This month's discussion is the last thing on the schedule. Are people interested in continuing? If so, two things will need to be decided: a new schedule, and a new host; a rotating series of hosts, like in the CGA threads, is likely the most sustainable long term move IMO.

Moving right along myself.

Links with more information for anyone undecided: LibraryThing:StoryGraph

Content Warnings based on user submissions from StoryGraph.

Plot summary of the previous work in the series (From Russia, with Love) from Wikipedia.

Let me know mods if I’m posting too much, if so I’m sorry!

Damn good read, devoured it over the course of two days in Quebec City last week and I’m just digesting it now.

Holy crow what a disambiguation of the word “mutiny” (apologies if I wrote that wrong).

I think David Grann manages to display the humanity in the central figures with clarity. Perhaps it’s due to some inference or poetic license in order to move the story along, but he make a good book and that cpt cheap was a dandy.

This is the eighth Tildes Book Club Discussion for 2026 and the twenty-eighth overall. We are discussing Light from Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki. At the end of September we will discuss Dr. No by Ian Fleming.

I don't have a particular format in mind for this discussion, but I will post some prompts and questions as comments to get things started. You're not obligated to respond to them or vote on them though. So feel free to make your own top-level comment for whatever you wish to discuss, questions you have of others, or even just to post a review of the book you have written yourself.

For latecomers, don't worry if you didn't read the book in time for this Discussion topic. You can always join in once you finish it. Tildes Activity sort, and "Collapse old comments" feature should keep the topic going for as long as people are still replying.

And for anyone uninterested in this topic please use the Ignore Topic feature on this so it doesn't keep popping up in your Activity sort, since it's likely to keep doing that while I set this discussion up, and once people start joining in.

We all know the big-name ones: Dune, 1984, The Martian Chronicles, etc.

What are some sci-fi books that you loved that you never hear about or that won't be making those top-of-all-time lists?

Why do they stand out to you?
What do they do well?
Why do you think they didn't get wider appreciation?

It seems like I may be dipping my toe back into "reading" through audiobooks. I realized that instead of listening to random YouTubers at work, I can listen to more intentional writing this way.

How do y'all feel about them? If you listen, what sorts of productions do you prefer? Are there any particular ones you think are spectacular, a cut above the rest? Do you listen to them in addition to reading the book as like a companion piece or instead of the book?

I've listened to some GraphicAudio books now and I like having a full cast for the characters, they've got some good voice actors. Though they're listed as unabridged, I worry they've still perhaps dropped paragraphs. But I think I'd end up zoning out more on single narrator books.

Part of why I never engaged before is because I have poor auditory processing, so I figured I just couldn't keep up. At least for simpler texts, I haven't had much problem, and it may be helping me improve in that respect. I hadn't tried before, but now I can watch YT vids at double speed without missing anything.

I started since my partner was interested so I set up audiobookshelf and some other services for grabbing files. It's been a great piece of software to use, there's other software that can manage and serve audiobooks, but none puts them first like abs does. Do recommend if you're interested in self-hosting audiobooks.

If anyone wants a replacement for the Tildes book club (and thanks /u/boxer_dogs_dance for running it consistently for so long!!) I run one that might interest speculative fiction readers. Be warned that it's a "dictatorship" where I pick every book, and I alternate between lesser-known books I've read and already enjoyed; and books that I'm interested in but haven't read yet.

Here is the list of books we have read:

• The Raven Scholar
• A Song of Legends Lost
• A Shadow in Summer (Long Price Quartet)
• Allow Me To Introduce Myself [the only non-spec-fic we've done thus far]
• Gods of the Wyrdwood (Forsaken Series)
• Kalyna the Soothsayer
• The Black Company (The Black Company)
• Battle of the Linguist Mages
• The Cloud Roads (Raksura)
• Sanctuary Duet
• Ten Thousand Doors of January
• The Dream Hotel
• The Element of Fire (Ile-Rien) [this is the only one so far that I hadn't read yet and didn't really enjoy]
• A Portrait in Shadow
• House of Suns [current month]
• City of Lies by Sam Hawke [next month]

The book club is in an "anyone can invite anyone but it's not publicly listed anywhere" Discord server dedicated to reading speculative fiction with about 1000 members, ~50 active), if anyone thinks like this list of books seems in line with your tastes I can dm you a join link! It's very low commitment and done with threads so you can read the current book or a backlist book and still talk about it + scroll through past discussion easily.

I can also offer advice (how to pick books, how to do things in Discord in a sane way, etc) if anyone else is interested in running something like this

Since we had a number of threads on Library resources, I figured we should have a place to consolidate them. If you find something of note, add it to the thread!

This will probably be rather US centric, but if something works in your neck of the woods, let us know.

