Legion World Forums LEGION COMPANION The Anywhere Machine So what are you READING?

Just back from 10 days in the trailer. As we crossed the border into the States I realised I hadn't packed a book. On our first re-supply stop options were limited, so I picked up "Game of Thrones". Only got a few chapters in, but it's been pretty good so far. It's certainly written in a very cinematic style, so I can see how it would easily be adapted to the HBO series (which I haven't seen). Hopefully I'll have more time to get to it over the summer.

I'm about 300 pages deep into Under the Dome (an inclination caused by a combination of a recent urge to read some King prose and your random recommendation) as we speak. A very suspenseful, engaging King work, thus far, highlighting his gift for creating a large cast of memorable characters. Thus far, trying to figure out what exactly is causing the Dome phenomenon is a real stumper, though secondary to watching various dominoes fall as they inevitably will.

My wife has all the Stephen King books and collections (except for the Dark Tower books which hold no interest for her). Prior to Dome, the only four King books I'd read were The Stand, The Shining, Salem's Lot and It. I enjoyed all four a great deal, so I'm not sure why I haven't partaken of a lot more with most of them so readily available.

More reports as they develop! I hope to read 11/22/63 soon after...if my mother-in-law ever finishes borrowing it.

Glad to hear you're reading it! The way King is able to introduce, develop and then just totally realize the characters is beyond fascinating, and he really does that well in Dome.

I don't want to spoil anything, but there is one recurring interaction between two characters that I found incredibly moving and by the end of the book I literally teared up. When you finish, I'll tell you who!

Meanwhile, I haven't hated a character like Jim Rennie in a longtime...and it's because he's such a realistic bastard. (As opposed to, say, Flagg or the Clown in It).

My favorite King books have now settled on Salem's Lot and Dolores Claiborne. The latter was so good that I can't really describe why. I've read about half of King's books, including a lot of the famous ones.

My fave is still It, followed by the first 7/8ths of the Stand (the ending left me feeling blah...)

The girl who Loved Tom Gordon is a great story, and not at all what I expected from a King book...but yet, everything that I love about him as a writer. Really surprised that it hasn't been turned into a movie.

11/22/63 is next on my list to read when I get a chance.

I think of the 4 I've read, it's a toss-up between Salem's Lot and The Shining for my faves. I love the other two as well, but these really benefit from their relative brevity, methinks. I mean, I love the immersive experience of the other two, but I generally find these shorter ones scarier and more taut.

"Realative" is a good word there, as I think the Shining could still stand to be about 20% shorter than it was. Yes it has a slowly building sense of dread and gives us an exhaustive look at Jack's personality so we have a good perspective when we see him go unhinged, but I think you could still have pared it down a bit and still been just as effective.

Dave, I wouldn't change a thing about my experience reading The Shining. Maybe I'll feel differently if/when I reread it, but I found it deliciously creepy and suspenseful. To me, there were enough creepy things happening along the way to keep me turning the pages. And the slow build really worked for me.

It's soooooooo different from the Kubrick film!

I finally finished Under the Dome last night. Definitely a page-turner, even at 1,074 pages. If there's anything I can criticize, it's that the good guys are very, very good, and the bad guys are very, very bad. Also, in a way, the big cataclysm (that is admittedly foreshadowed aplenty) kinda robs us of some confrontations that I personally would have liked to have seen play out.

This book reminds me of Salem's Lot in that we have an entire town engulfed by a threat, and in the process we get to know many, many townspeople and see how their stories play out. Many characters have their own small or large arcs that play out.

Overall, it's a really cool concept hat King executes really well, imo. I don't think I'd put it up there with the best of what I've read of his works, but I really enjoyed reading it.

I could see, actually, the concept and characters working really well in a multi-season TV series. A lot of things happen in a really short period of time, but I could see them happening over a longer term with possibly a different ending. Apparently, though, Showtime is looking into making a mini-series out of it.

Yeah, I think I know who you mean: <span class="spoiler_containter"><span class="spoiler_wording">Click Here For A Spoiler</span><span class="spoiler_text">Ollie and the soldier, right? I enjoyed that, too, though I didn't tear up.</span></span>

Meanwhile, I haven't hated a character like Jim Rennie in a longtime...and it's because he's such a realistic bastard. (As opposed to, say, Flagg or the Clown in It).

<span class="spoiler_containter"><span class="spoiler_wording">Click Here For A Spoiler</span><span class="spoiler_text">Bastard got off easy, I'd say!</span></span>

I would have enjoyed an epilogue or two, actually. Who knows? Maybe... <span class="spoiler_containter"><span class="spoiler_wording">Click Here For A Spoiler</span><span class="spoiler_text">Ollie might be the lead in a future novel?</span></span>

Dev, my wife obtained that one from her mom (she'd only gotten three chapters in!), so it's next on my list. I may start that one as early as next week.

