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By the way, all this talk about Anubis Gates has resulted in me ordering it from Amazon with a gift card I got for Christmas. Here's hoping it's as good as you say! Finished Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale which was a pretty solid Atwood book that didn't rely too much on flashbacks - the only real problem with her books, I've learned, is that she really overuses the narrative device of a frame story. Also read Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger, about a servant in India who starts his own outsourcing company - and also murders his employer. Very cleverly written with a great narrative voice. It won the Booker Prize in '08.
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Jan 3, 2010 19:58
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I just finshed The Stranger by Albert Camus.I'd only recommend it for existintialist and people who like reading on that stuff. ASnyone who likes that warm fuzzy feeling after finshing a book will most likely not get it from this one.
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Jan 4, 2010 00:09
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Sandstorm by James Rollins was like Indiana Jones lite. Religious artifacts, world travel, guns and blowing things up, mysteries to solve, mediocre writing, ridiculous science thrown in at some points. Not a total waste of time, but enough of a forgettable book that I had to check my Goodreads list to even remember it. The Box: Uncanny Stories by Richard Matheson edit: apparently I did NOT finish Matheson's book as I skim a synopsis on Amazon... I gave up on the kid who wouldn't talk story and moved on to a book I paid to read intending to go back. And forgot to. drat. I'm halfway through a paid book right now (Haunted by Chuck Psomething) and it's decent, so I'll just have to wait. Roman Lives: Coriolanus, Pompey, Caesar, Cicero, Brutus, Mark Anthony by Mestrius Plutarchus. Long, detailed biographies about ancient famous Romans. Could have been condensed a bit, but apparently Plutarchus lived around 100AD so I cut him a break. Haven't read much in the last month as we had a huge deadline and worked very long hours. Also, discovered the series House and have been watching eps on the comp when I'm actually at home and not asleep.... I promise to do better in January! That70sHeidi fucked around with this message at 01:27 on Jan 4, 2010 |
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Jan 4, 2010 01:19
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Just finished a 10 hour marathon with The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. I couldn't tell if there were troubles with the translation from Swedish (and the diction in the English is by no means flowery) or if there are weird cultural feelings about women in Sweden, or both, but some of the descriptions of the titular character in the beginning of the book are off-putting; she's a pretty normal 21st century girl, but Larsson tries really hard to make her into an enigma. That being said, it's the only problem with the book. The financial journalism/cold case murder mystery plot is gripping, the details grisly, and the payoff satisfying. There's a family tree in the front to help with the plethora of characters, but it was written well enough that I didn't need to use it. Gonna pick up the next one tonight!
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Jan 4, 2010 03:14
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urbancontra posted:Just finished a 10 hour marathon with The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. I couldn't tell if there were troubles with the translation from Swedish (and the diction in the English is by no means flowery) or if there are weird cultural feelings about women in Sweden, or both, but some of the descriptions of the titular character in the beginning of the book are off-putting; she's a pretty normal 21st century girl, but Larsson tries really hard to make her into an enigma. Everyone and their dyslectic grandmother are reading Stieg Larsson's novels in Denmark right now, or have been doing it since 2008. I never got around to them because of two reasons: First, if it's so popular that it catches everyone's attention it could be as crappy as the da vinci code. Second, the protagonist who is supposed to seem so tough and outstanding sounds like ripped out of Kill Bill and some William Gibson novel, so why bother reading this.
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Jan 4, 2010 11:12
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I just finished Exodus by Leon Uris. Fantastic book in my opinion, very thought provoking, emotional and powerful. The Haj is another excellent book by the same author, dealing with the same issues from a different perspective. Both of them are well worth reading. Both of them are fairly old but well known, so second hand bookshops are probably the best place to find them.
