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Post by berkley on Jun 27, 2019 20:30:04 GMT -5
That's disappointing to hear - I've had Winslow on my to-read-list for a while, since I've seen a lot of very strong word-of-mouth recommendations of his stuff online, and also a few "official" reviews, one of them at least from a journal that doesn't usually rate thrillers of any kind. I might still give it a try, but my expectations will be lowered now - which is probably not a bad thing anyway. Sorry. You might still want to give it a shot. It certainly reads quickly, and if it's a page-turner you want, it will be fine. To me it read more like a Netflix series, if you know what I mean. World-weariness, cynicism, action sequences, all those double-crosses, etc. No, I'm glad to hear a counter-balancing view, it'll probably allow me to enjoy the book more than if I had gone into it with unrealistically high expectations. And I will most likely give it a try one of these days. Also, now that you mention it, one of the reviews did compare Winslow's books to the well-known tv crime show The Wire as a point of praise.
Right now, my crime reading is still back in the 50s - I've been remiss in bringing them up here, but will try to start posting some brief reviews soon.
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Post by EdoBosnar on Jul 3, 2019 5:55:50 GMT -5
The Lonely Silver Rainby John D. MacDonald This is the last Travis McGee novel, which does seem to functions as a sort of send-off to the character, as he (McGee) spends a lot of time contemplating the fact that he's aging (and basically 'getting too old for this s**t') during the course of the story. Also, near the end there's a big revelation, which I won't spoil, that changes his life and priorities quite a bit. Even so, the ending creates that impression that MacDonald probably would have written more McGee stories, or at least one more, if he had not died a year after this one was published. In this one, the Ft. Lauderdale-based boat bum and 'salvage expert' sets about recovering a stolen boat for a wealthy friend of his, only to find it with three dead bodies on board. That gets him caught in the middle of a war between different organized crime cartels involved in the cocaine trade between Mexico, South American and Florida, because certain parties want to pin the murders on him. This isn't among the best of the McGee adventures/mysteries, but it's a solid and mostly enjoyable read. Otherwise, I have to note that I spent the last month reading the last nine of the McGee in one fell swoop - I only got turned onto them a few years ago, and I'd been slowly going through the catalogue in chronological order, but then at the end of May I reached "A Tan and Sandy Silence," which I have in this omnibus volume: Even though it's five separate novels, I always feel kind of weird about setting aside a book I'd started, so that forced me to read the two intervening novels between it and The Dreadful Lemon Sky, i.e., The Scarlet Ruse and the Turquoise Lament: (Didn't like Scarlet Ruse very much, by the way, and that's one I'd recommend skipping if you're not a completist like I am.) Then I could resume reading the rest of the books in that omnibus, and when I finished that, I figured I'd just keep going, since there were only two left: the one above and Cinnamon Skin. (Hate that cover to the UK edition, by the way - I generally don't cover designs that use cheesy photographs, and the woman on the cover clearly doesn't have 'cinnamon' skin, as does one of the key characters in the book...)
