What books did you read in 2021?

[Vimster]

08. Fully-Automated Luxury Communism by Aaron Bastani - Definitely interesting ideas about tackling issues coming in the future, from automation to environmental disaster. 

 

09. Roadside Picnic by Arkady and Boris Strubatsky - took a while to get into largely due to the strange phrasing of the translation, but for a relatively short novel it gets a ton over about the effects on stalkers going into The Zone, the alien aspect of it is superbly done, properly alien and unknowable. 

 

 

Spoiler

 

01. Timescape by Gregory Benford

02. The Commitments by Roddy Doyle

03. From Elephant To Hollywood by Michael Caine

04. The Assault On Truth by Peter Oborne 

05. Coming Up For Air by George Orwell

06. The Prime Ministers by Steve Richards

07. Beneath The Bleeding by Val McDermid

08. Fully-Automated Luxury Communism by Aaron Bastani

09. Roadside Picnic by Arkady and Boris Strubatsky

 

 

[Stopharage]

19. Hungry by Grace Dent. Guardian food writer tells all about her upbringing in Carlisle, her roots, how food has been a key part of her life and her parents deterioration in recent years. She's does a great job of describing growing up in the 80s and for any 40-somethings there are enough 'I remember that' moments in there to entertain you and to look back on the 80s with reverence for the past and gratitude to have left that world behind. She's a likeable narrator, aware of her flaws but proud of her successes. I often find autobiographies overly narcissistic but this was pitched just right. 

Spoiler

 

1. Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell. 

2. Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam.

3. Cage of Souls by Adrian Tchaikovsky.

4. Doggerland by Ben Smith. 

5. The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson.

6. Malorie by Josh Malerman

7. We Are Bellingcat by Elliot Higgins.

8. Blacktop Wasteland by S.A.Cosby

9. Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

10. Step by Step by Simon Reeve

12. Firewalkers by Adrian Tchaikovsky

11. Wallking to Alderbaran by Adrain Tchaikovsky

12. Firewalkers by Adrian Tchaikovsky

13. Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener

14. Press Reset by Jason Schreier

15. The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

16. Dogs of War by Adrian Tchaikovsky

17. The Assault on Truth: Boris Johnson, Donald Trump and the Emergence of a New Moral Barbarism by Peter Oborne

18. The Premonition by Michael Lewis

19. Hungry by Grace Dent

 

 

[Exidor]

Another month, another bunch of books. 

Problems and Other Solutions - Allie Brosh
An illustrated memoir of sorts from the woman behind Hyperbole and a Half, covering weird childhood obsessions, friendship, loneliness, daft pets, crippling depression and all the usual stuff.

 

Script Doctor - Andrew Cartmel
Cartmel's memories of his time as script editor on Sylvester McCoy's run of Doctor Who. He doesn't come across super well considering these are all his own words - it's always the production people who ruin the stories and never the guy who commissioned stuff they didn't have the budget for and who couldn't time a script to 25 minutes if his life depended on it, and he can't seem to resist dropping in references to the physical attractiveness of any woman he had to work with, which may have been how you did things in the 80s but comes across a bit creepy in the 21st century. Still, it's fascinating to see how the BBC was run in those days and go behind the scenes for the shooting of some of the stories. It's a wonder anything ever got made at all. 

 

McSweeney's Quarterly Concern #12 - Dave Eggers (Ed)
I got a bunch of these off ebay a while back because I'm a sucker for gimmicky book design. Issue 12 features 12 stories by new writers, a story by McSweeney's regular Roddy Doyle and a selection of 20-minute flash fiction curated by Dave Eggers. It's a mixed bag and your enjoyment of it is going to depend to some extent on your tolerance for hipster literary showboating. Highlights for me were the Doyle story and a piece about growing up in Ceausescu's Romania by Andrea Dezso that's like dystopian Elena Ferrante.

 

The Case of Charles Dexter Ward - HP Lovecraft & INJ Culbard (graphic novel)
Ian Culbard has carved himself a bit of a niche doing comics adaptations of classic creepy tales. If you know Lovecraft then you'll know this one - curious young man bites off more than he can chew when he takes an interest in an ancestor who had some unusual interests. It works surprisingly well in the comics medium, quite cinematic use of space and timing and he captures that creeping sense of dread nicely.

