Karsa Orlong

Janet, I've just noticed your signature. I don't care if you don't like SF or fantasy, you have my eternal respect Of course, you do realise that if you ever change your signature I will immediately withdraw that comment

I thought you'd read them all already Lucky you, to have all that shelf space It's the shelf space that I find precious Don't be silly, of course you'll agree! Sounds like a plan

Ha, the only way I'd find them in my local charity shop is if I donated them in the first place Got to love blurb like that He is good, though - but he's no Druss <<snooty look>> Maybe we should coordinate? Although the prospect of starting yet another series at the moment (bearing in mind my latest plan) is slightly . . . exhausting

£6.50??? You'd be lucky to get the covers for that much in London Brilliant purchases. Re Eddings, The Diamond Throne is great fun. Personally, I'd still start with 'The Belgariad', as it's his best work, imo. My worry would be that, reading 'The Elenium' first, you might start to notice his formula if you then went on to read 'The Belgariad', but it's a minor thing. Sparhawk's a great character (but there's no Silk!). As you know, Dawnthief is one I own and have been meaning to read for ages. I've heard that the first book is nothing to shout about, but they get progressively better

I've never heard you say it, so that's obviously not true

She's 49 Her rant seems so far off the mark to me that I think it was done to provoke reaction (which it did, if you read the comments) Even stranger, she's a big fan of 'vintage' SF, so I'm sure she must have encountered far, far worse examples of the sort of thing she's on about

Can't imagine who'd say something like that Congrats on finishing your plan

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OD72Dm258A

Castle 6x03

1985?

Yes, that did occur to me

Whether they get the science right or not, if Sandra Bullock's in it it's bound to be rubbish

A new plan of sorts: Emperor of Thorns by Mark Lawrence - started 14/10/13 Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch Desolation Island by Patrick O'Brian The Lords of the North by Bernard Cornwell Imperium by Robert Harris The Legend of Deathwalker by David Gemmell The Lamp of the Wicked by Phil Rickman Caliban's War by James S.A. Corey May have to add more to this to get TBR below 50 - especially if I order these Vernor Vinge books ETA: I've just noticed that all of those books are parts of trilogies/series I have on the go

No, not yet, but I've got my eyes on three or four more which might end up on there pretty soon I saw the omnibus back when I wanted to re-buy A Fire Upon the Deep (having cleverly got rid of my original paperback) and you're right, it's HUGE, which is why I didn't buy it. I bought them as individual paperbacks instead. They recently arrived on Kindle, too, for £2.99 each Thanks! Working on it . . .

Plan update: Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel - finished 13/06/13 Emperor: The Gates of Rome by Conn Iggulden - finished 24/07/13 Prophecy by S. J. Parris - finished 18/06/13 The Mauritius Command by Patrick O'Brian - finished 14/07/13 The Black Dahlia by James Ellroy - finished 27/06/13 The Odyssey by Homer - finished 24/08/13 Something by David Gemmell, to be decided (probably either Hero in the Shadows or The First Chronicles of Druss the Legend) - finished 26/07/13 A Deepness in the Sky by Vernor Vinge - finished 13/10/13 The Technician by Neal Asher - finished 04/07/13 Pompeii by Robert Harris - finished 06/09/13 The Silver Spike by Glen Cook - finished 22/06/13 The one no-one saw coming: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee - finished 16/08/13 Well that plan took me a while to complete, but it's finally done. Might come up with a shorter one now to try and get the TBR down to 50

