Book Recommendations?

Can anyone recommend anything good on Kindle Unlimited or Prime Reading? I've got some long bus rides in my future and need something I can download and take and we currently have a 30 day free pass.

Succubus 3 (The Good The Bad And The Crazy Stupid Hot): A LitRPG Series caught my eye but maybe something a little higher caliber...lol.

Sydhart wrote:

Can anyone recommend anything good on Kindle Unlimited or Prime Reading? I've got some long bus rides in my future and need something I can download and take and we currently have a 30 day free pass.

Succubus 3 (The Good The Bad And The Crazy Stupid Hot): A LitRPG Series caught my eye but maybe something a little higher caliber...lol.

Genre? Obviously fantasy might work.

Sci Fi: Craig Alanson's Expiditionary Forces series is pretty decent.

I also listened to Steve McHugh's Hellequin urban fantasy series, and it wasn't bad.

Jeff Wheeler's got a bunch of fantasy books you might try.

DJ Molles's post apocalyptic stuff is good, I think some of those are now on KU.

I just read a couple of James Swain's Vegas heist/con books and enjoyed them.

All of the Markos Kloos sci fi.

Elliot Kay's Poor Man's Fight series.

Anything Drew Hayes.

Dennis Taylor's Bobiverse sci fi is great.

That's just from scrolling down my history. There's a lot of junk in KU, but those have been at least decent time wasters for me. Out of those, my favorites were Drew Hayes, Dennis Taylor, Markos Kloos, and Craig Alanson.

I'm more of a fantasy fan but I do enjoy a good post apocalyptic series.

I was also eyeing the Jeff Wheeler stuff. It looks like he has quite a few series but 3 series stood out, The Kingfountain Series, Legends of Muirwood, and Harbinger. Storm Glass from Harbinger series popped up on my recommendations reads so that may fit well. Muirwood sounds like a pretty good read too.

Thanks for the recommendations.

So I ended up stopping by the used bookstore on my work break walk and got a copy of Ready Player One for $2.00 which I haven't read.

Sydhart wrote:

I'm more of a fantasy fan but I do enjoy a good post apocalyptic series.

I was also eyeing the Jeff Wheeler stuff. It looks like he has quite a few series but 3 series stood out, The Kingfountain Series, Legends of Muirwood, and Harbinger. Storm Glass from Harbinger series popped up on my recommendations reads so that may fit well. Muirwood sounds like a pretty good read too.

Thanks for the recommendations.

A lot of Wheeler's series are set in the same world. Kingfountain and Muirwood are for instance. Those two don't cross over that much, but will on occasion.

Don't go in looking for anything too deep, but I went through a bunch of them when I picked up a KU subscription really cheap (like 3 months for $1).

All of my recommendations had audiobooks, there are a lot of things on KU I'd like to read that don't. If you're looking to read, there are a lot more interesting things out as well.

EDIT: Forgot all of the Scott Myer stuff was on KU. Those are humorous fantasy. Lots here on this post have recommended them.

Sydhart wrote:

So I ended up stopping by the used bookstore on my work break walk and got a copy of Ready Player One for $2.00 which I haven't read.

That's some expensive toilet paper, buddy.

Jonman wrote:
Sydhart wrote:

So I ended up stopping by the used bookstore on my work break walk and got a copy of Ready Player One for $2.00 which I haven't read.

That's some expensive toilet paper, buddy.

Ouch, that bad? I'd thought I read that people liked that book?

Sydhart wrote:
Jonman wrote:
Sydhart wrote:

So I ended up stopping by the used bookstore on my work break walk and got a copy of Ready Player One for $2.00 which I haven't read.

That's some expensive toilet paper, buddy.

Ouch, that bad? I'd thought I read that people liked that book?

A lot of people do. I didn't hate it, but didn't love it like some do. I also don't think there's anything wrong if the nostalgia makes you love it.

Read it, form your own opinion. It's just one of those books. I enjoyed the hell out of it a few years ago. Now that there's a whole genre of Nerd/Gamer Reference fanfic it might seem a bit overdone. It's popcorn reading. Don't go into it expecting to have your whole world view challenged or anything. Just have fun.