 

The Motherless Oven/The Can Opener's Daughter/The Book of Forks - Rob Davis (graphic novel)
Starts off like Jan Svankmajer doing Grange Hill and then gets weirder. Scarper Lee is a schoolboy doing normal schoolboy things in a bizarre world where your dad might be a steam-powered boat on wheels and it rains knives on a regular basis. He's living out the last three weeks of his life with quiet resignation. He knows it's three weeks because everyone in his town knows when their deathday is. Things start to change when he meets new girl and chaos magnet Vera Pike though. It's hard to explain where it all goes from here because it only makes sense if you read it, but the worldbuilding, character development and slow reveal of why the world is the way it is are all top notch.

 

The Road to Wigan Pier - George Orwell (audiobook)
A book of two halves. The first is decent social journalism, with Orwell embedded in the working class North and describing the miserable conditions first hand, then the second is a supposed defence of socialism that does the cause no favours at all. He never really presents an argument for how socialism would work in practice, or even attempts to explain what it is, just sets up some straw man arguments against it and then dismantles them. It's chock full of his hangups about his own class and, despite his time spent with the miners oop north, a lingering tendency to view the proletariat as a single lumpen entity that needs stirring into action by its betters. It does still offer some interesting insights but the endless moaning about the damage done to the movement by fruit juice drinking do-gooders in pistachio shirts (?) gets a bit wearing. He really fucking hates fruit juice drinkers.

 

The House on the Borderlands - William Hope Hodgson
I picked this up because I heard that it was an influence on Lovecraft. That's quite the understatement, seeing as it lays out the blueprints for two of HPL's favourite subjects - slouching subhuman beast men and vast, unknowably abstract cosmic horror. As with Lovecraft, the cosmic stuff can sometimes disappear up its own arse a bit but the more human scale horrors are really well done.

 

House of Psychotic Women - Kier-la Janisse
An unusual combination of film criticism and memoir. Janisse writes about her own turbulent upbringing and illustrates/expands on it with analysis of a range of cult and exploitation films that centre on disturbed women. It's not the most flattering comparison to make but she breaks everything down very rationally and has clearly done a lot of work getting to the roots of her own self-destructive behaviour. Applying the same kind of serious consideration to the characters in bargain basement exploitation crap is surprisingly interesting and I've now got a list of absolute chod to try and find on youtube.

 

Spoiler

Things the Grandchildren Should Know - Mark Oliver Everett
There is no Antimemetics Division - qntm
Noriko Smiling - Adam Mars-Jones
The Art of Space Travel - Nina Allan (short)
The Bloody Chamber - Angela Carter (audio)
The Rift - Nina Allan
Any Way the Wind Blows - Seanan McGuire (short)
The Cabin at the End of the World - Paul Tremblay
The Penelopiad - Margaret Atwood (audio)
Roadmarks - Roger Zelazny
Paper Girls - Brian K Vaughan & Cliff Chiang (graphic novel)
The Unreality of Memory & Other Essays - Elisa Gabbert

 

[little che]

I've just finished Dreamland by Rosa Rankin-gee. 

Set in the extremely near future , sea levels are rising fast and the unwanted and undesirables of Britain are being relocated to the rapidly sinking seaside resorts.

Chance and her family are sent to Margate where they scratch out a living in the rapidly deteriorating conditions.

It's a bleak , dystopian novel which I can thoroughly recommend without hesitation.  It's a triumph.

[joemul]

Dark Matter - this was rubbish. Poorly written, poorly structured, and fails what could be a great concept. I genuinely thought this was a self-published Amazon amateur effort. Very surprised to read that the author is pretty well known for another series called Wayward Pines. 
 

1/5

 

 

[Arn X Treme]

18 hours ago, joemul said:

Dark Matter - this was rubbish. Poorly written, poorly structured, and fails what could be a great concept. I genuinely thought this was a self-published Amazon amateur effort. Very surprised to read that the author is pretty well known for another series called Wayward Pines. 
 

1/5

 

 

 

I didn't think much of Wayward Pines either, which I read on the back of watching the fascinating TV Show. 

[Stopharage]

He's a dreadful, dreadful writer. I think he has some fairly interesting ideas but the execution is woeful. 

