What are you reading now?
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I finally found a translated version of With fire and sword. It must be an old translation, though, from the 50s or 60s maybe because even the personal names are translated to their Spanish equivalents and the surnames are transcripted: Jan Skrzetuski is Juan Kretuski, Bohdan Khmelnytsky is Diodado Mielniski and so on.
Just convinced me to pick it up next time I pass the bookstore. Got some giftcards but I couldn't decide on what to buy the last time.Beny said:
Bought myself King's 'Cujo' a month back but started reading Game of Thrones for the third ****ing time for some reason. Probably going to finish that and then get on to King.
I've just started second book of Mistborn. I must say that I did not trust the series at the start. But I took the opportunity after reading Stormlight Archives. I must say, It's amazing. It's not totally great and I've read better books. But it's emotional and the world is really unique (That's one of Sanderson's talents, he makes a great fantasy worlds and environments.). Also, I find some of the autor's choices too drastic - Even tho some of them are really important.
If you ignore the coming of age bull**** it's really really good, yeah.
The second set of books set in that universe is in a kinda steampunk-y wild west thing, 300 years after the end of the original ones. It suffers a bit from the amount of comedy relief he put in - it's really like a slapstick comedy at times... - but the story and world work even better IMO. But they have way less coming of age annoyance and less of the ominous "destiny" ****.
The second set of books set in that universe is in a kinda steampunk-y wild west thing, 300 years after the end of the original ones. It suffers a bit from the amount of comedy relief he put in - it's really like a slapstick comedy at times... - but the story and world work even better IMO. But they have way less coming of age annoyance and less of the ominous "destiny" ****.
I liked the Mistborn trilogy (Sanderson is a magnificent goddamn beast), or at least the first two books, but the BIG REVEALS of the third one didn't work for me. Kudos to the author, everything fit together well and made perfect sense, but I didn't like the ending.
That's probably the reason why I didn't pick up the Mistborn Adventures. I should probably reconsider. *sigh*
All this "deification" stuff, namely. Oh, no, Creation! Ruin! THE BATTLE OF THE POWERS THAT CONSTRUCT THIS WORLD. Holy ****, Vin = Creation!!!
Reminded me too much of Mass Effect 3's abysmal ending, where "we do what we do" turned into "MAKE A CHOICE ABOUT THINGS YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND CONCERNING THE ENTIRETY OF THE UNIVERSE!". No thanks, can I just save Earth, please?
Reminded me too much of Mass Effect 3's abysmal ending, where "we do what we do" turned into "MAKE A CHOICE ABOUT THINGS YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND CONCERNING THE ENTIRETY OF THE UNIVERSE!". No thanks, can I just save Earth, please?
That's probably the reason why I didn't pick up the Mistborn Adventures. I should probably reconsider. *sigh*
RhaenysTargaryen
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I'm reading Riordan's Sword of Summer. I used to love his books in middle school, and it's actually a pretty fun read.
Lumos said:
Well, there's a really cool reason for all of that deification stuff!
There's a ton more to understand about the whole thing. There's an entire Cosmere out there for you to discover. I strongly encourage picking up Mistborn: Alloy of Law. It's the first book of the second Mistborn series, set hundreds of years after the first trilogy's events. And there's going to be a third trilogy as well, sometime in the future.
On the other side of the Cosmere, pick up the Stormlight Archive (first book - Way of Kings)! They are some of the best books I've read in the last couple of years.
Once you start reading other Mistborn books or Cosmere books... well let's just say, keep an eye out for, hm, familiar-looking people
I've read everything Cosmere except the Mistborn Adventures, so I know. That's why I said that Sanderson is a beast. And a magnificent one, at that.
The sheer amount of work he puts out is awe inspiring by itself.
And the intended scope. There's someone that set himself a life-long goal and is busy working away at it.
And the intended scope. There's someone that set himself a life-long goal and is busy working away at it.
Reading the Tank War by Mark Urban. So far its been great. Though i know some about the north african campaign, i had no idea in Operation Crusader the 7th armoured division made some 150 miles in two days and almost cut off the entire german and italian armies. Also it was cool to read about sidi rezegh airfield, i am used to fighting in it in Forgotten Hope 2
Currently reading a book I've had for ages called The Knight And Chivalry by Richard Barber. It's got some odd theories in it and I'm not sure if they're just outdated and wrong, or if they're right and I'm just too used to old stereotypes. Here are some of them:
1. The crossbow required more training than the longbow which is why the latter was more common. The genoese had a monopoly on their manufacture and use.
2. Cavalry charges were absolutely decisive and knights could rarely be reorganised for a new charge.
3. Longbows were much better than recurve bows (the author calls them "eastern bows" which instantly rings alarm bells)
4. No body of infantry was able to inflict large casualties on mounted knights before the 1300-1400s.
5. European destriers and chargers could not be easily manouevred by their riders.
6. A knight who didn't go on crusade was unlikely to see any more than intermittent warfare. (I know this one is nonsense. The crusader kingdoms in the eastern mediterranean saw similar levels of warfare to europe and long campaigns were much rarer, although probably significantly larger. But still. Odd statement to make.)
It definitely feels like a book from the 90s so I guess I can excuse it.
1. The crossbow required more training than the longbow which is why the latter was more common. The genoese had a monopoly on their manufacture and use.
2. Cavalry charges were absolutely decisive and knights could rarely be reorganised for a new charge.
3. Longbows were much better than recurve bows (the author calls them "eastern bows" which instantly rings alarm bells)
4. No body of infantry was able to inflict large casualties on mounted knights before the 1300-1400s.
5. European destriers and chargers could not be easily manouevred by their riders.
6. A knight who didn't go on crusade was unlikely to see any more than intermittent warfare. (I know this one is nonsense. The crusader kingdoms in the eastern mediterranean saw similar levels of warfare to europe and long campaigns were much rarer, although probably significantly larger. But still. Odd statement to make.)
It definitely feels like a book from the 90s so I guess I can excuse it.
RhaenysTargaryen
Veteran
Finished that Riordan book I mentioned. It was pretty fun. Probably going to reread Don Quixote next.
I'm pretty sure that crossbow required less training than the longbow.
Urgrevling said:
Just finished reading the second book, Marathon, having read the third book, Poseidon's Spear, beforehand because the god of shipping is fickle. I really love the bits at sea (at least half of any given book in this series)
Don't know if it's because I miss stuff when reading, but sometimes characters seem to be in two different places at once. I also think the hero's fighting ability is somewhat exaggerated, which could be justified since he's the narrator but sometimes he contradicts himself by saying things like "1v4 are impossible odds" and then later handily overcoming worse odds than that. There are also countless moments of "I would have died then, if it hadn't been for [a piece of armour] holding".
Those are just small niggles, I'm still devouring these books. There's two more books in the series to go before I'll probably go back to Tyrant.
As an aside, reading his books made me want to start working about and I've been doing that for a month now. It's probably too early to start saying they "changed my life", but... yeah, a bit.
Just started reading the Iliad. My version is in Norwegian, in very flowery and a bit archaic prose and written to keep some of the original's lyrical quality. I think it's impressive but I would personally prefer a more literal translation because I don't understand poetry. Really, all this meter business is almost impossible to understand for me. It doesn't do anything for me in the way I imagine it does for some people.
El Perro Finlandes said:
I know, that's the stereotype. It's just that medieval historiography has undergone a complete revisionist overhaul since the late 90s which is sometimes hard to keep up with. Old myths like "longbows were machine guns", "stirrups were revolutionary" and "the crusades were imperialist genocide" were common knowledge in c.1980 but would get you literally laughed out of any modern institute.
