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It’s that time again, to survey the various science fiction and fantasy awards and see what kinds of interesting short fiction we can find. 2013 Hugo Award Nominees 2012 Nebula Awards 2012 British Science Fiction Association Shortlist I’ve read the majority of the short story nominations for those three awards. The three up for the [...] Yea, yea, it’s April Fool’s, which means that most of you (or at least the two of you who even thought about it) were assuming that my threat to deliver a First Monday post today was just another joak. Ha. Joke’s on you. I actually did read a book this month. In fact, I read [...] this is a book: they work like this: they have words and stuff and communicate language. did you read any lately? Back in college I took a two-semester course called “Great Books,” wherein all we did was read and discuss (and I suppose there were some papers?) great books. The professor provided a list of 100 great books (it wasn’t the Time 100, or any other known list, just the professor’s own, but there was obviously [...]  Daneekas Ghost  January 7th, 2013, at 3:33 pm  87 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) I like pretentious things. I like difficult things. The higher the concept is, the more willing I am to try and appreciate what the author/artist/musician was going for. This past month was the most prolific reading month I’ve had in quite a while, and I read three books in particular that bore out my penchant [...] brianS December 4th, 2012, at 2:22 am 23 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired)  1491, Best-of lists, Charles C. Mann Comes the end of the year, the last First Monday of the year. With the world ending on Dec. 21 and all, my selection for this month seems entirely appropriate: Charles C. Mann’s 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus This 2006 best-seller by the science writer and Atlantic Monthly contributor was a [...] brianS November 5th, 2012, at 3:00 pm 10 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) National Book Award, The Dust Bowl, The Great Depression, Timothy Egan Tomorrow is election day. Go vote if you have not voted already. Else, it’s all your fault. This month’s selection is Timothy Egan’s The Worst Hard Time, “The untold story of those who survived the Great American Dust Bowl.” Wow. What a depressing book. Chapter after chapter of personal stories of misery and deprivation [...] Algonad October 22nd, 2012, at 7:00 am 27 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Joe Posnanski, Paterno I told BrianS I would pick up the book day post. The wife and kids are out of town for the weekend so I figured I could fit this in between cleaning the garage, raking leaves, trimming bushes, trimming trees, etc. I recently finished “Paterno” by Joe Posnanski. I’m not a big college football fan. [...] brianS September 3rd, 2012, at 7:27 am 32 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) book lists, Library of Congress So, I didn’t get much reading done this month either. And I’m currently back in the Motherland (“Hi, guys! Sure hope I can slip out for a Surly with y’all!”), ensconced with brotherS and sisterinlawS, preparing to deposit The Boy at the Alma Mater. Which means that this post was actually written some time ago. [...] brianS August 7th, 2012, at 12:42 pm 28 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) here's your damn book post, singularity, Vernor Vinge It’s been a long, hot summer, curiously bereft of book posts. The Natives are restless. Ok, ok, ok. My bad, people. Truth be told, I haven’t finished a book in the last two months. Back in June, I started reading a book about the experiences of a first-year med student learning about human [...] I felt the need for some good, old-fashioned, rock-em, sock-em space adventure stories recently. So I reached for a volume with the appropriate cover art (manly man with bulging muscles and movie-star good looks in futuristic, military-style outfit, set amidst post-apocalyptic ruins): L.E. Modesitt Jr.’s omnibus, The Forever Hero, a stapling together of three [...] brianS May 7th, 2012, at 8:07 am 39 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Ken Follett, The Pillars of the Earth This month, I succumbed to marketing. I’d seen multiple copies of Ken Follett’s The Pillars of the Earth around my used book store, trumpeting the new miniseries. Ken Follett seemed like such a familiar name, but I’d never read any of his stuff. So I figured, what the heck? Well, heck. This sprawling novel plays [...] brianS April 2nd, 2012, at 6:30 am 55 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) George R.R. Martin, Ken Follett, Richard Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker, The Pillars of the Earth Ok, so, I finally finished the latest installment of A Song of Fire and Ice Spoiler SelectShow Everyone dies. That pretty much wore me out. But I have started a new epic — Ken Follett’s The Pillars of the Earth. Of course, Follett has no chance of rivaling Martin for scope or spectacle, [...] brianS March 5th, 2012, at 10:17 am 13 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) A Song of Ice and Fire, Amador County, George R.R. Martin Mailing it in this morning. I spent all day yesterday with mrsS and friends in Amador County sampling wines. We had a lovely time celebrating the 30th anniversary of a good friend’s illegal entry into the country (he’s long been a citizen, and is a teacher at my kids’ high school), but it didn’t get [...] brianS February 8th, 2012, at 2:55 pm 20 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) beer, beer is awesome, books about beer Sorry for the delay, kids. Life happens sometimes. But the set-back allowed me to see this link on the burgeoning brew scene in Duhloot. Combined with the awesomeness that is the Northern Waters Smokehaus, and Duluth suddenly is a destination city. Back to the book biz. This month’s selection, Ambitious Brew: The Story of [...] brianS January 2nd, 2012, at 10:24 am 51 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Hugo Awards, Joan D. Vinge, space opera, The Summer Queen, The Winter Queen Happy New Year (celebrated). I’ll be heading to the office shortly, to get caught up a bit. I don’t have ESPN anyway, so I won’t be missing the bowl games (grrr). The New Year is a traditional time to look backward and look forward. Today’s selection, Joan Vinge’s 1991 Hugo nominee, The Summer [...] brianS December 5th, 2011, at 6:01 am 56 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Brandon Sanderson, Robert Jordan, The Wheel of Time, Towers of Midnight The paperback edition of Towers of Midnight finally came out a month or so ago, so I pounced at last. Yes, I am a cheap @ss. I waited a whole year just so that I wouldn’t have to pay those exorbitant hardback prices. Unfortunately, the year-long wait meant that I’d lost track of many [...] If ever there was a book that deserved to be the signature book of the WGOM, this baby would have to be it, because it is full of half-baked cr@p. Rose George’s The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters is, without a doubt, the best book I’ve ever read [...] brianS September 5th, 2011, at 7:26 pm 60 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Charles Dickens, Dan Simmons, Drood I have been a big fan of Dan Simmons’s work since I first ran across his Hyperion. The Hyperion Cantos, as the four-volume set is known, is a big-canvas space opera work, but one that is particularly literate, drawing liberally on the spirit of Keats as well as the structure and feel of the [...] I remember the first times I read Neuromancer and Mona Lisa Overdrive. Or, at least, I seem to remember them. The memory places me in the middle of summer, up in my old bedroom which hangs out over my mom’s driveway. The windows are open and the fan is struggling to move the hot, soupy [...] |
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