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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   3065 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for July 6, 2025

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So, what are you reading?

I'm picking up With and Without Galton, an open access book on Vasilii Florinskii and Russian eugenics, or as the author calls it, 'eugamics' (ie. well-married), as distinguished from Galton's eugenics.

I'm going through the Dante (the 8' tall 1000lb 2000-year-old genetically engineered super-soldier not the 35-year-old presumably normal height and weight narrator of Divine Comedy) books as a bit of a palette cleanser. Despite the almost complete lack of literary value I keep finding myself drawn back to various 40k books, and will usually wolf down two or three before turning my attention back to something a bit heavier. It's not exactly a secret as to why I do so, I adore the 40k universe. Everything about it makes for enjoyable stories, and the fact that there's multiple authors working on the same universe with some, let's say reasonably attentive, editors making sure everything stays more-or-less consistent across the big pictures means it's hard to run out of options.

Once I've wrapped up the Dante trilogy I've got Stalingrad: The Fateful Siege 1942-43 on deck.

Currently re-reading The Craft Sequence which is great.

I've been reading The Library Trilogy, a fantasy series by Mark Lawrence. I enjoyed most of the first book, which felt like a bit of a cross between Garth Nix's Lirael and His Dark Materials, but it started to fall apart by the end and the second book, while readable, couldn't really rejuvenate my interest.

Something in particular that irritated me slightly were the somewhat clumsy allusions to real-world politics scattered throughout the books; most of the time I don't want to think about political issues and that's especially the case when I'm reading for fun. I also don't like the feeling that the author on some level presumes his readers will be smugly nodding in agreement with his fairly evident views on current affairs.

The new Sanderson novel, Isles of the Emberdark. It is, of course, not very sophisticated or thoughty, but is a fun little adventure.

Contractor, by Bradley Buckmaster.

Cybernetically modified child shock trooper was abandoned by his government after the war, took to a life of nihilism and mercenary work, and now well into his fifties he takes a job that has him uncover the hidden history of the war that made him.

It's alright. Buckmaster hs a fairly unique style that's fun to read, and is almost completely unapologetical about the violence and the decidedly un-modern morality or lack thereof that fills his books. His world-building is fairly light, but his descriptions of combat and the technologies involved are probably the absolute best I've ever read (for what little I, an eternal civilian, know). At the same time the novel sometimes feels a little self-indulgent; and when you've read his other books, Brigador and Brigador Killers: Pilgrim, you notice a lot of re-cycled patterns. He describes the Contractor series as a writing exercise, so I suppose it must be forgiven. Then again, he subverts the expectations he sets up often enough to surprise this humble reader. It feels more predictable than it is, sometimes.

I'm not quite done with it, having a few chapters to go yet. It's fairly short overall. It's currently free on Kindle.

Edit: Finished it now. The ending is somewhat...out of scope? It's okay for Sci-Fi and I suppose the story has built up to it, but it has nothing to do with why anyone might read these particular books.

Recommended if you like boots-on-the-ground military sci-fi.

Sounds more experimental than anything but you've piqued my curiosity.

Be quick about it; I think the gratis period expires today or tomorrow.

I don't realistically have the time to get to it in the foreseeable future anyway but thanks.

What hath God Wrought: history of the US from 1815-1848. Also still slogging through Way of Kings.

What's your opinion of What Hath... so far? I read it shortly after it came out and thought it was one of the stronger entries in the series, at least among those I've read. I'd also be curious to know which other installments you have read and your opinion of them, besides the McPherson, of course, which is one of the towering monuments in American historiography.

I am really enjoying What Hath so far. I'm only a few chapters in, but I like how he is framing the whole period in terms of a transportation/communication revolution. Also enjoying his take on Jackson as a bully. McPherson is awesome, as you've surely seen me post about before. The only other two I've tried are The Republic for Which it Stands and The Glorious Cause. I found the first 5-6 chapters of the first one really really good (dealing with Western expansion/Reconstruction), but have been getting bogged down in the social history that follows those chapters. The second book is overwritten, at least in the first few chapters. I'd like to revisit them both quite soon though. Soft goal for this year is to read all of Oxford US history books that have come out so far.

