I often have a summer reading slump, and 2025's arrived on schedule. I scored one Bingo, finished both my #BookSpin and #DoubleSpin reads, and logged one #readyourebooks pick. But no Perry Rhodans -- whatever else, I must fix that in July.

Thanks for hosting @thearomaofbooks !

(1951) A far-future galactic empire teeters on collapse. Hari Seldom, a visionary “psychohistorian“ invents a strategy to reduce the coming dark ages from 30 millennia to just one. I first read the Foundation series forty (?!?) years ago, and enjoyed it much. Very happy to report I admire it still, though its central premise now seems, erm, improbable, and its demographics very 1950s office-building. But given the premise the ride is a joy.

And here's my #readyourebooks list for July

Thanks for hosting @cbee !

Here's my #BookSpin #DoubleSpin #BookSpinBingo card for July.

(2023) I picked up this collection of stories shortly after finishing “Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke“ with a weird mixture of “WTF did I just read“ and “I'd like some more please.“ And this delivers: body horror, with an aesthetic more of dread than splatter, about love and cruelty and the things we know we shouldn't do and we do them anyway

(1957) In Norton's 1954 book, “The Stars Are Ours,“ scientists escape an antiscience populist government (ahem) to establish a colony on the distant planet Astra. This follow-up takes place about a hundred years later, when the colony is well established and a threat from Astra's distant past reemerges -- at the same time explorers from a very different Terra arrive. It's a good adventure, and also a light riff on themes of cultural evolution

(1963) This is Delany's second novel, first in his “Fall of the Towers“ trilogy. It's a Dying-Earth style pulp adventure and a very accessible one, given the reputation Delany earned with his later work. It's fine for what it is but most interesting for how it hints at the future Delany, especially with a surreal climactic chapter in which the heroes pursue the villain across space under the influence of mutant moss.

(1984) Third in Peters's cozy mystery series featuring librarian Jacqueline Kirby. In this one Kirby solves a murder at a historical-romance convention. The mystery is not especially memorable, but the characters are so fun, the prose so sharp, and the jokes (many at the expense of the romance publishing industry, of which Peters seems to be an unfan) so frequent that the mystery barely matters.

(2012) First in a light high-fantasy series featuring thief Easie Damasco. In this one Easie finds himself impressed into a warlord's army, from which he escapes by stealing the warlord's battle-giant. It's fine, though Easie comes off neither as a trickster nor as a rogue with a heart of gold but more as an asshole who thinks his sense of humor redeems him -- which might have worked better if he were as funny as he thinks he is.

(2012) Second in the urban fantasy/romance series about a witch who stumbles across an old manuscript containing a secret about the origins of magical beings, and the vampire she falls in love with. Not usually my thing, but the first was a mild pick several years ago and I thought I might continue. But didn't until #ReadYourEboooks this month. This one was *really* not my thing (too romancey, too little forward momentum) but I did finish

We arrived in an undignified heap of witch and vampire.

#FirstLineFridays
@ShyBookOwl

(2025) The author, gazing on Arctic and mountain ice that she knows will be gone in a few short years, longs for a word to describe her sense of loss over something that isn't lost yet, and her urge to memorialize a climate that is only in the process of changing. From this departure point she muses about memory, memorials, monuments, language, responsibility, and the climate crisis. I recognize her feelings, and am grateful for her voicing them

Years ago, before I became a parent, I had a low-paid job that required me to travel to Slovenia every summer and drive a bunch of writing students around the country in a large, unwieldy van.

#FirstLineFridays
@ShyBookOwl

(2025)

Facebook, ugh.

This is a memoir by a former director of public policy at Facebook. The leadership and corporate culture she describes is even worse than you'd expect even if you dislike Facebook as much as I do. The only thing that doesn't ring quite true is the author's pose of persistent idealism even while collaborating with awful people on their awful goals. Still, I'm grateful for the story and hope the telling helps her conscience

And here's my #BookSpinBingo card for July.

Thanks@thearomaofbooks and good luck everybody!

Here are my picks for June's #readyourebooks

I completed 2/4 in May, and hope to do at least as well this month.

Thanks for hosting @CBee !

Hey hey BookSpin Day!

Here are my #BookSpin and #DoubleSpin books for June: a couple of short books I'm very much looking forward to. One is a collection of horror stories by the author of “Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke,“ which I read and was unsettled by in May. The other is, I understand, a long essay on language and climate change. June looks like a good reading month from here.

Thanks @thearomaofbooks !

May was a very good month for #BookSpinBingo: only two scores, but the board is nicely covered and I finished both my #BookSpin and #DoubleSpin reads

Ready now for June!

Thanks for hosting @thearomaofbooks !

