I HIGHLY recommend the audiobook. Gaiman narrates it himself, and he has an insanely good storytelling voice.
I was actually rather disappointed about this book.
It's not that it was bad really, but nothing in it was neil gaiman. I had literally read every story in that book in a *VERY* close exact form when i was a kid reading norse myth stories. As far as I'm concerned neil Gaiman's name on it was Bait. I was expecting a dogma-like story with characters spun in his own unique way. you are NOT getting that here.
I want someone to make a short or skit that makes a video version of Dune very literally. So just like, two or three people awkwardly standing around a room while they hyper analyze one another's breathing patterns, hand twitches, minor mouth movements, and so on for like 5 minutes straight. I wonder if reading Dune in freshmen year of highschool was one of the reasons why I was so paranoid about every little action I made around people (more likely answer is being a dumb teenager full of hormones.)
Put your goddamn hand in the goddamn box.
Stercus, Stercus, Stercus, Morituri Sum
+2
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Raijin QuickfootI'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPAregular
I HIGHLY recommend the audiobook. Gaiman narrates it himself, and he has an insanely good storytelling voice.
I was actually rather disappointed about this book.
It's not that it was bad really, but nothing in it was neil gaiman. I had literally read every story in that book in a *VERY* close exact form when i was a kid reading norse myth stories. As far as I'm concerned neil Gaiman's name on it was Bait. I was expecting a dogma-like story with characters spun in his own unique way. you are NOT getting that here.
I thought it was pretty clear he was just retelling the known myths in his own words. I enjoyed it
+3
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Raijin QuickfootI'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPAregular
I started Horns. It's my first Hill book that isn't a graphic novel. I'm on chapter 8 and its...ok? The prose reads like Hill is TRYING REALLY HARD and doesn't seem to have much of a smooth natural flow.
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Raijin QuickfootI'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPAregular
edited April 2017
Chapter 28 now and it's really grown on me. The forced feeling I had is gone as I've gotten into the flow of the book.
Rooting for or against Paul, or what but. Man, between killing billions of people and turning himself into a religious figurehead I hope he gets taken down, or takes himself down, or something. Interesting to see his growth from the scrappy underdog to a ruling tyrant though.
+4
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webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
Started re-reading the dresden files at book three. Should be a good way to burn a few weeks.
I usually start a reread with book 4 great reread series, but i felt it didnt really getting a continuity until then.
I like three because it introduces Michael.
When I started book three I got the idea that the series would just add a new sidekick for each book. Damn was I wrong. Michael and Charity and the family are some of my favorite characters in the series, only being surpassed by mouse and mister.
True. Michael is awesome and three isnt as 'samey' as 1 and two were, I guess the trigger for the continuity switch (for me at least) didnt occur until Molly appeared.
Michael and family are some of the best bits of the whole series. It is a thing that is hard to do well without going over the top but he does a good job with it.
Rooting for or against Paul, or what but. Man, between killing billions of people and turning himself into a religious figurehead I hope he gets taken down, or takes himself down, or something. Interesting to see his growth from the scrappy underdog to a ruling tyrant though.
If I'm remembering right, that's one thing it does effectively, because on the one hand you do have
God Paul the tyrant. But he really really does believe that only he can stop the fremen spilling into a galactic jihad. For me it was at least a sympathetic l, "no really I think I'm serving the greater good here!" So yeah, I think being conflicted was intended.
Rooting for or against Paul, or what but. Man, between killing billions of people and turning himself into a religious figurehead I hope he gets taken down, or takes himself down, or something. Interesting to see his growth from the scrappy underdog to a ruling tyrant though.
If I'm remembering right, that's one thing it does effectively, because on the one hand you do have
God Paul the tyrant. But he really really does believe that only he can stop the fremen spilling into a galactic jihad. For me it was at least a sympathetic l, "no really I think I'm serving the greater good here!" So yeah, I think being conflicted was intended.
It's been decades but:
I very much remember it as Paul doing bad shit he hated because the option of him not doing the sorta bad shit was some incredibly super double plus ultra bad shit. Also he was pretty firmly locked into his path because of just how well he could see the future. A well intentioned refusal wasn't something he could hope would work out for the best, it was something he knew would lead to ultra-jihad and so was no longer defensible as well intentioned.