I tried giving Worth the Candle a shot, but didn't like it. Maybe it will be subverted later on, but in the first book I found the implied worldview of the author not self-aware enough, sometimes bordering on the comical, which is especially bad considering that it's obvious the author wants to go for something more philosophical. The basic internal story was OK, good enough so that I finished book 1 without feeling like it was a slog, but I also have very little motivation to carry on. So, I guess it's at least still better than the Wandering Inn, which did turn into a slog just a few chapters in.

Treason's Harbor - Stuck in Malta while their ship is refitting Aubrey and Maturin discover the place is infested with prostitutes, French spies and a geriatric Admiral that can't keep his hands off the help.

I'm still enjoying this series and I'm not even half way through. I hope the quality keeps up.

Is there a secret to being able to actually understand what's going on in those books?

I'm as big a wordcel as you would expect someone who hangs out on this forum to be, but I cannot for the life of me finish Master and Commander. It feels like I'm a teenager being forced to read Shakespeare and not understanding the Early Modern English.

Do I need to persevere until my brain just gets it? Get ChatGPT to summarise the chapters for me? Re-read every sentence? Is there any trick beyond 'be less dumb'?

The audiobooks can carry you along with the narrator's tone doing a lot to provide context. Some people claim that they didn't get everything out of the books on their first 'read' but were pretty well versed by the end of the series. They then understood more on a re-read. Also some concepts aren't explained until later books where O'Brien often uses Maturin as a scrub land lubber stand in for the reader to have a sailor explain all things naval.

That might sound daunting, but if you can make it through Master and Commander things get easier (and more enjoyable).

I need to confess I still don't understand where all the sails are placed and for what purpose, but in general I understand that too much sail can tear the rigging (carrying away like a kite with a snapped line, even including ropes, beams and 'top men' ) or even crack a mast.

Do I need to persevere until my brain just gets it?

That's what worked for me.

Honestly I've just never had that problem at all but I guess that's a function of familiarity with the English of the time? It's unavoidably gained by reading history and especially firsthand accounts.

Yes, actually just get a good LLM to read over the chapter you just finished and catch anything you might have missed. I feel like I got SO MUCH more out of the books this way.

I’ve heard good things about A Sea of Words: A Lexicon and Companion to the Complete Seafaring Tales of Patrick O'Brian. Full disclosure though, I’ve never read it, nor any of the original books themselves.

Do you know how the narration of the audiobook is?

I'm listening to the audiobooks (narrated by Patrick Tull back in the 90's, and highly rated on the relevant subreddit). He has excellent pronunciation and while his accents aren't perfect, they don't break suspension of disbelief. Highly recommended.

If you have trouble sourcing the audiobooks, the subreddit is a good place to go spitting on your hands and raising the black flag looking.

The Secret of our Success by Joseph Henrich. Just as fascinating as Scott's review of it made it sound: I'm less than halfway through it and I already feel like I've learned so much. I've quoted so many interesting anecdotes from it to my girlfriend that she wants to read it as soon as I'm finished.

Mania by Lionel Shriver. Her novels are fun in a way that's hard to describe.

My mum was reading that a few months ago, and I teased her that she was reading a book by an admitted climate-change denier.

Heh, it's been kind of entertaining watching Shriver wander from The Guardian to The Spectator over the last decade, her boomer 2nd wave feminist liberalism (and I don't mean that as an insult) not sufficiently hip for the contemporary left and she too stubborn to get with the times.

I suppose what makes her fun to read is her uncompromisingly brutal honesty (Critics would just call her uncompromisingly brutal, but hey, some people have a taste for bitter.) combined with a scalpel-like vocabulary. It doesn't matter if the story is especially great (some are; some aren't) when the telling is that fun to read. That several of her novels draw from personal disquiet only add to the charm. I only later learned that So Much for That (an over-the-top takedown of American healthcare) was actually based on a close friend's death from mesothelioma.

To be frank she reminds me so much of my favorite English teacher from high school (a unique, highly intelligent, and, yes, profoundly bitter person; we were kindred spirits in that regard) that I sent her my copy of We Need to Talk About Kevin after reading it.

Finished Sharpe’s Tiger by Bernard Cornwell. I’d love to read more historical fiction of this quality, especially set in India.

