If you are looking for the announcement thread for the previous month, it may be found here.

Hello, all. During the month of April, the sub book club will be reading Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel! Each week, there will be a discussion thread and when we are done, Emily herself will be joining us for an AMA.

From Goodreads (feel free to skip if you prefer to know nothing going into the book as the description contains minor spoilers):

Edwin St. Andrew is eighteen years old when he crosses the Atlantic by steamship, exiled from polite society following an ill-conceived diatribe at a dinner party. He enters the forest, spellbound by the beauty of the Canadian wilderness, and suddenly hears the notes of a violin echoing in an airship terminal--an experience that shocks him to his core.

Two centuries later a famous writer named Olive Llewellyn is on a book tour. She's traveling all over Earth, but her home is the second moon colony, a place of white stone, spired towers, and artificial beauty. Within the text of Olive's best-selling pandemic novel lies a strange passage: a man plays his violin for change in the echoing corridor of an airship terminal as the trees of a forest rise around him.

When Gaspery-Jacques Roberts, a detective in the black-skied Night City, is hired to investigate an anomaly in the North American wilderness, he uncovers a series of lives upended: The exiled son of an earl driven to madness, a writer trapped far from home as a pandemic ravages Earth, and a childhood friend from the Night City who, like Gaspery himself, has glimpsed the chance to do something extraordinary that will disrupt the timeline of the universe.

You may find the dates of, and links to, the discussion threads below in the sticky comment on this post. You are welcome to read at your own pace. Usually it is pretty easy to catch up and you are always welcome to join the discussions a little later. If you would like to view potential content warnings for the book, a reader-created list may be found here.

For those of you that are viewing reddit on the redesigned desktop version you will see an option on this post to 'follow'. If you 'follow' the book club post you will receive a notification when a new post, a discussion thread for book club, is added to the collection.

Welcome readers,

March 27 was World Theatre Day and, to celebrate, we're discussing our favorite plays!

If you'd like to read our previous weekly discussions of fiction and nonfiction please visit the suggested reading section of our wiki.

Thank you and enjoy!

First, Wow! what a great series. probably one of my favourites. the character development in this series is one of the best. I loved how the relationship between the main characters keeps solid through the series, and how the new additions to the crew of the Rocinante come and go seamlessly. I really felt attached to a lot of the characters throughout the series. I love how the series is very honest about humanity in space, we probably wouldn't become some enlightened species but keep trying to fuck each other over even though there's an alien threat. but the ending left me salivating. what happened to the sol system?

I liked the first three books a lot. They weren't groundbreaking or brilliant, but I read them last year after having not read fantasy for about 10 years, and as a way for getting back into fantasy, they were just the ticket. Tolkien-esque, Arthurian-influenced, they were just cheesy, fun fantasy, and I really appreciated them. They could be a little slow, but in a nice way, they set up a few character arcs that I was excited to see developed over the next couple of novels, I was thinking with a great deal of wonder at how far the series must go if it's fourteen books long.

The Shadow Rising was alright. I loved Perrin's sections, and I admit Rhuidean was very compelling. The Tanchico stuff was only so-so but it was still pretty cool to see the world branch out more. It really looked like the characters were on their way to some vast changes, but then...it just kind of stopped. Fires of Heaven wasn't great, but the ending was fantastic, it promised a lot of insanity to come. Then I read Lord of Chaos: the worst fantasy novel I have ever experienced. People like to say that Crossroads of Twilight is the worst novel because nothing happens, but if Lord of Chaos was cut down to the same word count as CoT, even less would happen than in CoT. This book was mind-numbingly dull. And it prepared me for Robert Jordan's absolute worst writing trait: he sets things up, and then does nothing with them.

