what are you reading?

[everklear]

Just about through with the "Priscilla Hutchins" books by Jack McDevitt.
Not brilliant, but enjoyable.

[merman]

The Unofficial Atari Visual History by Darren Doyle/Greyfox Books - nice little book with some interesting interviews, Llamasoft get a mention for Attack of the Mutant Camels.
www.greyfoxbooks.com

[Daniel]

Just finished "Red Country" by Joe Abercrombie.
I have been on break from Abercrombie since "Best Served Cold". I really liked his "First Law" triology, but "Best Served Cold" was a bit disappointing. So I haven't read any of his later books, until now.

I am glad I decided to give him another chance.
"Red Country" is a fantasy western about gold rush and vengence. A dedication to Clint Eastwood sets the tone on the first page, and the story takes off from there. It is very cinematic and has a vibe of Sergio Leone and Kurosawa. The writing is good, the characters are cool and the dialog is superb. If you enjoy a book with cool characters who say cool things to each other this is a must read. The fantasy setting is very light and does not intrude on the story.

[merman]

Dues Ex Machina - The Best Game You Never Played, by Mel Croucher

Hilarious and insightful memoir by industry legend Mel Croucher on the story of Automata, how a trained architect became a software pioneer and his magnum opus that was "multimedia" before anyone coined the phrase. From working with Ian Drury to breaking a hip, this is a truly bizarre and one-of-a-kind story.

[MattyP]

Currently reading this:-
No bullshit innovation by David Rowan
Fascinating read...

https://g.co/kgs/CHcK2Q

[Deckard]

Rod Stewarts autobiography which is frankly great...hard to imagine anyone else doing a whole chapter on the "bouffant"

[zip accident]

The Wandering Inn, a webserial. I'm currently getting near to the end of an archive binge that's taken me since I think January.

It's really long, if you don't have a lot of free time, don't even think about it. Also beware that "just one more chapter" can be the best part of two hours (not always, but often).

Some people say it's slow to get going, but I would say that when it does get going, it's a bit like "A Song of Ice and Fire" sometimes, sometimes not, but sometimes.

https://wanderinginn.com/

[RedOktober]

Photographer's guide to the Sony DSC-RX10 IV.

I'm not really a photographer, and I'm finding this a bit dry,
but there isn't any decent documentation with the camera itself.

[NorthWay]

This just in: Warren Davis "You Can't Call It @!#?@!" https://www.blurb.com/b/9722764-you-can-t-call-it
Longtime games programmer who started out with pinball before doing the seminal Q*bert.

[Deckard]

My new favourite maths book of all time



Anything that can explain why doors open outwards (hundreds of victorian kids clambering for xmas presents and dying) or what a number is and isnt in Excel and why it matters its 32 bit and then reach to an intricate explanation of the Pac-Man board glitch is a winner in my book....

The fence is 50 feet long , the posts are 10 feet apart - how many are there ? (I got that wrong -d'oh)

He also moaned about this being wrong -



And dont have the surname Null

And never play this first -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penney%27s_game

[Mat]

Allie Brosh finished her new book "Solutions and Other Problems", and I snapped it up as soon as it was available.
In turns gut-wrenchingly funny and heart-rendingly sad, it's a brilliant follow-up to "Hyperbole and a Half". If you enjoy her stuff, it's a no-brainer.
As with all her stuff, it's deeply, disarmingly honest in its autobiographical nature.

It's a glorious physical thing too, being a hefty size and full colour throughout.

There's a great sample chapter up on her blog over yer:
http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/

[zip accident]

I read "Humble Pi". From the blurb I was expecting a story, it's not that, it's a collection of anecdotes, mildly amusing if you've never heard of them before, but some I felt I had. Good, but a tiny bit short of brilliant for me.



https://www.amazon.co.uk/Last-Brooklyn- ... g=mh0a9-21

A bunch of short stories all set in (a mythical) Brooklyn in New York, violent, gay, people being stupid like people sometimes are. I'm not sure I agree with the author's attitude, but he definitely has one.



https://www.amazon.co.uk/1914-1918-Hist ... g=mh0a9-21

Seems to be a good history of WW1. The photos in this particular edition are mostly lousy, must have been resized without going back to the originals.

[Deckard]

Sandman Slim - dark magic action story about a guy who got sent to hell and who survived for 10 years somehow and has now come back to LA to have his revenge on the magicians who sent him there - quite comic in places and dark in others.

In Book 2 he is a body guard for Lucifer who is starring in a hollywood film.....

He also owns a video store and his magical sidekick is a disembodied head with a taste for porn and. Lots of world building, quite a lot of cool lore and left-field monsters....its trashy but I am thoroughly enjoying it.

Must also recommend an autobiography by a man who has played on over 5000 songs ! and is an absolute legend - Nile Rodgers - Le Freak. Warts and all but good humoured.

[WiteWulf]

Bear Head, by Adrian Tchaikovsky

It's a sequel to his excellent Dogs of War, about synthetic bio forms created out of animal bodies and human-like boosted personality traits to act as workers. The original was about a combat unit made up of a dog, a bear, a "dragon" and a swarm of bees (itself a "distributed" intelligence) that questions what it's doing and whether it's right, with huge consequences by the end of the book.

This is a follow-up, set thirty years later in the aftermath of the political and social fallout from the first book and involves some of the original characters and mankind trying to terraform part of Mars with similar technology now being used on, essentially, indentured humans.

Yeah, Elon Musk wouldn't like it...

[merman]

100 Best Video Games (That Never Existed) by Nate Crowley.

A Twitter post got over 100 likes, and so Nate had to invent an imaginary old computer game for each like. The best titles, including NES action game Seapuncher and the very gory Beastenders, are each given a two-page spread with all their imaginary details and background trivia. Short themed round-ups of more titles break up the main entries and add even more laughs. Even funnier is that Rebellion Games held an in-house game jam and actually made some of them a reality...