Reading questions...
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Wed 2nd Jan 2019 /cpj

2018 was a busy year for me, as I was finishing off a post-graduate diploma
in municipal management. As such, I was reading management theory in my
spare time, and not fiction, or engaging non-fiction, as would be my want.

The last few weeks, since I wrote my exam in early December, have been
filled with gopherness, which has been a welcome reward for my labours.

2019 promises to be a better year for my hobbies and leisure pursuits, now
that I have bought the house (with a bit of property). I still have to get
my amateur radio tower erected (or at least antennas outside), my storage
locker cleaned out and closed, and general house-related puttering
accomplished.

I have a couple dozen books on the "To Be Finished" pile, including:

- Ready Player One (Cline)
- When We Are No More (Rumsey)
- Barney's Version (Richler)
- The Square and the Tower (Ferguson)
- Buddhism for Busy People (Michie)

Lists are motivating things.

And so, without further ado, my answers to Christina's questions:

Who are your favourite protagonists?

- anti-heroes

Who are your favourite antagonists?

- anti-villains

What, so far, is the best book you've read this year?

- I am finishing _Agent of Byzantium_ by Harry Turtledove. It's 2019 as I
  write this. ;)

Can you list three to five of your favourite authors? Why are they your 
favourite?

- Spider Robinson
- Douglas Adams
- Neil Gaiman

I believe all three writers to be necessary additions to one's bookshelf /
e-reader. For me, each author's seminal work defines their contribution to
their genre -- for Robinson, his Callahan series, for Adams, his
Hitchhiker's Guide, and for Gaiman, his Sandman series.

What are your least favourite genres to read?

- Romance, true crime (I prefer untrue crime, as fictional criminals are
  less dumb.)

What was the last book you recommended to a friend?

- _Pirates of the Horsehead Nebula_ by my friend Georgie Brown

What is your favourite film adaptation of a book?

- _Princess Bride_

What books have you read the most times?

- _The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy_ by Douglas Adams

What fictional world or novel's setting would you like to live in?

- Amber, featured in Roger Zelazny's Amber Series.

What are your favourite classic books?

- _Lord of the Rings_ (trilogy), Tolkien
- _Sandman_ (series), Gaiman
- _Amber_ (series), Zelazny
- _I, Robot_ (series), Asimov
- _Stranger in a Strange Land_, Heinlein
- _Illuminatus_ (trilogy), Robert Anton Wilson
- _Dragonriders of Pern_ (series), McCaffrey
- _Fafrd and the Grey Mouser_ (collection), Fritz Leiber
- _Gord the Rogue_ (series), E Gary Gygax
- _The Fionavar Tapestry_ (trilogy), Guy Gavriel Kay

What is the most recent book you didn't expect to like, yet did?

- _Shadows Over Sheradan_, the self-published first book of a friend of
  mine, Scott Barker, to whom I did not have to lie when I said I liked it.
  ;)

If you could meet one author, living or dead, who would it be?

- Jules Verne

What authors do you think more people should read?

- Canadian