I haven't read the books, only watched the Sean Bean tv movies. Do you have a comparison to how you see the books vs tv?

I think I previously watched/read a few that were set in Europe, and wasn’t too impressed with either. I don’t enjoy TV very much in the first place, and the books felt much weaker than Cornwell’s Arthurian/Viking-Saxon/medieval archer book series or Patrick O’Brien’s works.

This one was a nice surprise.

Well I just finished The Geneva convention(s). So I started with a new book "In another world with my smartphone"

The Geneva suggestion convention is a way more interesting read when you have all the cultural context of people calling things war crimes. It's a lot of fun to read and go "wow that isn't a war crime and the amount of effort it puts into this is really fun. (admittedly I was also watching an anime with a bunch of people in /r/anime and just recording the war crimes comitted by the good/bad guys (mostly the good guys) really made it a lot more fun of a read.

It's a lot of fun to read and go "wow that isn't a war crime

Can you give some examples of things which were described as war crimes but which actually weren't?

White Phosphorous munitions is the most common one you'll see online.

But there's also "firing at fleeing soldiers" "Double tapping" (very controversial but probably not a war crime though it can be a war crime in certain circumstances)

Also what counts as a child soldier depends on the treaty, for example the Geneva convention sets the age at 15, but OPAC defines it as below 18. (most nations have signed OPAC)

One funny thing about watching an anime with people was going "yeah meteor bombing the city was not a war crime but Inaho(the main character) using the school as a command post was because there was a hospital next door to his command post"

Double tapping

Is that when you fire twice at someone's chest?

Shooting at somebody after you've already hit them.

Shoot>Hit>Shoot again to make sure they're actually dead.

I think it's when the bomb site is bombed again after emergency personnel and allies/relatives have shown up... Bombing a funeral would be similar.

"Double-tap" is a rapid pair of aimed shots. They're probably referring to a game-of-telephone version of "dead-checking", where you shoot a downed enemy to make sure they're dead.

yeah it's gotten game of telephoned indeed. I heard it get called Double tapping in justin Taylor's youtube channel figuring that's probably a more "modern term" than what legal scholars from the 70s were saying...

The other place I read it is https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/wvlr/vol108/iss3/10/ which is an article from 2006

Finished the Rhesus Chart from the Laundry Files. I am sure it were a lot funnier for me if I were a Brit, absent that it kinda feels the series are running out of steam. Started the Annihilation Score which only supports the conclusion so far. Maybe it will get better, but starting it I found it a bit hard to sympathize with Mo so far. We'll see how it goes.

Started the Annihilation Score which only supports the conclusion so far. Maybe it will get better, but starting it I found it a bit hard to sympathize with Mo so far. We'll see how it goes.

Annihilation Score was the last one I read. I was not terribly impressed with it, and since I didn't think Rhesus Chart was all that great, either, I saw no reason to keep going.

The series starts very strong but gets worse as it continues, not to mention that it eventually segues into something like superhero fiction. Last one I read was The Labyrinth Index and I will not be proceeding.

I'm actually surprised at how effectively Stross keeps his leftist ideology from ruining the books entirely. It does make it through sometimes but generally can be ignored. There's much handwringing in later books about how 'society' basically renders middle-aged women 'invisible' e.g. Sure I rolled my eyes but no big deal.

Yeah a bunch of that in Annihilation Score that I noticed. It felt especially weird given the author is actually a male. Like, is he white-knighting for his political agenda, or does he try to paint Mo as a whiny Karen for some reason? That's certainly not what I'd expect from a professionally successful woman who is a highly sought after demon fighter and literally the main character, to be constantly worried about.

I'm actually surprised at how effectively Stross keeps his leftist ideology from ruining the books entirely. It does make it through sometimes but generally can be ignored.

Just be sure to never ever visit his blog. That's woke leftist central to the power of one million.

Miles, Mutants and Microbes, a Miles Vorkosigan anthology. It’s got a very different voice than either the stereotypical or reactionary flavors of modern sci-fi. More to say on this once I’ve finished it.

I’m reading it as a palate cleanser from those John McPhee geology essays. The last one was about California fault lines, which are simultaneously awe-inspiringly massive and, uh, kind of dull. Not my favorite. Plus, I was too young to remember the 1989 World Series earthquake which kind of inspired the piece, so that was lost on me.

