Reading: The Book Thread

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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by KungFooBob »

Rockburner wrote: Mon Dec 04, 2023 10:01 am
KungFooBob wrote: Sat Sep 02, 2023 6:06 pm Just seen this on Friendface.

As a massive Iain M Banks fan, I think I'm going to have to sign up.

I know there's a few fans on here...

https://www.orbit-books.co.uk/landing-p ... 3z6HT6by1A

Edit: Maybe not the limited edition at a guestimated £250!
I've got that on my wishlist.... if my (equally Banksian) brother doesn't buy it for me I'm cutting him off....
It's nice to have as an Iain M Bank completest, but you might find the content a little disappointing, it's very much a coffee table book.
Last edited by KungFooBob on Mon Dec 04, 2023 10:10 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Count Steer »

Just read 'On the road' again but my 'Oxfam books scout' has snagged all of the Mortal Engines (and the prequels). She says they're well written/plotted etc so it's a bingefest of YA fiction next for me. :D

(Then 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas' to get back in 'road trip' mode :thumbup: )
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by cheb »

John Drury Clark, Isaac Asimov - Ignition!_ An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants.

Recommended to me by a friend who's a rocket scientist. A lot of it goes straight past me but it's an interesting read, written in a dry style.

Before that was Written in Bone by Sue Black.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Rockburner »

Count Steer wrote: Mon Dec 04, 2023 10:09 am Just read 'On the road' again but my 'Oxfam books scout' has snagged all of the Mortal Engines (and the prequels). She says they're well written/plotted etc so it's a bingefest of YA fiction next for me. :D

(Then 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas' to get back in 'road trip' mode :thumbup: )
I've read some of them, they're not bad.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Slenver »

cheb wrote: Mon Dec 04, 2023 10:15 amA lot of it goes straight past me but it's an interesting read
Don't see why it should. It's hardly brain surgery.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Noggin »

Sunny wrote: Sun Dec 03, 2023 11:39 pm I'm a big sci-fi fan, but every so often I pick a 'classic' to read. I've just started Jane Eyre. Too soon to tell if it's one to regret.
I read pretty much everything the Bronte girls wrote when I was a kid - really really enjoyed them :)

When I visited my mum recently, she had a couple of the books on her shelf still - next time I go back (when I'm in a car!) I'm going to try and borrow them :D
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by cheb »

Slenver wrote: Mon Dec 04, 2023 12:12 pm
cheb wrote: Mon Dec 04, 2023 10:15 amA lot of it goes straight past me but it's an interesting read
Don't see why it should. It's hardly brain surgery.
He's always genuinely amused when he use the line 'It's not rocket science, and I should know.'
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by ChrisW »

Every time I see this thread pop up my brain thinks it's to do with a book about the place in Berkshire.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Le_Fromage_Grande »

Do NOT read "the Cotswolds Wrecking Crew" it's utter shite, I felt the need to leave a scathing review on Amazon, thankfully it was in Kindle Unlimited so I didn't pay for the crap.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Mr. Dazzle »

cheb wrote: Mon Dec 04, 2023 10:15 am John Drury Clark, Isaac Asimov - Ignition!_ An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants.

Recommended to me by a friend who's a rocket scientist. A lot of it goes straight past me but it's an interesting read, written in a dry style.

Before that was Written in Bone by Sue Black.
Bought my Dad that for Christmas a few years ago. I really must steal it.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Count Steer »

ChrisW wrote: Wed Dec 06, 2023 7:22 pm Every time I see this thread pop up my brain thinks it's to do with a book about the place in Berkshire.
It would be a very short book. :lol:
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Rockburner »

Count Steer wrote: Wed Dec 06, 2023 7:41 pm
ChrisW wrote: Wed Dec 06, 2023 7:22 pm Every time I see this thread pop up my brain thinks it's to do with a book about the place in Berkshire.
It would be a very short book. :lol:
Oh, I dunno.....

There's an awful amount of abuse that could be justifiably hurled that way.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Mr. Dazzle »

I can't read it any other way now either, so thanks :D

I'm the same with Manslaughter. What are all those blokes finding so amusing.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Count Steer »

It's not everyone's cuppa, and it was nominated for the 2022 Booker Prize but in this case, rightly so. It's a slim tome at 110 pages but it doesn't waste a word. A book of the year for The Times, Observer, New Statesman, FT etc etc and dedicated to the women and children who suffered in Ireland's mother and baby homes and Magdalen laundries....but don't let any of that put you off.

'Small Things Like These' by Claire Keegan is a little diamond. :thumbup:
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Slenver »

cheb wrote: Wed Dec 06, 2023 7:15 pm
Slenver wrote: Mon Dec 04, 2023 12:12 pm
cheb wrote: Mon Dec 04, 2023 10:15 amA lot of it goes straight past me but it's an interesting read
Don't see why it should. It's hardly brain surgery.
He's always genuinely amused when he use the line 'It's not rocket science, and I should know.'
I'd say it's probably worth whatever it took to get there to be able to do that.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Supermofo »

Currently reading, and loving, Garth Marenghi's TerrorTome. Got it for crimbo last year but only just got around to it. Helps that I like Matt Holness humour and watched Dark Place when it first came out years ago and also loved that. Actually been making me laugh out loud, it's ace. A perfect parody of 70s/80s horror.

Dare you crack open the TerrorTome? (Mind the spine)

When horror writer Nick Steen gets sucked into a cursed typewriter by the terrifying Type-Face, Dark Lord of the Prolix, the hellish visions inside his head are unleashed for real. Forced to fight his escaping imagination - now leaking out of his own brain - Nick must defend the town of Stalkford from his own fictional horrors, including avascular-necrosis-obsessed serial killer Nelson Strain and Nick's dreaded throppleganger, the Dark Third.

Can he and Roz, his frequently incorrect female editor, hunt down these incarnate denizens of Nick's rampaging imaginata before they destroy Stalkford, outer Stalkford and possibly slightly further?

From the twisted genius of horror master Garth Marenghi - Frighternerman, Darkscribe, Doomsage (plus Man-Shee) - come three dark tales from his long-lost multi-volume epic: TerrorTome.

Can a brain leak?
(Yes, it can)


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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Mr. Dazzle »

I think I've suffered a stroke just reading the precis, I shudder to think what the actual book would do to me.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Count Steer »

Started on 'The Every' by Dave Eggers. It's a follow up to 'The Circle' which was pretty much 'the future according to Google' and a pretty dystopian, not so very future it is too.

Now 'Circle' (ie a Google/Facebook/Twitter conglomerate) has absorbed 'an on-line retail and delivery company named after a jungle' :D and morphed into 'Every'.

In some ways it's funny but it's also chillingly believable. :(
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by gremlin »

Frederick Forsyth's 'The Shepherd', only because it's been made into a filum recently and was in the news, it has 'planes in it, plus it was only 99p.

Haven't started it yet.
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Re: Reading: The Book Thread

Post by Rockburner »

gremlin wrote: Tue Dec 12, 2023 10:49 am Frederick Forsyth's 'The Shepherd', only because it's been made into a filum recently and was in the news, it has 'planes in it, plus it was only 99p.

Haven't started it yet.
I read that when I was about 12, I seem to remember it was the first proper "grown-up" book that my father gave me*. I still remember it vividly and don't mind admitting I got a bit emosh when watching the short film.



* He flew Vampires in Suez....
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