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Author Topic: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread  (Read 10950 times)

Cthulhu

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #60 on: January 31, 2021, 02:08:07 am »

The idea of elite sex and murder cults goes waaaay back, the first known blood libel is from the 10th century and of course a reference to a rumor means the rumor already existed.  I wonder if there have been similar legends outside Europe.  Probably, but I don't know anything about them.  Anyway, SRA is scary as hell, not for the satanic cults part but for, like I mentioned, the fact that therapists were able to implant false memories and use them to ruin innocent people's lives.  The applications for political shenanigans and counterintelligence are pretty obvious, and thanks to the Church Committee we know the intelligence community was interested in such capabilities.  That's scary, and the alternative (you know, that the kids' memories were real) is way worse.

Starting to lose interest in the book though.  He gets extremely lost in the weeds with his satanic cult shit.  There are still some interesting hints, things he brings up while missing the more plausible implications.  David McGowan is a full-spectrum conspiracy nutbar, he has theories on basically everything and in his need to know everything he misses the fun of conspiracy shit, where you just pick through the little hints and scraps of information and let the holes in the story gape with all their horrible implications.
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Jimmy

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #61 on: January 31, 2021, 03:09:39 am »

I know that type of author. For awhile, I was really into post-apocalyptic and survival fiction. I read a lot of the classics of the genre, and in my search for more, eventually started going down the rabbit-hole of far right American prepper fiction. Y'know, the kind of story where war breaks out conveniently slowly enough to allow time for our characters to escape to their LMOE cache, load up their guns, and rid the world of evil by shooting the hell out of it when it trespasses on their land.

I think literally half the wordcount in the novels I read were descriptions of survival gear brands, with most of that being firearms. It's basically just the author's self-insert wet dream fantasy.
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delphonso

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #62 on: January 31, 2021, 06:43:11 am »

His fixation on satanic cults leads him to miss the much more obvious angles there. 

This is my reaction to QAnon shit - like you guys are very close to understanding the real issue (namely, a wealthy class play by entirely different rules than everyone else) but have taken child-sacrifice as a given and then lose the plot.

Anyway, here's a progress report, I guess.


Goal - read 12 books at least this year.

3 fiction books, since I will certainly do that by the end of February.   0/3
- The Shadow over Innsmouth
3 non-fiction histories, biographies or the like. 1/3
- Bandersnatch
3 non-fiction academics.
2 books in not English (above kids book level, I guess. Maybe depends on the language.)
1 thing I wrote and actually consider finished.

Anything above the number in those categories won't count toward the 12, but I might keep track anyway.

Finished Bandersnatch by Diana Gyler. This book is great. I grew up reading C.S. Lewis and J.R.R.Tolkien and it was great to get some insight into their relationship and writing method. The book ultimately concludes with the argument that the "lone genius" concept of invention is faulty, while still making room for - in Gyler's words - the relationship between 'author' and 'authority'. It's a cool book and very inspiring as a hobbyist author; not to mention the book pointed out some glaring faults in my own attempts to make a community project.

Currently reading:
Waiting for Godot - Beckett
Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary - Tolkien

Frumple

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #63 on: January 31, 2021, 07:37:22 pm »

Kernstalion! 117k. Probably the most solid writing of what I've posted so far, I think? VR isekai setting, the kind where it's actually a ~portal to another world~, with a handful of interesting things going on I haven't seen very often in the isekai genre (which I guess are spoliers so I'll not directly mention 'em). Pretty nice romp so far and definitely starting to hit a good stride, RSS'd with disappointment 'cause I ran out of it to read :P

E: Heaven of the Dream Fantasy! 159k. Fluffy VRMMORPG thing, where mostly clueless balance breaker rolls around breaking things and attempting to woo the governing AI in what amounts to an early release VR game. Even with significant characters being breast obsessed and similar nonsense it's a fairly pleasing read, almost a palate cleanser of a bit of fiction. RSS' cheerfully.

E2: Legendary Farmer! Meager 56k, but pretty nice so far. Slice of life... ish? So far. Dude wanting the slow life out in the boonies, recovering from a ~mysterious past~ with buddy cops giant goat, giant spider, and smolbat. Other stuff happens and smolgoats and goblin and stabbyteen and ostrich shows up and now there's just waiting to see if more updates happen.

E3: Oasis Core! Slightly less meager 70k. Baby desert oasis dungeon core vs mad god, both infected by universe destroying/reincarnating superbeing, in a race to reverse or finish an apocalypse. Biomancy dungeon defense to save a broken world! It's neat. Easily RSS'd.

E4: What litrpg there is only needlework! 58k tiny like MC. Shortstack probably-spectrum sewing obsessive meets system apocalypse! Has no shits to give about system nonsense, just wants to thread. Readble enough but also not much has really, like... happened. So far. Anyway, RSS'd easily enough.

