What Are You Reading?

[Ironclad Alibi]

Three sort-of related books: A ginormous coffee-table-type-book titled The Gold of the Pharaohs by Henri Stierlin, as well as Isis, or the Search for Egypt's Buried Past, by Pierre Montet.

The latter is a lovely old book, published in the late 1950s, but the text itself is somewhat hard to read. It's fairly small and sans-serif, which itself is hard to read when on paper. I squint a lot.

And lastly, Secrets of the Pharaohs, by Ian McMahan.

If you would like a very interesting book about Egypt check out A Thousand Miles Up The Nile by Amelia B. Edwards.

Online here.

PDF here.

[Pixelated]

Three sort-of related books: A ginormous coffee-table-type-book titled The Gold of the Pharaohs by Henri Stierlin, as well as Isis, or the Search for Egypt's Buried Past, by Pierre Montet.

The latter is a lovely old book, published in the late 1950s, but the text itself is somewhat hard to read. It's fairly small and sans-serif, which itself is hard to read when on paper. I squint a lot.

And lastly, Secrets of the Pharaohs, by Ian McMahan.

[TheSHAD0W]

I gave up on Ring of Fire a few years back. Just lost interest, not sure exactly why.

The Ring of Fire series IMO suffers from being *too* realistic. The greatest interest in the story is how the alternate history contrasts with actual history; and if such an anachronism like this actually happened, changes would cascade so quickly that reality would be completely different within a handful of years - which is what happened in the series.

This contrasts with something like the Conrad Stargard series, which took place in a smaller area, at a time when movement between nations was more constrained. Later books also mainly limited themselves to where frontiers were pushed. (Except for the last, posthumously-completed book, which I'm not going to spoil.)

[It's me]

I gave up on Ring of Fire a few years back. Just lost interest, not sure exactly why. Maybe I'll give the series another go... I own the first several ebooks.

[Seanette]

Yeah, Ring of Fire is getting a bit overwhelming, isn't it? Great concept, but maybe there's such a thing as TOO successful?

[dalesys]

I'm cashing in and re-reading all the Ring of Fire ebooks I have (51)... there are (currently) about 77 more.

[AnaKhouri]

Just started reading a novel from a respected smaller press, written by a NYT Bestselling author.

The first three pages were nothing but exposition, and now, three chapters in, every other page has a huge chunk of exposition.

Just...why? How?

[Victory Sabre]

Triggered by Donald Trump Jr.

I always had a good feeling about him, I'm getting to understand why. I'd love to go hunting or fishing with him.

[greek_jester]

Latest books: "The DeathSpeaker Codex" series by Soyna Bateman.

Love this series! Just finished the (current) last in the series.

[It's me]

The Dressdown Files?

Boo!!!. Hiss!!!

[It's me]

Latest books: "The DeathSpeaker Codex" series by Soyna Bateman.

I'm on book 3 of 10. The characters are interesting, the writing is well done, and there is some nice world-building going on.

Grabbed the blurb from Amazon:
Driving dead people around Manhattan is all in a day's work for body mover Gideon Black. He lives in his van, talks to his passengers -- even though they don't have much to say -- and occasionally helps the police solve murders. His life may not be normal, but it's simple enough.

Until the dead start talking back.

When Gideon accidentally rescues a werewolf, she drags him into the secret world of the Others. Fae, shifters, golems and more, trying to survive unnoticed in the looming shadow of Milus Dei -- a powerful cult dedicated to hunting down and eradicating them all.

Then a dead man speaks to him, saying that Milus Dei wants him more than any Other. They'll stop at nothing to capture him and control the abilities he never knew he had.

Because Gideon is the DeathSpeaker. He is the key. And he's not exactly as human as he thought...

[It's me]

"Fade" sounds interesting, but what the heck are "The Laundry Files"??

Easiest way to explain is to grab the Wikipedia entrry:

The Laundry Files*is a series of novels by*Charles Stross. They mix the genres of*Lovecraftian horror,*spy thriller,*science fiction, and*workplace humour. Their main character for the first five novels is "Bob Howard" (a pseudonym taken for security purposes), a one-time I.T. consultant turned*occult*field agent. Howard is recruited to work for the Q-Division of*SOE, otherwise known as "the Laundry", the British government agency which deals with occult threats. "Magic" is described as being a branch of applied computation (mathematics), therefore computers and equations are just as useful, and perhaps more potent, than classic spellbooks, pentagrams, and sigils for the purpose of influencing ancient powers and opening gates to other dimensions.*

[dalesys]

... but what the heck are "The Laundry Files"??

The Dressdown Files?

[Pixelated]

I am about half way through "Fade" by Daniel Humphreys.

It's like a cross between the Dresden Files and The Laundry Files.

*snip*

"Fade" sounds interesting, but what the heck are "The Laundry Files"??

[Pixelated]

I'm just about finished reading this weird YA fantasy novel titled Sir Tuesday by Garth Nix. It's the fourth in the Keys to the Kingdom series, so I'm having to do a bit of extrapolating to figure out exactly WTF's going on.

Central character is Arthur Penhaligon and he and his friend Leaf (?) are trying to get back to Earth from ?? (I'm not sure where, but definitely not the 'normal' earth ... possibly something like Hogwarts and the Muggle world?)

The background story appears to be (from Wikipedia): "Arthur, a 12-year-old boy, has recently moved to a town and wants to fit into it. After suffering an asthma attack, he is saved by a mysterious metal object, called a Key, given by an even stranger character, Mister Monday, whose servants bring an incurable plague to Arthur's town. Arthur hurries to the House, a mysterious structure that only he can see. Shortly after arriving in the House, Arthur discovers the structure of the house is a complete universe and is informed of his duty to unseat the seven Trustees who run the House, claim their Keys, and rule all of Creation."

The Trustees are known as the Morrow Days, and they are: Mister Monday, Grim Tuesday, Drowned Wednesday, Sir Thursday, Lady Friday, Superior Saturday, and Lord Sunday.

If Arthur uses the Keys as he's supposed to, he will become infected with sorcery and will ultimately become a Denizen of the House. He doesn't want to do this because whenever a Denizen appears in the Secondary Realms (which includes Earth) they are fatal to mortal life.

There's also a character way back in the history of the House that's called the Architect; I haven't figured out yet whether this is a sort of god to the Denizens, or a myth, or what.

The books have been criticized for their slow pace, but I found it generally to be a good read. I suspect I'll end up reading the entire series ....