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Re: READING?

At 01:58 PM 3/11/2005, Jon Southwood wrote:

>Yep, I'm on a Neil Gaiman kick. Never read his Sandman graphic novels,
>but a friend gave me "Neverwhere" as a gift a number of years ago and
>I was completely enthralled by his use of language and his ability to
>tell a damn fine story. His "American Gods" is even better.

Nice one.  I'm a Gaiman fan as well from way back (used to buy Sandman and 
Books of Magic religiously).  I can hardly wait for him to finish "Anansi 
Boys".  While not really being a sequel to "American Gods", it's supposed 
to feature a lot of the same characters.

Myself, other than trade mags and tech manuals, I've been reading Kim 
Stanley Robinson's "The Years of Rice and Salt".  I've loved Robinson's 
soft-science writing since his story "The Lucky Strike" won the Nebula 
back 
in the eighties.  I'm not so crazy about his Mars trilogy ("Red/Green/Blue 
Mars"), but my tastes in science-fiction generally run more toward the 
speculative Ellison/Zelazny/PKD stuff, than the Niven/Pournelle/Bear 
school 
of hard SF.

Anyway, "Years of Rice and Salt" rewrites history as it might have 
occurred 
had the total population of all Europe been wiped out by the Plague around 
1000 CE.  Thus, the course of history would have been shaped by the 
cultures of Asia, the nations of Islam, and the Native Americans, rather 
than the influences of Western Europe.

I also just picked up William Gibson's "Pattern Recognition", which is new 
in paperback.  Haven't gotten a chance to start on it yet, 
however.  Anybody have any thoughts on that one yet?

         --m.

_____
"i want to reach my hand into the dark and *feel* what reaches back"
                                                 -recoil