Books Read 2022

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Blackhawk
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Blackhawk »

Since audiobooks, ebooks, and dead tree books are more or less interchangeable these days, I hope people don't mind me discussing them in here.

I've been working my way through the audiobooks for World War Z and Snow Crash lately (WWZ while I paint Zombicide, Snow Crash while I drive.)

Snow Crash is... interesting. I'm about halfway through, and I'm still not sure what it's about. With that said, I'm still enjoying it. The world and atmosphere are really engaging in an absurd sort of way.

World War Z, presented as an audiobook, is fantastic. I've never read it in the original format, but the full-cast audiobook format is perfect for it. The premise (for the two people other than myself who haven't read it) is that the author is traveling around the world a few years after the 'war' interviewing people in different nations about their experiences. With the full cast (including Nathan Fillion, Alan Alda, Rob Reiner, Mark Hamill, Simon Pegg, Martin Scorsese, and others - even Frank Darabont has a role), it honestly feels like listening to a war documentary. It's really well written, and I can see why the fans were dismayed by the film that had absolutely no relation to it.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by ImLawBoy »

Lots of people discuss audiobooks in here. You're more than welcome to do so as well!

I read the hardcover of World War Z and never bothered with the movie. While I generally don't do audiobooks (unless I'm listening in on my son), that does sounds interesting given the nature of the book and the cast.
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Re: Books Read 2022

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The full cast. No spoilers save for character names. There are a huge number of known actors in there (and a surprising number of Star Trek cast.)
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Jeff V »

Blackhawk wrote: Wed Feb 16, 2022 1:39 pm Since audiobooks, ebooks, and dead tree books are more or less interchangeable these days, I hope people don't mind me discussing them in here.
Almost all of the books I've "read" in the past 5 years have been audiobooks, with the occasional e-book and the annual dead-tree book or two (good for reading on the patio during summer). I need to get back to the hamster wheel (an hour or two per day that is perfect for audiobooks). I try to listen to audiobooks whenever I do any significant driving (anywhere in our blue car. The red car requires a wire that doesn't works so good).

I do need to get back to putting in an effort to reading Librarything Early Reviewers books. I have a pretty large backlog right now.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Jaymann »

Yes they kill trees to make books, but my understanding is they grow them specifically to make paper and replant them. So it's not like chopping down a virgin forest.
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Re: Books Read 2022

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Just finished:
Image

I read this a few years after it came out, but it was so long ago I remembered almost nothing outside of the basic premise. Published in 1969, but taking place in 1992, I wanted to see if it held up. I would have to say yes and no.

At the time I thought it was the greatest achievement in literary history. It is likely the first instance of the now trope of someone trying to open their front door but the door won't budge until you pay it. And it may also be the first ever usage of the concept of half-life. It is a slow burn and doesn't really pick up until over half way through.

If you are a fan of Dick it is a must read. Otherwise WMMV. 5.5/8 spray cans.
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Re: Books Read 2022

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Deadhouse Gates by Steven Erikson

This is book 2 of The Malazan Book of the Fallen series. What can I say, I really like this series so far. Erikson has created an interesting set of characters inhabiting an interesting world. These books are part Abercrombie, part Cook and part Tolkien. One difference from Abercrombie is that Erikson has characters who still have moral purpose, there is good and bad in his world and people who are trying to do something about it. Although in a pecking order of Gods, Ascendants, immortals, demons, humans and non-humans they don't always have the means.

Nothing is perfect so I can't rate this perfect, but it is very close. There are characters from book 1 so you would want to read that first.
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Re: Books Read 2022

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Scuzz wrote: Thu Feb 17, 2022 2:56 pm Deadhouse Gates by Steven Erikson

This is book 2 of The Malazan Book of the Fallen series. What can I say, I really like this series so far. Erikson has created an interesting set of characters inhabiting an interesting world. These books are part Abercrombie, part Cook and part Tolkien. One difference from Abercrombie is that Erikson has characters who still have moral purpose, there is good and bad in his world and people who are trying to do something about it. Although in a pecking order of Gods, Ascendants, immortals, demons, humans and non-humans they don't always have the means.