[Jamie John]

On 07/04/2021 at 08:56, Boothjan said:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

1. Cibola Burn by James S A Corey - 4/5

2. How Not To Be a Professional Football by Paul Merson - 1.5/5

3. The Twins of Auschwitz by Eva Mozes Kor - 4/5

4. Ian Wright - A Life in Football: My Autobiography by Ian Wright - 4/5

5. Straight Outa Crawley: Memoirs of a Distinctly Average Human by Romesh Ranganathan - 4/5

6. My Thoughts Exactly by Lily Allen - 4/5

 

 

7. I, Claudius by Robert Graves

 

I'm a huge fan of the magnificent 1970's BBC adaptation of this book, but I'd never read it before.  I've missed a treat TBH - this is clever, beautifully written and hugely interesting, with or without any prior knowledge of the Julio-Claudians or the TV series.

 

I can certainly see why the novel is so highly regarded and would recommend to anyone interested in the history of Ancient Rome.

 

4/5

 

Fun fact: my grandad was the head cameraman for the 70s BBC adaptation. Won a Bafta for it, in fact.

[Darren]

13. I Am Malala - Malala Yousafzai

 

The autobiography of "the girl who stood up for education and was shot by the Taliban." I don't think I'd realised until reading this how accurate that tag-line is. I'd assumed that the Taliban had a problem with girls getting educated (this part is correct), that Malala was just a random schoolgirl they happened to shoot (this part is wrong) and having survived she decided to dedicate her life to campaigning for education rights (this is also wrong). I now understand that Malala was already an outspoken campaigner for her own and all girls' right to an education before she was shot, and that it was this that caused the Taliban to target her and attempt to kill her, both to silence her and pour encourager les autres.

 

What really stands out in her story, alongside this central thread, is her absolute love for her homeland. She pulls no punches describing its problems, but also spends a lot of time writing vividly of its beauty and the innate decency of its people. It's clearly the words of a very young woman, unexpectedly displaced halfway around the world (she was unconscious between being shot in Pakistan and waking up in hospital in Birmingham), who is desperately homesick even while she appreciates the opportunities that have come her way, and who would love to return home but knows that to do so would put her life at risk again. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see her follow her hero Benazir Bhutto into politics and eventually become Pakistan's Prime Minister; the tragedy of this unfinished story is that I wouldn't be surprised to see her, like Bhutto, assassinated for it.

 

Spoiler

1. Circe - Madeline Miller

2. Star Wars: The Destiny Path - Charles Soule & Jesus Saiz (graphic novel)

3. Darth Vader: Dark Heart of the Sith - Greg Pak & Raffaele Ienco (graphic novel)

4. Star Wars: Shadow Fall - Alexander Freed

5. Immortal Hulk: The Keeper of the Door - Al Ewing & Joe Bennett (graphic novel)

6. Doctor Aphra: Fortune and Fate - Alyssa Wong & Marika Cresta (graphic novel)

7. Bounty Hunters: Galaxy's Deadliest - Ethan Sacks & Arif Prianto (graphic novel)

8. Star Wars: Operation Starlight - Charles Soule, Ramon Rosanas & Jan Bazaldua (graphic novel)

9. The Talisman - Stephen King & Peter Straub

10. Immortal Hulk: The Weakest One There Is - Al Ewing & Joe Bennett (graphic novel)

11. Darth Vader: Into the Fire - Greg Pak & Raffaele Ienco (graphic novel)

12. Bounty Hunters: Target Valance - Ethan Sacks & Arif Prianto (graphic novel)

13. I Am Malala - Malala Yousafzai

 

[Stopharage]

20. Many Different Kinds of Love by Michael Rosen This is the second COVID-focused book I've read in the last month. This tells the story of Michael Rosen's infection, fortuitous intervention by a family friend, hospital treatment, recuperation and anger at the government. A lot of the entries aren't made by Michael Rosen but were diary entries from his loved ones and NHS staff during his coma and subsequent weakness. It's a mixture of Rosen's poetry and writing, alongside heartfelt anecdotes and medical updates from NHS workers. Rosen's love for the NHS shines through and it's both an uplifting read and a deeply, deeply infuriating one. 

 

21. The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel As the resident St Mandel fanboy (Have you read Station Eleven yet? If not, why not?!!) I was aware that this was quite different to her previous novel and felt it had a touch of the Donna Tarrt about it, especially The Goldfinch. It's a tale of lost souls and deeply misguided individuals. It worked for me, but I can imagine those expecting more of the same, after Station Eleven, will feel a bit let down. 

Spoiler

1. Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell. 

2. Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam.

