Gnomeball takes a ramble in 2026

Hi everyone, I'm Gnomeball; a lifelong fan of all things Sci-fi and Fantasy, having been brought up on TNG, the X Files, and the Lord of the Rings; I am however not a lifelong reader, having only really started a few years ago, so there's quite a lot of "that's not what happened in the book" I have still yet to experience.

This thread exists primarily to catalogue my fictionally-flavoured ramblings throughout 2026 (as well as this month, I guess); as a starter I won't be letting it go unsaid that I've recently finished reading Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K Dick (I quite enjoyed it, despite it's occasionally somewhat more abrupt nature than the film loosely based in it's world, and perhaps a little anti-climactic also, I'm still making my mind up), and have also just started reading the Earthsea Cycle by Ursula K Le Guin (so far only I'm half way through the first one, but nonetheless am looking forward to seeing where the story goes).

I suspect my entries here will somewhat mirror those I am making in the category challenge for 2026, for almost everything I've read in the last 6 months has been Sci-fi or Fantasy in some way and so far everything I'm planning in 2026 is also Sci-fi or Fantasy - a re-read of the Lord of the Rings as well as The Hobbit, taking in the first parts of two longer series, Leviathon Wakes and Hyperion to see which one will cause my shelves to overflow first, the newest Witcher book Crossroads of Ravens, and a bunch of others that shall remain nameless until I commit - and as such, I thought it worthwhile joining this group.

Hi and welcome to The Green Dragon. Pardon me if I haven't run into you before, but here's your annual thread topper (I do this for pretty much everyone who has a personal reading thread here) -

Oo I love it, I'll just have to imagine the one on the left is reading up on their friends conquest for Erebor, but hasn't gotten to the end yet :D

>1 Gnomeball: Welcome to the group, and a very happy new/first thread to you!

Welcome! Happy New Thread! :)

What >5 Alexandra_book_life: said.

>1 Gnomeball:
Welcome to The Green Dragon and happy reading.

Your comment on Blade Runner being loosely based on the book is something that can be said for most of the films based on PKD’s works.

I hope you enjoy Hyperion and Leviathan Wakes.

>1 Gnomeball: Welcome to the Green Dragon!

I am currently finishing up a re-read of The Fellowship of the Ring myself. I read Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep earlier in 2025 too, then watched the original movie again. I much preferred the book, though I thought it was lacking in tension a bit.

Welcome to The Green Dragon!

You already have quite a list for 2026! I never plan my reads ahead of time. Well, except book club books. :)

>9 catzteach: I must admit most of the planning I've done is because of the 2026 category challenge, but because almost all of them are sci-fi or fantasy I can list them here too :D

I have just finished my first book of the year, A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K Le Guin; it took me a few chapters to really warm up to the characters and the writing, it felt slightly distant to begin with (but I think that was simply the style of Fantasy in the 1960's?), but I soon found it difficult to put down .. I will definitely be back for the rest of the series.

>11 Gnomeball: I am glad you enjoyed it!

This series was one of my "formative reads" when I was a teen :)))

Happy 2026!

>11 Gnomeball: Glad you enjoyed it! I think the writing style was a deliberate choice by LeGuin.

Thanks both :)

I think when I first came across the series, a few months ago now, that I saw a couple reviews / write ups mentioning that Fantasy writing in 1960's America wasn't really held in the same regard as more 'realistic' types of Fiction, and that's why it's written in a more distant and almost poetic style (essentially to show off some kind of over-sophistication); but that the later entries, especially from the 4th onwards, as these were written many decades later, tone down this more distant style for a 'modern' and direct approach to the writing.

Either way that story finished only on page 126 in the over 1,000 page Books of Earthsea collection, so I've still got many hundreds of pages to explore :D

>14 Gnomeball: Happy new year!

