Univerze
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Posts posted by Univerze
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Have read about 50 pages today of Dragonquest, and won't be all I read of it today, going right back to it. This series is even better in English than in Dutch.. and I do remember why I loved them so much when I read them first years ago.
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^I still plan to re-read both LotR (since I only got through the first book) and Earthsea, since both have been years and years ago and my reading skills and taste have changed.
And the suggestions I made too, aren't particularly too much like Tolkien, just epic fantasy like Tolkien..
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Eragon by Christopher Paolini certainly pays a lot of respect and owes much to Tolkien's fantasy world A very well written and fluid fantasy tale which expands into a series.
And if someone thinks HP is too child-like, Eragon isn't?
Sorry, but I hated Eragon, is like a nice idea, but just not good enough. I recommend Robert Jordan, The Wheel of Time series, a loooong series of big books (always good for escapism), that is set in a sort of medieval world, and deals with magic and creatures like in Tolkien's works.
There's the Bitterbynde Trilogy, by Cecilia Dart-Thornton. I have only read the first two, but they're enjoyable books.
The Earthsea books by Ursula K. LeGuin always reminded me of Lord of the Rings, particularly in a way where, it was hard for me to read Lord of the Rings, and I never really got through these books either, but I have heard people love them.
Katherine Kerr is a writer your friend might also want to look into, she has several series of fantasy books, celtic based mostly, this series involves a lot of flashbacks to previous lives/incarnations of the lead-persons, so if that's your thing, they're great series.
Actually, there are a lot of fantasy series that in a way, resemble Lord of the Rings, mostly in plot. You know, ancient evil reawakens, a group of people from different races has to work together to save the world, undertaking some sort of queste.
Check this page out, wikipedia always helps me lots.
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I have two different opinions or whether I like to keep my books looking good or not. One, is for my hardcovers, my pretty books and books that mean a lot to me (you know, when I finally get to buy it after having read it several times at the library or something). Those books I treat with care. I love hardcovers too for letting me read them over and over without looking mangled, even though I hate dust jackets or whatever that cover's called.
Then, there's paperbacks. Most, if not all, of my paperbacks look like they've been read plenty. I have to enjoy reading, and I can't when I am constantly worrying if I crack the spine or not. So my paperbacks can look really bad.. I always figure when it's so mangled I have the urge to throw it away, I'll buy me a cheap-ish hardcover some day. Like at some discount book store, or when I walked into Forbidden Planet with a friend and discovered they had the very pretty hardcover of Kushiel's Chosen for just 4 pounds.
But besides cracking the spine, I keep them looking nice. You know, no dog-earing, no smudges etc.
AND it's for ME to mess up my books. When I loan my books to someone (rarely ever happens, my friends don't care about my kind of books, nor do they read english ones), they have to be returned to me in exact the same condition they were.
And about the parcels being delivered.. well I order just at one online shop since I don't have a creditcard and we don't have that many national online bookshops. So I always order at the cheapest one, which also happens to be the one that has the most books, and the best service. It's a shop that started out as new books shop, but now sort of intermediates for second hand books too... have bought my copy of Harry Potter and... eh, well can't remember which one exactly, but it looked brand new. However, if you have complaints, the book's not as expected, the shop makes sure you get money back etc. So that makes it safe to buy secondhand books. And our post is usually very careful with parcels, yay.
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My car is an actual Leon, a Seat Leon, we just call it 'The Leon'. Not very original I know
Hee hee, my brother's name is Leon, and he has a Seat Leon too.
I finished Dragonflight today (Anne McCaffrey), guess it was only around 200 pages, and since I have this omnibus thingie of the first three books in her Dragonriders of Pern series, it's on to the next part, Dragonquest.
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^I can agree with that, but I can struggle to read a new book, but if my mind's put to re-reading one I have already read, it's hard to read the new one. Sometimes you just want something you've already read, plus sometimes I don't have the money to read something new. My local library (or actually, the libraries in this part of my country, since you can order any book from any of those) sucks. It doesn't have a lot of books I want to read that I haven't read yet, or they just have the translated versions. And since I am pretty much determined to read them in english if that's the original language they're written in..
So often too, re-reading is something I do when I have no choice.
