What are you currently reading?

[brlesh]

After TDS, started Classic Monsters Unleashed, edited by James Aquilone.

Half way through and it’s been an entertaining, if unmemorable, anthology to this point.

None of the stories have been great (though a couple, IMO, could have been with better endings) and none have been awful.

B

[brlesh]

Finished The Dog Stars by Peter Heller a few days ago.

Great book!

A different kind of post apocalyptic story.

While most post apocalyptic stories tend to have a long and sprawling story line with a huge cast of characters, TDS was a very intimate, character driven story with a rather simple plot; society has gone to shit, do what you need to do to stay alive.

I thought Heller did a good job of presenting a realistic apocalypse scenario, no zombies, no supernatural deities, just two men trying to survive on a daily basis, which was enough for one but not the other.

A lot of bad things happen in TDS, though most of action takes place “off screen”.

I also liked that Heller didn’t sugar coat his two protagonists.

While you’re sympathetic to the two main characters (more so Hig; less so with Bangley), they do awful things to stay alive and preserve their safe haven.

Definitely a different kind of read.

Highly recommended, especially if you are looking for something outside the normal horror / sci-fi reading genre.

B

[sholloman81]

Just finished reading the SST LE of Stephen Graham Jones' "Demon Theory", a first time read for me. Really enjoyed it as I have all of SGJ's stuff. This one was definitely more of an interesting & fun read rather than being particularly scary. You could tell that the author was having loads of fun playing with the characters and formatting of each section of the book. I also really enjoyed how the author played with and subverted a lot of the typical horror story/movie conventions (horror in the woods, hospital, Xmas, etc.). This edition was also the author's preferred text which made a difference in that this book had way fewer footnotes than the standard edition. The level of footnotes in the standard edition always put me off on wanting to read it. Overall, I'm glad that I finally got around to reading this book and would give it a B- to C+ grade.

Am now reading the SST LE of Josh Malerman's "Inspection".

[sholloman81]

Oh - here are some pictures of tonight's event.

Daniel Kraus is touring his new book Whalefall. Sadie Hartmann turned me onto this book (it's about a diver who gets swallowed by a whale - hits lots of checkboxes for sure!) Stephen Graham Jones was there as a moderator/interviewer. I've seen SGJ at two official events, and one unofficial when I saw him in line as a fan at a recent convention in Denver, so tonight was my third time meeting him.

It was a great talk - I'm not familiar with Kraus as an author, but Whalefall is going to move to the upper portion of my TBR pile.

Got my copy signed (and stamped) and I had SGJ sign my SST edition of Demon Theory. Yeah, I know some collectors are going to freak that I had an LE personalized to me, but I'm not ever going to part with this, plus double signed now! The inscription is pretty cool tool. (This was also the only SGJ book I had handy since all of my books are currently in storage.)

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Wow, am even more jealous now! That event looks bonkers!

[Sock Monkey]

Sounds like a great time. And that additional signature and especially that inscription, on the limited edition is very cool! Congratulations!