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Post by Calamas on Jul 3, 2019 9:23:48 GMT -5
The Lonely Silver Rainby John D. MacDonald This is the last Travis McGee novel, which does seem to functions as a sort of send-off to the character, as he (McGee) spends a lot of time contemplating the fact that he's aging (and basically 'getting too old for this s**t') during the course of the story. Also, near the end there's a big revelation, which I won't spoil, that changes his life and priorities quite a bit. Even so, the ending creates that impression that MacDonald probably would have written more McGee stories, or at least one more, if he had not died a year after this one was published. In this one, the Ft. Lauderdale-based boat bum and 'salvage expert' sets about recovering a stolen boat for a wealthy friend of his, only to find it with three dead bodies on board. That gets him caught in the middle of a war between different organized crime cartels involved in the cocaine trade between Mexico, South American and Florida, because certain parties want to pin the murders on him. This isn't among the best of the McGee adventures/mysteries, but it's a solid and mostly enjoyable read. Otherwise, I have to note that I spent the last month reading the last nine of the McGee in one fell swoop - I only got turned onto them a few years ago, and I'd been slowly going through the catalogue in chronological order, but then at the end of May I reached "A Tan and Sandy Silence," which I have in this omnibus volume: Even though it's five separate novels, I always feel kind of weird about setting aside a book I'd started, so that forced me to read the two intervening novels between it and The Dreadful Lemon Sky, i.e., The Scarlet Ruse and the Turquoise Lament: (Didn't like Scarlet Ruse very much, by the way, and that's one I'd recommend skipping if you're not a completist like I am.) Then I could resume reading the rest of the books in that omnibus, and when I finished that, I figured I'd just keep going, since there were only two left: the one above and Cinnamon Skin. (Hate that cover to the UK edition, by the way - I generally don't cover designs that use cheesy photographs, and the woman on the cover clearly doesn't have 'cinnamon' skin, as does one of the key characters in the book...) This is a series where everyone seems to have a different favorite and least favorite. My favorite is LEMON, though I may be prejudiced by it being my first. I agree that SCARLET is not a high mark, but I hold TAN AND SANDY and TURQUOISE in lesser regard, and actively dislike PINK. But I love the series as a whole. And I definitely think more of SILVER than you. Coming into this book cold and with no foreknowledge of McGee, I think most would consider it a failure. The mystery is practically irrelevant to the story. But that’s the point to longtime fans. McGee’s real opponent is mortality. As the penultimate book in the series--as it was intended to be--it accomplishes everything it sets out to do. But in doing so, it short shrifts some basic element needed to satisfy a first time reader. A more than fair trade, I suspect, as MacDonald was nearing the end of his, even if he had survived the heart operation that actually took him. But like I said, everybody feels differently when it comes to MacDonald and McGee. It produces more varied reactions than any other series that I know of.
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Post by EdoBosnar on Jul 3, 2019 11:55:31 GMT -5
This is a series where everyone seems to have a different favorite and least favorite. My favorite is LEMON, though I may be prejudiced by it being my first. I agree that SCARLET is not a high mark, but I hold TAN AND SANDY and TURQUOISE in lesser regard, and actively dislike PINK. But I love the series as a whole. And I definitely think more of SILVER than you. Coming into this book cold and with no foreknowledge of McGee, I think most would consider it a failure. The mystery is practically irrelevant to the story. But that’s the point to longtime fans. McGee’s real opponent is mortality. As the penultimate book in the series--as it was intended to be--it accomplishes everything it sets out to do. But in doing so, it short shrifts some basic element needed to satisfy a first time reader. A more than fair trade, I suspect, as MacDonald was nearing the end of his, even if he had survived the heart operation that actually took him. But like I said, everybody feels differently when it comes to MacDonald and McGee. It produces more varied reactions than any other series that I know of. Don't necessarily agree that a first-time reader would consider it a failure; I'm pretty sure that if 'Silver' had been the first one I'd read, I'd still probably be interested in reading the others regardless. In fact, I think 'Scarlet' is the only one that - if I had read it first - would have made me think, 'Yeah, no,' and never pick up another McGee book.
Otherwise, I liked 'Silver' well enough, just not as much as a quite a few others (esp. Gold, Amber and Gray).
