Okay everyone: I want to know what you’re reading right now? It can be comics, mangas or actual (gasp) books! Let us know in the comments below.
Me? I’m reading a bloody book called ‘Training For Climbing’. I’m also reading Rise of the Videogame Zinesters, which I’m ashamed to say I haven’t read yet.
So that’s me at the moment, although I admit it’s a struggle to find time to read these days…
Comments
74 responses to “Off Topic: What Are You Reading?”
Gardens of the Moon (first of the Malazan series) – Steven Erikson
Pretty good so far. Apparently it really grabs you as you keep going.
The first few books in this series are epic. Very unique take on the dark fantasy genre. His writing leaves a lot to your imagination, which is challenging and liberating all at once. I took a user name from one of his awesome characters – ‘Surly’. Enjoy! PS. I had to take a break after the 4th books…heavy going.
Edit: PPS. you will find how he incorporates the use of ‘magic’ in the stories is quite fresh as well.
I’m slowly getting my head around magic and how it works. Definitely very interesting and very fresh.
Upon reflection – generally speaking, a lot of people find the GOT series is punctuated with a lot of gray areas and characters. I would say that the Malazan series muddies the divide between good and evil even further. Good, virtuous, honourable or even remotely noble, simply does not exist in these books. Pure survival of the fittest.
I’m coming off finishing The First Law series. Every book after that is just puppy dogs and rainbows.
Intriguing. I have not read these books. I’ll check then out.
It’s a trilogy and then 3 stand alone books that are in the same world that continue with side characters.
That grey area you have in GoT, it turns it up to 11 and you seriously start to hate certain protagonists and love ones you probably shouldn’t.
I must get around to reading this one of these days, given how heavily influenced by “The Black Company” it’s meant to be. Maybe after I finish off Glen Cook.
I’m currently getting my partner to read the “Lincoln Rhyme” series by Jeffrey Deaver, so I’m re-reading the series as well, but 1 book in front of her so as to refresh my memory at all the little plot twists and surprises so when she gasps in shock / horror / surprise / delight I have an idea of what’s coming next.
So currently I’m reading “The Stone Monkey” by Jeffrey Deaver.
Anything from Privateer Press or the novels they’re outsourcing to Skull Islands.
Zen and the art of Motorcycle maintenance – Just for some light reading….. (Matthew Reilly’s The Tournament is next on the list)
HITMAN.
Non fiction: Basic something something in intensive care.
Fiction: The last thing I was reading was Thief of Time.
(Yes, I often have several things going at once.)
Just finished english (fan) translations of all the Witcher books.
They any good?
Just finished Divergent, now a couple of chapters into Vampire academy
Still going through Sanderson’s The Way of Kings. Just over halfway through, really enjoying it, but hard to find time to read nowadays…
Devils In Exile by Chuck Hogan.
Cheers to Childbirth – A dads guide to supporting your partner during labor…. trying to get my head around being a support to my 7 month pregnant wife without falling apart in the delivery room.
1984 George Orwell
Feet of Clay by Terry Pratchett
Non-fiction: Invisible: A memoir by Hughues de Montalembert (story of an artist who interrupts a home-invasion/robbery only to have acid thrown on his face. It’s how he coped with suddenly losing his eyesight).
Planning to read “The Art of Osamu Tezuka”.
Just finished reading the above comments.
Just finished my Kickstarter copy of Rudy Rucker’s “The Big Aha” https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/rudyrucker/the-big-aha-a-novel
Picked up a second-hand copy of “Godel, Escher, Bach” a few months ago, the spine is heavily creased up to the half-way point, marking where 35 years of readers have hit the bit about programming theory and given up. I’m in the middle of it now, still hopeful of finishing…
I’m reading (technically, audiobook) Just A Geek by Wil Wheaton
Just finished Thrones (finally), so moving onto Isaac Asimov’s Foundation. It’s a pretty cool guy so far
I should really finish reading A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Heaven: (Or, How I Made Peace with the Paranormal and Stigmatized Zealots and Cynics in the Process) by Corey Taylor, but I just lack the motivation. His first book Seven Deadly Sins was great and a much better read.
the dark knight returns again
Halfway through A Dance with Dragons and just started Marching Powder.
Bought one of the Witcher novels online today too 🙂
Marching Powder is incredible. Now that I think about it, where’s my copy..?
I went to a book store with a friend and she bought it for me saying how good it was. Pretty intrigued now 🙂
I’m just reading The Last Wish at the moment and it’s pretty great.
I’m not usually a big reader but the story has really sucked me in.
I’m working my way through The Night Angel Trilogy by Brent Weeks. So far up to 2nd book Shadows Edge. They are great haven’t been able to put them down.
You’ve got to read the Lightbringer series by Brent Weeks when you’re done with Night Angel Trilogy. Amazing series, can’t wait for the next book!
Yeah, except SO LONG TO WAIT 🙁
It took me a bit to get used to his writing style, but all his books are epic 🙂
Reading the Gone series by Michael Grant… for a series aimed at teenagers its pretty dark and gritty. Finally on the last book
Just finished reading the chemist warehouse sign outside the office window.
