Which ‘Older’ Book Should I Read Next?

After what seems like far too long, I’ve finally managed to work my way through the rest of ‘Viriconium’. I found it to be a lot better read the second time round and you can expect to see my review posted at some point over the weekend. So, what book should I pick up next..?

While the focus of the blog remains primarily on the newer genre releases (and I’ll be continuing to read these) there are a few older books on my shelves that I bought a while ago and haven’t got round to reading. Seeing as one of my New Year’s resolutions was to do just that (and it’s April already) I thought that not only should I get on with this but I could enlist you kind people to help me decide what book to pick up next.
The choices are...



‘A Nomad of the Time Streams’ – Michael Moorcock

Oswald Bastable’s adventures in the Multiverse are collected in ‘The Warlord of the Air’, ‘The Land Leviathan’ and ‘The Steel Tsar’. It’s been years since I read these and I found myself a very nice first edition of this collection which has been sat on the shelf for far too long now. Will it be the book I end up reading or will it have to wait a little longer? Check out the other two options...



‘The Anubis Gates’ – Tim Powers

Brendan Doyle is a twentieth-century English professor who travels back to 1810 London to attend a lecture given by English romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge. This is a London filled with deformed clowns, organised beggar societies, insane homunculi and magic. When he is kidnapped by gypsies and consequently misses his return trip to 1983, the mild-mannered Doyle is forced to become a street-smart con man, escape artist, and swordsman in order to survive in the dark and treacherous London underworld. He defies bullets, black magic, murderous beggars, freezing waters, imprisonment in mutant-infested dungeons, poisoning, and even a plunge back to 1684. Coleridge himself and poet Lord Byron make appearances in the novel, which also features a poor tinkerer who creates genetic monsters and a werewolf that inhabits others' bodies when his latest becomes too hairy.

This book was the overwhelming reply when I asked readers where would be a good place to start reading Tim Power’s work. Life got in the way though and I still haven’t picked this one up yet. Should it be the next book that I read...?



'No Present Like Time’ – Steph Swainston

The Emperor San and his Circle of Immortals strive to protect the medieval empire of the Fourlands from monstrous creatures called Insects, but the continuity of the Circle is threatened. Serein, the Swordsman, is unexpectedly defeated in ritual combat by a young upstart, who is then sent—along with Comet, the Messenger, and other Immortals—on a mission to Tris, an idyllic and recently discovered island nation. Unfortunately, the Immortals, who assume their own superiority to mere humans, make a mess of things, upsetting the democratically minded islanders and accidentally loosing on them an Insect they'd brought along to help persuade the natives to join the empire...

Swainston’s ‘The Year of Our War’ was one of the first books I read for the blog and the release of her latest book, ‘Above The Snowline’, makes it a good time for me to catch up on the books of hers that I haven’t read in the meantime. Should it be the next book that I read though...?

It’s the same deal as ever, if you think one of these books should be read before the other do then simply leave a comment next to the post and tell me which one you think it should be! The book with the most votes wins :o) I don’t know how long I’ll leave the voting open for (a week maybe?) so don’t be shy about posting a comment...