Louis McMaster Bujold is always a blast. Sometimes a little preachy in the later works, but great howdunnits. Miles, Mutants, and Microbes is a little weird of an anthology since "Labyrinth" touches on topic the topic but not as heavily on the plot points of the other two works, while Diplomatic Immunity is more dependent on Cetaganda than either of the other two stories.

DI can stand alone or as a sequel to Falling Free, but it's an odd editing decision, even by Baen's standards.

You see that Vorkorsigan-like tones more often in fantasy -- Diana Wynne Jones is a little less high social drama but similar -- but it does seem pretty badly underserved in scifi. Maybe some of the Ciaphas Cain series, if you're into Warhammer?

I keep seeing The Vorkorsigan Saga pop up in recommendations.

I gave the Warrior's Apprentice a shot, but Miles spends so much of it moping around the house not doing anything. Can you recommend one of the other books that's friendlier to someone with a short attention span who isn't that interested in hearing about the main character's family members?

Warrior Apprentice does start slow, but it gets a lot better when Miles get into Dendarii mode. If you got turned off in the first couple chapters, try skipping to chapter five and start from there. On the other hand, if you were still getting bored by the pathos in chapter ten, you're probably better off skipping the book. The main character's a bit bipolar, so Warrior's Apprentice isn't the last time he'll go into a pointed funk, but it's usually paced a lot better. If that's issue, some options:

Cetaganda works without having much knowledge of the setting. I think it leans a little to heavily on the 'throw a grenade in when stuck' approach to plot pacing, but it's got a reasonably good grabber and at worst that pacing errs toward the rushed, so it's a good middle-of-the-pack read. Murder-and-politics mystery in a scifi setting that pushes real heavy on what transhumanism might actually look like rather than Star Trek-style goofiness, though the expectations are a bit dated today.

The Vor Game is much stronger work and a lot faster to the point -- which is good, because it sets up a lot more small plot points for the rest of the series, often in pretty subtle ways -- but it is still very much The Sequel To Warrior's Apprentice. It'll tell you most of what you need to know about big plot, but there are especially some character bits that won't hit as hard without having seen the characters in action before. Great villains, witty heroes, and Miles at his most second-most saving-the-day-by-the-seat-of-the-pants, and necessary reading for the great Memory and Komarr (and, indirectly A Civil Campaign). There's a particular quote about unsolvable problems that'll stick with you.

Barrayar is probably easier as a starting point, and a much faster-paced work with clearer stakes (and a more specific timeline) for the protagonists, along with being set chronologically earlier. It gives a lot more complete an understanding of how fucked up the titular planet is, rather than leaving you wondering if it's Just These Assholes, and the motivation for all the characters is generally resonant even where a reader might know what the actual conclusion to the character's arc is going to be. Downside is that Miles is literally prenatal, and while Cordelia is a good main character, she's drastically different in tone. Also, like Pratchett's Night Watch there's a lot of subtle references to chronologically later works that you don't need to know, but will still miss out on. (Shards of Honor is chronologically even earlier and is readable, but it's the most Star Trek-fan-story of them all, so I wouldn't recommend it as a first read in the series.)

Borders of Infinity is a short story, and does show up enough in the rest of the stories to be worth reading in timeline order, but also they're representative of the highs and lows of the series. Would read before Komarr regardless, but it's a good intro to the pre-Memory Miles character and works with fairly little knowledge of the setting. There's a few stories in the series that are better, but if you don't like this one you're probably going to find getting to the best ones not worth it.

Louis McMaster Bujold is always a blast

Used to be. But Gentleman Jole unfortunately has been like chewing cardboard. I understand why she wrote it, but can't recommend reading it to anyone. The Flowers of Vashnoi (the last work in the Vorverse for now, AFAIK, and probably for ever) is a little better but I wouldn't also go as far as calling it "a blast" - nowhere on the usual spectacular level.

Fair on Jole; like Ethan of Athos it feels like it's putting too much effort into trying to answer Le Guin's 'taking life versus giving it' problem, but without the big narrative tension from a speeding deadline. Flowers felt stronger if a bit more repetitive and is certainly no Memory or Komarr, but I still enjoyed it about the same lines as Cryoburn.

