|
Crashbee posted:How about some Chinua Achebe, such as Things Fall Apart or No Longer at Ease? Or The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan, since it just won the Booker Prize. I've never participated in BotM, but I would for Things Fall Apart. Also, thought y'all might be interested in this. http://imgur.com/a/HVrZy
|
# ? Oct 25, 2014 04:16 |
|
|
# ? Jun 3, 2024 23:56 |
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:Hahaha, what? Seriously? And nobody pointed that out? When? Sharp as tacks I am! :P Well according to this thread the first time was October 2006, so to be fair that's an almost eight-year gap. Worth reading twice anyway!
|
# ? Oct 25, 2014 07:51 |
|
Could you copy/paste the list of books that have been TBB BOTM? I don't have access to the archives.
|
# ? Oct 25, 2014 10:48 |
|
Walh Hara posted:Could you copy/paste the list of books that have been TBB BOTM? I don't have access to the archives. quote:Past Books of the Month
|
# ? Oct 25, 2014 10:50 |
|
In addition: 2009: January: "All Quiet on the Western Front", by Erich Maria Remarque Febuary: "The Yiddish Policemen's Union", by Michael Chabon March: "The Beautiful & Damned", by F. Scott Fitzgerald April: "The Road to Gandolfo", by Robert Ludlum May: "The Bell Jar", by Sylvia Plath June: "Porno", by Irvine Welsh July: "The Jungle", by Upton Sinclair August: Candide by Voltare September: Dracula, by Bram Stoker October:Foundation, by Isaac Asimov November:The Road, by Cormac McCarthy December:Heart of Darkness, by Joseph Conrad 2010: January: Knut Hamsun, Hunger Febuary/March: Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow April: Orhan Pamuk, My Name Is Red May: J.G.Ballard, The Atrocity Exhibition June: Sadegh Hedayat, The Blind Owl June: Deb Olin Unferth, Vacation July: Jaroslav Hašek, The Good Soldier Švejk August: Cherie Priest, Boneshaker September: Carl Sagan, The Demon Haunted World October: Jorge Luis Borges, Fictions November: Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man December: Thomas Hardy, Return of the Native The rest are in the OP.
|
# ? Oct 25, 2014 19:36 |
|
Thanks! Apparantly One Hundred Years of Solitude has been BotM twice as well.
|
# ? Oct 25, 2014 20:17 |
|
Perhaps something by Robertson Davies?
|
# ? Oct 26, 2014 01:12 |
xcheopis posted:Perhaps something by Robertson Davies? What specific title would you recommend?
|
|
# ? Oct 26, 2014 17:31 |
|
The fifth business
|
# ? Oct 26, 2014 20:14 |
The significant other has informed me that we have a copy of "Murther & Walking Spirits." Is that one good?
|
|
# ? Oct 26, 2014 20:19 |
|
I just picked up a copy of As Meat Loves Salt by Maria McCann, so I selfishly nominate that sucker.
|
# ? Oct 27, 2014 20:42 |
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:The significant other has informed me that we have a copy of "Murther & Walking Spirits." Is that one good? Yes.
|
# ? Oct 27, 2014 21:12 |
|
Beyond sane knolls posted:I just picked up a copy of As Meat Loves Salt by Maria McCann, so I selfishly nominate that sucker. Bit late unfortunately http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3676554
|
# ? Oct 27, 2014 21:14 |
|
What about Isaac Asimov's The Gods Themselves? It is probably the most pornographic thing Asimov ever wrote. Some Pinko Commie fucked around with this message at 21:37 on Oct 28, 2014 |
# ? Oct 28, 2014 21:33 |
|
Wade Wilson posted:What about Isaac Asimov's The Gods Themselves? Love that book, but I don't think H.A. wants another science fiction author in a row.
|
# ? Oct 28, 2014 21:37 |
|
Okay then, London Falling or The Severed Streets by Paul Cornell. I'd like to recommend the sequel because it has a very interesting depiction of Hell in it, as well as Neil Gaiman being portrayed in a completely different light than he is in every other book that references him.
|
# ? Oct 28, 2014 21:39 |
Wade Wilson posted:What about Isaac Asimov's The Gods Themselves? That's a good suggestion but I've already got five on the list and the poll is up for next month, so remind me again in 25 days or so! As to your other two selections they're both fun books and I've been recommending them to friends, but I'm generally hesitant to choose recently-published SF & F for the BotM, just because we have so many threads for that stuff already it seems unnecessary. I feel like (and maybe this is something worth debating and talking about!) part of the role of the BotM should be to highlight stuff the average goon would like, but hasn't read yet -- expanding goon horizons etc. So to my mind that rules out most genre fiction, especially if it's in a genre we have ongoing threads about (and Paul Cornell's stuff is frequently discussed in the Dresden Files thread, which is sortof the de facto urban fantasy thread on the forum). So much of the forum is weighted towards SF & F that I feel like I should set a higher bar for those genres than for other suggestions. With that in mind, what I'm looking for in a SF&F nominee for BotM is that it be some combination of esoteric, unique, and forgotten or ignored, along with some kind of significant artistic merit. The Gods Themselves, like this month's selection, might be a good choice as you say because even though it's by a major author it's "off the beaten path" and several decades old. On the other hand, something like, say, Katherine Kurtz's Deryni Chronicles might not be that good a choice though because even though it's something of a "lost gem" / "forgotten favorite" and has some interesting features at heart it's basically a generic medieval fantasy novel and not something I'm going to ask the whole forum to slog through. Similarly, Ringworld would be a bad choice because almost everyone's already read it. Canticle for Liebowitz might be a judgment call -- it's definitely got strong literary merit but I think most people have already been exposed to it (but I could be wrong, which is one reason I do the polling). Does all that make sense? Do people think all that sounds reasonable, or is this a policy that I should consider changing?
|
|
# ? Oct 28, 2014 22:22 |
|
Sounds good to me. What would be too obscure? I've got Asimov's Guide to Shakespeare in my hardback collection, which is really out there for what people normally associate with Asimov. Also First and Last Things by H. G. Wells, which is a really interesting, if dry, book about pretty much everything Wells believed.
|
# ? Oct 29, 2014 02:10 |
|
I think the policy sounds great. I love to read but don't keep up with what's good in literature.
|
# ? Oct 29, 2014 02:43 |
|
As Meat Loves Salt is neither SF nor F!
|
# ? Oct 29, 2014 05:15 |
Beyond sane knolls posted:As Meat Loves Salt is neither SF nor F! That'd be a great suggestion! Remind me of it in twenty days or so =)
|
|
# ? Oct 29, 2014 05:21 |
Well, I hope everyone liked the book! For November, it's Grendel.
|
|
# ? Nov 3, 2014 00:58 |
|
|
# ? Jun 3, 2024 23:56 |
|
I enjoyed this. I'd not really read anything like it before. Was a bit confused at first with the ideas being introduced quite slowly (especially reading a chapter a day and the short chapters at the start). The collection of characters felt natural to the setting, and kept it feeling 'fun'.
|
# ? Nov 4, 2014 18:10 |