Book 7 of " Dungeon crawler Carl " series by Matt Dinniman.

Accidentally read book #4 first and am now going back to read the first one.

I enjoyed White Noise so much I decided to read another.

Enshittification by Cory doctorow

Been enjoying most of these stories. A few fall flat though.

Sci Fi book week for me

Passport to Magonia by Jaques Vallée, crazy alien junk.

"The wager I actually really enjoyed it, currently in South America, but sadly I don't have time to go visit it

Adrian Tchaikovsky - Pretenders to the Throne of God

The fifth installment in the "Tyrant Philosophers" series, the fantasy series takes inspiration from the european independence movements of the 1840s. It is based in a world where magic isn't just real, but where hundreds of different magic systems all come together and clash, as each different culture has several ways that things are done. From helliers calling demons through contracts to work the industrial mills, to the leftovers from thousand-year-dead necromantic empires that locked themselves away in their tombs, to a city that has actually figured out utopia, and can work any miracle (but the city has a hard population cap) to minor gods who actively manifest and can do miracles, to the keepers of a mysterious forest that seems to allow people to move between realities... For a price.

Between them all (or, rather, surrounding them), we have the Palleseen: a new imperial power swiftly taking over the world. Strictly "rational", abhorring all gods, woowoo, and mumbo-jumbo, the Palleseen are all-business, exporting their "perfection" (in the form of absolute bureaucracy) to the rest of the world by diplomacy, and, failing that, the underside of an iron-shod army-regulation boot. From a Pal-occupied city turning into a powderkeg of rebellion, to the front lines of one of the Palleseen's ever-present wars, to a country facing the Pal's more diplomatic face, to a city under siege, we see this world the Pals seek to "perfect" through the eyes of the weirdos, the outcasts, and those whose livelihoods rely on the messy inefficiencies of human life (those whom the Palleseen philosophically reject, and yet rely on as integral parts of civilisation) we explore the perspectives, flaws and beautiful rube-goldberg collision of these weirdos, both those fighting against and as part of the Palleseen engine.

This series examines the inescapable fallacy of a system which claims to be perfect, and how systems that work require the flexibility afforded by diversity of thought. Through every crack we glimpse as the imperialist war machine plods implacably forward, we glimpse the inevitable fall of such a machine, and have to ask "at what point is there hope in standing against an unbeatable foe? Should you stand against it anyway?"

Just started the bread book

Three Body Problem

Hard to be a God

Futuristic earth scientists are secretly studying life on a medieval planet, disguised as local nobility. One of these scientists struggles to remain aloof while the king and his minister enact a progrom against those intellectuals who history would otherwise remember as the geniuses of their era.

When a coup against the government brings even more violence and brutality, this scientist is pushed to his limit.

This novel also spawned two pretty good film adaptations.

Physical book: I'm re-reading House of Leaves

Audio book: I'm listening to the latest Wandering Inn book

As per suggestions from here!

The Dungeon Crawler Carl series by Matt Dinniman. I'm half way through book 7 and excited for book 8 to come out in a few months.

For myself

With the kiddo

And theory

Roadside Picnic tells a story about an alien visit to earth, however they all already left and only some of their stuff remained in incredibly dangerous Zones. At the beginning of the book we follow Red, a Stalker, they wander into the Zone and try to escape with their lives, if they are lucky they will bring some alien artifacts and sell them to the highest bidder.

The book is much more firm that the Zone was created by aliens, and brings you to question that, if there where aliens, would they try and talk to us or even see us as intelligent?

The story was heavily adapted for the games (called S.T.A.L.K.E.R.), but I also enjoy them very much.

Trying to get into Dupont Dynasty, I need to spend more time reading.

Background pony

The Dispossessed by Ursula Le Guin

Off to a great start! It feels a lot faster paced than the first book

I finally started reading it. Saw a review that said "just read it. The less you know the better" so I got it. Haven't read it.