Fantasy wasn't nearly as common back then and looking at my collection, the fantasy novels, other than LOTR, start in the very early 70's and aren't the same style at all, from writers such as Zelazny, Norton, Moorcook and Leiber. Did those write-ups mention any other fantasy authors from the 1960s? I know fantasy was being written long before then in the monthly magazines.

>15 Karlstar: Not that I recall, they were primarily focused on the Earthsea series itself and how LeGuin's writing style changed through the decades.

Welcome to the Green Dragon! I hope you have a great year of reading. The Earthsea books are some of my favourites. To me, they have a mythic feel to them.

Welcome to the group! Hope you have a great year of reading in 2026.

Another one down, Crossroad of Ravens by Andrzej Sapkowski, a Witcher prequel of sorts, seeing it's titular character in a much earlier part of his life, essentially as a fresh-face out of Witcher school. Potentially lacked tension in some parts, although as a series of short snippets, often only a handful of pages each, it doesn't really have room in each segment to delve that deep, but nonetheless does explore what makes Geralt .. well, Geralt, in the way many readers will know him (and makes me want to re-explore the other novels again).

>20 Gnomeball:
Where should one start with the Witcher books? Is Crossroad of Ravens a good place to start given it is a prequel?

>21 pgmcc: I think it still makes sense to leave it until after you've read the main canon as it were, but really because it doesn't spoil anything, probably doesn't either really add anything (there's also very little character overlap), and if you were really set on reading them in chronological order you could read it before the other prequels (putting it after Lady of the Lake, the last of the main 5, but before Season of Storms, the first post-main-story prequel).

Personally I think they're still best read in release order (basically the order here: The Witcher, minus the final entry as it is non-canon), as that's a far better, and more organic, introduction to the world of the Witcher (Crossroads doesn't explain all that much, because even though it's a prequel it assumes some level of familiarity with the world). Essentially I don't think you'd benefit much from reading it anything but last.

>22 Gnomeball:
Thank you for the advice.

Just finished reading Leviathan Wakes, the series opener to The Expanse. Quite the ride, certainly a space opera in book form, and as a bit of a space and wider science nerd I really admire how plausible almost the entire setting feels - with the notable exception of near-instant communications between long distance space objects I guess; light speed is still a hard barrier in this universe, but ignoring that here is totally fine. It would be a pretty boring universe if all communication between Earth and Mars actually took an average of 14 minutes each way, just imagine the lack of all tension as a result (7 minutes of terror for everything, I guess?), so that's always forgivable in a near-real setting like this. That all aside, you can see that a serious amount of hard thought has gone into making this setting feel like a real possibility for the future of humanity, and that makes it a lot easier to fill in the visual-blanks when reading.

I will definitely be back for the next one; probably not the very next thing I'll read though, as I've recently picked up a few more Star Trek novels, and they're just begging to be consumed.

>24 Gnomeball:
The Expanse was a great series. I enjoyed the screen version before reading the books. Having watched the story I thought reading the books might not be a great experience. However, I enjoyed the first five books. Currently on an Expanse break before getting back to them.

I've never seen the series, so I was going in almost blind - though I had heard people mention it in passing quite a few times, many years ago, so I knew for example that it was set in our own system, with civilisations spread across the inner planets and the asteroid belt; that many of the more far-flung areas had developed cultures of their own, with languages developed from our current ones but still linguistically sensible (the primary reason I think I'd heard of it prior to picking up the book myself, through a few linguistically interested friends from university); and that for the most part the science of the series was accurate, but with some caveats taken to make it a more reasonable story telling experience.

I will certainly watch the series eventually, especially now that it's finished so I won't be left waiting for years between seasons (I recall doing that for both Game of Thrones and Westworld .. two series which summarily goofed, but that's an entirely different story), but that I will likely not do so until I've read most, if not all, of the books. Primarily because I wouldn't want to be spoiled on something I first begun on paper (and it's not like the series is going anywhere, I hope) - the reverse would be true had I started the show first and then found the books later.

