#76 Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C Clarke

Captain Norton of the space ship Endeavour is ordered out to make contact with an alien vehicle coming into our solar system. Humans have spread thru the local planets, but have never met life that didn't come from Earth - until now.
The shrewd and level headed Captain takes his crew thru docking on the ship - dubbed Rama - and leads the exploration of its interior.  The interior is a world built on the inside of a gigantic tube that -at first - appears to be frozen and inert. At first, anyway.

It is odd to me to have so much adventure in a story, with not that much excitement.  There is some drama, but no real grandiose tension.  Clarke Norton and the crew of the Endeavour too careful and sober for that.  Any leader worth his salt in Clarke's eyes would not put his crew at a greater risk than need be.  Any loose-cannon types would have been off his ship long ago.  They all work together as a trusting and tight-knit unit. ..and that is exactly the way a good outfit of genuine spacers would need to be.

I enjoyed the play between the planetary councils. He calls it the United Planets and the people from the different regions have different attitudes. Permanent habitation has long been established on the Moon, Mercury, NOT Venus (too harsh), Mars and several moons of Jupiter as well as colonies in the further reaches of the solar system.  They consider their OWN worlds home and do not consider themselves "Earthlings".  You especially have to watch those Hermians ( people from Mercury ).  They are hot blooded and untrusting souls.

p115
"Suppose that we do find that Rama is -active- and has these capabilities. There is an old saying in military affairs that capability does not imply intention."

p156
He paused at the last spot where he could hear it, like a faint throbbing deep in his brain. So might a primitive savage listened in awe-struck ignorance to the low humming of a giant power transformer. And even the savage might have guessed that the sound heard was merely the stray leakage from the colossal energies, fully controlled, but biding their time.

p173
The crab showed no reaction whatsoever, nor did it slacken its pace. Ignoring Jimmy completely, it walked straight past him and headed purposefully into the south. Feeling extremely foolish, the acting representative of Homo Sapiens watched his First Contact stride away across the Raman plain, totally indifferent to his presence. 
He had seldom been so humiliated in his life. Then his sense of humor came to his rescue. After all, it was no great matter to have been ignored by an animated garbage truck.  It would have been worse if it had greeted him as a long-lost brother. 

#22 The Dark Tower series by Stephen King (1 of 4?)

I was in the middle of yet another 900+ page Wheel Of Time book when my wife and I went on vacation last week.  Not wanting to lug around a 3 inch deep tome, I decided to bring something more portable.  The Gunslinger. This is my FIRST book by Stephen King that I have ever read.

In the afterward, King says he wrote the book over the span of several years and you can kinda tell in how different it feels at the beginning versus the end.  The weariness and depressing persistence of the "chase" brings you well into the head of the man you find out a couple hundred pages later is named Roland.  He coldly recounts how the town of Tull went from a frontier town to a ghost town to a lone settler who is equally as unaffected by the horrible tale as he is in telling it.  It partly feels like a confession, but without the seeking of absolution.  Just an admittance, rather..

Then the boy, Jake, comes into his life. Jake's sorry is odd and sad and depressing.  It feels like he was there to serve a purpose, but it didn't really fell like he did... other than to briefly show the Gunslingers capacity for humanity and compassion- at least a remembrance of it anyway.

Meeting the MIB was really an anticlimax. The resolution of that interaction even more so.

Maybe those turn out to be NOT yet totally resolved in the next books.

All in all, parts of the writing were very good, but the overall story is not great.  Not yet anyway.

p37
He suddenly became aware that the room had gone silent again, and he tasted thick tension in the air. He turned around and stared into the face of the man who had been asleep by the door when he entered.  It was a terrible face.  The odor of the devil-grass was a rank miasma.  The eyes were damned, the staring, glaring eyes of those who see but do not see, eyes ever turned inward to the sterile hell of dreams beyond control, dreams unleashed, risen out of the stinking swamps of  the unconscious.   

