constant re-reading

[kirk55555]

I've read almost all my Star Trek books atleast twice. I have so many, that rereading them all a third time will take awhile.

There are several that I could reread a lot and enjoy them (Q-Continuum trilogy by Greg Cox, ST - TNG Reunion, Crossover).

As for non Star Trek books, I've read all the Harry potter books at least 3 times, and some 5-6 times. I've read the Lord of the Rings Trilogy about 4-5 times. I've read the three first Dune books about 5 times as well.

 

[FatherRob]

I find myself revisiting a lot of Diane Duane's stuff fairly regularly, especially The Wounded Sky.

Just read that one for the third time earlier this year.

Peter Morwood's Rules of Engagement (very under-rated and over-looked, IMO)

You know, that was my first original Trek novel (first I read was TMP novelization), and I hold a place in my heart for it, so to speak... but when I tried re-reading it last year, it fell flat and I didn't even finish it.

Not sure why...

Rob+

 

[JWD75]

I like to reread the old numbered TOS and DS9 novels, the works of Alastair Reynolds, It and Pet Semetery by Stephen King and biographies of Benjamin Franklin and Theodore Roosevelt. William Shatner's Star Trek Memories is the book that I've probably revisited the most; it's like comfort food. Whenever I'm feeling down or going through a difficult time in my life I pick it up and it never fails to make me feel better.

 

[mindx2]

The only two book that I consistently reread are The Lord of the Rings and the Dune series. I try to read LotR once every year. I have ever since my mother gave me the books when I was eight years old. That was wayyyy back in 1978 ! I come back to Dune every three years or so. I just get totally immersed in Tolkien and Herbert's worlds. Haven't yet found authors who have created such elaborate and wonderfully unique worlds.

As far as Trek is concerned I don't reread them. I don't really feel like I need to as more books keep coming out and the story is still continuing.

edit: Also forgot to mention Stephen King's The Stand as well. I usually reread it after my wife picks it up again for her own rereading!

 

[FatherRob]

I just get totally immersed in Tolkien and Herbert's worlds. Haven't yet found authors who have created such elaborate and wonderfully unique worlds.

I feel that way about 2001. Time and time again, I can close my eyes while reading/listening to 2001 and just envision myself on the control deck of the Discovery, or descending to Japetus (your spelling may vary) with David Bowman in the spacepod.

Interestingly, I do think that Clarke creates such worlds, but only once - his revisits usually leave a lot to be desired. For example, I find 2001, The Songs of Distant Earth, Rendevous with Rama, and Childhood's End to be books I can revisit at will and mine ever-greater depth from. While I found 2061 to be marginally enjoyable, the rest of the Space Odyssey series left me flat. Rama II and beyond are wastelands (and Lee's Rama-verse solo work Bright Messengers was utterly unreadable!). Fortunately, he never tried his hand at a sequel to Childhood's End. (And, to those who would say, "But no sequel to Childhood's End is possible!", I'd say, "Yea, and I thought the same thing after reading 2001!"

With Clarke, however, I often enjoy the various revisions when his tales migrated from short-story to novel form. TSoDE is masterful in either short story or novel form. Childhood's End is also amazing either way. The various shorts that eventually blossomed into 2001 are outstanding in their own way as well.

Even Imperial Earth had an oddly compelling universe surrounding it, even if I did think the story was utter crap.

Anyway, I just love Clarke... which I do find ironic, given how disdainful he was of religion. Oh well.

 

[Stevil2001]

The Rama sequels are putridly awful, and completely fail to understand everything interesting about Rendezvous with Rama.

 

[Fer]

I didn't hate Rama II, but I definitely didn't enjoy it as much as Rendezvous with Rama and still haven't cracked open Garden of Rama, despite the obvious set-up for it from Rama II.

This morning I had a strong urge to reread the Red Dwarf books. (Well, the first three anyway; I much preferred Backwards to The Last Human.) But I've just started Children of the Storm and by the time I finish that Fate of the Jedi: Ascension will be out...

 

[FatherRob]

The Rama sequels are putridly awful, and completely fail to understand everything interesting about Rendezvous with Rama.

Yes. Exactly what you said.

(I tend to blame a lot of that on Gentry Lee.)

Rob+

 

[T'Ressa Dax]

I didn't hate Rama II, but I definitely didn't enjoy it as much as Rendezvous with Rama and still haven't cracked open Garden of Rama, despite the obvious set-up for it from Rama II.

This morning I had a strong urge to reread the Red Dwarf books. (Well, the first three anyway; I much preferred Backwards to The Last Human.) But I've just started Children of the Storm and by the time I finish that Fate of the Jedi: Ascension will be out...

Hmm, I found the Rama books entertaining enough, but I was only starting to read science fiction seriously then. I'm not sure I could get through them again. Especially since Clarke isn't on my list of favorite authors. If I had to pick favorites just by him there'd probably be a few other titles ahead of those, including 2001 and 3001.

 

[Scout101]

So, so many books I could put on this list. I read really fast, and have been reading star trek books since I was in the 4th grade, so 20 years or so worth of reading there.

