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ronsboy67

@ronsboy67@mas.to

ये दुनिया है या आलम-ए-बदहवासी? ہم دیکھیں گ
je ne sais rien, non sono qui.
Victoria Concordia Crescit
He/him, etc
#fedi22
#Arsenal #linguistics #reading #ebooks #Aotearoa #GoldenAgeMysteries #JDramas #KDramas #OLDHindiFilms

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ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
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@bookstodon

Martin Edwards
Madhulika Liddle
David Crystal
Terry Pratchett
P. G. Wodehouse
Margery Aliingham
Cecilia Peartree
C. J. Cherryh
Iona Whishaw
Francis Vivian

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

seeking @bookstodon help - looking for on slow train travel in all suggestion gratefully received!

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

4/5
@thestorygraph for "Steeltown Magnolia" by Melissa F. Miller, a tense and gripping series debut that I enjoyed, even while being put off by what felt like overt product placement for Apple being made integral to the story.
@bookstodon https://app.thestorygraph.com/reviews/49233080-a64f-4e11-b0d0-c9da5a83a10b

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

TFW you're really enjoying a mystery/thriller but end up having to dock points from your review for its insistent aPPLe promos. On the + side, it did give me an opportunity to confirm my guess that "malophobe" is the word to describe how I feel about that company😡
@bookstodon

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

The end of Daylight Saving Time last night emphasised that it's definitely Autumn here, but happily it's ALWAYS Springtime at Blandings and Uncle Fred in Springtime is the perfect mood lifter for the newly dark autumn nights.
@bookstodon

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

Dennis Romano's "VENICE - The Remarkable History of the Lagoon City" was a remarkable read: 600 pages to cover 1200 years of political cupidity. Very glad I read it, but in need of a palate cleanser. And of course, "palate cleanser" is spelled with THREE letters

P
G
W

So even though it's Autumn not Spring up here near the top of the world, this is my current read

@bookstodon

ronsboy67 , to History
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

It took me 23 days to read the book on the left, just a few hours to read the book on the right. Both were thoughtful and informative, especially as the 1200 year old city on the left may one day end up in an edition of the book on the right, which features many drowned sites.
@bookstodon

Image shows the cover of the book "ATLAS of ABANDONED PLACES A journey through the world's forgotten wonders" by Oliver Smith

ChrisMayLA6 , to bookstodon group
@ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us avatar

At the risk of reigniting a debate that has been had in my timeline in the past... here's a report of a University of Valencia that looked at over 20 paper examine the differential effects of reading digitally & on paper.

The research confirms my experience (my own & in the reading of my erstwhile students) that reading digitally is less likely to lead to long-term educational (knowledge) benefits...

@bookstodon

https://www.upmpaper.com/knowledge-inspiration/blog-stories/articles/2024/makes-you-learn/?utm_source=linkedin&utm_medium=paid_social&utm_campaign=PaperBecauseItsReal2024&utm_term=&utm_content=Image

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@adritheonly @ChrisMayLA6 @bookstodon The professor enjoys reigniting this debate, and proselytising for print, if the number of times he has done so in the past is any guide.

youronlyone , to Random stuff
@youronlyone@c.im avatar

A common trope (if we can call it that) in is they always tell their plans/next step to their enemy/opposition, otherwise, there won't be friction and twists. ^_^;;

E.g. “I'll talk to B tomorrow, so forget your plans.” Which won't happen because of the tip. LOL

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@youronlyone A common variant is when they unintentionally tell the enemy their plans by lengthy, detailed conversations carried on in public or near public spaces at significant volume

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

4.75/5 @thestorygraph for "The Book Forger" by Joseph Hone. Dr Hone has delivered a near-flawless template of how to write academic history brought to life for laypeople. A truly gripping story, one that was hard to put down.
@bookstodon
https://app.thestorygraph.com/reviews/5a903c51-853b-42f6-8a66-ab5b403d74ce

leapingwoman , to bookstodon group
@leapingwoman@spore.social avatar

@bookstodon 22 of the Funniest Novels Since ‘Catch-22’ Because we could all use a laugh. What would you add to this list? Anything you'd remove? Gift link.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/14/books/funny-novels-humor.html?unlocked_article_code=1.ck0.KmuI.eh8Ym-bSCOp6&smid=url-share

