I've been reading Look at Me by Jennifer Egan. She's one of the best writers out there, I think. Her books are always marvelous.
I read Feed over lunch. A very fast read, but also one of the most stunning novels I've read in awhile. Just beautifully written.
Light by M John Harrison is unabashed weird space opera, fertile with ideas. Maybe not the stone-cold classic some make it put to be (SFX Magazine recently called it the best SF novel of its 20-year lifetime) but a compelling page-turner nonetheless. Got to like a novel where one of the protagonists is a quantum physicist and serial killer, I suppose.
I have just started listening to Jean M Auel's Clan of the Cave Bear narrated by Sandra Burr. I know my mother and sister liked this series and I am trying to decide if I should buy the whole series while they are on sale for $4.99 each. Is anyone going to read Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee which is being released in 7 days time?
Oh! I LOVED Clan of the Cave Bear! I have the whole series in the hardcover books, so you know I paid dearly for them...I think it was nearly 30 dollars for each of the 6. Where did you find them for 4.99 each?
Finished War of the Worlds: Global Dispatches. Absolutely brilliant. Quite a blast to read, and a must if you're a fan of War of the Worlds. Highlights for me were a Wild West story and the John Carter/WotW crossover. Moving on to Leviathan Wakes by James S.A Corey.
I read Clan of the Cave Bear when I was twelve or so, and while as an adult I can reflect on some of the problematic aspects, I recall enjoying it then. I am pretty sure I read the next book in the series, but they kind of fizzled.
The first two books have plots. After that it's a prehistoric soap opera. I just finished Christian Wolmar's Engines of War, about the role of trains in war.
Michael Crichton's Jurassic Park. I'm almost through now, will be seeking out The Lost World in a few days.
Boarding The Enterprise [Transporters, Tribbles and the Vulcan Death Grip in Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek] edited by David Gerrold and Robert J. Sawyer. A collection of essays. Consider "Star Trek in the Real World" by Norman Spinrad. Previous sci fi shows were anthologies (Twighlight Zone, Outer Limits) or kiddie shows. The network executives wanted shows with familiar settings and regular characters, so that audiences would tune in every week. Roddenberry had a "leap of faith" and set a show aboard a starship, with regular characters. The regular characters would be based on archetypes that had been seen before. The starship would be a ship of the sea, but re-imagined as a spaceship. Over three seasons, that ship would become as familiar as Dodge City, or Giligans Island.
Oh! You Pretty Things, by Shanna Mahin. Totally not what I normally read -- a novel about Hollywood and dysfunctional relationships. But it was on the new-fiction shelf at the library and caught my eye... and it turned out to be really good! Do you recommend any particular novel to start with?
Finishing up James Madison and the Making of America by Kevin Gutzman...probably will start Pandora's Lunchbox: How Processed Food Took over the American Diet next.
I am listening to Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee, narrated by Reese Witherspoon. The first few chapters were boring, after a while it picks up a bit but the adult Jean Louise (Scout) can certainly waffle on.
Starship Century, edited by James Benford and Gregory Benford. Anthology combining fiction with science fact/speculation.