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I am surprised to see not everyone re-reads. I do that, so many times. I just buy books when they're my favs or I know I'll like them (money issues) and those I re-read over and over. My favourite books, I might have read at least 10 times. I think every good book deserves to be read at least two times. The first time you can't really judge, at least with me. Is like watching a film once, the second time is very different. Second time around you see different things. I have books I have read six times and still every time is different. And some books, they're like my favourite place to be, the world, the characters have become home and friends to me.
But seriously, if you like a book, why not re-read? Is like you watch a film you love multiple times, you don't just watch it once do you?
I don't get people who don't re-read.
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The remake was on TV recently and I recorded it but I'm quite worried about watching it. I can't imagine it will be anywhere near as good as the original!
If by remake you mean the 2001(-ish?) film, it's horrible, and has very little to do with the book. A lot has been sacrificed to make it a more popular, more Hollywood type of film. The beginning is okay, at least not annoying and with reasonable acting. The special effects too, are good, when he travels through time, looks amazing.
But from when he comes into the future, troubles start. The Morlocks, the Eloi, everything is different. And I think it's Samantha Mumba that plays Weena, and she's horrible. But the Eloi here are no longer the docile, indifferent creatures, they're pretty much a normal people.. the Morlocks have a class system suddenly and are just quite different.
I didn't like this film one bit, though you should probably see for yourself to see what they made of it.
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You know, I looked this book up and I think I might read it, I love post-apocalyptic fiction in general and already thought about reading Day of the Triffids, but now it seems this writer has more good books.
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In 15 minutes, CSI Miami, then Lie to Me, then House will be on telly.
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Well, I know this topic's kinda old. But just wanted to give my thoughts to this as it seems that everyone likes War of the Worlds better.. I don't. I love this one better. I have loved the story since I was a kid, watching the 1960's film over and over with my dad. Then a few years back, I finally ended up reading this, and I loved it. Have also read WotW, but seriously.. the Time Machine is my first love. Or well, one of them.
I don't mind H.G. Wells keeping on about the future of mankind, as I am sort of interested in that myself.. loving mostly (post)apocalyptic scenarios, which this would be, in some way. And though it just plays a minor role, I love the bit where the time traveler travels on to the end of the Earth, the far far future, where all human-like life has vanished.
In my opinion, this book is good, as far as you can call it a book.
So short. -
Mom's got the radio on, Natasha Bedingfield with Unwritten is on there, I don't like pop-music generally but this one's quite ok.
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Well, I haven't read it, and I voted, "don't intend to". Since that's what I think, but like I said somewhere else, I might some day, like with the DaVinci Code, just to see what the fuss was about. (Hated that one). But really, this sounds too much like kid books to me, and not in a good way. I agree with HH above, seriously. I like my vampires scary, human blood drinking and not really part of human society. (I know, I read Laurell Hamilton's Anita Blake series too, but even though the vamps there are legal citizens, they also drink human blood and can be quite scary and bloodthirsty at times). I also like gothic and horror fiction, so to have vampires turned into this whole popular-teeny hype is a little distasteful.
Strangely, saying this doesn't mean immediately that I couldn't enjoy them when reading them. Just, it would get old fast that they're for teens, since I like my books to have more gore and sex than generally in these kind of books.
Mind you, what I have said above is from the impression I have of what the books are like. If I am totally wrong, please feel free to correct me.
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I generally not judge a book by it's nice cover, as I've found that, even though the nice covers gets you to pick up a book and flick through it, often they have very little to do with the book. I have many books that I still don't know why on earth they have that particular cover.
I am attracted to book titles however.. a gripping title gets me looking at the book sooner.. but I judge my book by the back print mostly, if I already have my eyes on that particular book.
What I do a lot, is read reviews. On the site of my online shop, on this forum now, on other book sites. I don't go for the opinion, I want to know the why, so I can tell if I'll like it. I stick to just a few genres mostly too. Authors I know, well some always get the benefit of the doubt. Laurell Hamilton (even though her books often are so not well-written), Anne Rice up till the Christian stuff. But even my favourite authors have books I don't care about, so I don't automatically buy it.
Though honestly, if I had a bigger budget to buy books, I would definitely be less picky.