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@leapingwoman @bookstodon The Uncommon Reader
https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/fae0d123-346f-4bb8-9e8a-6ada38bc19d0

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

anyone who's read Deborah Crombie's Kindcaid and James series: I loved the first 7, but 8 & 9 both went VERY heavy on the past timeline device AND blended it with the present via various forms of psychic/paranormal woo-woo. I'm very much not a fan of either, so both together is just is ugh. Are subsequent books in the series similar? @bookstodon

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

No wonder people complain that English orthography is bizarre! 🤣 @bookstodon

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

4.5/5
@thestorygraph for The Seven by
@hammerNow

ronsboy67 OP ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@skua @thestorygraph @bookstodon Your'e absolutely right, of course

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

2/5 @thestorygraph for A Finer End, book 7 in the Kincaid & James series by Deborah Crombie. My 61st book of 2024, it dragged my average down to under 4.1/5 , thanks to my zero tolerance for mysticism & mumbo-jumbo in mysteries. I skmmed through it 90 minutes, only reading to keep up with developments in Gemma & Duncan's lives. I hope the series leaves the woo-woo behind now. @bookstodon

ronsboy67 OP ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@tashasounart @bookstodon
I have enjoyed the development of the lead characters. Not just romantically, but as individuals with their own issues. Books 3-5 were the strongest for me so far,
I'm hoping the character growth continues, as it's something that I enjoy when done well, detective characters who age in more or less real time. It's a big part of the reason why Allingham's Campion is my favourite of the Golden Age sleuths, the way hs grew as a person and changed as he aged.

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

A Finer End, book 7 in the Kincaid & James series by Deborah Crombieset in Glastonbury & apart from all the tedious mystic mumbo-jumbo, the eons-old fixation on a tiny hill reminded me a Kiwi acquaintance in the UK who, when a colleague said he was going mountain climbing on the weekend, asked "Have you imported some?" 😆 @bookstodon

pussreboots , to bookstodon group
@pussreboots@sfba.social avatar

Five stars: What an Owl Knows: The New Science of the World's Most Enigmatic Birds by Jennifer Ackerman (2023) is a survey of our current understanding of owls. The audiobook is read by the author.

https://pussreboots.com/blog/2024/comments_03/what_an_owl_knows.html

@bookstodon

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@pussreboots @bookstodon This could be interesting, thanks. I've long been fascinated by the fact that the owl is revered as a symbol of wisdom in the West and contemned as an icon of stupidity in Indic languages

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

Finishing Walter Isaacson's Einstein biography was a nice way to round out February, just hours before my Early Bird renewal @thestorygraph - not too unhappy with my progess on this year's Reading Challenges there. @bookstodon

youronlyone , to Random stuff
@youronlyone@c.im avatar

I think it's safe to say that 2024 is the official beginning of 12-episode .

From the 90s to 2024:

  1. 150+ episodes
  2. 100 episodes
  3. 52 episodes.
  4. 24-27 episodes.
  5. 18
  6. 16 (longest trend)
  7. 12 (current trend)
  8. 6-8 episodes (they're experimenting on this for a few years now)
ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@youronlyone Dailies are still ~120, of course. I really hope 12 does become the new norm, but there are still plenty of 16s being made, sadly. It was great to see a 12 episode Drama, Knight Flower, set viewing records for its network slot. It might help accelerate the trend.

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@youronlyone In case you haven't seen any of these, here are the 4 short KDramas I've scored at least 9/10

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@youronlyone
Page Turner was not a Web it was a KBS production, possibly from a screenwriting contest, I think?

Check Out The Event may have been a web Drama as MDL lists both iQiyi and MBC as the networks responsible. Neither Drama was a compilation of shrot web episodes though

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@KDramaQn @youronlyone There are A LOT of recent shorter series that are clearly built around at least the possibility of a 2nd season, and I tend to shun those as I INTENSELY dislike that element of "Westernisation".
But having drifted toward (where 12 is LONG) in large part because of all the saggy bloated filler in >=16 ep KDramas, I love the nice tight feel of those that are written short and complete. "One Day Off" is a beautiful example

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@youronlyone @KDramaQn

None of those series appealed to me, and am suprised by your praise for the IRIS sequel. In the 11 years I've been watching , that one has been universally lambasted as an absolute turkry. You're literally the first I've ever heard praise it.
I HATED the 1st Strong Woman for its brazen misogyny, so was never going to watch a 2nd season. The ONLY I've wtached with more than 1 season was Forest of Secrets - which, to be fair I scores S2 higher than S1

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@youronlyone @KDramaQn @kdrama @kdrama @kdrama

"If it is an art, then we have to view it and understand it from the creator's perspective."