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Jan 4, 2010 11:31
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Vermillion Sands by JG Ballard. I know it's sacrilege to disparage Ballard, and I really liked EotS & Crash, but the only reason I finished this is because I brought it along everytime I went on the bike machine (which took the course of about two months). The writing style is of course beautiful, but the eponymous setting basically resembles a half evolved Dune-universe with lots of sand and crazy sonic devices. More importantly even though there's a crisis in each story, there's never any tension. It gets repetitive; moderately wealthy & bored 'artist' is haunted by a mysterious femme fatale involving some strange technology. In fact flicking through it just now, that applies to literally every story. If anything, what would have worked better for me would have been expanded version of the The Screen Game or Cry Hope, Cry Fury! I'm not going to deny there's highly evocative language and brilliant imagery, but gripping it is not.
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Jan 4, 2010 13:49
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The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time. Read it one long sitting — just fantastic. It was especially gratifying after finishing The Lovely Bones just prior, as both are reasonably interesting stories that really benefit from the distinctively beautiful prose with which they're written. Instant addition to the favorites list.
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Jan 4, 2010 20:32
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rasser posted:Everyone and their dyslectic grandmother are reading Stieg Larsson's novels in Denmark right now, or have been doing it since 2008. I never got around to them because of two reasons: First, if it's so popular that it catches everyone's attention it could be as crappy as the da vinci code. No. rasser posted:Second, the protagonist who is supposed to seem so tough and outstanding sounds like ripped out of Kill Bill rasser posted:and some William Gibson novel, so why bother reading this. Yeah, you´re right about this.Larrson was a big sci-fi fan and thoses cyperbunk stories with almighty hackers influenced him a lot. I finished "The Long Goodbye" by Raymond Chandler. The first Marlowe book, I´ve ever read and it´s still my favourite.People say it´s dull, but you can just chill out and dwell in his prose. Just started 2666, by Roberto Bolano.It seems I`ll need a month for this one. AstroWhale fucked around with this message at 20:57 on Jan 4, 2010 |
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Jan 4, 2010 20:51
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My wife and I just finished reading The Hobbit in parallel. It was great! I was worried about the book being too simple and child-oriented. It wasn't incredibly complicated but rather a kickass read that I can see myself coming back to across the years. Very immersive and a wonderful fantasy, and it cleared up a few Middle-Earth questions we had. Even better, we read it in one sitting, over six hours. Awesome. 4.5/5, losing .5 points due to the absence of hardcore erotica. The Hobbit has almost everything.
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Jan 5, 2010 07:31
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causticfluids posted:My wife and I just finished reading The Hobbit in parallel. It was great! I was worried about the book being too simple and child-oriented. It wasn't incredibly complicated but rather a kickass read that I can see myself coming back to across the years. Very immersive and a wonderful fantasy, and it cleared up a few Middle-Earth questions we had. Even better, we read it in one sitting, over six hours. Awesome. 4.5/5, losing .5 points due to the absence of hardcore erotica. The Hobbit has almost everything. It's been years since I read it, but in middle school, when the movies were first being released, I went on a nerdy LotR splurge and read The Hobbit and then a single-volume compilation of all 3 LotR books. After I finished everything, I still remember liking The Hobbit the best out of all of them. It doesn't take itself quite as seriously, and doesn't have any of the mentioned hardcore gay hobbit erotica, so it's overall a much easier and enjoyable read. I mean, unless you're into pages and pages of gay hobbit erotica, music-less lyrics of dwarf songs (seriously, why the gently caress do authors do this  ), and landscape description that's so painfully detailed that it induces thoughts of suicide.
