What are you reading at the moment?

pmbomb

HAL9000 said:

Right now I’m re-reading the Gormenghast Trilogy - rather more wordy and slow than I’d remembered, and took quite a while to get going. Now that it’s hit its stride I’m enjoying it but I can fully understand  anybody giving up on it earlier on. The (usually somewhat grotesque) characters (and descriptions of them) are superb.

Next up is The Thursday Murder Club.

I read Titus Groan once - it's like a super rich cake fruit cake, I just took a nibble at a time. It's quite a pice of work for sure.

Worth keeping going with the rest?

Mattharrier

Storm Front by Jim Butcher. I've heard of the Dresden Files books, any nerd worth their salt probably has, but other than watching the short-lived TV series (which I actually enjoyed, although as far as I'm aware nobody that had read the books did) I hadn't any experience until a good old Kindle Daily Deal turned up.

Very early so far, but just the opening few paragraphs display a subtle, dry sense of humour that is right up my street. It reminds me a little of the Spenser novels by Robert B Parker, which I am very fond of - self deprecating privately employed investigators seem to be a favourite of mine.

hollywoodrox

Just finished The practice of Practice by Johnathan Harnum 

  Very good  would recommend to anyone who practices anything ,this is aimed at musicians and it’s in well with lots of other books on the subject of practice , learning etc. Like “ the talent code”
outliers, bounce , the practicing mind etc .

would definitely recommend all the above 

ICBM

The Last Children Of Tokyo - Yoko Tawada

Dystopian future novel set in a Japan where the elderly live almost indefinitely and children are weak and tend to die young... quirky and odd, I can't quite decide if it's brilliant or rubbish to be honest! I'm about 2/3 of the way through, and I will know when I finish it. I think.

Nitefly

Oh dear... haven't read it myself, but Our Maud found the Osman book (and I quote) "Naïve, like Enid Blyton for grownups" 

She found his "asides to the reader" especially annoying, you know the way he does "asides to the camera" on House of Games?

I can't seem to settle to novels any more - I still haven't finished the one I took on my trip to New Zealand over 2 years ago 

Re the Gormenghast trilogy, @pmbomb - I found the second one to be the best of the three, although it's nearly 50 years since I read them.  

HAL9000

pmbomb said:

HAL9000 said:

Right now I’m re-reading the Gormenghast Trilogy - rather more wordy and slow than I’d remembered, and took quite a while to get going. Now that it’s hit its stride I’m enjoying it but I can fully understand  anybody giving up on it earlier on. The (usually somewhat grotesque) characters (and descriptions of them) are superb.

Next up is The Thursday Murder Club.

I read Titus Groan once - it's like a super rich cake fruit cake, I just took a nibble at a time. It's quite a pice of work for sure.

Worth keeping going with the rest?

IMHO yes - well the first two books anyway. I understand that the third book, Titus Alone, was written when Peake was suffering with mental illness and sadly it shows. It (again IMHO) lacks the epic sweep and evocative use of language that characterises the first couple of books.

ICBM

Nitefly said:

Re the Gormenghast trilogy, @pmbomb - I found the second one to be the best of the three, although it's nearly 50 years since I read them.  

I recently re-read them for the first time in about thirty years, and would have agreed about that before I did - but now I would say they're impossible to separate, especially the first two which are really just two halves of the same book - and all equally brilliant. I was especially more impressed by Titus Alone, reading it as an older adult than a teenager or a younger adult - I'm not sure that in some ways it isn't the best of the three, but it's the least typical.

Probably my favourite book (all three together) I've ever read.

Nitefly

ICBM said:

Nitefly said:

Re the Gormenghast trilogy, @pmbomb - I found the second one to be the best of the three, although it's nearly 50 years since I read them.  

I recently re-read them for the first time in about thirty years, and would have agreed about that before I did - but now I would say they're impossible to separate, especially the first two which are really just two halves of the same book - and all equally brilliant. I was especially more impressed by Titus Alone, reading it as an older adult than a teenager or a younger adult - I'm not sure that in some ways it isn't the best of the three, but it's the least typical.