E5: Nah, this is Exp Stealer now! Somewhat less speedbumpy 92k. Title also too bloody long so Iz shortened it. Anyway, post isekai isekai thing, cheat hero with ~cursed power~ (sometime during writing this edit I realized their cursed power is... basically Rogue's, from X-men, except always permanent and systemified) defeats the demon king and their hordes and goes home, losing most of his powers in the process!

... to find out thousands of other people have also been isekai'd while he was away, with magic kidnappings continuing to happen, leading to the tentative start to a multi-dimensional empire/trade network basically powered by summoned heroes and a bunch of other stuff. Anyway, since most of these superpowered critters are teenagers with varying degrees of PTSD (the MC's gives him superpowers! Also it's extra bad 'cause he basically won a mostly one-man war of genocide in order to get home and has an explicit seven or eight digit sophont body count before he turns 18.), the world governments mostly made an international hero school, so that's where MC ends up, recovering powers, running rescue missions, and so on. The school part is pretty low key so far, basically functioning as a barely there networking thing and excuse to have superpower granting VR machines.

... anyway, it does some decently interesting stuff, the MC isn't too bad for someone with genuinely serious issues and barely any time to decompress after waging impressively brutal war for months on end, so on, so forth. Worst bits are probably some grammar hiccups and general lack of physical challenge for MC McOPFace, but overall it's pretty alright and I don't mind the RSS.

E6: Returning to no applause, only more of the same! A light 86k. This one... is actually pretty legitimately well written, I think. Technically isekai litrpg, more character stuff and issues with reintegrating an end-boss with mondo PTSD into society.

Dude gets hero-napped with some other kids (they eventually don't make it, ahaha), time-dilations through a century+ of trauma related to that, ultimately manages to make it back home ten years objective, 130 years subjective later.

Then stuff happens, and unlike very very many isekai MC, he's actually remarkably cooperative and the powers that be only somewhat idiot ball dealing with the two-legged WMD, so! Things go pretty smoothly, guy picks up a hobby, eventually reunited with family-wot-hadn't-been-eaten-by-magic-alligators, starts reintegrating with society... it's just steadily about-as-noce-as-can-be when dealing with someone that's spent the last three decades murdering people en masse literally non-stop. Guy's just happy to be back home and no longer dealing with entire nations failing to kill him.

Anyway, RSS'd quite cheerfully. The litrpg aspect isn't enough for me to exactly be looking forward to it, but it'll be refreshing to reread through at some point!

E7: Project You Have Died. 194k. This one is... honestly kinda' poo. Probably the worst thing I've read this year. Isekai nonsense with OP vampire elf MC and various junk themes ("hung like an elephant", prominent male gaze writing -- no, being told the cup size of half the female cast doesn't actually improve things -- casual slavery, etc.), some of the systems were kinda' okay and the thing regularly skirted having almost interesting ideas, but overall it's just kinda'... puerile, and not in a vaguely good way. Didn't RSS, wouldn't recommend.

Not-an-edit8:The Wielder of Chains! 275k, apparently, and claims to be completed. Felt shorter, though, and it's very definitely a "book 1" sort of story. Fairly neat setting, post system apocalypse sort of deal, pokemon as an inventory system, yadda yadda yadda. Biggest downside's probably the writing itself being occasionally shoddy, editing errors and such, and it's not that bad. Overall alright, in any case, and RSS'd in case a book 2 ever shows up.

E9: Doom Guy Isekai! 70 something k. Doom's MC gets isekai'd into ~generic system fantasy~... 's Hell. Proceeds to enact mindless, increasingly morally questionable mostly genocide on whatever local hellspawn they can get their hands on. It's okay for what it is (mindless doom-roadkills-demons silliness)! Probably given up on so far as writing goes? Eh. Was occasionally amusing, mostly just an even-more-idle-than-usual idle romp of a read. RSS'd just in case.
« Last Edit: February 18, 2021, 09:03:34 pm by Frumple »
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Vector

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #64 on: February 20, 2021, 05:58:49 pm »

Read some more books:

We Want to Do More Than Survive: Abolitionist Teaching and the Pursuit of Educational Freedom - Bettina Love
Empire of Wild - Cherie Dimaline
Permutation City - Greg Egan

Spoiler: Goal (click to show/hide)

Progress:

Spoiler: All About Prison, 2/4 (click to show/hide)

Spoiler: Other books, 3/0 (click to show/hide)

