What Are You Reading?

[arjue]

If you ever feel like reading a book as transgressive and violent as American Psycho, you should check out High Life. It is fucked up. Now on to something a little less grimy.

[Detour]

I just finished Larry Correia's Hard Magic which was an absolute blast start to finish. Alternate history depression era earth where a small percentage of the population have magic powers. It's a steampunk noir action adventure epic and I am dying for him to write more in that universe.

[YellerDog]

I am about to finish IV. I recommend jumping right on-- it's strange in that it's almost entirely about Roland and the beginning of his life. I haven't read about Jake, Eddie or Susannah in a good 400 pages.

I am entirely ok with that... The couple and the brat are wearing out their welcome.

[Mzo]

That's part of what makes IV the best.

[YellerDog]

The bumbler is better than all three of them by himself. It should just be Roland and Bumbler Adventures.

[Some Stupid Japanese Name]

did you have a chance to read "Springtime for Hitler?"

[Compass]

Finally read A Song of Ice and Fire: A Feast for Crows. kof's crazy. Plenty of entertainment to be had.

Definitely don't mouseover this if you're only watching the HBO series:

Cersei's mounting paranoia. Chilling allusions to Qyburn's activities in the black cells. Arya becoming foul-mouthed Cat of the Canals and murdering douchebags in cold blood with her pointy knife, then stealing their shoes. Brienne getting her face gnawed off by some zombie-ish dude. Brienne's hanging!

Tyrion and Daenarys viewpoints were definitely missed, but still a solid entry. I might put it above Clash of Kings.

Martin's still ridiculous with his character overload. He'll introduce like ten new names in a paragraph; fifty a chapter. This is on top of the hundreds already established. Is anyone able to keep up? Even the relatively major characters often have similar names -- Emmon, Edwyn, Edmure -- and/or nicknames, and little in the way of distinctive traits. "Wait, who are these people again?" is an ongoing question I'm way too lazy to answer by repeatedly flipping to the back of the book to check the poorly formatted manifest. Some kind of highlight/pop-up reminder system would be cool for the digital versions.

[taloony]

Finally read A Song of Ice and Fire: A Feast for Crows. kof's crazy. Plenty of entertainment to be had.

Definitely don't mouseover this if you're only watching the HBO series:

Cersei's mounting paranoia. Chilling allusions to Qyburn's activities in the black cells. Arya becoming foul-mouthed Cat of the Canals and murdering douchebags in cold blood with her pointy knife, then stealing their . Brienne getting her face gnawed off by some zombie-ish dude. Brienne's hanging!

Tyrion and Daenarys viewpoints were definitely missed, but still a solid entry. I might put it above Clash of Kings.

Martin's still ridiculous with his character overload. He'll introduce like ten new names in a paragraph; fifty a chapter. This is on top of the hundreds already established. Is anyone able to keep up? Even the relatively major characters often have similar names -- Emmon, Edwyn, Edmure -- and/or nicknames, and little in the way of distinctive traits. "Wait, who are these people again?" is an ongoing question I'm way too lazy to answer by repeatedly flipping to the back of the book to check the poorly formatted manifest. Some kind of highlight/pop-up reminder system would be cool for the digital versions.

Wait until you get to Dance and the ridiculous names in Dany's chapters. Just speaking for myself but those names helped make her chapters a chore to read.

I didn't like Feast when it came out but on my recent reread I enjoyed it much more. Very good storytelling and I was really enjoying Jamie's chapters.

[sedition]

I'm about 25% through Dance with Dragons... Dany chapters and the new Cersi chapters for me... ugh.

[arjue]

I just read a book called "Bigfoot War" because its name was "Bigfoot War". Good idea, terrible execution.

I also just read "The Dead Women of Juárez" by Robert Andrew Powell, a sceptical investigation of the supposed femicide the region is known for. Its interesting stuff and really highlights the tragedy of the whole city (eg, statistically speaking, you have a higher than 98% chance of getting away with murder there).