the books I have on the go. what are yours?

[porphyre]

Kathe Koja's newest novel, Under the Poppy, has been adapted for an immersive stage production slated for 2011 at the Detroit Opera House!

I've been talking about books a lot this week, but it's only just occurred to me that I never seem to tell anyone what it is I read. Ridiculous, considering how much of it I do, even now, after I've made it a

Comments

[fyr3lyt3]

I admit I've been carrying around Diana Wynne Jones' "The House of Many Ways" since it came out in paperback. I keep putting it into bags and taking it places and not reading it when I'm there. Its getting a little ridiculous.

[porphyre]

Freedom and Necessity is at risk of becoming that book for me. So far I read a little bit every morning while I brush my teeth, but it hasn't been interesting enough for me to want to take it on the bus, which is a bit of a death knell.

p.s.

[porphyre]

Whoah! That's a book series and I never knew! Aie! I fail!

[why_gravity]

Right now I'm working at Snowcrash by Neal Stephenson (I haven't read it in years and it's awesome), and in the pile under it I've got Nation by Terry Pratchett, Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlen, and further than that I haven't made up my mind about which section of my "To read" shelf I'm going to bust through.
I've got at least one William Gibson novel, lots more Neal Stephenson, and for the billionth time I'm itching to go through everything I've ever loved by Orson Scott Card. Which will definitely take some time.

[porphyre]

I just talked Tony into reading Snow Crash, which he properly loved, as all people should. Somehow he completely missed Neal Stephenson until I pressed Anathema on him earlier this year. Which now makes me wonder, did I miss Orson Scott Card? All I've read is Ender's Game, which I didn't find as revolutionary as it was presented to me.

Nation, however, is incredible, especially when viewed as Pratchett's response to Alzheimer's.

[why_gravity]

Awesome, yeah, I've been meaning to get the rest of the Stephenson books into my brain for a long time. Most of my problem there is not wanting to commit to any really long books (I've read the beginning of Cryptonomicon about eight times, it's been on my bookshelf for six years)because I have such a hard time sitting still and reading as often as I'd like to, I guess

[porphyre]

Oh yes, entirely. I've read close to everything Pratchett's ever written.

William Gibson was the writer I started with when I was tiny, and I think that really influenced a lot of my sci-fi leanings, in so much that I want detail and complex plot lines and cultural quirks flayed out for my inspection. Neal Stephenson, then, is perfect. Or at least, became perfect once he started writing the massive tomes he's now known for. Before those kicked in, Snowcrash seems to be the only thing he wrote that actually had an ending.

[kencf0618]

The Anarchist Prince: Peter Kropotkin by George Woodchuck and Ivan Avakumovic is my current carrying-around book. I hadn't really appreciated how the Anarchists and the Socialists had gone at it hammer and tongs back in the day.

[porphyre]

Did libertarianism come out of that arguement? I don't know enough about it.

[kencf0618]

Certainly in the sense that that argument is one of the intellectual great-great-grandfathers of libertarianism. An interesting study, Anarchism.

[mordicai]

I keep them nice & organized.

[porphyre]

Yes, hence part of my realization. You and many other people write reviews, even. Me, I eat them like candy, go through them like water, and then never seem to speak of them.

[mordicai]

I think keeping a running blurb factory of them is great; highly recommended. Fulfilling.

[sr_smith]

How was The Windup Girl?

[porphyre]

I really liked it. There's a crispness to his writing that's rare in a first novel that's a treat to read. Part of it is that his universe is very clearly defined, very detailed in its reality.

I'm looking forward to eventually getting my paws on a copy of Pump Six and Other Stories, his second book.