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Cyberdud posted:i just finished reading Insomnia by Stephen King. Was the Robin Williams movie based on this?
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Aug 8, 2007 02:26
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perceptual_set posted:Was the Robin Williams movie based on this? No. That was a Cristopher Nolan movie and was written by 2 other people.
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Aug 8, 2007 02:28
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CrimsonGhost posted:Happy Ending by Jim Norton. Be prepared... he's loving PERVERTED. Like all that "I need a woman to use my face as a toilet" joking he does? He's not kidding. It's great. MONSTER RAAAAAIN!
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Aug 8, 2007 04:26
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Last night, I finally finished reading Killing Pablo by Mark Bowden (Black Hawk Down). It tells the story of the rise, fall, and eventual killing of Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar. This was an absolutely fascinating read and gave me great insight into the life of Escobar and the mission to take him down. I never knew taking him out was so unbelievably difficult and complicated. I'm all out of books for now, so I'm going to have to browse the thread and look for some new reading material.
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Aug 8, 2007 08:04
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Last week I finished Cat's Cradle by Vonnegut, of course. It took me a long time to finish it because I wasn't putting a ton of effort into it. All-in-all, a really good book, though I still liked Slaughterhouse V more. Wish I could remember what I did with my other Vonnegut books. Just finished Zorro by Isabel Allende. A friend reccomended I check her out, so I did, and I enjoyed it immensely. I was reading it for hours a day, couldn't bear to put it down. Now I've begun The Unbearable Lightness of Being, and I got about halfway through it today. It's... Honestly, it's boring me pretty badly but poo poo man, I've got tons of free time at my job to read, so I might as well get through this. Gotta read the bad and the good, right? Next will probably be a bit of P.G. Wodehouse, as I really enjoyed Code of the Woosters, and they're quick reads. As a side note, my sister just finished The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which was assigned to her for summer reading. That makes me incredibly happy, as it is definitely one of my favorite books of all time.
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Aug 8, 2007 08:30
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bobservo posted:Can you provide me with some links, sir http://ww3.telerama.com/~joseph/cooper/cooper.html This is the Twain piece he was referring to - it's brilliant. It also criticizes Collins, as it quotes her (him? Wilkie seems feminine to me) rather sarcastically. And if you like Romantic stuff, give Pamela a read. Possibly the worst book I ever had to read. It inspired some great satire, though.
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Aug 8, 2007 08:39
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Finished Castleview by Gene Wolfe yesterday. Wolfe's one of my personal favorites, but I didn't really care for this one that much. Perhaps it would have made more sense if I were more familiar with the Arthurian mythos, but even then, I felt it got disjointed and hard to follow towards the end, even for a Wolfe book. Reading Tijuana Straits by Kem Nunn at the moment and it's pretty good so far. Got interested in checking out Nunn since I've been watching HBO's John From Cincinnati and Nunn is credited as a series creator along with David Milch.
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Aug 8, 2007 16:33
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I just finished For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway. Really incredible, easily one of the best books I've ever read. I understand why he is so influential now. The way he manages to convey strong feelings and emotion without ever breaking the restrained prose and stoic personalities of the fighting men he's writing about is brilliant.
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Aug 8, 2007 17:33
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Settling Accounts: In at the Death - Harry Turtledove The final conclusion to the Timeline 191 series. I skipped like half of the book not caring to read about half of the character's stories and mainly just wanted to find out what happened to Featherston and who nuked who first. Good conclusion but half of the characters were completely unnecessary, but such is the case for most of Turtledove.
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Aug 8, 2007 17:38
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Baudolino by Umberto Eco. It's about the adventures of a peasant boy who becomes the adopted son of King Frederick of the Holy Roman Empire. The story chronicles his life and its hard lessons as he searches for the phantasmagorical land of Prester John. It's a beautiful story, mesmerizing and surreal, but the historical backdrop is just as fascinating.
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Aug 8, 2007 18:39
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peanut- posted:I just finished For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway. Really incredible, easily one of the best books I've ever read. I understand why he is so influential now. That's the next one on my list. I actually just finished another Hemingway book, A Farewell to Arms. It was very good, but I'm a far bigger fan of The Old Man And The Sea and The Sun Also Rises.
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Aug 8, 2007 19:26
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Zero Karizma posted:That's the next one on my list. What did you think of the Nurse Character in Farewell? I remember always disliking that book because she was so stereotypical and two-dimensional in the story.
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Aug 8, 2007 19:35
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Axissillian posted:What did you think of the Nurse Character in Farewell? I remember always disliking that book because she was so stereotypical and two-dimensional in the story. Which nurse? The friend, Ferguson? Or the evil overlord "Nurse Ratched" clone, Van Campen?
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Aug 8, 2007 19:49
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Zero Karizma posted:Which nurse? The friend, Ferguson? Or the evil overlord "Nurse Ratched" clone, Van Campen? Catherine Barkley, the love interest.
