Newcomers Paradise discussion

Foundation
by Isaac Asimov

First thoughts:

Parts of this book can be a little dry. A lot of it is just characters talking to one another. So far I found the midsection of the book to be really engaging, the time flew by.

The Girl With All the Gifts by M.R. Carey

Thoughts:
I ruined one of the twists that is revealed early in the book by reading a review, but it was still enjoyable. A few of the characters are flat and they have little to no character development so far but the plot is engaging and it's interesting to learn about their world.

Eminia wrote: " The Girl With All the Gifts by M.R. Carey

Thoughts:
I ruined one of the twists that is revealed early in the book by reading a review, but it was still enjoyable. A few of the cha..."

The book I was reading also had flat characters. What do you think is more important, dynamic characters or an engaging plot?

seal308 wrote: "The book I was reading also had flat characters. What do you think is more important, dynamic characters or an engaging plot?"

Personally, I prefer bildungsromans, books who focus entirely on the develop of the characters, but they have a relatively average plot (there are exceptions, of course). I just find it fun to see how the protagonist or even the secondary characters grow over the course of the book.

I'm currently reading:



1.The Left Hand of Darkness

Ursula K. Le Guin

2.The Book Thief

Markus Zusak

I'm reading this for a book club I'm currently in. I will post my experience in the "Connecting with Others" thread.

Hey all,

Just joined :)

I am reading The Stranger Beside Me: Ted Bundy The Shocking Inside Story by Ann Rule.

I'm not very far into it yet (about 10%) but it is very good thus far.

Channing wrote: "Hey all,

Just joined :)

I am reading The Stranger Beside Me: Ted Bundy The Shocking Inside Story by Ann Rule.

I'm not very far into it yet (about 10%) but it is very good thus far."

Hello and welcome to the club!
Interesting book the synopsis says that the author was a close friend of Ted Bundy. Does she sound sympathetic to Bundy?

seal308 wrote: "Interesting book the synopsis says that the author was a close friend of Ted Bundy. Does she sound sympathetic to Bundy?"

Well, to a degree. I'm still not very far through the book but the beginning of it discusses how the author and Ted knew each other. Oddly enough they both volunteered at a suicide prevention hotline. I'm very intrigued to dig deeper into this book and will have to report back once I have been able to get further along in it.

Just finished reading The Book Thief.
The Book Thief

Markus Zusak
The book was not emotionally gripping for me as it was to others. A possible reason is the explicit foreshadowing made by the narrator. I may reread the novel not for the story itself but instead for the amazing imagery. Zusak is creative with imagery and has beautiful fine crafted sentences that make it a joy to read. As a YA novel it truly is on another class to its peers in terms of writing. I didn't find the story gripping, oddly I was most engaged when the focus was not on the female protagonist but instead on war and the subtle bits of humour found in surprisingly dark places. Perhaps a story about a German girl in WWII just isn't for me, not something that gets me excited or emotionally grips me. In the end The Book Thief reminds me of a bittersweet and melancholic dream. Where upon waking, feelings of sadness or warmth are fleeting and start to wane into obscurity.

Going to start reading The Kite Runner.
The Kite Runner

Khaled Hosseini

It's a book about afghan children who are friends. One boy is rich the other is poor. I believe it's a story about friendship.

I'm going to chat about this book with someone else on Books Amino. If anyone else wants to join you can. I put a writeup on Amino here in the "Connecting with Others" thread if you want to know more. Click here

So I realized I never got back to the group about The Stranger Beside Me: Ted Bundy The Shocking Inside Story. The main reason was it took me FOREVER to finish it. I wrote the following review on it:

(Rated 3/5 on Goodreads) "3.5/5 stars is a bit more accurate. This book, as fascinating as the information in it was, suffered from the writing style that Rule exhibits. I often found myself bored out of my skull with some parts of this book, while other times I couldn't put it down. I also felt that Rule emphasized things too many times and rambled on about the same details discussed in earlier pages far too many times. Some points that she would empathize in great detail for pages and pages, ultimately would have no connection later in the story.

I did ultimately enjoy the book. It provided a different account of Bundy and you could almost "feel" for him at times in the beginning of the book. It is an incredibly interesting read and overall I would recommend it, however, I would caution the reader that there are some lumps where they will have to force themselves to get through it."

The reason the book actually took me so long to finish is because some parts were so tough to follow. I felt like I was reading the same pieces of information over and over and over again. It grew very tiresome. The information and portrayal of Bundy is excellent (and creepy). Rule's personal knowledge of Bundy was something that gave the book some extreme depth as well as eeriness.

Channing wrote: "So I realized I never got back to the group about The Stranger Beside Me: Ted Bundy The Shocking Inside Story. The main reason was it took me FOREVER to finish it. I wrote the followin..."

I'm happy you got through the book.
Apparently it was Rule's first book which explains the redundancy in her writing and your issue with her style.
To me it sounds like a very raw book, where the author has an obvious connection to the story and shares her own experiences. While those experiences were important to her, it might not seem as important to the reader.
It would be interesting to see the changes in her writing style over the years, because she wrote a number of books after The Stranger Beside Me.

Long time no see.
I'm currently reading Neuromancer because Aqua made me read it :)
It s very difficult read so far.
I hope to get it done by early October.

The Queen's Gambit
by Walter Tevis

I bought the book after loving the netflix series and it is interesting to see the differences between the series and the book.

The book in some ways is less dramatic than the series and at sometimes a little bland however, I find the characters to be better developed and believable in the book.

I did not anticipate for how many mentions of chess moves would be made throughout the book, which for someone who does not play chess often can be a bit difficult to picture however because I had watched the series it isn't too bad.

Overall, so far (pg 206/243) I would give the book a 3.5 / 5 (would probably be higher if I was a more avid chess player). It is a good well written story with likeable characters however personally I am struggling to feel as inspired from the novel as I had expected from watching the series.

I’m currently reading the last book in the Firebird series called A MILLION WORLDS WITH YOU .. overall I’m really enjoying it just started reading it today.. I’m a slow reader so I’m still on page 31 and yah✌️