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food court bailiff posted:Have you actually read the book? Because it ends with Kvothe almost getting killed by some random mook demon at his run-down lovely country tavern because of a nasty and apparently permanent case of magical erectile dysfunction. The whole point really is that no matter what heroics he's done in the past, he's completely washed up by the time the first book starts and he begins telling this huge story about himself. It goes off a cliff.
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Dec 5, 2016 18:06
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:Unfortunately she's a hack and Hundred Thousand Kingdoms at least belongs to this thread. It was her debut novel. By all accounts, she's improved a lot since then. I've seen a lot of folks who didn't like 100KK, but are really into The Broken Earth (the series starting with The Fifth Season).
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Dec 6, 2016 11:26
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The Saddest Rhino posted:... an angel who's also a van You are Miranda Leek and I claim my five pounds.
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Jan 11, 2017 03:49
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Tom Kratman is a retired US Army Lieutenant Colonel who was once Director (Rule of Law) for the US Army War College's Peacekeeping and Stability Operations Institute. He's also an open fascist whose contribution to John Ringo's Legacy of the Aldenata series was to write a book about heroic resurrected Waffen-SS fighting aliens. So reading one of his books might provide you with a useful insight into another likely member of the Trump administration, at least. 
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Feb 3, 2017 00:39
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font color sea posted:Why not post the best bit from the review: Man, those orgy researchers from Germany must have had a wild time with that one.
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Mar 31, 2017 17:10
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Rough Lobster posted:"The FootBall (also known as a pig-skin) was the freshly severed head of a swine. Everybody hosed the pig's face." Think you're mixing it up with the Eton Field Game there.
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Apr 2, 2017 17:08
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The Lone Badger posted:Split the difference between a YA novel and a comic book. Yeah, this is pretty much it. They're YA novels with illustrations.
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May 11, 2017 12:20
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Jerry Cotton posted:That metaphor limps so bad uggh ITT, we discover that goons also have strange and terrifying ideas about what codpieces are.
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May 20, 2017 21:02
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Jerry Cotton posted:The fruit bit. ... eh, close enough.
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May 20, 2017 21:04
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Powerful Two-Hander posted:'A novel', as opposed to what exactly? Were people picking it up thinking it was a dvd or something? As opposed to a history or biography, I guess. It actually crops up quite a lot in literature.
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May 30, 2017 19:36
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Powaqoatse posted:That's a bad and dumb copout unless it's later revealed that Satan has no idea about anatomy. He was probably deeply confused when Eve ate the apple with her mouth.
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Jul 22, 2017 12:34
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Clearly, none of you are aware of what a profound, devoted feminist Ernest Cline is.
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Jul 30, 2017 17:14
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there wolf posted:You can just pick different characters and scale the villain down accordingly. Or change the nature of the threat. Being a walking nuke may not be so helpful against, say, a political enemy.
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Aug 2, 2017 10:43
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I'm just surprised that RPO came out in 2011. It seems like a work from at least half a decade earlier.
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Aug 5, 2017 12:10
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Inescapable Duck posted:I'm reminded of CineD chat about Matthew Reilly, Australian author whose works is something like Tom Clancy minus the political screeds and with more Michael Bay sensibilities. The best poo poo ever when you are 14, in essence. That and he went out of his way to have the antagonists be from different backgrounds; one book is basically about people caught up in a fight between different US military branches over a superweapon. Ferretbrain had a pretty fun article (and comment-thread) about him.
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Aug 6, 2017 14:03
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And Kamen Rider.
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Aug 8, 2017 16:03
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Deadspin actually has some moderately interesting things to ssy about RPO.
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Aug 8, 2017 23:47
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FreudianSlippers posted:The only non-pretentious art form is lewd public restroom graffiti. Clearly, someone has never been to the Tate Modern. No, this isn't me cracking wise about their exhibits - the bathroom graffiti there is legit something else.
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Sep 15, 2017 12:40
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chitoryu12 posted:I've finished Handbook for Mortals. At no point does it get any better, and almost nothing of importance happens. My chyric gland swells at this news.
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Sep 21, 2017 18:28
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queserasera posted:Has there been a book like Watch on the Rhine done competently? I'm a fan of "summoning the Deep Ones to stop Cthulhu" stories and they all suck. Like eating your favorite treat not realizing it's stuffed with something disgusting and now it's running down your shirt. I assume you've read A Colder War?