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Jan 5, 2010 09:24
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I finished The Sorcerer's Apprentice by Tahir Shah. I'm generally wary of travelogues on India because they tend to be total and utter rear end. Too much time is spent with the author poking fun at the fact that a vast majority of Indians speak less than perfect English.* I'm happy to report Shah's book suffers from none of this malaise. It's a fascinating story that reads like a mixture of a tall tale and travelogue. Halfway through it, I was caught between me knowledge of just how bizarre a country India is, and wondering whether Shah is embellishing reality to make it more interesting. But it really doesn't matter - this not Lonely Planet and its purpose is more to entertain than inform and it does entertain spectacularly well. After being very impressed by the magical prowess of an old family retainer at age 11, Shah hotfoots it down to India in the mid-90s to learn magic. He's meets his family retainer's guru, the sadistic and mercurial Hakim Feroze who puts him through a grueling torturous routine that seems to have everything to do with taking the piss out of Shah and nothing to do with magic. Shah is happy to portray himself as a man of almost imbecilic but good-natured guilelessness. He's soon sent for a tour across the country where he encounters several godmen and debunks and demystifies each one of their tricks to the reader - he knows better than to denounce these people before their masses of followers. This is easily one of the most enjoyable books I've read in ages - a far cry from the depressing and/or horrific fare I generally subject myself to. *Optional rant: This pisses me off immensely. These people are stepping out of their linguistic comfort zone in order to communicate with visitors. The least these assholes can do is to not make jokes about the fact that a masseur in Kerala or a grocer in small town Uttar Pradesh doesn't speak like a loving BBC newscaster. The authors who are the most guilty of this frankly bullshit attempt at infusing humour into their tired, terrible narratives are Alexander Frater (author of the abominable Chasing the Monsoon), Pankaj Mishra (author of the superlatively lovely Butter Chicken in Ludhiana, a book that has made me determined to slap Mishra first and only then talk to him should we ever meet, differences in size notwithstanding), Paul Theroux (though he gets over this in his later books) and Mulk Raj Anand (a writer so bad that everyone in his books speaks atrocious english. Even the Britishers who are supposed to be speaking bad Hindi rendered into English.)
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Jan 5, 2010 11:49
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AstroWhale posted:Feedback I appreciate the feedback. Are the novels worth the lengthy read, and well written? I have considered reading them earlier but hesitate now, but I might persuade myself not to be an elitist rear end in a top hat and read something that just grabs my attention. If there's any chance it goes down like a Bourne movie with chocolate on the side, or better: equipped with wifebeater and cool beer, I'll go for it.
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Jan 5, 2010 13:13
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I just finished 'World War Z' and i'm currently diving into Frank Herbert's Dune... last time I tried reading it I think I was a little too young as I found it impenetrable... however, thus far I am finding to be really good - chock full of high politics in the vein of Machiavelli. It took a little while to break through the small 'wall of understanding' initially, but since then I have been unable to put it down...
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Jan 5, 2010 18:20
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rasser posted:I appreciate the feedback. Are the novels worth the lengthy read, and well written? I have considered reading them earlier but hesitate now, but I might persuade myself not to be an elitist rear end in a top hat and read something that just grabs my attention. If there's any chance it goes down like a Bourne movie with chocolate on the side, or better: equipped with wifebeater and cool beer, I'll go for it. The first book starts slowly, but the action quickly picks up.The second book is clearly the best,but in the third book you can see why the author left his money to the Swedish Communist Party,after his death.  Lisbeth is clearly the most original character in a Thriller book for quite a while, I mean a bi-sexual computer hacker who looks like a "Rock gruopie"? 
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Jan 5, 2010 18:23
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AstroWhale posted:I'm on it, thanks for input!
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Jan 5, 2010 23:38
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Just finished Letter to a Christian Nation, very insightful and to the point. I hate reading, and it was very easy to finish. Some great arguments for Abortion, Stem Cell Research, etc
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Jan 6, 2010 04:49
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Finished Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (Das Parfum) by Patrick Süskind, which is now filed under the category of "My Favorite Things Ever" on account of being utterly amazing in every way. Jean-Baptiste Grenouille is the most wonderful horrible little man. At every turn I found myself alternately astounded by his audacity or in the strangest way relating to him (which was of course more than mildly disturbing).
