Recent Activity
Our members regularly comment and rate the books we have been discussing, below is some of the most recent activity on the site..
This month: Graham rated The Great When
This month: Sean rated Dakini Atoll
This month: Sean rated Rakesfall
Aug 2025: Sinclair rated Neuromancer
Aug 2025: Sinclair rated Mickey7
Aug 2025: Sinclair rated Asunder
Jul 2025: Ross commented on Mickey7 (see comment...)
I feel this might be like a more watered-down version (in terms of badness) of Artemis, where the further away I get from it the more shite I think it was. There were aspects of this novel I liked. I liked how it didn't come down hard on the (philosophical) questions of personal it was raising - it was all just whatever the particular character thought. I disliked intently how the universe was set so far in the future that they don't have a clear memory of Earth (long lost) but the language is that of VERY contemporary American sitcoms - this is difficult to do well but you have to at least try. His thoughts on mutually assured destruction and it's accompanying weapons and how the knowledge of that interacts with culture seemed pretty incoherent to me - which was annoying as they partially drove the book. Like some modern authors he seems to have bought into a completely unpoetic approach to how to describe unworldly things/characters, which I personally intensely dislike. However, it does make for novels which you can just blaze through easily. I genuinely think the film is alot better than the book in most ways - go and see it!
Jul 2025: Ross rated Mickey7
Jul 2025: Ross commented on Asunder (see comment...)
Too long but I kind of appreciated the epicness of it. Some surprising developments in the characters who she obviously thought alot about, but it didn't have the kind of strange atmosphere that The Border Keeper had. Would be very difficult to maintain that over 500 pages of whatever it was, but still. I was unsure on what was going on in the world building, as it was at some level of economic and technological development which I occasionally found jarring and not really thought out (which would be fine - nobody expects, say, the economy of "Dream Quest to Unknown Kadath" to make sense, but in a putatively "set in a believable world" fantasy like this, it seems a bit strange).
I really liked the ending.
Jul 2025: Ross rated Asunder
Jul 2025: Ross commented on Redshirts (see comment...)
I really did hate this, and more admittedly because it somehow won the Hugo Award. Having read two Scalzi novels, I can opine that he writes like a scriptwriter, you get no sense of who his characters are as they basically all act like sitcom characters or tropes, he isn't half as funny as people claim, the plot was somehow stupid (even though when I think about it it should have been a good idea maybe for a novella) and appealed to the worse cliqueness of nerd culture, it was too long even though it was only 300 pages, and had this somehow extremely irritating coda.
Jul 2025: Ross rated Redshirts
Jul 2025: Ross commented on The Last Hero (see comment...)
I enjoyed reading this so much, having been one of those teenagers who stayed up till 5 in the morning reading whenever they got a new Pratchett.
Jul 2025: Ross rated The Last Hero
Jul 2025: Ross commented on Theatre of the Gods (see comment...)
Quite unique. I wish I had read it when I was a teenager - it's got that kind of zany energy that I remember from Robert Rankin, only even crazier, if anything.
Jul 2025: Ross rated Theatre of the Gods
Jul 2025: Ross commented on In Ascension (see comment...)
This had to grow on me, and it was certainly too long. However, despite myself, I found myself taking in by the lead character.
Jul 2025: Ross rated In Ascension
Jul 2025: Ross commented on Lords of Uncreation (see comment...)
Surprisingly enjoyable given that we went straight to Book 3. Stress tested as a holiday read - it passed.
Jul 2025: Ross rated Lords of Uncreation