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dustydigger
Posted 2021-11-06 7:35 AM (#23523 - in reply to #22775)
Subject: Re: Pick & Mix 2021 challenge		Quote Reply



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Location: UK		Well,I managed to finish the Pick N' Mix challenge last month. Real life has been a pain (literally) this year. Dogged by illhealth,including pernicious anaemia which induces brain fog,lethargy and a host of other symptoms,and crippling arthritis I have done only a minimum of online typing,and so apart from the What Are We Reading In... thread I totally neglected this thread to my shame. Much time had to be spent too on looking after my 81 yr old husband,and coping with the isolation of sheltering from covid.I had to adjust my reading,reading a lot more short fiction than usual,and that was actually very enjoyable. I followed many recommendations from our excellent WWEnd lists.
Some of the most interesting books I read this year are:
David Lindsay - A voyage to Arcturus. A very strange book,often bizarre,but it has stuck in my mind for some reason!
Robert A Heinlein - All You Zombies. I often reread this paradoxical time travel story.I wouldnt want to try to explain this story,but its great for clearing cobwebs from the brain. RAH was so good at time travel stuff. I also love his delightful The Door Into Summer in the same subgenre
Octavia E Butler - Bloodchild. Possibly my favourite read of the year.
Charles G Finney - The Circus of Dr Lao. This was a bit of a weird one,about a magical circus coming to town. Spooky and dangerous
Neal Stephenson - .Seveneves. Surprised myself by actually LIKING a Stephenson book,which a never do as a rule.I think I enjoyed it as a sort of throwback on good old fashioned SF with engineers cobbling together on the fly solutions to disasters.
George R Stewart - Earth Abides. A wonderful book about the aftermath of a terrible plague which kills more than 99% of mankind. The protagonist gathers together a tiny group of people who have to rebuild.I had a horrible feeling that the group would die out in the future once the old generation who remembered civilisation died off. A rather sad book,but very impressive.
Ted Chiang - The Tower of Babylon. Fantastic short story,the first tale I have ever read by Chiang. Wont be the last.
I also thoroughly enjoyed yet another reread of Night in the Lonesome October,for Spooky October,and lots of Robert Bloch,Robert E Howard,Algernon Blacwood and other weird tale genre authors. Such fun.





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