I’m reading Kaffe Fassett’s Passionate Patchwork while I wait (im)patiently for Joe Hill’s Locke And Key Volume 2 to arrive in the mail.
I think I’m up to volume 4 of Locke and Key. You just reminded me I need to get on with that. Is it weird that I enjoy Hill’s writing more than King’s? Slightly more macabre, and slightly more magical.
2312 by Kim Stanley Robinson. Only a few chapters in, but it’s hooked me so far.
I just finished Magician by Raymond E Feist for about the 30th time (no exaggeration) so I’m deciding what to pick up next. And, as usual, The Walking Dead is on my commuter rotation.
I really liked those Feist books too, though oddly (?) I prefer the *blah* of the Empire books.
In fact, when I first started using names on the internet, my first was Macros The Black 😉
Sounded more bad-ass than Pug lol
I haven’t read much of his other stuff apart from Darkness at Sethanon and Silverthorn, but Magician I can for back to again and again. My cat’s name is Pug, and when I’m able to get a dog I’m calling it Tomas. Me like that book 🙂
Definitely read the Empire trilogy, it’s set the same universe as Magician et al but takes place on the Tsurani (sp?) home world. Really good.
Yeah, I’ve heard they’re pretty good and the Game of the Council seems intriguing … putting them on the list.
Still a better love story than twilight.
I’m only missing the 3 “Empire” books from my collection – I own every single other book in the series. I suggest you read them all in release order first, then there’s a chronological order published on his website that gives you a bit of a different path through them.
There’s a couple that a somewhat weak in places (compared to the rest of the series, but still awesome). As a series it’s an epic journey that throws some very interesting curve balls at you. Highly recommended.
Sorry for necro, but after this thread I got thinking it’s time to re-read some Feist again, as it’s been years..
Picked up the Riftwar Trilogy for Kindle, only to realise it’s (Magician at least) been re-released in the intervening years as a sort of ‘Feist’s Directors Cut’ version, with a bunch of extra bits and pieces (better explained, some bit’s re-written, extra dialogue etc).
Not sure if Silverthorn and Sethanon got the same treatment (they probably did, would be weird to only do the first book of the trilogy), but there you go, just some FYI for you.
How long ago was your revised version published? My copy of Magician is the revised edition, and I’ve had it for about 15 years. So far as I know Silverthorn and Sethanon haven’t gone through the same treatment, but unless he’s added even more since then it should be the same book I’ve been reading for years.
Um not sure. I think it was revised in around 1992 there abouts, so your copy might well be that one. There’s a 2 page ‘forward’ from Feist at the start of the Kindle book explaining the reasoning for the revisions etc.
“Originally published in 1982 this is the first book in the Riftwar Saga series which after its success led to many more books being written by Feist about the fantasy world of Midkemia. It was re-published as a revised edition in 1992 which contained text omitted from the original release.”
– from http://midkemia.wikia.com/wiki/Magician_%28novel%29
The only version I have read was the 1982 first edition, so it’s a bit different to me.
*dons hipster hat with ironic glasses* I was reading it before it was cool… 😉
Ha ha, yeah I would have got mine after ’92, and it has the foreword. From memory, the main differences were reinstating dialog which the publisher pushed to edit, and expanding on Kelewan’s history (particularly in regards to the Enemy) during Pug’s Testing on top of the tower.
Feist says it was about 50,000 words.
Cool, mind you it’s been so long since I read the series that it’s all again quite new. I remember bits and pieces, like the names, but the sequence of events was lost to me.
Good stuff, I’m enjoying it greatly.
Great to put the cricket/soccer on in the background and read away 😀
I am reading Kotaku.
Oh, you mean *books*.
“Like a Mighty Army” by David Weber – set in the distant future on a planet ruled by a militantly anti-technological religion. Just came out today; book 7 of the Safehold series.
“The Coming of the Third Reich” – Richard J. Evans
“The Rapture of the Nerds” – Cory Doctorow & Charles Stross. Set in a post-singularity Earth where the orbiting posthuman cloud occasionally… experiments with the humans remaining on Earth.
“Java & Android Application Development for Dummies”
Also read a bunch of manga the other day, but since any given manga takes well under an hour to read I usually can’t say I “am reading” any particular volume.
On Writing by King at the moment. So many great tips on the craft. I’m still rolling through Pale Blue Dot by Sagan, and I have Cosmos after that.
Non fiction is A Clash of Kings and a re-read of Heart Shaped Box by Joe Hill. Waiting on some more to arrive in the mail.
Re-reading the Sparhawk books by David Eddings at the moment. I owned the books years ago and gave them away for some reason (packing and moving I think, was 10 years ago) but recently bought them all for the kindle so reading them again.
Just about at the end of Sapphire Rose.
Also reading Joe Abercrombie books at the moment as well, the First Law trilogy. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Abercrombie)
Oh!