Nothing is perfect so I can't rate this perfect, but it is very close. There are characters from book 1 so you would want to read that first.
You had me at Abercrombie. Bit of a backlog ATM, but this series goes on the TBR list.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by hitbyambulance »

read a bunch of Franz Kafka short stories and fragments - a few that stood out:

The Burrow - OCD-induced anxiety incarnate in text form (from the POV of a small woodland mammal)
The Hunter Gracchus - a nice little piece of weird fantasy
In the Penal Colony - quite dreadful/disturbing, but the atmosphere is such that this is one i would like to adapt to the film format (had i the skills/talent/budget).

Kafka is clearly a fan of incorporating the sensations and logic of dreams/nightmares into his stories.

were a lot of these even intended to be published?
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by LordMortis »

hitbyambulance wrote: Thu Feb 17, 2022 3:36 pm read a bunch of Franz Kafka short stories and fragments - a few that stood out:

The Burrow - OCD-induced anxiety incarnate in text form (from the POV of a small woodland mammal)
The Hunter Gracchus - a nice little piece of weird fantasy
In the Penal Colony - quite dreadful/disturbing, but the atmosphere is such that this is one i would like to adapt to the film format (had i the skills/talent/budget).

Kafka is clearly a fan of incorporating the sensations and logic of dreams/nightmares into his stories.

were a lot of these even intended to be published?
I'm not sure Kafka intended anything to be published posthumously and lots was. I think he just wrote and Max Brod assembled things as best he could for publication after Kafka's death.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Brod
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by hitbyambulance »

this was something i didn't know before:
On Kafka's death in 1924, Brod was the administrator of the estate. Although Kafka stipulated that all of his unpublished works were to be burned, Brod refused. He justified this move by stating that when Kafka personally told him to burn his unpublished work, Brod replied that he would outright refuse, and that "Franz should have appointed another executor if he had been absolutely and finally determined that his instructions should stand."
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Re: Books Read 2022

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Image

An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz (ebook): From the title, I thought this book would be a general history of Indian tribes. Where they lived, what they ate, how they interacted with each other, etc. But it's not that. It is solely about their near-extinction at the hands of European Christians. Its detailed coverage of countless atrocities is as relentless as the Europeans who used war, disease, economic exploitation, treaty-breaking, and cultural assimilation to commit genocide.

It wasn't until halfway through the book that I took another look at the title and realized how accurate it was. This book really is a history of the United States from the point of view of indigenous people. And from their perspective, the United States has been nothing but a genocidal force.

I now have a deeper understanding of America's history and destructive nature. From Jamestown to Wounded Knee to the Vietnam War to the grim headlines of today, deadly imperialism has been dominant in Americans' DNA. Even William Tecumseh Sherman, who I've longed considered a heroic figure, told Ulysses S. Grant "We must act with vindictive earnestness against the Sioux, even to their extermination, men, women, and children."

The little-discussed Doctrine of Discovery that fueled the Europeans' taking of indigenous lands is still the cornerstone of American law and policy. Even as recently as the 1970s, the USA military forcibly removed thousands of indigenous people from sites with strategic military importance. When asked by a reporter about the deportation of the Micronesians, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger supposedly replied "There are only ninety thousand people out there. Who gives a damn?" And every time we get excited by fighter planes soaring overhead during the National Anthem at the Super Bowl, that sentiment reverberates in us.

This book is dense and unpleasant, but it made me realize that America can never become a great nation unless it exorcises its rapacious soul. The last chapter mentions some significant and hopeful steps toward this end, but those are just the beginning of a very long journey. If, even after the events of the last few years, part of you still believes "the myth of an exceptional US American people destined to bring order out of chaos, to stimulate economic growth, and to replace savagery with civilization--not just in North America but throughout the world," maybe you should read this book and become a part of that journey. 5 out of 8 glass beads.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Carpet_pissr »

Dune, the first.

Great book. Maybe not mind-blowing as I was expecting, but definitely great.

Something about it reminded me of Ender’s Game.