Micheal is the best. Also liked the other knights.
That bit in
skin game when he came out to meet Nick
ranks in my top 5 badass scenes in literature.
azith28 on
Stercus, Stercus, Stercus, Morituri Sum
+2
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JedocIn the scupperswith the staggers and jagsRegistered Userregular
I'm slowly re-listening to the Dresden Files. It's taking a while, because my library has only one copy of each e-audiobook, and I've been waiting for Small Favors since February, despite the fact that library policy is to purchase copies until the wait list is under one month, Janet.
Anyway, it turns out I forgot about most of the middle of the series. I thought that the whole Tenochtitlan business went down way earlier in the series, and I kind of thought that the entire horror movie convention plot from Proven Guilty was a short story from Side Jobs.
The thing that bugged me about naruto was that everyone could identify someone else having sharingan eyes or any other eyes from 50' away.
Re:vorkorsigan saga
I'm up to five narrators now, and it works.
But there are so many little throwbacks to shards of honor and barrayar that it's making me laugh and freak out in equal measure.
There's also other feminist themes coming through the book as well child birth for example being women's eternal coin of the realm, the one commodity they've had the least choice in selling, but have gained the most power in the books by using technology to export it.
The fact that she's taken me from vae victus' consequences for the family's descendents 100 years later to, how do legally punish this guy for buying women's leftover eggs from clinics and popping out as many girls as he has mechanical wombs?
There's dynamics here after all these novellas and stories that make good reading.
Edit: the vae victus plot is involving one of the families who have been honorable and played it straight in the past, so it especially sucks.
Well, that was a surprise, but honestly, in a patriarchal society, if you have the cash and the opportunity, why not?
Still better than the guy growing little girls by the dozens down the road.
in order to inherit her late brother's title as count, Lady Donna transitioned to Lord Dono.
The technology of the story allows for a quick three month physical transition, but he is still tripping on the psychological.
Again, this is a patriarchal society that has a deficiency of female nobels due to foolish gender preferences and whose rural population still murders newborn babies if deformed.
I kind of want to root for this fellow but his family name is......tied to one of the evilest characters in Shards of Honour.
Edit: Found out the details, I'm behind this guy all the way and right in front when the plasma arcs start flying
I'm slowly re-listening to the Dresden Files. It's taking a while, because my library has only one copy of each e-audiobook, and I've been waiting for Small Favors since February, despite the fact that library policy is to purchase copies until the wait list is under one month, Janet.
This might be a silly question but have you asked any of the librarians about this? They can almost always make purchasing suggestions to the people that handle that and patron requests are almost always handled faster than any kind of policy about when to buy things would.
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Mx. QuillI now prefer "Myr. Quill", actually...{They/Them}Registered Userregular
I've been listening to the Red Rising books at work and just got to Part 3 of Golden Son.
Does GS start picking up steam at this point? Seems like it kinda dragged for a bit with Part 2 pretty much being just one day in-universe.
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JedocIn the scupperswith the staggers and jagsRegistered Userregular
I'm slowly re-listening to the Dresden Files. It's taking a while, because my library has only one copy of each e-audiobook, and I've been waiting for Small Favors since February, despite the fact that library policy is to purchase copies until the wait list is under one month, Janet.
This might be a silly question but have you asked any of the librarians about this? They can almost always make purchasing suggestions to the people that handle that and patron requests are almost always handled faster than any kind of policy about when to buy things would.
I am the librarians, unfortunately. I might ask the head of material selection at our annual meeting next month, but I'm pretty sure this kind of situation only arises when we either can't get this audiobook from the vendor anymore or the price per circ rose above the "no dupes" threshold. Emedia pricing for libraries is a goddamn nightmare these days.
I think I'm going to make more use of wikis through this reading. I spent a lot of time the first time through thinking "I don't really know what's going on but maybe if I just keep going it will all make sense" and... nope! You just keep getting thrown more people and gods and races and magical terms and if you don't keep up it becomes a confusing mess.
I did a bit of homework and now feel like I have a better idea of what the hell holds, warrens, ascendants, and houses are so hopefully will not feel quite so confused straight out of the gate.