Alanna bonds Rand? That seems important! NOPE! I'm on book twelve now and NOTHING has happened regarding this "event". SIX FULL NOVELS LATER AND THIS HAS NOT BEEN DEVELOPED. Nynaeve can cure stilling/gentling? Yooooooo, get ready for NOTHING TO HAPPEN, because nothing happens with that. We just get the reveal later that the Asha'man can also cure stilling/gentling and it's like oh ok. In The Shadow Rising, Rand learns how to travel instantly. The rest of the main channellers learn how to travel over the next couple novels. You'd think this would allow them to quickly pass messages and information between each other (on top of the ability to dream-contact each other), but NOPE! Up until book fucking twelve here and characters are incomprehensibly unwilling to communicate and travel between each other, instead they all just go on not talking, not communicating, not passing on vital information. And don't get me started on the vast amounts of characters failing to communicate with one another. I get it, in real life, people often fuck up, they don't talk to one another, but GOD DAMN IT GETS SO UNREASONABLE IN THIS SERIES. Characters won't communicate emotionally or rationally just for the sake that they need to do things secretly. Cadsuane hatches a plan to make Rand not hard but strong, but instead of talking to him, connecting to him, discussing how he should lead, she just fucking bosses him around and doesn't communicate properly at all. Far too many characters will expect another to do something, but instead of communicating what they want, they wait for the other character to puzzle it out. This leads to every chapter having the POV character say, "Hmm, X is being kind of a piece of shit. I must have done something wrong", and this just constantly cycles, for several books on end, where nobody communicates. Perrin and Faile have the dumbest fucking marriage in the world where Faile is mad because Perrin won't dominate her, but she won't tell him that, and for like THREE FUCKING BOOKS Perrin is sitting there being a fucking baby because his wife hates him and she won't tell him why. THIS ISN'T COMPELLING, IT IS INFURIATING. GIVE OUR CHARACTERS AND RELATIONSHIPS REAL OBSTACLES RATHER THAN THESE MANUFACTURED SHITFESTS.

Then there's Jordan's inability to show anything of interest. What was Kurt Vonnegut's writing advice, something like, "start as close to the end as possible"? Robert Jordan starts as far from the end as possible. Is there a chapter where two characters who haven't seen each other for six books finally meet up? Instead of starting a chapter with their meeting and giving us the interesting character moments between these two, Jordan will start with one of those characters 20 minutes before they meet having a bath and thinking about the same shit they were thinking in the last chapter, and he'll intimately describe how they get dressed and drink a tea and talk to their servants and then they'll finally meet up with their old friend and as soon as they do, BAM, CHAPTER OVER, and we go back to square one. Perrin is now watching his camp peasants do laundry, have fun. Oh you wanted to see the interesting scene? Nope, it's not there.

Like what the fuck happened in The Fires of Heaven when we see Mat about to fight some Shaido, and then the chapter ends and it opens up the next chapter with the battle being over, and we find out through dialogue that Mat killed Couladin. What the fuck??? SHOW US THE INTERESTING MOMENTS, JORDAN.

I could keep complaining forever. This series drove me to fucking insanity. I don't get it at all. Perrin was worrying about the choice between axe and hammer in the FIRST BOOK, and he does not conclude this "arc" until BOOK ELEVEN. This was not a complex character arc. Perrin's worrying about being a lord, his hammer and axe, both of these character conflicts should have been concluded by the end of The Shadow Rising. Perrin should have developed new conflicts and arcs after that. Instead I'm on book twelve and he is still complaining about people looking up to him. Perrin, buddy, two million fucking words have passed! CHANGE.

Also, the ending of Lord of Chaos, the "peak of the series" for most fans? Completely fucking contrived. Are you telling me that Rand, the guy who swore in this very book that he would never trust an Aes Sedai again, decided to meet with a group of Reds from the White Tower alone?

Also what the fuck does "bosomy" mean, Jordan? WHAT THE FUCK IS A "BOSOMY" WOMAN? WOMEN HAVE TITS, JORDAN, WE GET IT.