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Jan 6, 2010 05:08
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Just finished Underworld by Don DeLillo. It was my first DeLillo and I wasn't thrilled with it. A lot of it felt like wading through mud and even though I enjoyed the characters, I don't really feel that most of them were put to good use. However, the section about the Shot Heard Around the World is really great and was my favorite part of the whole book. Unfortunately it was the first section, so it was more-or-less downhill from there.
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Jan 6, 2010 06:46
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Skavoovee posted:Just finished Underworld by Don DeLillo. It was my first DeLillo and I wasn't thrilled with it. A lot of it felt like wading through mud and even though I enjoyed the characters, I don't really feel that most of them were put to good use. Yeah, that's Underworld for you. I like DeLillo a lot and I couldn't finish that monstrosity. Try White Noise, End Zone or Americana.
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Jan 6, 2010 16:38
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Hunger, Knut Hamsun It ended a bit anti-climatically, but then it had to end somewhere somehow. I thought the protagonist was even more hilarious than Ignatius or Holden Caufield. He can't catch a break because he actively sabotages himself at almost every turn, all the while screaming about how hard the world is. He screams and convinces himself he's going to go back and show that person what for when he's completely alone but when a confrontation is actually possible he slinks away. He harasses people just for the sake of being obnoxious. Just a horrible person all around. It really overshadowed the descriptions of being hungry to me.
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Jan 6, 2010 16:45
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I just finished reading Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. I thought it was pretty interesting; I found some of his examples used to prove his point a little hard to follow at times, but overall I thought it was a good read. I just started reading A Million Little Pieces by James Frey, even though he tends to lie.
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Jan 7, 2010 04:02
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Ballsworthy posted:Yeah, that's Underworld for you. I like DeLillo a lot and I couldn't finish that monstrosity. Try White Noise, End Zone or Americana. Yeah, I'll be picking up White Noise the next time I hit my favorite used books store. After that I'd like to spend as little as possible on him until I know I'll like it.
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Jan 7, 2010 06:37
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Just finished up The Well of Ascension: Mistborn Book 2 by Brandon Sanderson. All I can really say is "Welp, didn't see that coming." I had assumed book 3 was going to be something completely different than what it's going to be. I really like this series, and I eagerly await to get book 3 next week. Though Mr. Sanderson really should grab a thesaurus. I'm not sure if it's becuase I'm reading through audio book or not though. Longer conversations are pretty much ended with "Vin said." "Clubs said." "Saizid said". I'd like a little more variety during these times.
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Jan 7, 2010 10:40
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Ballsworthy posted:Yeah, that's Underworld for you. I like DeLillo a lot and I couldn't finish that monstrosity. Try White Noise, End Zone or Americana. I wish I'd read this a year ago when I gave up on Underworld after three tries and thought I was to blame. I'll pick up one of your recommendations later this year, now.
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Jan 7, 2010 13:51
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I made a New Year's resolution to read a bunch of the books that I have wanted to read forever, but never got round to. First up was some genre fiction: Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card. I enjoyed this a lot, and enjoyed being over-trumped by the author near the end when I smugly thought I was very clever for working something out. Yesterday it was Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby on the train to and from work. I'd kinda been putting it off for some reason, but I liked it better than I thought I would. It was a bit like if an American had got the brief for Brideshead Revisited. I suspect that not reading it until my thirties would have been less common if I were American? Now it's Mansfield Park by Jane Austen. I'm loving it already, but I knew I would: I'm a sucker for my 19th Century English and Scottish novelists.
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Jan 7, 2010 17:10
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Endie posted:Yesterday it was Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby on the train to and from work ... I suspect that not reading it until my thirties would have been less common if I were American? Probably. I read it as part of a reading assignment in the 10th grade (~16years old, which I'm sure is true for a lot of Americans), but I didn't really 'get it' as well as I would if I read it now.
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Jan 7, 2010 19:00
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Yep, I tried to read it when I was a lot younger and simply found it dull beyond words before giving up. Now I found it poignant, and the characters I thought were boringly unattractive are now brilliantly grotesque.
