Reading update!

Half-way through War and Peace, and finding it pretty fascinating - not just in itself (oh, but the flaws!) but as a major and influential nineteenth-century artefact.  ( Reaction to W&P, so far )

 

The SF classic which I was reading very late indeed was The Dispossessed, Ursula LeGuin,1974. I was rivetted partly by the boldness of the concept, partly by the thinking, partly by the truly engaging characters/relationships, but also very much kept enthralled just marvelling at her artistry - how on earth did she manage to keep the reader (this reader!) interested, with such a thin, dry thread of story spun around such vast ideas?
However she did it, it worked.  I was interested, or more than interested - things got so razor's-edge at one point that I had to stop reading, because I could see so clearly that disaster was about to break, and I couldn't take the tension of it all.   (I started again, after a break. :)  )   Definitely recommended, with the proviso that it's on the dryish side - more politics than pizazz.

and I've bought a heap of books, and have been reading most variously, but time in the work-day presses, so I'll post the rest of this reading update tomorrow.  :)

Reading update! #2

Or "book purchase update", really, about most of the armful of books I've bought recently

Your Fatwa Does Not Apply Here: Untold Stories from the Fight Against Muslim Fundamentalism - Karima Bennoune.
This was recommended by the_emu  on LJ - thanks! I got it because I felt in myself an unease at the apparent lack of Muslim voices against Muslim extremism, and wanted to address that (in myself) before it tipped into blaming Muslims-in-general for the actions of those few who use the name of Islam as a cover for sickening things  - so a crash course in just what's happening where seemed like a good way to go - and it was. 

The author (herself a US-based Muslim from algeria) travelled to many places, mostly in the Islamic world, and gives many, many accounts of meetings with Muslims who have struggled against the various manifestations of this evil, people of amazing courage and tenacity.  Surprisingly, she didn't travel to Indonesia - the world's most populous Islamic nation - which was a big gap, but that's my only gripe; what she does provide all builds to a sobering and very challenging montage.  I'm glad I read it.

That's the only one of the new purchases that I've actually read, so far, apart from Hyperbole and a half - allie Brosh, most of which I'd read in blog form.  I bought that one because I'd read her blog so much, and shared some of its entries so often, that I felt I owed her that much.
If you don't know her already, here's a sample.

Waiting in line, unread, are:

( four more books! )

 

So that's all waiting. Meanwhile, in other reading news: 

I've decided that there's just too much coming in on the New Scientist LJ feed, so I've reluctantly cut it out.  It was great, but overwhelming. 
But coincidentally, the South China Morning Post (scmp.com) has dropped its paywall! - so now I have another solid news source to check from time to time, and one which opens the world for me a little beyond Europe, North america or australia.  (Particularly useful since the Guardian seems to be getting less and less useful as a place to read analysis.  :(  )