No doubt you’ll all have been exploring the lovely new revamped Shiny New Books with its wonderful array of reviews and recommendations! I have a few reviews coming up on the site, and one is published today – my thoughts on the latest reissued Stanislaw Lem book from Penguin, “Mortal Engines”.
Like the other Lem books I’ve read from Penguin, this one contains a collection of shorter works. However, in this volume they’re selected by translator Michael Kandel, and they’re an intriguing bunch with some longer stories moving away from the kind I’ve read so far.
My review of this fabulous collection is here – do go and have a look! 🙂
Kaggsy's Bookish Ramblings 
Feb 14, 2017 @ 17:40:11
Nearly finished on Mask. Great how he slowly let’s you in on the nature of the being narrating. People have repeatedly pointed me towards Lem because of my AI text- generating. It’s such a surprise to find a medievalist-gothic romance flavour to the story. There’s no reason for the cyber to be about gleaming chrome and plastic.
Feb 15, 2017 @ 07:29:47
No indeed – Lem certainly gives the genre a flavour all of his own!
Feb 16, 2017 @ 10:56:56
I love this cover and thank you for reviewing for Shiny. I must revisit Lem, haven’t read him for … years.
Feb 16, 2017 @ 16:40:48
The Penguin reissues look beautiful and I like the fact they’ve moved away from stereotyping his books in a traditional sci fi cover – I’m not necessarily a fan of categorising books and the fact that Penguin Modern Classics encompass so many types of writing is great!
Feb 18, 2017 @ 12:28:43
Thanks for reminding me about Gormenghast. I read the trilogy when I was a post-grad student (so 40-something years ago). While I enjoyed (most of) them, they are incredibly powerful and I found very depressing — so depressing that I had to give up about halfway through the last book “Titus Alone”. In consequence I’ve never gone back to them; maybe I should. Something else to add to the pile by the bed!
Feb 18, 2017 @ 15:06:30
Definitely worth revisiting if you can – Titus Alone is very different from the others, but very powerful and I’m actually anticipating that re-read most of all.
Apr 19, 2018 @ 06:41:48
Jan 24, 2020 @ 06:37:04