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Jan 7, 2010 21:24
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Just finished up Pandemonium by Daryl Gregory. It takes place in an alternate timeline, one where people get randomly possessed and have been since the 1950s or so. The majority of the book takes place "nowadays", so it isn't something weird like steampunk sci fi or aliens invaded or anything like that. Just random possessions by people that cause them to do weird poo poo. Interesting poo poo, but still weird. All in all it was an interesting read, but a little hard to follow at times. The scenes tended to jump around a bit without much warning, and sometimes that made the chapter a bit hard to follow. I have to say though, for a debut author and a fiction novel, it's a pretty decent read. I enjoyed the take on Philip K. Dick among others  . I am a sucker for paranormal books when they are fairly well written and this was one of em. Also surprisingly, there was NOT a huge amount of religion in the book. One of my pet peeves is when authors decide to become evangelical and structure the book in a way that just says LOVE JESUS AND QUIT BEING A DICK or YOUR SILLY SKY WIZARD DOESN'T EXIST. For a book about demons and whatnot, it didn't have much in the religion category.
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Jan 8, 2010 09:21
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The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand It was awesome, as are all the books of hers I have read so far. Though I must admit Atlas Shrugged was a bit more epic in scale and I liked it better, start with that.
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Jan 8, 2010 09:29
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About A Boy by Nick Hornby I’m totally in love with Hornby. It started with the movie versions of Boy and High Fidelity, then I read Fidelity and How to be Good (thought it might help). Not sure what took me so long to get around to this one but I’m glad I’ve read it. And, having done so, I’ll be keen to read still more of his work. But I almost think I want to dole them out – one a year or one per major depressive episode – just to keep from going through them too fast. Let the wisdom and joy sink in. Everyone always says this about a favorite author but he’s so incredibly insightful – his characters and their feelings and thoughts are achingly recognizable. Usually, though, when I read a smart, insightful author, I find his insights run along the lines of “people suck, society is stupid, the world is a hole and life is pointless.” While that line of thought may sort of be the implicit in Hornby’s writing he doesn’t leave you there – his books are uplifting, even affirming, without being saccharine. It’s loving magic. I would love to find other authors who pull off a trick like that. This is also now one of my favorite examples of how best to adapt a novel into a film (along with The Princess Bride). The overall themes were the same, and the plot was more or less similar until a huge divergence at the end but each one told the story utilizing the strengths of its respective medium. The film wasn’t afraid to diverge from the book so it could be a better film. One of the funniest scenes in the film isn’t in the book and, when I realized it would be absent, I was a little disappointed. On the other hand, I’ve already seen that scene  and the book’s ending was slightly more subtle and, arguably, realistic. I can see why they did what they did for the movie – and I still love it – but it’s neat to compare the two and learn what methods of storytelling best suit each version. So: funny, insightful, honest, warm, but uplifting too. All in all a fine piece of realistic fiction.
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Jan 9, 2010 01:58
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Portrait of an artist as a young man by james joyce Excellent book. Reasonably hard reading at points because of how disjointed it is. Settings change quickly without a ton of warning. Highlights were the dinner table dialogue, the description of hell by the priest, and the dialogue between Stephen and his friend at the end. Specifically the hell description was... wow. If you don't want to read the whole book at least read that.
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Jan 9, 2010 02:05
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Just finished Pirate Latitudes by Crichton. It was more of a "hey I researched how people talked and acted in the 1600's!" than an good novel. It was a decent read but didn't have the thrills and tech that I was used to from him.
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Jan 9, 2010 02:48
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Just finished (well, gave up on) When You Are Engulfed in Flames, by Sedaris. I had hoped it would offer some of the wit and originality of Me Talk Pretty One Day, which had me in stitches. Instead, I personally found the pacing slow and the wit lacking. I'd characterize that as a subjective assessment, though: others may like the work, it's probably just not the sure fire winner Me Talk Pretty One Day was.