The book by Cherie Dimaline was especially interesting. It was in the category of genre fiction written by Indigenous authors: in this case, a detective novel. I was disappointed by the climax and then surprised since the ending turned out to be much, much sadder than I had expected. The author certainly seemed new to novel-writing, but I enjoyed her style and humor; I have another one a bit like it out of the library and will try to read it sooner than later.
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"The question of the usefulness of poetry arises only in periods of its decline, while in periods of its flowering, no one doubts its total uselessness." - Boris Pasternak

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Frumple

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #65 on: February 21, 2021, 08:24:47 pm »

... thank you for posting before I hit the character limit. I was starting to worry :P

Anyway~ Junk Emporium! 150k. My Hero Academia crossed with one of those... I forget what they're called, CYOA writing prompt things? Anyway, it supposedly uses basically an encounter table for powers the MC collects as the story goes along, with the writey person rolling with it, from what I understand. In this particular case with a focus on buildy stuff. There's at least one more fairly lengthy celestial forge thing I'm aware of, just set in Worm instead of MHA. Any case, it's... okay? It's okay. Decent romp, no major stylistic issues I can recall, read pretty smooth. Just now hitting the point really major things are starting to happen, though, so... yeah. Not RSS'd ('cause if you can do that on SV I'unno how), but watched with some cheerfulness, heh.

Also sometime in the next month or so, I'm (probably) going to be getting my hands on the cyber samurai TMNT mini-series, so... sorta' looking forward to reading that. Gonna' see Raph punch Hitler!

E: Dragonspawn! 280k. Dude gets blown up by a mine, reincarnates into my hero academia land as baby dragon shapeshifter chick. Lives life! Experiences significant trauma and loses the shapeshifter for just-be-a-dragon-all-the-time! Does hero in training-y stuff, has ~family drama~, grows as a person dragon. It's pretty nice. Watched with cheer!

E2: Scientia Weaponizes the Future! Nibbly 74k. Adult lawyer gets isekai mind-melded into Wormverse Taylor, with super knowledge powers. Does things! Solves the P = NP thing! Other stuff! It's alright. Pretty fast moving, but also that perennial ~just getting to the good bit~ thing that always seems to be happening when you hit the end of the current work of an incomplete bit of fiction. Anyway, watched without reserve. Next!

e3: https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/snapping-turtle-naruto-si.83751/reader/ snapping Turtle, see title, 120k good nuff to read in one day, no type more due to hurt hand

e4: https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/mandalore-the-administrator.74563/reader/ title in url, star wars tinker taylor throwing wrenches around wormverse, 100k, totes dead due to writer life interrupt, wrist still fairly fucked so no typeformat junk, decent enough up to the point of kaput! Kinda' half-assed yuri plot, but one of the better half-assed yuri plots I've seen! anyway it's alright

e5: https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/the-skittering-chaos-worm-hazbin-hotel-helluva-boss.86712/reader/ tiny 60-something k, somewhat nsfw, I guess? Nothing super explicit, but some pretty rough language and gore. Worm/Hazbin Hotel crossover, so, y'know. Anyway, it's fairly decent, seems to be trying a redemption(?) arc on some of the Merchants. Worm characters dealing with the whole hell-actually-exists dealio and what that means for, well, Worm characters. Post golden morning worm characters.

If nothing else it made me realize I'd never really considered the implications of afterlife + crapsack/post-apoc settings, where billions or trillions of people that led pretty shitty lives full of questionable decisions suddenly end up super dead en masse. It's a thought!
« Last Edit: February 28, 2021, 11:53:26 pm by Frumple »
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Vector

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #66 on: March 04, 2021, 11:16:49 am »

Read some more books... sort of ... :

In Defense of Looting - Vicky Osterweil
[GAVE UP]x+y: A Mathematician's Manifesto for Rethinking Gender - Eugenia Chang

Spoiler: Goal (click to show/hide)

Progress:

Spoiler: All About Prison, 2/4 (click to show/hide)

Spoiler: Other books, 5/0 (click to show/hide)

I rearranged some things based on impressions in retrospect. Mind you, everything in the Other Books category was good, but it wasn't, like, ... ~amazing~.

I am also making a new category, "I read most of it and I'm not finishing."


So, the Vicky Osterweil book was interesting, much more interesting than I had expected -- I picked it up as "a manifesto on a topic I don't agree with." It drags a little in maybe the fourth sixth of the book but in a pair with Debt: The First 5,000 Years, which I read last year, it became relevant to my interests. I won't say anything more in order to avoid turning this into the Ameripol thread, but if either of those topics sound interesting to you, I recommend giving them a read.

x+y is a book by an author I respect. Her first two books were excellent popularizations; her third book was at least an interesting reframing of arguments in 2016-ish America; however, in this book the mathematics she brings to bear and discusses is less sophisticated and interesting than in the previous books, and her plan to solve gender politics seems to be "what if we thought about gendered features like they were yin and yang (abstracted and decoupled both from sex assignment and gender identity) and then talked about whether we need more yin or more yang in our culture, rather than using words like 'feminism' that are considered divisive."