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Aug 8, 2007 19:51
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Axissillian posted:Catherine Barkley, the love interest. Oh. I thought you meant a minor character or something. Eh, she was okay. Typical "woman in a love story" kinda thing. Catherine was decent, but she seemed to be more of a plot device than a deeply thought out character. But in Hemingways defense, I feel that happens with female characters a lot though... in all forms of fiction. The plot almost solely focuses on what interesting things are happening to the important men, and then there are these female sideline characters there to occasionally provide supporting statements or objectives.
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Aug 8, 2007 20:25
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I just finished Space Cadet by Robert Heinlein, thus completing my journey to read every novel he wrote. It took about 6 years (not only reading him, of course) and I must say that every single book was very enjoyable.
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Aug 8, 2007 21:46
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Notes From the Underground by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (Andrew R. McAndrew translation). I tried taking on Crime and Punishment a few years ago, but stalled out for some reason, so this would be the first Dostoyevsky I actually finished. It was a fascinating work; Underground Man's monologues and dark fantasies had a nasty vitality to them, and his masochistic/self-destructive streak was something to behold. Next: As usual, not a clue. Looking at my stack, James Shapiro's A Year In the Life of William Shakespeare: 1599 seems appealing, but sweet fancy Moses, I've got a hell of a backlog.
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Aug 9, 2007 03:03
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I just finished John Crow's Devil by Marlon James. It was a random pull while I was browsing for horror; I read the inner flap and said it sounded good enough to try. It takes place in Jamaica in the late '50s in a little ex-planation town with an awful preacher. Not that kind of awful. He's just bad at it and always drunk. Out of the blue a new guy shows up, calling himself the Apostle York. Some of the women in town are witch women. There's a bit of magical realism - the Apostle has hints of power - which is used to good effect throughout. The one tricky thing is that some of the speech, and some of the interleaving short chapters, are written in Jamaican. It really flows beautifully when one takes the time to slow down and read those parts out loud, but it's a little confusing when someone just tosses the word 'bloodclaat' at you. I immediately handed it over to a friend of mine and she stayed up until 2 finishing it. Not for everyone, but short enough to be worth a shot if the themes are appealing.
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Aug 9, 2007 03:21
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Michio Takeyama's Harp of Burma, originally aimed at Japanese high-school students. Picked it up for a few bucks in a secondhand store having heard praise lavished on the movie adaptation, figured the book was worth a look. Not so much. It's juvenile enough that it's probably better suited to primary school students, and features a jarringly virtuous portrait of the Japanese army to boot. That said, there's about 30 pages near the end that I can see the movie capitalising on, so probably best just to watch that instead. Also stumbled across the unlikely find of a Folio edition of Kalman Mikszath's St Peter's Umbrella, complete with woodcut illustrations. Written in the late 19th century, it's compelling both for its total inability to achieve a seamless blend of folk tale/familial epic/romance, and how little the author cares about doing so. Also a whole bunch of fun.
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Aug 9, 2007 07:39
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Survivor by Chuck Palahniuk. This and Rant are the only two Palahniuk books I've read so far, but I really like his writing style and plan on reading all of them. I liked Survivor, but the ending wasn't as strong as I hoped it would have been. Definitely a good read though.
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Aug 9, 2007 09:29
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BobDoleBobDole posted:Survivor by Chuck Palahniuk. This and Rant are the only two Palahniuk books I've read so far, but I really like his writing style and plan on reading all of them. I liked Survivor, but the ending wasn't as strong as I hoped it would have been. Definitely a good read though. https://www.chuckpalahniuk.net has a more in depth explanation of the ending by the author if you need more closure or you just want to know if you got it right.
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Aug 9, 2007 13:08
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I just finished the Ramayana. It was the first Hindu text that I read, and it was a great tale on par with other ancient epics. Its popularity is enduring today, and is important in the daily lives of millions of people. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/6563959.stm Second picture in the series. This peaked my curiosity about the origins of Hanuman, and now I know.
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Aug 9, 2007 15:19
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Finished Tijuana Straits last night. Good read throughout, though it's depressing as gently caress. I did like the way it ended on a somewhat hopeful note, though. I'll definitely be checking out Nunn's other books.
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Aug 9, 2007 17:05
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BobDoleBobDole posted:Survivor by Chuck Palahniuk. This and Rant are the only two Palahniuk books I've read so far, but I really like his writing style and plan on reading all of them. I liked Survivor, but the ending wasn't as strong as I hoped it would have been. Definitely a good read though. I really loved Survivor, but I have to say, his style gets old. I'd say this is probably his best work. Then again, I hated Choke, which apparently the rest of the world loved.
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Aug 10, 2007 03:15
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Just finished Ian Flemming's Casino Royale. It was my first experience with any of his novels and turned out to be the perfect place to start. The movie was very different but the core story stays the same; really I can't decide which was better.