Book #59: A Deepness in the Sky by Vernor Vinge From Amazon: After thousands of years searching, humans stand on the verge of first contact with an alien race. Two human groups: the Qeng Ho, a culture of free traders, and the Emergents, a ruthless society based on the technological enslavement of minds. The group that opens trade with the aliens will reap unimaginable riches. But first, both groups must wait at the aliens' very doorstep for their strange star to relight and for their planet to reawaken, as it does every two hundred and fifty years.... Then, following terrible treachery, the Qeng Ho must fight for their freedom and for the lives of the unsuspecting innocents on the planet below, while the aliens themselves play a role unsuspected by the Qeng Ho and Emergents alike. More than just a great science fiction adventure, A Deepness in the Sky is a universal drama of courage, self-discovery, and the redemptive power of love. A Deepness in the Sky is a 1999 Nebula Award Nominee for Best Novel and the winner of the 2000 Hugo Award for Best Novel. Thoughts: A Deepness in the Sky is the multi-award-winning prequel-of-sorts to Vinge's earlier novel A Fire Upon the Deep. However, although it is set in the same universe and features one character who appeared in A Fire Upon the Deep, the connections end there (the events in this novel take place some 30,000 years before AFUtD) and the book can be read as a completely standalone novel, without any knowledge of the other book - and AFUtD can be read without any knowledge of this one, too. The story starts with a manhunt and then jumps forward 160 years as the Qeng Ho, a group of galactic traders, arrive at a mysterious sun called the OnOff star, which blazes to life for 35 years and then goes dark for two and a half centuries. It has been repeating this cycle since the Qeng Ho first observed it, thousands of years ago, but only recently have they detected radio transmissions from within the system. These radio transmissions also attract the attention of another human civilisation, the Emergents, who arrive almost simultaneously. Various things happen, and both human fleets find themselves marooned in the OnOff system, like flies trapped in amber, waiting for the sun to reignite and bring the civilisation on the planet below out of hibernation, and then wait even longer for them to achieve a technological level that the humans can exploit, repair their ships and regain interstellar flight so that they can return home with their bounty. This all happens right at the start, and it is from this point that Vinge's story really takes off. It is a tale of treachery, manipulation and murder. At its heart, I suppose it's a fairly straightforward tale, but Vinge's brilliance is in layering the tale with twists, misdirections and revelations and, whereas a lot of authors of hard SF are all about the ideas and forget the characters, he once again creates a memorable bunch of humans and aliens to populate the story and drive it forward. The central themes of slavery and mind-control possess a very human heart, and spiral outwards to examine capitalism, totalitarianism, democracy, and more. Although the bad guys are obvious and beg to be disapproved of, the characters develop organically and believably. This is especially true, I found, of the Spiders. As with A Fire Upon the Deep's marvellous Tines and Skroderiders, he has once again created a truly memorable alien race but - unlike in the earlier novel - the Spiders are notable because they reflect the development of our own world, not because of their complete otherworldliness. The family at the centre of the story make for a group of wonderful, loveable characters whose trials and tribulations sucked me in completely. Sherkaner Underhill, in particular, is a joy, a genius bursting with ideas and humour and charm. At 775 pages, A Deepness in the Sky is a big, complex novel that spans many years. I found it dark and yet somehow uplifting. Perhaps it lacks the galaxy-spanning scope and the sense of fun that infuses its predecessor but there is still a sense of awe about it, and an intense focus that meant I never once wanted to rush to finish it but, instead, to take my time and absorb it. In fact, I'm sad it's over, and it's left me once again wanting to read everything this brilliant author has written. 10/10

I suppose I should be pleased it's as low as it is, really, but it would be nice to get it into the 40s, as I've been stuck in the 50s for months now

Bought a couple of Kindle books the other day: Emperor of Thorns by Mark Lawrence and Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch I'm never going to get my TBR list down to 50 at this rate

Sleepy Hollow 1x01. Like.

I'm 550 pages into A Deepness in the Sky

Yeah, me too. One of the aspects of audiobooks I dislike is that pronunciation of names etc might be different from how I imagined. I'm sure we all pick the pronunciation that flows easiest for us as we're reading, and stick with it - I don't need someone else messing with that! Plus I have in my head what the characters sound like, so someone doing silly voices doesn't help. Of course, these authors could make it a hell of a lot easier for us by providing a pronunciation guide, like they do with, say, The Odyssey. Without that I would've gone on pronouncing Telemachus as Tele-Mak-us instead of Te-lem-a-kus

Groan!