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jul 3, 2019 14:39:56 GMT -5
No Way to Treat a First Lady by Christopher BuckleyAs a general rule I don't read or watch anything dealing with legal issues and seldom with police stuff. As a lawyer I just can't suspend my disbelief that far. The exception tends to be comedies (My Cousin Vinny is a hoot). Given that a LARGE portion of this book is the trial of the former First Lady for assassinating the President there was definitely danger that I'd not be able to deal with it. On the other hand, Christopher Buckley, whatever his other faults, is a damn funny guy. So I went ahead and read this one. And while it's not without faults, I'm very glad that I pulled the trigger on this. It's been a long time since a book caused me to lose sleep. This one did. It was just compellingly readable. Yeah, seventeen years on, parts of it have aged a bit badly. And the third act is weaker than the rest. But it was funny and I couldn't put it down.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 4, 2019 9:57:34 GMT -5
Finished reading the first volume of the James Blish Star Trek adaptations last night... interesting to see the variances from the episodes as aired-some cleave very close to the episodes, some differ to bigger or lesser degrees, such as the adaptation of Miri which cuts out almost all the shenanigans with the kids and only gives the gang of kids (except Miri herself) about 3-4 paragraphs of "screen time" overall, but spends a lot of time of McCoy and Spock working on the antidote and the computer problems. Miri is not one of my favorite episodes, mostly because I really didn't like a lot of the scenes with the gang of kids, so I actually preferred the adaptation. -M
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jul 5, 2019 14:55:17 GMT -5
Vanilla Ride by Joe R. Lansdale. Hap and Leonard return after an eight year hiatus. Marvin Hanson, still recovering from multiple afflictions, comes to the boys for help in getting his granddaughter, who is living with a group of drug dealers, back back home. The boys go in with their usual planning and foresight and end up kicking ass and taking names while "rescuing" Gadget. Unfortunately Hap decides to flush a whole passel of cocaine down the commode and these dealers are tied in with the Dixie Mafia, who don't take kindly to the loss of product and the thumping of their low-level dealers. This leads to an ever escalating attempt to get Hap, Leonard, Marvin and their families and loved one. After making a deal with the FBI, getting the non-combatants to safety and bringing in some reinforcements Hap and Leonard meet the problem head-on...in their own inimitable fashion. When it comes to Hap and Leonard the plot of the book is tertiary. What it's really about is Lansdale giving us two of the most interesting and likable characters you're ever going to find and then subjecting them to his unique brand of humor and violence. Which isn't to say that the plot of this one is bad. It's just that it's really not the point. This is a great return after a significant time away. And Yay for that.
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Post by berkley on Jul 5, 2019 18:22:20 GMT -5
Finished reading the first volume of the James Blish Star Trek adaptations last night... interesting to see the variances from the episodes as aired-some cleave very close to the episodes, some differ to bigger or lesser degrees, such as the adaptation of Miri which cuts out almost all the shenanigans with the kids and only gives the gang of kids (except Miri herself) about 3-4 paragraphs of "screen time" overall, but spends a lot of time of McCoy and Spock working on the antidote and the computer problems. Miri is not one of my favorite episodes, mostly because I really didn't like a lot of the scenes with the gang of kids, so I actually preferred the adaptation. -M I read at least one of those James Blish Star Trek books when I was a kid, and also one novel - I think Spock, Messiah. I liked them a lot at that age, no idea how they'll read now but I've just recently started looking for used copies of the old paperbacks. Nice covers on a lot of them! Even the ones with still-shots from the tv show look good, which isn't usually the case with me.
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Post by berkley on Jul 5, 2019 18:30:00 GMT -5
This is a series where everyone seems to have a different favorite and least favorite. My favorite is LEMON, though I may be prejudiced by it being my first. I agree that SCARLET is not a high mark, but I hold TAN AND SANDY and TURQUOISE in lesser regard, and actively dislike PINK. But I love the series as a whole. And I definitely think more of SILVER than you. Coming into this book cold and with no foreknowledge of McGee, I think most would consider it a failure. The mystery is practically irrelevant to the story. But that’s the point to longtime fans. McGee’s real opponent is mortality. As the penultimate book in the series--as it was intended to be--it accomplishes everything it sets out to do. But in doing so, it short shrifts some basic element needed to satisfy a first time reader. A more than fair trade, I suspect, as MacDonald was nearing the end of his, even if he had survived the heart operation that actually took him. But like I said, everybody feels differently when it comes to MacDonald and McGee. It produces more varied reactions than any other series that I know of. Don't necessarily agree that a first-time reader would consider it a failure; I'm pretty sure that if 'Silver' had been the first one I'd read, I'd still probably be interested in reading the others regardless. In fact, I think 'Scarlet' is the only one that - if I had read it first - would have made me think, 'Yeah, no,' and never pick up another McGee book.