3. Cage of Souls by Adrian Tchaikovsky.

4. Doggerland by Ben Smith. 

5. The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson.

6. Malorie by Josh Malerman

7. We Are Bellingcat by Elliot Higgins.

8. Blacktop Wasteland by S.A.Cosby

9. Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

10. Step by Step by Simon Reeve

12. Firewalkers by Adrian Tchaikovsky

11. Wallking to Alderbaran by Adrain Tchaikovsky

12. Firewalkers by Adrian Tchaikovsky

13. Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener

14. Press Reset by Jason Schreier

15. The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

16. Dogs of War by Adrian Tchaikovsky

17. The Assault on Truth: Boris Johnson, Donald Trump and the Emergence of a New Moral Barbarism by Peter Oborne

18. The Premonition by Michael Lewis

19. Hungry by Grace Dent

20. Many Different Kinds of Love by Michael Rosen

21. The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel

 

[Miner Willy]

39. Just Ignore Him by Alan Davies. Really impressive book about Davies' life and abuse at the hands of his father.

 

40. The Fellowship of the Ring, 41. The Two Towers, 42. The Return of the King by JRR Tolkien. I read Tolkien pretty much on a continual loop through my teens, but haven't since, and decided to revisit. Have to say, I still absolutely loved them, though perhaps in different ways. This time I really enjoyed the opening section in the Shire especially, as it strongly brought home feelings of growing up in rural England in simpler, happier times. I also still loved all the dialogue, most of which I remembered word for word. I listened on Audible, and had feared the narrator might be dated, but actually thought he was perfect.

 

43. American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins. I'd seen this highly recommended, but after a powerful opening I wasn't particularly impressed by it. I felt the key topics (drugs cartels and the horrific experiences of migrants from South America) are much better explored in works of non-fiction such as Chasing the Scream and Tell Me How it Ends.

 

Previously:

 

Spoiler

1. Piranesi

2. The Devil and the Dark Water

3. I Love the Bones of You

4. Feral

5. Melmoth

6. The Beekeeper of Aleppo

7. Deadeye Dick by Kurt Vonnegut
8. Moneyball by Michael Lewis
9. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

10. The Deficit Myth

11. Butcher's Crossing

12. Schismatrix

13. There is no Antimemetics Division

14. Lost at Sea

15. The Assault on Truth

16. A Month in the Country

17. Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea

18. The Mermaid of Black Conch

19. Bear Head

20. The Templars: The Rise and Spectacular Fall of God's Holy Warriors

21. Walking to Aldebaran

22. 24 Hours in Ancient Rome

23. The Memory Police

24. The Ardent Swarm

25. Firewalkers

26. Failures of State

27. West with Giraffes

28. Command and Control

29. Conversations with Friends

30. The Panama Papers

31. The Premonition

32. Contact

33. Zone One
34. Guns, Germs and Steel
35. Creativity
36. The Midnight Library
37. A Different Drummer
38. Sunburn: The Unofficial History of the Sun Newspaper

39. Just Ignore Him

40. The Fellowship of the Ring

41. The Two Towers

42. The Return of the King

43. American Dirt

 

[Garwoofoo]

On 27/01/2021 at 14:39, Glasgowchivas said:

1. The First Fifteen Live of Harry August by Claire North

I've posted about this book before so I won't say too much about it here. I love it so much that I ordered a 2nd hand Hardback version, just so I could have a physical copy.
 

Harry August is born, lives a relatively uneventful life and dies an old man. Whereupon he wakes up, as a newborn baby, on the day of his birth, but with his previous life memories intact. The book explores how Harry comes to adjust to his life as an Orborouan whilst dealing with messages that are being passed down, child to dying person, from the future: "The world is ending and it's speeding up."

A fantastic book that I cannot recommend highly enough.
 

 

I've just finished this, after several recommendations here and elsewhere.

 

I thought it was decent, maybe not quite as good as it's been made out to be but definitely a worthwhile read. Its major problem is that its central conceit is so fundamental to the plot that it spends pretty much the entire first half of the book illustrating it and explaining things, but nothing much really happens story-wise. It jumps around Harry's varous lives randomly so there's no real momentum. I nearly put it down at around the halfway point, but I'm glad I didn't.

 

The second half, when the actual plot kicks in, is really gripping and I finished it in two straight evenings. The characters are still mostly ciphers and there's no real sense of time passing but the central rivalry that drives the story is very well depicted.

 

The whole thing reminded me very much of The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell, but that book is I think much better - if you enjoyed this one then give it a go.

