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Sphinx posted:Has anyone bought books published by Dover Thrift Editions? Their books are very cheap, ranging from around $2 to $5 depending on if they are giant versions. I've read that the paper and binding is of poor quality. Would I only get about one sitting out of these books before they fall apart or is that an exaggeration? No, they're not that fragile, though they are low quality. If you're incredibly hard on your books, it could be an issue, but they are so thin that you have to really throw them around for that. The biggest issue with them is that the font is pretty small. The paper quality is sort of similar to a really thick or high quality newspaper, so it's definitely cheaper than most book paper, but then I still have some of my copies which managed to survive copious highlighting and annotating and being a teenager at them. I wouldn't necessarily recommend them for translated works as they can be a bit poor, but if you just want to read some books for cheap, they're not bad.
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# ¿ Jan 17, 2014 01:32 |
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# ¿ May 8, 2024 04:43 |
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In a lot of ways, it can be really useful to have some kind of historical/cultural grounding in many of these books because having a better understanding of the setting or time period or author's life/biases etc can make for a better reading. It's when they also throw in a lot of the literary criticism and interpretation stuff that it can really ruin it. Though some introductions are so very biased and fluffy, it's like reading a school book report.
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# ¿ Jan 21, 2014 01:13 |
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It's always a bit weird to see deckle edging on modern books. It often seems to be used to make books seem a bit more 'serious' and literary since the edge is mechanically reproducing an unavoidable effect of older papermaking. Here's a bit more about it.
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# ¿ Feb 26, 2014 01:22 |
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Joramun posted:They specify it because it's a selling point, not a deterrent. It's sort of both. It's mostly used as a selling point, but then there are also people who will complain or return a book because they think they were sent a poor quality copy and that something is wrong with the pages.
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# ¿ Feb 26, 2014 18:17 |
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The trouble is, these local bookshops in the Shire are often small, specialised, and don't have a very large or comprehensive selection of books. If you want basic airplane fodder or local authors, you're grand. Otherwise, you're often out of luck.
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# ¿ Dec 30, 2014 23:30 |
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Hedrigall posted:Grrmge GRRM GRRM Grrmtin's livejournal has quite a lot about it: http://grrm.livejournal.com/tag/hugo%20awards I have no idea what that is talking about but it contained the words 'Puppygate' and 'The Hugo War' so I know it's bad
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# ¿ Apr 26, 2015 15:27 |
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blue squares posted:This like the time I read War and Peace for 8 hours and my hand cramped so bad I couldn't go fishing. That is just not a sentence I would have ever imagined reading.
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# ¿ Jul 8, 2015 15:47 |
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TV Zombie posted:Getting through Patrick Rothfuss' second book of his King Killer trilogy: A Wise Man's Fear and it was just a slog to get through. It definitely didn't feel as brisk as the first book and I hated how the protagonist went on two detours from his original quest. Just felt like it made the book longer than it needed to be. I could barely put the first one down, but I've been struggling to finish the second for months. I feel bad as a friend gave it to me as a gift, but I keep looking at it and then putting it down in favour of a different book. So far it feels very same-y
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# ¿ Jul 14, 2015 21:56 |
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Franchescanado posted:Not really. I usually buy physical books every few weeks, and usually buy used if possible. I get a kindle book if it's ridiculously cheap or on sale. Maybe they're trying to encourage you to buy more then. I didn't get one and I buy kindle books semi-regularly.
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# ¿ Aug 16, 2015 14:06 |
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Our brains also process on-screen text in a different manner to printed text, and we read and remember things differently depending on whether it's a physical book or something digital http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/reading-paper-screens/
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# ¿ Aug 17, 2015 17:55 |
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Twitter is this weird place where we pretend that the random thought vomit of famous people is somehow different and better than a random person's, so anytime someone famous types 140 letters insulting Taylor Swift, it is a serious news story.
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# ¿ Aug 18, 2015 16:08 |
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Now I sort of want to order pizza in order to pose math riddles, like asking them to slice it into seven pieces using only 3 cuts. Probably would just result in eating spit pizza though.
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# ¿ Aug 22, 2015 03:16 |
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"Australia" is all you ever really need to explain something weird.
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# ¿ Oct 29, 2015 23:16 |
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boom boom boom posted:I started reading How The White Trash Zombie Got Her Groove Back. Those are all words, and I'm sure they probably form coherent thoughts, but this post reminded me of when my coworkers suddenly start talking about the latest Coronation Street episode.
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# ¿ Nov 21, 2015 18:10 |
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Did you ever find that book you were looking for where the main character and his numerous descendants had a strange colour of pee?
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# ¿ Nov 22, 2015 01:48 |
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For Whom the Bell Never Tolls
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# ¿ Jan 4, 2016 20:02 |
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Esme posted:This is a very goony/"college dorm" suggestion and I wouldn't blame you for scoffing, but I really like a small string of Christmas lights for nighttime reading. It's bright enough to see clearly, but soft and unfocused enough that it doesn't keep me from getting sleepy. You must have really good eyes or really bright Christmas lights. I love the glow of Christmas lights, but I would really strain my eyes trying to read by it. The amount of light you need to read by slowly increases as you age, though. That said, having a small bright light in an otherwise dark room is really hard on your eyes. When your eyes drift off the page even for half a second (which they do frequently), they will start to dilate because everything else is so dark. Then your eyes flick back to the brightly lit page and your pupils constrict again. It's pretty tiring on the eyes. Sharp contrast between small, bright, focused lighting and darkness is really hard on your eyes, which is why using your phone or computer in the dark is really tiring as well. I don't have any specific lamp recommendations since that would depend on what stores are nearby, but the best kind of reading light is something that sits behind and slightly above you and is filtered in some way by opaque glass or a shade etc (ie not a naked bulb in your line of sight). Really bright light on white pages creates a bit of a glare that also puts a strain on your eyes, so brighter isn't always better. There are ones that you can mount on the wall behind you which shine down soft light, which is the general type I would recommend.
