Book Hauls!

[GOLLUM]

Picked up a duology edition of Gene Wolfe's classic soldier series "Latro In The Mist" whilst peruisng at Borders.....

[Taltos]

Got my order ... about week earlier than expected :
Richard K Morgan Broken Angels
Richard K Morgan Woken Furies
Jim Butcher Fool Moon
Justina Robson Keeping It Real
Alfred Bester The Stars, My Destination
Jack Vance Suldrun's Garden
M. John Harrison The Centauri Device

[GOLLUM]

Picked up:

Beauty - Sherri S Teper - Part of the Masterwork series.
The latest from the talented Tepper is many things: a fantasy of manners, a dystopian science fiction tale, a time-travel story and an eco-morality play. Still more impressive is the evolution of the narrator and title character, whom we follow for a century of life (ages 16 to 116) as she matures gradually and subtly from a pouty, slightly spoiled daughter of a duke to a wise old woman. Retelling various fairy tales, Tepper strips away each story's gloss. Sleeping Beauty's sleep continues endlessly, prince notwithstanding; Cinderella is as heartless and nasty to her ugly stepsisters as they are to her; and Snow White is a blond bimbo, while the dwarfs are a querulous collection of Basque brothers. Tepper manages to maintain interest, style and theme throughout these disparate elements, and she consistently sniffs out the ugly (e.g., the storybook land of Chinanga, which has all the facets of a fairyland but is an extremely boring place to live). Despite an often depressing worldview, this is a beautiful book from one of the genre's best writers

Watchmen - Graphic novel by Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons. A classic of the ages I'm looking forward to finally reading!!

And on recommendations by Jay....

Requiem - Graham Joyce
After the tragic death of his wife, Tom Webster travels to contemporary Jerusalem in search of a lost love and a reason to keep on living. He finds a city haunted by ghosts and djinn, divided by warring religious factions, and hiding ancient secrets that draw him ever closer to a mysterious woman who just might be the restless spirit of Mary Magdalen.

The Facts Of Life - Graham Joyce - World Fantasy Award winner.
In this moving novel, Joyce traces the boyhood of Frank Vine, born into a loving and ramshackle family in the English countryside during World War II. The product of a brief liaison between an American GI and a local woman, Frank is marked with an extrasensory gift that he shares with his matriarchal grandmother and his emotionally unstable mother. Shortly after his birth, Frank's mother is deemed unfit to care for him, so his grandmother makes the executive decision that his care will be divided among his six aunts, each highly unconventional in her own right. During the next 10 years, Frank makes his home at a farm, a commune, and a makeshift mortuary, slowly finding his place in his eccentric but loving family. Joyce's emotional tale skirts sentimentality by presenting the family warts and all: each of the sisters is a complex and contradictory figure, and Joyce fully examines the consequences of the small feuds and squabbles that characterize a close-knit family. A beautifully written tale that entwines domestic drama with magic realism.

[Nikitta]

I went to Waterstones today and ended up buying 3 books, which have been talked about in here.

Season of the Witch Natasha Mostert.
The Blade Itself Joe Abercrombie.
World War Z Max Brooks.

They look very promising, all 3.

[murphy]

Just ordered from Barnes & Noble:

1. The Lightstone -- David Zindell
2. Coyote Dreams -- C. E. Murphy (A guilty pleasures book)
3. River of the World -- Chaz Brenchley
4. The Last Colony -- John Scalzi

From Amazon:

1. Malazon Book of the Fallen #7: The Reaper's Gale -- Steven Erikson
2. Before They are Hanged -- Joe Abercrombie

[j. d. worthington]

Received my copy of The Children of Hurin in the mail... it is a lovely book. Now, if I can just clear some time to read the darned thing....

[GOLLUM]

Yeh tell me about it!....

Picked up....