(2022) A space crew operating on the edge of developed space pick up a distress signal from a luxury spaceliner that disappeared without explanation a generation ago. The crew decides (maybe because none of them has watched any horror movie ever) to salvage the ghost ship. What happens next is no surprise to anyone who has watched a horror film ever, but the pace is good and there's enough novelty to keep things interesting. I'll read more Barnes

(1966) “Hunt for the Time Agent“

The “parasprinter“ Woolver twins and teleporter Tako Kakuta sneak onto a Tefroder base to kidnap Frasbur, the agent in charge of the time gate, for leverage in returning Perry and the CREST to the present. This one stretches credibility more than usual and includes appearances Ernst Ellert and Harno “the living television“, which are always a bit weird. I think the writers don't really know what to do with them.

Tagged by @kspenmoll -- Low-key, minimal-movement weekend recovering from knee & ankle sprains. (Thanks, dog who cannot resist chasing chasables and thanks slimy rain-and-runoff-collecting sidewalk, couldn't have done it without both of you.) I had to go out earlier for some necessary shopping and haircut, but now back home with my leg up and a café con leche in reach. Thinking I might read a book. @AllDebooks #Chatterday2025

(1993) This is a short but dense discussion of how modern ideas about authorship and copyright developed in the early 18th century. It's academic and not exactly riveting: I had to take it a few pages at a time, sometimes pausing to track down a citation or to ask Wikipedia about things the author assumed I already knew. It asks questions about ideas I thought I was comfortable with, which I found instructive, mind-changing, and a little worrying

Here is my list for the #ReadYourEbooks lottery, randomishly pulled from the craptonne of unread books I've acquired for Kindle and/or Kobo.

Thanks for hosting @CBee !

Still a few days left in May, but it's pretty clear what I'm going to be able to finish. So here's my #BookSpin #DoubleSpin #BookSpinBingo list for June.

Thanks for hosting, @theAromaOfBooks !

(1971) “In Search of Psychonaut“

Space detective Ralf “Psychonaut“ Burkard goes missing while investigating a murder. Burkard's friend and wannabe-detective Fred Wieler sets out to answer the questions that stump Burkard's colleagues: what happened to Psychonaut? Where is his body? And who committed the murder he was investigating? Forgettable but just fine and pleasantly short.

(2023) First in a Lovecraftian dark urban fantasy series featuring a professor and a student at Miskatonic University. In this one they battle Chthonians, with a showdown in an abandoned mine; and face their own pasts, with drama to be played out as the series develops. Mixed feelings: the story is fine, but I'm not comfortable with the blossoming student-teacher romance. That, and nitpicky copy-editing gripes, mean I probably won't continue.

(2021) Book one of an epic high-fantasy series, set on a tidally-locked world (maybe a distant future version of our own), whose single moon is falling out of orbit and soon will fall into the planet. An motley band of heroes sets out to avert this catastrophe, as happens in this sort of story. It's a sort of story that appeals to me, and this hit the right notes well enough that I want to continue.

(2022) Sharp poems on hard subjects, by a Somali-British poet. These poems touch on the refugee experience, domestic violence, and complicated family relationships. They will break your heart.

(2016) After 200 years of peace, the space navy has become more of a social club than a fighting force. So when ex-Sergeant Roger Rogers finds himself forced to reenlist he expects hours of unprofitable time-wasting. His old ship is more chaotic than ever, but when an actual crisis looms, he may have to take his job seriously. The comedy is a little broad for my taste--too many body-function jokes--but the satire of bureaucracy is frequently sharp

(2024) Fifth in the author's “Singing Hills“ series of novellas about a traveling, storytelling cleric. There's not a dud among 'em, and this is a strong addition to the series. All five enthusiastically recommended.

(1947)

This is a kind-of sequel to April's #ClassicLSFBC read, “The Weapon Shops of Isher“, and continues the story of Weapon Shop agent Robert Hedrock. Here he investigates rumors about a new interstellar drive ... and finds himself condemned to death both by the Empire and the Weapon Shop. This was conceived as a single story so feels more coherent than mashup TWSOI; still, the story takes off in multiple directions for that signature VV style

(1966) “Shock Troop in Time and Space“

Perry and the crew of the CREST III are still stuck 50,000 years in the past, but in the last episode, the “parasprinter“ Woolver twins snuck past the guards of the time gate and returned to the present to update the other Terrans on the CREST's status. Now the Woolvers, teleporter Tako Kakuta, and 22-cm secret agent Lemy Danger dive back into the past to help Perry find his way home

I have a four-day weekend, so am on board for the #JumpStartSummer readathon. These reads top my TBR:

The Starless Crown (my May #BookSpin pick)
Mechanical Failure (#ReadYourEbooks)
Shock Troop of Time and Space
The Weapon Makers
The Brides of High Hall

I'm well into three of them already, so I feel confident about finishing all of these. We'll see what comes after.

