What're you reading?

[sweet_sparrow]

I'm curious, what's everyone reading right about now?

I'm currently doing some more of my university course prep reading because "Read this small section of the book" means "read the whole book" to me. (I mean, if you're not going to read the whole thing, what's the point?)

I've recently finished up Two Medieval Outlaws by Glyn Burgess, which translates two romances about outlaws and which was a lot of fun. I've also finished up The Alliterative Morte Arthure, which just proves, again, that I don't get along with medieval texts and am staring at The Stanzaic Le Morte Arthur before delving into Malory's more well-known Le Morte d'Arthur.

In between I've been reading The Magicians and Mrs. Quent by Galen Beckett (well, I was until I finished it. ^-~) It was a lot of fun. Now I know why I've seen comments along the lines of "Austen, but with magic!" and the like. It's, obviously, more nuanced than that (and certainly not like, say, Pride and Prejudice and ZombiesThe Harp of the Grey Rose by Charles de Lint and I also need to reread Susan Cooper's The Dark Is Rising at some point so I can take notes and figure out if I can get enough out of the book to write an essay on it. And I should really, really pick up Kay's The Last Light of the Sun some time soon. I promised a friend to read it ages ago. >> Plus there's the group read too...

(Oh, and I should be rereading Shakespeare for that course too. I have too many books...)

So... what're you reading this month? ^-~

Comments

[aedifica]

Right now I'm reading The Pilgrim's Progress, by John Bunyan, and O Jerusalem, by Laurie R. King. Utterly different but both fun (though I am regularly irritated at the person who did the notes for TPP--he explains the obvious things and skips the obscure ones).

[sweet_sparrow]

Oooh. I don't think I've heard of Laurie R. King before. (Or, for that matter, Bunyan, despite the fact I'm earning an English degree. ;p) They sound like they make a neat balance. ^-^

(I have a love-hate relationship with notes and remain glad I don't have to make any except in essays.)

[amanda_in_pajamas]

I've got lots going, atm, because they're mostly non-fic books that I can pick up and put down at the direction of my three-year old. As is the case now, I usually only have one fic book going at a time, however.

viva la repartee clever comebacks & witty retorts from history's great wits & wordsmiths - Dr. Mardy Grothe

The Handmaid's Tale - Margret Atwood

If Ignorance Is Bliss, Why Aren't There More Happy People? Smart Quotes for Dumb Times - John Lloyd & John Mitchinson

The Intellectual Devotional: American History - David S. Kidder & Noah D. Oppenheim

The Guide to Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol - Greg Taylor ("The Daily Grail" and "The Cryptex")

[sweet_sparrow]

Oh, dear. Looking up that first one led me to not-so obscure reference material one buys in case of occasionally needing it... *twitch* (Yes, I'd read a dictionary for fun if the mood strikes.)

How're you enjoying Atwood? So far The Handmaid's Tale is the only book by her I've read, but it was a while ago now.

[queen_ypolita]

I'm reading The Land of Green Plums by Herta Müller (this month's book group book that I didn't finish in time for the meeting :o) and A Dedicated Man by Peter Robinson. And I expect to read pretty much all of Information Ecology by Thomas Davenport for uni.

[sweet_sparrow]

Is it a big problem if you don't manage to finish a book due to time constraints? I'm sure we must have book clubs here, but I'd have no idea where to look for one.

[mab_browne]

The Lady in the Tower by Alison Weir - it examines the political forces that sent Ann Boleyn to the block.

[sweet_sparrow]

Ooooooh, that sounds fascinating!

I shouldn't ask questions like this. My TBR pile is out of control as it is. *sighs and adds another book to it* But it's fun to have lots of choices and possibilities!

[starlady]

Oo, did you like The Magicians and Mrs. Quent? It's looked intriguing in the bookstore at me for a while now.

I'm currently in various stages of completion on Octavia Butler's Kindred, Zahrah the Windseeker by Nnedi Okorafor, and The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin. Also Mechademia 4 and Tom LaMarre's The Anime Machine.

There really needs to be a 25th hour in the day, IJS.

[sweet_sparrow]

Very much so! It's not perfect, but it's a really fun read. My biggest worry is that people'll react much like I did to the pov-switch in the middle because that threw me pretty badly. (It's not pointless, but it did jar. Partially because of my investment in events up to that point. It jars everyone's lives too.) Beyond that, it's kind of a "Austen meets Heyer meets Brontë meets fantasy" if you want a really, really quick summary.

Ooooh. I've got Kindred abdZahrah the Windseeker both on my wishlist and considering adding The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. Do you recommend them?

I always wish for a 48-hour day. (I swear I've a friend who has 32 hours in a day, all the stuff she gets done. O_O)

[nomnomchuupie]

I've been reading a lot of Raymond Feist lately, and the next one (which I am waiting for through ILL) is Krondor: The Betrayal. I look forward to reminiscing about the video game from years ago.

[sweet_sparrow]

I never got to play the computer game, but I did play its sequel "Betrayal in Antara". I should possibly pick up that particular book sometime and see if they're similar just for the sake of it. ^-^

[shanaqui]

I think I'm about to start on Discworld. I was reading The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi, but I can't really get into it.