#60 Going Postal by Terry Pratchett

That was a fun book. Moist von Lipwig is a con artist that gets caught, condemned, hanged - but not killed - then is offered the job as Postmaster of the city of Ankh-Morpork. This is not a good gig because the last several postmasters have gone insane due to the mountains of undelivered mail that are stuffed into every corner of the post office.  They WANT to be delivered.. and they drive you mad. 
The other characters are plucky, but not terribly involved.  This is a one man story.  Just Moist. 
Yep, Moist.  He knows it is a weird name but since he spent most of his life a s a con man up till the hanging, he rarely used it.  He had every grift in the book; from forgeries to 3 card Monty to passing off a cheap 1$ ring as a 1000$ ring and getting someone to think they are swindling him by selling it for 100$. He got away with it for so long because he know what people wanted to see.  He made sure everyone remembered the suit he was wearing - not the man in the suit.  He was a real people-person.. in a sense. He could really work a crowd.
He uses this to get the post office up and running again. The forgery experience comes in great when designing (inventing) stamps. His promotional and crowd working skills get people quickly very interested in the post office and they thankfully will not notice him outside of his golden winged hat and gold suit.  See the suit, forget the man.
The other main communication network of the world notices him too, and are not too keen on having competition.  The "clacks" - a network of semaphore towers - is the only game in town for local and long distance communication.  That lack of competition has made them inefficient and corrupt, but people have just gotten used to poor service. Pratcehtt is going for some socio-political commentary her I am sure, but it is subtle enough to be able to take it as-it-comes.  He does not bludgeon you with it as so many other authors do. I found that refreshing.
The other denizens of the post office are interesting, but ultimately just in the background. His would-be girlfriend is rather forgettable too, but I did like Mr Pump.  Mr Pump is a golem.  He is both Moist's assistant and his parole officer. Oddly, the un-fleshed character seemed the most fleshed out. Maybe it just seems that way because he is so simple.  He was created to be a tool, but his is a liberated and possesses a sense of "personhood". People didn't like the thought of golems being like salves, so they gave them rights.. but they were designed to be "living" tools.. so all they do is work.  Again, a social commentary that is at a take-it-or-leave-it level.  Nice.

p313
Neverthless, he picked up a piece of smashed chair.  It had splintered nicely, and the thing about a stake thru the heart was that it also worked on non-vampires.

p378
Always remember that the crowd that applauds your coronation will also be the crowd that applauds you behading.

p458
"But I'm going to have my hands more than full with the Post Office!" Moist protested.
"I hope you are. But, in mu experience, the best way to get something done it to give it to someone who is busy." said Vetinari. 

#79 Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury

It was hard to get thru this, but I had many distractions.  I feel like I've started one of these off this way before.. Stupid nursing school.
Jim Nightshade and Will Halloway.  Neighbors, best friends, 13 year old boys, lightning rod purchasers.  These carefree boys first meet a traveling salesman who gives a warning that the coming days are going to be as unlucky as their ages. He gifts them a lightning rod woven thru with spells and charms to ward off not only natural lightning, but the more metaphorical storm they are bound to get caught up in on this mid October evening.  The circus is coming to town, and that is bad news.
The boys quickly recognize that something is just not right with the supposed entertainers as they spy on them while they set up shop.  The curiosity, daring and invincibility of pubescence gets the best of them as they investigate and it is quickly known to the devious Mr Dark that someone knows their evil secret.
They fend off some assaults on their own, but in the end, can't do it all alone.  The mopey-yet-intrepid Charles Halloway - Will's dad - is eventually enlisted as well.

The writing is WONDERFUL. Almost too wonderful. You can almost say that Ray wrote a 230-odd page poem. It is beautiful. It is whimsical to the extreme. Flowing, imaginative, rambling - yet still on track. The character's grasp on reality seems as tight as that of a child reaching for the brass ring on a merry-go-round.

This is one book that I need to buy and keep as opposed to borrowing from the library.  I can easily see picking it up and reading a few pages here and there just to get a dose of that spooky Bradbury flavor..

p191
For those beings, fall is the normal season, the only weather, there be no choice beyond. 
Where do they come from/  The dust.
Where do they go to?  The grave.
Does blood stir in their veins? No: the night wind.
What tickles in their head?  The worm.
What speaks from their mouth?  The toad.
What sees from their eye?  The snake.
What hears with their ears? The abyss between the stars. 
They sift the human form for souls, eat flesh of reason, fill tombs with sinners. They frenzy forth. In gusts they beetle-scurry, creep, thread, filter, motion, make all sullen, and surely cloud all clear-run waters. The spider-web hears them, trembles - breaks.
Such are the autumn people. Beware of them.