Will Wight is one of the better fantasy authors on Unlimited. The Cradle series is a decent one to read through. If I am looking for Unlimited stuff, I usually go look at the top 100 in the category like fantasy or scifi and pick something that looks interesting. There for sure have been some stinkers but some good stuff too.

Sydhart wrote:
Jonman wrote:
Sydhart wrote:

So I ended up stopping by the used bookstore on my work break walk and got a copy of Ready Player One for $2.00 which I haven't read.

That's some expensive toilet paper, buddy.

Ouch, that bad? I'd thought I read that people liked that book?

Lots of people like it, I'm just being ornery.

But truly I thought it was abysmal. Worst book I've read this decade, by a country mile. It read worse than those first 4 chapters of my epic fantasy trilogy that I wrote when I was 14.

bighoppa wrote:

Read it, form your own opinion. It's just one of those books. I enjoyed the hell out of it a few years ago. Now that there's a whole genre of Nerd/Gamer Reference fanfic it might seem a bit overdone. It's popcorn reading. Don't go into it expecting to have your whole world view challenged or anything. Just have fun.

How was the movie? Better as a movie or a novel? I enjoyed The Martian as a film much more than I enjoyed The Martian as a book.

Natus wrote:

How was the movie? Better as a movie or a novel? I enjoyed The Martian as a film much more than I enjoyed The Martian as a book.

Probably better if I hadn't read the book.

It was fine. Probably not something I'll re-watch over and over, but it was fun. A lot of the changes didn't make sense to me, or apparently to non-readers, since my wife and in-laws have bugged me about plot points in the movie enough times I eventually just gave them the book to read. Jonman probably considers that a crime, but they were satisfied :D.

bighoppa wrote:
Natus wrote:

How was the movie? Better as a movie or a novel? I enjoyed The Martian as a film much more than I enjoyed The Martian as a book.

Probably better if I hadn't read the book.

It was fine. Probably not something I'll re-watch over and over, but it was fun. A lot of the changes didn't make sense to me, or apparently to non-readers, since my wife and in-laws have bugged me about plot points in the movie enough times I eventually just gave them the book to read. Jonman probably considers that a crime, but they were satisfied :D.

Nah, man. I'm not here to yuck other people's yums. I'll just tell you at great length about my own yucks.

The movie's actually on my "to watch when I'm sick on the couch" list. I suspect it'll be a perfectly serviceable and forgettable pile of shiny nonsense, and there's a place for that in my movie library, just not on my bookshelf. I can enjoy a bad movie. I cannot enjoy a bad book.

Jonman wrote:

Lots of people like it, I'm just being ornery.

But truly I thought it was abysmal. Worst book I've read this decade, by a country mile. It read worse than those first 4 chapters of my epic fantasy trilogy that I wrote when I was 14.

My book club read it last spring (hey, it's a genre book club, and sometimes we read the popular genre stuff).

I enhanced my enjoyment by listening to a podcast full of snark to go along with it, by some of the writers on MST3000 / Rifftrax.

I was glad that most of the other people in book club enjoyed it more than I did!

Sydhart wrote:

Can anyone recommend anything good on Kindle Unlimited or Prime Reading? I've got some long bus rides in my future and need something I can download and take and we currently have a 30 day free pass.

Check out what your public library has. Many title available in Overdrive are downloadable as kindle books. If you are reading on a phone, there's also the 3M reader, the Overdrive ap, and hoopla.
Any time I travel, I check out bunches of ebooks from the library.

Jonman wrote:

. I can enjoy a bad movie. I cannot enjoy a bad book.

Avoid The Meg book. It was dreadful and I had a wonderful time reading it. I have no desire to read any of the others in the series though. The wiki summaries were plenty.

bighoppa wrote:

Read it, form your own opinion. It's just one of those books. I enjoyed the hell out of it a few years ago. Now that there's a whole genre of Nerd/Gamer Reference fanfic it might seem a bit overdone. It's popcorn reading. Don't go into it expecting to have your whole world view challenged or anything. Just have fun.

Yeah, I pretty much agree with Mannish. I read it to the end, but I was hate reading it by about the 70% point.

