401–410 of 459 posts
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I envy your reading abilities
A couple of says ago there was an excellent comment here on Hacker News about that you shouldn't read only in bed but allocate proper not tired time for reading. Otherwise you learn to associate reading with sleeping and drowse off after a few pages.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Housekeeper_and_the_Profes...
is a beautiful novel about a mathematician with a short term memory condition, that should appeal to HN readers.
The Lord of the Rings
I'm rereading the Lord of the Rings after about ~15 years since my last one. For this read through I've been thoroughly delighted by the interlude of poems and songs whereas before I'd just gloss over them. I wonder if this is an effect of getting older.
Bilbo's Last Song scene here(spoiler warning for those who haven't read it as its at the end of the book).
"The Emperor of All Maladies" by Siddartha Mukhejee. He is a medical doctor, researcher .. plus writes great science / medical books. This one won a Pulitzer prize. Check out his other books "The song of the Cell" and "The Gene". The books take some work to read but every page is a treat.
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You've got some great ones on here. I'm curious how you found some of them to be. Jim Butcher "Brief Cases": I'm a huge fan of the Dresden series. I find it to be very enlightening as we watch an author grow with his primary character. The early books were particularly weak, but they grow and get better and better. However, I'm unfairly biased against short stories, so I avoid all the X.5 releases. Are these worth ex…
I revisited Assassin's Apprentice recently, as an audiobook, having read the series 20 years ago. Personally, I will not be continuing. The best term I came across to describe it is "injustice porn" or "misery porn." Fitz and the other protagonists are stymied and beaten at every turn, through the entire series (I checked summaries to see if there would ever be any payoff in continuing). If you're in the mood for an…
There sure are positive outcomes in Elderling series. In the long run. The characters and their life. It's not easy laid back reading, but in the end it is one of the best series. (Minus the four books of "Dragon ...", these are slop, not sure why Hobb wrote those).
My top book this year was Joe Abercrombie "The Devils". Also highlights were: - Brandon Sanderson "Wind and Truth" & "Yumi and the Nightmare Painter" - Indrek Hargla most of "Apothecary Melchior" series (didn't read all yet :) - Jim Butcher "Brief Cases" - James Islington "The Strength of the Few" Rest of the stuff: - I. Hargla "Süvahavva" series - John Gwynne "Ruin" & "Wrath" - nobody103 "Mother of Learning" I, II,…
You've got some great ones on here. I'm curious how you found some of them to be. Jim Butcher "Brief Cases": I'm a huge fan of the Dresden series. I find it to be very enlightening as we watch an author grow with his primary character. The early books were particularly weak, but they grow and get better and better. However, I'm unfairly biased against short stories, so I avoid all the X.5 releases. Are these worth ex…
"Mother of Learning" I picked up from my (ex-)colleague. Not in the time-travelling, but he told me that I would probably like Dungeon Crawler Carl. Haven't gotten to it yet. He's read more fantasy than me so he just suggested after we discussed about our preferences. This one I just wanted to read because he really was into :)
About Fitz -- read my other comment. I think whole Elderling series is worth it. It is the long game. Just being invested in characters and Robin Hobb can write characters. If you only think about Farseer trilogy, then I still think it's worth it, but maybe I'm just sucker for it. :-) (there are pacing issues for sure, but Hobb wrote it in 90s, in that sense it was ahead of time, forgive some of those small issues). Read it first I guess 20+ years ago or so..
I replied to the dead "What did you read in 2025" thread, so I'll just paste it here. Usually I hit a book a week pretty reliably, but this past year has been particularly crazy according to my audible purchase history. There are around 80 titles that I've added in 2025 and I've completed the vast majority of them. Some stand outs for me: Dungeon Crawler Carl - One of the few novels that I think it actually much bett…
I started in August, but the two books I read were Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, and East of Eden by Steinbeck. I tried reading Catch-22, but 50 pages in it just seemed like a bunch of military guys trolling each other by being as autistically literal as possible with absurdist Airplane-style humor. I noped out at the prospect of reading 500 more pages of it. I don’t get why people here recommend it so m…
I know what you mean by your comment, but you might want to give catch 22 another try sometime. I'd say that the start with the Texan is far from the best the book gets. Reading it, I think you'll find Yossarian more and more understandable and the situations more and more bleakly comic as you go. Or don't. There's no end of great novels out there.
The Silo series by Hugh Howey -- some excellent sci-fi to go along with the show The Red Rising series by Pierce Brown -- lots of sci-fi fun, extremely epic The Dark Tower series by Stephen King -- King's "Lord of the Rings" opus, great writing, ending maybe a little unsatisfying but not abnormal Artemis - Andy Weir's first book -- Fun read about a heist on the moon. Anticipating Project Hail Mary movie early next ye…
Wasn’t ‘The Martian’ Andy’s first book?