This actually gets debated A LOT, in many forms of art: Is the creator's perspective the only valid one, assuming we can be sure we know what their perspective is? I've seen many writers say that once they finish a work, it's no longer theirs but belongs to those who consume it. It's an interesting question, one that will be debated forever, I think

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@youronlyone @KDramaQn @kdrama @kdrama

It's an interesting paradox you have created for yourself - insisting that only the writer's perspective is the correct one UNLESS their perspective is that theirs is NOT the only perspective.

In that case, you are saying that you are right and they are wrong, which contradicts your assertion that theirs is the only correct pov.

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@youronlyone @KDramaQn @kdrama @kdrama

It's definitely been a very stimulating discussion and a great way to stay awake in the early hours after midnight, thanks!

ronsboy67 ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@youronlyone @KDramaQn @Erzbet I think the longest US series I'ver finished was Babylon 5, ~120 eps altogether. Or 360 eps if you count the fact that I've watched it 3 times. 😂

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

REALLY enjoying Walter Isaacson's "Einstein: His Life and Universe" but the I'm reading must be the US edition - I simply HATE it when books about science t use Imperial measurements.

SI or die!

The problem is that no I've read on science ever states whether it uses SI or not, and samples don't go far enough to show it either. @bookstodon

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

4/5 @thestorygraph for "The Monk", book 5 in the DS Cross series by Tim Sullivan. My 50th read of 2024, and the least enojyable of the Cross series for me so far. On the plus side, I'm now 22 books and 10875 pages ahead of schedule for my reading goals for the year @bookstodon
https://app.thestorygraph.com/reviews/5e73044e-8593-423c-911e-edeed4315937

ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

TFW you're reading a mystery set in the UK written by a UK resident author and your keen detective abilities make you think "hmmmm, US edition?"🤔
@bookstodon

ronsboy67 OP ,
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

@benetnasch @Rob_l @bookstodon I did wonder about that possibility actually, whether it was being used as a term of art. Te subsequent use elsewhere of "club class" reinforced my view, though. That to my (non-UK) ears also sounded very North American - here in Aotearoa, we'd say "business class"

ronsboy67 , to History
@ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

When I first heard Romagnol, I thought it sounded a bit French. Reading "San Marino la storia in miniatura", with its snippets of Romagnol songs & poems led me to a YT recording of someone speaking Romagnol. Many commenters who spoke Catalan said they could understand it easily, so I tested Google Translate out with "detect language" on the following. It said "Corsican" and offered a translation for almost every word. Interesting! @bookstodon

Image shows Google Translate window of a passage in Romagnol, which Google has identified as Corsican. The romagnol is as follows: ”La bona sera che da vo mi pert Quanti suspir fora per la stred; Am’andarò vultand indrì ad ogni pass Per vdè la dama mì dinca la lass; Gnì pass am andarò vultand indrì Per vdè dov a la lass la dama mì” The English Google offers is: "The good evening you gave me How many sighed outside for the stred; I will go back and forth at every step To see the lady, let me tell her; Gnì pass am I'll go back in To see where the lady left me"
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    • ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    Rigorous attention to factual accuracy even in minor details is always a good sign in crime novels😀☕ @bookstodon

    Iamge shows a paragraph of tect on a Kobo Sage ereader, from "The Patient" by Tim Sullivan. Text as follows Later that day, Cross and Ottey drove out to the New Zealand-owned coffee bar that had been ordained by Cross as the only café in Bristol capable of making a coffee good enough for him to enjoy.
    ALT
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    • ronsboy67 , to Random stuff
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    According to their Xitter profile "A better internet starts with privacy & freedom." but clearly

    @protonmail

    does NOT think "a better internet includes providing any customer service at all.