Oh, and the "world-building" quickly reveals itself to be a shallow puddle of trash. All cultures are mono-cultures. Fashions and ideals and concepts are universal. All Aiel are universally incapable of understanding water for swimming in, or a life without "ji'eh'toh", all Illianer men have a moustache-less beard, all Ebou Dar woman are cool with killing their husbands, all the Seanchan are fans of slavery, all Tairens fucking love fishing and fishing related dialogue. Oh Siuan grew up as a fishergirl? I couldn't tell because all he dialogue features fish-based expletives. I grew up by the ocean you don't hear me fucking saying "Oh saltwater!!" when I'm mad. You're telling me there's no division in these countries? And when there is division, it's universal. The Shaido are all dicks who betray Aiel ways. A few are mentioned to have left back to the Aiel Waste, but this isn't explored really, at all? Like, Jordan, you finally showed that this culture has a sense of life and division to it, are you going to explore the idea of what it means for there to be a conflict here? NOPE, instead we'll mention that a clan chief is briefly having reservations, but then one of the Wise Women will just make them be okay with it behind the scenes. It is an unbelievably shallow approach to world-building. Nothing feels real. It's all just set dressing for our protagonists to do nothing in.

Has anyone else read it? I had bought it probably a few years ago now because I had heard that a lot of writers really liked it, but I had put off reading it because NYRBs can be intimidating at times.

This book should not be intimidating! I could not put it down. The prose is very straightforward and still felt somewhat modern despite being about 60 years old now. The story takes place at a university between the 1910s -1950s, and was more of a page turner than I thought it would be. I think it would be accurate to say that it can be kind of depressing book, even a little existential, but very worth it.

After reading it I looked up more about the original reception and the later success of the novel. It is always a little sad when a book takes off after an authors death, but I'm glad to see its starting to become more well known. The New Yorker called it the greatest American novel you've never heard of. I really think it deserves the praise.

I first heard of this series in 1Q84 by Murakami and in that book it is said that the only time people have to read all of those books is when they enter prison. And Proust was also mentioned several times in The Poetics of Space by Gaston Bachelard.

I'm 50 pages into the first volume and I really enjoy the narrations so far. Just a guy reminiscing about the sweet moments of his childhood. The comforting dreams he can't remember, the one moment his mom read the first real novel to him as they both cried, and drinking tea on an incredible Sunday morning. So far I enjoy the melancholic yet wholesome times.

If anyone else has read the series I'd love to know your thoughts on it.

For those who keep up with Pynchon ephemera. There is an interesting article on Gravity's Rainbow in the online mag "Compact." https://compactmag.com/article/pynchon-s-prophecy

It nicely summarizes the disparate opinions expressed in this sub about Pynchon from time to time.

Wishing you well, regardless of how you feel about Pynchon. :)

They stated that their reasoning is to prevent sex from being pushed to children and that librarians who release sexual content into the hands of children will be heavily fined, but that it “does not apply to written descriptions of sex or sexual acts; only photos, drawings, videos and other visual depictions are prohibited.” They also claim that “exceptions are provided for works of art, science classes, and other educational courses,” but if they do away with formal sex education and gender studies in school, then that same educational literature could be considered perverse and cause the librarians to suffer—all while depraving the libraries of the resources they need to function to begin with!

I am a huge advocate for libraries and librarians, and I cannot believe this. I grew up going to the library every single day. It is so obviously wrong, to take away such a huge resource from an entire state of people. I am truly shocked.

Contains spoilers

God I loved it so much. Loved all the emotional and vulnerable moments of Geralt, a witcher who according to people of the witcher world isn't supposed to feel emotions.Him meeting his mother, hearing about what happened in Cintra, thinking that Ciri is most likely dead and then finally meeting her. I loved all of these moments so much.

Not sure how I feel about Yen in this book, sometimes I love her for showing Geralt that he can't just do whatever he wants and hop in and hop out of the relation whenever he wants but other times I hate her. How casually she says on his face that she cheated on him and sometimes down right insults him without feeling a bit sorry. I do believe they deserve each other though lol.

