Ebooks tree dot net appears to be offering free downloads of several published works.
I'm not absolutely positive, but looking at authors I follow here I found books that I have either recently purchased or am planning to purchase - current fiction still for sale on Amazon at least.
They also appear to have scraped fanfic sites - I found out about this from a fanfic author whose work was published without her permission.
One of the things that makes me realize I’m living in the future is the joy of having a dozen or so novels in my pocket at all times. It was surprisingly easy to learn to read on my phone; for convenience it’s become my primary reading device.
My recent reading has been divided. About half the time, I’m either re-reading or filling in backlist titles; authors whose books I read and lost or never caught on the first time around. Barbara Hambly’s backlist is now pretty well available on Kindle and I’m rationing myself. I’ve also picked up Martha Well’s City of Bones, which I never read in paperback. Well’s strength (in this reader’s opinion) is writing highly relatable characters inside wildly imaginative alien worlds. I think her Ile-Rien series is next for me. (Late edit, just started The Wizard Hunters and am enjoying it.)
The other half of my reading time is being spent on YA fantasy, particularly the subgenre I think of as the “fantasy of manners” – though some of my reading really doesn’t fit that description. I’ve been trying to figure out why these books have caught my reading interest, and here are my somewhat jumbled thoughts. First, they’re highly character-centric stories. This isn’t good or bad, just a preference of mine. Second, these books feature characters that are limited both in actual power and socially. I do go through phases where Honor Harrington type characters are appealing, but sometimes it’s nice to read about someone who isn’t superman. In some ways this is the opposite of what draws me to epic fantasy – epics pit characters against events that will move their worlds; these stories tend to pit characters against personal challenges that are overcome in personal ways.
The reading list for me in this (stretched) genre:
Sorcery and Cecelia, of course, plus sequels. Highly worthwhile.
Emilie and the Hollow World, another Martha Wells. A little outside of genre and to me reads slightly younger; it Joan Aiken went for a romp in Edgar Rice Burroughs’ playground something like this might be the result. Highly recommended for younger readers or those with any interest in YA.
Kat, Incorrigible Stephanie Burgis. Picked this up after reading an essay by the author online. Reads somewhat younger than any of the others; more like Tamora Pierce than Wrede or Wells. Not as engaging for me but recommended for younger readers; even with the younger writing style the main character was interesting.
A Matter of Magic, Patricia Wrede. YA, but engaging for adults. This is a book I reread when I want a lighthearted character romp; highly recommended for readers at about the same level as Sorcery and Cecelia.
Also, just outside this genre, Impulse by Stephen Gould. The third novel in his primary Jumper universe, which I would think of as T rated YA fiction. A highly worthy successor to an excellent book and while nominally YA I would quite recommend the series to any reader. The spine story is Jumper, Reflex, and Impulse. Jumper, Griffin’s Story is backstory set in the universe of the movie, which is somewhat different. I find Gould’s treatment of the movie as AU laudable, and I enjoyed that story too – just be aware that it’s a different world from the main series.
I've been reminded that word of mouth is a good thing, and I don't talk about my book addiction enough. I've been doing a lot more reading on the Kindle; the move keeps me away from my physical books. So presume that all books I talk about are available as ebooks.
Martha Wells: The Cloud Roads I've owned this for a while in paperback without ever finishing it. My personal taste has leaned away from books with highly alien environments or cultures. Perhaps I'm getting lazy in my old age. This book has some pretty extreme woldbuilding, but it was well worth getting over the information barrier. As a reader, I'm very much looking forward to the sequel. As an amateur author, I'm going to be looking hard at the craft displayed in getting this worldbuilding out to the reader without interfering in what is a very fine story. The sequel, The Serpent Sea is about to come out.
Doyle and Macdonald: The Magewar trilogy The Price of the Stars is an old favorite of mine - space opera at its finest. The series is mostly available in e-book format now, which fixes my major problem with it. (I bought three copies of the paperback and they all fell apart; it got the worst physical book construction I've ever seen. The entire series was badly bound.) There are at least seven books in this universe, but I recommend highly The Price of the Stars, Starpilot's Grave, and By Honor Betray'd.
Barbara Hambly: Stranger at the Wedding I'm slowly rebuilding my collection of Hambly novels on Kindle. I happen to really like this one; a fantasy set in a later time period than the normal pseudo-middle-ages. Hambly is an author you can count on for consistency of setting anywhere from early rome to 1920s hollywood. Much of her backlist is now available as ebooks and I'm probably going to buy them all. One warning for some readers: Hambly's work often contains some darkness; this novel's darker themes may be disturbing for some readers.
Jo Walton: Farthing This book is one fo the few I reread not only for the story but because I think it's an important work. It may be the 1984 of our generation, but somewhat less heavy handed. Seriously, read this book.
I'm sure I'm forgetting some. I'll post about books as I think of it, and may not always do so in the order I consume them.
One final note: I tend not to write bad reviews. This isn't because I like all the books I read, but because I think that good reviews are more strongly correlated. There are a lot of reasons to dislike a book that don't make it a terrible book - for another reader. Books I like tend to share a lot of characteristics, so if you like one on this list, give a different one a try.
