Books 2012: bugpunk and a special offer

[hawkwing_lb]

Books 2012: 189


189. Kameron Hurley, Rapture. Night Shade Books, 2012. ARC, ebook.

Third in Hurley's excellent trilogy, after God's War and Infidel. While these books are problematic, they're also one of the most interestingly fresh approaches to science fiction I've read since Bear's Carnivale or Dust. Recommended, if you don't mind brutality and a lot of death. I'll be giving this one a more detailed review for Tor.com (hopefully get that done before the end of the weekend), but in short, I'm very pleased with how the trilogy concludes.

---

And now it is time to figure out what to read next. I have a list. I solicit votes, since, alas, I cannot create a poll.

I'm still waiting on the arrival of two books I need to review as soon as they arrive, one by T. Aaron Peyton, and one by Jacqueline Carey. Sigh. Waiting.

KJ Parker, Sharps. (To be reviewed for Vector: I have been putting this off because I've heard it's unforgiving, and didn't have the emotional energy for it.)
R.M. Meluch, Jerusalem Fire. (Library book: I am meaning to read this for the Tor.com column.)
Christopher Bennett, Only Superhuman.
Sharon Lynn Fisher, Ghost Planet.
N.K. Jemisin, The Killing Moon.
Adrian Tchaikovsky, first book in his giant series.
Jon Courtenay Grimwood's latest.
Pierre Pevel, The Alchemist in the Shadows.
Mark Hodder, The Strange Affair of Spring-Heeled Jack.

Or somone else? If I have the book...

Pick a book for me, and I promise at least a 250-word review appearing in this space. (If you donate to the Strange Horizons fund drive, I will write a 500-word review here, unless the review has been promised elsewhere. Because I like Strange Horizons, but am fairly broke until I get paid. And even after that, since that money is all pretty much already promised.)

Comments

[green_knight]

Be very cautious about KJ Parker. I don't know that particular book, but he wrote one of the most horrifying scenes I've ever read - a scene that made me put the book into the trash, because not only did *I* never want to read it again, I didn't want anyone else to read it. It depicted a vile action that would have been horrendous when performed by an evil overlord (though most evil overlords are a lot nicer); but here it was the protagonist for whom I had, up to that point, rooted; and the protagonist committed an atrocity to score a point in a relationship.

My stomach turns just thinking about it, and I don't want to spread the disgust, so engage with great caution and in full dayllight.

[hawkwing_lb]

I appreciate the warning.

[green_knight]

You're welcome. I usually have a pretty strong stomach - I get bored by torture porn and gore, I get annoyed at writers for not using their tools better - but that scene hit me in the guts, not just because of the sheer callousness of it, but because the writer trivialised the sheer evil. If you read disengaged in academic/critic mode, it's probably dealable with - I was in full _sympathize with protagonist and happy-to-meet-them mode, and my stomach turned.

I don't think I've thrown away any other book in my life.

[hawkwing_lb]

Can you tell me which book that was?

[green_knight]

It was the second in the Fencer trilogy (I never read the third) - I liked the first one a lot at the time, and had a lot of expectations for the second, so the feeling of betrayal was all the greater.

[hawkwing_lb]

Thanks.

[fadethecat.livejournal.com]

I pick the Alchemist book, on the principle that I'm trying to sell an alchemist book and want to know what my competition is like.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

Thanks. It will go to the front of the list. :)

[clarentine]

Grimwood, who I really enjoyed in the past, or the new Parker, which is on my library list but hasn't come home with me yet, damn it.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

Okay, Sharps is now second on my list.

[clarentine]

Yay!