Book Recommendations?

Gobbled up Agency by William Gibson over the weekend. It's the follow up to Peripheral, and a real page turner! I like the setting he's come up with for these novels, and in general it's just good to have Gibson back on his game.

I just reread Peripheral to refresh before diving into Agency. Forgot how much I liked the book, which is very much indeed. Gibson is absolutely one my favourite authors. Can't wait to get into Agency, right after I finish The Fated Sky.

Whilst I reread Ancillary Justice (a book I bounced off the first time I read it, but so many people love it, I'm gonna give it another go), I've been using up my audible credits on the Murderbot books (again, a series I've read but not listened to). The narrator is a bit disappointing. It takes some doing to suck all the humour out of those very witty books, but he managed it. It was a bit of a shock after listening to the audiobook of Gideon the Ninth, which has an amazing narrator.

I watched a youtube video of John Scalzi interviewing Martha Wells, and the 3 second gap between her talking and Scalzi hearing her was utterly painful.

Just noticed Jennifer Hale of Fem Shep Mass Effect fame did a Christopher Paolini audiobook (of Eragon fame). To Sleep in a Sea of Stars.

Harrow the Ninth was amazing.

Now on the second of the Daevabod trilogy, Kingdom of Copper, and really like the series.

Queued up is Seannan McGuire’s latest October Day novel.

I enjoyed A Killing Frost (October Daye). She did a good job of giving brief reminders to what happened in other books when needed, so I didn’t need to go looking for online summaries. It doesn’t end on a cliffhanger, but I am pretty sure I will just preorder the next one!

I’ve created this thread:

Hidden Gems of Audible Premium Plus

I’ve already put a couple of recos. I would love to know what y’all have enjoyed that’s included with the membership.

MathGoddess wrote:

I enjoyed A Killing Frost (October Daye). She did a good job of giving brief reminders to what happened in other books when needed, so I didn’t need to go looking for online summaries. It doesn’t end on a cliffhanger, but I am pretty sure I will just preorder the next one!

There’s getting to be a whole lot of backstory in the series now (14 books now). She usually does a good job of softly brining the reader back up to speed again

I stopped reading Gideon the Ninth for a few months; it was, I dunno, over-stimulating? Too much too fast? But I picked it up again yesterday and it's caught me again. Quite a striking story.

Yeah, it's a great book, but one that I wasn't sure if I liked at all until a third or even a half way through it.

I really enjoyed Susannah Clarke's new one, Piranesi. It is not very much like Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell.

Susannah Clarke has a new novel?? Why wasn’t I informed?!

Turns out I stopped Gideon the Ninth literally pages before Big Things happened. I tore through the rest of it yesterday, great stuff. On to the next!

John Scalzi's novellas in The Dispatcher series books are good. The Dispatcher and Murder by Other Means.

It's a current/near future world where somehow the world has changed to where if you die from unnatural means not suicide, you disappear and reappear naked at home, in the health you were in a few hours before. So a new occupation evolves called a dispatcher. A dispatcher ordinarily works in roles like an insurance agent, bailing people out of risky medical procedures that may go wrong when it is clear a person is going to die by killing the person and resetting them.

There also is a grey area around this role where a lot of questionable things happen. Those things give these two stories kind of a film noir vibe when the protagonist gets involved with the cops and some unusual occurrences.

Both of these novellas are included in the new Amazon Plus service, so if you're an Amazon subscriber, you can listen to Zachary Quinto reading them for free. I recommend them and hope more come out in this series.

This Audible Plus has been a HUUUUGE value add to the subscription. So many good things out there to enjoy!

MannishBoy wrote:

John Scalzi's novellas in The Dispatcher series are good. The Dispatcher and Murder by Other Means.

It's a current/near future world where somehow the world has changed to where if you die from unnatural means not suicide, you disappear and reappear naked at home, in the health you were in a few hours before. So a new occupation evolves called a dispatcher. A dispatcher ordinarily works in roles like an insurance agent, bailing people out of risky medical procedures that may go wrong when it is clear a person is going to die by killing the person and resetting them.