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# ¿ Jan 5, 2016 11:58 |
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I like talking about books because reading feels like getting to exist in a different world, and I want others to be there too.
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# ¿ Jan 6, 2016 15:13 |
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Franchescanado posted:Is Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank dystopian or post-apocalyptic? It's a post-apocalyptic novel, or more accurately an apocalyptic novel I suppose as it takes place during an apocalyptic nuclear war that destroys the first world.
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# ¿ Jan 17, 2016 23:07 |
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I think the last bookmark I used was some kind of glittery rainbow monstrosity covered in unicorns. Picking out bookmarks as a kid was almost as much fun as picking out books.
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# ¿ Feb 6, 2016 00:14 |
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Instant ramen is made out of the processed pulp of the books leftover from library and yard sales.
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# ¿ Mar 27, 2016 16:29 |
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A human heart posted:is talking about a book really that hard man Reading books is hard, man. Now you want to talk about them too?
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# ¿ May 28, 2016 22:44 |
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Going from really poor and completely unknown to mega rich and a household name based on your ability to make things up would drive most people nuts.
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# ¿ Jun 11, 2016 18:10 |
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Embassytown is a dense read but really interesting, especially if you like exploring linguistics and meaning in language.
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# ¿ Jul 1, 2016 20:22 |
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I am not sure how long these books/chapters are or how much you are planning on cutting out/summarising, but I would consider including more than a sentence or two at a time, unless a particular sentence is really noteworthy and deserves in-depth explanation on its own. It's a bit hard to go from reading a sentence of the book to reading a sentence of analysis to reading a sentence of a book to reading analysis, etc. It's hard to get into a flow of either, though maybe that is an inherent feature of let's play type things. I have never done any kind of let's read, so take this as random advice from someone who knows nothing about the subject. It sounds interesting though and not too academic. I might check it out whenever you do it as I'm generally too much of a baby to ever read horror.
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# ¿ Jul 9, 2016 20:53 |
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Yeah I was thinking that maybe if you had combined the two quotes you posted into one, it would be a good length to get a feel for the style and narrative flow, then to be followed by your analysis and comments. However, that's just my random internet opinion. Horror stories often try to evoke a certain kind of atmosphere/tension, which I think might be a bit lost if it's broken up too much. I haven't read the books though so don't know how true that would be here. You can experiment and do shorter quotes for bits that aren't very tense/atmospheric maybe and do longer passages where that is important.
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# ¿ Jul 9, 2016 21:54 |
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William Stoner posted:Does anyone find that having a long to-read list overwhelms them? Or that access to audiobooks distracts from reading? I joined the goon book lord challenge this year, and it has both helped motivate me to read more and also gotten me to branch out of the sci-fi/fantasy rut I'd fallen into. I'm still reading slower than I'd like and slower than I used to a few years ago, but I'm getting through ~3 books a month now, compared to last year where I read maybe 5 total. Even if you decide you're going to spend 15 minutes reading before doing anything else helps because you get into a story then.
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# ¿ Jul 25, 2016 14:23 |
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Middlesex was pretty good, but I don't think I would call it one of the best novels of the century (which is a really dumb concept when we're only 16 years in) Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is a great author.
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# ¿ Jul 31, 2016 22:50 |
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ulvir posted:what book did you pick for BOTM hieronymous? Poll for BOTM: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=3785106
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# ¿ Aug 1, 2016 11:51 |
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That sounds terrible in an amazing way. I don't want to read it, but I want you to keep reading it and posting goofy lines and summaries.
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# ¿ Oct 20, 2016 18:57 |
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Is this all in the one book? Please draw a comic of Jack's Forbidden Door being opened.
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# ¿ Oct 20, 2016 23:38 |
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UWBW posted:Killing Floor Update: I guess Jack Reacher probably has super strength of something, but getting 5 dead bodies into a wheelbarrow (what kind of giant wheelbarrow fits 5 adult men?) and then stuffing them into a car is a pretty insane and lengthy ordeal. corn in the bible posted:i have read a couple jack reacher books because i was stuck in an airport for 20 hours. the finniest moment was when one villain used jack's impossible bullshit height against him by fighting inside a room with low ceilings That is amazing. Even the villains manage to find ways to compliment him in a backhanded way.
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# ¿ Oct 25, 2016 21:12 |
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What a thriller
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# ¿ Nov 2, 2016 10:11 |
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corn in the bible posted:That's really how the book describes the tiny rooms Jack Reacher has to fight tiny Mexican guy in, yes. Part of me can't believe that's a real quote. The other part of me wants to believe.
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# ¿ Nov 3, 2016 00:55 |
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So is Jack Reacher supposed to be an awesome badass or a complete buffoon? He seems to be amazing at killing people and terrible at normal human things like walking.
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# ¿ Nov 3, 2016 13:03 |
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Go to your local library or to a cafe. Leave your phone behind. Once you get drawn into a story, you will want to keep reading it.
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# ¿ Feb 3, 2017 22:45 |
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what the gently caress is up with this supposed nobel literature not even having decent world building
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# ¿ Mar 17, 2017 19:23 |
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I'm hemidemisemi-feminist and semihemidemisemi-Cherokee.
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# ¿ Mar 18, 2017 00:00 |
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But it's disturbing that professors can force you to read books and take away our sacred right to DNF
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# ¿ Mar 18, 2017 01:36 |
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# ¿ May 8, 2024 04:43 |
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I know this has been asked before, but which translation of War and Peace would book goons recommend?
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# ¿ May 27, 2017 23:54 |