[multi]

On 30/06/2021 at 15:50, little che said:

I've just finished Dreamland by Rosa Rankin-gee. 

Set in the extremely near future , sea levels are rising fast and the unwanted and undesirables of Britain are being relocated to the rapidly sinking seaside resorts.

Chance and her family are sent to Margate where they scratch out a living in the rapidly deteriorating conditions.

It's a bleak , dystopian novel which I can thoroughly recommend without hesitation.  It's a triumph.

 

Thanks for recommending this. I downloaded the free first few chapters after reading your post today.

 

Immediately paid for the full book after finishing and the only thing stopping me from burning through it right now is the football being on.

 

It's very, very good (so far)

[little che]

22 minutes ago, multi said:

 

Thanks for recommending this. I downloaded the free first few chapters after reading your post today.

 

Immediately paid for the full book after finishing and the only thing stopping me from burning through it right now is the football being on.

 

It's very, very good (so far)

Yes, it's excellent and I hope it gets the recognition it deserves.

[Oracle]

Shattered Sword: the untold story of Midway. Fantastic book, we’ll researched and a great introduction into the war in the Pacific. 

[RubberJohnny]

Masters of Doom - I don't think this was a great read, the story doesn't go anywhere (two people work together and do well, then work separately and don't do well, but never work together again), and I thought it was pretty poor at giving a sense of the industry context around them (which I think was responsible for their collapse more than the personal falling out - the industry developed rapidly to be more ambitious while they were still churning out the same format). The thing that sticks in the memory is all the anecdotes of just how adolescent and unprofessional everyone was, which judging by the Blizzard stories, never really went away.

 

Abandoned: Benjamin Franklin (Walter Isaacson) - Choosing to read multiple biographies was a bad idea, but after 100 pages with Ben Franklin you think he's charming, erudite and reasonable, after 500 pages you think he's a hypocritical, sanctimonious prick.

 

Da Vinci (Walter Isaacson) - This is the better of the two books, Isaacson collapses a lot of the myth-building around Da Vinci, talking about how all his gadget designs were mad impracticable, but the ahead-of-his-time stuff was his studies of anatomy and light.

[ZOK]

On 04/03/2021 at 12:04, Miner Willy said:

 

12. Schismatrix by Bruce Sterling. I know this is popular on here, but I'm afraid I didn't love it. I found the first third pretty bewildering, but even once I settled into it I didn't really warm to any of the characters. I dunno; not my kind of sci-fi I guess.

 

 

  Reveal hidden contents

1. Piranesi

2. The Devil and the Dark Water

3. I Love the Bones of You

4. Feral

5. Melmoth

6. The Beekeeper of Aleppo

7. Deadeye Dick by Kurt Vonnegut
8. Moneyball by Michael Lewis
9. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

10. The Deficit Myth

11. Butcher's Crossing

12. Schismatrix

13. There is no Antimemetics Division

14. Lost at Sea

15. The Assault on Truth

 

 

Only your praise for Butcher’s Crossing has prevented me from reporting this post.

[Vimster]

10. Alphabetical by Michael Rosen - fantastic book just brimming with interesting information not only relating to the letters of the alphabet but everything from dictionaries to letters we don't use any more. The audiobook is read by the author, he has one of those voices that takes me back to my childhood, hearing him reading poems on schools programmes, and it just makes it that bit more enjoyable. If you have any interest in language then this is essential reading.

 

Spoiler

01. Timescape by Gregory Benford

02. The Commitments by Roddy Doyle

03. From Elephant To Hollywood by Michael Caine

04. The Assault On Truth by Peter Oborne 

05. Coming Up For Air by George Orwell

06. The Prime Ministers by Steve Richards

07. Beneath The Bleeding by Val McDermid

08. Fully-Automated Luxury Communism by Aaron Bastani

09. Roadside Picnic by Arkady and Boris Strubatsky

10. Alphabetical by Michael Rosen

 

[Miner Willy]

1 hour ago, ZOK said:

 

Only your praise for Butcher’s Crossing has prevented me from reporting this post.

 

Sorry! But yeah, Butchers Crossing is great. Did you also get a McCarthy's Border Trilogy vibe from it?