There also is a grey area around this role where a lot of questionable things happen. Those things give these two stories kind of a film noir vibe when the protagonist gets involved with the cops and some unusual occurrences.

Both of these novellas are included in the new Amazon Plus service, so if you're an Amazon subscriber, you can listen to Zachary Quinto reading them for free. I recommend them and hope more come out in this series.

I only knew of the one. I'm all in for another!

SallyNasty wrote:

This Audible Plus has been a HUUUUGE value add to the subscription. So many good things out there to enjoy!

Yep. If they're smart, they'll keep adding books that are first in series to help people know where to spend credits. I put stuff in my wish list like that waiting on sales. If I can try that type of stuff for free, that's great.

ranalin wrote:
MannishBoy wrote:

John Scalzi's novellas in The Dispatcher series are good. The Dispatcher and Murder by Other Means.

It's a current/near future world where somehow the world has changed to where if you die from unnatural means not suicide, you disappear and reappear naked at home, in the health you were in a few hours before. So a new occupation evolves called a dispatcher. A dispatcher ordinarily works in roles like an insurance agent, bailing people out of risky medical procedures that may go wrong when it is clear a person is going to die by killing the person and resetting them.

There also is a grey area around this role where a lot of questionable things happen. Those things give these two stories kind of a film noir vibe when the protagonist gets involved with the cops and some unusual occurrences.

Both of these novellas are included in the new Amazon Plus service, so if you're an Amazon subscriber, you can listen to Zachary Quinto reading them for free. I recommend them and hope more come out in this series.

I only knew of the one. I'm all in for another!

I think I liked the second one better than the first. Have fun.

SallyNasty wrote:

This Audible Plus has been a HUUUUGE value add to the subscription. So many good things out there to enjoy!

ahemahemahem

RawkGWJ wrote:

I’ve created this thread:

Hidden Gems of Audible Premium Plus

I’ve already put a couple of recos. I would love to know what y’all have enjoyed that’s included with the membership.

I like this thread best and prefer to keep my book convo here in this long running thread:)

yea i was planning on the Plus thread to post about new or cool updates to the catalog. I'll do the book conversation here.

Just finished the audiobook of Burr by Gore Vidal. It's SO well-narrated that I didn't want to blitz the last hundred pages on my physical copy. It's a tremendous achievement, I was very impressed, and this was obviously written decades before not only Hamilton, but before PCs and the internet.

Robear wrote:

Turns out I stopped Gideon the Ninth literally pages before Big Things happened. I tore through the rest of it yesterday, great stuff. On to the next!

The next one, Harrow the Ninth, is very different. But stick with it, the payoff is so worth it.

I want to go on, but absolutely no spoilers.

I'm gonna have to pick up Gideon the Ninth soon, didn't seem like my kind of thing but I can no longer go past all the rave reviews of the past year.

I'm about 2/3 through Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix Harrow and I'm hooked. She's got a new book coming out early next month that I'll be grabbing on release.

malking wrote:

I'm about 2/3 through Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix Harrow and I'm hooked. She's got a new book coming out early next month that I'll be grabbing on release.

I LOVED that book so much.

That title always reminds me of "The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet", by David Mitchell. Amazing book.

Currently switching between book 8 in the Inspector Rebus series, "Solutions and Other Problems" from Allie Brosh, and "Harrow the Ninth", which is... interesting, as I expected.

N. K. Jemisin's The City We Became is the Daily Deal on Audible today at $5.99

Natus wrote:

N. K. Jemisin's The City We Became is the Daily Deal on Audible today at $5.99

Yoink! I've just started When Will It Be Black Future Month.

I pulled a Clocky on this one. I just bought that yesterday! I guess this is the part where I say "You're welcome!" To everyone, huh?

Anyone read Myke Cole's Sixteenth Watch? What's up with the footnotes? They seem incredibly random.