What book(s) are you reading?

[MrAngryFace]

One of my favorite Warhammer 40k novels to date. Its nice being able to read about Astartes Chapters that betrayed the Emperor without having to spend the whole book reading about the kinky weird shit the Blood God is into. Order the second book on Amazon- totally reading that after I finish Battle of the Fang

[Howard Alan Treesong]

Ready Player One

sucked so hard, but I felt I "had" to for professional reasons

imagine Family Guy crossed with VH1's I Love the 80s, as narrated by a constantly winking Redditor about how we geeks know what he's talking about, right? wink wink

no fucking clue how they're going to turn it into a movie as 95% of the book is namedropping copyrighted works from the 80s. for example, the main character drives a Delorean with KITT installed, Ghostbuster decals on the side, and outfitted with Buckaroo Banzai's matter phasing Oscillation Overthruster. extrapolate that for 384 pages and you have yourself a book (or at least a screenplay deal)

Recommended for people who really like when other people know about the things you know about, too

[Madrun Badrun]

The Party: The Secret World Of China's Communist Rulers
http://www.amazon.ca/Party-Secret-Chinas-Communist-Rulers/dp/0061708771

[Eric P]

Low Town- sub Scott Lynch fantasy.  Oh god why am I reading this?  Why am I telling the internet that I'm reading it?

The last book I read, The Last Werewolf, is probably the absolute best thing I've read this year.

[Mupepe]

I'm reading The Next 100 Years by George Friedman.  Interesting, but a lot of it sounds way too optimistic for the US

[MrAngryFace]

Recently finished


Night Lords are the best Chaos Marines. I enjoyed this book and the book I am currently reading because they feature Chaos Marine chapters that don't actually embrace the warp like the followers of Abaddon do. It places them in this weird grey area- they recognize the stagnation within the emperium- and instead of choosing to continue to follow the Emperor- decide to just devote themselves to vengeance against whatever chapter pisses them off the most. This book also lets you view Abaddons war from the eyes of a chapter that doesnt entirely buy into it- allowing you to see how fragile the forces of chaos actually are in terms of manpower and resources. I also really enjoyed how the author went into describing the sad torment of being a Dreadnought and why theyre called on so rarely.

Currently reading


Great stuff- this is one of the Space Marine Battles books, which usually boil down to shitloads of bad guys vs not shitloads of space marines. Helsreach is my favorite so far with The Purging of Kadillus being my least favorite.

Reading next

Second and latest book in the night lord series- cant wait. I've also thought about looking into the Salamander series but i'll just wait that one out for an omnibus.

[Great Rumbler]

I bought a bunch of cheap paperbacks a few weeks ago, decided to start this one:

(Image removed from quote.)

I want to read something weird, something a little different and by all accounts Lord Tyger fits the bill for that. Apparently it's a deconstruction of the Tarzan mythos with lots of sex thrown in. Only just read the first few pages, so I'll see how it goes from there.

Been reading some more of this and it is quite weird. Lord Tyger is basically Tarzan if Tarzan had sex, like, ALL THE TIME.

[MrAngryFace]

Finished this, and I really liked it- I think as far as Space Marine Battles books go its my new favorite, with Helsreach close behind. I think my favorite part of GOOD Warhammer 40k novels is that they dont go for the easy ending- or rather the ending that's easy on the characters in the book. I think that's part of the reason I wasn't huge on the first Sisters of Battle book- the ending was too clean and neat; I mean there was still the idea of sacrifice and sucking it up- but it just felt like the end of a hollywood production. Im hoping the second Sisters of Battle book out later this year is different. So this book gets two thumbs up, read Helsreach after that- avoid Purging of Kaladus. I haven't read any of the others yet.

Im on the fence if ill read the second Night Lords novel next, as planned, or read the new Grant Morrison book Supergods

[Cormacaroni]

Supergods is best read in short chunks, I think. It's very episodic in nature.

