What book is currently on your nightstand? How do you like it? Would you recommend it to others?

  • wjrii@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    Just finished The Expanse books, and now reading The Wall by Adrian Goldsworthy. It’s absolutely beach-reading sword-&-sandal nonsense, but the author loves his (paper thin) characters and is an Oxford-educated professional historian who writes novels on the side, so it’s fun and the world building and research are impeccable.

    Technically I am also still wading through In the Name of the Rose. Gotta get back to that one and wrap it up. I’m fond of ol’ William, but my bandwidth to understand and allegorize the intramural politics of late-medieval monastic orders is limited.

    • McBinary@kbin.socialOP
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      1 year ago

      Oye Bosmang!

      I read Leviathan’s Wake last year and it was really good. They really undersold Fred Johnson in the TV show, he’s a badass. I’ve only read about half of Calaban’s War and then set it down for some reason or another, and never went back to it. I should really finish that while I’m waiting on my Libby holds to be released.

      • wjrii@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        They’re really good, but while I may be influenced by having seen the show first, I think it’s one of the best adaptations I’ve ever seen, especially given the offscreen drama with budget, network, cancellation, and some unfortunate awfulness from one of the cast members.

        Some characters are slightly better in the show, some in the books, but I’ve rarely seen a show nail the tone and spirit of the source material like The Expanse did, but that said, there’s so much more space to live in the characters’ heads and soak up their world in a book, that’s it’s absolutely worth it to go back and pick them up, and they’re easy to start and stop, I’d say.

    • iNeedScissors67@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      If you enjoy novels written by historians, try Essex Dogs by Dan Jones. I just finished it last week and absolutely loved it. I’m itching for the sequel to come out, it’s a long wait until October for me now.