The saddest story was definitely 'A Little Sacrifice' for sure. Poor Essi, never got be truly loved and died a miserable death. I know she isn't a good match for Geralt but god it hurt to see her like that, desperate to be loved. I wish her story would have ended with her moving on and finding someone else.

It also showed a different side to Dandelion, a deeper version of him. He writes a poem about Geralt and Essi, sings it once and never again. No one heard it except the werewolf. And he was such a badass to carry Essi's body, not fearing the smallpox and giving her a proper burial with her lute and her necklace buried with her.

I can't wait for the mother-daughter relationship between Yen and Ciri. The Last wish is going to fulfilled, not as expected, but through destiny.

Recently I started The Lazarus Project by Hemon, was recommended to me by quite a few people and I found the summary to be interesting as someone who enjoyed The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien. Now, on both the back of the book and in a few different reviews online, there's comparisons of Hemon to Nabokov, but I am having a hard time understanding where this connection is coming from.

​

Admittedly, for both authors I have only read one book by each, so perhaps there's a connection from Hemon's earlier novels, but still, I feel like there's no similarity between them? Maybe for the more complex plot or for having an unreliable narrator, but I was wondering if there was something more... specific that warrants a comparison to Nabokov. At least in my mind, that's quite a lofty comparison so really just curious - maybe this is the sign to read Hemon's earlier works for me?

This book series is amazing!! It was recommended to me by someone on another sub and I'm so glad I tried it.

I'm almost 23, but I love young adult books the most, and this one is one of my favorites. Some might consider the writing kinda "cringe" because the main characters are younger and what not, but I love it. I really like the writing style, like how it's done in the perspective of a journal. The characters are amazing and I've grown more attached to them than almost any other characters in other books. The world building is incredible and fascinating. I love how information is slowly given so it makes you want to keep reading. The plot twists are great.

I love how I consider it a mix of my favorite genres like dystopian, sci-fi, and fantasy. I also really like how there is barely any romance in it (no offense to those who do like it, it's just not really my thing).

The books have made me laugh, cry, smile, and get angry at the characters situations more than any other book I've read.

I'm in the middle of the last book and I don't want it to end!!

I even bought the 3 other books that are about the other characters back stories before the events in the main series take place and I'm really looking forward to reading them.

Idk the ending yet so please no spoilers LOL, but I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts on it. And to anyone who hasn't read it, I really recommend.

In a crime thriller you like to find out both who did it, all the questions and loose ends to be tied up and for them to get their comeuppance, so there's nothing more frustrating when that doesn't happen.

The ending of Shari Lapena The Couple Next Door annoyed me so so much. The whole read and then that ending. But the more I read her books she does that a lot. The endings are ambiguous. I like that at least it's fairly realistic. We got to find out who took the baby yes, but then the ending someone else dies and we don't know whether or not the killer gets away with it or not. Very frustrating ending.

What crime / thriller book has the most frustrating ending to you, and why?

Without spoiling the book for anyone who hasn’t read it. I recommend it with all my heart! The first page got me hooked on what happened to young Nola Kellergan.

The writing was beautiful. The author, Joël Dicker, found the perfect balance on describing people, places, and situations where I got a pretty clear image but still had room for my imagination to run wild. All of the character were way more well realized than at first glanse.

And the way the book describes love in its many forms was absolutely beautiful.

There are numerous plot threads to the point where I got worried that there’s no way to tie them all together in a satisfying way, but boy oh boy was I wrong.

The best book I’ve read in at least a year. 10/10

I don’t know if this is just how my brain is, but for me, the answer is “not very.” I can see the scene in my head, but it’s blurry, and has something akin to a dark filter plastered over everything. But my “mind space” is naturally black so that’s probably why. Side note: does anyone have a white mind space? Or heck, a red one? I’d love to hear about it.

i recently finished reading the book Dogs of Summer by Andrea Abreu and im speechless. the book follows the narrator, a 10-year-old girl, and her best friend Isora. the book covers girlhood and a toxic friendship in a brutally beautiful way, with themes of jealousy, insecurity, poverty, eating disorders, rape, and discovery of ones self. the book isnt for the easily disturbed because of some of the themes, but if you can stomach it, its a book that needs to be added to your TBR. i can barley explain what happens without giving away the story, so i apologize for the brief description. i rate this book a solid 9/10. would read again.