I will be taking a break before the next one however, to avoid falling into the trap of reading them all back-to-back and either getting burned out, or else-wise distracted .. though I do really want to know what happens next after that finale; and from the title alone I am currently guessing it's not the most peaceful of periods.

But no, as for at least the next short while I'll be exploring a slightly different 24th century, albeit one not quite peaceful either, through the exploits of the USS Titan.

Possibly the quickest I've ever consumed a book; Star Trek Titan: Taking Wing just seemed to read itself.

The first of many Titan books I hope, having already read the Destiny trilogy (it was my initial entry into beta canon around a year ago now) I had a decent idea of who was where, and how they got there, etc, but until now didn't know exactly how the timeline went from Nemesis to .. Destiny (if you know you know), now I'm starting to see that.

Another Star Trek novel consumed; Star Trek Titan: The Red King, a direct follow up to the previous story, and one that digs a little less into the murky politics that is the Romulan Star Empire in the 2830s. Overall probably slightly weaker than the previous story (review pending), and a mid meandery in parts, but still a solid entry.

As I understand it now, the Titan is now off to places new, and doesn't really intersect again with the other threads in this part of the First Splinter Timeline, so I continue to look forward to their travels.

>27 Gnomeball: >28 Gnomeball: Both of those sound good.

Yes, they were, so good in fact that I've decided I'm going to read the next one straight away :D

I am quite enjoying the slightly less Borg-oriented side of the First Splinter Timeline; it's actually rather refreshing to see Trek how it was when I was growing up .. full of positive wonder regarding the unknown, visiting something new each 'week', rather than re-traipsing over the same old stories time and time again.

Another very quick read; Star Trek Titan; Orion's Hounds, in which the crew of the Titan well and truly get themselves mixed up in some mess they then have to find a clean way to rectify.. quite wordy in parts, and with several typographical errors littered throughout, but otherwise a fairly easy read.

Not sure I want to read a fourth Titan book in succession, so my next foray into their exploits likely won't be for a few weeks.. likely after I read at least one of the Early Review books from this month (I believe one of them is fantasy adjacent), or possibly after the next in the Expanse series, or possibly possibly, because I've been meaning to read them again and my recent delving into that world has reignited that desire, something from the Witcher series, or possibly possibly possibly, something else entirely different, who can know.

Another one! Star Trek Titan: Sword of Damocles, in which wibbly wobbly timey wimey (wait, wrong franchise) shenanigans occur, and time paradox's make your head spin. Loved it.

No idea what I'll get up to next, but that's everything pre-Destiny finished, so whatever I read next in terms of Trek will be from the other side of that universe-altering trilogy.

Another one.. but this time from the prime universe; Star Trek Picard: The Dark Veil, which I think is a little stronger than the first entry in the series, but still not on the level as the beta canon stories. Overall it also doesn't seem to add much to the main story either, due to the way the story moves we leave the book knowing scarcely little more than we did going in, and what we do learn could be explained in a single sentence. Still, I enjoyed the story.

Has been a little bit of a while since I posted .. I must admit to having been reading some decidedly not science fiction (woops).

That said, I have just finished reading Childhood's End by Arthur C Clarke. Actually my first foray into his writings, which I know are numerous, but I do not suspect it shall be my last; even though the main body of this was written in the early 1950s (the edition I read has the 1989 re-write of the first chapter) it would be hard to position it as from that era, and therefore was quite the fun read (and I especially liked the accurate portrayal of travel at relativistic speeds).

>34 Gnomeball: I tried to reread this one a few years ago and I just could not get into it, and yet I loved it when I first read it back in the late 1970s. I may try it as an audiobook.

>35 clamairy: I did have some difficulties getting started, what with the first part being rather more political than sciencey, but as soon as I got a few chapters into part two it became a lot more difficult for me to put down (though the opening to part two; the party; is quite the drag .. after the first part it didn't feel very sciencey either). And whilst I twigged parts of how it would end quite a bit earlier than Karellan informs you (I figured Humanity would end, just not quite how) I still wanted to see what happened with Jan.