That's a pretty good idea. Steven Erikson definitely doesn't seem like a guy who gives a crap about whether or not you're keeping up. I'm pretty sure I remember a character getting sucked into a dimensional void and then showing up again a book and a half later with no real effort to remind you of the context.
Not to mention the books which take place not only on a different continent, but months or years prior to the book you just read with hints to the fact until like halfway through.
Just finished the first book of the "path of ascendency" by Esslemont. It covers Dancer meeting Kellenved in Heng and is one of his better ones. I struggled through a couple of the earlier ones in the crimson guard pentology just because I enjoy the Malazan world so much so it was a nice surprise for it to be as readable as it was. Now I've got to wait until august for the story of how they took over Malaz isle.
The one about the fucking space hairdresser and the cowboy. He's got a tinfoil pal and a pedal bin
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The JudgeThe Terwilliger CurvesRegistered Userregular
Finished Sharp Ends last night.
Little disappointed. Was hoping for more standalone/new stuff, but you best have read all the other books before this one or the callbacks and drop-ins will fly over your head.
Last pint: Turmoil CDA / Barley Brown's - Untappd: TheJudge_PDX
I'm slowly re-listening to the Dresden Files. It's taking a while, because my library has only one copy of each e-audiobook, and I've been waiting for Small Favors since February, despite the fact that library policy is to purchase copies until the wait list is under one month, Janet.
This might be a silly question but have you asked any of the librarians about this? They can almost always make purchasing suggestions to the people that handle that and patron requests are almost always handled faster than any kind of policy about when to buy things would.
I am the librarians, unfortunately. I might ask the head of material selection at our annual meeting next month, but I'm pretty sure this kind of situation only arises when we either can't get this audiobook from the vendor anymore or the price per circ rose above the "no dupes" threshold. Emedia pricing for libraries is a goddamn nightmare these days.
Fuckin yeah it is, librarian brofist.
+1
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Raijin QuickfootI'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPAregular
To collate your editions, to see them organized on the shelf, and to hear the respectful silence of the library patrons.
+2
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JedocIn the scupperswith the staggers and jagsRegistered Userregular
Depends on what you're looking for. If you want to be able to share the books you love with people who will love them, you're liable to get your heart broken. I guarantee that you wouldn't like the vast majority of the books that are published every year, and since that's true of everyone else as well, you rarely run into patrons who want to read what you're reading.
If you think you'd enjoy answering weird questions that you'd never think to ask or successfully match a person with a book based on criteria you would never share, than being a reference librarian at a moderately busy public library is a hell of a job. It's like people coming up to you all day and giving you crossword puzzle clues to solve. As long as you're the kind of person who can believe in evolution and still take satisfaction in helping some homeschooler find the perfect book on young Earth creationism, it's a blast.
Yeah I have a ton of respect for people that are Liberians, and and overwhelming majority of them that I've met are totally kind helpful and generally warm people.
I think public libraries don't get enough credit anymore for how awesome they are too, though last time in my local branch I was kind disappointed. They had much less shelf space then they used to and much more loosely stocked. I wonder if it just has to do with a transition to digital or a funding thing or a combination of the two...
It kind of makes me worry about folks with no access to electronics for whatever readon being able to access quality reading and resources though.
Yeah I have a ton of respect for people that are Liberians, and and overwhelming majority of them that I've met are totally kind helpful and generally warm people.
I think public libraries don't get enough credit anymore for how awesome they are too, though last time in my local branch I was kind disappointed. They had much less shelf space then they used to and much more loosely stocked. I wonder if it just has to do with a transition to digital or a funding thing or a combination of the two...
It kind of makes me worry about folks with no access to electronics for whatever readon being able to access quality reading and resources though.
Sadly, it's probably a funding thing. Emedia spending has more or less plateaued at 10% of the average library budget, with usage statistics to match. So far, ebooks are useful for providing fiction bestsellers and evergreen classics like 1984, but they're not doing very well at creating the broad nonfiction collection that patrons need for everyday research. And I've never worked at a branch that had too much shelf space to fill, given the budget to fill it.
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The JudgeThe Terwilliger CurvesRegistered Userregular
. As long as you're the kind of person who can believe in evolution and still take satisfaction in helping some homeschooler find the perfect book on young Earth creationism, it's a blast.