[Naysonymous]

@RubberJohnny It’s been years since I read Masters of Doom but I’m kinda with you in some regard, it’s not a great book but it’s an interesting document of a really pivotal time and place in video game history. I was 14 when Doom came out, lusted after it in magazines but never had anything powerful enough to run it until the Saturn version came out a while later but the whole PC scene mid/late 90s was fascinating to me probably because it was completely unobtainable. Carmack and to a lesser extent Romero were mythical figures  and I never realised just how young they were too.   By the time he’d released Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Doom 2 and Quake, John Carmack was still only 25(!) and he was basically having money thrown at him faster than he could spend it and had nobody really to answer to.  I’m not at all surprised everybody went a bit crazy.  

[lolly]

10. Dune

 

In preparation for the upcoming movie I've revisited Dune as I don't think I got the full gist of it 20 years ago when I originally read it. Always thought it was  bit of a White Saviour story and while it may well be argued that it is, there's a fair bit more going on. Some of the imagery and ideas are fantastic and it's suprisingly action light in terms of big set pieces anyway. Really liked it a lot this time around whereas originally I though it was a bit meh.

 

Previously

Spoiler

1.best served cold -Joe Abercrombie

2. Ancillary Justice- Ann Leckie

3.the 5th Season - N.K. jemisen

4. All you need is kill-

5 To kill a mockingbird- Harper lee

6. Pompeii- Robert Harris

7.D-Day through German eyes Volumes 1&2 - Holger Eckhertz

8. There is no antimemetics division

9 Fight Club- Chuck Palahniuk

10.Mortal engines-Philip Reeve

 Currently reading the first 15 lives of Harry August as it sounded right up my street, and it is.

[ZOK]

On 24/07/2021 at 19:34, Miner Willy said:

 

Sorry! But yeah, Butchers Crossing is great. Did you also get a McCarthy's Border Trilogy vibe from it?

A little bit, but to be honest the book that kept coming to mind was Blood Meridian…I think near the end of that book someone talks about having hunted the buffalo to extinction, and that was echoing throughout my read.

 

Wonderful books though, all of them.

[Darren]

14. Slaughterhouse-Five - Kurt Vonnegut

 

I love a bit of classic science fiction but having read this I can understand why Kurt Vonnegut railed against the sci-fi label. This is a brilliant piece of literary fiction, and if it really must be categorised into a genre then it's much more a semi-autobiographical war story (or an anti-war story). But you stick a few aliens in it and have your protagonist travelling through time and nope, on the sci-fi shelves it must go next to the ray guns and rockets (which I love). The tragedy is that this isn't invaders from space pulp, it's a harrowing first-hand account of the aftermath of the Dresden firebombing, and the mental scars that war leaves on the survivors. It's basically a bleaker, less cynical but more weary Catch-22 with an in-story reason for its non-chronological narrative. And aliens, obviously.

 

Spoiler

1. Circe - Madeline Miller

2. Star Wars: The Destiny Path - Charles Soule & Jesus Saiz (graphic novel)

3. Darth Vader: Dark Heart of the Sith - Greg Pak & Raffaele Ienco (graphic novel)

4. Star Wars: Shadow Fall - Alexander Freed

5. Immortal Hulk: The Keeper of the Door - Al Ewing & Joe Bennett (graphic novel)

6. Doctor Aphra: Fortune and Fate - Alyssa Wong & Marika Cresta (graphic novel)

7. Bounty Hunters: Galaxy's Deadliest - Ethan Sacks & Arif Prianto (graphic novel)

8. Star Wars: Operation Starlight - Charles Soule, Ramon Rosanas & Jan Bazaldua (graphic novel)

9. The Talisman - Stephen King & Peter Straub

10. Immortal Hulk: The Weakest One There Is - Al Ewing & Joe Bennett (graphic novel)

11. Darth Vader: Into the Fire - Greg Pak & Raffaele Ienco (graphic novel)

12. Bounty Hunters: Target Valance - Ethan Sacks & Arif Prianto (graphic novel)

13. I Am Malala - Malala Yousafzai

14. Slaughterhouse-Five - Kurt Vonnegut

 

[Mercury]

8. The Life-Changing Magic of Sheds by Henry Cole

 

I started reading Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance which I am finding hard going but persevering with. In the meantime I rushed through this. I can understand why people dislike Henry but I like The Motorcycle Show and his style has grown on me. This isn't really about Sheds - it's about Men's hobbies and the most interesting parts are the ones where he talks about guys who buy up old Harrier Jump Jets or Tanks.