On to the second!
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Jeff V »

Carpet_pissr wrote: Thu Feb 17, 2022 10:27 pm On to the second!
Prepare to be disappointed. I just re-read Dune Messiah for the third or 4th time, while it does establish what's to come in the many other books, by itself it's not all that interesting. Children of Dune helps it make more sense, as does God Emperor, and some of the Brian Herbert books (don't let the nay-sayers steer you away from those...they are more entertaining than some of the quasi-philosophical books Frankie wrote after the original).
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Carpet_pissr »

Jeff V wrote: Thu Feb 17, 2022 10:34 pm
Carpet_pissr wrote: Thu Feb 17, 2022 10:27 pm On to the second!
Prepare to be disappointed. I just re-read Dune Messiah for the third or 4th time, while it does establish what's to come in the many other books, by itself it's not all that interesting. Children of Dune helps it make more sense, as does God Emperor, and some of the Brian Herbert books (don't let the nay-sayers steer you away from those...they are more entertaining than some of the quasi-philosophical books Frankie wrote after the original).
Heh, I guess you already know that the forward written by Brian Herbert in Messiah tries to explain why people hate it? He said it’s basically just misunderstood.

“ The detractors did not understand that Dune Messiah was a bridging work, connecting Dune with an as-yet-uncompleted third book.”

“To get there, the second novel in the series flipped over the carefully crafted hero myth of Paul Muad’Dib and revealed the dark side of the messiah phenomenon that had appeared to be so glorious in Dune. Many readers didn’t want that dose of reality”

I’m personally ok with that. After all, there were quite a few hints dropped in the first book that it wasn’t going to be a bed of roses (as the forward also mentions).
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Jeff V »

I didn't hate that book (or God Emperor, which is more of the same...lots more). And I didn't read Brian's forward, I just did the audiobook version this time around and they don't include such things.

The one thing that's always bothered me about the series, both Frank's and Brian's books, is that I think in total they span something like 10,000 years and you still have the same core families and entities running the affairs of man.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by YellowKing »

Sandstorm - James Rollins. I had already read this one years ago, but decided to start over Rollin's "Sigma Force" series and this was the first one. He writes ripping adventure yarns that are a mix of military special forces and National Treasure/The Da Vinci Code. This series' hero is Painter Crowe, a half-Native American Jack Reacher type. Some of it gets a little far-fetched (this first book stretched the bounds of credulity in a big way), but they're fun reads if you check your brain at the door.
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Re: Books Read 2022

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Finished A Troll Walks into a Bar by Douglas Lumsden in paper copy. My wife picked this up on a whim for a Christmas gift. It bills itself as a "noir urban fantasy", although it's more hard-boiled detective than noir if I'm being pedantic. It's reminiscent of the Dresden Files by Jim Butcher, but instead of a wizard private detective dealing with the supernatural in our present world (where the world is almost completely unaware of the supernatural), Alexander Southerland is a relatively normal dude in a world that is openly populated by trolls, gnomes, were rats, and the like. (He's relatively normal because he can summon up minor air elementals, so he's got a little bit of magic to him.) The book starts, appropriately enough, when a troll walks into the bar where Southerland is having a drink. This troll is a police detective in what appears to be this world's version of San Francisco, and he tells Southerland that an adaro (water nymph) is going to approach him about a job, and that he'd better turn it down if Southerland knows what's good for him. Southerland isn't quite sure what's good for him.

What follows is pretty good detective story with corrupt cops, warring gangs, and lots of fantasy elements. It's also the first book in a series, and I may just look into the sequels. The plotting was good and the atmosphere was fun. Lumsden sometimes falls back on repetitive dialog, but hopefully that will improve as we go along. I really wasn't sure what to expect from a "noir urban fantasy", but I ended up enjoying the book.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by coopasonic »

I finished up Maus this week. I don't read much anymore, so this counts. It is really well done, if obviously a bit dark but manages to throw some humor in there.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by xenocide »

Some of you may be interested in this

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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by xenocide »

Carpet_pissr wrote: Thu Feb 17, 2022 10:27 pm Dune, the first.

Great book. Maybe not mind-blowing as I was expecting, but definitely great.

Something about it reminded me of Ender’s Game.

On to the second!
Dune is still my favorite novel of all time. I re-read it about every 18 months or so.

Never really got into the other books in the series the same way. 2 was rough for me to read, took many false starts before I finished. 3 was good. 4 was ok. Have not read 5 or 6 yet
Last edited by xenocide on Tue Mar 01, 2022 3:22 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by xenocide »

Jaymann wrote: Thu Feb 17, 2022 12:54 pm Just finished:
Image

I read this a few years after it came out, but it was so long ago I remembered almost nothing outside of the basic premise. Published in 1969, but taking place in 1992, I wanted to see if it held up. I would have to say yes and no.

