OK, how has THIS never been a thing?
I’ll get us started. I’ve read a couple of books this year. The one I just put down was Iain M Banks:
Quality book, has quite a sombre tone to it, but the SCALE!
Holy shit, this author just nails being able to talk about human matters and scale, expand on hundred kilometre structures, and describe utterly alien creatures.
It’s not a bad entry into the Culture novels.
Next up I’m going to read:
Anyone else been up to any reading?
Ok well, where to begin. I could say that I read a lot(20-50 books per year). I like fantasy books and that is what I mostly read. Most resent would be the the books for the Faarseer trilogy From Robin Hobb. I have read these once already also I have read the other books in this universe.
So on to recommendations. It has to be the Malazan book of the fallen series(read this 3 times already). A word of warning, there are 10 books in the series. Additional side story books as well. They are very complex with loads of characters and nothing is really being told to the reader you have to figure out information based on the bits you are given. So not light reading as such.
i enjoyed the farseer/liveship/the one after that trilogies but haven’t read past that.Does that world ever stop shitting on it’s characters?
I am currently reading TA Today; A New Introduction to Transactional Analysis.
Do comics count? If so, everyone should read Sex Criminals.I recently read the Rick and Morty comics, Age of Ultron vs Marvel Zombies, Old Man Logan v2, and I’ve started re-reading 100 bullets and will shortly read the most recent Wildstorm.
Yeah fuck it, chuck comics in as well.
Favourite fantasy author is definitely Joe Abercrombie.
The first trilogy and most of his spin offs are set in The First Law universe, which is a pretty awful place to live, that actively makes its inhabitants worse people for trying to do good.
But it’s really well written, with fantastic characters and pacing. The end of the last book, “Last Argument of Kings” is mindblowing.
I don’t read books that frequently but the last book I read was The Martian by Andy Weir 
Really enjoyed it and the film is not as good as the book IMO so if you watched the film but have not read the book I recommend it.
I had read the book before I saw the film so found myself listing things missing in the film.
@adrock no I don’t think it will ever stop shitting on the characters. @ChEd the movie put me off the book and I have not read it. Also it is the usual way, books are best and adaptations to a movie or series are never as good. Usually these do not follow the books properly even to the extent of changing the mood of the whole thing.
Its taken me over a year o read this. I dont read a lot. Generally only when im on holiday…but the kids have ruined that for me now. Only really get hald hour reading while kids are swimming on a Sat.
Next up it this
Im sure this will take me a while too
I’m trying to alternate between fiction and non-fiction these days.
Such a massive backlog of stuff to get through.
Currently, it’s a Peter F. Hamilton novel: The Great North Road.
It’s a slow burner and being quite tiresome to get through, but that’s the usual pace of his stuff.
Man I absolutely love Banks, was gutted when he died, such a loss. And Neuromancer was amazing but I haven’t read it since it came out…not read the sequels either
I’m probably not the best for this thread. I read continuously - and generally 3 or 4 books on the go at once.
Most recent (ie since the summer) were the Neal Asher War Factory series, a couple of Alastair Reynolds, latest Peter F Hamilton and a re-reading of Iain M Banks’ Culture series (so glad I got to meet him a few times before he sadly went).
Also managed to take in the 15 Lives of Harry August and Claire North’s other mental book - Touch, as well as re-reading classic Philip K Dick shorts in time for the TV series…
Currently proofreading the drafts of Krystle Kingston’s 2nd novel in her Rose series - it’s not my usual genre (it’s Victorian Romantic Vampire…) but I quite like proofreading, and I think the series will go down well with quite a large audience.
I don’t know how you can do that 3-4 books on the go at once. My GF does the same thing. I tried this with 2 different Dan Brown books, needles to say it did not go well and I never finished either book.
Well…Dan Brown is not a good author so I’m not surprised you didn’t finish them, I bought them and was immediately disappointed - turns out the most common books given to charity shops are Dan Brown and 50 Shades…
Dan Brown books are trash. Utterly trash.
Decent pop corn movies. But trash books.
Always wanted to try some “Ancient conspiracy” style stories. Anyone got any suggestions?
No suggestions for you Xander. Yes well imagine my confusion since the characters and the story on both books were pretty much the same.
If you want to go high brow with it read Foucault’s Pendulum by Umberto Eco. It’s where Dan Brown got a lot of his ideas from but it’s research is far far deeper. And the language and writing is infinitely better.
Absolutely! Also read the Name of the Rose. It was a good film, but an awesome book.