What are you reading?

Taking a brief detour from the Codex Alera series and reading a book on Alexander Hamilton. I've read other books on him during university but this one supposedly includes some new fascinating essays that were recently found, written by Ron Chernow.
 
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A small book listing all inscriptions of Pompeji which can still be read these days.
Translated, of course. :D
 
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I'm currently re-reading Faulkner's The Sound and The Fury.

I know I need to read that book, and maybe I will some time. But at first glance, I thought you were talking about "Fates and Furies." That was another one of those books that everyone seemed to think was amazing. I guess it's about some dude's struggles with trying to live up to his own expectations? And then the second half of the book is told from his wife's point of view, where you see that everything in Mr. Self-centered's life actually happened a mind-blowingly different way? Or something like that. I didn't get that far.

It seemed to me that at least the first hundred pages are only about the guy sleeping with anything that has an orifice. It gets old fast.
 
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I am reading this book about Steve Jobs, intresting person, interesting life, I like reading biographies of famous people.
 
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The German translation of "The two Baronesses" by Christian Andersen.
 
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Pretentious Police please don't come after me, but I'm enjoying the first of the Blood Wars trilogy by J Robert King. I'm a few chapters in and it's pretty well-written, but best of all is that it's set in the Planescape D&D setting. After recently finishing PS:T I became enamored with the setting and have been grabbing whatever books I can for it, the Blood Wars trilogy included. I'd recommend it for anyone who enjoys the lore of Planescape and is interested in seeing Sigil and the Planes from a different angle.

As a collector and not really a D&D player, I'd also recommend the Monster Compendium Appendix II and the Blood War box set. The box set comes with a nice little art book, as well as a pretty cool comic and of course the original manuals for the adventures. The Monster Compendium is just lush, beautiful artwork, plenty of lore and of course stats/D&D game-related stuff. These are the only things I own so far, but I'm hoping to get more.
 
I'm currently reading through a collection of Pompeji graffity. A lot of them are … not for young people.

Very vulgar, very crude, very obscene … But all in all very close to the RL of Pompeji !
 
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The Hamilton book was quite excellent, I really enjoyed how it covered his entire life, not just focusing on the more well known parts. And finally finally F I N A L L Y, he's in Turn! I've been looking for him in that show ever since Washington took the bloody field, lol. Finally, he's arrived!

Then I went back to the Codex: Alera, book four, Captain's Fury. None of these books have disappointed so far, and the fourth volume was no different. Last night I started Radiant Angel, of the thriller series by DeMile, and that's off to a good ripping start.
 
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I finished up the first of the Blood Wars trilogy - Blood Hostages. It was good! I liked the different settings and Planes the characters visited, as the writing was quite vivid and painted an interesting picture. There were some really standout points, like the one character,
Sung Chiang, the Thief God. He is an actual God in the Planescape world, and everything about him was interesting.
And one really crazy part I enjoyed a lot -
the party falls through the 665th level of the Abyss.
Overall I really liked it.

So the book sets the stage for the second in the trilogy, Abyssal Warriors, which I'm reading next. I wish there were more Planescape setting novels, but I guess there's at least one more beyond this trilogy. It's a really great setting for novels.
 
Surface Detail, Culture book #9, by Iain M. Banks
Liked it a bit more than Matter. 4/5

The Hydrogen Sonata, Culture book #10, by Iain M. Banks
A sublime (hah) final novel in the Culture "series". I liked this one a bit more than the previous two, which I gave 4 points, and at some point I have to round up. In a way, this read a lot like Consider Phlebas. Amazing vistas and ideas, fun Minds, lovable techno-babble. Also, it's mostly about the Culture and an equiv-tech civilization, i.e. very high tech throughout, which I prefer over a blend of pseudo-medieval societies with science fiction. 5/5

The Forever War by Joe Haldeman
Really liked it. 4/5.

Raft, Xeelee Sequence book #1, by Stephen Baxter
Typical Baxter. Fun astronomy / physics theories in story form. 3/5

Way Station by Clifford D. Simak
Liked it generally, but it was a very slow read for me. Reminded me of the movie The Man from Earth, which I recommend watching if you liked Way Station for its "outside look on humanity" theme. 3/5

Orb, Scepter, Throne, Malazan Empire book #4, by Ian C. Esslemont
Really enjoyable, my favorite of the Malazan Empire books so far. 4/5

The Crippled God (The Malazan Book of the Fallen, #10) by Steven Erikson
At last. What a journey. First half was a little slow as usual, second half picked up a lot. It wasn't straight 5-star book for me, maybe 4.5 stars, but I just had to round up for the series as a whole. There's this thing that permeates these books, which I greatly enjoyed: Gravitas. They have a lot of it. 5/5

And, currently being in my fantasy cycle, I'm now reading Guy Gavriel Kay's The Lions Of Al-Rassan, my first from this author. I'm not enjoying it as much as I'd hoped.
 
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I almost fell of my chair with this -
how-to-make-a-cliched-high-fantasy-cover
 
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"Getting Gamers: The Psychology of Video Games and Their Impact on the People Who Play Them" by Jamie Madigan

It is two years old so realistically written in 2014 and technology & games, VR in particular, have moved a bit in 3 years. So far (about 40%) interesting but not world shattering. I do find his fault finding on earlier psychologists using his current standards very disappointing and I am already skipping sections where he self-aggrandises.
 
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I'm reading the final book of the Codex Alera, it is going to suck when this fine series is over. At least I've some other books lined up to jump into next!
 
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Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay

... have just finished Revenger by Alastair Reynolds 4/5
 
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Finished The Lord Of The Rings yesterday ... It was my I think 5th read-through since the mid-80s (one time in English around the change of the Millennium).
 
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Finished The Lord Of The Rings yesterday … It was my I think 5th read-through since the mid-80s (one time in English around the change of the Millennium).

Just curious, are you aware of any noticeable/significant differences between the original and translated versions?
 
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In the Dutch version some of the names are Dutchified, I guess it is similar in other translations (obviously the names are not Dutchified in those cases :))
Someone even made an overview. In several cases the names are just a direct translation in others the names are actually changed.

As far as I recall, besides the name changes, the content is the same.

This is not unusual. I know the same thing happens in Harry Potter and in the Thomas Covenant books (those are the only ones I have read in both English and Dutch).
 
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