At the time I thought it was the greatest achievement in literary history. It is likely the first instance of the now trope of someone trying to open their front door but the door won't budge until you pay it. And it may also be the first ever usage of the concept of half-life. It is a slow burn and doesn't really pick up until over half way through.

If you are a fan of Dick it is a must read. Otherwise WMMV. 5.5/8 spray cans.
PKD is a tough one for me. I feel like I should like his stuff but the couple I've tried didn't resonate with me.

Man in the High Castle I think it's fair to say is one of my least favorite books I've ever read. I did not enjoy it at all

Ubik was ok but nothing special

Have not been able to get myself to read another after those 2
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Jaymann »

PKD is definitely hit or miss. I got half way through Man in the High Castle but DNF. Part of the problem may be the rose colored glasses of when his stuff came out. As I mentioned, some things he originated were inventive then, but cliche now. A Scanner Darkly captures drug crazed paranoia like almost nothing else. The Valis trilogy is semi-autobiographical and a bit more accessible than some other works. If neither of those move your needle, you should probably look elsewhere.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Carpet_pissr »

Finished Dune 2, and though I said upthread that the "darker" side of Paul would not bother me, I was 50% wrong there. But not because it showed a dark side of a character who up until then, had been portrayed as nothing but a hero. It's because I felt the writing was significantly worse. And that Herbert was trying a little too hard to show us just how nasty Paul had become. Little things like the verbs used. I remember on one page almost laughing, then going back and counting how many different ways he wrote that Paul "scoffed, sniveled, grumbled, seethed" etc. After the third or fourth conversation like this, I just thought it was a little much. OK, man, we get it, he's grouchy! :P Just a sample of several instances where the inferior (IMO) writing, especially compared to the first novel, really pulled me out.

Anyway, I guess I will try 3, but 2 didn't do a lot for me, and it wasn't due to the much darker tone.

I will give it a 7/10 on the Piss-O-Meter, but dangerously close to a 6.
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Re: Books Read 2022

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Jaymann wrote: Tue Mar 01, 2022 3:40 pm PKD is definitely hit or miss. I got half way through Man in the High Castle but DNF. Part of the problem may be the rose colored glasses of when his stuff came out. As I mentioned, some things he originated were inventive then, but cliche now. A Scanner Darkly captures drug crazed paranoia like almost nothing else. The Valis trilogy is semi-autobiographical and a bit more accessible than some other works. If neither of those move your needle, you should probably look elsewhere.
i'm finding that i now need to re-read the first books i've read, because i can't remember at all what happened in them. first two candidates will be _Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?_ and _Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said_
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Re: Books Read 2022

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A twofer! I had some extra time to read while hanging out in the hospital, so I finished a couple of books.

Finished Falling Man by Don DeLillo in paperback. I've had this on my shelf for a while, but only recently remembered it when I was loading books out of boxes and into some bookshelves in the new house. Originally published in 2006 or 2007, this was DeLillo's 9/11 book. The main characters are a couple in New York City who are married but separated. On 9/11, Keith shows up at Lianne's apartment covered in ash and blood with glass and debris all over him in a state of shock. The book chronicles their relationship in the immediate aftermath of the attacks and, later, a few years after. The title refers most directly to a performance artist known as the Falling Man who appears throughout NYC hanging from wires as though he's falling, but it also can be seen to refer to the images of people leaping from the towers and to man's plight in general. It's not a long book (230+ pages), but it's not fast paced at all. I found it fascinating, particularly as I was dealing with thoughts of my own mortality at the time, and I also wonder what impact it might have had reading it 5 years after the attacks vs. 20 years after. It's not everyone's cup of tea, but I found it well worth the read.

I also finished No Way Back by J.B. Turner on Kindle. This was an Amazon Prime freebie, and I want my money back. This uninspired thriller follows Jack McNeal (who, coincidentally, is also married but separated). Jack is a detective with NYPD Internal Affairs, and he's by the book and very morally upright. His wife is a political journalist who is living in DC. When she shows up dead in an apparent suicide in the Potomac, Jack suspects foul play and he may just have to break the rules to get answers. There are no real surprises along the way in this book. The good guys are dressed in white and riding brave steeds, and the bad guys are twirling their mustaches and cackling evilly. Turner makes little attempt to hide that his US President character is a shallow caricature of Trump (admittedly hard to do given the shallow nature of the parody target). Not all of the loose ends are tied up in an apparent attempt to get me interested in the follow up books, but I'll pass.
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Re: Books Read 2022