[Eric P]

this metal dude on the train kept looking at me on the way home yesterday.  turns out we were both reading supergods.  #touchingnerdmoment

I'm up to the silver age stuff.  It's interesting that his favorite hero is The Flash, but he's never done a Flash story, has he?

[Cormacaroni]

He wrote the regular book for a while.

[Cormacaroni]

(i.e. Wally West, Flash vol. 2)

[Eric P]

really?

TO THE INTERNETS!

[Eric P]

I'm also reading this adaptation of the first Modesty Blaise book by Patrick O'Donnell and Dick Giordano.  Great art, horrible adaptive writing.  Lots of explanations of what we're seeing plainly in the panel.  But the art and visual storytelling is just gorgeous.

[Dickie Dee]

Anybody read the newer Dan Simmons books Black Hill or Flashback? Honestly both premises are uninteresting to me but I want to check them out because he always deliverys.

[Eric P]

ha ha.  yeah, flashback is glen beck porn.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/book-review-flashback-by-dan-simmons/2011/07/19/gIQA62F6lI_story.html

Dan Simmons’s “Flashback” is an abundantly entertaining, often outrageous right-wing fantasy about a weak, broken United States 20-odd years from now. The country is ruled over by the Japanese, lives in fear of the Islamic Global Caliphate, and its citizens mostly spend their time stoned on a drug called flashback that lets them escape to a better past. Some of the events that have occurred between now and the early 2030s can be summed up thusly:

U.S. Goes Bankrupt

Israel Destroyed by Nuclear Attack

Mexican Army Invades California

Sharia Law Rules Europe, Canada

Giant Mosque Built at Ground Zero

U.S. Down to 44½ States

There’s more, but you get the idea. And if you haven’t guessed, the blame for almost all these disasters lies with the fellow who was elected president of the United States in 2008.

[MrAngryFace]

Supergods is best read in short chunks, I think. It's very episodic in nature.

Thanks for the tip- maybe ill read it while reading something else then; chapter at a time.

[chronovore]

I think if I read that book, I would become your namesake.

Caliphate? Really? There is not enough smh.

[Joe Molotov]

ha ha.  yeah, flashback is glen beck porn.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/book-review-flashback-by-dan-simmons/2011/07/19/gIQA62F6lI_story.html

Dan Simmons’s “Flashback” is an abundantly entertaining, often outrageous right-wing fantasy about a weak, broken United States 20-odd years from now. The country is ruled over by the Japanese, lives in fear of the Islamic Global Caliphate, and its citizens mostly spend their time stoned on a drug called flashback that lets them escape to a better past. Some of the events that have occurred between now and the early 2030s can be summed up thusly:

U.S. Goes Bankrupt

Israel Destroyed by Nuclear Attack

Mexican Army Invades California

Sharia Law Rules Europe, Canada

Giant Mosque Built at Ground Zero

U.S. Down to 44½ States

There’s more, but you get the idea. And if you haven’t guessed, the blame for almost all these disasters lies with the fellow who was elected president of the United States in 2008.

Sounds like the best novel written since Michael Crichton's State of Fear.

[MrAngryFace]

I think if I read that book, I would become your namesake.

Caliphate? Really? There is not enough smh.

me? who?

[chronovore]

I think if I read that book, I would become your namesake.

Caliphate? Really? There is not enough smh.

me? who?

I would become a "mister angry face" -- I think the idea of a caliphate is super unrealistic, and seeing it used for fear mongering is lame. I actually thought the Jesusland secession shown in Richard K. Morgan's THIRTEEN is a more realistic proposal.

[MrAngryFace]

Im reading warhammer books...

[chronovore]

Yeah, I got that. I've been known to from time to time as well.

[MrAngryFace]

what are we talking about then?

[Cormacaroni]

This is what you get for being clever-clever Chrono

[chronovore]

 

Yeah, I won't be trying that again, soon.

[Cerveza mas fina]

I pretty much stopped reading lately, off period. Have at least 10 books just waiting on me.

Only thing I read a bit now is



which I'm rereading after 15(?) years just in time for the movie.