[sweet_sparrow]

Oooh, which Discworld book are you going to start with? It took me ages to get into Pratchett. When I was a teen, I just kept on wanting to throw the (library) books against the wall after the first three paragraphs or so. Now I'm hooked/sold and slowly winding my way through the lot. ^-^ My first completed Discworld book was The Last Hero, but I used to play the games made based on them a lot. ^-^

[margaretdriscoll]

I'm reading a mystery called O' Artful Death by Sarah Stewart Taylor. It's about an assistant professor specializing in cemetery art who accepts a friend's invitation to check out a sinister and mysterious gravestone at the Vermont artist colony where he (the friend) grew up. It has the old mystery intertwined with a new mystery (and several other unsettling plot threads), a great atmosphere, intriguing characters, and I'm not even halfway into it. Of course that means it could take a horrible turn for the worse, but so far I've really been enjoying this book.

[sweet_sparrow]

If it helps any, I rarely find books that've engaged me for half of it and then fell completely flat. It sounds intruiging, though. Is it a modern mystery or historical?

[archersangel]

i'm currently re-reading the harry potter series. i'm a few chapters into number five at the moment.

[sweet_sparrow]

I'm hoping I can find my copy of the first book in the mess that is my book collection because I need to reread it at some point, though. ^-^ Have fun with the rereading! ^-^

[mackiedockie]

I'm reading two quite different histories (one fictionalized); Justinian's Flea by William Rosen and The Last Full Measure by Jeff Shaara. The Girl Who Played with Fire is on deck soon.

[sweet_sparrow]

Justinian's Flea is a really intruiging title... The reviews seem to be a bit of a mixed bag, though. *is a nosy creature*

[jassanja]

Earlier in the month I read "An Echo in the Bone" by Gabaldon. It was surprisingly good after the last two books in the series were quite boring.

Now I'm back to Armstrongs "Women of the Otherworld" series, and "Frostbitten" has sucked me right back into that wonderful world

There are also two books about the financial crisis, one - "Zaster und Desaster"- more fictional, the other - "Too big to fail" interesting, but also a bit too detailed to make it a page-turner you can't put down

[sweet_sparrow]

I've heard a lot of good things about Gabaldon, but the size of her books keeps putting me off. (I'd have to carry them around, as I do most all my reading whilst travelling.)

[shallowness]

I'm making my way through 'Teen Dreams - Rereading Teen Film and Television from Heathers to Veronica Mars' by Roz Kaveney, which is that rare thing, a non-fictional book that I'm reading. At some point today, I'm going to start 'Grass for His Pillow' by Lian Hearn, the second of The Tales of Otori, after having enjoyed the first some months ago.

[sweet_sparrow]

Not a big fan of non-fiction? I tend to have really bad luck with the non-fiction I pick up and it's either so simplified I want to throw a tantrum and go "Treat me like an intelligent adult!" or it's so dry it's almost deadly to try and read it.

I hope you'll enjoy Grass for His Pillow! It's been ages since I read Tales of the Otori, but they're somewhere on my reread pile. One day I'll get to them...

[packbat]

Recently finished The Moonstone by William Wilkie Collins, which has always been a great book; I'm currently going through a pile of borrowed-from-friends, with the present one being A Philosophy of Interior Design by Stanley Abercrombie (not to be confused with David T. Abercrombie). Next on the list (chiefly because I've never read anything by the author): Angels & Demons by Dan Brown.

[sweet_sparrow]

I think I need to get mum that interior design book... She might like it.

[slyprentice]

I just recently finished Homeport by Nora Roberts, which I'm glad I borrowed from the library instead of buying outright; the majority of the characters annoyed me in some form or fashion. Now, because I can't seem to read just one book at once, I've dipped my toes into The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown and Dracula The Un-Dead by Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt. They both seem promising so far.

[sweet_sparrow]

May you enjoy them both more than the Nora Roberts book! A friend gave me one of her books for my birthday, but I haven't got around to it yet. I'm quite curious, but haven't found the right mood strike me yet. (Good news is that if I do like it, I can actually use the library for something! They're bound to have some of her books untranslated.)

[psyche29]

So...am I allowed to just jump in here? I'm not sure of the protocol when diving into something new, but as I've made the decision to try to make new friends around DW, I thought responding here would be a good start.

I am currently reading Born Round: The Secret History of a Full-Time Eater (Frank Bruni) and rereading Lament: The Faerie Queen's Deception (Maggie Stiefvater). I also have From the Kingdom of Memory (Elie Wiesel), The Golden Compass (Philip Pullman) and The Love of a Good Woman (Alice Munro), which I need to read soon because they're due back at the library in a week.

Waiting for me on hold at the library, too, are The Screwtape Letters (CS Lewis) and City of Glass (Cassandra Clare).

I'm making my way through my book list, but veeeeeerrrrrrry slowly.

EDIT: I LOVE Susan Cooper's The Dark Is Rising sequence! Just saying. :)

[sweet_sparrow]

Of course you're allowed to jump straight in! ^-^

Multi-book reader! XD *only reads at most two books at a time, and that not often*

How're the fey portrayed in Lament? (On the one hand, the book is interesting. On the other, I'm developing an allergy for fey that don't feel, well, fey but human.)

This is going to be my second/third read-through depending on the book I'll be reading since I have to backtrack the reread I'd already started.

(*has comment suckage at the moment* Sorry...)