|
White Coke posted:The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole. Perhaps the first Gothic novel ever written, I found the story itself to be okay but enjoyed reading the editor's notes and commentary about the historical context of the novel and the cultural and political significance of Gothic-ness. I was ordering some other books from an on-line second-hand book store, and due to your post, searched for "otranto" just for the heck of it. Didn't find any Walpole but found this for 4€, which seems interesting:  (Not the English edition, but anyway.)
|
#
?
Jul 6, 2022 07:51
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 18, 2024 21:04 |
|
|
Finished 'Stations of the Tide' by Michael Stanwick. Liked the vibe, but could have lived with fewer graphic sex scenes centering around putting thumbs in butts. Whole paragraphs spent on thumbs in butts.
|
|
#
?
Jul 6, 2022 15:30
|
|
|
Tezer posted:Finished 'Stations of the Tide' by Michael Stanwick. Liked the vibe, but could have lived with fewer graphic sex scenes centering around putting thumbs in butts. Whole paragraphs spent on thumbs in butts. I wish writers on the whole were less horny. I do not need to get titillated by this Clive Cussler novel, please do not tell me about Dirk's dirk If I wanted porn I'd read porn dammit
|
|
#
?
Jul 7, 2022 05:59
|
|
|
3D Megadoodoo posted:I was ordering some other books from an on-line second-hand book store, and due to your post, searched for "otranto" just for the heck of it. Didn't find any Walpole but found this for 4€, which seems interesting: Walpole loosely based the story in history but was unaware when he wrote it that there was an actual Otranto castle.
|
|
#
?
Jul 9, 2022 02:07
|
|
|
In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez: a historical fiction telling the story of four sisters coming of age during the time of El Jefe in the Dominican Republic. It's inspired by the true story of the Mirabal sisters and their deaths by the regime, and I found it to be a good story. The book alternates chapters told from each sisters' perspective, going through their lives, involvement in the revolution, and eventual deaths. It does a good job with each one's voice and their internal thoughts towards everything going on while growing up in a violent dictatorship. This isn't my usual genre choice, but there was a recent attempt to get it banned in a nearby school district, so I wanted to see what the fuss was about. There are parts that danced around a woman's sexuality and menstruation, and one vague account of torture. But nothing worse than the violence depicted in Lord of the Flies (which is another book in that school district for a younger grade). I have no idea why someone would want it banned. Some serious pearl clutching going on. Good-Natured Filth fucked around with this message at 16:56 on Jul 9, 2022 |
|
#
?
Jul 9, 2022 16:34
|
|
|
Finished Between Two Fires, by Christopher Buehlman. What a fantastic book! Wasn't sure how I'd get on with it as I've never really read anything that's explicitly marketed as horror (except for some Steven King) but it absolutely gripped me - it was a brilliant mix of horror moments mixed with a more "standard" low fantasy plotting underpinned with constant threat. The writing itself was fantastic as well and the characters were so fun to watch grow. Really really glad I picked it up! Spoiler stuff - I had to put it down in the introduction to the last act just because of how perfect it was I every way. The Lord made answer.is such an incredible way to kick off the ending sequence after everything that's come before.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2022 20:39
|
|
|
Not the Messiah posted:Finished Between Two Fires, by Christopher Buehlman. What a fantastic book! It's been brought up a lot recently, but yes, this is a fantastic book.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2022 21:00
|
|
|
MartingaleJack posted:It's been brought up a lot recently, but yes, this is a fantastic book. Ha, I've not checked the thread in a while but the last time I did was probably the last time it was mentioned a lot that prompted me to put it on my list! I think it was when the Blacktongue Thief came out so there was probably renewed discourse - it's been on my list for a while (ie far too long) Not the Messiah fucked around with this message at 23:11 on Jul 13, 2022 |
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2022 21:29
|
|
|
I haven't read Suicide Motors Club or anything other than The Blacktongue Tongue Thief yet because I'm terrified it won't be as good! I will be brave soon...
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2022 21:47
|
|
|
Chas McGill posted:BaseballPCHiker posted: Glad you liked it! That book had me thinking back to it for weeks. Just finished This Is How They Tell Me The World Ends by Nicole Perloth. It was OK. I work in the industry so I understand a lot of the details that get glossed over for a wider audience. It did a good job covering major events, and offering salient commentary on issues. I'd recommend it for people interested in InfoSec on a casual level. Off to reread Dune for the first time in about 15 years!