I would be fired so fast in the Bible belt. If not for the wrong book, then for my "annotations" in the right ones.
Started Death's End. The third book from Cixin Liu, author of Three-Body Problem. I've really liked series as it tackles how a global society would react to the news that extraterrestrial life is real, and it hates us.
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Librarian's ghostLibrarian, Ghostbuster, and TimSporkRegistered Userregular
Depends on what you're looking for. If you want to be able to share the books you love with people who will love them, you're liable to get your heart broken. I guarantee that you wouldn't like the vast majority of the books that are published every year, and since that's true of everyone else as well, you rarely run into patrons who want to read what you're reading.
If you think you'd enjoy answering weird questions that you'd never think to ask or successfully match a person with a book based on criteria you would never share, than being a reference librarian at a moderately busy public library is a hell of a job. It's like people coming up to you all day and giving you crossword puzzle clues to solve. As long as you're the kind of person who can believe in evolution and still take satisfaction in helping some homeschooler find the perfect book on young Earth creationism, it's a blast.
If you want to talk to people about the books you like to read, School Librarians are much more in that line. I am regularly being asked what I'm reading and share it with students who are interested.
There are some more hoops you have to jump through, needing the teaching certificate, and also having to deal with other education related issues.
Just finished Ladies of Grace Adieu, Susanna Clarke's short story collection in the Strange & Norrell world. A bit uneven, as collections are wont to be, but the high points were very high and the lows weren't very low. Mainly made me wish for another full length from her, though.
Read the first four books in The Expanse series. Dug the first three - pacey, clever pop sci-fi. Nothing earth shattering, but a fun enough time. Didn't much care for the fourth book, between some boneheaded (and inaccurate, and completely unnecessary) lines about America's colonial history, and a scene where a dude mansplains a woman's crush on another dude to her, talks her out of the crush, and talks her into sleeping with him instead, in a ludicrous two-page monologue. Barf city. Might be checking out on the book series and just sticking with the TV show.
Currently reading Zadie Smith's On Beauty. Not very far into it, but I really love her prose style. Her dialogue is especially rad; it's meticulously crafted to convey the physical actions of the character speaking, without breaking from quotation marks, while still feeling naturalistic. Globe-hopping academics aren't my favorite characters in the world to spend time with, but I'm definitely sucked in enough by the prose to give the characters time to grow on me.
Posts
Goku's still powering up
I was actually rather disappointed about this book.
It's not that it was bad really, but nothing in it was neil gaiman. I had literally read every story in that book in a *VERY* close exact form when i was a kid reading norse myth stories. As far as I'm concerned neil Gaiman's name on it was Bait. I was expecting a dogma-like story with characters spun in his own unique way. you are NOT getting that here.
I usually start a reread with book 4
Put your goddamn hand in the goddamn box.
I thought it was pretty clear he was just retelling the known myths in his own words. I enjoyed it
I'm really enjoying it now.
Shit... Did not realize I triple posted here.
I like three because it introduces Michael.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
If I'm remembering right, that's one thing it does effectively, because on the one hand you do have
It's been decades but:
That bit in
Anyway, it turns out I forgot about most of the middle of the series. I thought that the whole Tenochtitlan business went down way earlier in the series, and I kind of thought that the entire horror movie convention plot from Proven Guilty was a short story from Side Jobs.
Re:vorkorsigan saga
I'm up to five narrators now, and it works.
But there are so many little throwbacks to shards of honor and barrayar that it's making me laugh and freak out in equal measure.
There's also other feminist themes coming through the book as well child birth for example being women's eternal coin of the realm, the one commodity they've had the least choice in selling, but have gained the most power in the books by using technology to export it.
The fact that she's taken me from vae victus' consequences for the family's descendents 100 years later to, how do legally punish this guy for buying women's leftover eggs from clinics and popping out as many girls as he has mechanical wombs?
There's dynamics here after all these novellas and stories that make good reading.
Edit: the vae victus plot is involving one of the families who have been honorable and played it straight in the past, so it especially sucks.
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
Fucking Lee Torneau, man.
Still better than the guy growing little girls by the dozens down the road.
