Early May 2015 reading...

Real life has interfered with my free time.  I had to take care of business last week.  I still have some more things in need of accomplishment.  But that isn't due until later on in the month.

I spent the weekend reading.  The first book I'm working on is Jack Campbell's The Lost Fleet:  Beyond the Frontiers:  Dreadnought.  I started backward with the Lost Fleet series.  I read The Lost Stars: Perilous Shield first.  I then picked up one of The Lost Fleet novels.  But I gave that book away as a going away present.

Now, I'm reading Dreadnought.  I'm about halfway done with the novel.  I've enjoyed it so far.  It's now getting interesting.  I'll write a full review when I get done with it.

I also have another fantasy book I started called Half a King by Joe Abercrombie.  It's a Viking fantasy novel about kingship and betray.  I've only gotten into the first couple of chapters.  Half a King moves.  I like the way Abercrombie writes.  I wish I had his way with words.  Its good to see an excellent author in action.  It's something to aspire.

But I'll confess.   I haven't read a fantasy novel in a long time.  I used to read tons of sci-fi when I was much younger.  I switched over to fantasy when I was in my early twenties.  By the time I'd reached thirty, I stopped reading genera fiction.  Most of my reading was straight military histories.  In fact, there was a period of time I didn't read at all.  It's only the past four years I've come back to reading genera fiction again.

My problem is with much of the fantasy novels.  They are badly written and sold as mega-series.  I'm not going to wade through 2000 pages of badly written fantasy novels by some hack.  But that is how most fantasy books are now marketed in the United States.  It takes a good writer for me to pick up a fantasy novel.

George R. Martin is one such writer.  Another is Gene Wolfe and David Eddings.  I enjoyed Glenn Cook's Chronicles of the Black Company.  But his later Black Company novels weren't as good as the original series.  But I'll also write another review of Half a King when I get done with it.

Regards,
Blake