To be clear, I'm not saying it's a bad book. I have no idea. If this sounds like a fresh take to you, more power to you -- Eugenia Chang is a very strong expositor and a gentle author, and often has a lot of insight. However, it wasn't bringing anything new to my particular table -- so I stopped.


To wash that out of my mouth a little, I'm watching the movie Beanpole, based on a story by Svetlana Alexievich (author of Voices from Chernobyl). As soon as I've gotten past the borrowing block at my local library I'll put some effort to borrow another one of her books, I read the one and somehow forgot to read others. I'm really looking forward to it!
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"The question of the usefulness of poetry arises only in periods of its decline, while in periods of its flowering, no one doubts its total uselessness." - Boris Pasternak

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pronouns: prefer neutral ones, others are fine. height: 5'3".

Caz

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #67 on: March 04, 2021, 12:23:55 pm »

<_< are comics a book?

Tbh I've been reading 'a lot' but it's all just short stories and education materials crap. I just can't seem to get into novels anymore. Anything you can dive into when you have a free 10 minutes, basically.
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Vector

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #68 on: March 04, 2021, 12:38:53 pm »

Ya! That stuff's great. What have you been reading?
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"The question of the usefulness of poetry arises only in periods of its decline, while in periods of its flowering, no one doubts its total uselessness." - Boris Pasternak

nonbinary/genderfluid/genderqueer renegade mathematician and mafia subforum limpet. please avoid quoting me.

pronouns: prefer neutral ones, others are fine. height: 5'3".

Caz

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #69 on: March 04, 2021, 01:51:39 pm »

Well one I do want to recommend others to read is The Antimemetics Division ('There Is No Antimemetics Division' and 'Five Five Five Five Five') which're in the SCP Foundation universe, centring around a division dealing with antimemetic threats (no spoilers t_t). It's in easy to read parts and actually is one of the best stories I've read in awhile... both conceptually and emotionally. Lara Croft has literally nothing on Marion Wheeler. -.- It's kinda horror tho. Is it redundant to put that story on the "dark" side of horror? 'Cause it's that.

Uh.. the textbooks are Ian Loveland's Constitutional Law, Administrative Law and Human Rights (makes me want to get into political rants, but also yawn) and Clarkson & Keating: Criminal Law (less yawn, more ugh) for the modules I'm doing this year.

Also Bessel van der Kolk's The Body Keeps the Score which is about the science of traumatic stress (interesting, though a lot of it is kinda 'no duh'). It does manage to avoid being pop-science crap though, which a lot of books on the subject seem to have trouble with.

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Yellow Pixel

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #70 on: March 04, 2021, 05:38:07 pm »

I began reading 'There Is No Antimemetics Division'. I guess I can't stop now...

Except if I forget...
« Last Edit: March 04, 2021, 05:42:52 pm by Yellow Pixel »
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hector13

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #71 on: March 04, 2021, 08:07:55 pm »

I’ve only read 1984.

Was going to start LOTR but I haven’t got round to it yet.
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Frumple

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #72 on: March 04, 2021, 09:40:20 pm »

... makes me wonder if I'll ever get around to actually finishing the trilogy, that. Idly wonder with a side of "probably not", though. I remember the third bit being staggeringly boring; I dropped it part way through and never finished. Hobbit was pretty good stuff, at least :P
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Arx

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #73 on: March 05, 2021, 12:50:12 am »

I've finished most of the Silmarillion and about a third of The Scramble for Africa, along with an immense quantity of assorted mixed-quality manga/comics. Probably going to reread Gardens of the Moon as my next fiction, so I can finally read Deadhouse Gates and make sense of the plot.
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Arx

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Re: 2021 Hot Fresh Reading Challenge Thread
« Reply #74 on: March 20, 2021, 02:11:04 pm »

Double post! Finished the rest of the Silmarillion a while back. Cherry picked some parts from Unfinished Tales, too, and now about 400 pages into LOTR. It's possible I'll finish it over tomorrow and Monday, but a bit unlikely.

Gardens of the Moon had to be postponed as it wasn't on my shelf in the fifteen minutes I had to look for it before leaving the house for a trip, so that'll be later again. I also have my eye on Heart of Redness by Zakes Mda, and another of his books I spotted I haven't read, and I think I saw a Solzhenitsyn (whose name I can never quite spell, I think) that I also want to check out.

And on top of all that it's just possible my local library will be open or partially open, so I may browse there a bit soon too.
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Hail to the mind of man! / Fire in the sky
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