What are you reading now?

[taiwan_girl]

The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.

The desert was the apotheosis of all deserts, huge, standing to the sky for what looked like eternity in all directions. It was white and blinding and waterless and without feature save for the faint, cloudy haze of the mountains which sketched themselves on the horizon and the devil-grass which brought sweet dreams, nightmares, death. An occasional tombstone sign pointed the way, for once the drifted track that cut its way through the thick crust of alkali had been a highway. Coaches and buckas had followed it. The world had moved on since then. The world had emptied.

Well............................ I finally did it. 8 books, 4300 pages, I finally finished "The Dark Tower" series by Steven King.

The Dark Tower series tells the story of Roland Deschain, Mid-World’s last gunslinger, who is traveling southeast across Mid-World’s post-apocalyptic landscape, searching for the powerful but elusive magical edifice known as The Dark Tower. Located in the fey region of End-World, amid a sea of singing red roses, the Dark Tower is the nexus point of the time-space continuum. It is the heart of all worlds, but it is also under threat. Someone, or something, is using the evil technology of the Great Old Ones to destroy it.

Inspired in equal parts by Robert Browning’s poem, “Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came,” J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, and Sergio Leone’s spaghetti Western classics, The Dark Tower series is an epic of Arthurian proportions.

Quite interesting, and from what I have heard, not a typical Steven King story. Overall, I quite enjoyed it.

Somewhat uneven, but I think that is expected in such a big series that was written over a 30 year period (~1975 - 2005)

• The Gunslinger
• The Drawing of the Three
• The Waste Lands
• Wizard and Glass
• The Wind Through the Keyhole
• Wolves of the Calla
• Song of Susannah
• The Dark Tower

[bachophile]

I’ve put this on my Amazon shopping list based on this review in the times

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/22/books/review/american-gun-cameron-mcwhirter-zusha-elinson.html

I don’t know when I’ll get around to it because I have a pile already waiting but it looks interesting

[Aqua Letifer]

[Jolly]

@LuFins-Dad said in What are you reading now?:

My guess is @Jolly has read this as it's been a part of the Baen free library for years. It's also free on Audible and Apple Books as well...

Alternate history... A small modern (2000 AD) coal mining town in West Virginia with a population of roughly 5,000 (very similar to towns @Aqua-Letifer and I have spent big parts of our lives in) gets transported by cosmic mishap to Thuringia (Germany) in 1631 AD, smack in the middle of the 30 Year War. creating a splinter universe timeline.

The modern town has it's own power plant, coal mine, several machine shops, and a modest agricultural base. It also has a new HS and Vocational Tech school... It also has a good number of Appalachian Coal Miners, Hillbillies, trucks, and modern firearms...

It's an interesting story of a town that has incredible technological advantages, but is also vastly vastly outnumbered in the middle of one of humanity's darkest and most violent periods. A time when they have to balance their own American ideals vs the needs of the moment. The author's VERY pro-union attitudes come through a little too strongly for my taste, but it's an interesting story,.

Funny, I'm rereading this now. Do a web search for "Baen CD" and you'll find some links to the CD's they used to put in their books. Probably a half dozen of the follow-on books, plus several editions of the Grantville Gazette.

While you're perusing all the available books, do try On Basilisk Station, the first book in the Honor Harrington series. Most of that series is pretty well written. Think Hornblower in space...

[bachophile]

Saw this just now in the non fiction list of the nytimes bestsellers.

Next on my shelf

[jon-nyc]

@Jon said in What are you reading now?:

I have read his Rise and Fall of the Third Reich I believe 3 times. Like that book, this is also quite interesting and informed by his personal experiences as he lived in Paris from 1925 until the early 30s, and then later when he had to leave Germany.

Finished this a few weeks ago. Superb book, though long like his others. I think it was 44hrs on audio.

Renauda - I think you’d love it. It covers the entire third republic from 1870 to its destruction in 1940, focusing most on the final 5-10 years.

[Horace]

Werner considers himself a writer and poet, before a film maker. I did not know that.

[Aqua Letifer]

@Horace said in What are you reading now?:

Werner considers himself a writer and poet, before a film maker. I did not know that.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic.

[Horace]

@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:

@Horace said in What are you reading now?:

Werner considers himself a writer and poet, before a film maker. I did not know that.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic.

I literally did not know that.

[Doctor Phibes]

I bought this again on Kindle. I first read it in about 1982, and I'm enjoying it a lot more this time. Not sure whether I'll keep going through all of them. That bit with the bloke turning into a shoal of fish rather jumped the sandworm for me.

[Aqua Letifer]

@Horace said in What are you reading now?:

@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:

@Horace said in What are you reading now?:

Werner considers himself a writer and poet, before a film maker. I did not know that.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic.