 

Previously:

Spoiler

1. The Guest List by Lucy Foley

2. Believe Me by JP Delaney

3. The Secret Barrister by Anon

4. The Sentinel by Lee and Andrew Child

5. Heartburn by Nora Ephron

6. Going the Wrong Way by Chris Donaldson

7. WIN by Harlan Coben

 

[Mercury]

On 24/06/2021 at 17:22, Stopharage said:

19. Hungry by Grace Dent. Guardian food writer tells all about her upbringing in Carlisle, her roots, how food has been a key part of her life and her parents deterioration in recent years. She's does a great job of describing growing up in the 80s and for any 40-somethings there are enough 'I remember that' moments in there to entertain you and to look back on the 80s with reverence for the past and gratitude to have left that world behind. She's a likeable narrator, aware of her flaws but proud of her successes. I often find autobiographies overly narcissistic but this was pitched just right. 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

1. Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell. 

2. Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam.

3. Cage of Souls by Adrian Tchaikovsky.

4. Doggerland by Ben Smith. 

5. The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson.

6. Malorie by Josh Malerman

7. We Are Bellingcat by Elliot Higgins.

8. Blacktop Wasteland by S.A.Cosby

9. Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

10. Step by Step by Simon Reeve

12. Firewalkers by Adrian Tchaikovsky

11. Wallking to Alderbaran by Adrain Tchaikovsky

12. Firewalkers by Adrian Tchaikovsky

13. Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener

14. Press Reset by Jason Schreier

15. The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

16. Dogs of War by Adrian Tchaikovsky

17. The Assault on Truth: Boris Johnson, Donald Trump and the Emergence of a New Moral Barbarism by Peter Oborne

18. The Premonition by Michael Lewis

19. Hungry by Grace Dent

 

 

 

Don't know if you listen to Podcasts but if so, download the episode of "In Writing with Hattie Crisell" with Grace talking about Hungry - it's fascinating. Episode 25 I think. 

[Miner Willy]

On 06/07/2021 at 20:45, Stopharage said:

20. Many Different Kinds of Love by Michael Rosen This is the second COVID-focused book I've read in the last month. This tells the story of Michael Rosen's infection, fortuitous intervention by a family friend, hospital treatment, recuperation and anger at the government. A lot of the entries aren't made by Michael Rosen but were diary entries from his loved ones and NHS staff during his coma and subsequent weakness. It's a mixture of Rosen's poetry and writing, alongside heartfelt anecdotes and medical updates from NHS workers. Rosen's love for the NHS shines through and it's both an uplifting read and a deeply, deeply infuriating one. 

 

21. The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel As the resident St Mandel fanboy (Have you read Station Eleven yet? If not, why not?!!) I was aware that this was quite different to her previous novel and felt it had a touch of the Donna Tarrt about it, especially The Goldfinch. It's a tale of lost souls and deeply misguided individuals. It worked for me, but I can imagine those expecting more of the same, after Station Eleven, will feel a bit let down. 

  Reveal hidden contents

1. Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell. 

2. Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam.

3. Cage of Souls by Adrian Tchaikovsky.

4. Doggerland by Ben Smith. 

5. The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson.

6. Malorie by Josh Malerman

7. We Are Bellingcat by Elliot Higgins.

8. Blacktop Wasteland by S.A.Cosby

9. Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

10. Step by Step by Simon Reeve

12. Firewalkers by Adrian Tchaikovsky

11. Wallking to Alderbaran by Adrain Tchaikovsky

12. Firewalkers by Adrian Tchaikovsky

13. Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener

14. Press Reset by Jason Schreier

15. The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

16. Dogs of War by Adrian Tchaikovsky

17. The Assault on Truth: Boris Johnson, Donald Trump and the Emergence of a New Moral Barbarism by Peter Oborne

18. The Premonition by Michael Lewis

19. Hungry by Grace Dent

20. Many Different Kinds of Love by Michael Rosen

21. The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel

 

 

I just finished The Glass Hotel and remembered your post. I loved it - I think I actually preferred it to Station Eleven, though they're both great and obviously very different books.

[little che]

Just finished Apeirogon by Colum McCann. The true story of two men, one Palestinian, one Israeli who each having lost a child to the violence helped formed a peace group.

 

It's one of the most profound and emotional books I've ever read . It's one of those books wherein on finishing it, you stare into space for a while to digest it and to try to process the emotions it causes .

 I thought Piranesi would be my book of the year but this is giving it a run for its money.