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Aug 10, 2007 06:37
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russia is HERE posted:http://ww3.telerama.com/~joseph/cooper/cooper.html I had to read both Pamela and Shamela for a class, with Shamela being the better book by a large margin (though it helped to have read Pamela first).
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Aug 10, 2007 06:46
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Zeus McBadass posted:Just finished Ian Flemming's Casino Royale. It was my first experience with any of his novels and turned out to be the perfect place to start. The movie was very different but the core story stays the same; really I can't decide which was better. Bond played poker in the movie. Hold'em poker. And it was utter blasphemy.  I need to get another Bond novel, The Spy Who Loved Me is up next on my list.
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Aug 10, 2007 07:17
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bobservo posted:I had to read both Pamela and Shamela for a class, with Shamela being the better book by a large margin (though it helped to have read Pamela first). So did I, actually! I really enjoyed Shamela, because Pamela was such a miserable experience. What confused me was that there was a professor of literature at Yale or Harvard that wrote about how great it was in the preface. I thought it was unbelievably poorly written. LooseChanj posted:Bond played poker in the movie. Hold'em poker. And it was utter blasphemy. Daryl Fucking Hall fucked around with this message at 08:27 on Aug 10, 2007 |
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Aug 10, 2007 08:24
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russia is HERE posted:You know, I know that move broke tradition and all, but seriously, gently caress baccarat. I don't know anyone who knows how to play that poo poo. Hold 'Em was good because it really did modernize the story. That's the problem, you can't modernize what is essentially a period character. Pitting Bond against terrorists is like trying to put Hornblower on the bridge of an aircraft carrier. It doesn't really work.
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Aug 10, 2007 10:46
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Zero Karizma posted:Be prepared... he's loving PERVERTED. Like all that "I need a woman to use my face as a toilet" joking he does? He's not kidding. I forgot to reply to this when I finished. I am unclear how the rules to Monster Rain work so I will just lay back under the porch while you demonstrate, okay? 
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Aug 10, 2007 18:11
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LooseChanj posted:Bond played poker in the movie. Hold'em poker. And it was utter blasphemy. That's exactally what I thought as I read the book! Hold'em is a simple game that's getting too big for it's britches. I'm in the middle of The Man With the Golden Gun and I'm starting to think that I should be reading these books in some sort of order... As a side note, at least the kept the SCROTAL TORTURE SCENE  in the movie!
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Aug 10, 2007 21:39
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Zeus McBadass posted:That's exactally what I thought as I read the book! Hold'em is a simple game that's getting too big for it's britches. I'm in the middle of The Man With the Golden Gun and I'm starting to think that I should be reading these books in some sort of order... I just bought The Spy Who Loved Me, it's up next when I finish Robinson Crusoe. I'm reading them in the order they're shown in the beginning of each book, which is the correct order. And yeah, jesus christ..
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Aug 10, 2007 22:14
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russia is HERE posted:So did I, actually! I really enjoyed Shamela, because Pamela was such a miserable experience. What confused me was that there was a professor of literature at Yale or Harvard that wrote about how great it was in the preface. I thought it was unbelievably poorly written. If you look hard enough, anyone will write an introduction to anything. In the Collins book, some scholar went on for ten pages describing the story with this method: "And who can forget when character X did action Y? How marvelous!"
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Aug 11, 2007 02:23
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I just finished Foucault's Pendulum, and while I got through the whole thing and understood a lot, I also came to the realization that Eco is much smarter than I could ever hope to be. Still, fascinating read, and loved every minute of it. Now I'm going Russian with One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. It should take one or two days tops.
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Aug 11, 2007 19:18
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CrimsonGhost posted:I forgot to reply to this when I finished. I am unclear how the rules to Monster Rain work so I will just lay back under the porch while you demonstrate, okay? Okay. So that's how you play an-- WAIT A MINUTE! GET BACK HERE! STOP TELLING EVERYONE I'M GAY!
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Aug 11, 2007 19:41
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A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin - I really liked it. It is a bit overrated but it is still great read and after I finish off my pile of books I'll go on to the next ones.
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Aug 11, 2007 20:33
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First Among Sequels - Jasper Fforde. I have an extremely busy schedule right now, but I took time out of it purely to read this book. I was not disappointed.
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Aug 12, 2007 08:51
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Just finished John Major's autobiography. Quite interesting to see his perspective on his time in power, but as with most political memoirs, it ultimately reads like an attempt to justify his career rather than admit when he screwed up. It confirms what I'd heard others say though, that on a personal level he was a thoroughly decent guy, and thus entirely unsuitable for the post of Prime Minister.
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Aug 12, 2007 11:36
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Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. The ending chapter was a little abrupt, but I think I read enough into it to make some meanings (even if they weren't intentional.)
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Aug 12, 2007 12:02
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Post Office - Charles Bukowski. Quick and easy read, enjoyed the evocative language.
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Aug 12, 2007 17:17
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