Another year has passed, and although 2011 will go down as the year before the year the world ends, that doesn’t mean there were not a menagerie of books that were read. Like last year, here is a big, fat list of all of the books I put to my brain.

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So I recently had some time to kill (driving through any portion of Western Kansas require some sort of distraction to maintain sanity) and I thought I’d queue up an audiobook I purchased a while ago. I still don’t know exactly how to feel about the book, but it was an interesting listen and kept me from wading out into the corn to find Jesus.

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Okay, I’ve been sitting on this review of The Gangs of New York for a little while now.  The first couple of drafts didn’t come out right.  I’ve been having a  time with this one, you could say.  The problem isn’t that it’s a very hard book to write about.  It just pissed me off.  I find it difficult to produce limpid, effortless prose when writing about things that piss me off.  My usually passable style descends to something only slightly more comprehensible than fevered text message jargon.  That being said, here are Gangs of New York and why it pissed me off!

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Today I’m going to be talking about a series that we’ve discussed before on the show in brief. Well, more accurately, I talked about the first book during Episode 80, back in the day. The series in question is George R.R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire.

As mentioned on the show, this series is not for the feint of heart. I’ve currently read three and a half of these novels (I’m 300 pages from finishing the fourth book), which comes to the sum total of roughly 2,600 pages. From what I understand, the series originally started in seven parts, with Martin currently writing the fifth installment, but we shall see how it all ends up. It’s very interesting for me to be reading a series that is so well established that also has years and years to go before finishing. I am reminded of Steven King’s Gunslinger series, which has seven novels that took upwards of two decades to complete. I really hope that is not the case here, but only time will tell. Read more…

I didn’t intend to do this post on Sergei Lukyanenko’s Night Watch yet, but I I have to write something on this book. This book was such a hit in Russia that it spawned two movies there before it was translated into English. These are movies out of the recovering post-Soviet film industry, and after reading the book, I want to see them. Read more…

If you haven’t read anything by Robert A. Heinlein, you’ve missed a huge chunk of 20th century American science fiction. You may feel bad about that. Maybe not. Anyway, one of the greatest Read more…

Hiho, it’s time to talk about a book. Here we have the first book I’ve read specifically for Pressed & Bound. It’s called Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, and it was written by Dai Sijie. Because it’s a brisk, cinematic read, I recommend it if you have to sit anywhere for a long time. Read more…

Alright, boys and girls.  It’s been a rough couple of weeks for updates, but here’s a big damn book for you.

Neal Stephenson is the author of Snow Crash, which Joe and Garret reviewed, and The Diamond Age, which I would love to write up sometime.  He’s a great author and has a huge, nerdy fanbase.  Today’s book, however, is why am not a drooling fanboy for him the way I am for Gaiman and Gibson. Read more…

Happy Oktoberfest, everyone!  I’m drinking hefeweisen on an empty stomach.  Let’s see how it affects my spelling and word choice.  This is Part the Third of the three-part Gaiman-thing! Once again, I am borrowing my girlfriend’s copy of this week’s book.  I have left mine at my parent’s house.  For God’s sake, please don’t tell her. Read more…

Welcome to Part the Second of the three-part Gaiman-tacular! In this riveting installment, we take a look at one of my absolute favorite books, Neverwhere: A Novel by Neil Gaiman. Read more…