>34 Gnomeball: You can post anything you read here, doesn't have to be fantasy or scifi!

>37 Karlstar: Indeed! >34 Gnomeball: Some of us read *gasp* literary fiction!

*oh no* 🙀

This one isn't literary, as such, and I'm pretty sure one of the tags I've given it actually is Science-Fiction .. it's one I got through the Early Review system, and on some initial research wasn't really in a hurry to delve into (the authors other works are decidedly singularly flavoured), so I waited for a few of the other takers to review it first, with the intention of gauging the response .. when they started to come back overwhelmingly positive it jumped up my to-read list somewhat.

Review does some talking, but I've probably edited it a dozen times already because I'm really still not sure how exactly it makes me feel (nor how open about that feeling I want to be on a public forum) .. at times I kept seeing a lot of myself in the pre-restored main character (think Vulcan, but *actually* without the emotions) and how emotionally distant I am as a person .. but towards the mid point where she finally has a wobbly enough "pattern fluctuation" she gets allowed to experience emotion .. and the visceral descriptions of the ensuing emotional break down (really it's a build-up, seeing as she started out without them, and is reeling from the effect of only just now feeling them for the first time, but it's .. the same thing really) just kinda hit the younger version of me inside my brain who has experienced similar moments in a way I didn't really think a story could? It's hard to really explain.

The post-reading me however .. questions how the dystopia described in the novel, and it is one, humans are nominally devoid of emotions, actually works .. though of course I'm not really as interested as to how we 'got there' as some of the other reviews (I've filled in my own head canon to plug that gap), I still can't make sense of how the world wants to work .. it's big yet small, progressive yet regressive (they clearly have higher technology than we currently do and yet one character still smashes rocks in a quarry?), money clearly exists but how, and just like .. it's gotta make sense.

That's probably quite rambly (and potentially explains why I'm still struggling to accurately review it) 🤔

The other three I've read in the ensuing period have been Matt Parker's Humble Pi, on recommendation from a friend (t'was very funny), Sabine Hossenfelder's Existential Physics (again very good, if not quite direct in it's German-ness, and increasingly challenging towards the end, especially in the interviews), and Carlo Rovelli's White Holes (which I read in a single sitting, and very much enjoyed - half physics, half philosophy, fully Italian in it's prose-like quality).

I am currently reading Lisa Kaltenegger's Alien Earths, as a break from the philosophical, to the more hopeful of science.

And on the 'most likely to be read next' pile, which is currently on the side of my desk, Alfred Hester's The Stars My Destination, and William Gibson's Neuromancer, which I know the former is a primary influence to the latter, and the latter is common cited as the father of the Cyberpunk genre (and later I actually have No Coincidence on Kindle, which is set in that world).

>39 Gnomeball: That one looks very tempting... Thank you for your honest review.

>40 Gnomeball: You have good taste! I've read Humble Pi, Existential Physics and Alien Earths and thought well of all of them. I've read The Stars My Destination too, but it's a trifle problematic. And I am a longtime fan of Carlo Rovelli.

>42 haydninvienna: I did read the prologue (and some of the first chapter) of The Stars My Destination in-store before purchase, so I can definitely see where and why it could be problematic, but generally I consider it par for the course whenever reading something from am era, or a culture, so far separated from our own present; in the same way a lot of stories written now will most certainly seem strange in 70 years time I shouldn't expect a story from 70 years ago to be any different.

>42 haydninvienna: >43 Gnomeball: I have seen The Stars My Destination so many times, it feels like I have it in my collection, perhaps I borrowed it from the library in the past. From what you are saying though, I don't think I need to pick up a copy.

>44 Karlstar: I'm pretty sure we did this one as a group read. It's definitely a mixed bag.

