I've just finished "The Five Philosophical Thesis" by Mao Tse Tung. I'm not a maoist but I found that book interesting.
this post was submitted on 15 Jul 2025
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I'm splitting my attention between The Classic of Tea and The Legend of Darkness. The former is a nice little hardback with trilingual contents (Classical Chinese, Vernacular Chinese, and English) while the latter is a bilingual edition (Classical Chinese, and English).
How is The Classic of Tea? Don't have enough interest in Tea to actually read that, but curious after checking it's details.
It's a little bit out of date naturally (1300 years will do that to you), but it's actually kind of amazing how relevant it still is today. It doesn't have information on all the different varieties of tea available today (the 2011-published tome The Classic of Chinese Tea which is increasingly the standard textbook for tea production in China corrects this), but what it does mention is still here today processed very much in similar fashions (albeit with upgrades in the equipment for picking it).
It would be a bit of a slog to read (because of some unfamiliar terminology you'd have to check up in the appendices) were it not so short. My trilingual edition is a small hardback book of 150 pages (including some opening pages with pretty pictures, two introductions, a preface, two appendices and a references list). About half that is the English text, so you're looking at reading about 75 pages. I think you could browse it quite successfully over a weekend without strain.
Blitzed through the Thursday Murder Club series (all of the published ones so far) and really enjoyed them. There are some really touching moments of grief mixed with optimism and hope draped in a backdrop of ridiculousness and intrigue. The short chapters make it easy to digest.
Read The Gone World whose take on time travel was neat and used the mechanic to craft an intriguing world(s). The crime/detective angle kept me pretty interested, though the writing style was a bit odd for me. There were many uses of sentence fragments that didn't flow naturally, more akin to bullet points shoehorned into paragraphs. There was also some background delivered via exposition/monologue that felt a tad lazy. I've heard that the ending is a sticking point for some but I didn't find it difficult to follow and thought the execution was not bad.
Finally also got around to A Wizard of Earthsea which I adored. The internal growth and journey of the protagonist felt genuine. I absolutely loved that there is much left to the imagination on this one. Shed some light on how I perceive Rothfuss' works.
My current book is A Gentleman in Moscow which is thus far well written and fairly entertaining though I'm not far enough to provide a more meaningful review.
I have only read the first book in Thursday Murder Club series, loved the book, but never got around to get the next books. Should do that soon.
I finished what’s out for the Amra Thetys series and now I’m working through a bunch of physical books I just picked up. I’m starting with When The Moon Hits Your Eye by John Scalzi and I’ll probably pick up Royal Gambit by Daniel O’Malley after I finish that (it’s the latest book following The Rook storyline.
I just finished the Chrysalids by John Wyndham. I thought it was a great book and I've gotten Day of the Triffids also by John Wyndham out from the library and will start reading that one tonight.
I just finished The Monkey and the Monk: An Abridgment of The Journey to the West, Wu Cheng'en, Anthony C. Yu (Translator), after attempting to read the primary work. Being exposed to western mythologies, I was very interested in exploring other cultural touchstones. I almost dropped it due to the enormity of the novel, but decided to switch to the abridged version. I'm glad I didz even if my heart didn't like the concept of an abridgment.
Overall, it was interesting, and I'm glad I read it but there must be some context regarding all the repetition within a single chapter that I'm missing. I can't count how many times a character explains, word for word, what has just happened to another character. I theorize two reasons. Either that the repetition is for emphasis(though this seemed inconsistent), or in Chinese there is symmetry in the placement on the page.
As a palette cleanser I just sped through The Dungeon Anarchist's Cookbook Matt Dinniman which was fun and easy.
The repetition is there because these are primarily oral tales that have been barely edited into something that almost, but not quite, has a coherent narrative.
The tales within Journey to the West come from a very wide period of historical storytelling and are in a wide variety of storytelling traditions. There's very little consistency from tale to tale, and any overarching theme was added much later in forming the "novel". (It's a "novel" in the same way that Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles is a novel, right down to inconsistencies from member story to story.)
Cool, appreciate the context. And this applies both to the repetition between chapters and within a particular chapter?
