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Hey, I just found this thread and I have a contribution to make. Sorry if it's been mentioned before. It's Cybermancy by Kelly McCullough, and I picked it up at a thrift store for fifty cents. It has a gloriously awful tagline: "Hades has a hell of a firewall." It's about a hacker/mage named Ravirn (his name was actually Raven but his grandmothers, The Fates, took that name from him when he did something bad, probably in the book this one is a sequel to - it's called WebMage but I haven't looked for it too hard), in a world where hacking and magic and Greek myths are all blended together in some kind of modern fantasy. I'll just quote from the back of the book:quote:Magic has gone digital in the twenty-first century, and Ravirn is a sorcerer with a laptop - otherwise known as his shape-changing best friend. There was one bit that I thought was kind of neat (still awful, but less so than playing cards with the three-headed hound who guards the underworld), and it's when he's in Hades, sneaking around the offices of the damned or something, and gets spooked by someone following him. Then a nearby computer lights up and a chat program starts sending him messages. It's Persephone, and she communicates through IM because her voice is too much for mortals (or near-mortals or whatever the gently caress Ravirn is) to bear. Ravirn begs her to say something to him, and she eventually relents and does so, and he immediately gets super-depressed and nearly suicidal because of it. I thought it was one of the few times the character actually seems like he's in trouble. Every other time, he's just cocky and sure that all of his unstated backup plans will work out (and they usually do). Of course, he gets out of that situation too, and soon returns to being a cocky rear end in a top hat. I haven't finished the book, or even picked it up in a few months, but when I found this thread, I remembered it and thought it was perfect for you goons. I'm hoping at least one of you has either heard of or read this book (or the previous one).
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Sep 19, 2017 22:03
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Zore posted:Oh yeah, I read both and the 2 or 3 sequels. There's some prime poo poo in there like; So I'm probably better off not finishing this or trying to find the others then, got it. I don't remember Cerice being his cousin, unless it just isn't brought up in Cybermancy. And as far as Raven's web-goblin thing, I actually wanted to kind of like that little dude, mostly because he seemed to like taunting Raven, the super-cool never-lose hero of everything ever, and those kind of characters should always have other characters making GBS threads on them. I got the book because it looked like dumb fun - cyberpunk but with Greek mythology! But Raven is just such a never-do-wrong 'antihero' (because he swears and is running away from his Fate to be a magic hacker and... help his girlfriend with her dissertation?) that I disliked him immediately, and wanted him to fail at every opportunity. Probably not what the author intended. My bookmark is about a third of the way through the book, and looking back a few pages to figure out what was going on, Raven and Cerice are equipping items before they leave for a mission to go visit the... Fates, maybe? Someone that Cerice wants to dress fancy for. And, well... okay, here: quote:"All the usual pomp and circumstance," I said, referring to my late family's fixation on the proper protocols and fancy dress. I guess I should be glad that it's only really wordy descriptions of Greek mythology Shadowrun rather than some of the other things that showed up in this thread. I mean, he's got Kevlar AND a matching helmet! Fifty Farts has a new favorite as of 00:03 on Sep 20, 2017 |
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Sep 20, 2017 00:01
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Ambitious Spider posted:I read all those books as a kid and loved them so much. I should see if i can dig them all up again. I had a few of those books, and I also liked them a lot. The only title I can remember, though, is "The Dark Secret of Weatherend," (but nothing about the actual story, other than "there was a big storm"). Looking it up, my memory was correct about the title, and somehow I forgot that the big storm hits Minnesota (where most of the story takes place) and northern Wisconsin (I lived in Green Bay as a kid, but it was still neat reading about cities/towns that I knew the names of).
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Feb 22, 2018 04:29
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I work at a thrift store taking in donations, so I see a lot of bad books. The usual suspects: Tom Clancy, Danielle Steele, Dean Koontz, you know. I haven't seen any copies of the infamous Wild Animus yet, but I'm sure it'll show up one day. There are also some good things - I got a book of zombie short stories published in the 80s, I think. It's sitting in my little desk drawer waiting for a rainy day when I don't want to fill up adult coloring books (I have a pile of like 15 of them because my manager keeps bringing them down for me when she sees one). I also have The Roswell Report: Case Closed, by Headquarters of the United States Air Force, but I don't know if that belongs here either. Anyway, this isn't really an awful book. It's more of a "dumb joke that I still find funny" book, but I don't know where else to put it. I saved something from being thrown away by the little old ladies who sort through our books before they go into the store. I give you Farts: A Spotter's Guide:  It's very tongue-in-cheek (  ), and the "still a 12-year-old" part of me loves it, but it's also the dumbest thing ever. I'm happy for the guy whose pitch ws "it's a book about farts, and we'll have buttons to play different fart sounds," and the answer was "Yes!" I had to buy new batteries for the sound board, but it was worth it. The introductory first page is a long-winded () joke about how the author's cataloguing of flatulence is just as valid as anything else, by making references involving famous naturalists (and farts). It's only about 10 or 11 cardboard pages, each full-page illustration is dedicated to one of the 10 types of farts on the sound board, with little factoids along the sides. This is the first paragraph:Farts posted:Aristotle, the world's first naturalist, passed gas. And Linnaeus must have eaten too much Solanum melongena (a.k.a. eggplant) while working through some late night taxonomical riddle, only to spend the following morning tooting in Latin. And, of course, with Captain FitzRoy's cooking on the HMS Beagle, Darwin surely broke wind like a maritime gale while chasing his finches around the Galapagos. And yet there is no evidence that these scions of natural history ever considered researching a dichotomous key separating the Flight of the Buttock Bees from the Sleeping Dog. The last sentence is talking about different types of farts he's named in the book. I can take more pictures if people are interested. I've never typed the word "fart" this much in my life.