I literally did not know that.

Gotcha.

Yeah, he's out there a lot of the time. I think he's right about his opinions, just out there.

[Horace]

@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:

@Horace said in What are you reading now?:

@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:

@Horace said in What are you reading now?:

Werner considers himself a writer and poet, before a film maker. I did not know that.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic.

I literally did not know that.

Gotcha.

Yeah, he's out there a lot of the time. I think he's right about his opinions, just out there.

I was being literal, he considers himself a writer and poet before a film maker. He thinks his writings will outlast the impact of his films, and he will be remembered mostly for them. He says so out loud. He was just on a podcast called The Gray Area.

[bachophile]

@Doctor-Phibes I reread dune about a year ago.

I think I’ve mentioned this but when I first read it as a young teen I fell madly in love with chani.

Though the recent movie’s chani didn’t do it for me.

[Aqua Letifer]

@Horace said in What are you reading now?:

@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:

@Horace said in What are you reading now?:

@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:

@Horace said in What are you reading now?:

Werner considers himself a writer and poet, before a film maker. I did not know that.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic.

I literally did not know that.

Gotcha.

Yeah, he's out there a lot of the time. I think he's right about his opinions, just out there.

I was being literal, he considers himself a writer and poet before a film maker. He thinks his writings will outlast the impact of his films, and he will be remembered mostly for them. He says so out loud. He was just on a podcast called The Gray Area.

Yep, I've heard him say that elsewhere also.

[LuFins Dad]

@Jolly said in What are you reading now?:

@LuFins-Dad said in What are you reading now?:

My guess is @Jolly has read this as it's been a part of the Baen free library for years. It's also free on Audible and Apple Books as well...

Alternate history... A small modern (2000 AD) coal mining town in West Virginia with a population of roughly 5,000 (very similar to towns @Aqua-Letifer and I have spent big parts of our lives in) gets transported by cosmic mishap to Thuringia (Germany) in 1631 AD, smack in the middle of the 30 Year War. creating a splinter universe timeline.

The modern town has it's own power plant, coal mine, several machine shops, and a modest agricultural base. It also has a new HS and Vocational Tech school... It also has a good number of Appalachian Coal Miners, Hillbillies, trucks, and modern firearms...

It's an interesting story of a town that has incredible technological advantages, but is also vastly vastly outnumbered in the middle of one of humanity's darkest and most violent periods. A time when they have to balance their own American ideals vs the needs of the moment. The author's VERY pro-union attitudes come through a little too strongly for my taste, but it's an interesting story,.

Funny, I'm rereading this now. Do a web search for "Baen CD" and you'll find some links to the CD's they used to put in their books. Probably a half dozen of the follow-on books, plus several editions of the Grantville Gazette.

While you're perusing all the available books, do try On Basilisk Station, the first book in the Honor Harrington series. Most of that series is pretty well written. Think Hornblower in space...

I’m getting up to the Ottoman part of the primary storyline, and remembering that I’ve read up to the Polish Maelstrom the first time I read it and looked ahead to see how many new books they’ve added.

0. And I just discovered that Flint died last year, and there are no plans for continuing the series with any of the ancillary writers. Very disappointing.

[Aqua Letifer]

Didn't so much read this one as listen to it, but it was quite a hoot. It's a mishmash of roughly the following:

• You wrap a wire around an iron nail and run a current through the wire, you can create an electromagnet. This works because there's a current running through the wire. Okay, so, instead of a wire, say you have a highway. And instead of a current of electrons you have a constant stream of souls with the power of free will, passing by other free-willed souls who are stationary on the side of the highway. This creates a kind of spiritual current, a kind of electromagnetism between our world and the afterlife.
• Daedalus isn't dead, he's just been busy elsewhere.
• The Minotaur is a place, not just a thing.

Seriously fun sci-fi. I was happy to learn that Powers follows a writing method similar to Ray Bradbury. Makes sense, too, when you compare how the plots of both writers unwind. There's a lot of "dream logic" going on.

[Klaus]

I haven't read a real novel in a long time, maybe decades. I read this one in two days (the original German version).

It was quite cool and inspiring. I had almost forgotten what it feels to read a novel and how to emphasise with its characters. This one was rather tear-inducing in some places (cried like a baby) but also strangely fulfilling.

This is a book about how we are shaped by our past, about what family is, about love. It's all super-relatable. Great book!

[George K]

I'm not a huge King fan, though I loved Salem's Lot and some of his shorter stuff (Apt Pupil). Also, of course, The Shining.

So....

[Renauda]

https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/27109827

[Copper]

I have been looking at textbooks lately.

There is not really a degree in the book. But that would have advantages over some school-bought degrees.