So what are you reading now? Part 2

[S. Gomez]

^Back into print, you say? Awesome! I could get the Reader online easily enough, but the completist in me wants to dive into the full tales and skim where I feel I want to. The pricing will be key for me as well, though.

I've been meaning to go back to Malory for a while now. I read an abridged pseudo-translation quite a while ago, and just last year picked up a more scholarly edition with original spelling and the rubrication of the manuscript recreated in a different font, but only got about 200 pages in. I'm wanting to get started on some Arthurian research I have planned (nothing fancy, just checking out the different versions) for a book I want to write.

 

[psikeyhackr]

I finished A Stitch in Time a little while ago. I would give it 3 1/2 stars. I think that ends my attempt to find good Trek Lit for a while.

http://www.trekbbs.com/showpost.php?p=3281403&postcount=251

I just finished some Robert J. Sawyer books. Fossil Hunter and Foreigner from the Quintaglio trilogy. I have also read Hominids the first book in the Neanderthal Parallax trilogy which won a Hugo in 2003. I am about to start the second book.

I am afraid the better Trek books aren't as good as the better non-Trek books. I just think they tend to get rated well by Trek lovers that will read them. Subtract at least one star from the rating to compare it to regular sci-fi book ratings.

psik

 

[ICW]

I am currently reading "The Never-Ending Sacrifice"

 

[indianatrekker26]

Still making my way through the "A Time to,,," series. now on book 5. About half-way through, barely keeping my interest.

 

[misterx3]

I am currently reading Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass. I can't say I've ever tried LSD before, but I can imagine this is what it would be like.

 

[Starfleet Engineer]

Reading The Once and Future King. Been on a King Arthur/Knights of the Round Table kick.

 

[Christopher]

I am currently reading Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass. I can't say I've ever tried LSD before, but I can imagine this is what it would be like.

You don't need drugs for that, just imagination. It's something we all have as children, but society does its best to beat it out of us as we grow up. Drugs are a feeble substitute.

 

[S. Gomez]

I am currently reading Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass. I can't say I've ever tried LSD before, but I can imagine this is what it would be like.

You don't need drugs for that, just imagination. It's something we all have as children, but society does its best to beat it out of us as we grow up. Drugs are a feeble substitute.

QFT. Thank you, Christopher!

 

[Reanok]

I'm reading the Enterprise novel, What Price Honor? by Dave Stern.

 

[indianatrekker26]

I gave up on the "A Time to,,," series for now and am getting caught up with the latest trek books, TNG"Losing the Peace", "A Singular Destiny", TTN"Over a Torrent Sea" and VAN"Open Secrets"

 

[Reanok]

A Singular Destiny and Over a Torrent Sea. Are good books I liked both of them.

 

[rahullak]

I am currently reading Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass. I can't say I've ever tried LSD before, but I can imagine this is what it would be like.

You don't need drugs for that, just imagination. It's something we all have as children, but society does its best to beat it out of us as we grow up. Drugs are a feeble substitute.

Truer words...

 

[Allyn Gibson]

^Back into print, you say? Awesome!

So says Lacy on the Arthurnet mailing list:

After several years of fruitless efforts to nudge Routledge toward keeping the Vulgate and Post-Vulgate Cycles in print and in stock, I have recently corresponded with the Routledge (UK) acquisitions editor in Oxford. Not only was she very apologetic (though she had known nothing about the situation previously), but she took steps immediately to make the volumes available again. They will be listed in the Routledge 2010 Literature Catalogue, and they may well be available before the catalogue appears, though I don't have a firm date.

Suffice it to say, I'm excited.

I could get the Reader online easily enough, but the completist in me wants to dive into the full tales and skim where I feel I want to. The pricing will be key for me as well, though.

The chapters that are skipped are summarized. At least in what I've read, I haven't felt like I'm missing anything. I can tell you, though, that based on the introduction, there are vast swathes of Prose Lancelot and Queste that are missing. Queste, however, has a readily available English translation. Prose Lancelot, probably because of its size, does not.

I've been meaning to go back to Malory for a while now.

I have the Caxton edition with modernized spelling. I'd like to get a version of the Winchester manuscript.

Merlin got my interest in matters Arthurian re-ignited. That's not a bad thing.

 

[Starfleet Engineer]

Also currently reading The Lancelot-Grail Reader, which is extracts from Norris Lacy's five volume English translation of the French Vulgate Cycle, the 12th-century Arthurian saga.

How are you liking it?

In college I read Queste del Saint Grail, so I'm familiar with that.