#48 Neverwhere by Neil Gaimen

Upon finishing the book my first thought was simply "Delightful!"  The general idea of the plot: a simple man taken out of his element and having to bumble his way thru a strange new world: is very familiar.  Many authors go with it because it just works.  Neil, naturally, works it well here.
Richard is a boring man living a humdrum life in a totally plain existence in a "present day" London. Gaiman was ?intentionally? vague about technology and it feels like that "present day" feel won't be outdated for a while. Richard almost literally trips over a woman fleeing from killers pursuing her from her wold of "London Below".  The denizens of London Below are a part of the real world, but are pretty much invisible to the people of London.  They are people that you pass by on the street and - if noticed at all - are instantly forgotten.  They walk thru our world without really interacting with us at all. Being a very ordinary man with no real family and few friends, Richard still finds it hard to be suddenly unnoticeable after having helped Door, who - surprise - turns out to be a princess.  Shocking, I know.. I've heard that one before too.  But hey, it works!
With the help of the brash, roguish and handsome ( again! ) Marquis de Carabas, she tries to escape the cruel Mr Croup and the brutish Mr Vandemar who were hired to get her.  There are plenty of very interesting and colorful minor characters like the Rat Speakers, the bird man, the Earl of Earl's Court and Door's bodyguard named simply "Hunter".  The Marquis is a fantastic character but I was most intrigued by Hunter.  I want to know more about her past.

I liked the clever progression of Richard's self assurance thru the story.  As he gains confidence he starts to introduce himself to new people with more certainty.  When he first is introduced to Door and the Marquis he mumbles and stumbles over saying his own name.  So much that they misunderstand what his name actually is.  By the meets new people toward the end of the book, he introduces himself simply as Richard.  I thought that was a nice and subtle way to see the progression of the character.

I do think that I would have gotten more oft of the book if I were a Londoner.  Several of the locations in the book are familiar locales to people who know their way around the Underground.  If I ever make it to London maybe I'll take a "Neverwhere" tour.   That has to exist, right?

p85
There was no moon, but the night sky was a riot of crisp and glittering autumn stars. There were streetlights, too, and lights on buildings and bridges, which looked like earthbound stars and they glimmered, repeatedly, as they were reflected with the city in the night water of the Thames. Its a fairyland, Richard thought. 

p175
Mr Croop smiled like a snake with a crescent moon stuck in its mouth and his resemblance to Stolen Cadavers numbers 1 and 30 was, if anything, increased by this. 
p176
"You see," explained Me Croop, in a voice like rancid butter, Right now we're just here to worry you." Mr Vandemar's voice was like a night wind blowing over a desert of bones "Make you suffer," he said. "Spoil your day."

p205
Mr Croup began to laugh. it sounded like pieces of blackboard being dragged over the nails of a wall of severed fingers.

p335
For a moment, upon waking, he had no idea at all who he was.  It was a tremendously liberating feeling, as if her were able to be whatever her wanted to be; he could be anyone at all - able to try on any identity; he could be a man or a woman, a rat or a bird, a monster or a god. And then someone made a rustling noise, and he woke up the rest of the way, and in waking found that he was Richard Mayhew, whomever that was, whatever that meant. He was Richard Mayhew and he did not know where he was. 

#12 The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan (4-6)

THE SHADOW RISING
It took 2 months to read, but I finally got thru. I read it at a leisurely pace.. which seems to match the pace of the series.  There is some really good action, some good plot developments, the characters are starting to know their own power.. but it felt slow.
Rand travels thru the waste to get in touch with his Aiel heritage.  He feels like he is getting too powerful already and we are still early in the series. I like that he has grown some confidence and has his own agenda.  He remains humble and manages his superpowers well.  He also has an Aile girlfriend, though he does not realize it.
Mat plays tag-along with Rand. The only thing that changed for Mat is he realized he speaks the old tongue and he gets a costume change.  He has the spear and the hat now.. but is still just Mat.  He needs to get away from Rand to start making his own waves in the pattern.
Perrin does get super awesome.  Falie snares him and they get married. He saves his people and fends off the trollocks and fades. Faces down the white cloaks.  He is granted the title of "Lord" by the Two Rivers people and answers to the name "goldeneyes". I suppose that is the best way to pick a ruler. Just decide it is so and start calling him by the title that you have granted.  Even if he doesn't really want it. I can't wait to see where he goes from here.
Egwaine goes into the waste with Rand, but not much happens to her.  She is a dreamwalker in training.
Min stops playing the Elmindreda game at Tar Valon and escapes the takeover of the tower with Siuan. I am interested to see how Siuan handles the fall from Amyrlin Seat to muggle.
Elayne and Nynaeve's bit is fun.  They make friends with a Seanchan.  They hunt down some Black Ajahs.  Nynaeve kicks some serious forsaken ass. I do like that her massive power is tempered by not always being available to use it.  It keeps her in check.

p253 Nayneve and Lan
"I will not be manhandled [kissed] in this fashion for the whole world to see.  I will not!"
"Not the whole world," he replied. "But if they can see, they can hear as well.  You have made a place in my heart where i thought there was no room for anything else.  You have made flowers grow where I have cultivated dust and stones. Remember this, on your journey you insist on making. If you die, I will not long survive."

p421
Voices whispered in Perrin's head, a thousand babbling mad voices clawing at the inside of his skull. Bitter blood.  Blood so bitter. Drink the blood and crack the bone. Crack the bone and suck the marrow. Bitter marrow, sweet the screams. Singing screams. Sing the screams. Tiny souls.  Arcid Souls. Gobble them down. So sweet the pain. On and On.

