o, books

[jazzfish]

So I finished rereading the Hitchhiker's trilogy, for the first time in, oh, probably fifteen years. (Side note: holy cow is Mostly Harmless ever a depressing book. It's really good-- it may be the best novel of the lot-- but, yow.) And now I find myself with an embarrassment of riches.

In Vancouver I picked up a copy of Anathem, which I am told is a Neal Stephenson book with an ending. Thing is, it's Big, and bulky, and kind of annoying to carry around. It's much easier to carry Heat of Fusion, and I've been meaning to get back to that for awhile, prompted by a reread of "Chromatic Aberration" for a sadly moribund discussion forum. But I've also been meaning to reread Wolfe's Long Sun and Short Sun series, so I can pick up on some of what I missed the first time through. (devouring The Sorcerer's House last week did not help matters here.)

Or I could go with my original plan and reread the Dirk Gently books. I worry that that'll be too much DNA all at once. I did pick up a copy of King Rat at Stone Ridge last weekend, I could always finally read some of Mieville's stuff. And of course there's Ratio, a book about cooking, which I got from uilos last year and have been slowly wending my way through.

And then I remembered, I have a paid account for just such an eventuality!

[Poll #1554467]

Comments

[mikailborg.livejournal.com]

I rather enjoyed the sixth Hitchhiker's book, "And Another Thing..." and would recommend it to folks who won't mind that it's not a perfect DNA imitation. It's not *quite* the same continuity as any other Hitchhiker's tale, but that somehow seems quite appropriate.

[jazzfish]

The introduction to my collected edition notes that pretty much every Guide-related thing ever published "flatly contradicts everything else," so, definitely appropriate.

My thought about And Another Thing is that I'll read it if a sufficient number (three) of people I know and whose taste I trust tell me it's decent. So, that's one.

[shield-toad111.livejournal.com]

I vote for Dirk Gently purely because you got the Hot Potato song stuck in my head, but I just packed my copy of the Omnibus away a couple days ago, so it would be Effort to go get it and read the book myself. And now the song will be stuck there forever. (Well, or until something else comes along. Bits of Candide have been popping up a lot recently.)

...and I should really go to bed soon, because if I don't, this may very well turn into the longest and most unrelated comment I've ever written. That and I have to be up in less than 6 hours.

[jazzfish]

. . . argh! Pain shared is lessened, or something.

And feel free to discourse/ramble at length, it gives me something to reply to!

[merseine0613.livejournal.com]

I listened to Anathem on a drive to-and-from my Mom's place in South Dakota... long stretches of southern MN swooped by quickly during that story. I know you've got the paper copy, but if you can swing an audio version - check your library - it was a good "listen" (as opposed to a good read...). I quite enjoyed the book, so I recommend it.

The "something else" depends on if you have any sort of e-reader available. I HIGHLY recommend the Baen library. They've got a bunch o' stuff for free and a whole lot of other stuff available for sale. I'm re-reading the Miles Vorkosigan series right now, thanks to Baen and my Nokia-810.

[jazzfish]

Audio books are sadly no good for me. They're so much slower than I can read, plus it takes effort to keep paying attention. I get distracted and suddenly it's three minutes later and I have no idea what the heck just happened. (This doesn't seem to happen with radio shows. I guess the different actors and the pacing is sufficient to keep my brain engaged. That or I've mostly listened to comedy shows.)

People have been telling me to read Miles for, um, almost two decades now. At the time it seemed like the availability of Bujold's backlist was pretty spotty so I never got into them. I /do/ have the Device, but it's slightly too small for convenient reading. As in, I have to turn the pages too often to easily get into the flow of things. This is one of those problems that will solve itself if I just use the thing more. . . on the other hand, I have all these dead-tree editions I've not read yet, which have a much lower barrier to entry at this point.

[marcmagus]

That happens to me when reading sometimes. Suddenly it's a page or so later and I have no idea what the heck just happened. I'm pretty sure I'd be just like you with audio books.

Not that you need another, but I also recommend Miles as worth reading sometime. I found them to be quite available on friends' bookshelves.

[jazzfish]

If I'm reading something fairly dense (Wolfe, Delany), or if I'm in the middle of an especially frenetic sequence, I'll turn a page, blink a couple of times, turn back, and reread the last paragraph or so of the previous page, because I've somehow lost the thread of what was going on.

So, just so I know, what's a good starting place for Miles? I note that the Baen Free Library has "Mountains of Mourning" available; how's that?

I find audio books perfect for long trips.

[stormking.livejournal.com]

because they help mind from falling asleep during boring tree populated countryside.. otherwise.. I totally agree with you.

[uilos.livejournal.com]

Palwick's The Necessary Beggar and/or Chabon's Gentlemen of the Road. Both are pretty quick. Palwick is (of course) very good and Chabon is amusing.

[jazzfish]

Of course! I'd lost track of Necessary Beggar in the multiple piles of newer new stuff. That'll probably end up being It.

[desfido.livejournal.com]

Upon mention of Chabon, I must ask: have you read

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay

yet? It's quite good. Like the first Flashman book, it's in the category of "Books I bought at an airport bookstore that are actual damn good and I reread, instead of just taking up some time on plane once and then being forgotten".

Actually, I think I got both of those at the SFO airport bookstore, possibly even the same trip. Huh.

[desfido.livejournal.com]

I screwed up my HTML there, but it's still readable, so I'm not touching it. Stupid lack of "edit this comment" functionality. Or else, stupid lack of Jay's awareness of how to access "edit this comment" functionality.

[marcmagus]

Edit is a paid-user-only feature, IIRC. :(

[jazzfish]

Yeah, my aunt Susan gave me K&C for Xmas, um, ages and ages ago. I thought it was pretty good. Probably worth a reread at some point but I'm not quite feeling the pull to reread it now.

(Also, I suspect that only paid users can edit comments.)

[rbandrews]

Anathem is the best thing Stephenson's ever written. But don't go in expecting Snow Crash, or even Cryptonomicon, it's a really different book. Think something like a happier version of Canticle for Leibowitz.

I think you'll like it though. It goes by a lot faster than its mass would have you believe.

[jazzfish]

Hm, okay. I'll likely be picking it up either next or next-next, I think.

Stephenson tends to read quickly for me, so it's not so much that I'm worried about it taking awhile to get through. I'm more worried about it aggravating my existing back issues when I carry it places.

[rbandrews]

. . . Okay, yeah, not much help there. Maybe you could hire a team of oxen and a cart?