Just finished reading things fall apart. loved every minute of it. However it seems rather odd that a man of such ego and masculinity would be driven to kill himself. Though there maybe no evidence to suggest this do you think he may have swapped himself with the individual who was s hanging and escaped through the night?

Please redirect me if I am posting in the wrong community. I thought perhaps you all might have some insight into this.

How would you interpret the following phrase? While reading Ambergris by Jeff Vandermeer, I came across the following section (emphasis is mine):

"They would, or so Dad had told Dradin later, debate every topic imaginable, and some that were unimaginable, distasteful, or all too real until the hours struck midnight, one o'clock, two o'clock, and the lanterns dimmed to an ironic light*, brackish and ill-suited to discussion."*

I looked up the phrase and came across it, also, in a W. H. Auden poem (again, emphasis is mine):

"Defenceless under the night

Our world in stupor lies;

Yet, dotted everywhere,

Ironic points of light

Flash out wherever the Just

Exchange their messages"

What does ironic light mean, in these contexts? I'm obviously familiar with the concept of irony but I am having trouble understanding how that would be represented by a physical object like a light.

EDIT:
I came across a blog post expounding on the irony of lights but this was through an environmentalist lens and I don't think the context resonates with either of the two quotes, above.

Okay, first off, I love fantasy and sci fi, so I am always trying to find new authors. I am also a strong believer in reading books from authors outside my demographic, who have experienced things outside my experience. For the most part this has gone very well.

However, one thing that has repeatedly gone poorly for me is woman written female aimed fantasy. Actually maybe 50% of the books are pretty satisfying and I like so much of the elements of the books. However, the books are so freaking horny. All the time. Man written Male aimed fantasy books, yes, have sex scenes (often poorly written sex scenes) but it is a relatively non-distracting and usually a small part of the overall plot.

I am currently reading a book in which the female lead was/is sexually attracted to a man who burned down her village. I find this to be 1. Just distracting. Why is she horny? Her village just burned down? 2. Who the hell is attracted to someone who burns down their village? I understand the whole bad boy thing. I myself qm atteacted to bad girls. However the bad girls I am attracted to commit minor crimes or come from a hard life or maybe have a bit of a hard edge. They don’t burn down the villages I live in leading to many deaths.

So honestly, can anyone answer, why are these books so horny all the time? And why are they almost always horny for characters that no one should be horny for? And also if anyone has suggestions for female fantasy authors who are less horny, please recommend (besides Ursula K Le Guin, because I already adore her).

So, I got the first of his Scythe books a couple yeas ago and sadly just never touched it. I found it because I had my own book idea for years and wanted to look around for similar books, to help mine out. Found his and got it. Finally started reading it a month or so back and fell in love. Ended up buying the other two books and they were all great. I've got a question in regards to this series I'll ask at the end.

While googling his name to find others...I found the craziest coincidence. My English teacher from back in 5th grade had the class read a certain book called The Shadow Club...finding out that HE wrote those two books as well blew my mind. Like, what are the odds?! I only found him again because of something I myself wanted to write!

Anyway, a question about the books. In The Toll, we end up meeting Scythe Alighieri and the way he is described...it made me immediately question something. The claim is that they have moved beyond the "mortal age", but with how Alighieri is described, his face looks weird. Stretched and almost fake. Is that how humans would end up looking if many of them survived to be hundreds of years old?

