What are you Reading?

Basically a General Thread to mention things you are reading currently, can be either stories or Mangas. Things you find interesting, or which you would recomment to others.

I have just read the Oneshot Rengoku No Ashe which is quite the beautiful short one with a interesting premise and wonderful characters. You will be so surprised by it, believe it. What happened totally got me from nowhere.

Actually, I have really liked some One-Shots over the years. Yogashiten Galaxy is a Oneshot from the maker of The World God Only Knows with the silly premise that a guy wants to conquer earth and thinks that cake is the most awesome powerful weapon and he tries to learn how to make it.

There was also Iron Knight which later became a full series... but the full series never had the same awesome feel as the Oneshot.

There are so many good Oneshots that never get turned into anything good...

There is I'm the Main Character of a Harem Manga, but I'm Gay So Every Day Is Hell for Me which is well.... I think the Name is saying it? Not sure if this is a Oneshot, but the premise is hilarious.

There is Zui Wu Dao, an interesting new Shounen Manga and Kuang Shen which has a different and more serious feel to it. Boku no Hero Academia is also pretty good among the stuff I have been reading.

Actually, there are way too many manga I am reading, I often lose track of one for a while and then see some further chapters. Whether it is Kyou no Cerberus or Sousei no Onmyouji or A Fairy Tale for the Demon Lord or any of the others.

That is not considering the big ones that come out once a week or month like One Piece, UQ Holder, To Love Ru Darkness or Bleach (I mostly check it out to see what crazy stuff they pull next.)

Huh, I have only list manga... well I don't read any books currently.

 

Let's see...

Danmachi and Danmachi Oratória - the stories of Bell and Aiz, two adventurers of diferent Familia and their adventures in Orario and the dungeon.

Iinazuke kyoutei - the story of a boy and his childhood promised girl, er girls... Very assertive girls. Very ecchi.

Isuca - over the top ecchi, and a good (if overused) premise. Very ecchi.

Keijo!! - Funniest premise ever a sports Manga where girls compete on a push battle using their breasts and butts, and the Mc doesn't actually wants to be the best, just win money and stop being poor. Ecchi.

Minamoto-kun Monogatari - a crazy aunt put her nephew up for the task of bedding 14 women chosen to match the loves of Genji. Very, very ecchi.

Okusama ga seitokaichou - a guy find himself married to his school council president. Ecchi.

Tsugumomo - the story of a guy and his tsukumogami, a girl who's also an Obi, and their struggles against Amasogi (a type of cursed object aparition) who seem to follow the guy. Very ecchi.

 

This thread.

But seriously? Probably due to reread the hobbit through LotR again soon. I'm planning on contacting my sister to see if she has some Tamora pierce novels lying around.

As to mangas, daily life with monster girls. Hajime no Ippo. I think that's all I've been going for recently.

 

Reading The Children of Hurin right now. Such a light hearted story.

 

Hm, I just recently finished The Fall of Hyperion, so I'll probably be moving on to the next one once I get my hands on it. I also recently picked up the novelizations of Blood+, which I didn't even know existed, so I'll have to read them soon too. After that, I have a bunch of the Shannara novels to go through.

Manga wise, I haven't been reading nearly as much as I used to. As a matter of fact, I've only been reading Bleach, and that's just out of habit rather than any real enjoyment.

 

I just finished catching up on Golden Empire on Anonkun, a looooooong quest about Megucas in a fantasy Byzantine Empire. It's awesome and I recommend it so everyone, here is a link to the author page.

I am also reading the Art of War by Sun Tzu, I read the 36 Stratagems last month or so.

A friend of mine who is a fangirl of Pierre Bottero gave me his entire bibliography... I am not convinced it's worth of my time, but she wants me to read it, sooooo.

 

Just finished my yearly reread of the Tamuli, actually. I'm rather fond of Sparhawk, even if the story is highly cliche. Eddings has a rather nice writing style.

Been meaning to go read the Breath of Fire 4 manga, since its highly recommended to me, but I haven't gotten around to it yet.

 

Reading 2/3s of the beka cooper trilogy by Tamora Pierce and I have the last Eragon book (the one I haven't read) sitting in my reading nook.

Complete with rocking chair. So psyched when the new apartment had space for that.

Not sure what I'm going to read next though.

 

A Letter to America by David Boren. It's nice to read a book by your Uni president!

 

I just finished the last book in the Eragon series. It was the End. And it was bland... And just not good. It wasn't terrible but it was definitely not a page turner.

Also came across the first transgender character I've read in Tamora Pierce's Bloodhound. There was some exteanneous bits that were unnessicarily reminding us about the character being transgender but it was handled very well otherwise. (The character was a key minor character the Main character has plenty!!! (The trans character proved pivotal and was in a key position the entire second half of the story) of interaction with. There was little need for the MC to place the trans character on this sudden 'must make reference to the other character's trans nature' pedestal)

But othersie Beka's tale was a good one I hope to find the last in that series soon.

 

Just finished Supergod.

I'm going to look at pictures of cats now.

 

JG (Short for Jagdgeschwader which means Fighter Wing) 26: Top Guns of the Luftwaffe by Donald L. Caldwell.