Finishing The Possibility of an Island, which has been mostly excellent. It’s plays with the ideas of Elementary Particles a bit less successfully, but it’s still Houellebecq and therefore still funny and romantic and sad. I’ll be officially finished with the œuvre and slightly heartbroken when I’m done.

He Who Fights With Monsters, Book 10 By Shirtaloon. I appreciate that it's (finally) become self-aware enough to subvert some of its tropes, but I'll probably have to give the series some time before reading 11 as I've been reading too much LitRPG lately.

This reminds me, I'm finding Dungeon Slayer pretty bad so far. The worldbuilding makes no sense, the main character is pretty dumb, and the secondary characters' behavior is extremely unrealistic. Fights have mostly been interesting and cool though!

I did laugh at the thought of adventurers pulling up to a dungeon in beat-up Honda Civics, doing their thing, and driving off. The author should lean a lot harder into this incredible juxtaposition of settings he's created. Like, it's weird to me that they do this dungeon in an urban area with good road access, then afterward sit around a campfire. They should be sitting around a table at Burger King afterward! Or perhaps shawarma.

(Edited to spoiler on the side of caution and also to add:)

Still enjoying 12 Miles Below but it's slowed down a lot and frankly I don't care about the robot girl who's gradually becoming human at all which sucks because I think she's like >50% of the content at this point. Seen it done too many times before and the author will have to pull off something truly surprising to make these chapters worth the slog. Still a super cool setting and the high points are pretty great. I think only four books are on audible though and I'm almost done with number three, so I'll probably hit a wall with that soon.

Anyhow even though I'm mostly complaining I do appreciate the recs. 12 Miles Below has unquestionably been worth the read overall and will stick with me.

Oh hey I started a new series recently called Iron Tyrant by Seth Ring and it's a lot of fun. First few chapters are extremely unrepresentative of the rest of the series. Overall the author shows a lot of competence in the stuff he's writing about -- brutal military training of enslaved child soldiers, espionage, political intrigue, etc. -- and that makes it good. First book is called Chain of Feathers. Absolutely cannot wait for more of these to come out. Oh, but I'll say that the magic system is... idk, it's not the most interesting, but he does cool stuff with it and for a litrpg it's surprisingly light on stats and stuff. It's much, much more about the character, the setting, politics, and just general coolness than it is about the magic system.

@Muninn extra ping in case you missed the edit.

Oof, sorry to hear that you're not enjoying Dungeon Slayer, and I'm afraid this is where my "cheap date" reader self doesn't necessarily do me any favors when I talk about series that I've enjoyed. It's a low bar! It's been maybe a couple of years now since I read the first few books and what I remember really liking about it was, in fact, the fight scenes and also the world-building, not just the dungeon part, which was fun, but also the tension between the ability-locked normies and the MC, which made for an interesting dynamic. I remember being close to bailing on the whole thing in the early going when the MC was starting out from butt monkey beginnings but I stuck with it and got into it enough to read several books. It sounds like your mileage is varying and I'd say feel free to throw that one against the wall and move on if it isn't doing it for you. I've picked up books and read them just because I wanted to see what the author would do with the premise, sometimes to my own chagrin.

On the 12 Miles front, yeah, developing To'Wrathh's character was annoying AF to me, too, though I understand the major plot points that revolve around her character making that necessary to a certain extent. A lot of her early stuff was just bloody annoying to me, though it did get better over time. To me, 12 Miles is at its best when it's exploring its world, particularly the underground sections, and at its dreariest when it's doing its developmental/consolidation bits. I can tell you that book 5 to me was largely one of those so I'd say there's no need to rush in picking up the audiobook when it becomes available. Regardless, I'm glad you're enjoying that one!

I appreciate the Seth Ring recommendation, Kindle pimps out his Battle Mage Farmer stuff to me semi-regularly because of a similar series that I read in the past. I have another series or three that I bought to make me immune to wanting to read another one of those but I might check out Iron Tyrant--it sounds interesting and more up my alley (that whole what will he do with the premise thing) than another "exploit the farmer class" style of LitRPG.

To'Wrathh

Goodness gracious, is that how that's spelled? I'd been thinking Turrath. Yikes. Now I'm afraid to ask about Toakar.

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