This is the seventh Tildes Book Club Discussion for 2026 and the twenty-seventh overall. We are discussing a Psalm for the Wild Built by Becky Chambers.

ANNOUNCEMENT - My schedule has changed and I have joined an in person book group. I will no longer be coordinating these discussions for the foreseeable future. I want to thank everyone who has participated and contributed and read along while lurking. It has been a pleasure.

I don't have a particular format in mind for this discussion, but I will post some prompts and questions as comments to get things started. You're not obligated to respond to them or vote on them though. So feel free to make your own top-level comment for whatever you wish to discuss, questions you have of others, or even just to post a review of the book you have written yourself.

For latecomers, don't worry if you didn't read the book in time for this Discussion topic. You can always join in once you finish it. Tildes Activity sort, and "Collapse old comments" feature should keep the topic going for as long as people are still replying.

And for anyone uninterested in this topic please use the Ignore Topic feature on this so it doesn't keep popping up in your Activity sort, since it's likely to keep doing that while I set this discussion up, and once people start joining in.

I finished reading Flowers for Algernon recently. I genuinely enjoyed it but as I progressed I felt it was closer to a human drama than a sci-fi book. I was surprised since it has been recognized as a sci-fi book for so long and won the Hugo and Nebula awards. I was wondering what others thought about it. I will add my rationale below (spoilers).

(Spoilers). The first thing is how shallow the science is, there is only one moment when is commented with ant type of depth and that moment has more big words than science backup, in my opinion. I know it is a book of its time, but I especially missed Charlie doing physical experimentation, taking tissue samples or applying the science that was explicitly mentioned in the book as the source of his intelligence when doing his own research.

The second thing is that the experiment feels like a device to trigger Charlie's specific human drama and to walk us through his childhood trauma. It is an amazing mechanism for that, but I expect sci-fi to hace societal impact and deeper world building. It is a bit reminiscent of the movie Awakenings, that uses specific medical procedures to give someone a window to experience life.

I also feel that the lack of stakes when Charlie escapes and takes Algernon with him are underwhelming, the research lab just let it happen and they don't engage the authorities to bring him back or, at the very least, to retrieve the most valuable mouse lab in the world. It felt as another mechanism to advance the human drama.

Lastly, and this is a common pattern for this theme, there is no time for Charlie to learn all he learns, even with super intellect, he needs to go through the regular knowledge absorption methods of reading and studying, and in a few months, there is just no time for that. He can be a genius, but a genius won't be a neurosurgeon without taking the time to learn.

All in all, I feel that as the tragic story of Charlie the book works exceedingly well. It is cleverly written and Charlie's progress (or lack thereof) felt earned. I would have liked Charlie to be less of a jerk when he became intelligent, but that is of course a creative choice. It does brings a very clear separation between emotional and intellectual intelligence that it is undeniable in the real world, so I can believe it.

I am glad I read it and would recommend it, just not as sci-fi, not sure what others think.

My two cents

I have an older kobo (Kobo Libra H20) and have been using Calibre, and basically manually plugging it in and syncing books over to it.

I'm wondering if anyone knows of any good ways of doing wireless sync?

I've looked into KoReader but not sure exactly how involved that would be to set up. I am comfortable setting up something "SelfHosted" as long as I can easily spin it up and spin it down, I don't currently have any computer I leave on 100% of the time.

I've seen previous topics here, and Booklore looked interesting, but when I went to track it down it looks like the website is down (the GitHub is still there though), and apparently lots of controversy surrounding it in some reddit posts...it looks like there is maybe a fork of it (Grimmory), but I'm wondering if anyone here has experience with it or anything similar.

I'd prefer something without a lot of AI/LLM use, but not sure how realistic that is.

I only read eBooks, not manga/visual novels, and I don't listen to audiobooks so I don't necessarily need anything with support for any of those.

I would also be fine paying for something, but preferably only a one-time fee not a subscription.

I primarily read books on my Kobo, but it would be a "nice to have" if I could somehow sync to my iPhone (or Apple books) and iPad, but not required (and I don't need it to sync progress between devices, as I'd pretty much only be reading on one at a time).

Additional "nice to have" would be the ability to add books from any device.

Any suggestions? Just use Calibre content server? Or is there something "better"?

Yesterday I saw a mention somewhere online a story, maybe a book, maybe a short story. It was:

• science fiction
• literary is uncommon (actually illegal?)
• the main (?) character is obsessed with film and learns to read based on the words that appear in the background of the films he watches
• there are robots?

Does anyone know what this is? I tried search, but search is worthless nowadays.

This is the sixth Tildes Book Club Discussion for 2026 and the twenty-sixth overall. We are discussing How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying by Wexler.. At the end of July we will discuss A Psalm for the Wild Built by Chambers.