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Watched the first two episodes again yesterday (of the 2005-ish series then), was great getting back to it. Though honestly, why they chose the first episode as the pilot, I don't know, I don't like the living plastic things.
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Have only read HP.. they're fantastic. I have no intention of reading Twilight. Okay, maybe someday in the future when I have nothing left to read..
But from what I know of Twilight, it's vampires for kiddies, basically.
All the negative comments here don't get me excited to read them either, but HP is just so good, I can't see how Twilight can be better. 
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You're a saint. Even if I don't like a book I can never get rid of it, at least, I wouldn't be able to give it away. We don't have a nice secondhand bookstore out here that does the exchange thing, not for books I like that is. But GIVE books away.. wow.
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Oh I thought of another one. Though this is a book, that's not horror, sci-fi, fantasy.. it's sort of, well a romance novel I guess. Belinda, by Anne Rampling, the pen name (one of) of Anne Rice. It's about a grown man, I believe he's in his 40's, that falls in love with this young girl, I won't elaborate on the plot much more because the plot wasn't what disturbed me. The book, I did love in a way. What disturbed me was, that this man falls for Belinda, I think she's 16 when all this starts, which isn't that young. However when you're 44 (just looked it up).. and the disturbing part was, that he dresses her up as younger. She doesn't look that young, but he starts with dressing her up like a girl that's not even 10 years old yet, taking pics of her, getting aroused by her like that.
The whole thing's described beautifully, however I just thought it quite disturbing, and felt like it was wrong. Felt it was quite creepy.
Ofcourse it didn't help that when I read this book my ex (26 at the time) had just dumped me for this 14 year old girl.
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For me, to read more. Last year has been a bad year for me, and I couldn't keep my attention on a book, so I read very little. And if I read anything it was from my book collection, a.k.a. books I had read a million times. So for me, read more, read more new books, and try to read books I have been wanting to read forever. It's not really my TBR pile cause I dont have these books myself, but more like, books I have been thinking about reading for a while, mostly classics.
Also, not just to stick to the easy books, you know, the quick-read kind. Read books I have to work a little harder for.
Oh and to get further in series I haven't completed yet. Anne McCaffrey, Robert Jordan, Stephen King's Dark Tower series.
And to try to read The Lord of the Rings trilogy, in english finally.
I have never cared much for non-fiction books, so not really read more of those, maybe one or two astronomy ones.
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Oh I don't dislike that he likes average humans, it's just that I couldn't stand Dora.
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loved her book and went to austria and did a small tour of home where it happened it was great the building did not change
Don't you mean the Netherlands? Amsterdam?
Being from the Netherlands, this is something that always is spent a lot of time on in school etc. I did read it, and well, can't say it's an enjoyable read, more amazed I was at the time, which was.. well I think I was about Anne's age. haven't since though, don't need it to remind me of what happened then, like I said there's lots of attention going to it all the time, as it should really. There are war cemetaries all over the place, and I live in Nijmegen, one of the cities where operation Market Garden took place.
But this diary makes you realize how surreal everything was then, we can't imagine something happening here with us nowadays.
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Wow, again a reading challenge hee hee, you know you make me feel so unstructurized (is that a word?) by just reading whatever I want next, no structure, no ideas.
Just checked this out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_years_in_literature
And I realized, I would honestly have an easier time reading a book from every decade of the 19th century, than of the 20th.. actually I have read some mentioned there, guess I like 19th century books better.
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Wow, good luck with this, must be hard to find books to read from some countries, I know my country doesn't have many books I'd like to read. Unless it's children's books, like Crusade in Jeans, used to love that one when I was a kid.
Amazed you haven't read anything from the UK yet! Not for your list anyway...
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I don't know how I'm going to read them when my mom thinks they're bad books and doesn't want them in her house.
How old are you? My mom never dictated what I could or couldn't read, my dad didn't care. Mom even got me adult books from the library on her librarycard cause I had a children's one and couldn't get them. I have been reading Stephen King since before I was 10 years old. And after I was like, 12, I had no one checking what books I read.. and I ended up fine hee hee.
But the Vampire Chronicles bad books? Has your mom read them herself or does she hate the idea of them...
What are you listening to?
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69 eyes - we own the night