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2022 01:47
|
|
|
BaseballPCHiker posted:I'd recommend it for people interested in InfoSec on a casual level. I also read this book and enjoyed it. Do you have other recommendations of similar caliber? Maybe something a little more advanced?
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2022 04:17
|
|
|
Armauk posted:I also read this book and enjoyed it. Do you have other recommendations of similar caliber? Maybe something a little more advanced? I liked Sandworm by Andy Greenberg, and I heard about it from other infosec people (who heard about it on Darknet Diaries).
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2022 05:13
|
|
|
The Bhagavad Gita translated by Eknath Easwaran. One of the oldest religious texts in the world, it is included in the Mahabharata, an epic poem about the conflict between the Pandavas and their cousins the Kauravas. The Gita takes the form of a dialogue between Arjuna, one of the Pandavas, and his charioteer Krishna. Arjuna is filled with doubt on the eve of a great battle and questions Krishna about what he should do. Krishna reveals himself to be an avatar of the god Vishnu and engages in a lengthy discourse about practical paths towards metaphysical insight and ultimate salvation. The Gita is undoubtedly one of the most important texts in world history because it proves that an author bringing his story to a screeching halt in order to lecture the audience about his personal interests is as old as fiction itself.
|
|
#
?
Jul 17, 2022 01:53
|
|
|
Sarern posted:I liked Sandworm by Andy Greenberg, and I heard about it from other infosec people (who heard about it on Darknet Diaries). Thank you.
|
|
#
?
Jul 17, 2022 07:06
|
|
|
The Welfleet Mystery (Mrs. Georgie Sheldon, 1885) Not a mystery, to dispense with that right off the bat. It’s a mystery to the characters, sure, but the reader knows all along what the score is. I would call this sort of book a crime thriller. Reminds me for all the world like a much, much shorter version of East Lynne. Guy and Josephine are orphans. The latter is sent to the Lovel boarding school, a most prestigious institute, and becomes friends with her roommate Theo. Theo is plagued by the unwanted attention of her music instructor John Knight, who intends to marry her one way or another. Trouble is, she was arranged nearly from birth to marry Bertie. Now that he’s reached twenty-one and wedding bells are ringing, the two sit down for a heart-to-heart. It seems like both of them were fine with the idea when it was a distant abstract, but now that it’s here, they don’t want to go through with it. No hard feelings on either side -- the decision to break it off is mutual. Knight doesn’t know that. He murders Bertie and frames Guy for the crime and he's very nearly convicted. (I don’t know how. I confess to knowing little about British law, especially nineteenth century British law, but there’s the matter of the corpus delicti. The prosecution doesn’t need to produce the body, but they do need to show that a crime has actually been committed, and, well, they just haven’t. Bertie could very well have just walked off into the night completely of his own accord, never to be seen again.) Simon Dodge, the lodger next door to Knight, proves to be a detective and gives a blow by blow breakdown of Knight’s crime. The case could not get worse for Knight until Bertie himself shows up. He didn’t die. He was strangled and thrown down the pit in the crypt, but while Knight was getting quicklime to dissolve the body, he crawled through the narrow outlet that lead to the reservoir and ultimately to the sea, where he was rescued. Knight, caught, blames it all on the opium, to which he has been irredeemably addicted. Ortho fucked around with this message at 02:44 on Jul 18, 2022 |
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2022 02:39
|
|
|
White Coke posted:The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole. Perhaps the first Gothic novel ever written, I found the story itself to be okay but enjoyed reading the editor's notes and commentary about the historical context of the novel and the cultural and political significance of Gothic-ness. A very fun book.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2022 03:10
|
|
|
Tell me, is there interest in me doing a read-through of all the Carolyn Wells mystery novels here, spoilering the endings? I might also go through all the Perry Mason novel, but I've have to dig them out. If not, I'd take a lighter tone and do it in GBS, but I'd rather do it here, (They are, many of them GBS worthy, I have to say) Ortho fucked around with this message at 09:04 on Jul 18, 2022 |
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2022 09:01
|
|
|
The Five by Hallie Rubenhold. Some really excellent social history of late Victorian England, centered around the lives of the five women who are the "canonical" victims of Jack the Ripper. But Rubenhold isn't looking to write true crime; she doesn't spend any time or energy on the murderer. Most of the attention this book has gotten has focused on Rubenhold's thesis that it is inaccurate and demeaning to throw the blanket term "prostitutes" over these women as if that's all we need to know about them, and that's true, and a point very much worth making. This is a book about bad luck, addiction, and the absolutely appalling lack of options available to women whose lives take a wrong turn.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2022 21:27
|
|
|