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Jan 9, 2010 08:51
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Just finished a double shot of Gord Rollo this morning. Jigsaw Man - Pretty decent book, hell of a first novel. It has an interesting take, but honestly it got WAY hosed up pretty quick, and kinda went from zero to "What the gently caress?" in record time. The only real complaint is that he seemed not able to decide if the main villain was evil, crazy, or just whatever happened to fit the scene. Also, minor complaint, but the story didn't seem to match up with the synopsis that was on the back of the book. To me, anyway. Still an awesome first novel. Crimson - Holy poo poo. This book was awesome. The best way to describe it is, well, imagine Stephen Kings It, but good and with an ending that doesn't suck. It's not exactly top of the line fiction material, but it is pretty good. Basic premise of the storyline is "young kids wake up something evil, and boy do they pay for it". Really kept a good pace, and actually seemed like the author learned from his mistakes on the first book. The villain is a complete bastard, and never changes from that I'd recommend em to anyone who likes horror fiction. Off to start 13 Bullets 
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Jan 9, 2010 20:22
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Just finished 'Death Masks', one of the Dresden File books by Jim Butcher last night. These books aren't very highbrow, but the story is pretty fun and I can usually finish them in one or two days. I like to read a book like this in between heavier books, shall we say.
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Jan 9, 2010 22:21
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I just finished The Stardroppers(aka Listen, the Stars) by John Brunner. It's not written badly, but it's a stupid little sci-fi story. I should have read something else. It's about an agent, who goes to britain to learn about stardropping(listening to possible alien signals) and people start to disappear. He talks to a bunch of people and in the last 5 pages he learns people learned to teleport and so does he. Whoohoo. If the ending was different, it might have been alright. I think I've got bad luck with my books recently. The book I didn't finish before that was The Storm Lord, by Tanith Lee. It's a fantasy story about a half reigning race/half dumb farmer race boy, who is destined to become the storm lord(kinda like the president). I really like Tanith Lee's style. Her descriptions are short, but so colourful. And her own fantasy world isn't bad. But the protagonist... He's an impatient rapist, who brings pain over everyone who follows or is around him. Ofcourse in the book every woman adores him and he's super talented and hot poo poo. But he made a mentally underdeveloped girl his girlfriend, cheated on her and then raped her. What the gently caress. I'm not going to read the stories of rear end in a top hat McRapist. \/ I kinda doubt it, but Herr Roboto fucked around with this message at 03:15 on Jan 10, 2010 |
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Jan 10, 2010 00:47
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Herr Roboto posted:I just finished The Stardroppers(aka Listen, the Stars) by John Brunner. It's not written badly, but it's a stupid little sci-fi story. I should have read something else. 
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Jan 10, 2010 00:50
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Folderol posted:Just finished (well, gave up on) When You Are Engulfed in Flames, by Sedaris. I had hoped it would offer some of the wit and originality of Me Talk Pretty One Day, which had me in stitches. Instead, I personally found the pacing slow and the wit lacking. I'd characterize that as a subjective assessment, though: others may like the work, it's probably just not the sure fire winner Me Talk Pretty One Day was. I wonder if how much someone's enjoyment of Sedaris is related to their previous exposure to him. I read Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim first and loved it, but got a little bored with Me Talk Pretty One Day, which everyone cites as their favorite.
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Jan 10, 2010 01:25
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I just finished David Halberstam's Summer of '49 the other day. On one level, it's a really good account of the 1949 baseball season, especially the pennant race between the Red Sox and the Yankees (which went down the final game of the season). It's full of anecdotes on the major stars at the time (DiMaggio, Ted Williams, Yogi Berra), lesser-remembered athletes (Charlie Keller, Vic Raschi, Dom DiMaggio) and key members of the media. But, I'd argue, on another level, it's also about America at the time. Baseball was struggling with some of the same issues the rest of the country was: racial integration, the power and influence of television and mass media, etc. Both were on the cusps of big changes in the next few years, and this book is a good look at them right as they started to change. I'd recommend it.
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Jan 10, 2010 03:43
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