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Old 01-20-2017, 07:21 AM   #401
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I started Brandon Sanderson's new series last night, Stormlight Archive, and so far book one (The Way of Kings) is awesome. I liked the way he handled Wheel of Time and have been meaning to pick up one of his series for a while.

Highly recommend.
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Old 01-20-2017, 01:03 PM   #402
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Agree to both. Three Body Problem was quite good.

Stormlight Archive is really good, I quite like the worldbuilding, really looking forward to the next one.
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Old 04-25-2017, 09:45 PM   #403
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Agree to both. Three Body Problem was quite good.

Stormlight Archive is really good, I quite like the worldbuilding, really looking forward to the next one.
Just finished "The Remembrance of Earth's Past" Trilogy from Cixin Liu

Three Body Problem
The Dark Forest
Death's End

What a ride. Provides a much different idea of an Alien invasion and Humanity's exposure to the greater Universe. It is from a Chinese author so the main characters are Chinese and it has more of an Eastern influence to story telling.

I strongly recommend this Trilogy. It blew my mind and I can not stop thinking about it.

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Old 04-25-2017, 10:03 PM   #404
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Old 04-25-2017, 10:22 PM   #405
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Currently reading The Terror by Dan Simmons. It's a historical fiction/horror novel based on the Franklin expedition. I've read a few of his books before, so I know he can write. Quite enjoying it so far. It's nice to have writers like Simmons who excel at different genres and are willing to take chances.

How did you like The Terror? It's one of my favorite Simmons books, and I agree he is an really amazing writer to be able to excel in so many different genres.
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Old 04-26-2017, 09:06 AM   #406
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How did you like The Terror? It's one of my favorite Simmons books, and I agree he is an really amazing writer to be able to excel in so many different genres.
I liked it a lot. Really atmospheric. Unpredictable. Simmons seemed to get the history right. He does have a habit of overwriting, where he'll go into such great scientific detail that the drama seeps away. Like a scene where a crew member is escaping the monster in the rigging and Simmons goes on for about 8 pages about ropes swinging in parabellas and arcs, exact distances between the mast and rigging - all for a scene that takes about 80 seconds. And the ending was a bit unsatisfying.

Still, it was a well-written and fascinating story. I've now read Hyperion, Summer of Night, and the Terror, and enjoyed them all.
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Old 04-26-2017, 09:15 AM   #407
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Old 04-26-2017, 09:29 AM   #408
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I read Shoe Dog by Phil Knight last month which was pretty good. It's about how he started Nike and everything involved in getting it to where it is today. I really liked it. His writing style was very descriptive and interesting.

I'm currently reading Tribes by Seth Godin. Pretty decent so far. If you are a business owner or higher up in the management chain I would recommend it as a good leadership book to read.
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Old 04-26-2017, 10:06 AM   #409
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I am currently reading "Dueling with Kings" by Dan Barbarisi

Essentially, he used to be a Yankees beat writer but quit his job to go "pro" at daily fantasy sports.

Pretty interesting read about the industry as a whole and his adventure to becoming a top DFS hockey player.
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Old 04-26-2017, 12:49 PM   #410
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I recently read A Gentleman in Moscow and it's changed my entire scale of rating books. It's like a Wes Anderson movie in a novel.

So very well written.
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Old 04-26-2017, 12:53 PM   #411
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This one is next on my list...sounds very interesting
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Old 04-26-2017, 01:00 PM   #412
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re-reading Asimov's Foundation trilogy. I'm on book 2 right now (Foundation and Empire).
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Old 04-26-2017, 01:06 PM   #413
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re-reading Asimov's Foundation trilogy. I'm on book 2 right now (Foundation and Empire).
I've fallen in love with that series. Currently reading the Robot series (The Naked Sun) right now. Have you read the Foundation prequels and sequels too?

