this post was submitted on 30 Dec 2024
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What was the last book that you read? (piefed.social)
submitted 5 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
50 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

For me: Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy.

I had seen the movie but never read the book before. It was a lot better than I expected.

Also what is your current/next book?

I'm continuing the saga with The Restaurant At The End Of The Galaxy.

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[–] TootSweet 3 points 5 days ago (2 children)

"Schizoid Phenomena, Object Relations and the Self" by Harry Guntrip.

I've been reading all the Dune novels in publication order. The Guntrip book was an interlude in the middle of "Paul of Dune" which is my... 15th Dune book? I've lost count. Lol. But anyway, I'm back to reading that now.

After that, I'll probably start "Determined: A Science of Life Without Free Will" by Robert Sapolsky.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Including the ones by Brian Herbert? I've never heard anyone say a single good thing about those.

[–] TootSweet 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

That's the ones. I had a friend who was a Dune superfan who convinced me to continue after I'd finished Frank's books. He expressed to me that he liked the Brian Herbert better and wished they'd started the recent Dune movies with Legends of Dune, the Dune trilogy by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson that's set earliest in the franchise.

(To be fair, it's ridiculously unrealistic to wish for that. And it'd only really be "better" than starting with Frank's book if they adapted basically... 11 to 14 novels worth to finish off the whole saga.)

Now, I'm not going to say I like Brian Herbert's better. Nor that there aren't things that I don't dislike about the Brian Herbert books. But there's a lot to love as well.

I'll talk about some of that in spoiler tags, but even in the spoiler tags, I won't give everything away.

Things I dislike about the Brian Herbert books:

spoiler

  • The whole "superhuman" thing (Bene Gesserit and various Kwizatz Haderach's) kinda wasn't a thing in any of the prequels until very near the end.
  • They definitely diverged from Frank's vision for the franchise in certain ways. Largely to tie the prequels (that were set before Frank's first book) to the sequels (that were set after Frank's last)).
  • Some of the books that come in between Frank's books drag a bit.

Things I like:

spoiler

  • I was afraid talking explicitly about the happenings during the Butlerian Jihad, the Brian Herbert books would ruin the mystery, but I've been really happy with how he pulled that off.
  • The way the sequels dealt with the long future of how Ghola technology would be used was great, I think.
  • The Brian books did introduce some of the best characters in the franchise.
[–] wjrii 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Kevin J. Anderson holds a special place in my development as a young reader. His Star Wars books helped me understand that a book can be absolutely awful, and I don’t have to finish it, and that I haven’t failed by putting it down.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

He is controversial: I've seen people describe him as "Good lore builder, pretty bad at actually writing."

He created the Maw and Kessel, purple and double-bladed lightsabers, Exar Kun, etc. that people liked, but you had to slog through long flowery dialogue to get through it. Meh, I am mostly okay with that personally, but yeah some people can't stand it.

Edit: I want to add that the vast majority of YouTube videos are so much worse in terms of blah blah blahbity blah I-want-to-make-this-video-just-over-10-minutes-long-so-I-can-sell-moar-ads. Books at least I can just go at my own pace and slow down or even skim a bit and speed up if I wish, while such videos (which are pretty much all of them?) are basically take-it-or-leave-it, so yeah I'm much more forgiving of such things when they appear in book form:-).

[–] benignintervention 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

I really enjoyed Determined and Sapolsky's other book, Behave!

[–] TootSweet 1 points 5 days ago

Yes! I've read Behave and Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers already and both were amazingly informative. The premise of Determined holds particular interest for me, so I'm expecting even greater things from this one.