    "Please note that due to the heavy load of tickets, we might not be able to reply to your inquiry within the next 24 hours."
    Or within 48 hours ,or 72 hours, or 96.
    NO reply AT ALL in 4 DAYS? I might be paying for privacy, clearly that payment doesn't buy customer service. Abysmal

    ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    Sam Neill's "Did I Ever Tell You This?" entertaining description of Ngaio Marsh proving that in going as high as SIX degrees of separation ain't nevah gonna happen 😀
    @bookstodon

    image shows a Kobo Sage ereader displaying the following text: It wasn’t until I was three years out of school that I tried acting again. This was in 1969 in Christchurch and here was a stroke of very good fortune. I was cast in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, directed by Dame Ngaio Marsh. I played Theseus. Ngaio was a grand dame of a very old school, and slightly scary. She drove a Jaguar XK150, smoked a pipe and spoke in a rich bass voice. She taught you to play Shakespeare in rather a bizarre manner, the way I imagine the classics were addressed in the West End before World War I. All rounded vowels, and gesturing grandly at things. Dame Ngaio spent every other year in the UK, and was friends with Sir John Gielgud and other thespian types. She also wrote dozens of bestselling detective stories, and was often compared to Agatha Christie. Quite a woman. The only word that seems to work for her presence seems wrong—‘patrician’.
    ALT
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    • ronsboy67 , to History
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    Reading "San Marino la storia in miniatura" for a reading challenge @thestorygraph - very interesting and VERY personal history of the author's home country. I'm grokking more unaaided than I thought I would but the Romagnola brings me (and translators) to a screaming halt😂
    "A j'ho la moj so l'uròla"" non capisco!
    @bookstodon

    ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    Who knew that in addition to being 100% on point about the "pernicious, psychopathic form of idiocy" that is nationalism, GBS also had a thoroughly correct laothing of petty prescriptivist pedantry? Thanks to Joanne Anderson's "Writely or Wrongly", I do now. @bookstodon

    Image shows a quote from George Bernard Shaw, as follows There is a busybody on your staff who devotes a lot of his time to chasing split infinitives. Every good literary craftsman splits his infinitives when the sense demands it. I call for the immediate dismissal of this pedant. It is of no consequence whether he decides to go quickly or quickly to go or to quickly go. The important thing is that he should go at once.
    ALT
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    • protonmail , to Random stuff
    @protonmail@mastodon.social avatar

    New week, new feature!

    Cleaning up your inbox just got easier – you can now label, move, delete, or mark as read all emails in a folder (including your main Inbox) at once on the web app.

    Have you tried it already?

    ronsboy67 ,
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    @protonmail A shame you haven't yet provided servers that will actually synch on my phone, or customer service that can reply to tickets in less than a week.

    ronsboy67 ,
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    @trusttrist @protonmail The new feature I'm waiting for is being able to open the ProtonMail app on my phone and have it sync properly. Getting replies to customer service tickets would be another nice new feature I'd like to see them add some time too. Those might make my ProtonPlus feel less like a minus

    ronsboy67 , to History
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    ALL DONE BABY! 🏆
    4.25/5 for Poland A History by Adam Zamoyski and with that,
    I have finished @thestorygraph

    10 books from 10 countries. All . no light or easy reads, another VERY productive informative start to my reading year @bookstodon

    Image shows covers of 10 books from 10 countries for "The Storygraph Reads the World 2024" Challenge 1. Cybernetic Revolutionaries by Eden Medina (Chile) 2. Germany A Nation in its Time -by Helmut Walser Smith 3 The Ghana Reader by Kwasi Konadu 4. Islam and Colonialism: Becoming Modern in Indonesia and Malaysia by Muhammad Ali 5. Rastafari Roots and Ideology by Barry Chevanne (Jamaica) 6. A History of Modern Lebanon by Fawwaz Traboulsi 7. Poland a History by Adam Zamoyski 8. Out Sri Lanka - poetry anthology 9. A Line in the River - Khartoum, City of Memory by Jamal Mahajoub (Sudan) 10. Venezuela: What Everyone Needs to Know by Miguel Tinker-Salas
    Image shows the 30 countries read by the user in the 3 years of the Read the World Challenge Argentina Brazil Chile Colombia Cuba Germany Ghana Haiti India Indonesia Italy Jamaica Lebanon Aotearoa/NZ Nigeria Norway Pakistan Palestine Poland Russia South Africa South Korea Sudan Syria Trinidad & Tobago Turkey Venezuela Vietnam Zimbabwe

    ronsboy67 , to History
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    4/5
    @thestorygraph for " A Line in the River - Khartoum, City of Memory" by Jamal Mahjoub. Unflinching and dispassionate, a difficult read. But I so LOVED reading MY thoughts expressed basically verbatim in this passage. @bookstodon

