Books - What are you reading?

Margaret Atwood's The Heart Goes Last is a cracking dystopian nightmare

I think it was actually written as a screenplay.

Edit - maybe not

Love The Handmaid's Tale - need to read more by Atwood.

@TM Have you read 'Blood Meridian'? It's not an easy-going read :-)

Don Quixote just came out in a new Swedish translation to make it actually readable. It's been updated long ago in English, German, French etc but this is the first time someone's done a proper job of it in my language. So that's my goal for the summer, reading don Quixote. Already loled a few times, only a couple of chapters in.

Did you start with All The Pretty Horses?

For anyone who's read the Wool/Silo series, this is pretty relevant: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2016-06/kl-eum062916.php

Nope - This is my first McCarthy book.

I can't remember why I bought it - possibly it was an "other people who like that book also liked this book", or it could have been another recommendation.

How does "All the Pretty Horses" compare?

The whole Border Trilogy is worth reading.

I still think Blood Meridien is his magnum opus, although it's not for the faint hearted.

It really is not, is it?! There were quite a few scenes that made me wince. He certainly doesn't tiptoe around the reader in that one.

The Nightmare Stacks by Charles Stross.

It's the latest installment of his Laundry Files series, Lovecraftian horror and black humor - even if you've not read any previous in the series this would stand on it's own.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24997064-the-nightmare-stacks

Anyone read Ellias Canetti?
Been recommended Auto de Fey by a friend who said it was one of her formative books.
Any opinions?

late reply I know, but regarding Nabakov - I loved Laughter in the Dark. Still not got round to reading Lolita...

Am reading the Goldfinch at the moment. Quite enjoying it

Need recommendations.

Not sure wether to go fiction or non... Just finished One Hundred Years of Solitude, which I really enjoyed but I also liked stuff by Will Self and Jonathan Meades, as well as things like A Short History of Nearly Everything and Command and Control and some physics stuff...

Leaning towards non-fiction, tbh. Any ideas?

just finished Morvern Callar by Alan Warner ........pretty good, didn't realise that it had been made into a film. Not sure I'd want to watch it and having to resist shouting "that wasn't in the book....." all the way through.

Ha! The film is actually pretty good. Under the skin really reminded me of it...

I've just finished The Next Watch - Sergei Lukyanenko and kindle linked me to 'you might like' and there is a new one coming in September, 'The Sixth Watch'
I am excite!
Forgot how much I enjoyed them, really need to either find my physical copies of the other Watch books or buy them on the Kindle.

Currently reading La Reine Margot (English abridged translation) and Le Comte De Monte Cristo (English and French unabridged in the same book) by Alexandre Dumas. Spent 9 days in France with my girlfriends mum and her partner and realised my French needs massively improving.

Monte Cristo I've read loads of times, it's my favourite book.

I want to read Sex at Dawn but am self-conscious that people on the tube will think I'm reading a dirty novel (which it isn't).

I've just finished the last Lisbeth Salander (as in "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo") book "The Girl in the Spiders Web" by David Lagercranz (carrying on from Stieg Larsonn). Excellent story line but he's spoilt the character by 'bigging' her up, you know making all subtleties a bit in yer face. Good but not quite Carling.

I'm about a quarter of the way through that [The Girl in the Spiders Web]! Enjoying it a lot, but it does seem like it's written as if for a screenplay rather than a novel. Wondering where it'll go next at the moment, chapter 6.

Also reading Hitch-hikers Guide to The Galaxy aloud with the gf. She's never read it and doesn't know anything about it which is refreshing.

I've just finished The Next Watch - Sergei Lukyanenko and kindle linked me to 'you might like' and there is a new one coming in September, 'The Sixth Watch'

Cool. Didn't realise there had been a fifth and now an imminent sixth incoming. Library trip on the way home I think!

Let me know what you think when you've finished.

Recommendations for good SF? Quite like the sound of Hyperion...

I read the first book in Hyperion, I don't really remember it gripping me and the fact that I didn't bother with the other books in the series suggests I didn't rate it that much.

Finally got round to finishing the Wool/Silo series. Quite enjoyed it, the early books were the best but the later ones were decent. I think I did miss a book out due to the stupid names (about 5 books called Wool, another 2 or 3 called something else, etc) which was a bit confusing.

For SF, William Gibson is well worth reading if you haven't already (and the Difference Engine with Bruce Sterling), Ernest Cline was entertaining, I really enjoyed the Deathstalker series by Simon R Green (although not at all hard SF if that's what you're looking for), Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan, Larry Niven and Ringworld if you're looking for hard SF.

Two books by Matthew De Abaitua, The Red Men and If, Then.
Very intelligent SF storytelling, and he's a very nice bloke. He wrote this thing about being Will Self's assistant, which is an example of his way with words.
http://fivedials.com/files/fivedials_no28.pdf
In fact, the whole of Five Dials is worth reading and subscribing to.
Also, anything by Nick Harkaway.