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PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   2611 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for May 3, 2026

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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So, what are you reading?

I'm getting interested in Ellul. Also about halfway through The Handmaid's Tale. Can't say it has really moved me yet one way or the other, but it seems to be moving towards something. It vaguely occurs to me that some of the undertone of resentment might be intended for readers like myself, but I can't quite figure out what precisely it is angry about yet. Hopefully it will be something that I can use.

Finished He Who Fights with Monsters 12... I liked it, did we really need to introduce trans pronoun norms to a whole universe?

Started Red Rising. Been many people who have raved about it, I should have seen it was young adult, but I wish someone would have warned me It's Hunger Games for Boys. I don't hate it but I started to see where it was going and got a little annoyed. I hear things shift for the latter books.

Had a long drive on the weekend, so Dresden Files' White Night kept me company. The series keeps to deliver, though this one was a bit lower stakes, comparatively, than the previous ones. The only serious arc advancements were that we now know how Thomas is surviving, Lash is out of the picture, after managing to teach Dresden to play guitar, of all things, and Marcone becomes a baron which I am sure will play out later somehow. A lot of unanswered questions - like what Cowl has to do with it and where the immortal super-ghoul army came from and why nobody knew about that even existing prior to that.

Also finished Howling Dark and Demon in White. Hadrian's transformation from a hippie to a superhero by the end of it is pretty much complete, now I am expecting him to do something with it.

Also, have been re-reading Father Brown stories. They never get old.

Baneslayer: System of Nil Book 1 by Tim Paulson. 3/5, mostly because the MC is progressing unbelievably fast by defeating mobs that are much higher than his own level. Normally I'd probably dip out on reading the larger series but alas, I bought 5 of them on Kindle Countdown Deals so as long as it stays decent, I'll probably continue to read it. Alas.

Just finished The Doomed City. It was good, but I feel like it could have been much better without the expedition plot- treating the turning point as the climax of the novel, with the philosophical commentary over drinks or in editorials, would have avoided the dragging and trippiness of the expedition.

To start Man Eaters of Kumaon.

I liked the expedition - it expands the world and shows there has been a lot of stuff going on that the City dwellers have no idea about and are basically beyond their comprehension. But I didn't like the ending too much... Too close to the dreaded "and then he woke up and it all was just a dream".

Agreed that the ending was quite bad. The expedition dragged. It was an acid trip. But most of all, nothing happened, it was merely a framing for philosophical rambling. There could easily have been philosophical dialogue over the problem of governing the city by the post turning point elites, in which something actually happens.

BTW, has anyone read Roadside Picnic?

I of course read it, many times, but if you intend to read it in translation, I have no idea about how good they are. This is an example of a good ending btw. The whole setup is kind of standard "weird sci-fi" thing - aliens, artifacts, zombies, everything of that sort - and pretty enjoyable by itself, but then the ending totally kicks it all out of the water and makes you just sit there and scratch your head, wondering.

Finally finished A Canticle for Leibowitz during the week. Slow, but worth the effort for the ending.

Next up is Philadelphia Fire.

UPDATE: Read the first few pages of Philadelphia Fire and didn't like it. Will have to find something else to read.

Finished Gideon the Ninth. Such a fun book.

Made a trip to half-price books for an excellent haul. Various Vlad Taltos novels, the first five Amber Chronicles, the next Aubrey/Maturin, and. Uh. Gulag Archipelago. There’s got to be something good in that pile!

Gideon the Ninth was an extremely pleasant surprise. Harrow the Ninth less so. Hoping Nona the Ninth can bring it back.

I read Zelazny about fifteen years ago, and I was so struck by his prose. Very sparse, simple, and efficient. I loved it.

Just started the Mage Errant series and I've blasted through three books. It's a light, fun read, though a bit too redditor for me to truly love it.

though a bit too redditor for me to truly love it.

That gets worse. There's a point where the very redditor author seems to realize the, let's say, meta-social implications of his worldbuilding and has an on-page freak-out about it.

...okay, now I'm morbidly curious. I'm just not sure if I want to slog through 7 books of reddit to get to it.

Spoilers for Mage Errant. General spoilers, @ThomasdelVasto should avoid mousing over, but for anyone else it's general worldbuilding stuff, not specific plot points. The magic system basically lends itself to an Archmagistocracy, rule by individuals who are personally powerful on the level of armies. It's essentially Great Man theory of history, the magic system. The political landscape is literally just "which archmage, lich, or superpowered monster lives in this area, and thus rules it." The main antagonist faction uses "tricks" to empower semi-disposable troops to fight above their level, but they're also the only thing remotely resembling a democracy that cares about their people on an institutional level. Somewhere around book 5 the author seems to have realized the implications of a small band of Randian Ubermen fighting off the vile forces of egalitarian institutionalism, and frantically retconned the main cast to try to backdate them as the mere product of having good supporting research teams, and you know, basically anyone could have done what they did with the right support network.

Actual plot point spoilers: And then the last book has an awkward villain-swap to a generic "steal the magic of others" raid boss monster that had minimal buildup. This is really glaring because the second to last book involves a detour to another world with a different magic system that is actually based on institutions and infrastructure and large-scale societal organizing, but the author clearly didn't consider any of this stuff when he was writing the first handful of books.

And if I recall correctly the author is an actual straight up SneerClub poster.

You are correct. What a shame.

...well. Alright, then. That certainly has a degree of hilarity to it, I will confess.

Thank you for the summery.

Don't ruin it for me. I'm gonna ride it out and do my best to ignore the redditor side of things.

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