The repetition between chapters happens because the storyteller of a given story doesn't know if you know the origin story or not. (It's like how every damned Superman or Spider-Man or whatever movie always has to show how Superman/Spider-Man came to be.) Within chapters it could be part of an oral recitation thing with the repetitions being vestigial choruses. There is a lot of scholarship around this novel, and I'm not really deeply involved in any of it. I'm a situation- and opportunity-driven dabbler.
Demon In White by Christopher Ruocchio. Not even 100 pages into it so I'm not gonna give an opinion yet. But what I'm finding really annoying in this book and the last one is the obvious missing content that's referenced over and over again from novellas he wrote in-between the main books. That's something I really dislike in general and it comes up so much. Like if whatever happened between books was so important that you reference it over and over again for context, why not just include it to begin with? That being said I've really enjoyed what I've read so far and Howling Dark is one of my favorite reads of the year so far. Everybody says Demon In White it the best book in the series. Can't wait to finish it.
Code by Charles Petzold. I'm about halfway through it. It's a good book that provides some context on how and why computers and code work the way they do. It's helped connect some bridges that just tutorials and practice coding didn't quite build. I'm not even in school for this shit. I'm just doing it as a side hobby. Still helps though.
Before these two I demolished The Three Body Problem in like a month. The first book is the fastest I've ever read a single novel. Took me about 3 days. I'm a slow reader, so that was lightning fast for me. Then I completed LotR for the first time completely. I started those books almost 20 years ago but never finished a single one for some reason. I still have my original movie copy of Two Towers with the Magic card I used as a bookmark in it. I bought the trilogy box set and just went for it. I cried multiple times throughout the read, then bawled like a baby at the end of Return of the King. I really felt that 20 year gap in my life come to a close. It was pure catharsis for me.
I think once I'm done with Sun Eater, I'm either gonna go Malazan or Elric. I'll probably sprinkle some Neuromancer in there for something different. See how that trilogy is before Hollywood fucks up another adaption. If anybody has any opinions on Malazan vs Elric I'll hear you out.
I'm very interested to see what you think once you finish Demon in White. I interpreted that the between context was intentionally omitted to show time has passed, but I hear what you're saying.
I completed LotR for the first time completely. I started those books almost 20 years ago but never finished a single one for some reason. I still have my original movie copy of Two Towers with the Magic card I used as a bookmark in it. I bought the trilogy box set and just went for it. I cried multiple times throughout the read, then bawled like a baby at the end of Return of the King. I really felt that 20 year gap in my life come to a close. It was pure catharsis for me.
Hear hear. I felt like that myself when I read it the first (and maybe also the 2nd) time. But that was 20 years ago. Actually, the first time was way before the first Peter Jackson movie came out. I long resisted even watching the movies, but they do stand up to the books imho.
The Oxford Handook of Theology, Sexuality, and Gender, ed. Adrian Thatcher. I've got 6 chapters left to go.
I feel like I’ve responded with this series several times already, but I’m not the faster reader.
Still listening to the Dungeon Crawler Carl series by Matt Dinniman. I’m on book 7, The Inevitable Ruin. I’ve listened all the way through twice. And I’ve heard the first couple a few more. A friend started the series recently so I started over to listen with her. I don’t mind at all. I really do love these books.
After this, I plan to finish the Red Rising series. I haven’t read the latest book in that yet. I’d also like to listen to the new series by James SA Corey. The Expanse series is probably my favorite of all time.
Looks like we’ll get book 8 around November-ish.
That soon? I figured it wouldn’t be until at least next year.
Is Dungeon Crawler Carl good? I wanted to find a light funny fantasy book and was deciding between that and Goblin Quest and decided to try the GQ first.
I am a big fan of Dungeon Crawler Carl, especially the audiobook. If you aren’t used to listening to books or you had trouble in the past, this is a perfect book to try it again.
It’s not going to be the best book you’ve ever read, but I promise promise promise you will never get bored. I found myself laughing out loud in my car a few times, and I teared up once.
The narrator, however, is the best I’ve ever heard and it’s not even close. I was absolutely blown away. This man could be doing very well for himself in cartoons and video games. You’ll feel like listening to a cartoon, which is why I say it’s an easy book to try on audio.