Recommended by Jay....Imajica - Clive Barker.
Imajica is an epic beyond compare: vast in conception, obsessively detailed in execution, and apocalyptic in its resolution. At its heart lies the sensualist and master art forger, Gentle, whose life unravels when he encounters Judith Odell, whose power to influence the destinies of men is vaster than she knows, and Pie 'oh' pah, an alien assassin who comes from a hidden dimension. That dimension is one of five in the great system called Imajica. They are worlds that are utterly unlike our own, but are ruled, peopled, and haunted by species whose lives are intricately connected with ours. As Gentle, Judith, and Pie 'oh' pah travel the Imajica, they uncover a trail of crimes and intimate betrayals, leading them to a revelation so startling that it changes reality forever

Another Fantasy Masterwork edn - Evangeline Walton's compilation of the Mabinogion
The author of the classic Mabinogian, the great compendium of medieval Welsh mythology, is unknown to us, but generations have thrilled to the magical tales set at a time when men and gods mingled, and the gods had more than met their match, tales of the wizard-prince Gwydion, of Prince Pwyll and Lord Death, and of the beautiful Rhiannon and the steadfast Branwen. In the masterful hands of Evangeline Walton the twelve "branches" of the ancient text were reworked into four compelling narratives: The Prince of Annwn, The Children of Llyr, The Song of Rhiannon, and The Island of the Mighty, resulting in one of the great epic fantasy works of literature.

Evangeline Walton's Mabinogian Tetralogy is a powerful work of the imagination, to rank with Tolkien's Lord of the Rings and T. H. White's The Once and Future King. The gods and goddesses, wizards and sorceresses, the mortal men and women of ancient days come brilliantly to life. Evangeline Walton's triumph is to have constructed a vital and living world on the foundations of myth.

And last but not least.....Kull Exile Of Atlantis A beautifully illustrated edition of Robert E Howard's Kull stories and fragments including introductory notes. A precursor to the more famous Conan, Kull still stands as an important literary character in the development of the Sword & Sorcery genre in his own right!

OH..and an animated Hellboy: Storm of Swords DVD.

GOLLUM dances a small jig....

[Allegra]

Did you win a lottery COLLUM?

Just received The Mark Of The Beast and Other Fantastical Tales - Rudyard Kipling. Thank you for your recomm, COLLUM. I like the cover design.

[iansales]

Originally Posted by GOLLUM

Beauty - Sherri S Teper - Part of the Masterwork series.

I quite enjoyed this, although it's a strange choice for the Fantasy Masterworks series since it's quite clearly science fiction.

Originally Posted by GOLLUM

Watchmen - Graphic novel by Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons.

A definite classic, and fully deserving of all the praise heaped upon it.

Originally Posted by GOLLUM

Requiem - Graham Joyce
The Facts Of Life - Graham Joyce

I think Requiem was the last book of Graham's I read. Not because I thought it was bad - he's an excellent writer - but my taste lies in other directions. I should have another go at his stuff.

[Who's Wee Dug]

Today I happened to find a hardback edition of The Night Watch,I have seen it mentioned here a few times what is the rating on it from anyone who has read it.

[Sathai]

Ordered these yesterday...

The Limits of Enchantment by Graham Joyce
A Princess of Roumania by Paul Park
Fudoki by Kij Johnson
Tooth and Claw by Jo Walton

[GOLLUM]

Today I picked up:

Elric - Michael Moorcock #17 Fantasy Masterwork series

Elric, Moorcock's damned albino swordsman, is one of the most striking creations of heroic fantasy. Living in a world doomed to be forgotten, last emperor of the decaying empire he betrays, he is a striking figure of teenage angst who becomes something rather more. He is the central figure of a world conceived largely for its gloomy decorativeness--Moorcock's fantasy landscapes derive as much from the author's favourite Romantic and Mannerist pictures as they do from the traditions of a genre for which he had mixed feelings early in his career. Elric is doomed to sacrifice friends and lovers, as well as those enemies he wishes to spare, to the great black sword from which he derives not merely prowess but the capacity to be other than a neurasthenic invalid in these early stories. He also finds his wife Zarozinia and his friend Moonglum only to lose them, and fails heroically to save the world from the melting encroachments of the lords of Chaos. There is a dark power to these stories which belies their occasional absurdities and haunts the reader's dreams and nightmares.


The History Of The Runestaff - Michael Moorcock #36 Fantasy Masterwork series

The earth has grown old, her landscapes mellow, her people lost in abrooding dream. It is an age of antique cities, scientific sorcery, crystal machines, great flying engines with mechanical wings. And the armies of the Dark Empire are relentlessly taking over the once-peaceful city states, ravaging and destroying as they advance, mile by brutal mile . . . The Dark Empire has humiliated and multilated Dorian Hawkmoon, but it cannot rob him of his two consuming passions: his love for Yisselda of Brass and his hatred of her ruthless suitor Meliadus. But before he can defy the Dark Empire and win the beauteous Yisselda, he must seek the Runestaff, a quest that will send him into barbaric wonder and perverse evil . . . and only if he succeeds will her avert the doom of all the world . . .