THE FIRES OF HEAVEN
Wow this one dragged.  People warned me that it got a bit slow around here but DAMN.
I got four or five hundred pages an and they.. walked out of a desert.. others walked to a river.. some other people walked somewhere else.  ugh.. There were little flashes of action, but reading about all that walking made me feel like i was being dragged along unwillingly. When you finally get to the big army battle it is rather ho-hum. Mat is coming to grips with being a skilled, yet unwilling leader.  Rand is getting comfortable with his power. I think Min felt like she was just tagging along - just like the reader. The dream world is quite interesting and the end battle is a fitting farewell to a BIG character, but it took its time getting there.
It feels like I was reading that book forever.  I actually read another book-and-a-half while reading this one because it was to big - in physical size - to pack with me when I went to Chicago and up north.
The next ones better start moving more quickly.  This is starting to feel like a chore.

p281
"You are a dirty fighter."  she muttered. Melaine quirked an eyebrow, "Do we fight? If we do, then know that in battle, there is only winning and loosing. Rules against hurting are for games..."

p577
"I always say, if you must mount the gallows, give a jest to the crowd, a coin to the hangman, and make the drop with a smile on your lips."


LORD OF CHAOS
Yes, still a bit slow.  The whole world is gripped in an extreme heat wave and drought, and the book has the feel of an afternoon spent laboring in the sun. It finally picked up about 400 pages in and the last 200 actually moved rather quickly.  Hundreds upon hundreds of pages of planning and plotting. I like that Loial and Min are back, but they are mostly just background.. except for Min making Rand randy. Nyneve and Elayne sneak around in the dream world and try to tell the real Aes Sedai how to do it.  The renegade Aes Sedai make a surprising choice for the new Amerlyn Seat. Someone that everyone else thinks is dead scheming to SLOWLY maneuver her self into a better spot.  Mat marches.. that's about it.  Perrin makes Falie jealous, but not on purpose.  Rand wrestles with the voices in his head. Rand setting up and inspecting not one, but TWO schools.  F'ing riveting I tell ya.
Then FINALLY a kidnapping, a chase and a rescue.
I hope all this setup keeps paying off.

p437
A Cairhienin playing the Game of Houses was usually easier to understand than a woman making no effort to be enigmatic at all. 

p512
"When you wish for so long that you could hear something," he said slowly, "and then suddenly, without warning, you do, it is like a lightening strike and rain on parched ground at the same time. You're stunned, but you can't hear enough. 

p751
We are always more afraid than we wish to be, but we can always be braver than we expect. 

#73 The Legend of Drizzt (Dark Elf trilogy) by R A Salvatore (in progress)

This one was all right. I'm one book in and it is good, but not fantastic.  It is set in the Forgotten Realms and is published by TSR / Wizards of the Coast so it has a very strong Dungeons and Dragons feel to it. A lot of the terminology is lifted right from the game so it was quite familiar. I wonder if Salvatore wrote it that way, or if TSR made alterations to give it that DnD mechanic.. I could see that happening. You can almost see Drizzt rolling a D20 sometimes. I wonder what feet he is going to choose at level 15..

Drizzt is a badass Fighter / Mage born into the evil Drow society. The story of his birth really sets the scene of ruthless ambition well. Salvatore paints a great picture of the subterranean Lawful Evil society.  Drizzt himself is not evil and he feels that he does not fit in to the mold of what a Drow is expected to be. He struggles to break the bonds of his wicked clan / community and strike out on his own. Normally I'd write something about a few of the other characters in the book - like his mother Malace or his uncle Zak (shh.. it's his father) but they weren't all that well developed to be interesting enough to note.  Sorry, spoiler alert about Zak - but you can see it coming from miles away.

p119 
Zak slid one of the swords from the scabbard and admired the weapon's wondrous detail. This sword, as with most of the Drow weapons, had been forged by the grey dwarves, then traded to Menzoberranzan.  The duergar workmanship was exquisite, but it was the work done on the weapon after the dark elves acquired it that made it so very special. None of the races of the surface or Underdark could out do the work of the dark elves in the art of enchanting weapons. Imbued with strange emanations from the Underdark, the magical power unique to the lightless world, and blessed by the unholy clerics of Loth, no blade ever sat in its wielder's hand more ready to kill.