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What are you reading?


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If books featuring asexual spectrum characters are difficult to find, try looking for one with aromantic spectrum characters.

 

That said, what books are you all reading or have read?

 

I've been reading Krakauer's Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town and Tóibín's Brooklyn. The former is interesting but infuriating to get through, and it angers me that sexual assault is not being taken as seriously as it should be. The latter has quite a bit of romance, which I knew going into it as I'd already seen the movie; it's not so bad, though, as it seems relevant to character development.

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I'm reading 'The Skull Throne' by Peter V. Brett, it's part of a series. I suppose it has 'romance' in it, definitely sex. Also has inaccurate female biology; you can tell it's written by a man xD But it has loads of political, idelogical and religious clashes in it which I really enjoy in books. I don't know if I would actually recommend it to anyone,but I enjoy reading it.

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I'm supposed to be reading Snow Crash for class tomorrow, but clearly I'm not, so I'll let you guys know how it is when I finish it. 

 

And I know you were looking for books with arospec characters, but I thought you might appreciate recs for ones with acespec characters too. Okay, it's pubished on AO3, so it's not really a book, but has original characters and it's really good. It's called Vinny Gets a Life, and it's about a pro hockey player who is trying to navigate his seemingly unrequited crush on his best friend/teammate and his lack of sexual attraction to him, as well as his relationship with the rest of his team. It's solidly a romance, but it has a happy ending, and it was a very accurate and thoughtful representation of a romantic asexual and the difference between romantic and sexual love. I re read it for the fourth time this weekend, so technically its the book I most recently read.

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Does our Basics of Theoretical Astrophysics course PDF count? :P Well, at least there's no romance. 

 

Was reading Pride and Prejudice this weekend. Honestly, for a romance novel it has surprisingly little romance. Most of it is just human interaction and social commentary. 

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We're being forced to read "Montana 1948" for an English class, and it's incredibly painful. One chapter in and a character's face is already being described as "always read you labor, or sex". Similarly, the entire plot is about a doctor who rapes poor Native American girls. By myself I'm working through "The Hobbit" once again along with Kaufmann's translation of Nietzsche's "Thus Spoke Zarathusra". Good times...

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Other than the Forensic Anthropology textbook I should definitely be reading right now, I'm currently reading North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell for the first time. It has a romantic endgame, but the main character seems pretty disinterested in romance as a concept, which I find refreshing.

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5 minutes ago, Shadow said:

I'm currently reading The Book Thief by Markus Zusak.

Ooo, Ooo! I've read that and I remember really enjoying it! I read a lot (or did, not as much at the moment) so it was nice to find a book with an original element to it's writing style. How are you finding it?

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12 minutes ago, RedNeko said:

Ooo, Ooo! I've read that and I remember really enjoying it! I read a lot (or did, not as much at the moment) so it was nice to find a book with an original element to it's writing style. How are you finding it?

I use to read a lot as well before I started uni, not as much now. So far I'm only a few chapters in, but I love the writing style, it's unique and different to anything else I've read. So far I'm really enjoying it and can't wait to finish it.

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9 hours ago, Shadow said:

I'm currently reading The Book Thief by Markus Zusak.

This is pretty much my favorite book ^_^ I read it a year ago and I love it!!

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Just today I bought "What If?" by Randall Munroe and started reading it. It's a book about "serious scientific answers to absurd hypothetical questions" as it sais on the cover and I already love it. If there's going to be any romance in this one, I'll be surprised xD

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1 minute ago, aihpen said:

Just today I bought "What If?" by Randall Munroe and started reading it. It's a book about "serious scientific answers to absurd hypothetical questions" as it sais on the cover and I already love it. If there's going to be any romance in this one, I'll be surprised xD

Oh, I read that on kindle! It was so hilarious at some parts. I loved the answers he gave and some of the sections in it.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Obernewtyn has no romance mentioned, but it is also written for a ya audience. It talks about the main character forming close friendships, but nothing else is mentioned.

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As for reading, I read quite a bit.

Currently, however, I am reading The Boy That Harnessed The Wind, by William Kamkwamba.

It's basically this story about a boy who lives in Africa where it's poor so he decides to create electrity with windmills.

Interesting so far, despite not really being the "journey to becoming an inventor" type. :P 

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  • 2 weeks later...

I read 'The Essays of E.B. White' for class, and found it surprisingly good! (Haven't read all the essays in it yet, admittedly, but the ones I have are quite solid.) Also has little to no romance in them, despite being autobiographical and featuring his wife as a character in several of the essays. They're humorous and reflective, and his descriptions of the natural world and his interactions with animals are top-notch.

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Last night I was going through the boxes and boxes of books I have piled up everywhere, and finished The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-In-The-Moon Marigolds by Paul Zindel, which hit...a bit too close to home, but still quite good (and no real romance either). I also read all of Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman, which has a tendency to put you in a quite peculiar but by no means unpleasant headspace. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Ann Leckie's Imperial Radch series has a main character I read as aromantic. I mentioned that in another thread but I'll repeat it because I really enjoy that series. I finished my reread of it this Christmas.

Right now I'm reading SPQR - A history of ancient rome by Mary Beard. It's very interesting and easy to get into. I'm also listening to Political order and political decay by Francis Fukuyama on audiobook. It's interesting but way too long. I feel like American popular science books often are. They need better editors.

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  • 3 weeks later...

“At the Existentialist Café: Freedom, Being, and Apricot Cocktails” by Sarah Bakewell

 

One of the best introductions to this philosophy.

 

Has romance in it, well, because of the biographies of the philosophers and their ideas about love. Mainly Sartre of course, lol. I do not fully understand him, but I have a strange curiosity about him. Also he's probably as heteronormative as you can be – claiming we aren't able to reach our full potential without being complimented by “the other sex” ...

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  • 4 months later...

I'm reading "An Abundance of Katherines" by John Green, and loving it. The main character is the type I would usually dislike (a clingy "nice guy" who falls very hard for girls and then resents them for not loving him as much) but he's so entertainingly eccentric I can't help but root for him. He's super-intelligent and trying to work out a mathematical formula that will predict the outcome of any relationship.

 

Also, the book is very funny and the central friendship between the main character and his best mate is just as integral as the romantic storylines.

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