[muckhole]

After grabbing it on a recommendation here, I've finally begun reading Tokyo Vice. I've just begun, but I enjoyed the setup/prologue, and I'm just getting through the little bits of how the author came to be working at the news agency. So far, so good!

[Eric P]

still reading supergods.  dude is going to make me buy all of The Invisibles again isn't he?

[Cormacaroni]

After grabbing it on a recommendation here, I've finally begun reading Tokyo Vice. I've just begun, but I enjoyed the setup/prologue, and I'm just getting through the little bits of how the author came to be working at the news agency. So far, so good!

I met the author last year and he was kind of a dick. Very disappointing but you figure you have to be a bit of an oddball to want to do what he did in the first place.

[MrAngryFace]

still reading supergods.  dude is going to make me buy all of The Invisibles again isn't he?

I'm not a huge comics expert but the book has been really entertaining and interesting so far

[Howard Alan Treesong]

still reading supergods.  dude is going to make me buy all of The Invisibles again isn't he?

I'm not a huge comics expert but the book has been really entertaining and interesting so far

I'm up to the Hollywood chapter - been enjoying it. I am curious to check out Marshal Law - never heard of it before, but he seems to put it up there with Watchmen and Dark Knight Returns as one of the 80s books that changed the game. It seems like it might have been more of a UK thing.

Also gonna finally check out Ellis' Stormwatch run, based on his breathless description of it as a proto-Authority.

Morrison is MAD JELLY people loved Ellis' Authority more than his lame-ass Ultramarines

[Eric P]

Marshal Law - never heard of it before

Ellis' Stormwatch run, based on his breathless description of it as a proto-Authority.

buh?

Never heard of Marshal Law?

Never read Stormwatch?

Stormwatch is the (ha ha) thoughtful Authority.  Authority is the "well fuck you guys! you want the pewpew up your doodoo? here it is"

edit: to be fair though, i didn't like Marshall Law when I first read it because I don't think I was in tune with its satire.  I just thought it was trying to push the excesses of the "dark and gritty" for its own sake.  but that was like 20 years ago or so...

[tiesto]

[Howard Alan Treesong]

Marshal Law - never heard of it before

Ellis' Stormwatch run, based on his breathless description of it as a proto-Authority.

buh?

Never heard of Marshal Law?

Never read Stormwatch?

Stormwatch is the (ha ha) thoughtful Authority.  Authority is the "well fuck you guys! you want the pewpew up your doodoo? here it is"

edit: to be fair though, i didn't like Marshall Law when I first read it because I don't think I was in tune with its satire.  I just thought it was trying to push the excesses of the "dark and gritty" for its own sake.  but that was like 20 years ago or so...

Hey, I don't give you grief for never reading Kree-Skrull before, man!

[Eric P]

i am just shocked that's all!

[Cormacaroni]

Marshall Law was the first and only comics signing I've ever been to, with Pat Mills and Kevin O'Neill. I was like 12 yrs old and terrified to be meeting these grown men who wrote such deeply perverse and transgressive material. It's great stuff but obviously a one-trick pony. Hate for capes writ large.

[Consul]

genius

[Dickie Dee]

ha ha.  yeah, flashback is glen beck porn.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/book-review-flashback-by-dan-simmons/2011/07/19/gIQA62F6lI_story.html

Dan Simmons’s “Flashback” is an abundantly entertaining, often outrageous right-wing fantasy about a weak, broken United States 20-odd years from now. The country is ruled over by the Japanese, lives in fear of the Islamic Global Caliphate, and its citizens mostly spend their time stoned on a drug called flashback that lets them escape to a better past. Some of the events that have occurred between now and the early 2030s can be summed up thusly:

U.S. Goes Bankrupt

Israel Destroyed by Nuclear Attack

Mexican Army Invades California

Sharia Law Rules Europe, Canada

Giant Mosque Built at Ground Zero

U.S. Down to 44½ States

There’s more, but you get the idea. And if you haven’t guessed, the blame for almost all these disasters lies with the fellow who was elected president of the United States in 2008.