If you do listen, let me know what you think! If you get to the later books, I’m always looking for someone to discuss theories with!
I haven’t heard of GQ, but I see on Goodreads, I see a friend of mine gave it 5 stars. (He rated DCC at a 4, for what it’s worth). How do you like it so far?
It starts out pretty light too, and I like how there’s some good deepening of the commentary of the society too.
It's alright.
Its shortish and I am like halfway through, and so far have yet to be forced to smile. It's an interesting idea of doing it from the Goblins perspective, but I don't feel enough time was spent in the beginning to get me attached to the character enough. I also just feel like it could be better in general, maybe it will be in the last half.
I haven't done audiobook in a while. Last one I did was one of Sanderson's Stormlight archive books and it was a little overwhelming while doing anything that requires any amount of focus.
I have yet to read Goblin Quest, but I do really like that author. His Liberiomancer series is really good.
Yeah. When I first tried audio, I couldn’t do it at all. I just kept missing too much. I had to teach myself how to do it and once it clicked, I couldn’t go back.
I find it helps me stay on task when doing tedious tasks while listening, but I can’t work my day job and listen either.
I finished up Terry Pratchett's Equal Rights the other day, and have moved on to Mort. As much as I enjoyed Equal Rights,I think Mort takes the title of my favorite so far. Lots to read yet, though, so we'll see if it gets displaced
Doing a deep read of The Politics of Nonviolent Action by Gene Sharp. There are many examples of how effective non-violent action/resistance has been to remove dictatorships. Along with the reasons they were successful or not.
Goblin Quest.
Wanted light funny fantasy and it seemed to be recommended a few times.
It's not as funny as they made it sound, but it's interesting enough.
@dresden
Chapter 4 of 'The Jane Austen Remedy' by Ruth Wilson. Inspiring book, adding titles to my TBR list.
I love the Jack Reacher books, so fun to read. The rugged 'murican roadtrip hero, but one that doesn't disrespect women, and has an individual conscience (not just patriotism or some such). The bad guys always get their comeuppance, which is satisfying. The ending might be expected, but the stories are not predictable. Not too realistic to get in the way of easy entertainment, but not too much strain on suspension of disbelief either.
I'm still reading Josiah Bancroft's Tower of Babel tetralogy, last book now. It's amazing, I love evrything about it. Plot twists, unusual characters, and unusal language too. He's making up his own analogies all the time and they all sound so natural.
I wish I could say the last book is as good as the first book, but that's an extremely high target and it doesn't just quite reach. That said, the series as a whole still stands miles above most of the genre.
What's the genre? 21st century Fantasy SciFi Steampunk?
In this age and time, I sometimes like my fiction to have the characters that are closer to white and black, instead of infinite shades of gray. Obvious good guy vs obvious bad guys, with the good guy winning in the end. At least something should be simple.
Haven't read Tower of Babel, but it has been mentioned before, will check it out.
Please do. "Senlin Ascends" is the first book.
Just did my annual re-read of "Jurassic Park". 10/10 always recommend.
Started "The Lost World" this morning. I always struggle to get into this one. Funnily enough, the cover has the blurb "Fast and gripping" from The Washington Post Book World. "Fast" is never how I've thought of this novel; seems like it takes forever to get going.
I recently finished the dark tower series from king. I enjoyed it.
Now I’m onto the expanse from Corey. I’m on the third book - so far I’m digging this series too.
Took a break in the series at The Wolves of Cala. Something about this particular book isn't resonating with me. Maybe this western showdown vibe is dragging on too long, it's almost off putting at this point. I want more of the sci fi elements and notes that the earlier books had.
Dark Tower: such an excellent series! I even didn't mind ðe ending as some did; I can't imagine how else he might have concluded it - ðere was a lot to tie up!
Expanse: I don't write spoilers, but the auþors have said ðhe Expanse's main driver was never intended to be ðe sci-fi, and ðis starts being very evident around books 6 or 7, which is when I fully lost interest. I haven't even boðered to read ðe cliff notes about what happened after. Lots of people liked it regardless - if you make it all ðe way þrough (is ðe series finished?) it'll be interesting to see your opinion. Did you watch the show?
