What are you reading?

[TRP]

The Trouble with Peace. Joe Abercrombie is REH w/o morality censors. He writes of grandiose world events (a la GoT), but the [anti-]heroes are always nobodies. Nobodies that eventually achieve notoriety (a la Conan). The characters you root for.

At least his two First Law trilogies are like that. His standalone novels tend to hew closer to the true REH tradition of following only nobodies doing badass stuff.

[T. Foster]

Also have a signed copy of Piranesi by Susanna Clarke on hold at our local bookstore around the corner. Have you dug into it yet, Trent?

Not yet, but I've got my copy and it's likely next on the reading list.

Started reading this last week, and it's short so I'm already just about finished. It's good, but difficult to describe without spoilers. Probably best to just start reading and let it unfold as it happens

[benjoshua]

I finished the second book in the Inheritance Trilogy by N.K. Jemisin entitled, The Broken Kingdoms. This book wasn't quite as good as the first, but that would have been asking a lot as the first book was excellent. In short, this was a fantasy murder mystery. There's some strange magic involved and a satisfying conclusion. These books are for mature readers. I'm looking forward to reading the final volume in the series.

[JasonZavoda]

Hero with a Thousand Faces and Pratchett's "Guards! Guards!"

[T. Foster]

Hero with a Thousand Faces and Pratchett's "Guards! Guards!"

Both good!

I'm currently re-reading de Camp & Pratt's The Incomplete Enchanter for the first time in 30+ years. It's holding up okay. Definitely extremely dated, but still mostly fun.

[Welleran]

I'm currently re-reading de Camp & Pratt's The Incomplete Enchanter for the first time in 30+ years. It's holding up okay. Definitely extremely dated, but still mostly fun.

I just finished it a few weeks ago with about the same gap since I last read it. Not surprisingly, my take is about the same as yours. The only thing that jumped out at me was a bit where they started talking about verbal and somatic elements to spell casting...pretty clear who THAT influenced!

[Ratbreath]

^and the bit about the broom of flying.

I'm currently about 1/3 through The Great Gatsby. Honestly so far it's just The Okay Gatsby. Not seeing why it was required reading in high school.

[benjoshua]

^and the bit about the broom of flying.

I'm currently about 1/3 through The Great Gatsby. Honestly so far it's just The Okay Gatsby. Not seeing why it was required reading in high school.

I've learned that a lot of "great" literature isn't that great. The main exceptions have been Lolita by Nabokov and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. I argue with English teaches about this. They say, "Once you understand this or that or the other, it's just fantastic!" I reply, "Just like explained jokes aren't funny, if you have to explain a book, it's not great."

[JasonZavoda]

^and the bit about the broom of flying.

I'm currently about 1/3 through The Great Gatsby. Honestly so far it's just The Okay Gatsby. Not seeing why it was required reading in high school.

I think Gatsby hasn't aged well. The literary and social culture that were taken by Gatsby have long since moved on and it has been several generations where anything except the style and quality of the exposition makes it an exceptional novel or required reading.

[benjoshua]

I finished the third book in the Inheritance Trilogy by N.K. Jemisin entitled, The Kingdom of Gods. It was a good read, but not best ever. It takes a while to get anywhere. Like the second volume, it's a bit of a mystery as to what's going on and who the bad guy(s) is. The conclusion speeds up the action considerably as literally their world is coming to an end. Cosmic and divine forces wrestle with reality, but it wraps up well. Overall, I'm glad I read this series. If you've ever wondered what gods and demi-gods do and think, this is an interesting take.

[squeen]

They say, "Once you understand this or that or the other, it's just fantastic!" I reply, "Just like explained jokes aren't funny, if you have to explain a book, it's not great."

Sometimes it does take a mental key to unlock and understand the value of a particular work. This happens to me more often with music. I recall vividly listening to the first track of Radiohead's In Rainbows album --- the song is "15 step" --- and I thought, "What is this rubbish? Sounds like noise!. I love the track now....I just didn't expect it, or see what they were attempting to do (and succeeded!). The song didn't change, but something clicked in me.

Still waiting to get "jazz".

[JCBoney]

One of the advantages of reading classical literature is reading it in tandem with studying the history of that period. The two are always tied together, so if you're into early 20th American history, especially with the rich, then The Great Gatsby is a good insight into what they were thinking and doing. Likewise, if you're into early Hebrew history, then the Old Testament is one good source to learn their thoughts and viewpoints, though Josephus is better.

[benjoshua]

Lyonesse vol. 2: The Green Pearl. It has been more than a decade since my last reread, so it was time to give it another whirl... partly because our recently launched campaign is heavily Lyonesse-inspired, and because I have also placed an order for the Lyonesse RPG. Timeless, elegant, and bittersweet - something modern high fantasy doesn't tend to be, but which Vance excels at. It is interesting how much the premise of Lyonesse shows similarities to GoT, but how much less it revels in grime and atrocity -- while Lyonesse has a fairy tale darkness that's always there behind the colour and whimsy, and a collection of twisted villains who are often self-justifying sexual predators, it takes a very sober attitude to human evil, and has a moral gravity that's rather unlike the TV depiction of "feudal fantasy".

It is also brimming with adventure ideas, which I am gleefully planning to mine in our forthcoming games.

I finished Lyonesse today and have already started The Green Pearl. These books are a little hard to follow at first as they refer to this king/city/event or the other, and you have to stop, find the map, genealogy chart or whatever in order to fully understand what's going on. The quality of the map in the book wasn't great, but there are better maps on-line (like the one below). However, by the middle of the book, I had learned who was who and what was what and could move right along. I saw where the Lyonesse RPG was $79.99 (hardcover+free PDF) or $25 (PDF Only). I hope it's worth the price. I agree with Melan's review above, and I look forward to reading the rest of the series.

[benjoshua]

I finished The Green Pearl and loved it. Like the first book in the series, it starts off a little slow but picks up steam. I found it hard to put the book down once I reached the halfway mark. Lots of good fantasy, intrigue, spells, monsters, and magic items. He also likes describing faces and food. I've already started the last book in the series.

[Flambeaux]

Currently

• The Winter Pascha by Fr. Thomas Hopko
• A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
• The Wim Hof Method by Wim Hof & Elissa Epel
• The Legends of King Arthur & His Knights compiled by Sir James Knowles

Dickens' A Christmas Carol is one I traditionally read to the family starting around Thanksgiving and, hopefully, finishing around Christmas. Sometimes it runs into the new year.

I wasn't enjoying Howard's Kull yarns so I set that aside for a while. Not sure if it's me, timing, or the stories themselves but they haven't just grabbed me the way the Conan tales do.

I need to make time to continue reading Odysseus Unbound. It's very dense since the argument rests on some geological & archeological speculation. Very enjoyable but not easy reading and the book itself is a large-format, lavishly illustrated coffee-table book, which is awkward at the end of a long day.