this is the most heartbreaking news I've ever heard, one of my favorite authors is Orson Scott card 2.0

[Eric P]

this is the most heartbreaking news I've ever heard, one of my favorite authors is Orson Scott card 2.0

who just rewrote hamlet, btw.

http://www.raintaxi.com/online/2011summer/card.shtml

Here's the punch line: Old King Hamlet was an inadequate king because he was gay, an evil person because he was gay, and, ultimately, a demonic and ghostly father of lies who convinces young Hamlet to exact imaginary revenge on innocent people. The old king was actually murdered by Horatio, in revenge for molesting him as a young boy—along with Laertes, and Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern, thereby turning all of them gay. We learn that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are now "as fusty and peculiar as an old married couple. I pity the woman who tries to wed her way into that house."

[muckhole]

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(Image removed from quote.)

genius

I loved this series when I read it years back, recently found out that an attempt is being made to turn it into a trilogy of movies. My initial reaction was "You've got to be kidding", but I'll admit that there's a tiny part of me that wants to see how it will be handled, just out of sheer curiosity. It would be a hell of a challenge to turn this into any form of usuable script IMO, with so many characters.

Or maybe they'll just turn it into a shit horror flick and focus on the Shrike. 

[chronovore]

still reading supergods.  dude is going to make me buy all of The Invisibles again isn't he?

Wait, I assumed that was a given. It's a given, right?

[Eric P]

I will probably hold off on buying Invisibles again with the hope that they put them into the deluxe editions things like 100 Bullets, Preacher and the like are getting.

[Howard Alan Treesong]

I will probably hold off on buying Invisibles again with the hope that they put them into the deluxe editions things like 100 Bullets, Preacher and the like are getting.

Man,  I would rebuy Deluxe Invisibles faster than you can say "MDMA"

[Consul]

(Image removed from quote.)
(Image removed from quote.)

genius

I loved this series when I read it years back, recently found out that an attempt is being made to turn it into a trilogy of movies. My initial reaction was "You've got to be kidding", but I'll admit that there's a tiny part of me that wants to see how it will be handled, just out of sheer curiosity. It would be a hell of a challenge to turn this into any form of usuable script IMO, with so many characters.

Or maybe they'll just turn it into a shit horror flick and focus on the Shrike. 

yeah....i hear bradley cooper is the one who is writing the script so don't expect anything great haha.

i would watch a movie just of fehdman kassads story alone. all those battles or the priests tale.

if it were up to me i'd split it up into 4 movies for the first two books.

[Cormacaroni]

I will probably hold off on buying Invisibles again with the hope that they put them into the deluxe editions things like 100 Bullets, Preacher and the like are getting.

Man,  I would rebuy Deluxe Invisibles faster than you can say "MDMA"

Yeah, it needs to be recolored for a start. I'm sure it will happen eventually though.

I started reading the Patrick Meaney book recently btw ('Our Sentence is Up'). I assume you have it?

[Howard Alan Treesong]

I will probably hold off on buying Invisibles again with the hope that they put them into the deluxe editions things like 100 Bullets, Preacher and the like are getting.

Man,  I would rebuy Deluxe Invisibles faster than you can say "MDMA"

Yeah, it needs to be recolored for a start. I'm sure it will happen eventually though.

I started reading the Patrick Meaney book recently btw ('Our Sentence is Up'). I assume you have it?

yes, and the Disinformation Guide

I reread Invisibles about 2.5 years ago - then immediately shed 50 pounds in the next 4 months, got promoted at work, and met my fiancée. So I take Morrison's nonsense about creating a living sigil that reprograms readers a bit more seriously than might be warranted

[Eric P]

now that you mention it, i re-read the invisibles, got fired from a job i hated and then moved to new york city where i got an awesome job that i love and have lived with my girlfriend for the past 2 years now.

