Welcome to the Tabletop Roleplayers' Book Club!
Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Categories
In this Discussion
Help offset server costs by donating. This is totally optional. Any overages will go to library fines or new books.
Comments
A philosophical thriller sounds cool to me
All: a quick reminder of the current state of play of the rota...
Apr @kcaryths The Saint of Bright Doors
May @Apocryphal being decided as we speak
Jun @NeilNjae (TBD)
Jul Me (TBD)
Aug @clash_bowley
@BarnerCobblewood if you have a title in mind to slot in somewhere please say so
OK, let's make it The Terminal Experiment by Robert J. Sawyer for May.
I'll put Make Room in the back pocket for a future pick.
Discussion area for The Terminal Experiment now set up.
Current state of rota play is:
Apr @kcaryths The Saint of Bright Doors - coming up very soon!
May @Apocryphal The Terminal Experiment
Jun @NeilNjae (TBD)
Jul Me (TBD)
Aug @clash_bowley (TBD)
@BarnerCobblewood (or indeed anyone else) if you have a title in mind to slot in somewhere please say so.
How about The Cautious Traveller's Guide to the Wastelands by Sarah Brooks for June? It's from last year, it's had good reviews, and is on my TBR pile already.
Funnily enough I just downloaded a sample of this so sure, fine by me
BTW, that website doesn't let you control cookies when you visit, you're supposed to go into your browser settings and do it by hand. Shit designers looking to grift your info. Won't visit again.
Questions for The Saint of Bright Doors are up. That was harder than I thought to come up with, so be nice ...hahah.
Discussion area for The Cautious Traveller's Guide to the Wastelands now set up.
Current state of rota play is:
Apr @kcaryths The Saint of Bright Doors - ongoing discussion still welcome!
May @Apocryphal The Terminal Experiment
Jun @NeilNjae The Cautious Traveller's Guide to the Wastelands
Jul Me (TBD)
Aug @clash_bowley (TBD)
@BarnerCobblewood if you'd like to have a month for Blindsight please say so.
All, looks like the extensive discussion about The Terminal Experiment is dying down so it's a good time to remind everyone that June's read is The Cautious Traveller's Guide to the Wastelands, selected by @NeilNjae .
I haven't yet picked a July choice but will get onto that in the next few days.
I'm currently reading your latest, Richard...
All, for July I'm pretty much settled on Plutoshine by Lucy Kissick. It is a fairly near-future SF work which was shortlisted for the 2023 Arthur C. Clarke Award. It's set (rather obviously) out on Pluto and has a number of plot elements revolving around a scheme to terraform Pluto. It's by no means perfect as a book but has, I think, a number of features that might make it interesting to talk about. Unless there are any profound objections I'll set up the monthly discussion area in the next few days.
Sounds interesting!
Plutoshine discussion area now set up!
How are people doing with Cautious Traveller ? I'm planning to post some questions in the next few days.
I'm ready when you are
I should be done by the weekend!
I just wrapped it up.
Trying to track down Plutoshine. My typical indie bookstore and library don't carry it!
Looks like it's available second hand through bookfinder.com, at least in the UK
Also not available at my library, it seems. They don't have any books by that author.
A search of Amazon.ca only renders Projekt Pluto by that author, in German.
Ah. Shall I choose a different book?
PS I think Projekt Pluto is in fact a translation of the same book but that may not be especially helpful.
That aside, I can quickly swap in The Riddle of the Sands by Erskine Childers, a 1903 spy novel which is widely regarded as having influenced pretty much everyone who came after. I read it quite a few years ago - it's short and an easy read, and available in about 100 editions depending if you want illustrations and maps or just the text
Riddle of the Sands is available from the Toronto Public Library as an e-book or as reference only hardcovers (which means you have to sit in the library to read them :rolleyes:) and there's a free Gutenberg e-book edition. There are also a few different readings available on Audible, one of them is free with membership. I'd likely do an Audio version. Most seem to be 10 hours long, but one is over 12 hours long and I wonder if that's a different version of the text or just a slower reading?
It's not a long book (under 300 pages) - I've noticed a few times recently with audio books that some publishers pad the thing out with extracts of other work. Or (more charitably) it could easily have some introductory thoughts by Someone Important talking about its influence on the genre?
Plutoshine looks quite good. I am surprised it's not more readily available!