Ready Player One wasn't as good as the buzz made it out to be, and that's turned around and caused a real blowback among those who came to it later. (like me). It was far from a great book, but it did 80s nerd trivia and nostalgia well, and I didn't think it was a waste of time or anything.

I think you'll get $2 worth out of it, at least if you're in the over-40 bracket. Under that, or if you weren't a geek when you were young, you probably won't like it as much. The recognition of the subject material and knowing about some of what he's referencing is a big part of the appeal; without that, it has has to stand more on its own merits, and it's really pretty mediocre on its own. I doubt anyone will look back on it as a landmark book.

Will Wight is pretty good, btw. I think he's mostly or entirely self-published, and while you can occasionally tell he doesn't have an editor, on the whole he does a good job. I've enjoyed everything of his I've read. It's medium-duty fantasy.... more than just popcorn fluff, but far from epic.

He's also pretty consistent about publishing a book about every 6-8 months. I'm reading his Cradle series and it's like he's novelized Jade Empire and I love it, flaws and all.

Green Hills of Africa pretty good, enjoying my time with it.

Mannish Boy wrote:

All of the Markos Kloos sci fi.

I love these books, but be aware that they are ... well, grim. There are hopeful and beautiful moments, but the overall conduct of the war is mostly appalling and sadly realistic, and Kloos is so good at writing it that you expect everything to fall apart at any moment.

Recently I decided to finally get around to reading three series that I've heard any number of good things about over the years, and always suspected I would enjoy, but somehow never got around to until now: Adrian Tchaikovsky's Shadows of the Apt series, Cixin Liu's Three-Body trilogy, and Glen Cook's Black Company series. I've finished Shadows of the Apt, and ... wow, I'm pretty blown away. This is really good.

There are ten novels in the main series, starting with Empire in Black and Gold, plus three collections of short stories that aren't essential to the main storyline. The first four books form a coherent story of their own, with what I think would be a satisfying ending even if you never read the other six, so you can safely start the series without committing yourself to the full ten books.

The background: This is a world where each human "Kinden" - tribe or nation - has an insect (or other invertebrate) totem, which gives them certain powers - their "Art" - some of them consistently available to all members of a given Kinden, others varying from one individual to another. For example, all Beetle-Kinden (the good guys, mostly) have superhuman endurance; some can also fly or see in the dark; Wasp-Kinden (the bad guys, mostly) can fly and shoot a "Sting", a bolt of destructive energy from their hands; Ant-Kinden can link their minds telepathically; and so on. Besides the division into Kinden, the population is also divided into the Apt, who have a natural talent for technology but are incapable of using magic, and the Inapt, who are the other way around. There's a strong but not absolute correlation between Kinden and Aptness - most (but not all) Beetle-Kinden and Wasp-Kinden are Apt, most Spider-Kinden and Moth-Kinden are Inapt, and so on.

In ancient times the world was ruled by the magical powers of the Inapt, specifically the Moth-Kinden, and the Apt were their slaves. But then some Apt tinkerer invented the crossbow, a weapon only the Apt could use, and the resulting revolution overthrew the Moth Empire and started an age of technological progress in which the Apt are on top and the Inapt second class citizens. As the story opens, 500 years later, the Apt, led by the Beetle-Kinden, are living in a steampunk-bordering-on-dieselpunk world where almost nobody believes magic ever existed. To most people, the Moth Empire is a footnote in some dusty history book, and the few surviving Moth-Kinden are just this funny tribe who live way up in the mountains and still believe in magic. (The Art that gives the Insect-Kinden their powers comes from an entirely different source, distinct from magic; the Kinden think of it as a normal part of the natural world and not anything supernatural.)

There's a new empire rising, though: the Wasp-Kinden have decided that they are destined to rule the world. So far they've been fairly successful, defeating the mighty Dragonfly Commonweal and subjugating any number of smaller city-states. Our hero (of the first few books, at least), Beetle-Kinden scholar Stenwold Maker, believes the Beetle city of Collegium is next on their list, but nobody believes him. So in between bouts of playing Cassandra to the Collegium Senate, he's assembled your basic ragtag group of heroes to infiltrate the Wasp-conquered lands and obtain intelligence about the Wasps before they can descend on an unsuspecting Collegium...