Probably my favourite book (all three together) I've ever read.

That's interesting @ICBM - when I read them half a century ago (!) I found Titus Alone felt like it had been written by someone else, the style was so different.

Perhaps it's time for me to follow your example and re-read them...

ICBM

Nitefly said:

That's interesting @ICBM - when I read them half a century ago (!) I found Titus Alone felt like it had been written by someone else, the style was so different.

Perhaps it's time for me to follow your example and re-read them...

It’s true that it was heavily edited after Peake’s death because there were a lot of inconsistencies in the manuscript which made some of it difficult to follow - and I think there’s more than one edited version. But although very different in content, I think it’s recognisably the same work.

Definitely re-read it, it’s an astounding work of genius. I’d been meaning to for years and finally got around to it in the first lockdown - I’m actually pleased I waited so long and was able to do it with less distraction.

randerson

Nitefly said:

Just finished Railway Modeller Feb 14 issue, so am about to start "Leviathan Wakes" by James S.A. Corey, on my son's recommendation.

Also about halfway through the Donald Fagen book from the other thread - very enjoyable.

What's the Donald Fagen  book please?

Blueingreen

randerson said:

Nitefly said:

Just finished Railway Modeller Feb 14 issue, so am about to start "Leviathan Wakes" by James S.A. Corey, on my son's recommendation.

Also about halfway through the Donald Fagen book from the other thread - very enjoyable.

What's the Donald Fagen  book please?

Eminent Hipsters.  It's pretty good.

Nitefly

randerson said:

Nitefly said:

Just finished Railway Modeller Feb 14 issue, so am about to start "Leviathan Wakes" by James S.A. Corey, on my son's recommendation.

Also about halfway through the Donald Fagen book from the other thread - very enjoyable.

What's the Donald Fagen  book please?

Crikey, @randerson - that was 7 years ago!  It was, as @Blueingreen points out, "Eminent Hipsters", and I did enjoy it, being a bit of a Dan fan.  Sorry I can't remember much about it at this distance of time...

JerkMoans

I Dreamed I Was a Very Clean Tramp - Richard Hell

Fun & laughs in rock n roll Babylon.

EricTheWeary

I Just Can’t Stop It - Ranking Roger. 

Apparently he finished the book ( with co- author Daniel Rachel) and the next day collapsed which turned out to be cancer which turned out to kill him. So although it’s a straightforward memoir no reflections on his last days of illness by Roger. 

Mostly focussing on the heyday of The Beat. Probably of not much interest unless you like that era of music but lots of  interesting stories. 

pigface

EricTheWeary said:

I Just Can’t Stop It - Ranking Roger. 

Will put that on my list. I loved The Beat in my wild and dissipated youth :-).

I'm busy with this one at the moment. A scholarly tome on the history of intelligence (the spying kind) from the Bible to modern times. For fans only, I suppose, but I am enjoying it. Close to 1000 pages of small print which is leading me to believe that I need new reading glasses.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/l1ceq79v6kuvc8z/secret_world.jpg?raw=1

Greatape

'Hardcore Zen', Brad Warner.

jonnyburgo

Ramble Book by Adam Buxton, jolly good stuff it is too. 

Dominic

Donna Tartt.........The Secret History
The Secret Barrister ....Fake Law ( not as good as her first book ' the Law and How it's broken ' ) and spoilt by what comes through as a left- wing agenda

boogieman

Second Sleep by Robert Harris. Very odd. I’m 100 odd pages in and have no idea what’s going on or where the story is headed. 

EricTheWeary

boogieman said:

Second Sleep by Robert Harris. Very odd. I’m 100 odd pages in and have no idea what’s going on or where the story is headed. 

I have read this. I heard an interview with Harris on the radio when he was promoting it ( last year?) and effectively he gave spoilers for the entire thing so I knew exactly where it was headed! 

I have read a few of his novels although it's going back a bit now and it's been a bit hit and miss. Archangel is the one I remember as the best and not a terrible film of it either. Although over 20 years since I read it.