Finished re-reading my favorite sci fi story of all time, “Virgin Planet” by Poul Anderson from like 1959. The basic premise is a space explorer lands on a planet populated only by women - the planet had been part of a colonization project centuries prior where the women were on a separate ship from the men, and the men’s ship never made it, and the women’s ship crashed and left most of their technology in ruins so their society is basically medieval-level tech. The women reproduce via cloning machines (their only surviving tech) so there’s, like, 100 different women who all get cloned so all the women on the planet are one of those 100 at various ages, and each woman “type” is something of a specialist or personality type in the society (warrior, builder, artisan, diplomat, leader, cook, etc). So these women have been waiting centuries for the coming of The Men, these mythical creatures that they know exist but have never seen, and this space explorer lands on their planet not knowing anything about it, and since he’s just some dude they completely don’t believe he’s A Man because he’s not bold and smart and perfect and a warrior and superhuman and noble (and they have no idea what A Man looks like), and it turns into a civil war between the women who start to believe he’s A Man and the women who are convinced he’s not. On top of that, there’s a ruling class of women who actively never want the Men to show up because they know it would screw up their power dynamic, so they try to discredit the space explorer and ideally kill him so no more Men show up. The space explorer, being a guy, tries to sleep with pretty much anyone he can but there ends up being exactly zero sex scenes in the whole story because he either botches it or gets hilariously interrupted or something every time. Even among the women who believe he’s A Man, they constantly have to save his rear end because he’s largely inept and no good in a fight. He falls in love with two of them (they’re genetic twins so it’s easy to do) and it turns into a humorous love triangle, and in the end the space explorer helps overthrow the ruling class with the promise that he will bring more Men, and the final page is one of my favorite final pages in any story ever and always makes me smile. There are elements that haven’t aged perfectly (it’s a 65 year old story) and some plot elements I think could have been stronger but on the whole it’s a lot of fun and doesn’t take itself too seriously and plays around with some tropes you’d expect to see in a story like this, and I absolutely love the final page.
|
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2022 18:24
|
|
|
Xenomrph posted:Finished re-reading my favorite sci fi story of all time, “Virgin Planet” by Poul Anderson from like 1959. That sounds just up my alley. In fact, I just read a story with similar themes for the inaugural edition of Deplorable Visions on Spotify.
|
|
#
?
Jul 20, 2022 02:40
|
|
|
It took me over a year from start to finish (i've really fallen off on my book readin') but I finally finished A Canticle For Leibowitz by Walter M Miller Jr. I'm assuming many don't need a synopsis for this one so I won't go through that but I really enjoyed this even with having to frequently pick up my phone to look up the latin translations peppered throughout. I'm a fan of dark humor and satire so adding a post-apocalyptic setting to the mix was right up my alley. It's definitely one of the more enjoyable books i've ready in the last couple years. I found out recently that there is a sequel that was posthumously released some 40 years later so that one is next on the list.
|
|
#
?
Jul 21, 2022 00:46
|
|
|
Pandora's Box: A History of the First World War was a bit weak when it comes to military matters, and didn't have much to say about most of the smaller nations involved in the conflict. However, the explorations of the social, political, and cultural experiences of the major powers in the war was worth the long pagecount, although he would often talk in foucauldian sociologist-speak.
|
|
#
?
Jul 21, 2022 21:07
|
|
|
So I read Marian Engel’s Bear. This is CanLit  published in 1976 that won the Governor General’s Literary Award. It’s also infamous for including explicit descriptions of physical intimacy with, yes, a literal bear.This book is good. It’s contemporary, set in 1975, but it’s surprisingly modern in its views about a lot of things. This could have been written today. A lot of the controversy focuses heavily on the gross stuff, and the afterword in the copy I have does as well - a woman only able to truly explore her sexuality and personal desires in the absence of men, embracing sexuality as natural - but honestly I have to wonder how people reading it through this lens weren’t bored by the other 50% of the book. Actually, I searched this thread, and the one other poster who’s talked about this does seem like they found the rest of it either boring or at least confusing. I don’t think I have some secret insight, I think modern reappraisals are looking at this book very differently. I read it as being about exploitation: of nature, of indigenous peoples, of people in general when you have a position of power to leverage. There’s nothing sexy about the bear: the narrative only ever describes it as a literal bear, and the narrator is exploiting it just like she’s exploited. While she’s dissing tourists and settlers and the myth of the “noble savage” and telling herself she knows so much better, she’s in the same breath describing this literal bear as “wise” and imagining that it could reciprocate (note she admits she sometimes has to cajole it with honey). This is a great example of a hypocrite as a narrator and I don’t think it’s particularly subtle about what it’s doing. The book is a giant warning against romanticism and there’s a lot of words spent on the crime of sanitizing history. There are some cool narrative devices. The first half of the book we’re kept at arms length from the protagonist by the narrative, then we get a very abrupt switch to a much closer perspective in an emotional moment and from then on start to learn a lot more about why she’s so unhappy. It’s confidently written. It starts slow, it has some great comedic moments (there’s a 2 page chapter that consists solely of a character’s nervous babbling that perfectly captures the feeling of a normal conversation going completely and suddenly off the rails, I laughed out loud). The prose isn’t overwrought. Dialogue is on point. I’m not sure how this would read to someone who isn’t familiar with Canada. There’s a lot of history and descriptions of nature that are definitely here to make a point about the kind of people who truck in wilted, familiar vegetables instead of being willing to eat what the locals do, but all this description (and it’s most of the book) might be baffling without context. So in conclusion, if you’re Canadian, you should read it! Give this notorious book a chance.