(Livejournal note: My posts now start over on Dreamwidth; same account name. Over here they're locked by default, even when I post publicly over there. If you have a dreamwidth account; let me know.)
Watching the current congress, it is obvious that Republicans care about women and children the same way the NHL cares about hockey pucks. There's not a scrap of interest in their welfare; they just want to slap 'em around to score points for their fans.
I spent last week with a cold, but unable to take any time off work, which was unpleasant but is now over. In talking with an old friend, I came up with a new way of thinking of things like this. "Bruised Ass" problems. They're constantly on your mind if you're the one who has to sit on them, but in the grand scheme of things are hard to really complain about. In fact, it's not too surprising if your friends (and even you) find them a little funny.
Anyway, I've had a lot of that level of problem lately. Minor illness, minor injury, minor depression, normal amounts of kid-triggered frustration. Sympathy not required, but snicker to yourself, ok?
There are upsides. Between the cold and the funk, I've been off my feed for the last week and I lost about five pounds. I broke on the happy side of 180 this morning, and though I don't really expect that to last it's not a bad thing at all.
I also want to note that among all the kid-frustration, there are moments of real fun. This morning on the way to school, we did a geometric proof together that the sum of the angles of a triangle is 180 degrees. This isn't rocket science, but Christopher did most of the work of the proof, following some vague directions from me. Math can be fun.
Life is going to be interesting for the next few months, for reasons I'm still processing internally and not ready to talk about much here. I'm going to try to remember that in a year or so, some of this will be kind of funny.
I just came back from a week in Yosemite with my parents and family. The scenery does make up for the crowds, though I was very done with people by the end of the week. Pictures may follow.
Aikido after a week and a half away was interesting. I did feel rusty - and I'm quite sore this morning - but I did better than expected. No stamina problems, and I took a set of about a dozen consecutive high falls with no problems. I think my high fall instincts are back. I'd also been having trouble with my right shoulder on forward rolls; that seems to have cleared up with a week of rest.
Test prep class tonight and Monday; I have to make a call soon if I'm going to withdraw. I expect I'll take the test, but I want to see how well I do in the practice sessions.
I came back from vacation to work in flux. This is pretty much standard for the game industry, but the change turned out to be good this time. A bit tense to come back to an email asking how I was dealing with the project changes, but as the dust settles I think I'm going to like this much better.
This is a good lesson in why I don't talk about my work online. Plans change in this industry. I personally think that putting the brakes on a project until it's going to be a hit is the right call; that doesn't mean that a rumor that "OMG, project X is delayed!" won't negatively impact stock prices. It's hard not to make the connection that institutional investors are stupid about this industry.
Unfortunately, sometimes you have to cater to the stupid.
I gave blood (platelets) again on Saturday. It will probably be a while before I do that again; I didn't really recover until late Sunday.
Aikido has been going fairly well, though I feel less prepared for this test than I did for the last one. One of the better senior students tries to run practice tests for us novices, but scheduling has been harder this time - and I'm one of two people scheduled to test this round. Last time there were something like five black belt tests, a nikyu test, and me. This time it's me and one sandan candidate, unless someone else signs up in the next few weeks.
I've been sitting on a number of unwritten rants, too frustrated to get any of them fully realized.
Prop 8. Because bigotry has always worked out before.
Teabaggers. Guys, Ron Paul is looking sane and rational next to you these days.
Ground Zero Mosque. Not at ground zero, not a mosque, not something I should be forced to care about.
Education policy, politics, and the marketability of incompetence. Education and politics are two areas where saying "I'm an amateur with no fucking clue" somehow makes you better qualified in the public eye.
I'm very much a beginner at this art. I know that in terms of mat time, I'm not really moving slowly, but it sometimes seems like I'm struggling against a complete lack of natural ability.
I've been pushing training pretty hard recently, as I hope to test again in a month, for 4th Kyu. I was discussing this with the senior student, trying to decide if I was ready or not. The problem I'm having is that the next most junior students are second kyu, and fairly talented. The median rank I train with is probably shodan, but might be nidan. I don't know what a 4th kyu looks like; I'm trying to hold myself to the performance standards of the shodan and nidan I train with.
Class last night was under the head of the dojo, and was mostly aimed at the vast horde of hakima that take the mat when he teaches. His classes always have a central theme illustrated by techniques. I'm not sure I fully picked up on the central theme of last night's class; I know that two of the techniques are ones I have trouble with. I did make two observations, though I'm not certain I'm correct in both of them. Sensei apparently means something more comprehensive by the word "posture" than I normally think of as a physical description. It's more like what is meant by the term for describing military units - not only physical position, but all aspects of preparedness.
The second observation was purely physical. Sensei was describing "moving outside uke's power". Observationally, I'm becoming more attached to the concept of moving tangent to Uke's strength. It may be the wrong way of thinking about it, but it was getting me through.
The last is an interesting category of observations, things that are superficially true - perhaps "fifth Kyu" true - but fail upon real understanding of the concept. I've run into two of those in one technique (ikkyo) where my first mental model was a sandtrap for real understanding of the technique. I've probably got another decade to work on this. Maybe I'll get somewhere by then.
tired