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Sep 21, 2017 20:14
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hackbunny posted:Oh god we have a live one. You've missed the fact that the Chinese government supplies the Laundry with the forearms of executed prisoners as raw materials to manufacture weaponized hands of glory. Or the fact that one of the Laundry's top officers keeps the shrunken heads of traitors on his desk as balls in a Newton's cradle. Tell me where the fragility is when the process can be industrialized or performed "recreationally". It's pure masturbation on how wizards (the nerds of the fantasy world) are the coolest and greatest (incidentally a huge point of contention in D&D version 3 vs version 4) The fragility is that the nightmare scenario they're preparing for is their own powers turning against them. CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN is an apocalypse where magic becomes more powerful, more common, less safe, less easily controlled, and more likely to attract more powerful creatures from beyond, until we either blink ourselves out of existence or get eaten by something else. In keeping with Stross's particular preoccupations, it's a none-too-veiled nuclear proliferation metaphor with a side-order of global warming.
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Sep 22, 2017 11:35
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:You seem to be the easily impressed by Yu-Gi-Oh! tier antics. Banks presents none of that in any interesting form because his prose is utterly forgettable. His writing has a hint of Vancian ambition, but none of Vance's lightness, buoyancy, and cleverness. The last part is important, because Banks simply could not write anything truly clever (his ending twists are just shlock). The likely reason why the game of Azad is so vague in The Player of Games is that it freed him from the burden of actually describing some intelligent strategies. Vance in contrast managed to produce pop picaresques because he is actually able to write about clever things, and make stories where the heroes in the end have no refuge but their wits and force of will. Like in his Killing Machine, where the protagonist uses a handicrafts centre and avant-garde photography to simultaneously free himself from prison, rescue a princess, humiliate a crime lord of mythic stature, and con an interstellar blackmail organization to the point of bankruptcy. FYI, I appreciate you balancing your posts by talking about more poo poo you Ike and why it works. It makes them significantly more interesting and pleasant.
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Oct 6, 2017 20:18
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Mr. Sunshine posted:Having read nothing of RPO except this thread and a few internet takedowns, I suspect that the move will be better than the book, or at least less obnoxious. 'Cause the book seems to go "This was a Firelfly class spaceship, based on the design of the Serenity from hit TV series Firefly by cult director Joss Whedon (who, did I mention, also happens to be president of the world)" at every other turn, but in the move it's just gonna be a spaceship unless you know where it's from. Spielberg's best days are behind him, but he's a fundamentally competent, experienced director with a solid track record of improving on shaky source material (hi, Jurassic Park). I would be extremely surprised if he can match the original book's ineptitude, although he may well manage the greater crime of taking it from 'interestingly terrible' to 'tediously mediocre'. Darth Walrus has a new favorite as of 21:40 on Oct 7, 2017 |
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Oct 7, 2017 21:38
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ryonguy posted:
I don't recognise the screenshot, but I don't think I've seen or heard of a Spielberg movie that totally discards even the most basic elements of cinematography, which you'd need to do to reach the visual equivalent of Ernest Cline's writing. Like, the guy can make a bad Hollywood movie sonetimes, but it remains a bad Hollywood movie. Not, like, The Room.
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Oct 7, 2017 23:02
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Dienes posted:Have you not seen Kingdom of the Crystal Skull? I have, yeah, and it was at least functional as a movie. The writing was bad and disjointed, but they mostly knew what to do with a camera and soundtrack. You could at least generally parse what the point was supposed to be, both to individual scenes and to the movie as a whole. What I'm saying is that there's a pretty vast gap between Spielberg bad and Cline bad - one misapplied his tools, and the other doesn't even know they exist.
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Oct 7, 2017 23:11
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Wheat Loaf posted:I've read most of the Cormac McCarthy novels and they're mostly just westerns to me. There must be something more to it than the particular category you sort them into. The best and most useful definition I've found for 'literary fiction' is experimental fiction, work that tries to create new genres, to use language in new ways, et cetera. So literary sci-fi, for instance, is experimental sci-fi that makes innovative use of the medium.
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Oct 10, 2017 13:28
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If you're willing to go for molluscs in general, there's always Testimony Before an Emergency Session of The Naval Cephalopod Command. By a goon, no less.
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Oct 11, 2017 10:14
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Trauma Dog 3000 posted:or maybe I don't like communism. Trauma Dog 3000 posted:now back to literary criticism consisting mostly of spitting on people below you So literary criticism is no big deal, and we should be pretty chill about it?
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Oct 12, 2017 10:54
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Trauma Dog 3000 posted:Genocide is inevitable too, i would still consider it a pretty big deal Man, there's some kinds of edgy teen nihilism you just have to sit back from and appreciate like a fine work of art. But not, you know, critically appreciate. That would be mean.
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Oct 12, 2017 11:05
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TD3K: "The world is cruel and unjust." Also TD3K: "No, gently caress you, you can't do anything about that." Like, what's even the point of sharing that with us? Does your average grocery trip take several hours because you keep ranting at the cashier about the futility of existence?
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Oct 12, 2017 11:37
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Like, if you're just cruising for a suicide pact, McDowell already has me booked.
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Oct 12, 2017 11:55
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Wheat Loaf posted:People take hobbies - whether it's books or politics - too seriously. One is, admittedly, slightly more likely to get you killed. Especially since e-books mean collapsing bookshelves are less of a threat.