I'm kind of jumping time frames a lot, but generally following this order:
https://www.quora.com/In-what-order-...ndation-novels
The Caves of Steel
The Naked Sun
Robots of Dawn
Robots and Empire
Foundation (alternatively could be #1)
Foundation and Empire (alternatively could be #2)
Second Foundation (alternatively could be #3)
Prelude to Foundation
Forward the Foundation
Foundation's Edge
Foundation and Earth
Foundation's Fear
Foundation and Chaos
Foundation's Triumph
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Old 04-26-2017, 01:09 PM   #414
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I've fallen in love with that series. Currently reading the Robot series (The Naked Sun) right now. Have you read the Foundation prequels and sequels too?

I'm kind of jumping time frames a lot, but generally following this order:
https://www.quora.com/In-what-order-...ndation-novels
The Caves of Steel
The Naked Sun
Robots of Dawn
Robots and Empire
Foundation (alternatively could be #1)
Foundation and Empire (alternatively could be #2)
Second Foundation (alternatively could be #3)
Prelude to Foundation
Forward the Foundation
Foundation's Edge
Foundation and Earth
Foundation's Fear
Foundation and Chaos
Foundation's Triumph
I've only read the original trilogy so far, and that was like 20 years ago. I'll probably end up going through the whole series eventually.
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Old 04-26-2017, 05:10 PM   #415
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I recently read A Gentleman in Moscow and it's changed my entire scale of rating books. It's like a Wes Anderson movie in a novel.
I just looked it up on Goodreads. Looks fantastic.

Currently reading The Day of Battle by Rick Atkinson. It's the second in his Liberation of Europe trilogy about the American army in WW2. Atkinson really brings the generals, soldiers, and the battles they fought to life.

I'm finding more recent histories of WW2 such as this are much more critical of Allied leadership and performance than older histories, which is refreshing. Reading Atkinson's books, and Max Hastings' Catastrophe, has left me thinking the Allies won in spite of their bungling and incompetence.

Churchill, in particular, comes across as a monstrously irresponsible meddler in this book, which deals with the Sicily and Italy campaigns. An old man in a silken bathrobe, guzzling whisky and devising strategies and battle plans from 2,000 miles away. You'd think after Gallipoli in WW1 his generals would know better than to undertake his hare-brained amphibious landing fantasies.
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Old 04-27-2017, 12:31 AM   #416
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I recently finished Roméo Dallaire's latest book; Waiting for First Light: My Ongoing Battle with PTSD. Like all of his books this one was a tough read.

I am currently reading Abaddon's Gate for something a little lighter.
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Old 04-27-2017, 10:19 AM   #417
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I liked it a lot. Really atmospheric. Unpredictable. Simmons seemed to get the history right. He does have a habit of overwriting, where he'll go into such great scientific detail that the drama seeps away. Like a scene where a crew member is escaping the monster in the rigging and Simmons goes on for about 8 pages about ropes swinging in parabellas and arcs, exact distances between the mast and rigging - all for a scene that takes about 80 seconds. And the ending was a bit unsatisfying.

Still, it was a well-written and fascinating story. I've now read Hyperion, Summer of Night, and the Terror, and enjoyed them all.
Did you read all four books in the Hyperion Cantos (Hyperion, Fall of Hyperion, Endymion and Rise of Endymion)? I think a lot of people just read the first two, and they're great, but I liked the Endymion books even more.

I also highly recommend his other sci-fi series, Illium and Olympos. I recently recommended these to a friend and he highly recommended the Dune series for me... I'm still considering reading Dune, but talking about Illium and Olympos with him now has me rereading those now instead.

In a similar vein to The Terror, The Abominable is a historical fiction, this time set around the early attempts to climb Mount Everest. Similar to The Terror, it's very well researched, and while the main characters are fictional, a lot of the people they interact with are real historical people. It does have a couple sections that kind of drag on as he describes in great detail mountain climbing gear and techniques of the 1920s, but despite that I highly recommend it.

I've read almost all the rest of Simmons works, and I've enjoyed them all, but the above ones are the best in my opinion and all are highly recommended.
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Old 04-27-2017, 10:34 AM   #418
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Did you read all four books in the Hyperion Cantos (Hyperion, Fall of Hyperion, Endymion and Rise of Endymion)? I think a lot of people just read the first two, and they're great, but I liked the Endymion books even more.
Just the first one. I plan to read the sequels at some point.

