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Do audiobooks count?
Leviathan Falls by James S. A. Corey. It’s the final book in The Expanse series. Really got hooked on it. I haven’t made time to find another book since then though 🤔
They absolutely do! I don’t understand the snobbery against audiobooks. When Borges lost his sight he had to have books read to him, and just consider the amazing stories he came up with (and the literary devices he developed) to make up for his blindness.
They definitely count as ingesting books but there is a difference between reading a book and listening to an audiobook.
Reading IS the activity but I feel like with audiobooks people are typically driving or something where the book is in the background. Though maybe some people put on headphones and just sit and listen or something. I don’t know if this makes me a snob lol.
Also The Expanse was the first book series I ever read. It was so good. And it made me like the show less even though the show is still great.
I just finished Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson. Great book, that not only coined terms like “avatar” and “metaverse” (for better or worse), but is also really well written. It somehow manages to find a tone that is consistent for the dystopian worldbuilding, the silly and self-aware things that happen in the world, and the philosophical aspect dealing with culture, religion and free will. Highly recommend!
And I’m currently reading his newest novel, Termination Shock. Quite different, but still has that Stephenson sense of world building that I love.
Last finished was Acceptance by Jeff Vandermeer. Currently reading Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir.
Project Hail Mary was excellent. Loved every second.
Old Man’s War by John Scalzi - not high literature by any means, but a fun read nonetheless. Currently reading the sequel, The Ghost Brigades, which is equally as fun :)
I was recently reading Scalzi too! His blog is great too.
Last book I finished? The Dragon Reborn. Currently reading? The Princess Diaries.
Ayyyyy, are you reading The Shadow Rising soon? I liked it more than the Dragon Reborn.
The Burning Land by Bernard Cornwell. It’s book 5 in the last kingdom series that the TV show is based off of. I love the time period.
The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch – a really fun heist-y story set in an engaging and well-crafted fantasy world
Last book on paper: D&D 5th edition Player Handbook (German edition)
Last novel op paper: Frank Herbert - Dune
Last audiobook: P. Djèlí Clark - A Master of Djinn
Piranesi by Susanna Clarke, and I hated it.
It takes a very cool premise, then fills it with incongruences and predictable twists that you understand chapters ahead of the protagonist. Then it all ends up being (SPOILERS AHEAD) a “humans used to literally talk to nature, modern society bad” mumbojumbo with some kind of unexplained multiverse in it.
Women, Race and Class by Angela Davis.
Reading some of the history that gets left out elsewhere. Did you know that before the end of the Civil War lynching was primarily used to terrorize white abolitionists? After the Civil War during reconstruction, during Jim Crow, white supremacists needed to find a reason to terrorize and control the black community so the myth of the black man as rapist was woven into public discourse. It was the most convenient excuse to find a reason to violently punish and control black people who in whatever way challenged or violated the status quo. Accusations of even inappropriate forwardness were enough to justifying hanging. But the real reason would be that some black person or family started a business, sought education or became empowered in some way, challenging the white supremacist social hierarchy - and were lynched for it.
I just finished Animal Farm and 1984, both by George Orwell. They’re fantastic books that offer an interesting perspective on the Russian Revolution and authoritarianism.
1984 (nineteen-eightyfour) from George Orwell. Currently reading nothing but news.
“Greenlights” - Mathew McConaughey. Currently reading ‘Look to Windward’ by Iain M. Banks
hemingway’s debut the sun also rises, i went in blind and didn’t expect it to be about bull fighting. i enjoyed the vibe of the 1920s travel through spain and france, the aimless plot and the character interactions.
i learned that bullfighting is terrible and cringed at the casual anti-semitism all over the book
Napoleon: A Life, really well written biography that reads like a novel highly recommended!