I don't have a particular format in mind for this discussion, but I will post some prompts and questions as comments to get things started. You're not obligated to respond to them or vote on them though. So feel free to make your own top-level comment for whatever you wish to discuss, questions you have of others, or even just to post a review of the book you have written yourself.

For latecomers, don't worry if you didn't read the book in time for this Discussion topic. You can always join in once you finish it. Tildes Activity sort, and "Collapse old comments" feature should keep the topic going for as long as people are still replying.

And for anyone uninterested in this topic please use the Ignore Topic feature on this so it doesn't keep popping up in your Activity sort, since it's likely to keep doing that while I set this discussion up, and once people start joining in.

This is the fourth Tildes Book Club Discussion for 2026 and the twenty-fourth overall. We are discussing The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane by Lisa See. For May, we will discuss Pnin by Vladimir Nabokov.

I don't have a particular format in mind for this discussion, but I will post some prompts and questions as comments to get things started. You're not obligated to respond to them or vote on them though. So feel free to make your own top-level comment for whatever you wish to discuss, questions you have of others, or even just to post a review of the book you have written yourself.

For latecomers, don't worry if you didn't read the book in time for this Discussion topic. You can always join in once you finish it. Tildes Activity sort, and "Collapse old comments" feature should keep the topic going for as long as people are still replying.

And for anyone uninterested in this topic please use the Ignore Topic feature on this so it doesn't keep popping up in your Activity sort, since it's likely to keep doing that while I set this discussion up, and once people start joining in.

This is the fifth Tildes Book Club Discussion for 2026 and the twenty-fifth overall. We are discussing Pnin by Vladimir Nabokov. For June we will discuss How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying by Wexler.

I don't have a particular format in mind for this discussion, but I will post some prompts and questions as comments to get things started. You're not obligated to respond to them or vote on them though. So feel free to make your own top-level comment for whatever you wish to discuss, questions you have of others, or even just to post a review of the book you have written yourself.

For latecomers, don't worry if you didn't read the book in time for this Discussion topic. You can always join in once you finish it. Tildes Activity sort, and "Collapse old comments" feature should keep the topic going for as long as people are still replying.

And for anyone uninterested in this topic please use the Ignore Topic feature on this so it doesn't keep popping up in your Activity sort, since it's likely to keep doing that while I set this discussion up, and once people start joining in.

Similarly to the few years old thread I made for webserials I would like to recommend and introduce some quests and fanfictions. Quests are a collaborative(ideally) stories that usually live in forums. The usual format is that the writer/s enable the readers an input in how the story is written which is usually done by voting. I found that fanfictions vary in quality wildly but any sufficiently popular work will have some that are very good.

For the tyrants fear your might - https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/for-the-tyrants-fear-your-might-a-quest-of-interstellar-rebellion.83706/ - (quest) - a story of a an entertainment planet in a hypercapitalistic society rebelling. Does not have a single protagonist

The Practice War - https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/the-practice-war-complete.31698/ - (quest, Practice Effect) - humanity creates space faring dragons but is defeated by an advanced and enigmatic race.

Divided Loyalties - https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/warhammer-fantasy-divided-loyalties-an-advisors-quest.44838/ - (quest, Warhammer fantasy) - a Grey wizard becomes the advisor to the Elector Count of Sylvania and later continuing on in her adventures elsewhere. Very long with several distinct arcs

RHUNRIKKI STROLLAR - https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/rhunrikki-strollar-warhammer-fantasy-golden-age-dwarf-runelord-quest.63581/ - (quest, Warhammer fantasy) - a life of dwarven golden age runemaster among the coming troubles

The Burbank Situation - https://archiveofourown.org/works/19189534 - (Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Chuck) - Chuck has some unusual hobbies, such as LARPing as a vampire hunter. First part of a series

My Name Is Beautiful - https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/155302 - (Unordinary) - reincarnation story. A side character from original story runs a rebellion built on lies and manipulation against the Authorities. Probably the darkest story on this list

To The Stars - https://archiveofourown.org/works/777002 - (Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika) - story set in a ai run world that tries its best among a brutal war with advanced aliens. And of a magical girl whose wish was to be extraordinary

Birds of a Feather - https://archiveofourown.org/works/15996890 - (Harry Potter) - this is both a solid character exploration and a depiction of WW2 Britain

A Song of Ice and Fires That Weren't All My fault - https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/a-song-of-ice-and-fires-that-werent-all-my-fault-asoiaf-dresden-files.336499/ - (Game of Thrones/Dresden Files) - Dresden makes a living in Braavos finding things. The merging of these two different settings is very good

The Maretian - https://www.fimfiction.net/story/396744/ - (The Martian/My Little Pony) - Mark Watney is joined on Mars by the crew of an alien race. More fantastical than Martian but still features engineering challenges. MLP fandom needs a lot of getting used to but has some good stories

I've made an effort to read some more poems this year and always enjoy finding out any more when I can. In the UK you can find anthologies of "The Nation's Favourite Poems" and "The Nation's Favourite Comic Poems" et alia by the BBC, which is where I've learnt most of my new ones this year. It'd be great to see what poems have left an impression on you this year.