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2022 03:29
|
|
|
I read Bear a few years ago, and was not familiar with Canada, so a lot of that stuff went over my head. But I agree, it's an interesting and often pretty beautiful book, with a lot of meaning to uncover.
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2022 05:07
|
|
|
the Spain Virus posted:Tell me, is there interest in me doing a read-through of all the Carolyn Wells mystery novels here, spoilering the endings? I might also go through all the Perry Mason novel, but I've have to dig them out. Yes, definitely!
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2022 23:45
|
|
|
kaom posted:So I read Marian Engel’s Bear. This is CanLit It was SA book of the month a while back: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3881149&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=2
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2022 23:56
|
|
|
The Approach to Al-Mu'tasim I've never seen this talked about, and I read it in a very strange way. Having attempted to use the Kindle apps weird one word at a time thing to read it while I was on the treadmill. So I can't say that I have the strongest grasp on the work, but as I came home the story seemed to crystalize in my head as one investigating the idea of criticism and reproduction in literature. The opening talks of the differing receptions the first and second editions had, as well as the impact the different language versions had, and then the ending talks of the diffrent races projecting different things onto the titular, Al-Mu'tasim. So the sceneario is, the protagonist is some reader, he kills the Hindu man who the text represents as Al, but can also be seen as an author. Without that the man is lost and attempts to search for the meaning in people that resemble him, each holds a part but projects their own proclivities onto the work. The man can get imperceptibly close to the source of knowledge, but never pull back the curtain fully, it's titled the Approach after all not the meeting. What Borges seems to be saying is that each person will find their own meaning in a work, and be able to do so with the help of numerous other perspectives on the matter, but they'll never be able to fully Understand the work like the original author did, and likewise the printing and reprinting itself changes the work from it's original. Interestingly I think by replacing Author with God one can find the same lesson applies to real life.
|
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2022 03:04
|
|
|
Gertrude Perkins posted:I read Bear a few years ago, and was not familiar with Canada, so a lot of that stuff went over my head. But I agree, it's an interesting and often pretty beautiful book, with a lot of meaning to uncover. I’m glad it reads well to someone outside Canada too! ulmont posted:It was SA book of the month a while back: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3881149&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=2 Thanks! I’m interested to see what people made of it 
|
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2022 05:14
|
|
|
I just finished Scaredy Cat by Robin Alexander. It's very much a Robin Alexander book in that her humour is on full display, and I thoroughly like the way the story has two people who don't instantly fall for each other, and instead gradually develop a friendship that suddenly blossoms into something more. Best of all, however, is how the main characters support each other in ways I can't easily remember having encountered in other novels. I'm not overly fond of how the paranormal plays a role in the lead-up to the finale, but it's entirely a personal-preference thing and I don't really think it detracts from the book - it just leaves something to be desired, meaning the book could've been slightly better, if only by a hairs width. Robin Alexander is on my absolute-favorites list for romantic comedies, because I don't think there's a single book I've read of hers that wasn't in the top-50 romances I've read, so if you're looking for a place to get into romance, you can't really go wrong with one of her books. BlankSystemDaemon fucked around with this message at 12:53 on Jul 25, 2022 |
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2022 00:36
|
|
|
Pierre Ménard, author of Don Quixote might be one of the most interesting, perplexing, and thought provoking short stories I've read. Gonna copy this text so I can paste it in for the rest of Borges work to I'm assuming.