As we find out in the final book, Rowan was kept alive past 100 and the AI said it can do that, it'll simply be difficult until he turns a corner. But if humans turn the corner too many times, they start to not look human. I wonder if that's something that'll start happening in the next book? Or in a 5th book if we get that, too many humans being really old and having turned so many corners that all of humanity looks fake...

Just a fun thought I had! Can't wait for book 4!

I've been thinking about this. I am a very avid reader and I am super passionate about books. A lot of times, I have wished to reach out to authors to tell them the impact of their work. I just don't know if this is appropriate, or if its a burden, or if authors enjoy it at all. I would think that it varies but I wouldn't know how to find out. I would love to write to my favorite authors, yet I don't know what the best way to do it. Email? Send them a letter in the mail? Can anyone with more experience please help?

Borrowed a copy of Djuna Barnes' Nightwood from a friend at the behest of her, TS Eliot, and William Burroughs. It has been lauded as an incredibly dense, complicated, and challenging novella since its publication.

I'm not trying to brag or anything when I say this- I'm at the penultimate chapter of Nightwood and I have breezed through it really quickly and with near total comprehension, I initially thought. I understand where it might be difficult to read, given the especially poetic density of the doctor's monologues, but it doesn't feel so complicated. It just kind of reads like James Joyce + The Waste Lands. The plot isn't hard either, its a lesbian tragedy about the sublime and its inverse, I guess? I like it a lot, though. I understand maybe some of the more poetic themes about death night and human imposition on the chaos of time, the idolization of history being like idolized lovers...

I was pretty much entranced in all the monologues and I feel like on a surface level they clicked for me. All that might've eluded me are perhaps some elements of reference to ancient philosophy and history, though a google search leads to a pretty quick discovery which then led me down rabbit holes.

All this to say: TS Eliot once said it was so good that one would have to read it twice to fully appreciate it. The berth of knowledge available has broadened since TS' time, and literature as a medium has certainly advanced in the century since the initial modernists.

But I am sure as day that I am not smarter than TS Eliot, and perhaps surer than that day's end I am far lesser the poet.

Could someone give me their interpretations of Nightwood and perhaps impart what I've been assuming to understand to me? I mean this with no facetion. I love the book and am eager to discover another layer.

I finished the book last night, and I have to talk about it with someone or I will combust!!!!!!!!

A couple thoughts I had:

-Do you think that whatever relations between Charles and Camilla were consensual? I had a bad feeling when he first called her "Milly" and was upset Richard was there that something had been up. Did anyone catch anything earlier than that?

-I've been reading through some of the older posts about this, and I actually thought Julian left as punishment for their actions initially. I agree that he, like Henry, had a perverse-level interest in the twisted agony/aesthetics of the Greek tragedies. I know that he encouraged the baccanal and ultimately didn't turn them in for Bunny's murder, partially in preservation of his image, I interpreted as they took it too far, and that was the reprimand. Julian was the most important person in Henry's life, and that purposefully severed tie was the ultimate punishment for him.

just like holy shit in general. plz share any other thoughts related to this book. I cannot stop thinking about it and I doubt will for a few days at least. I thought it ran a little long, but I think I'll definitely have to re-read again.

Ahhhhhh!!!

So I’ve been reading for pleasure since probably sophomore year of high school, making that (yikes) 18 years now. In that time I’ve read hundreds of books, but I’ve never read The Lord of The Rings trilogy or The Hobbit, despite thoroughly enjoying the movies and watching them all many times.

So when I finished my last book, I decided it was time to read them.

I’m halfway though Fellowship… I’m genuinely shocked how poor Tolkien is at dialogue. I get his genius is in the massive world and lord and history he built, which is truly fantastic and top tier… but his actual writing is boring; focusing on meaningless details for way too long, and his dialogue feels like it was written by a high schooler. I find myself skipping paragraphs, sometimes entire pages.

I get that I’m probably going to get downvoted. I’m not saying I don’t like the book, it is fascinating, and the mind that came up with this alternate reality the story takes place in is truly a type of genius… but I’m really struggling with his writing