What are you reading these days? | Fab forum

Ok so this topic is to talk about books (it seems most of us are readers).

 

So I'm currently reading Dune by Frank Herbert. Fantastic book. I can't wait to finish it.

 I read the whole Dune series! The first book is the "easiest", but the others are still fascinating, though VERY complicated at times…)

I've just finished "Soul music" by the fantastic Terry Pratchett!

If you haven't read any of his "Discworld"-series – make it your next book! It's not the first one, but you still get a good introduction into the series.

And, as the title suggests, it's about music, but not any music, but "Music With Rocks In"! A young bard Imp Y Celyn (the latter meaning "bush of holly"!) comes to Ankh-Morpork (the biggest city in discworld) and discovers a special guitar… Together with a dwarf and a troll (who names himself Cliff!) he forms The Band With Rocks In – and create a fever for music, guitars, leather, black and silver etc. among the people! And of course there's the hopeful but hopeless band looking for the perfect name for their band, changing it every few hours (The Whom, &U…), and lot's of song name parodys. AND there's another story-line about Death taking some time off – AGAIN! And his granddaughter (!) Susan has to fill the gap.

Believe me, it's a very funny read, especially for any musician who know's just a LITTLE bit about Rock'n Roll.

For those who don't know ANYTHING at all about Discworld: It's a satirical Fantasy-parody, with wizards, dwarfs, trolls, vampires, golems etc. This world is a disc, standing on the back of four elephants, standing on the back of a huge turtle! Many people say Pratchett's style is similar to Douglas Adams, but Pratchett is a LOT sharper and funnier, imo.

Regular characters are

Death (speaks only in capitals and develops more and more personality while the series continue)

Rincewind (the worst wizard ever)

Cohen the barbarian (the oldest barbarian – which means he's the BEST!)

Sam Vimes (commander of the city watch, my favourite character!!!!!)

Captain Carrot (he's an adopted dwarf, more than 6ft big, strong as a troll and so honest and nice that he makes the worst people doing their best in his presence)

Nobby Nobbs and Sergeant Colon (two other (in)famous) members of the watch, Nobby having a certificate that he's indeed human!)

Granny Weatherwax (the greatest witch)

The Patrician (Named Havelock Vetinari, trained Assasin, believer in a very democratic system: One Man, One Vote. He's The Man, so he's got The Vote…)

In each book the story will concentrate either on Rincewind (the most regular character in the first half of the series) or Sam Vimes (most important in the second half) or Granny Weatherwax and the witches or some other character with many of the others popping up here and there.

What I like about Pratchett is his humour and fantasy, creating fascinating stories and good laughs every two sentences.

But I LOVE him because with all the humour he still carries a strong message of humanity and how the powerful in ANY world will use others for their goals and how stupid humans sometimes are, letting themselves being used when promised something etc. etc.

The more the series continues, Pratchett's tone get's darker and even more thoughtful – but without giving up the good laughs!

My favourite books:

Nightwatch

Soul music

Interesting times

The fifth elephant

Carpe Jugulum

but most of the others are totally brilliant as well (The last continent being the only one I don't like that much).

I hope I was able to get some of you hooked – you won't regret it!! The only problem could be, that you'll need another bookshelf just for Pratchett pretty soon…

Enjoy!

minime said:

I though Terry Pratchett was a woman. Ohh, well.

 

No, that's Terry Hatcher! 

MeanMrsMustard said:

 Have fun with Dr. Freud. I like the "dream interpretation" stuff, but I think the whole "penis envy" thing was a load of crap. 

I'm reading All Quiet on the Western Front for English.

For fun I'm reading Les Misérables and re-reading The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. 

 

 

I've been trying to read that one for a while because I love the musical so much but I'm still only on where he's talking about the bishop. But thankfully I think Jean Valjean should enter soon. Which should make the book much more interesting.

Here, There, and Everywhere by Geoff Emerick and Bossypants by Tina Fey (it's incredibly funny and almost impossible to put down!).