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MARC Coding and AACR2 textbooks. (Library Cataloguing)

That's some good stuff right there.

Stack 'em up and they're the perfect height for a pillow in class.

... Can you tell exams are next week?

I haven't read anything for fun since Christmas. Had to do a "book journal" wherein I read 26 Children's and YA books and wrote reports on each, but I'd rather shoot myself than do it again or recommend anything out of that load of useless page upon useless page of printed garbage.

Though if you do want kid's book rec's, I can do that. Scaredy Squirrel and My Penguin Osbert are AWESOME.

I'm reading The Wheel of time books again i intend to stop at 7 as i usually do and play the rest of the series in my head where it doesn't completely suck.

I'm reading Immanuel Velikovsky's Earth In Upheaval. I'd say what it;s about, but it's kind of hard to explain...so I'll let wikipedia do it. It's a very interesting book(as are his others).

I Just finished over last weekend Dead by dawn and the first 2 Rama books. Next up are the last 2 Rama books then a look thru the pile to see what looks good.

I've been working my way through Discworld by Pratchett. Quirky, funny, nonsensical fantasy.

Non Sci-fi/Fantasy I would recommend Hermann Hesse a german author who lived around WWI and beyond. Siddhartha is probably the best known story, though I am sure Smasharoo would be the first to come in and pick apart a early 20th century German writing on Buddhism and enlightenment. Damien, Steppenwolf or even Journey to the East are to be recommended.

Edit - I picked up Eye of the World after getting into the previous WoT thread. Since I first read the series in 1997 I have probably read the series back to front about 6+ times. As bad as books 7-10 are I still thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster (blessed be his noodly appendages) that at least it didn't turn out like the Sword of Truth Series. I didn't mind the first couple books in that series, not high fantasy but it kept me reading. However by book 4/5 it quickly turned into hamfisted diatribes on social issues from communism (cause we are in the 50's you know) to Pacifism to minorities using political correctness and past transgression by the majority to impose their will on populations. Absolutely horrible, trite, childlike rambling.

Edited, Jun 5th 2008 10:56am by bodhisattva

Finished reading Lonely Werewolf Girl the other day.

Man was that a weird book. It's about werewolves obviously, but the characters are so insanely weird in general that they mythical species thing is almost like a side issue. It's a good book, but boy was it bizarre.

It's a trilogy, The Golden Transcendence is the final part of it. I've read the first two parts, but I have to confess I have yet to completely finish it. Sort of cyberpunk space opera style, not really my thing although the first two books did have some truly memorable scenes.

Erm, I have to challenge you on the cyberpunk description. Most pre-1980's science fiction envisaged shiny new worlds full of technological wonders, even if they often also envisaged sinister social regressions. The hallmark of cyberpunk was that it envisaged a grimy future filled with rubbish, detritus and scrap, for the majority of humans, with only a tiny minority elite enjoying a shiny comfortable world. Cyberpunk envisaged an overall physical regression, a disappearing of the comfortable mass of the middle class. Protagonists are in a desperate tooth-and-nail economy, where they soup up their body with second-hand technologies installed at unlicensed medical practitioners with dubious hygiene.

In Wright's universe the vast majority of known humans inside the culture of The Golden Oecumene live lives of immense physical splendour, or a mental splendour so complete that their physical situation is irrelevant. Humans have incredible amounts of choice as to their physical make-up, which make for some strange examples. Maybe it's this "strange bodies" thing that makes you think "cyberpunk"? Since cyberpunk also featured strange changing to the normal human body. But in the Golden Oecumene it's easy to be wealthy and comfortable. The vast mass of humans are. It takes a conscious philosophical choice to step out of the comforts of the civilisation, or a really monumental chain of *****-ups to dwindle your resources and actually put your life in jeopardy, with massively advanced computer AI assisted adjustments to your emotional balance and intellectual judgment available to you every step of the way.

As far as I can tell, Phaethon's mysterious bankruptcy, Hyacinth's death [a very minor character, no spoiler] and the economic and physical plight of the Neptunians are examples of very possible, but very minority misfortunes. The whole society is very conscious of living in a Golden Age of universal comfort, with the few people in hardship really "doing it to themselves".

I'm reading Peter Hamilton "The dreaming void". Am loving it, if you haven't read his books and like sci-fi, then you're missing out. (i'm sure its been talked about somewhere here before though)