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I also recently finished the Dark Tower and man… don‘t read the finale sitting in a crowded bus like I did, too many feels ._.
I thought the ending was perfect. It was tough, but I agree, how else could it have finished?
I enjoyed it every step of the way in all its wackiness.
Between books atm. However, I did finish:
The Fisherman by John Langan (literary cosmic horror) | bingo squares: award, late to the party (HM)
Two friends go fishing at a creek with an unbelievable history.
Given how much buzz this got when it came out, I was expecting something more than the sort of classical Lovecraft et al.-inspired horror that it is, but maybe that's exactly what its fans were excited for. Would probably rate this as "fine", albeit far too slow for my taste. I found the middle section more interesting than the rest, largely because it's more plot-driven and there's no fishing in it. Be prepared for a lot of fishing.
A Prayer for the Crown-Shy by Becky Chambers (cozy solarpunk) | bingo squares: minority author, orange, short, LGBTQIA+, award, cozy
2nd novella in the Monk & Robot series. The monk introduces the robot to human civilization.
This was also fine, but I liked the first one better.
(Edited b/c I forgot summaries.)
Just wrapped up “The Devils” by Joe Abercrombie. Really good first book to his new series. Top notch character building and prose. Classic fantasy characters based on old tropes but done really well with his unique flair. Best Werewolf I’ve ever read.
How "grim" is it? Compared to his First Law Trilogy
Equally grim. I believe the driver of his storytelling is trying to find a morsel of happiness in a dark and brutal world.
Ah, will keep it for "some day" then. I loved the First Law Trilogy but don't feel like reading anything that grim again.
I started reading le Carré earlier ðis year, starting wiþ Tinker Tailor, and read ðe next two before starting over at "ðe beginning" wiþ ðe first Smiley novel. It's been spaced out between Þe Black Company novels, and I just finished ðe second middle two back-to-back ðat feature Smiley only incidentally. I wasn't þrilled wiþ The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, and The Looking Glass War was better but not fantastic; maybe I'm just overly fond of Smiley and since he barely appears in eiðer... le Carré was a fantastic writer, so his novels have a higher bar, I guess. le Carré's worst storytelling is better ðan most author's best. I quite liked A Murder of Quality - full on Smiley, and no spy story! How interesting!
I'm taking a break before ðe next in ðe Smiley series. In going to read eiðer Baxter's Destroyer, or Tchaikovsky's Shroud; I haven't yet decided which.
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I finished Trust by Hernan Diaz, which I absolutely loved (the quickest I've ever read a novel according to my StoryGraph). Hernan Diaz might be my new favorite author, and I added his first novel, In The Distance, to my TBR.
I'm currently reading Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism by Sarah Wynn-Williams.
Finished AE van Vogt's "the universe maker". Like I said last week, an older book in an archaic Dutch translation. I was quite amused by it, even though the protagonist is totally unsympathetic to me. This may be due to the age of the book, I'm not sure. After that I've read "the forever war" (award winning in 1975) and "forever peace" by Joe Haldeman. They're also good, if you like space opera's, but these are 50-ish year old books, and there's some rampant homophobia in the main character. I also failed to see how this adds to the plot. The last book has some wierd ending, like the author wrote himself into a corner and didn't know how to get out. Still, an entertaining read.
I'm still listening to "the eye of the Bedlam bride" by Matt Dinniman on my commute. This a first time listening to an audiobook for me, but I like it so far. I have to say this kind of book lends it for listening (for me at least) due to it's length. Basically if I miss a part during listening (when driving) I'll pick back up without missing much or having to "rewind".
Reading Ketogenic: The Science of Therapeutic Carbohydrate Restriction in Human Health
Very dense book (textbook?) about the science behind the Ketogenic diet. Every cited reference to a study is additional reading which I've not done yet, but this is the most information I've seen about this in one place.
You should post about that over in !ketogenic@discuss.online, seems like the sort of thing @pulsejet@discuss.online would be interested in
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