Have fun, everybody! And thanks @TheSpineView !

(1982) Kirk and Spock trade places as captain and first officer under a nonsensical premise. Spock turns into a tyrant, Kirk into a toddler learning the boundaries of “no.“ Turns out their adversary is provoking aggression for scientific reasons, but that leads nowhere interesting. I'd been warned by @RamsFan1963 that this was a bad one. I don't think I disliked it as much as he did but I do think the best part was the first blank page at the end

(1735-1738) It's a wildly inventive, uniquely structured story about underground civilizations, cities in the air, and strange kingdoms in faraway lands. It's like a mashup of ideas proposed in a brainstorming session led by Jonathan Swift: Worm people! Toad monsters! Achieving enlightenment through being chewed to death by giant bees! Unfortunately, it's complicated by 18th-century misogyny, but the relentless flood of wild ideas is spec-fic joy

(1966) “Return to the Present“

The CREST III is stuck 50,000 years in Earth's past. The time gate is heavily guarded so that the CREST cannot return the way it came, and Perry sends Rakal and Tronar Woolver -- who as “parasprinters“ can travel radio waves -- into the enemy fleet with orders to get a message to the future by any means possible. It's a good episode with plenty of action and our first direct encounter with a “Master of the Island“

(1877) I understand this was one of the first books to use first-person perspective from an animal's viewpoint, and that choice was brilliant for Sewell's project of exposing cruelties toward animals. It won't be among my favorites -- too plotless and polemic and I'm probably just too old -- but I admire Sewell's aim and her effortless prose. I get why it's a classic.

The mighty north winds had been tossing us around in a terrible storm for three days and had thrown us on death‘s doorstep in the raging chaos of our blasted sails, when they suddenly stopped.

#FirstLineFridays
@ShyBookOwl

(2019 Ed.) It's a fast and humorous love letter to horror films in the form of a handbook for readers who think they might be in a horror movie and wish to survive. I expect that it would appeal most to horror fans: others may not get the joke, mistake it for ridicule, or find that it wears out fast. But I dug it, and if you enjoyed the Scream series for its meta commentary, or Cabin in the Woods for any reason at all then you may too.

(1980) Two immortal humans -- one a killer and the other a healer -- are lovers and rivals and the parents (figuratively and often literally) to communities of super-powered humans, set against the backdrop of the Atlantic slave trade. It's a disturbing read because of its gaze at abusive relationships and abusive social structures, but also a very powerful one. For my taste, it's the most effective of the series so far.

(2024) This is a very scary account of how autocratic governments around the world work together to stifle dissent and promote antidemocratic movements worldwide. It was published only last year, and already things have gotten worse. This stuff keeps me up at night.

(2023). Cosmic horror at Gallipoli, mostly told through dispatches from an embedded journalist, all tangled up with ponderings about truth-telling, secrets, and information control. The horror works, and the themes speak to some of my own preoccupations. Plus: it's short.

(1966) "The Temples of Darak"

Still trapped 50,000 years in the past, the crew of the CREST III find themselves involved in a battle among ancestors of the Maahks and Haluters, a crew of cosmic engineers likewise stuck in the past, and newly-introduced aliens who met Gucky and conclude he is some sort of god. Plenty of action, and some dot-connecting among the plots of previous adventures.

The first place that I can well remember was a large pleasant meadow with a pond of clear water in it.

#FirstLineFridays
@ShyBookOwl

(2011, English translation 2017)

This was a delight. It's an understated story about the relationships and preoccupations of a publishing team as they prepare a new dictionary. The story takes up questions about the relationship between words and the concepts they signify, the value of experience in forming definitions, and the ever-changing nature of language. Thoughtful and charming, and recommended.

And here's my #BookSpinBingo card for May.

Good luck everybody!

And thanks @theAromaOfBooks !

Here are my #ReadYourEbooks picks for May.

Thanks @Cbee !

Kohei Araki had devoted his entire life—his entire working life—to dictionaries.

#FirstLineFridays
#ShyBookOwl

Hip-hooray for #BookSpin Day! My May picks are very different books: #BookSpin is a chunky volume one of an epic fantasy series; and #DoubleSpin is a Victorian-era classic of animal fiction. Looking forward to both.

Thanks for spinning, @thearomaofbooks !

(2025) Here's one of the better horror stories I've read in a while, about a sister and two brothers in a difficult family situation. When one brother gets into trouble with the law, they escape to a cabin in the woods where family history, present reality, and the sister's nightmares blur together. It's a suspenseful, surreal, and very smart story about family trust and family trauma, and resonates with experiences of my own extended family