That one's intrigued me somewhat ever since I read an article about it and realized Tom Gordon was a then-current MLB pitcher when the book came out. Is there anything supernatural about the book? (There doesn't have to be to determine whether or not I'll read it, but I'm curious.)

I do not want to give too much away, but it might be the most straightforward novel he has written that I have read.

I used to really like King.
Now I do still enjoy his books, but his charm wore off for me when he started trying to shoehorn everything he wrote into the Dark Tower. Compounding that issue is the problems I have with his endings. Quite often he seems to just pull them out of his ass.
His short stories and novellas are another story (excuse the pun), most of those are great and very twilight zonish in how they end.

Yeah, those two characters are who I meant. One of King's major strengths is making you truly care about a character, showing a relationship start, build and grow, and then using that relationship to make you FEEL something. That happened here for me in a big way!

Agree about Rennie! Thibidieu too!

<span class="spoiler_containter"><span class="spoiler_wording">Click Here For A Spoiler</span><span class="spoiler_text">King is always very realistic about villains getting a comeuppance though. It's not something I mind, actually, because there an honesty to it.

In fact, I agree a little with Deddy about King's endings. I've talked about this with my brother a lot over the years as he's also a fan. But we think its just a matter of how King views the world. He really sees true horror in realistic situations...and he sees those situations resolving in "kind of" realistic ways, even when they contain elements of the supernatural. It's an odd perspective, and hard to put into words, but I think that's the basis for it.</span></span>

Agree that I enjoyed it immensely but its not among his greatest novels. I do think its his best one since Green Mile though that I've read (so within the last 10 years or so).

The Salem's Lot similarity is one I also noticed. King does a great job with a big cast where everyone is intersecting. The Stand also being a prime example, though it doesn't have that small town quality that Dome & Lot have.

From what I understand, either HBO or Showtime are doing it as an ongoing series. It'll be in their usual 12 episode format (which how all the best shows on TV are done anyway). Brian K. Vaughn is actually the lead writer on this! So you can expect some quality there.

I love his short stories too, Deddy. "Children of the Corn" is great--much better than all those movies that followed!

Freddy and Fredericka by Mark Helprin

This is a satirical novel about royalty, based on Charles and Diana. It's totally insane, but from what I've read of the royal family, the characterizations might actually be pretty close to fact.

Freddy is heir to the throne, he's an eccentric intellectual, but with a love for hard physical challenges. Unfortunately, he hasn't yet proven himself worthy of the throne, according to an ancient test involving falconry.

Fredericka is his beautiful wife. People adore her, although she's a bubblehead who cares only for fashion. She does have a photographic memory, though, and surprises Freddy at times with bits of arcane knowledge.

The prince and princess, because their behaviour has created a scandal in the press, are required to earn their right to the throne by achieving a quest. They will be parachuted into New Jersey, with no money and minimal clothing, and required to reconquer the American colony.

The book follows their misadventures for the year that they are in the States, meeting people equally strange. In the end, it's quite sympathetic to the two, as their true characters emerge amid the challenges. But the story never stops being insane.

Mark Helprin wrote the beautfully lyrical Winter's Tale (reviewed somewhere up-thread). This is quite a different story, but equally compelling.

Let's see, I have recently read:

Dangerous Marine Animals by Bruce Halstead

This was a fun read. I learned a lot about what animals to avoid. One doesn't encounter too many of these animals in Kentucky, but ya never know...


The Book of Scientific Anecdotes by Adrian Berry

This was a pretty fun read, if only to discover what a huge jerk Isaac Newton apparently was.


The Hobbit by duh. If you don't know I am not gonna tell you! Still a fun read.


A Tale Dark and Grimm by Adam Gidwitz

This was a book my 6th grader read for school. He loved it...and so did I! Adam Gidwitz takes the Brothers Grimm and makes them even more bloody, if that's possible. The author has many humorous "Here's what's coming up next - maybe you should send the little kids off to bed!" interjections, along with a wonderful story and some wisdom thrown in. I would highly recommend this book to children of all ages!

Well, maybe not children who are too young. It is a little gruesome in some places, but thats the Brothers Grimm for ya...

Gonna try to read Spellbound by Larry Correia this weekend.

Since my last update I've read quite a few books...

I was reading the first Gears of War novel, since then I've completed the series (all five books). Great little series though I can't recommend them to anyone who hasn't played the games.

While on my videogame novel binge I also read "Bioshock: Rapture". A really interesting novel that ponders "what if" someone put Ayn Rand's philosophy into practice.

I also read the next two Wizard of Oz books.
The first 4 stories in "The Complete HP Lovecraft" (I'd give a review but it is to horrible to describe ) are also finished.