That's just the beginning. This series is a genuine Epic in every sense of the word, with multiple viewpoints and plotlines carrying the reader all over (and under) the world of the Insect-Kinden. The war between the Wasps and Beetles branches out into an assortment of local wars; treaties are made and broken; and behind the scenes, the former rulers of the world plot to use their magic to restore their rightful position. And now and then, there are hints of the true cosmic horror that waits underneath everything, indifferent to the desires of Apt and Inapt alike, and endlessly patient...

It's got wild action and adventure. It's got seriously mad science. It's got three-dimensional characters who aren't just there to fit on a page from TV Tropes. It's got friendships and love affairs and betrayals and assassinations and plot twists and surprises. It's got epic journeys across vast distances. It's got an incredible variety of fascinating societies based on the wide variety of Insect-Kinden. It's got Mind-Mangling Horrors from the Forgotten Past. It doesn't try to whitewash the horrors of technological warfare, although it doesn't dwell on them overmuch either - I don't think anyone would call this Grimdark, despite a few passages of grimness and darkness.

In short, I enjoyed the whole series immensely and can't recommend it highly enough.

Worth noting: the series was (very loosely) based on an RPG campaign the author ran years ago.

Oh yes - and it should also be noted that Adrian Tchaikovsky managed to complete a ten-volume fantasy epic in seven years. Possibly a lesson there for one or two other writers.

Based on the recommendations on Ilona Andrews blog, I finished Written in Red by Anne Bishop. Slow to get started, but once it picked up, I thoroughly enjoyed it. What I'm struggling with is how to classify it. Given that there's a mix of technology & supernatural, I guess it's urban fantasy, but somehow that label doesn't quite fit. Rather than a world that followed historical patterns where the supernatural is hidden (Dresden) or brought out by some cataclysmic event (Rachel Morgan), Bishop builds a world where the supernatural has always been the apex predators and humans have managed to eke out an existence.

Clumber wrote:

Based on the recommendations on Ilona Andrews blog, I finished Written in Red by Anne Bishop. Slow to get started, but once it picked up, I thoroughly enjoyed it. What I'm struggling with is how to classify it. Given that there's a mix of technology & supernatural, I guess it's urban fantasy, but somehow that label doesn't quite fit. Rather than a world that followed historical patterns where the supernatural is hidden (Dresden) or brought out by some cataclysmic event (Rachel Morgan), Bishop builds a world where the supernatural has always been the apex predators and humans have managed to eke out an existence.

This sounds really interesting. Adding it to my list. Thanks!

Oh yeah, does anyone else use Goodreads? I just noticed there is a friend section! Hit me up if you want.

https://www.goodreads.com/friend/i?f...

There is a Goodjer group on goodreads but it seems pretty idle right now.

Finished up the new Black Company book Port of Shadows. It is by far the weakest book in the series. Definitely one to grab from the library.

qaraq wrote:

There is a Goodjer group on goodreads but it seems pretty idle right now.

Thanks! I joined the group. Looks like last activity was 2 years ago! Let's get it started back up! i'm really enjoying the Goodreads website so hope to be stay pretty active on it. I definitely need something to help keep me organized on my books as I get older and I forget what series I've started and what book I'm on.

Also, thanks for the friend invites.

NathanialG wrote:

Finished up the new Black Company book Port of Shadows. It is by far the weakest book in the series. Definitely one to grab from the library.

Aw that’s too bad. I was wondering if he could recapture the magic.

Grady Hendrix, the author of “Horrorstor” (with umlauts I left out) is out with another book, called “We Sold Our Souls”. I’d call it a rock and roll memoir wrapped around a horror core. It’s the story of a Metal band that nearly made it big, but fell apart under unusual circumstances, and what happens to the people involved around 20 years later. It’s fast-paced, lots of action but also good character-building, and a methodical cluing-in of the reader as the story progresses. It avoids Mary-Sue-ing for the most part; the characters face constant challenges appropriate to the power of their opponents. Good, modern horror story with light humor elements.