Glorianna OR The Unfulfilled Queen - Michael Moorcock #22 Fantasy Masterwork series

Gloriana rules an Albion whose empire embraces America and most of Asia. A new Golden Age of peace, enlightenment and prosperity has dawned. Gloriana is Albion and Albion is Gloriana; if one falls, so too will the other. And Gloriana is oppressed by the burden this places upon her - and by the fact that she remains incapable of orgasm. The maintenance of the delicate balance that keeps Albion and Gloriana thriving depends of Montfallcon, Gloriana's Chancellor, and on his network of spies and assassins - in particular on Quire, cold hearted seducer of virtue and murderer of innocence. When Quire falls out with Montfallcon, he forms an alliance with his greatest enemy and conceives a plan to ruin Gloriana, destroy Albion, the empire and the Golden Age itself. But even the utterly ruthless Quire does not fully understand what he has set in motion when he persuades the Queen to fall in love with him... Moorcock's masterly evocation of Gloriana's strange and secretive palace and of a vibrant London make this one of his most powerful and memorable novels.

Was - Geoff Ryman #43 Fantasy Masterwork series

WAS is the story of Dorothy. Orphaned as a child in the 1870s, she goes to live in Kansas with her Aunty Em and Uncle Henry. They face drought and poverty. They face each other. Alone, abused, Dorothy meets an itinerant actor called Frank and inspires a masterpiece. From the settling of the West and the heyday of the Hollwywood studios to the glittering megalopolis of modern Los Angeles, WAS is the story of all our childhoods.

And tommorow....

Sea-Kings of Mars and Otherworldly Stories - Leigh Brackett #46 Fantasy Masterwork series.

Leigh Brackett is well known as the main writer on Howard Hawks's classic Bogart movie THE BIG SLEEP. She also wrote RIO BRAVO and several more Hawks movies, as well as doing outstanding scripts for others. She wrote the first script for The Empire Strikes Back, considered a far superior piece of work than the version eventually filmed. But she was also one of the most influential science fantasy writers of the 40s and 50s, inspiring and eventually collaborating with the young Ray Bradbury. Her stories of Eric John Stark, some of which appear in this collection, are perhaps the best examples you can find in the sf pulps of her day, appearing in the likes of PLANET STORIES, STARTLING STORIES and THRILLING WONDER STORIES. I know they were a huge influence on my own early science fantasy tales. Through Bradbury, she also influenced J.G.Ballard in such sequences as his Vermilion Sands stories. As such she can be seen as a kind of godmother to the so-called 'New Wave'. These are fast-paced, evocative tales of a Mars where lone adventurers ride strange beasts over dead sea-bottoms, seeking the secrets of ancient races who may be largely forgotten but are not necessarily dead. For sheer exotic storytelling in prose which has something in common with Hammett and Chandler, you can't beat Leigh Brackett. If you like M.John Harrison's and China Mieville's science fantasy, you'll enjoy these stories just as much. I can't say how pleased I am to see Brackett back in print.

[Nikitta]

Not really books, but I've finally gotten around to order a GP2X which I plan to use for e-books.

I'm excited about it and I will write a post about how it is to read on when I get it.

[sassy1]

Originally Posted by murphy

From Amazon:

1. Malazon Book of the Fallen #7: The Reaper's Gale -- Steven Erikson

I tried reading the first book in that series... Gardens of the Moon i think its called, and i couldnt get into it... maybe because i was reading 7 books at the time and my head was so full of storylines i couldnt take any more in. I'm being good now and only reading 1 at a time, so i might have to give it another go sometime

[murphy]

Originally Posted by sassy1

I tried reading the first book in that series... Gardens of the Moon i think its called, and i couldnt get into it... maybe because i was reading 7 books at the time and my head was so full of storylines i couldnt take any more in. I'm being good now and only reading 1 at a time, so i might have to give it another go sometime

It's a complicated book and needs your full attention, otherwise you could get lost.