The technology of the story allows for a quick three month physical transition, but he is still tripping on the psychological.
Again, this is a patriarchal society that has a deficiency of female nobels due to foolish gender preferences and whose rural population still murders newborn babies if deformed.
I kind of want to root for this fellow but his family name is......tied to one of the evilest characters in Shards of Honour.
Edit: Found out the details, I'm behind this guy all the way and right in front when the plasma arcs start flying
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
This might be a silly question but have you asked any of the librarians about this? They can almost always make purchasing suggestions to the people that handle that and patron requests are almost always handled faster than any kind of policy about when to buy things would.
Does GS start picking up steam at this point? Seems like it kinda dragged for a bit with Part 2 pretty much being just one day in-universe.
I am the librarians, unfortunately. I might ask the head of material selection at our annual meeting next month, but I'm pretty sure this kind of situation only arises when we either can't get this audiobook from the vendor anymore or the price per circ rose above the "no dupes" threshold. Emedia pricing for libraries is a goddamn nightmare these days.
Not to mention the books which take place not only on a different continent, but months or years prior to the book you just read with hints to the fact until like halfway through.
Little disappointed. Was hoping for more standalone/new stuff, but you best have read all the other books before this one or the callbacks and drop-ins will fly over your head.
Fuckin yeah it is, librarian brofist.
Because as of right now I feel like it's kind of a dream job for me
What is best in life?
To collate your editions, to see them organized on the shelf, and to hear the respectful silence of the library patrons.
If you think you'd enjoy answering weird questions that you'd never think to ask or successfully match a person with a book based on criteria you would never share, than being a reference librarian at a moderately busy public library is a hell of a job. It's like people coming up to you all day and giving you crossword puzzle clues to solve. As long as you're the kind of person who can believe in evolution and still take satisfaction in helping some homeschooler find the perfect book on young Earth creationism, it's a blast.
I think public libraries don't get enough credit anymore for how awesome they are too, though last time in my local branch I was kind disappointed. They had much less shelf space then they used to and much more loosely stocked. I wonder if it just has to do with a transition to digital or a funding thing or a combination of the two...
It kind of makes me worry about folks with no access to electronics for whatever readon being able to access quality reading and resources though.
Nos4a2
Steam - Talon Valdez :Blizz - Talonious#1860 : Xbox Live & LoL - Talonious Monk @TaloniousMonk Hail Satan
Sadly, it's probably a funding thing. Emedia spending has more or less plateaued at 10% of the average library budget, with usage statistics to match. So far, ebooks are useful for providing fiction bestsellers and evergreen classics like 1984, but they're not doing very well at creating the broad nonfiction collection that patrons need for everyday research. And I've never worked at a branch that had too much shelf space to fill, given the budget to fill it.
He said Hill, not King.
Is this a bit
I would be fired so fast in the Bible belt. If not for the wrong book, then for my "annotations" in the right ones.
If you want to talk to people about the books you like to read, School Librarians are much more in that line. I am regularly being asked what I'm reading and share it with students who are interested.
There are some more hoops you have to jump through, needing the teaching certificate, and also having to deal with other education related issues.
Just finished Ladies of Grace Adieu, Susanna Clarke's short story collection in the Strange & Norrell world. A bit uneven, as collections are wont to be, but the high points were very high and the lows weren't very low. Mainly made me wish for another full length from her, though.
Read the first four books in The Expanse series. Dug the first three - pacey, clever pop sci-fi. Nothing earth shattering, but a fun enough time. Didn't much care for the fourth book, between some boneheaded (and inaccurate, and completely unnecessary) lines about America's colonial history, and a scene where a dude mansplains a woman's crush on another dude to her, talks her out of the crush, and talks her into sleeping with him instead, in a ludicrous two-page monologue. Barf city. Might be checking out on the book series and just sticking with the TV show.
Currently reading Zadie Smith's On Beauty. Not very far into it, but I really love her prose style. Her dialogue is especially rad; it's meticulously crafted to convey the physical actions of the character speaking, without breaking from quotation marks, while still feeling naturalistic. Globe-hopping academics aren't my favorite characters in the world to spend time with, but I'm definitely sucked in enough by the prose to give the characters time to grow on me.