Otherwise, I liked 'Silver' well enough, just not as much as a quite a few others (esp. Gold, Amber and Gray). I read the whole series from start to finish over a span of probably 2 or 3 years, around ten years back. After that much time, I struggle a bit matching up some of the colour-coded titles with the right story. But I do remember liking The Scarlet Ruse, myself - I thought it featured one of the more interesting antagonists to McGee. I like the cover you posted for Scarlet Ruse too - different from the one I read.
Doesn't McGee look a bit like Brando on the cover to that omnibus?
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jul 10, 2019 12:01:42 GMT -5
Rocket Men by Robert KursonThe first phase of the U.S.' s experiment in manned space flight (Mercury-Apollo) was largely over before I ever became aware of it. I was only five when Apollo 17 landed the last men to walk on the moon. But I was a pretty big space geek when I was a kid. That said, I don't think I was ever fully aware of the full story or importance of the Apollo 8 mission. Luckily Robert Kurson fixed that with this very readable and informative book. In the wake of the Apollo 1 fire NASA was on tenterhooks. It seemed extremely unlikely that they could meet President Kennedy's pledge to place a man on the moon by the end of the decade. Tests of the Saturn V, necessary to take men to the moon, weren't going well and by mid-1968 it had never had a manned flight. Added to the problems were intelligence reports that indicated that the Soviets were planning and apparently capable of putting cosmonauts into orbit around the moon by mid 1968. In this situation the powers that be at NASA decided to take a huge risk and send Apollo 8 to orbit the moon. The flight was moved well up in the rotation, was the first manned flight of the Saturn V and was rushed to try to put Americans into lunar orbit before the Soviets. This book is the story of the men who made that decision, and particularly the men, Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and William Anders, who took mankind to another world. It's the story of what was one of the most important ventures into space...and what turned out, arguably against the odds, to be an almost perfect space flight. Really a great read. If you have any interest in space flight it's well worth the time, particularly if you've glossed over Apollo 8 for the subsequent flights of Apollos 11 and 13.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 11, 2019 15:46:06 GMT -5
Finished the second Fu Manchu novel last night... It was good up until the end (the post defeat sequence aboard the ship sailing towards Egypt was a let down, predictable and anti-climatic), but not a patch on the first book. I am not sure if this is just a sophomore slump or the start of diminishing returns on each successive book. I have 3 more Fu Manchu novels, and I will at least read books 3 and 4 (the 2rd book I have is from much later in the series), before determining the overall quality of the series as it moves forward. -M
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Post by wildfire2099 on Jul 13, 2019 21:29:16 GMT -5
Skylark Three EE 'Doc' Smith I've read some of the Lensman books, so I was kinda excited for this one... I'm not sure if I have just have rose colored nostalgia lenses from that (it was one of the first classic sci-fi books I read. WAY back when one could still join the sci-fi book club and get 5 books for a $.01), of this one's just not as good.. but getting though this book was really a chore. Smith's focus is his 'science' which mainly consists of the smaller the particle you find, the more powerful the guns. The main characters are plucky Americans that can of course do just about anything possible to defeat the bad guys. There's a villain chasing the good guys that seems to have no purpose, too... maybe that becomes important in a later book. Never mind the painful gender stereotypes.. I get it, it's 1930.. but even the super evolved aliens that are millions of years ahead of humans and evolution have all male scientists and females that focus on decor and music.... at least 5 times the wife of the main character said some variation of 'I can't possibly under stand that? Can I go play with the children?' Probably only worth revisiting for Smith's place in history. On a unrelated note, I picked up a hardcover version of Warlord of Mars at a used book store on my mini-vaca to Cooperstown for $6. Not sure if it's worth much (looks like it might be the 2nd publisher of the book, grosset and dunlap), but it's really cool
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jul 15, 2019 11:26:45 GMT -5