For brevity, I'll put a short one here and then two longer ones I discovered this year down in the comments.

Two Cures for Love - Wendy Cope

Don’t see him. Don’t phone or write a letter.
The easy way: get to know him better.

As a proud husband, I wanted to share that my wife's new book is officially released today! We both knew nothing about publishing books before this journey and now she is independently publishing her 5th book and first in a new series. She writes romance, so not my normal choice of material, but I have read all of her books and really enjoy them. There is just something cool about seeing my wife bring characters to life, especially since I do not consider myself a creative.

She did have a photography business before Covid, which fell apart thanks to the lockdowns. That's when she got into bookstagram and eventually decided to write her own books. Its been a wild ride since and she has met a ton of great people. It sure doesn't pay the bills, but that seems pretty par for the course. AI slop isn't helping that either.

Anyways, if you have Kindle Unlimited you can read it there for free. Or you can find her book on Amazon if you want. Sadly, its the best place left for indie authors.

Random question. What do the wonderful people of Tildes think about self promotion here? My wife is an indie author. As a proud and supportive husband, if I posted about her new book here is that fine or in poor taste? I searched but nothing came up, which made me assume I just wasn't searching correctly. But maybe no one has asked before?

So I would love to know/hear everyone's opinions.

I'm having a lot of trouble creating an image of the city in my head and would like some help!

Any kind of image or graph is appreciated. Maps, artist renditions. Anything. Both for the city as a whole and the different locations within the city that Clarke describes.

But it must be accurate, or at least an attempt to be accurate (which is why I can't just use Google for this, since I lack the ability to distinguish between freestyle art and accurate ones).

Thanks!

Here is the schedule for the upcoming year

Last week in August - Cats Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut,

Last week in September - Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang

Last week in October - The Poisoners Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine by Deborah Blum,

Last week in November - We are Legion (We are Bob) by Dennis Taylor,

December break for the holidays.

Last week in January - Fire on the Mountain by Terry Bissen,

Last week in February - The Truth by Terry Pratchett

Last week in March - The Metamorphosis by Kafka,

Last week in April - The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane by Lisa See,

Last week in May - Pnin by Nabokov,

Last week in June - How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying by Wexler,

Last week in July - A Psalm for the Wild Built by Becky Chambers,

Last week in August - Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki

Last week in September - Dr. No by Ian Fleming

I'm looking for some recommendations. I'm not a voracious reader, so just about anything you can recommend will be new to me.

I'm not sure how to describe the genre I'm after, which is really why I'm here. I just got done binging Petscop on YouTube; the surreal and Lynchian story telling coupled with the dark subject matter really sucked me in. I'm also somewhat enthralled by some of the higher quality Backrooms content.

I'm interested in short stories or novels.

Edit: sorry for not tagging. I completely forgot!

This is the third Tildes Book Club Discussion for 2026 and the twenty-third overall. We are discussing The Metamorphosis by Kafka. At the end of April we will discuss The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane by Lisa See.

I don't have a particular format in mind for this discussion, but I will post some prompts and questions as comments to get things started. You're not obligated to respond to them or vote on them though. So feel free to make your own top-level comment for whatever you wish to discuss, questions you have of others, or even just to post a review of the book you have written yourself.

For latecomers, don't worry if you didn't read the book in time for this Discussion topic. You can always join in once you finish it. Tildes Activity sort, and "Collapse old comments" feature should keep the topic going for as long as people are still replying.

And for anyone uninterested in this topic please use the Ignore Topic feature on this so it doesn't keep popping up in your Activity sort, since it's likely to keep doing that while I set this discussion up, and once people start joining in.

I have a friend who recently started reading fiction books for the first time since he was a teenager. It's been great recommending him some books, and he is currently exploring different genres to find ones he likes with a goal of one book a month this year. I was chatting with him about his reading today and this got me thinking about the books I enjoy and associated tropes of different genres.

This made me think it might be fun seeing what my fellows tilders think about tropes in books.

• Do you have any tropes in books that you love?
• On the flip side, do you have any tropes that you can't stand?
• Are there any novels that execute these tropes well/poorly?
• Do you find yourself enjoying tropes being subverted?
• Anything else trope related you want to chat about!