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Jul 14, 2023 02:28
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IshmaelZarkov posted:I can honestly say I would very much like that, and - if you have it in your heart to do so, kind goon - I would love a video of a dramatic reading. There's absolutely no chance of a dramatic reading, but I'll take some pictures. Sorry about the glare on some of them. Introduction:  1:  4, 5, 8, 10 I don't want to post the whole book, but maybe I'll try to record some of the fart sounds at some point. However, I'm easily distracted and Jagged Alliance 3 comes out tomorrow, so it probably won't be soon, if ever. Fifty Farts has a new favorite as of 04:33 on Jul 14, 2023 |
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Jul 14, 2023 04:06
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LITERALLY A BIRD posted:Belated hi back, Sam! I did leave for a while; life got a little busy and between that and that one unpleasant ex-goon that started harassing me in 2020 I took a forums break. Life has gotten less busy, and I missed my community, and that person remains fixated on me regardless of whether I have an online presence or not, so I have been venturing back in a bit recently I did say that it was more of a dumb and funny book than a bad one and i didn't see a thread for books that 13-year-old me would think are hilarious and awesome. Fart book is good, not terrible. Also wb, bird. 
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Jul 24, 2023 19:32
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A few months ago, I posted about a fart book for kids with a so0undboard, because it was stupid and funny. Today I rescued another bit of fart-themed media from the dumpster. It's a deck of playing cards (they include two extra farts to make a full deck), not a book, but it inspired me to change my username and avatar. I know I'm running the risk of becoming known as "that fart goon" (especially with the username), but that's, like, a third of all goons anyway; I'm just being honest about it. Besides, I don't think I can top the lactose-intolerant goon who refused to give up cheese and cleared out his office (if I remember the story correctly). If anyone's interested in "scholarly" fart jokes, I can probably get some pictures tomorrow (there was a big line at the checkout counter when I was leaving, so I decided to buy it tomorrow). Here's the full box art for the deck of cards that I cropped for the avatar:  "Peer-reviewed" makes me picture a bunch of old dudes sitting around literally sniffing each other's farts. Fifty Farts has a new favorite as of 20:07 on Oct 25, 2023 |
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Oct 19, 2023 23:43
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Captain Hygiene posted:Amazing, more fart related content please That's quite a username-post combo. Also, I like to think that you've been refreshing this thread all day waiting for more fart-centric posting. Wait no more, fart-friend. I'm here to deliver! Tree Bucket posted:Friend, you've come to the right place. Hey, that's my line! -- As promised/requested/threatened, here are some cards from the Fifty Farts deck. Again, apologies about the glare/focus on some of these; I just laid them out and took pictures so I could post this as soon as possible. The back of the cards are pretty simple:  Aces:     Kings:   (the first part there that's covered with a glare says "n: sonorous")   Sorry, but I haven't looked closely enough to see if there are any repeats (it's called "Fifty Farts" but the box says there are two "extra" farts included to make a full deck). I salute the brave researchers who catalogued and classified all the types of farts. I bet a similar project but about burps would be much more difficult since there aren't as many types. In conclusion: Farts. 
Fifty Farts has a new favorite as of 20:07 on Oct 25, 2023 |
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Oct 21, 2023 00:05
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Okay, one more and then I'm done. At least until I make a thread for the rest of the deck.
Fifty Farts has a new favorite as of 20:08 on Oct 25, 2023 |
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Oct 21, 2023 03:19
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Captain Hygiene posted:PYF terrible book: see also MUSICAL FRUIT As much as I appreciate your enthusiasm for the subject, I think the thread title should be related to actual books, not joke playing cards. edit: I nominate "PYF Terrible Book: All about merkins" from Unkempt's post about Maledicta a few pages back. edit 2: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?noseen=1&threadid=4045326&pagenumber=1&perpage=40#post535411355 I made a thread to post more cards in to end the fart-digression in this one
Fifty Farts has a new favorite as of 04:48 on Oct 21, 2023 |
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Oct 21, 2023 03:48
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Carthag Tuek posted:is the woman on the cover supposed to look disdainful? She looks like somebody just told her the name of the book and she can't bother to hide her disappointment.
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Dec 28, 2023 23:26
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