Went to dinner at cousins place who also heard good things, got the book, and hasn't read it. So I'm reading it for the both of us I guess

i've been a little disappointed in this third book in the trilogy. it's extremely horny for some reason

It's an older anthology but it checks out, sir.

Terry Pratchett Men at Arms

The brand new translation of LOTR.

Why yes I am crashing out over the blasé, abject cruelty of normal average humans. How could you tell?

Akumetsu. Batman, if he wanted to destroy the institutional corruption of Gotham.

I'm reading Labor's Untold Story. It's about the rise of unions. The latest chapter ended with a capitalist killing themselves, so pretty damn good so far.

Nation by Terry Pratchett

I just finished The Lamb Will Slaughter The Lion, a queer anarchist horror novella about a trans travelpunk hunting a demon with a group of anarchists whose commune is about to go to shit. It's a pretty fun read, I am looking forward to reading the rest of the trilogy.

None😅

(I really should read more though)

Kimi no Hanashi by Miaki Sugar One of my favorite Novels author

Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon. I am halfway and understood nothing. 5/5, would recommend.

I don't really read much, this is my first book since a couple years since I wanted something to do while on a plane. I really like it though, the court intrigue and attempts to consolidate power are interesting if you can keep up with all the different characters, and there are many. The author also uses quite a lot of not-so-common words, so as a non-native speaker you'll have to infer a bit from context but I didn't find it too bad.

The Communist Manifesto

Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia

My second attempt.

The House of Blades by Will Wight. His writing style is so fast-paced and the action scenes are a lot like Mistborn's. Wight also happens to work with the same enthusiasm as Sanderson and has about 26 books written since 2011. All of his books also happen to take place across parallel realities called "Iterations" with different magic systems all using similar underlying principles. I'm still early on in his bibliography but I've been enjoying it a lot so far.

Children of Dune

https://files.libcom.org/files/2024-10/no-spiritual-surrender_guts%20(1).pdf

Rule 34

I’m enjoying it. First book I’ve read by this author, but he also wrote True Grit. It’s about a guy who founds a group like the Masons, devoted to the ostensible lost wisdom of Atlantis.

I just read A World Appears by Michael Pollan on a flight today. Honestly I was a bit disappointed, it was a pleasant read but I dont think there was a single novel bit where I thought "oh I didn't know that or haven't thought about that". I'm probably not the target audience (or rather, 14 year old me might have been but 41 year old me is yawning) but if you haven't thought much about what consciousness is all about I'd still recommend it.

This is abuse of authority and police brutality 😭

~~more please~~

It's interesting, but on the subjects of Grant and Sherman in particular the text goes out of its way to paint them as anti-Reconstruction or Reconstruction-skeptical, even when the immediately preceding or succeeding sentence in the original text directly contradicts it.

Sherman's opinions changed with time, and radically so. Not that Sherman in particular isn't chalk-full of horrific opinions even at the latest possible point, mind, only that it's not entirely fair to paint him, as one popular history put him, as the original "unreconstructed rebel" when his entire trajectory was increasingly pro-African-American even through a period when white Americans as a whole began to lose their stomach for the fight for equality.

But Grant in particular is a sore point for me, since Grant went far out of his way to support racial equality, even though his strong support for civil rights literally split 'his' party in two. He may not have been the most radical Republican, but he also was far from lukewarm on equal civil rights or a simple opportunist.

Nevertheless, it certainly cites a wide variety of primary sources and makes otherwise compelling arguments. The only downside of a book is that picking the author's mind on specific points is much harder. :p

Pretty interesting and involved delve into the 1920s pandemic (often called the Spanish Flu in America) and the history behind what made it (and society) different from previous epidemics.

I'm usually enjoying Sanderson's long novels more, but his short form fiction is also pretty damn good.

The bloodsworn saga by John gwyne.

It was pretty good. Ended abruptly I thought. considering what the writer went through was a satisfying conclusion if rushed.

Melmoth the Wanderer

It's slow going for me though

Just finished 580 pages of steamship and railway business dickering.

Now on to something where the vampires are less metaphoric.

I'm most of the way through contact harvest,