Basically the chronological history of a German Fighter unit that fought from the beginning to the end of WWII. It's interesting to watch these guys go from the top dogs in the sky to just trying to survive against the increasingly vast odds arrayed against them by the end of WWII. Who says I don't know how to have fun, eh?

 

I don't really read all that much that's worth mentioning, well, it's probably worth mentioning but not worth recommending, and I'm not currently reading anything.

Well, I guess I could heavily recommend two Light Novels since I really love both series even if I've yet to get around to finishing either.
The first of them would be Book Girl, which I really need to get around to reading more of seeing as I've had the remaining volumes sitting on my bookshelf for ages and just haven't gotten around to reading because the internet is horribly distracting.
The second of the two would be Hakomari which I need to get around to reading the last two volumes of, it's a light novel I'd honestly suggest everyone give a shot, it's a great read that I'd love to see get an anime.

Beyond those though, I'm fairly boring taste-wise and tend to just read manga that aren't very noteworthy and can't think of any quest I'd really recommend, and those are basically all I read nowadays.

 

There is a simple solution to this- look them up on the internet and read them there. As stupid as it sounds it actually does help some for me at least. My best guess for the reason is when what you want to do is made into the distraction it is harder to get distracted from it.

 

That really doesn't work either, if it didn't I wouldn't still need to read the last two volumes of Hakomari. Well, that and either I'm terrible at finding books or there's no scans of Book Girl to actually read on my computer.

It's not like I would prefer reading on the computer either, reading books without the feel of a book just feels wrong when you have the option to read a physical copy of it.

 

Recently, I've been rereading my dad's collection of Patrick McManus's short stories. I doubt you can find them outside of the Pacific Northwest, but if you can, I'd highly recommend them. They, along with Redwall, were the first non-picture books I've ever read. The short stories are about fictionalized accounts of Pat's life, heavily featuring the outdoors. There are plenty of stories of him not catching fish, not getting deer, building airplanes and diving suits with his childhood friend "Crazy Eddie" Muldoon, and his adventures with his mountain man mentor, Rancid Crabtree. I've typed up an excerpt from one story, "Mosquito Bay"

Spoiler

My four daughters stopped by the other day, trailed by a riotous band of my grandchildren. I make a practice to count the kids when they arrive for a visit, and again when they leave, just to make sure none has been left behind. It's a simple precaution one learns after a few years of grandparenthood. When one settles down in the evening with one's newspaper, one likes to avoid the shock of finding a stray grandkid hiding under it.

"Hi, Grampa!" the kids chorused, coming in and throwing their coats on the floor.

"Hi, guys," I said, doing my best impression of a jolly old elf. "Ho ho ho! I was hoping you would come over, because we can play a game."

"Oh, wow! What is it?"

"It's called 'Don't Touch Any of Grampa's Stuff.' Doesn't that sound like fun? Here's how it's played. The first guy I catch catching Grampa's stuff is Out. Now, what does 'Out' mean? Your cousin Bernard could explain that better than I, although-"

"But, Grampa, we don't have a cousin Bernard!"

"Not anymore. You see, I walked into my den, and there was Bernard swatting flies with my split-bamboo fly rod and-"

"How come you didn't want him swatting flies?"

"A very good question, Daniel. You see, it wasn't the flies I was concerned about, which is one of the reasons for my inventing the game 'Don't Touch Any of Grampa's Stuff.' So what happened, Bernard tried to-"

"Enough about Bernard!" shouted my wife, Bun. "There never was a Bernard, kids. No Bernard."

"I thought there was," I said.

"Nope, no Bernard. Now, kids, you mustn't believe everything your grampa tells you. He has a tendency to rearrange reality."

After Bun left the room, I asked the kids if they understood what Grandma meant by the phrase "rearrange reality."

"No," they said.

"Good," I said. "So Bernard told me he didn't know he wasn't supposed to play with my three-piece fly rod, and I told him that no he wasn't, because it was supposed to be a two-piece fly rod. Then Bernard opened my big tackle box, and something came out and ate him. Does everyone understand what is meant by the phrase 'ate him'? It means Bernard was Out."

 

My alerts, repeatedly.
Standard operating procedure.

 

Just reread Jim Butcher's Skin Games again, over the course of two evenings. Now I've started in on A Hymn Before Battle by John Ringo, pretty good so far. I've got a number of the sequels waiting in the wings after this.

As for manga, I went and bought the first six volumes of the Lucifer and Biscuit Hammer series, my all-time favorite manga. I've read all of it three or four times before, but this is the first time it's been an "official" translation. I've already noticed a few differences. Should be interesting comparing my memories of the fan scanlation to what I'm reading now.

 

Tensei shitara slime datta ken. A bit like Re:Monster but more amusing in that the protag is a slime (and stays that way even if he can shapeshift and by all means is not a slime anymore.

Of course, it has some power scaling problem true to the nature of the protag having "absorb, analyze and mimic" abilities like the Gamer, but the novel pretty quickly establish that he's not the only one with bullshit powers.

 

Jack Ludlow's The Last Roman: Vengeance. Historical fiction about Flavius Belisarius' early life. Just finished The Elder Scrolls: The Infernal City by Greg Keyes which is about a giant soul eating city appearing over Blackmarsh. Would recommend for fans of Elder Scrolls lore but give it a pass otherwise.