Whatcha reading redux.

[Cybrludite]

Tonight's order to Amazon is "Expanded Universe" by R.A.H., and also "Contact With Chaos" and "Rouge" by Mad Mike.

[cageym]

I also got an e-copy of "Earth Abides" which I haven't read in decades!

[evan price]

Just finished Michael Crichton's State of Fear and it wasn't bad, typical Crichton but attacking globular warmination which is good for a laugh. Envirohippies getting byatch-slapped makes me laugh.

I read A Hymn Before Battle a year or two ago and it was just so-so, slow, plodding. In 20-20 hindsight it was obviously background needed to base the book series on. I wasn't impressed then so I never bothered reading more, and it left me disinclined to continue reading that series. So I searched out other Ringo books that were NOT directly in the Posleen War series.

I ran out of other stuff on my list, had read the first two Looking Glass books, and feeling in need of a Ringo fix I read Cally's War and Sister Time which were good of themselves, and learned that we defeated the Posleen after the mess in Diess and Barwhon and the depths of political stuff with the Indowy and Darhel and that suddenly showed me my total lack of understanding of the Posleen War and I was like, Whoah, something happened, this stopped sucking!!! so I had to go find a copy of Gust Front and suddenly it was HOLY CRAP this is good! So now I'm 3/4 through Gust Front and got the next two on reserve at the library.

The political, military and Sye-Fye aspects were much more better, like chili that was left to sit for a few days tastes better than fresh- everything blends better and smooths out.

[Rod]

Found a true gem in among the books my mother in law left. Commerce of the Prairies by Josiah Gregg. This is a 2 volume reprint (1962) of the journal of a man who traveled the Santa Fe Trail as a merchant in the 1830s and 40s. Surprisingly, much of his observations were used by others in research for books about the West.

Also reading Hard Magic by Larry Correia. Picked it up last night at Barnes and Noble and am 1/3 of the way through it. I'm enjoying it.

Side note: Wife got to talking to two young men about books and mentioned the Islands in the Sea of Time series by S.M. Stirling. I went and got Island in the Sea of Time, then added Gust Front by Ringo and 1632 by Flint. Also mentioned Larry and showed them the Hard Magic book. They seemed VERY appreciative.

[Johnnyreb]

I read MH Alpha a couple of months back and just finished Dead Six.

Now I'm halfway through George R.R. Martin's latest book in the Song of Fire and Ice series, the one titled Yes, That Guy Dies Too.

And I'm thinking on what books to throw in the car since I'm heading out for a week in a couple of days to visit with my folks back in Texas. I think one of them is surely going to be the old hard cover 1st edition I have of Samuel Elliot Morrisson's The Two Ocean War.

I have one published in the early 1950s as well. A history of Marine Corps aviation. Damned good read. They started the war with 250 or so aviators and ended it with over 20,000. For marine aviation, the entire war is a history of throwing a squadron together, getting it tuned, and then seeing HQ loot it for trained personnel to form another squadron or two.

[308Mike]

I just got done reading Yeager, the autobiography of Gen. Chuck Yeager:



An absolutely GREAT read about someone who despised many of the rules of the dictatorial Air Farce which impeded getting things done to satisfy someone else's anal-desires for making sure boxes were checked and rules were followed - at the expense of doing what needed to be done to ensure they could do their jobs.

[Rumpshot]

book.jpg

The Five Thousand Year Leap: 30 Year Anniversary Edition with Glenn Beck Foreword

Got lots of great thoughts, appropriate for today.

Private property rights for example. Partial quote from Locke:

It is obvious that if there were no such thing as "ownership" in property, which means legally protected exclusiveness there would be no subduing or extensive development of the resources of the earth. Without private "rights" in developed or improved property, it would be perfectly lawful for a lazy, covetous neghbor to move in as soon as the improvements were completed and take possession of the fruits of his industrious neghbor. And even the covetous neghbor would not be secure, because someone stronger than he could take it away from him.

Sounds an awful like the noises being made by the OWS crowd.

He goes on to discuss the things that would happen if property rights did not exist. Including destroying incentive of an industrious person; deprivation of an industrious persons fruits of their labor; Marauding bands confiscating by force and violence....

[Rod]

The Outline of History by H.G. Wells ( Revised and brought up to the end of World War II by Raymond Postgate). 1956 edition.

[Steamforger]

"Rogue" by Mad Mike.

[evan price]

Just starting Eric Flint's 1632. Looks promising in the two chapters I've read so far.
Larry Correia's Monster Hunter International was good enough that I ordered the next two.