I also wasted some time reading a few books on SEO (search engine optimization) but they didn't offer any new information to me

And currently I have FINALLY gotten around to reading Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn novels.
I've finished the first and am 10% into the second. I'm really enjoying these books and Sanderson's magic system is both very unique and clearly defined.

I haven't posted in awhile, but wanted to mention my current obsession: Cherie Priest's Clockwork Century series.

Roughly, it's alt-history steampunk with zombies. It takes place in a world in which the American Civil War has raged on for 20 years, dirigibles are a major part of the transportation infrastructure, and an accident with a mining machine has caused a strange gas to flood the city of Seattle, turning it's inhabitants into the living dead and requiring
that the city be walled off to prevent its spread.

The first book, Boneshaker, concerns the teenage Zeke Wilkes who makes his way into the walled city of Seattle to find answers about his father (who invented the mining machine), and his mother, Briar Wilkes, who follows him into the city to retrieve him. Apparently it's soon to be made into a motion picture, which should be pretty awesome.

The second book, Clementine, is about an ex-slave and air pirate who is attempting to retrieve his ship that has been stolen from him. When it turns out that the stolen vesssel is carrying parts for a Union super-weapon, the captain ends up in an unlikely partnership with a past-her-prime Confederate spy.

The third book, Dreadnaught, is about a Confederate nurse trying to make her way cross country from Richmond to Seattle to see her estranged father before he dies. Traveling by dirigible, Mississippi River Boat, and Union War Train, she gets caught up in the front lines of the ongoing confrontation between North and South. Plus there's a Ranger from the Independent Republic of Texas and a couple of Mexican officials who are travelling to Utah to investigate the disappearance of a Mexican militia unit who have gone missing on a humanitarian trip Both of the border, with strange rumors that they've gone crazy and started engaging in cannibalism. The epic battle between Union and Confederate trains attempting to race each oher throigh the Provo Pass and its aftermath is not to be missed.

I've just begun the fourth book, Ganymede, which opens in a New Orleans brothel and apparently focuses on a dangerous submarine, and it promises to be another groovy addition to the series.

Highly recommended for fans of exciting adventure and action stories, strong characters (especially females), groovy steampunk technology, and zombies!

^ THOSE. BOOKS. SOUND. AMAZING!

What a crazy mish-mash of concepts but it sounds like it all really works. I love writers who are able to create a fully-fleshed, real-seeming universe for their characters to inhabit and this one sounds like she's been able to do it.

Never heard of the author or the books before but I'll definitely keep my eye out for them now.

Yeah, they're pretty nice on the world-building front, with each one pretty much a self-contained story but with the whole ongoing zombie-spread plot in the background tying them together. There's lots of nice references to real world figures in the background, which is cool for 19th Century American History buffs.

I'm a little annoyed at a fairly major continuity gaffe towards the beginning of Ganymede, where two characters are presented as meeting for the first time, when they clearly met in the last book, but, other than that, I've been really satisfied with them. The next book in the series, The Inexplicables, is coming out by the end of the year, and I'm really looking forward to it!

I'm reading the Brideshead Revisited. I wonder about the title.

Its a good read, very well written, easy, but, I wonder about the whole theme of unrequited love ... impossible love ... stuck in circumstances beyond your control. It dosn't seem like an adult would have a hard time in the situations that the main characters are in. Just tell people to frack off ... or don't ... but don't agonize and ruin your life over it. ya know.

Its a lot of himming and hawing ... and I'm not sure where or what the real plot is.

Julian May's Galactic Milieu.

It's part of a series that started with a human society that had become operant, with several mental abilities and having joined the bigger galaxy. Some do not fit well into that galaxy and take an "out" to go six million years into the past where instead of saber tooth and caveman society, they find Earth has been inhabited by operant aliens. May wrote three books on this then wrote

Intervention: which back in the present tells how humans came to be operant. This was followed by

Galatic Millieu, the three volume story of how we became a part of the bigger universe. It basically gives the backstory to the story already told.

Jack-the-Bodyless: I trudged honestly through the previous volumes but this one is a Masterpiece. In previous issues Julian May shows considerable knowledge of society building, biology, cosmos, physics, mystery, and weaving a non-linear story with clarity. She's an extremely smart individual but in this volume she finally was able to make me start to care about the characters, particularly Jack. May had written interesting characters but I didn't have an interest in the relationships until this volume.

Finished the next book in Galactic Milieu: Diamond Mask.

It was as good as Jack the Bodyless.

The next book is about Jack's and "Diamond Mask's" life together fighting the big bad.

Julian May would have been a great Legion writer. Very strong in science and philosophy, great at coherently weaving several story threads and her dozens of characters have distinct voices.

I echo Blacula's thoughts! These sound amazing! I'm really curious now!