Here is the Spoiler-free thread.
https://www.librarything.com/topic/167598

Spoiler thread: https://www.librarything.com/topic/168681

>45 clamairy: Thanks, lots of votes in there for 'pass'.

>46 Karlstar: You're welcome. I think I was being generous with my three stars, and I am a rather high rater. If it hadn't been a group read I know I would have jumped ship very early on.

>45 clamairy: Do we still do these, or did you guys read all the books already? :p

I have just looked at my review of The Stars My Destination. It was 13 years ago when I wrote the review and I do not remember a lot of the detailed story. My impression was that it was a worthwhile read. I gave it three stars and having read my review I believe this was for its analysis of the growth of corporate power that is still as relevant today as it was 13 years ago and 70 years ago.

My review does comment that Bester did not populate his novel with any nice people. I also mention that some of his technology predictions were not realised and that the story was written before the Space Race began with the launch of Sputnik in 1957.

The "spoiler" mask covers comments on themes rather than a lot of detail about the story.

>48 Gnomeball: We do! We just don't do them as regularly as we used to. And we often forget to add the links to the main list. Also the discussions are permanently open, so if there's anything you want to add to any of them please do.

I'm only 5 chapters into The Stars My Destination and I'm already questioning the physics of Jaunting .. is it relative or absolute?

If we are to believe executing a jaunt is a simple case of "Location, Elevation, Situation", and that you know these by co-ordinates then it must be absolute; however, this would mean a maze won't do squat unless you also move the room to somewhere you cannot ascertain it's location via external information.. something we clearly see in chapter four. Buuuut, if it's absolute, then why can't they jaunt out of the prison; Andorra is likely less than 100 miles away, and it only works if every prisoner lacks knowledge both of that place, and their current location; and through the idea of "Blue Jaunting" we must assume it's therefore relative? But then it can't be "LES" .. make it make sense!

Good idea, so far poorly executed (and I'm only failing to reconcile the physics, let alone the societal impact this would cause) .. something which I recall seeing people also question in both above linked threads.

I can only hope this gets ironed out in the remaining chapters.

Edit: finished part one, it must be absolute .. but I still can't reconcile it

Well, having now finished it .. I'm still none the wiser on how Jaunting works, it's relative, absolute, neither, and yet both.

Absolute blast though.

>52 Gnomeball: Glad you enjoyed it!

Neuromancer is one heck of a story .. I think I'll need to read it again to really understand how everything interacts, but it's certainly a stand out.

Not sure I can accurately review it just yet (for now it's just an instant 5* and entered into Favourites), there's so much there; I can definitely see a lot of Cyberpunk cross over.

Finished reading Rocannon's World last night, and once again I got that kind of 'distant' feeling in the way it's written; it's very "and then it was that this occured".

Perhaps that was just Le Guin's style in the 60s 🤔

Another book, another trek, this time back to the Splinter timeline; Star Trek Titan: Over a Torrent Sea by Christopher L. Bennett .. wherein the crew of the Titan discover a world of water, without technology or even metal, and summarily find themselves in the midst of a diplomatic meltdown .. exactly what Trek should be.

Another weekend, another train journey, this time to London and back, and of course, another Trek book consumed; this time Star Trek Titan: Synthesis by James Swallow, the next in the Titan series .. but the final one I'm reading for now, as the Splinter chronology steps into the Typhon Pact next, where I shall be starting with Rough Beasts of the Empire.

>57 Gnomeball: Spock and Capt. Sisko? How does that work?

>58 Karlstar: It's set in 2381, in the First Splinter timeline; where Sisko returned from the Celestial Temple in 2376 (I believe in this timeline he returns just prior to the birth of his daughter, around 9 months after the DS9 finale), and where Spock is living undercover on Romulus with the reunification movement (remember that Vulcans can live for 200+ years, and Spock is only 150~ here - only around a decade older than Tuvok as seen in STP). I haven't read enough of it yet to know exactly how their stories match up though.