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I also highly recommend his other sci-fi series, Illium and Olympos.
I bounced off Illium. The concept is right in my wheelhouse (I'm a classical Greece and Trojan War geek), but for whatever reason it didn't engage me. But I enjoy Simmons enough as a writer that I'll probably take another crack at it.

Edit: I've also read Drood, which may actually be my favourite Simmons. Can't believe I forgot that.

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I recently recommended these to a friend and he highly recommended the Dune series for me... I'm still considering reading Dune, but talking about Illium and Olympos with him now has me rereading those now instead.
I read Dune four or five times when I was younger. It's a classic for a reason. The sequels fall off in quality (quite steeply after Children of Dune), but the original is everything you'd want in a space opera. Herbert's other work has fallen into obscurity, but back in the day I really enjoyed the Dosadi Experiment, as well as the Jesus Incident (which inspired the movie Avatar) and its sequel the Lazarus Effect.

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In a similar vein to The Terror, The Abominable is a historical fiction, this time set around the early attempts to climb Mount Everest. Similar to The Terror, it's very well researched, and while the main characters are fictional, a lot of the people they interact with are real historical people. It does have a couple sections that kind of drag on as he describes in great detail mountain climbing gear and techniques of the 1920s, but despite that I highly recommend it.
I'll give it a try.
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Old 04-27-2017, 11:02 AM   #419
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I just looked it up on Goodreads. Looks fantastic.

Currently reading The Day of Battle by Rick Atkinson. It's the second in his Liberation of Europe trilogy about the American army in WW2. Atkinson really brings the generals, soldiers, and the battles they fought to life.

I'm finding more recent histories of WW2 such as this are much more critical of Allied leadership and performance than older histories, which is refreshing. Reading Atkinson's books, and Max Hastings' Catastrophe, has left me thinking the Allies won in spite of their bungling and incompetence.

Churchill, in particular, comes across as a monstrously irresponsible meddler in this book, which deals with the Sicily and Italy campaigns. An old man in a silken bathrobe, guzzling whisky and devising strategies and battle plans from 2,000 miles away. You'd think after Gallipoli in WW1 his generals would know better than to undertake his hare-brained amphibious landing fantasies.
I haven't read Atkinson's books or Hasting's Catastrophe, but I have read the latter's D-Day.

I just finished reading Jack Granatstein's The Best Little Army in the World and Robert Engen's Canadians Under Fire and Strangers in Arms.

All three books are about the 1st Canadian Army's eventual evolution into a green, volunteer force scraped together with second-rate equipment into a first-rate (maybe the best) medium fighting force.

Normandy, and North-west Europe was a ####-tough fight. On a scale and concentration worse than anything on the Eastern Front, and with casualty rates surpassing the awful bloody grind of the First World War trenches.

The Allies basically threw green troops with brand-new, often untested equipment against well-entrenched, well-armed, and experienced German formations. The ground they fought on was incredibly well-suited for the defense, and negated a lot of the Allied advantage in material and munitions.

Engen really emphasizes how most of the action in NW Europe was small-unit action, almost indistinguishable from the trench raids of WWI. Artillery, and aircraft strikes were not effective in breaking up German defenses, but did do a significant job in reducing German logistic capability.

All in all, I think the Allies did incredibly well. Remember, the Battle of Normandy was a resounding defeat for the Wehrmact and Waffen SS.

I think you are mainly talking about the failure of Operation Market Garden, correct? A failure born out of the carnage of Normandy, its ambition was only slightly exceeded by the risks and challenges of what they were trying to do.

Amphibious assaults were never really fully utilized by the Allies until the Canadian operations in the Battle of Scheldt, where they were successful.

EDIT: Bah, you said WW2, but Catastrophe is about WW1. BTW Hastings is pretty Anglocentric, and has been criticized for diminishing the innovation and efforts of ANZAC and the Canadian Corps in actually ending the Great War.
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Old 04-27-2017, 11:05 AM   #420
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