Ones I've hit the most? Prime Directive, Imzadi, Federation, the Yesterday saga, My Enemy My Ally, Entropy Effect, Uhura's Song, heck any number of the old numbered TOS books. Some of the early ones from my collection are worn straight through, and have been replaced at least once.

 

[Smellincoffee]

Before I got back into the current of Trek literature, I was re-reading some books over and over again -- the first two Stargazer novels, Starfleet: Year One, the Dominion War tetrology, a few isolated novels (particularly The Forgotten War), and the Avatar-Abyss books in the DS9 relaunch. I've also read DS9 Millenium four or five times by this point.

 

[Desert Kris]

Of Star Trek books, I've only ever re-read Diane Carey's Final Frontier "giant" novel. For some reason that book has a special place of interest to me. Every 5-7 years I will pick up the trusty, old, worn copy I have from when it first came out. I once re-read through half of Imzadi, but I didn't finish it (I don't remember why, but it's not because I don't like it, I really do).

As far as non-Star Trek, I re-read Lord of the Rings once, and a small handful of the very short Doctor Who novelizations were re-read multiple times, especially when I was younger. I've recently re-read through the Mowgli stories from the Jungle Book, but I so wish I had been able to appreciate them way back when as I did now, Kipling's prose seems quite dynamic, much to my surprise; it didn't seem that way when I was little.

I don't know if we're including audiobooks (only unabridged, to count as a full "re-read") then I've listened to all the Harry Potter books (they lend themselves particularly well to listening), The Lord of the Rings (got the audio after I had read the book twice), and Dune. Dune and LotR are great for all the stuff that I only picked up on after multiple re-reads/re-listenings.

 

[Technobuilder]

I've been reading and rereading the ongoing Honor Harrington series by David Weber and The Dresden Files series by Jim Butcher since I first came across both of them less than 6 years ago.

I've gone through the 20+ Honor series 4 times thus far and I'm starting my 4th time through Dresden Files now that I've just finished the new Dresden.

 

[Sxottlan]

I generally don't re-read books. Too many books. Not enough time.

I did re-read the DS9 Relaunch leading up my purchase of the paperback of Unity.

I have thought that maybe I'll re-read Vanguard when the series is complete.

 

[Technobuilder]

I totally understand that.

But for certain books, it's like rewatching favorite films.

Plus, it helps to pick up extra details of 20+ books ongoing series when you go back through a few times lol.

 

[mindx2]

I totally understand that.

But for certain books, it's like rewatching favorite films.

Plus, it helps to pick up extra details of 20+ books ongoing series when you go back through a few times lol.

That's exactly how it is for me and the LotR / Dune books. It seems every time I read them I find something new or I'd forgotten it and it "feels" fresh all over again!

 

[Scout101]

Some of them just have that 'comfortable' feeling to them.

Dan Simmons' Hyperion Cantos is another series I can re-read over and over again, love those books!

 

[Therin of Andor]

My to-read pile is teetering again, but books I have re-read several times are the TMP novelization, "The Entropy Effect", "Strangers from the Sky", "The Final Reflection", "How Much for Just the Planet?", "The Wounded Sky" and "Andor: Paradigm". Jeff Ayers got me to re-read "The Prometheus Design" in a weekend for "Voyages of Imagination" - for which I scored an autographed copy of his book - but I still don't know if it was a TrekBBS April Fool's Day joke that he had actually "lost" his notes on the novel.

I plan to re-read "Paths of Disharmony" again soon to catalog accurately all of its many Andorian references and cross references. I have many novels with little bookmarks in them, indicating all the TAS and Andorian references, but I'm way behind.

I also used to play the early 90 min ST audios quite a lot.

 

[Christopher]

Interestingly, I do think that Clarke creates such worlds, but only once - his revisits usually leave a lot to be desired. For example, I find 2001, The Songs of Distant Earth, Rendevous with Rama, and Childhood's End to be books I can revisit at will and mine ever-greater depth from. While I found 2061 to be marginally enjoyable, the rest of the Space Odyssey series left me flat. Rama II and beyond are wastelands (and Lee's Rama-verse solo work Bright Messengers was utterly unreadable!).

Despite what the covers say, the Rama sequels are almost entirely Gentry Lee's work, with Clarke basically just contributing the alien worldbuilding. I don't even count them as part of Clarke's own body of work.

And for most of his career, Clarke didn't do any sequels or series at all, except for his "Tales from the White Hart" series of science-fiction tall tales, and those were only connected by their narrator and the titular tavern in which he told his stories. 2010: Odyssey Two was the first time he gave into pressure to do a sequel, and even then it was a sequel to the movie 2001 rather than the novel 2001, so it still didn't quite count as the same continuity. I've always considered it something of a trademark of Clarke's work that virtually every novel and story was in its own separate universe.

 

[JD]

^And I think I remember reading somewhere that 2061 and 3001 also contradict the other books in the series. I haven't read the books, so I don't know what is different, I just remember reading that when I was reseaching the books when I was thinking about reading them a while back.