So, What Are You Reading These Days? (besides comics)

[Alan M.]

Just bringing this discussion over to ning...

What books are you reading right now that don't have a narrative driven by images as well as words?

[Jeff of Earth-J]

I haven't been reading too much lately. The last serious book I read put me off reading for a while when I realized "It Really Can Happen Here." Years ago, whenever I was in the midst of a reading drought, I'd read a piece of "fluff," usually a Star Trek novel, to bring me out of it. but that doesn't work anymore. The last two or three Star Trek books I tried to read I didn't even finish. what I've been reading for the past 20 years or so to bring me out of a reading drought have been books by comedians. I can't even tell you how many I have read, but it's a lot. Sometimes, if I liked reading the book, I'd buy the audio version of it as well. (Of course, they always read their own books.) Which leads me up to the piece of "fluff" I just finished.

YOU'LL NEVER BELIEVE WHAT HAPPENED TO LACEY by Amber Ruffin and Lacy Lamar: Amber Ruffin is a writer for Seth Meyers, and she recently launched her own show on the NBC streaming service, Peacock. Lacy Lamar is her sister. The subtitle is "Crazy Stories About Racism" and they are just that. Most of the text is written by Amber, but there's a certain amount of back-and-forth with each of the sisters' parts being printed in different fonts. The dust jacket describes these stories as "entertainingly horrifying"; I agree, but you'll have to decide for yourself which parts are entertaining and which are horrifying. There are many things I find funny, but I rarely ever laugh out loud. I did so three times while reading this book, once until tears came to my eyes. I would recommend this to anyone who thinks he might want to read a lighthearted treatment of a serious subject; don't expect the feelgood story of the year, though. I may have to buy this one on disc as well. 

[JD DeLuzio]

After finishing a Canadian literary work that was well-written, but not that interesting, and an SF book by a noted author whom I sometimes like, and decided it was not one of his better efforts, I cracked open Trina Robbins' Last Girl Standing. Two chapters in, and I've found a fascinating glimpse of a life, 50s/60s SF fandom, a woman in comics and Bohemia, and more.

[JD DeLuzio]

The book does not consistently hold up to its opening chapters, but I am impressed at how much ground she has covered in her life.

JD DeLuzio said:

 Two chapters in, and I've found a fascinating glimpse of a life, 50s/60s SF fandom, a woman in comics and Bohemia, and more.

[anthony wareing]

Jack Reacher #8 the Enemy, reading them in order although this one is actually set 6 months before #1. 

[Jeff of Earth-J]

THE PRISONER by Thomas M. Disch: I just finished reading this novel based on the cult classic TV show for the third time. My main takeaway is that I don't want to ever read it for a fourth time. Very frustrating. 

[Rob Staeger (Grodd Mod)]

I just read Later, the new book by Stephen King for Hard Case Crime. I liked it a lot. I tend to like King best at his least ambitious -- just telling a story in an efficient way, get in and get out. This one's about a young boy who sees dead people, and can talk to them... and they can't lie to him. And how, eventually, a detective who knows his secret takes advantage of his powers. It's pretty casual for a while, laying the groundwork for a couple big events, and takes the kid from when he's around 6 to when he's 14 or so (and told from his vantage point of 22... later, as the title says).

[Jeff of Earth-J]

Oh, I just read a review of that book yesterday. Sounds good.

The best Stephen King reading experience I ever had was back in the '90s when The Green Mile was being published serially. There were 8 or 10 people in my office reading and discussing it as it was coming out, just as the author intended. 

[Travis Herrick (Modular Mod)]

From a Certain Point of View: The Empire Strikes Back, the title is quite a mouthful, but this is a short story collection that is just what the title says. For instance you have an Imperial who is part of the team that analyzes probe droid data, or a cook in the mess hall of the Rebellion.

While the main characters do make appearances, they are not the stars of these stories.

This is a fun collection. I've enjoyed pretty much all of the stories I have read so far.

[JD DeLuzio]

A History of What Comes Next by Sylvain Neuvel, an alternate or "hidden" history SF about stranded aliens who live among us. One is trying to direct human development and get us to the stars. The other has more problematic motives. Neither, after centuries of a kind of reproduction, have all of the information they started with.

It's an interesting, fast read, a fair bit of fun, and it incorporates a lot of real history.

[Doctor Hmmm?]

She by H. Rider Haggard.

My Non-Comics Reading Project for 2021 is kind of loosely defined as "Classics I Always Wanted to Read Sometime."  I started the year by working my way through all of Sherlock Holmes (previous reads had always stopped at the Reichenbach Falls), and I then moved on to King Solomon's Mines.  I'm not sure where I'll go next, but I'm grooving on late 19th/early 20th century detective/mystery/adventure fiction right now, so I may stay in that zone for a while. (Come October, Varney the Vampyre is waiting for me.)

[Jeff of Earth-J]

I never did make it all the way through sherlock Holmes (I blush to admit), but I have the entire series in BOMC editions. 

I bought a copy of King Solomon's Mines a couple of years ago in conjunction with a League of Extraordinary Gentlemen reading project, but after Dracula, The Invisible Man and Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde my purpose cooled and my interest petered out. 

I've never read Varney the Vampyre. Maybe I'll pick up a copy and join you in October. 

I have a list of 16 series (some of which I actually have finished) to either read or re-read.

[Doctor Hmmm?]

My (2-volume) copy of Varney reprints the original penny-dreadful publication, and is in print so small that I may have to get a magnifying glass (or --shudder -- reading glasses)!

If I tried to make such a list -- even limited just to books I already actually own -- my ambition would have to have a word with my mortality.