|
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2022 05:08
|
|
|
Gaius Marius posted:Pierre Ménard, author of Don Quixote might be one of the most interesting, perplexing, and thought provoking short stories I've read. Gonna copy this text so I can paste it in for the rest of Borges work to I'm assuming. My favorite Borges story. “Tlön, Uqbar” may be more mind bending, and “Babel” May be more impactful, but I think about “Author of Don Quixote” the most.
|
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2022 14:43
|
|
|
I read Tlon a couple weeks ago and then started Foucault's Pendulum and I've already got a pretty good idea what's going on because of it.
|
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2022 16:09
|
|
|
Dust by Chris Miller was a lot of fun up until the end. Once our Lovecraftian god shows up "on screen" it loses most of its charm.
|
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2022 17:45
|
|
|
Gaius Marius posted:I read Tlon a couple weeks ago and then started Foucault's Pendulum and I've already got a pretty good idea what's going on because of it. Ma gavte la nata.
|
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2022 18:22
|
|
|
The last book got me hooked on romance again, so I continued with another of Robin Alexanders - this time Rusty Logic. I'm not sure I can put into words how much I like this book. The characters don't immediately fall in love, but as with the prior book they develop a friendship that then blossoms, there's a lot of good and open communication between the characters, the lead-up to the finale is a tense page-turner but mostly because of the pacing of the story and not because of the somewhat-stereotypical bring-everything-to-ahead-for-the-conclusion-of-the-book, and the conclusion itself feels like the perfect knot on the red thread of the entire book. Basically, it's the perfect romantic comedy - and I know that's incredibly high praise for anyone to give, but I think it's warranted.
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 00:03
|
|
|
"Pellucidar 3 Kuninkaan poika" (Tanar of Pellucidar), the last one in the series published by Taikajousi after the translator cum publisher kicked the bucket. It literally ends with "and then they had a lot of adventures on the way back, and these other guys had a lot of adventures too, and this guy oooh this guy is gonna go have an adventure too just you wait!". Contemplating getting the rest in English but I really only read this one because I got the first two books as a kid and I wanted to complete the set. They're not, like, very good.
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 06:31
|
|
|
I just finished Fred Saberhagen’s First, Second, and Third Book of Swords as well as Berserker. The Swords trilogy is a far-future Earth where technology has largely disappeared, and Roman gods and demons have reappeared. The gods decide to play a game consisting of scattering twelve magic swords around to see what the humans do with them. Each sword has a unique ability, like making the wielder unkillable as long as they’re defending unarmed people, or instantly killing anyone it’s thrown at, and a corresponding weakness, like there’s nothing stopping you from dying when there’s no longer anyone to defend, or no longer having the sword so it can be thrown right back at you. The books are the standard chosen rural boy gets enmeshed in war, although book two veers into a heist. Berserker is a collection of short stories about humanity fighting robot ships called berserkers sent to destroy all life. The tactics evolve through the stories, as humans and berserkers get better at fighting each other, like mind-disabling rays, brainwashing, and simulcrums. It’s unusual that I read through four books by an author this quickly, so I’ve formed a theory that the faster a book is written, the faster it is to read. Saberhagen was certainly prolific, as there are another 8 Sword side-novels and like 8 berserker novel/short story collections. Maybe I’m able to read authors like him faster because he didn’t have time to be anything other than straight-forward.
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 16:20
|
|
|
The Dhammapada translated by Eknath Easwaran. A collection of sayings on a variety of topics attributed to The Buddha. The translator and commentator are most concerned with discussing the practical aspects of the Buddha's teachings, but in the process brush over some differences between Buddhism and Hinduism and those between Theravada and Mahayana Buddhism. Aside from that the book was interesting and many The Buddha's teachings are of use and interest today, but it's whetted my appetite regarding disagreements among and within eastern religions.
|
|
#
?
Jul 27, 2022 02:18
|
|
|
Hyperion by Dan Simmons. Finished after 12 years on my shelf. I believe the hurdle for any possible adaptation isn't the multiple narrators, the frequent sex-scenes, or the stomach-churning violence. It's the fact that all the Keats stuff just flew over my head because I know nothing about guy except him being dead. Will probably read the second half in future, though word on this forum has been unkind to the Endymion series afterwards.
|
|
#
?
Aug 1, 2022 08:16
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 18, 2024 21:04 |
|
|
Inspector Gesicht posted:Will probably read the second half in future, though word on this forum has been unkind to the Endymion series afterwards. Also Simmons is a shithead and doesn't deserve any support.
|
|
#
?
Aug 1, 2022 13:15
|
|