    Image shows a Kobo Sage ereader and a paragraph of text, as follows: I’ve never understood the idea of national pride. The notion of being proud of the place one happened, by chance, to have been born requires fetishising the complete randomness of the fact. Allegiance is one thing, but believing that one’s national habits, the food you eat, the clothes you wear, the language you speak, and so-forth are somehow self-determined is plainly absurd.
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    • ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    Book 4/6 for the 2024 onboarding challenge @thestorygraph was an interesting read, and the first of the 8 I've finished this year to prompt a more detailed review. @bookstodon
    https://app.thestorygraph.com/reviews/e92e125e-d638-4fef-94aa-b89dbab6008e

    ronsboy67 , to bookstodon group
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    After getting halfway through the 10-book "Reads the World" 2024 challenge at
    @thestorygraph today with the brutal & emotionally draining "Out of Sri Lanka", getting to halfway through their 6-book 2024 onboarding challenge with Tina Fey's "Bossypants" is the perfect palate cleanser
    @bookstodon

    Image of Kobo Sage ereader text as follows (from Tina Fey's "Bossypants") Posted by Centaurious on Monday, 9/21/2009, 2:08 A.M. “Tina Fey is an ugly, pear-shaped, bitchy, overrated troll.” Dear Centaurious, First let me say how inspiring it is that you have learned to use a computer. I hate for our correspondence to be confrontational, but you have offended me deeply. To say I’m an overrated troll, when you have never even seen me guard a bridge, is patently unfair. I’ll leave it for others to say if I’m the best, but I am certainly one of the most dedicated trolls guarding bridges today. I always ask three questions, at least two of which are riddles.
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    • passenger , to bookstodon group
    @passenger@kolektiva.social avatar

    @bookstodon

    I need to buy a gift for a family-of-friend. I am informed that they really like mystery stories, especially in historical settings, but are not fond of SFF.

    I assume this means they have already read the obvious candidates, the Cadfaels and the like, or if they haven't then that's a conscious choice on their part which means I shouldn't buy them one of those.

    What's a non-SFF mystery story you've enjoyed recently? Recommend me a book please!

    ronsboy67 ,
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    @passenger @bookstodon For a historical detective series in a less common time and place setting, you could try Madhulika Liddle's Muzaffar Jang series. Set in Mughal Delhi. The author's sister is a published historian whose focus is Delhi, so the historicity is solid, and the lead is interesting

    jda , to Android
    @jda@social.sdf.org avatar

    Reading books with ReadEra. It really is a great reader app - free and no ads. Easy to add books to it. Highly recommended.

    https://readera.org

    @bookstodon

    ronsboy67 ,
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    @DrDanMarshall @jda @bookstodon I don't do a lot of reading on my Android devices but I have found Moon Reader Pro worth the small price

    ChrisMayLA6 , to bookstodon group
    @ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us avatar

    Oh, I so love it when one of my (often exercised prejudices) is offered some validation by research... this time its the boost in comprehension a reader gets from reading on paper rather than via a screen.

    For years this is what I told my students (based on my own experience), to be often told it was an age thing... well looks like I was right. Hurrah!

    [No doubt this will re-open the e-book vs. paper book debates in my timeline, but so be it]

    @bookstodon
    https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/dec/15/reading-print-improves-comprehension-far-more-than-looking-at-digital-text-say-researchers

    ronsboy67 ,
    @ronsboy67@mas.to avatar

    @IoSapsai @ChrisMayLA6 @bookstodon This! A single purpose ereader addresses many of the distraction issues highlighted in the Grauniad piece. My Kobo Sage is always offline except when updating the firmware or adding books, no external distractions to break focus. Perhaps kids' reading comprehension would also be better on eink ereaders than multifunction OLED devices.

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