[lolly]

12. The first 15 lives of Harry August- Claire North

 

Yeah, not bad , the 1st half is pretty gentle and explains how the mechanics of the situation play out and lacks a bit of urgency and the 2nd half the story kicks in and to starts moving along at a better clip. There was the opportunity to delve into some of the respective lives and bloat this out a bit but given the scenario there would be little peril involved so largely pointless maybe and something the author avoids. While it was building up towards the climax it does end somewhat abruptly (at least for me it did) though it makes sense in the context of the story.  It's pretty good  and worth a read but I'll probably remember it  in a few years more for the concept than the actual story.

 

Previously.

 

Spoiler

1.best served cold -Joe Abercrombie

2. Ancillary Justice- Ann Leckie

3.the 5th Season - N.K. jemisen

4. All you need is kill-

5 To kill a mockingbird- Harper lee

6. Pompeii- Robert Harris

7.D-Day through German eyes Volumes 1&2 - Holger Eckhertz

8. There is no antimemetics division

9 Fight Club- Chuck Palahniuk

10.Mortal engines-Philip Reeve

11.Dune- Frank Herbert

 

[Stopharage]

22. The Mixer by Michael Cox. A reread. Football tactics officianado Cox tells the story of how football has changed through the Premier League's history and how the game has evolved beyond all recognition.  Great insight on the developments in the game and the players and managers who helped this evolution. 

 

23. Whose Game Is It Anyway by Michael Calvin. Another football book. Calvin has been writing about the game for over 40 years and his book is part autobiography and part polemic, directed at the heroes and villains of the modern game. It's clear that Calvin adores the game and that his life has bee shaped by the experiences and memories that football has given him. He sets his sights on the unrelenting largesse of the Premier League and how he feels that football has lost some of its soul. But its not an overly negative tome, he celebrates the importance of football in the community and its wonder.

 

24. Notes on a Nervous Planet by Matt Haig. Haig discusses how the modern world impacts on our mental wellbeing, detailing his own struggles with depression, stress and anxiety. He offers solutions and strategies for dealing with these issues, without being unrealistic, judgmental or condescending. His got a really genuine way of writing and comes across as a decent compassionate soul. 

 

25. To be a Machine by Mark O'Connell. The writer meets with various members of the transhumanist community and looks at the various hacks that people are undertaking to cheat death. From implants to diets, he meets with a diverse group of supporters of the transhumanist community. He also addresses the morality of some of these advances and what it means to be human. I thought this was a bit of a mess from a structural POV and became more about the writer than the people he was interviewing. 

Spoiler

1. Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell. 

2. Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam.

3. Cage of Souls by Adrian Tchaikovsky.

4. Doggerland by Ben Smith. 

5. The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson.

6. Malorie by Josh Malerman

7. We Are Bellingcat by Elliot Higgins.

8. Blacktop Wasteland by S.A.Cosby

9. Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

10. Step by Step by Simon Reeve

12. Firewalkers by Adrian Tchaikovsky

11. Wallking to Alderbaran by Adrain Tchaikovsky

12. Firewalkers by Adrian Tchaikovsky

13. Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener

14. Press Reset by Jason Schreier

15. The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

16. Dogs of War by Adrian Tchaikovsky

17. The Assault on Truth: Boris Johnson, Donald Trump and the Emergence of a New Moral Barbarism by Peter Oborne

18. The Premonition by Michael Lewis

19. Hungry by Grace Dent

20. Many Different Kinds of Love by Michael Rosen

21. The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel

22. The Mixer by Michael Cox

23. Whose Game is it Anyway? by Michael Calvin

24. Notes on a Nervous Planet by Matt Haig

25. To be a Machine by Mark O'Connell

 

[Vimster]

11. Shatter The Bones by Stuart MacBride - Seventh Logan McRae novel and I'm not sure if this was a disappointing book or the law of diminishing returns is setting in.

 

Spoiler

01. Timescape by Gregory Benford

02. The Commitments by Roddy Doyle

03. From Elephant To Hollywood by Michael Caine

04. The Assault On Truth by Peter Oborne 

05. Coming Up For Air by George Orwell

06. The Prime Ministers by Steve Richards

07. Beneath The Bleeding by Val McDermid

08. Fully-Automated Luxury Communism by Aaron Bastani

09. Roadside Picnic by Arkady and Boris Strubatsky

10. Alphabetical by Michael Rosen

11. Shatter The Bones by Stuart MacBride