Finished the second Fu Manchu novel last night... It was good up until the end (the post defeat sequence aboard the ship sailing towards Egypt was a let down, predictable and anti-climatic), but not a patch on the first book. I am not sure if this is just a sophomore slump or the start of diminishing returns on each successive book. I have 3 more Fu Manchu novels, and I will at least read books 3 and 4 (the 2rd book I have is from much later in the series), before determining the overall quality of the series as it moves forward. -M It's been eons since I've read more than the first Fu Manchu book. I know that the first one was pieced together from shorter works. I don't recall when Rohmer started writing novels as novels. But quality-wise they are what they are and aren't going to get a lot better. Skylark Three EE 'Doc' Smith I've read some of the Lensman books, so I was kinda excited for this one... I'm not sure if I have just have rose colored nostalgia lenses from that (it was one of the first classic sci-fi books I read. WAY back when one could still join the sci-fi book club and get 5 books for a $.01), of this one's just not as good.. but getting though this book was really a chore. Smith's focus is his 'science' which mainly consists of the smaller the particle you find, the more powerful the guns. The main characters are plucky Americans that can of course do just about anything possible to defeat the bad guys. There's a villain chasing the good guys that seems to have no purpose, too... maybe that becomes important in a later book. Never mind the painful gender stereotypes.. I get it, it's 1930.. but even the super evolved aliens that are millions of years ahead of humans and evolution have all male scientists and females that focus on decor and music.... at least 5 times the wife of the main character said some variation of 'I can't possibly under stand that? Can I go play with the children?' Probably only worth revisiting for Smith's place in history. On a unrelated note, I picked up a hardcover version of Warlord of Mars at a used book store on my mini-vaca to Cooperstown for $6. Not sure if it's worth much (looks like it might be the 2nd publisher of the book, grosset and dunlap), but it's really cool It's been eons since I've read this one too. I'll likely not be revisiting any time soon because I'm just not a big fan of Smith's work. I understand his importance, but that doesn't make me want to read his books. I tried a re-read of Triplanetary a couple years back and couldn't make it through.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jul 15, 2019 11:38:44 GMT -5
Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells. The third Murderbot novella finds Murderbot investigating the GrayCris Corporation from the first novella and, again, having to rescue some humans from some bad operatives. There wasn't anything particularly wrong with the story...it just wasn't anything that much different than we've seen twice before. It did move the narrative forward a bit. So that's good. But none of it was particularly new nor was it terribly interesting. It also wasn't bad. It just felt very "been there, seen that." I'll read the fourth novella here in a bit and hope it gives me something better. Unfortunately it looks like Wells may be saving the main action for the forthcoming novel. By that time, if Exit Strategy (novella 4) doesn't wow me, I may have run out of interest.
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Roquefort Raider
CCF Mod Squad
Modus omnibus in rebus
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Jul 15, 2019 18:45:06 GMT -5
I’m reading the 2013 Hugo Prize winner, John Scalzi’s Redshirts and honestly haven’t laughed that hard readin a book since Connie Willis’s To say nothing of the dog.
I went in with moderate expectations, supposing Redshirts would simply be a Star Trek spoof told from the point of view of the eponymous sacrificial lambs who always manage to get killed in the pre-title opening scenes... but it’s turning out to be far funnier and clever that I had first given it credit for! The way some characters observe that some things make no sense but work anyway (like talking technobabbly gibberish to the science officer) and decide to play along, the way they have discovered the rule according to which once a redshirt is killed in the presence of the captain then the others are safe for the rest of the mission, is absolutely priceless... especially since they all seem to take it in stride, even if they think the whole thing is absurd.
This is the third Scalzi novel I got my hands on, and he has yet to disappoint!
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