Histoire del Saint Grail was interesting. It's written in a faux-Biblical style; given the story it tells, beginning with the Crucifixion and Joseph of Aramathea's imprisonment, that style makes sense. The attitude toward history is intriguing; on the one hand, the dating of the Crucifxion in relation to Vespasian's reign is accurate, while at the same time, the story puts Saracens active in the Middle East circa 80 CE. The story also seems to think that one can get from Palestine to the Middle East in about eight hours.

Merlin I've enjoyed. The detail about Merlin's birth is fascinating, and the portrayal of Uther and his reign is welcome. (Malory puts that off-stage, while that's fairly important in the Vulgate.) There's more detail given about Uther's seduction of Ygraine than in Malory, and the manner in which Arthur impregnates his half-sister is laughable, but remarkably innocent.

I haven't dug down into the Prose Lancelot yet. And I skipped ahead and read the Mort Artu, which (at least in these extracts) is rather short. John Cleese played Lancelot right, I think; in the Mort Artu, Lancelot is a homicidal idiot.

The book is incredibly readable, and if you have an interest in matters Arthurian, and you're looking for something beyond Malory, then this is a pretty good volume to pick up, based on what I've read thus far.

The five-volume complete translation is coming back into print next year. I'm hoping it will be affordable, because if it is, I'm adding it to my library.

Nice. I had no idea when I posted that you were having this discussion. Now it looks like I've found some new Arthurian reading material. Synchronicity of some kind. Thanks. I've only read Roger Lancelyn Green's King Arthur and His Knights of the Round Table and now The Once and Future King. Next I plan to read Malory.

 

[S. Gomez]

I'd like to get a version of the Winchester manuscript.

The Norton Critical Edition is, if I recall correctly, based primarily on the Winchester, with certain little bits interpolated from Caxton which are clearly marked. That's the one I have that I was talking about before.

 

[Paris]

I just finished DRG3's amazing Lost Era book, Serpents Among the Ruins, the first book by i've read by Mr. George. What a fantastic read . Aventeer Vokar is one of the best trek villains of all time! I still need to process all my thoughts about the book; it was that good. I'm moving onto Iron & Sacrifice, DRG3's Captain Sulu story from the anthology Tales of the Captain's Table. Mr. George, you have another fan for life!

 

[Steve Roby]

I'm finally reading something that Allyn Gibson suggested to me a while back: Phonogram: Rue Britannia, the first collection of Phonogram comics by Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie. Allyn described it as being like Nick Hornby's High Fidelity crossed with Hellblazer, and he's not wrong. This one's particularly about the Britpop moment in the mid-'90s and is full of references to bands from that scene, the good, the bad, and the mediocre. The one mistake Gillen makes, however, is to class Echobelly among the mediocre rather than the good.

I hope the current series is collected in paperback soon.

 

[TenLubak]

Reading Star Trek : The Next Generation #14 Exiles.
plus Star Trek: Titan Over A Torrent Sea in free time. Not getting thru very fast cause of school tho.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

I hope the current series is collected in paperback soon.

The Singles Club collection is supposed to be out in either November or December. The fourth issue just came out about a month ago (thinks -- right before I saw Elbow in DC), and the fifth is due sometime this month. They haven't been on a regular shipping schedule, unfortunately, because McKelvie has needed to pick up some other work here and there to pay the bills (such as the recent Gotham Gazette specials). So, I'd take the release date for the collection with a grain of salt; I'd hope for a trade collection by Christmas, but there's no guarantee that we'll see the seventh and final issue of The Singles Club by Christmas.

 

[F. King Daniel]

I’ve just finished Preserver (and thus the mirror trilogy), and I thought it was another fantastic Kirk adventure (why aren’t the Reeves-Stevens’ writing a STXI novel? Their style is perfect). A few nits to pick:

I like the Foundation psychohistory references, but at the same time psychohistory could never ever work in Star Trek: The Mule almost ruined the Seldon plan single handedly – imagine what the next super-powered-alien-of-the-week would do to Trek’s version! (and that’s assuming the psychohistory is a conglomerate of all the species’ psychohistories combined)

I don’t like the idea that the TNG crew erased Lily’s memories after her adventures on the Enterprise in First Contact – or that they tried to do the same to Cochrane.

Bits I loved:

The idea that the mirror universe is what ours would be if it weren’t for the continuous meddling of the Preservers.

Finding the true identity of Project Sign’s Captain Radisson (and the idea of the holographic avatars)

Going back to the Preservers after Federation (although it couldn’t be a true sequel because of pesky schmanon)

Up next: The Ringworld Throne.

I’ve been waiting to get hold of a copy of this for years. Now I have. All is good.