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YellowKing wrote: Mon Feb 21, 2022 8:35 am Sandstorm - James Rollins. I had already read this one years ago, but decided to start over Rollin's "Sigma Force" series and this was the first one. He writes ripping adventure yarns that are a mix of military special forces and National Treasure/The Da Vinci Code. This series' hero is Painter Crowe, a half-Native American Jack Reacher type. Some of it gets a little far-fetched (this first book stretched the bounds of credulity in a big way), but they're fun reads if you check your brain at the door.
I love this series. It's a bit formulaic, but they're just really fun adventure series that you don't really see much of anymore. I think my favourite one is Seventh Plague, and I thought the whole sacred elephant sanctuary was really interesting.
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Re: Books Read 2022

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Trunk Music by Michael Connelly

This is the first Harry Bosch book I have read by Connelly. Well, to be honest he was a character in one of the Mickey Haller books I read. Bosch is a tough LAPD detective who tries to solve what seems to be hit masterminded by the Vegas mob. Or is it.

This book was well written, fun to read with interesting characters. I bought this book at a library sale and I will probably buy more Bosch mysteries.
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Re: Books Read 2022

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Read the first three books in order. You can find them bundled
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Formix »

I've fallen into an Erik Larson rut. He writes nonfiction, but it reads like fiction. I read In the Garden of Beasts first, which is about early 1930s Berlin written mainly from the family journals of the American Ambassador. I liked it so much, I moved directly on to the Devil in the White City, which is a story simultaneously about America's first serial killer and the World's Fair in Chicago. Also fascinating.
Not to spoiler anything, but despite feeling like I had a grip on the beginnings of WWII, there were facts included here I had no inkling of.
I claim no knowledge whatsoever about the turn of the century Chicago, and I found the people, places, and lifestyle of the time details in that book to be very interesting.
I have a library hold on The Splendid and The Vile, about Churchill and the Blitz, and on Thunderstruck, about Marconi, so whichever hold comes in first, that's where I'm headed next.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by A nonny mouse »

Formix wrote: Thu Mar 03, 2022 6:19 am I've fallen into an Erik Larson rut. He writes nonfiction, but it reads like fiction. I read In the Garden of Beasts first, which is about early 1930s Berlin written mainly from the family journals of the American Ambassador. I liked it so much, I moved directly on to the Devil in the White City, which is a story simultaneously about America's first serial killer and the World's Fair in Chicago. Also fascinating.
Not to spoiler anything, but despite feeling like I had a grip on the beginnings of WWII, there were facts included here I had no inkling of.
I claim no knowledge whatsoever about the turn of the century Chicago, and I found the people, places, and lifestyle of the time details in that book to be very interesting.
I have a library hold on The Splendid and The Vile, about Churchill and the Blitz, and on Thunderstruck, about Marconi, so whichever hold comes in first, that's where I'm headed next.
The first one I read, and the one I still like the most is Isaac's storm - about the 1900 hurricane that hit Galveston island.

I also liked the Splendid and the Vile. I couldn't get into In the Garden of Beasts.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by El Guapo »

If the Allies Had Fallen, by various.

This is a collection of essays by historians exploring alternate "what if" scenarios around World War II - e.g., what if Britain had made peace with Germany in 1940, what if the Allies had pushed through Yugoslavia, what if Germany had focused on the Mediterranean instead of striking at the USSR, etc.

Pretty interesting stuff. It's a bit funny because the answers to most (though certainly not all) tend to be "well this postwar outcome might have been somewhat different but it wouldn't have changed the outcome of the war". I will also say that the best essays were ones that were written as an (alternate) historical account - e.g., it writes as if a historian is writing about something that actually happened. The ones that weren't often weren't all that engaging, basically just a series of "well this is one way that could've happened, here's another, probably doesn't matter all that much in the end".