Spock also isn't sent back in this timeline, because the Romulan star doesn't go supernova

There is a bit of a continuity gap, but the two books Avatar, Rising Son, and then Unity, all of which I still need to acquire and read, explain the Sisko side of the story.

Having just finished it, I think I can now say how the two characters interact; they don't, beyond a single conversation in which Sisko mentions Spock's current situation.

The Sisko story also doesn't really feel connected with the rest of the novel .. but I think I understand why it's there.

Anyway, next up Zero Sum Game by David Mack, the first numbered, but second chronologically, cross-over entry making up the Typhon Pact.

>60 Gnomeball: Thanks for the explanation. I guess my instincts were correct, it wouldn't work!

I get the idea they were going for; the Typhon pact series is a kind of cross-over but for the villains (the Tzenkethi, the Kinshaya, the Gorn, the Breen, the Tholians, and of course the Romulans); and each of the books focuses it's story on one of them. Rough Beasts of Empire is the Romulan story (Zero Sum Game is the Breen story, and so far much more fun - book Breen are far more interesting than screen Breen), and so the two characters on the front are meant to be two sides of a story that reflect the situation within.

This being the Romulan book it's therefore basically a political story driven by this timelines fallout from Nemesis; a ruptured Romulan people. One side led by a self-proclaimed Praetor, the other by a treasonous and self-proclaimed Empress.

Spock is obviously a good pick for the Romulan Star Empire side of the story, he's on Romulus during the events of the story, and interacts very well with the story there. Sisko on the other hand .. is just a starfleet captain who once had a run in with some Romulans (literally the reason given in the book as for why he's the one to contact Donatra, Empress of the Romulan Imperial State).

Book Sisko came off as a very different character to Screen Sisko; this is the first book I've read within the Splinter timeline to feature him, and so far I have to say he's a bit wooden. As for why his story is here, that's a harder sell; I don't think the overall story would be too damaged by removing the Sisko perspective, save for that singular conversation .. though you'd then have quite a lot of pages to fill, and I'm not sure what else you'd put there that doesn't step over into other story lines.

After I've read Zero Sum Game, and before I read Paths of Disharmony, I probably need to remind myself of the wider scope of things .. so many story lines intersect in these crossovers, and unlike when I read Destiny I don't have the fortune of blissful ignorance on my side this time 😅

Zero Sum Game seemed to fly by .. I liked it, but I don't think the Bashir we see in it matches up with the one we see on screen, not fully at least. Though as per the previous book, this I think is the first time I've encountered him on the page, so maybe it's my understanding that needs a tweak.

Either way, I've re-studied my reading orders, and decided to swap Seize the Fire and Paths of Disharmony (and if I wanted to go full ham, I'd read all nine of the Vanguard series between these two); this means next up is Seize the Fire, followed by Paths of Disharmony, then a sojourn back into Titan for Fallen Gods, before beginning the finish up of the Typhon Pact .. I'll be happy when this event is over and I don't have to marry up 3 different reading order lists to build a cohesive narrative.

Another week another Trek book down; Seize the Fire; seems to build and build and build, and then just .. end.

Anyway, I'm probably taking a wee break from Trek for a while, so many back to back has scrambled my brain a little.

>64 Gnomeball: The way they keep mixing characters from different shows, it is no wonder!

>65 Karlstar: That doesn't bother me; the ships and their crews aren't monolithic and unchanging. Indeed it would be strange to expect them to stay exactly the same multiple years (in-universe) after their respective TV shows / Films had finished.

This is the tenth Trek novel I've read featuring Tuvok on the Titan .. they aren't mixing characters on a novel-to-novel basis, it's a continuous story and he's been there the whole time.

It's more so how every story seems to surround a universe altering / ending event, and that can get a bit much when you read too many of them back to back. Especially with how the fallout from one story necessarily affects many of the next stories, because they aren't isolated, they all happen in the same universe, and all interconnect; doubly so with these being crossovers.