Nov
16
Posted by : | On : November 16, 2004
Nine of the 10 people who showed up to discuss this Discworld novel had tried reading it, but only 5 finished. Six had read Pratchett before and 2 sent in e-mail comments.
Although still satire, this is Pratchett’s darkest book in the series. It’s a socio-political police procedural. In it Sam Vimes, one of the Ankh-Morpork Guards, ends up in his own past during a time of political struggle. He mentors his younger
Nov
02
Posted by : | On : November 2, 2004
Only 7 of the 12 people who came to the discussion on a dismal election day had read this sequel to Darwin’s Radio. All who started it had finished and all but one person had read Bear before.
This book begins 12 years after the first book and follows some of the same characters. The “virus children,” the next evolutionary leap, are growing up. Their odd looks and abilities cause fear, which leads the government to put them in
Oct
19
Posted by : | On : October 19, 2004
Eight out of 10 people who showed up for this discussion managed to lose themselves in this book of British nonsense, and 6 of them found their way to the end. Four had read Fforde before.
This is the second book in the Thursday Next series. Four have been published so far and a fifth is due out the summer of 2005. The first book, The Eyre Affair, which we read last year, is a stand-alone book. This second book, however, is part of a continuing series in which Literary Detective Thursday tries to retrieve
Oct
05
Posted by : | On : October 5, 2004
We moved this extremely long, complex space opera up in the queue 2 weeks early so only 5 people of the 7 who showed up at the meeting had read any of it. No one had finished. Four people had read Reynolds previously.
This book is set in the same universe as Reynolds’s first book, Revelation Space, which we read earlier. Although Chasm City covers some backstory about the universe, the book can be read as a stand-alone novel. In it a bodyguard, Tanner
Sep
21
Posted by : | On : September 21, 2004
Eleven people met to discuss this book, and 2 sent in e-mail comments. Of the 11, only one had not read any of the book and one had not finished. Nine had read Moon’s work previously.
In this Nebula Award-winning, near-future book, autist Lou is faced with a dangerous procedure to correct his condition, but it may also change who he is. Moon paints a vivid picture of his different inner world, showing us his obsession
Sep
07
Posted by : | On : September 7, 2004
Fifteen people turned up for the discussion of this darkly humorous ghost story, and one person called in comments during the meeting. Four had finished the book and three had read a portion, but definitely did plan to finish it later. Seven had read Sean Stewart before.
The story is about an aging punk, “Dead” Kennedy, who sees ghosts in black and white, is still in love with his ex-wife, loses dead-end jobs on purpose and is haunted by dead relatives–one of them a murderer. One reader loved the book enough to call it “my religious experience for the year,” while another thought it
Aug
17
Posted by : | On : August 17, 2004
Twelve people showed up for the discussion of this first book in the Crossfire series. Of those, five had finished it, three had read part of it, and eight had read Kress before.
The book begins when Quakers, Saudis, American Indians, and other groups with enough money to buy passage off a dying Earth colonize a planet they call Greentrees. There they discover puzzling, non-native inhabitants, the Furs, and become embroiled in interstellar war. Besides the usual problems of survival on a
Aug
03
Posted by : | On : August 3, 2004
Of the seven people who showed up for this discussion of the first book in The Fall of Ile-Rien trilogy, five had read the entire book and six had read Wells before. Two people e-mailed comments and one sent a verbal message.
The trilogy starts 30 years after the The Death of the Necromancer when Ile-Rien is at war with an unknown enemy, the Gardier. The bombing by the black airships, along with the early Twentieth Century level of technology, gives this story the feel of World War II England. Tremaine, a strong but reluctant heroine,
Jul
20
Posted by : | On : July 20, 2004
Fifteen people showed up for the discussion of Stross’s first novel published in book form (a previous novel was serialized). Two people had not read the book and five had not finished.
Comments ranged from “The best book we’ve ever read,” to “I’m surprised it made the Hugo [nomination] list.” We found this post-cyberpunk space opera surprisingly complex for its length. The conflict begins when an artificial intelligence called The Festival drops telephones on a repressed pseudo-Russian
Jul
06
Posted by : | On : July 6, 2004
Of the ten people who showed up for this discussion of the second book in the Tamir Trilogy, seven had read the book and one still had to finish it. Seven people had read Flewelling’s work previously, and seven (not all the same seven) had read the previous volume, The Bone Doll’s Twin.
In the second book, Tobin, the second heir to the throne of Skala, now knows that he (Flewelling uses male pronouns for Tobin until nearly the end of the book) is really a girl and was given his twin brother’s shape by dark magic. Throughout this book Tobin trains as a warrior and deals with the problems of coming of age
