It’s still a week or so before I am finally on holidays. Something I should have added to my list of things to do was stop.

Stop.

Return to a state of rest. Exist in that moment.

Then re-engage.

That’s a bit of luxury to be honest but it does me the world of good.

I was worried that my reading had died off but I seem to be steadying. I have recently read, and loved, Rotherweird, and will get its sequel soon. I have ordered nice editions of both but they haven’t arrived yet. I may buy the ebook version of the second as I can’t wait much longer to read it. I am currently reading Old Man’s War by John Scalzi. Early stages but enjoyable. Shaping up in a sort of military SF sort of direction though basic so far. This is my first stab at Scalzi though I’ve occasionally read his blog and tweets. Scalzi keeps popping up with Subterranean Press releases too, all of which I’ve missed out on as I hadn’t read him. Following on from Scalzi, I have queued Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan as I really enjoyed the first season on Netflix and liked the ideas at play.

Speaking of Subterranean Press, a few years ago, they published a nice edition of Altered Carbon but it’s really hard to find…so hard that the only copy I have found is over USD$3,ooo! It originally sold for US$75. They’ve recently published the next book, Broken Angels, and I have chosen not to collect. On one hand, there is money to be made, on the other, I’m not interested in buying books to make money. But I like a complete set and that won’t be possible with these. I am however collecting complete sets of Subterranean’s editions of Malazan and The Expanse. So far so good.

I am collecting all of Subterranean’s releases by Greg Egan. Egan is an Australian writer from Perth who does fantastic, ideas driven, hard-SF. I haven’t read everything by him but I dip in occasionally with fascinating works like his early material: Permutation City, Quarantine, and Distress, + other bits and pieces.

There’s a new book, Time’s Convert, due out soon from Deborah Harkness. I have read multiple times, her All Souls trilogy and have even bought her guide to the World of All Souls… Funnily enough I have also read her non-fiction as she initially wrote in my own field of the history and philosophy of science. Somewhat ashamedly, many years ago, I bought a copy of her book, The Jewel House, fully intending to read it…and I haven’t quite got round to it. I must add that to the priority pile of books to be read.

Admittedly, the priority pile of books to be read is rather large.