The Identity Trap.
great discussion about how identity politics came out of no where and took over the world in a few short years. and how utterly awful it is and why it makes everyone so hateful and violent.
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There Is No Antimemetics Division by qntm.
So weird and original. Nothing makes sense but then it somehow does. Nice to find some fresh SciFi for a change.
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Canada growing ties to the EU. The britain sovereignity treaty. My marriage.
The funniest thing i learned: the Gutenberg bibel was a financial flopp and Gutenberg therefor got sued by the bank and got his assets seized.
The Light Fantastic by Terry Pratchett
I just listened through Project Hail Mary (yes, the book the movie was based on) and that was a phenomenal experience. Very heartfelt, funny, and all around a delightful experience.
Been reading the Bobiverse book series by Dennis E. Taylor. Really fun series, though book 4 was a little tough to get through. Book 6 just came out on Audible but waiting for the workflow the print version. Weird that the audio one came out before print.
If you're a fan of audio books, the series is read by Ray Porter who did an amazing job with Project Hail Mary so I assume they are good too.
The Memory Police
It's a dystopian novel by Japanese author Yoko Ogawa. It was first published back in the 90s, but recently (2019) translated to English by Stephen Snyder.
The way it's written just has this haunting, surreal matter-of-fact-ness that I really enjoyed.
Dungeon Crawler Carl. Been reading all summer, on book 8.
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The Cure for Drowning by Loghan Paylor. I rarely give books 5/5, but this one got it from me.
I read a fanfiction about ANTONBLAST about how Anton met Annie and it was pretty good.
Gideon the Ninth by Tamsin Muir. Necromancers in space, an irreverent heroine, a magic system which is clearly thought out but doesn't get explained in exhaustive detail.
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The Wretched of the Earth. Phenomenal work from a Marxist psychologist on the revolutionary class struggle in the colonized countries.
Perdido Street Station by China Miéville
Extremely weird and engaging book that I can't recommend enough, and although it's cliche the city the book is set in, is definitely the main character. And the city shines in a well built creative way it feels lived in and varied, filled with class conflict and many strange and exciting aliens races which show the heights of creativity fantasy should be striving for. All in all can't recommend more.
Recently finished my 40th book of the year, and it's pretty hard to pick a favorite. It probably has to be a reread of Gateway by Frederick Pohl. Such an amazing book. Here are my spoiler-free notes:
- In Earth's future, tunnels are found on Venus that contain alien artifacts left behind hundreds of thousands of years ago. Later an asteroid is found that is riddled with tunnels and studded with nearly a thousand small ships, most of which are in working order. The ships will travel faster than light to a preset destination, and return automatically, but no one knows where the destination will be, and a significant percentage of ships either never return or return with the crew dead. Of those that do return, many return with alien technology or data on valuable locations, making the crew very wealthy. This has set off a sort of gold rush, with people spending everything they have to get to the “Gateway" asteroid and gamble their lives on the chance to get rich. The story is told through the eyes of one such man, who has gotten to Gateway, but then is too scared to take a mission. This is an amazing book. I read it originally in the 80s (it was written in the 70s), and I believe this was my first reread since then. I can't recommend it strongly enough.
For a first read that wasn't the latest book in a series, I might have to say Someone You Can Build a Nest In by John Wiswell. Here are my spoiler -free notes for that one:
- It's a love story, except the main character is a shape-shifting, man-eating monster, and she falls in love with a woman who helps her, thinking she's an injured human. I really liked this book a lot. It's clever, and it has a certain joy and goodness to it, even though there's a lot of terrible things going on all through it.
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I read Buffalo Hunter Hunter earlier this year and loved every bit of it. It started me down a Stephen Graham Jones rabbit hole I'm still doing down.
The Pearl by John Steinbeck
A short story warning of the corruption of wealth.
Runner-Up: The Toilers of The Sea by Victor Hugo
A study of human perserverance and sacrifice.
I think it might have been the end of last year rather than this year, but: "Everything is Tuberculosis"
Incredibly well written and absolutely fascinating.
A Bell For Adano by Hersey.
Great writing and characters, a pleasant amount of humor.
Chaucer's Canterbury tales, but i think I can't remember anything prior to this June
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Been going through Project Gutenberg's library recently and came across The Blue Castle.
Gave it a read and was pleasantly entertained.
Kate Atkinson's life after life. It's about a woman who starts back at the beginning every time she dies. You see her experience WW2 in numerous different ways.
Its not new I don't think, but my book club read "The Last Murder at the End of the World" by Stuart Turton this year and I loved it.
Probably They Bloom at Night by Trang Thanh Tran with an honorable mention (since I talked about it just this morning on lemmy) for How High We Go
I re-read it earlier this year.
"Night Soldiers" by Alan Furst. A young fisherman is killed by a Fascist mob in a small Bulgarian town. His brother is recruited to join the KGB. After training in Moscow he's sent to fight in the Spanish Civil War.
A great mix of atmosphere, action, and politics. Every character, from a Nazi pilot ot a Paris café owner is portrayed perfectly.
Looked at my library history YTD. Maybe
The Lies of Locke Lamora
But I'm not sure, have been reading a lot and a lot of it good.
Both Clover Blue, and This I Know, by Eldonna Edwards.
Listen for the Lie by Amy Tintera
Its a murder mystery where our main character is a woman who is the leading suspect of a true crime podcast going on during the whole book.
The audiobook is excellent because you get to actually hear excerpts from the podcast, music and all, with a different actor playing the host of the podcast.
The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley. But I gotta step it up -- Bookwyrm tells me I'm only 33% of the way to my reading goal for the year.
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