when I was in university but couldn't get into it at all. Now...well, my God, it's brilliant. The vocabulary alone is worth it. I'm not sure if it was intentional, but it kind of reads like a grittier version of Gormenghast.

Getting ready to start the Doctor Who books that my son gave me for Christmas. I think that we will read it together through FaceTime. I never really watch the Doctor Who television series except for a couple episodes with Tom Baker as a doctor, so I'm looking forward to this. There are two novels in the book, and I think they both have something to do with Daleks and are based off of TV episodes.

- Wheggi

Philotomy Jurament wrote:My wife got me two new Bernard Cornwell books: The Flame Bearer (latest Saxon novel) and Cornwell's Waterloo (history, not fiction).

I got The Flame Bearer as well. Great series! Took me about 3 days to finish it.

Kellri wrote: Just started in on Gene Wolf's first Book of the New Sun, Shadow of the Torturer. I tried to read it when I was in university but couldn't get into it at all. Now...well, my God, it's brilliant. The vocabulary alone is worth it. I'm not sure if it was intentional, but it kind of reads like a grittier version of Gormenghast.

Great series. I have been thinking of picking the books up again recently.

Kellri wrote:Just started in on Gene Wolf's first Book of the New Sun, Shadow of the Torturer. I tried to read it when I was in university but couldn't get into it at all. Now...well, my God, it's brilliant. The vocabulary alone is worth it. I'm not sure if it was intentional, but it kind of reads like a grittier version of Gormenghast.

One of my ALL TIME favorites! I've read it at least four times, currently in the middle of "Claw of the Conciliator." Admittedly I keep a number of resources handy while reading now: a dictionary and some Wolfe related scholar works such as Castle of the Otter and Lexicon Urthus. Gene has a penchant for obscure vocabulary

I just picked up a massive Lovecraft tome yesterday at Banes & Nobles. The Annotated H.P. Lovecraft with an intro by Alan Moore. Delving into this soon.

simrion wrote:Admittedly I keep a number of resources handy while reading now: a dictionary and some Wolfe related scholar works such as Castle of the Otter and Lexicon Urthus. Gene has a penchant for obscure vocabulary

I only recently learned of a similar Vance fiction dictionary, _The Jack Vance Lexicon: From Abiloid to Zygage: The Coined Words of Jack Vance_. This type of book doesn't strike me as a terribly useful resource vs. a very good standard dictionary, unless it only includes terms created by/invented for Vance's or Wolfe's fiction??

simrion wrote:I just picked up a massive Lovecraft tome yesterday at Banes & Nobles. The Annotated H.P. Lovecraft with an intro by Alan Moore. Delving into this soon.

This is worthwhile---I've been re-reading favorite stories in bed before going to sleep, and am nearly done with "The Shadow Over Innsmouth." I like Klinger's annotations and notes, and it's a nice touch that they include many pictures of sites in HPL's New England.