What are we reading?

[Martok]

Just finished Sword Song; next one in the series is The Burning Land.  Am slightly worried I'll finish the 8th book before the 9th one (The Flame Bearer) is released at the end of the month. 


EDIT:  Me no count gud.  :-[ 

[bbmike]

Just started re-reading Icerigger by Alan Dean Foster. I read it and the sequel way back in high school and both are good books. There is a third book that I never read and I'm looking forward to reading it.

[airboy]

The Audible versions of the Heinlein juveniles have been very good.  Thus far I've listened to Farmer in the Sky, Space Cadet, Orphans in the Sky (I'd avoid that one), Citizen of the Galaxy and Have Spacesuit Will Travel.

The only negative is how the narrator says "huh?" 

[OJsDad]

Just finished David Weber's 'At the Sign of Triumph'.  This ended the current story line for the Safehold series.  Weber has promised more books, but not sure when he plans on delivering them.

I cannot say that a lot of how the book ended was a surprise.  Not that it wasn't worth reading, just not a great surprise.  Having read all of Safehold books, and more of the Honor Harrington books, I wasn't blown away with some of the twists that he through in.  Not that I saw them coming, it's just that he has so many twists and surprises, that I tend to expect them.

Weber's a good writer, but in this book, and some of his others, include Shadow of Victory, he gets too long winded.  Too many scenes that he goes into great detail for no real purpose.  Felt like I was rereading the same sections at times, just different names and places.

[airboy]

I finished rereading "The Drawing of the Dark" by Tim Powers.

[airboy]

Finished "Taken" and "Treachery's Tools"

Treachery's Tools was good if you like the Imager books by Modesitt.  I would read the Harry Dresden series instead of Taken.

[bob48]

I'm working my way through some of the 'Disc World' books again because they always cheer me up.

[Windigo]

I just read the 2016 Subaru Crosstrek Owners/Operators Manual.

Still unclear what the consequences are of driving/running the Suby's boxer engine when the little temperature light is still blue. Seems to stay on for awhile.

[Sir Slash]

Ohhh. I LOVE Owner's Manuals. It's like punishing your brain when it miss-behaves.  :wow:

[JasonPratt]

I just finished the first two Missing 411 books (Western US & Canada + Eastern US and Quebec / Nova Scotia) by David Paulides. Not for the faint of heart (or faint of wallet -- the cheapest way to get the current box set still runs over $100, and many books are out of print so sell at exorbitant rates easily crossing $80 each.)

By the nature of his research, a good half the cases simply fall in the "they disappeared in this area at some time around then and were never seen again", with no real details beyond that. But the cases that do have details are often chilling in themselves, and moreso as the less-but-still-somewhat detailed cases correspond to the variant patterns of the more detailed cases.

I'm not sure yet how many of his subsequent books (I think there are six in the box) repeat past case reports from earlier books; I'm working on finishing another small book before going back to the series. But anyone living in rural North America ought to become familiar with the case details: whatever the cause(s), the cases are still happening with some regularity. The Pinson, TN boy south of here about an hour and a half corresponds strongly to the details; and while I was reading it (the first two books are actually one book in two volumes) Mom heard about a case on the news, involving the daughter of one of the famous "Piano Men" internet musical team whose disappearance and remains fit the profile somewhat just in the past few weeks.

For those unfamiliar with the cases, people disappear in rural areas across all North America (although with some areas producing more clusters than others), often in or near state or national parks, in ways which aren't easily explicable. Young children, most of whom have just learned to walk up to 4 years old, make up a majority of the cases. When dogs are used, they either lose the scent or never pick it up or refuse to track even when they have the scene. When recovered alive, they're always in peculiar places that make little to no sense for their capabilities or (when adults) their situation. They tend to shed some or most or all their clothes quickly after disappearing regardless of weather conditions (which tend to get suddenly worse after their disappearance, hampering searches). Shoes and (where applicable) socks are most often lost, yet their feet show little sign of wear even if they have thorn scratches on the rest of their bodies. Not uncommonly, the found clothes are discovered in weird placements (whether or not the person is found alive or dead). If found dead, their bodies will either show up in areas already thoroughly searched despite (per autopsies) having died soon after disappearing; or they'll be recovered from freakishly difficult to reach areas that make no sense for them to have gotten into. If they leave behind equipment other than clothes, the equipment makes little sense for how they've been abandoned. Sometimes extensive searching turns up nothing at all. When recovered alive or dead (more often dead), they're found miles (sometimes many miles) from where such a person could be expected to have gotten to, often having crossed terrain that make no sense for the time and capabilities involved for them to have arrived at final recovery. If recovered, they're either too young (or mentally disabled already) to give clear explanations for what happened; or if adults, they act like they've been drugged in such a way that they couldn't form memories to recover. Despite the fact that the FBI doesn't officially get involved in mere missing person cases, they often show up to observe and advise even when abduction hasn't been formally proposed. In the Appalachians (especially on the Tennessee / North Carolina border), Green Berets have been sometimes brought in to hunt in armed squads to find the missing person -- never successfully so far.

One of the most damning bits of data brought forth, is that neither the Department of the Interior, the National Park Service, nor the National Parks themselves, profess to keep lists of people who have gone missing in or nearby the parks; and their explanations for not doing so sound reaalllly lame. When the author brings this up in discussion with other law enforcement officers and Seach-And-Rescue leaders, he says the response is universal incredulity, since this is an extremely basic law enforcement jurisdictional action. No one except the NPS relies on "institutional memory" (i.e. the experience of officers working in the area over time) to keep track of missing persons: it would be impossible to track patterns for detecting and catching serial abductors! This is basically why Paulides started the series, to provide the closest thing possible to a database for unexplained missing persons in and near American national and state parks, after discussing a smaller set of such disappearances years ago with a park ranger and learning there is no such database. (Or for oddly explained disappearances where the official explanation doesn't match the known data of the disappearance very well.)

[Gusington]

The blue light on a Subaru dash means 'global warming is a myth'

[Staggerwing]

The blue light on a Subaru dash means 'global warming is a myth'

It actually means that the engine is not yet hot enough to cook roadkill on.

[BanzaiCat]

I've read Earthrise Book 1 and Earthrise Book 2 in dribs and drabs here and there...it's a great concept though the stories are a bit weak and the characters don't act much like soldiers. I'll probably eventually pick up Book 3 but only after I get through the library I have on my Kindle.

Finally started Honor Harrington Book 2 last night.

[Gusington]

Realized that I haven't posted the last 3-4 books I've read because I have been reading them pretty quickly. Still in pseudo-Halloween mode. Right now I'm in the middle of the Penguin History of the Undead: 1500 Years of Supernatural Encounters, edited by Scott Bruce. It is very academic but kinda interesting to skim late at night :)

[Windigo]

The blue light on a Subaru dash means 'global warming is a myth'

I love it when you talk bad you dirty boy!