The Sapphire Rose?
Far out, I read that ages ago… and now want to re-read it, too.
I’ve tried to find some of Joe Abercrombie’s books in my local library… no luck.
I may have to eBook it.
Loathe as I am to do so.
I’ve already got the Tamrulian Sparhawk series line up to read next. They are relatively short books, only takes a few days for me to read each.
See if you can track down the other good series Eddings wrote about Belgarath; the Belgariad and the Mallorean if you haven’t already read them.
The Abercrombie ones are pretty good, but I have only read the first book before I got sidetracked into re-reading the Eddings ones 😉 Quite a bit darker than the fairly cheerful and happy adventures taking place in Eddings worlds
Eddings tend to recycle the same plots, but the characters make up for it. Not that he doesn’t recycle the characters, too.
If you like the Belgariad/Mallorean and Elenium/Tamuli you may also want to check “The Redemption of Althalus”, which is broadly similar but crams the entire plot into a single book. The viewpoint character is the Belgarath analogue (i.e. the lovable, immortal rogue.)
Yeah right, the name rings a bell, not sure if that’s just from seeing it in the ‘Also by this author…’ list or because I have read it. I’d best track it down and check, you know, for science.
I have indeed read the Belgariad and Malloreon series.
I’d like to re-read them, as well… I don’t have time to re-read though… I just started Steven Erikson’s Malazan Book of the Fallen series… up to book two, Deadhouse Gates… and I just bought Brandon Sanderson’s Words of Radience, book two of The Stormlight Archive.
Re-reading Magician by Raymond E Feist. Probably the 4th time reading this book and every time I read it I pick up extra things over the last read. And just finished the Malazan series and that was truly epic in it’s scale.
Have you read the whole series, or just a couple of books? Each time I read the series I pick new stuff up as well.
I just got Magicians End and before I read it I am going to go through the entire series again so the whole story is fresh in my mind. Going to be a couple of months before I get there but I think the wait is worth it.
It most certainly is 🙂 I knew when it was coming out so I planned ahead and re-read probably 5 of the books leading up to it so that I was refreshed on the situation.
Just finished reading Shaq uncut and currently reading a split of Pistol the life of Pistol Pete Maravich and Game of Knowns by Dr Karl.
Just started rereading the Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss
I’ve just finished “Game Over: How Nintendo Zapped an American Industry, Captured Your Dollars and Enslaved Your Children’ by David Sheff – great history of the rise of Nintendo – the video game industry has far more lawyers involved than you would think!
Next up after getting interested in New Hollywood (after randomly watching ‘Dirty Harry’) is finding a copy of ‘Easy Riders Raging Bulls: How the Sex, Drugs and Rock N Roll generation saved Hollywood’
Maybe I have a thing for long-winded book titles!
I’m reading a Haruki Murakami novel, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. I’m finding it interesting, but also kind of an odd read. I have friends who recommend his work so highly, but I find this book slightly mundane in parts. Perhaps his other books are quite good?
“Whispering Nickel Idols”, by Glen Cook. Fortunately not featuring nymphomaniac Greys this time around.
Currently reading The Path of Daggers by Robert Jordan.
… When A Memory of Light came out last year, I realised I didn’t remember what happened in the first thirteen, so I have been re-reading.
I’m only up to book eight… I need to step up.
I have been reading other books in between, though. I have no idea what series to move onto next, either.I’ve been on a bit of a book binge of late – worked my way through the first couple of books in the Orphanage/Jason Wander series, Libriomancer and the Newsflesh trilogy (Feed/Deadline/Blackout) – now I’m awaiting delivery of the other Orphanage books otherwise I might get distracted by some other random titles I picked up a little while back 🙂
I’m “reading” Hate Plus. I’ve always been into visual novels and I really enjoyed playing/reading Analogue: A Hate Story which I got in the Steam Sale, so I’m getting into the sequel.
Just started reading “all you need is kill” by Hiroshi Sakurazaka
It’s not the most advanced of plots, but it’s cool nonetheless, there’s a war against hostile aliens, and one guy is caught in a time loop that resets when he dies. it’s basically groundhog day but with aliens and war.
i picked it up after reading some of the manga adaption, and wanting to go to the source material. it’s also getting turned into a hollywood movie starring tom cruise, which they’ve renamed to “Edge of Tomorrow” which i can’t decide whether it looks good or crap…
Birth, School, Metallica, Death.
A biography. Got it for Christmas of my Mother-in-law, pretty good so far!
@shane, what are you doing? This article has been up for 7 hours and you still haven’t pimped your books! For shame.
Aw man. To make matters worse, the last book I read really was Volume Two of Peaceful Tomorrows, the 2013 Aurealis Award finalist penned by Shane W Smith himself.
Currently reading “Rainbow Six” again as I haven’t for years.
Just finished Karen Hancock’s “Light of Eidon”, and while it has very “Christian” undertones, it had me hooked the whole way through. Enough so that I have bought the entire series.
Deadhouse Gates, by Steven Erikson.