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Oct 12, 2017 12:17
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Powaqoatse posted:The Culture considers itself benevolent but they're interventionist as hell & always up in everybody's poo poo. Which is okay when it works out but then sometimes they gently caress up badly and cause gigadeaths. Whoops. And sometimes they just shrug off the brutal deaths as acceptable losses. Banks tends to make antagonists of the Culture clearly seem like they deserve an rear end-kicking... until it actually happens, and it’s just awful and needlessly sadistic and reveals that the Culture is, in many ways, no better, because bored, entitled little shits who throw lethal tantrums when you aren’t their sort of person are really awful neighbours. Darth Walrus has a new favorite as of 10:54 on Oct 19, 2017 |
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Oct 19, 2017 10:51
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Midnight Voyager posted:Things learned from english class in school: loving nothing is good when you have everyone alternate reading it out loud. NOTHING. I disagree - having a senior school class ham their way through Juliet’s argument with Papa Capulet is a lot of fun. All it takes is one person willing to inject a little enthusiasm.
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Oct 30, 2017 21:31
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The thing to remember about Wuthering Heights is that it's a horror story. An isolated rural community with one foot in the world of the supernatural has to deal with a direct manifestation (Heathcliff and his unnatural bond with Catherine), handles it extremely poorly, and pays the price. The violation of taboo is there to shock, yes, but to shock with a purpose - it reminds us that we're in an alien, hostile world now, and ordinary human social norms will not protect us. As in any horror story, there are points when we're encouraged to feel satisfaction at an ordinary, human monster getting some of what's coming to them (Hindley) and points when we're simply encouraged to feel terror and sorrow at the fate of an innocent victim (Isabella). In fact, it's actually a little more hopeful than most novels of its genre Heathcliff is, if not redeemed, at least defused by the end, and Hareton and Cathy Junior manage to put their horrific pasts behind them and begin to live healthy, happy lives together.
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Nov 5, 2017 12:31
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Inescapable Duck posted:I dunno about the supernatural element, but there's definitely something to it about cycles of abuse and Romeo and Juliet style young dumb love having horrific consequences. There’s a clear supernatural element. Apart from Cathy Senior killing herself through sheer force of will and then returning as a ghost, there’s Heathcliff himself, the ‘queer, dark little thing’ of alien emotions and alien powers. Something to understand about Wuthering Heights is that it’s a Gothic romance, and Gothic literature is basically reactive commentary on a previous genre, Romance. Basically, Romance was the pursuit of the ‘sublime’, the alien, unknowable, and transcendent, which Romantics like Wordsworth and Shelley held as the truest form of beauty. Gothic stories are more cynical - the sublime can be beautiful, but its alien incompatibility with humanity is as terrifying as it is alluring. It’s a big reason for Wuthering Heights’s multiple layers of unreliable narrators - they exist to preserve the mystery of what, exactly happened, because the sublime is not something the human mind can truly process. Even Lockwood, who literally saw a ghost, still has difficulty believing what happened by the end of the book.
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Nov 5, 2017 13:42
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Safety Biscuits posted:Gothic literature is hardly a reaction to the Romantic; it began at the same time or earlier... Yeah, I should have been more specific. The Gothic movement as a whole predates Romanticism by some distance, but the particular vein of mid-to-late-nineteenth century British Gothicism that Wuthering Heights was part of was heavily influenced by Romanticism. As for the supernatural elements, as I mentioned, keeping it vague and (mostly) otherwise explicable is just part of the genre, but there’s enough weird poo poo going on to let you know that something outside normal human experience is going on here. Heathcliff’s bizarre death-by-haunting is another example.
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Nov 6, 2017 13:43
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The purpose of the multiple unreliable narrators in Wuthering Heights is both to show that what happened was in many ways beyond human understanding (because you’ve got the literary effect of a whole bunch of people trying to wrap their brains around something inhuman) and to demonstrate that something extraordinary did happen - it’s important to note that when someone describes weird poo poo, it will be something they grudgingly acknowledge because it goes against the grain of their own biases, or they will gloss over it while making it clear to the reader that they’re mistaken to do so. It’s very much in the vein that would later be pastiched by Lovecraft’s cosmic horror - it’s clear that poo poo went down, and it’s also clear that our tiny human minds do not have the faintest chance of processing exactly what happened and why. All we know is that a strange boy named Heathcliff came into the community one day, that he formed a strange attachment with his adoptive sister, and that when he could not have her, he disappeared, came back as a mighty man of mysterious means, and destroyed said community for the insult, before dying himself by similarly mysterious means.
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Nov 7, 2017 11:54
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Arcsquad12 posted:Huh? Probably just realised she was posting on SA. No big deal.
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Nov 7, 2017 23:27
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