Books!

[RanVor]

Depends. How much time can you devote to reading, and how angry does plot sprawl make you?

Time? Not as much as I'd like to, but I'm a quick reader, so it's not that bad.

How angry? Well, I've tackled some pretty long series (one that comes to my mind is The Black Company cycle by Glen Cook), but I'm not sure how they compare.

[Ragnarok]

Time? Not as much as I'd like to, but I'm a quick reader, so it's not that bad.

How angry? Well, I've tackled some pretty long series (one that comes to my mind is The Black Company cycle by Glen Cook), but I'm not sure how they compare.

Okay, go right on ahead and read.

[Hi]

I love reading, but I really haven't had much time lately...
I've been reading the same, relatively short book for weeks.

[Mélusine]

I love reading, but I really haven't had much time lately...
I've been reading the same, relatively short book for weeks.

I love books, and usually set a goal of 60 books/other supports read per year, partially because I always have a lot of book "in advance". I'm at 8/60 right now -__- but I don't despair to find more time in a way or an other.

[urbicande]

Having read Tiamat's Wrath I have one spoilery thought

Spoiler: show

I can't imagine that Bobbie would have died any other way.

[Purple Wyrm]

Recently finished Dark Emu by Bruce Pascoe. It's an astonishing collection of evidence for Indigenous Australians practicing agriculture, storing grain, constructing large scale water engineering, and building villages (and even towns!) before European invasion. It actually made me rather ashamed of my lack of knowledge, having been taught that the Aborigines were hunter gatherers who cleared out the land with fire to improve hunting, and had a few eel traps.

[Róisín]

Pascoe makes many excellent points. The invasion, however, would have been much harder if they had had to make the same kinds of treaties as the Europeans had to make in New Zealand with the Maori people. But once Australia was declared terra nullius it was open slather, with a general attitude of 'no intelligent life here, go for it'. Sad. Though if you read the accounts of many early explorers they mention things like being taken to a well-built stone house and being fed on roast duck and cake.

Indeed, in the refuge valley not far from my place, the remnants of those stone houses can still be seen.

May I also recommend the work of Robin Coles, most notably 'The Ochre Warriors'. I have been on some of the trips Coles guided around here, and it was so worth doing.

[Purple Wyrm]

if you read the accounts of many early explorers they mention things like being taken to a well-built stone house and being fed on roast duck and cake.

That's the amazing thing - all that evidence freely available yet the vast majority of Australians (including myself until recently) have never heard of any of it!

[Lenny]

Oooooh thank you for bringing that to my attention :O Same case here, really. We did get taught about stone house remains and how the positioning of buildings was done deliberately for certain reasons, but the chief impression remained that most were hunter gatherers that moved around a lot. Also didn't really cover that there were/are multiple languages and cultures (and entiiirely skipped the Tasmanian genocide, found out about that from museums instead). It being Tasmania also meant that there were very few Aboriginals on the island - I met maybe 3 in my entire time there, and for pretty much everyone except those who went to the mainland regularly it was kind of like learning about a dead culture. I'll have a look if I can find those books somewhere, it's very much worth knowing more.

[urbicande]

A new Rivers of London novella just came out and Peter Grant apparently has a fanboy

[Krillian]

I've been reading Flames by Robbie Arnott, it's a fairly interesting fantasy adventure on the island of Tasmania, telling the stories of a bunch of people and their contact with this pair of supernatural siblings. It's a relatively short read but I am loving it.

[Róisín]

Krillian, thanks for the recommend! I found a review site with a few chapters of the book, which I read and enjoyed. I intend to buy it as soon as I have enough spare money. Having lived in bush and coastal towns in country Tasmania, I love how the author catches the feel of the land there, and was particularly touched by the description of the young man and his working-partner seal, since the grey seal is one of the totemic animals of my own family. I mentioned the author to my library writers group this morning, and none of them had heard of him or his work, so hopefully some of them will now have a new book to read.

[Lenny]

OOooooooOoOOooooh thank you for that recommendation! :O I've never come across a fiction work about Tasmania that wasn't about the animals exclusively, I'm going to search that up. Am curious how it captures the place. A cursory look at reviews tells me it's a style right up my alley, too :O

[Purple Wyrm]

A new Rivers of London novella just came out and Peter Grant apparently has a fanboy

Just finished it today after picking it up on Sunday. A very enjoyable read!

[viola]

I recently read Venegeful and Vicious by VE Schwab and they were both really good! I recommend them for anyone who likes stories about people who end up with special powers. If any of you know the podcast the Bright Sessions, it really reminded me of it just more for adults and a lot darker.
Also I'm a sucker for angsty characters.