Anyway, worth a read if you're in to alternate histories.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Isgrimnur »

Worth an Audible credit.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Scuzz »

A nonny mouse wrote: Fri Mar 04, 2022 3:35 pm
Formix wrote: Thu Mar 03, 2022 6:19 am I've fallen into an Erik Larson rut. He writes nonfiction, but it reads like fiction. I read In the Garden of Beasts first, which is about early 1930s Berlin written mainly from the family journals of the American Ambassador. I liked it so much, I moved directly on to the Devil in the White City, which is a story simultaneously about America's first serial killer and the World's Fair in Chicago. Also fascinating.
Not to spoiler anything, but despite feeling like I had a grip on the beginnings of WWII, there were facts included here I had no inkling of.
I claim no knowledge whatsoever about the turn of the century Chicago, and I found the people, places, and lifestyle of the time details in that book to be very interesting.
I have a library hold on The Splendid and The Vile, about Churchill and the Blitz, and on Thunderstruck, about Marconi, so whichever hold comes in first, that's where I'm headed next.
The first one I read, and the one I still like the most is Isaac's storm - about the 1900 hurricane that hit Galveston island.

I also liked the Splendid and the Vile. I couldn't get into In the Garden of Beasts.
Garden of the Beasts is my favorite so far. I have recently bought The Splendid and the Vile and I have yet to read Isaac’s Storm.
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hitbyambulance
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by hitbyambulance »

Fyodor Dostoyevsky - Crime and Punishment : some contrived coincidences and a number of monologues sorta lowered the believability level, but i was still hard-pressed to put this book down and i read it in two weeks. there were a few scenes (Porfiry's last speech, Sofia's last appearance before the epilogue) that were breathtakingly good. even
Spoiler:
Svidrigailov's final hours
was movingly related. surprisingly uplifting, even redemptive.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Skinypupy »

Finished the second book in The Expanse series last night, “Caliban’s War”. An absolutely fantastic read, will be starting book 3 right away.
ImLawBoy wrote: Wed Feb 23, 2022 1:01 pm Finished A Troll Walks into a Bar by Douglas Lumsden in paper copy. My wife picked this up on a whim for a Christmas gift. It bills itself as a "noir urban fantasy", although it's more hard-boiled detective than noir if I'm being pedantic. It's reminiscent of the Dresden Files by Jim Butcher, but instead of a wizard private detective dealing with the supernatural in our present world (where the world is almost completely unaware of the supernatural), Alexander Southerland is a relatively normal dude in a world that is openly populated by trolls, gnomes, were rats, and the like. (He's relatively normal because he can summon up minor air elementals, so he's got a little bit of magic to him.) The book starts, appropriately enough, when a troll walks into the bar where Southerland is having a drink. This troll is a police detective in what appears to be this world's version of San Francisco, and he tells Southerland that an adaro (water nymph) is going to approach him about a job, and that he'd better turn it down if Southerland knows what's good for him. Southerland isn't quite sure what's good for him.

What follows is pretty good detective story with corrupt cops, warring gangs, and lots of fantasy elements. It's also the first book in a series, and I may just look into the sequels. The plotting was good and the atmosphere was fun. Lumsden sometimes falls back on repetitive dialog, but hopefully that will improve as we go along. I really wasn't sure what to expect from a "noir urban fantasy", but I ended up enjoying the book.
This sounds right up my alley, will definitely be giving it a look.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by hitbyambulance »

i can highly recommend Edgar Allan Poe's short story "The Spectacles" as it was really not something i expected out of this author. guy could write anything.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Jaymann »

hitbyambulance wrote: Thu Mar 10, 2022 6:03 pm i can highly recommend Edgar Allan Poe's short story "The Spectacles" as it was really not something i expected out of this author. guy could write anything.
Thanks for the recommendation. I found the story online. As often with Poe, I guessed the reveal about half way through, but was still transfixed to the end.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Hipolito »

hitbyambulance wrote: Wed Mar 09, 2022 5:16 pm Fyodor Dostoyevsky - Crime and Punishment : some contrived coincidences and a number of monologues sorta lowered the believability level, but i was still hard-pressed to put this book down and i read it in two weeks. there were a few scenes (Porfiry's last speech, Sofia's last appearance before the epilogue) that were breathtakingly good. even
Spoiler:
Svidrigailov's final hours
was movingly related. surprisingly uplifting, even redemptive.
I loved this book, and have been thinking about reading it again or another of his books as that's the only one I've read. Maybe The Brothers Karamazov.
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Re: Books Read 2022

Post by Jaymann »

I have The Gambler by Dostoevsky on my kindle. This basically means I only read it when I'm waiting for an appointment or something. If at some point I get engrossed or am in between reads I might finish it off.
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