[Cormacaroni]

Well, I accepted the idea that literature can change how you view the world a loooooooong time ago, so he's just stating the case a little more dramatically and attempting a more rigorous framework than most, I think. If The Invisibles is a living sigil, then so is Das Kapital or Mein Kampf. Or even The Audacity of Hope!

Actually, just reading the letters pages would probably be enough to rearrange pliable minds if you were already sufficiently invested in Morrison's ideas or fiction already.

[Eric P]

I'm reading Supergods and I can now dunk on Jordan.

[Eric P]

Wait, what did reading Cerebus do to me?

[tiesto]

ha ha.  yeah, flashback is glen beck porn.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/book-review-flashback-by-dan-simmons/2011/07/19/gIQA62F6lI_story.html

Dan Simmons’s “Flashback” is an abundantly entertaining, often outrageous right-wing fantasy about a weak, broken United States 20-odd years from now. The country is ruled over by the Japanese, lives in fear of the Islamic Global Caliphate, and its citizens mostly spend their time stoned on a drug called flashback that lets them escape to a better past. Some of the events that have occurred between now and the early 2030s can be summed up thusly:

U.S. Goes Bankrupt

Israel Destroyed by Nuclear Attack

Mexican Army Invades California

Sharia Law Rules Europe, Canada

Giant Mosque Built at Ground Zero

U.S. Down to 44½ States

There’s more, but you get the idea. And if you haven’t guessed, the blame for almost all these disasters lies with the fellow who was elected president of the United States in 2008.

this is the most heartbreaking news I've ever heard, one of my favorite authors is Orson Scott card 2.0

Wow, this book sounds right up my alley... If US was ruled by the Japanese does that mean we will actually get good Japanese games localized again? 

[Howard Alan Treesong]

ha ha.  yeah, flashback is glen beck porn.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/book-review-flashback-by-dan-simmons/2011/07/19/gIQA62F6lI_story.html

Dan Simmons’s “Flashback” is an abundantly entertaining, often outrageous right-wing fantasy about a weak, broken United States 20-odd years from now. The country is ruled over by the Japanese, lives in fear of the Islamic Global Caliphate, and its citizens mostly spend their time stoned on a drug called flashback that lets them escape to a better past. Some of the events that have occurred between now and the early 2030s can be summed up thusly:

U.S. Goes Bankrupt

Israel Destroyed by Nuclear Attack

Mexican Army Invades California

Sharia Law Rules Europe, Canada

Giant Mosque Built at Ground Zero

U.S. Down to 44½ States

There’s more, but you get the idea. And if you haven’t guessed, the blame for almost all these disasters lies with the fellow who was elected president of the United States in 2008.

this is the most heartbreaking news I've ever heard, one of my favorite authors is Orson Scott card 2.0

Wow, this book sounds right up my alley... If US was ruled by the Japanese does that mean we will actually get good Japanese games localized again? 

no, but the second-hand market in Mickey Mouse watches will go through-the-roof

[Howard Alan Treesong]

I came across Ender's Game on my shelf the other day and flipped through it. The idea of Peter taking over the world by making REALLY GOOD message board posts seems pretty ridiculous today.

Whereas in 1985, it was extremely believable!

[Consul]

I came across Ender's Game on my shelf the other day and flipped through it. The idea of Peter taking over the world by making REALLY GOOD message board posts seems pretty ridiculous today.

This is merely phase one my friend.

[Robo]

Wow, this book sounds right up my alley... If US was ruled by the Japanese does that mean we will actually get good Japanese games localized again? 

no, but the second-hand market in Mickey Mouse watches will go through-the-roof

 

[Eric P]

are you kidding me?  nerds LOVE that shit.  it's ridiculous.

[Howard Alan Treesong]

'struth - despite all reality to the contrary, Ender's Game and Memory, Sorrow and Thorn both still have nerd cred

[Robo]

Currently reading A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court during unpacking breaks.  It's all over the place, conceptually, but the humor is fantastic -- puerile, maybe, but I am adoring the skewering of Arthurian legend.

[chronovore]

Wait, what did reading Cerebus do to me?

BAM! You're a misogynist.