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Barely missed my goal last year so I'm gonna give it another shot. Name: Grizzled Patriarch Number: 40 Booklord: Hell Yeah And a Goodreads link, cause last year I got some good recommendations through goons.
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Jan 1, 2017 18:30
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| # ¿ Apr 27, 2024 07:15 |
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Someone shoot me a wildcard - preferably something that's free or cheap online since my library sucks, or something I can snag through Kindle Unlimited.
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Jan 2, 2017 03:32
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Old Story posted:Someone gimme a wild card over here. Pedro Paramo by Juan Rulfo.
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Jan 10, 2017 03:54
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Well 2666 ate up basically my entire February, but here's where I stand so far: 2666 by Roberto Bolano - (9/10): Still kind of digesting this one, but man, this is a hell of a book. I've read quite a few of Bolano's short stories, but I hadn't read Savage Detectives or any of his novellas before this, so I wasn't sure what his longer-form writing was going to be like. This book is so dense and discursive and honestly kinda ugly and apocalyptic, but I'm going to be thinking about it for a very long time, I think. Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee - (8/10): First time reading Coetzee. I was a bit worried when the initial setup looked like it was going to be the "old professor has an affair with a hot young co-ed" thing that has become sort a workshop lit. fiction joke, but the context pretty rapidly justifies itself. Strangely though, I find myself torn on some parts of this book. The writing can be beautiful at times, but the dialogue is pretty consistently wooden and it sometimes it can feel a bit *too* pointed, like it's running down a checklist. There are powerful images and important issues being discussed, but it also, in a way, seems to be holding back - there are moments that feel like appeasements, or little unearned moments of redemption. Maybe it's just me. Hell of an ending, though. Waiting for the Barbarians by J.M. Coetzee - (8.5/10): Read this one after Disgrace, and it's probably heresy to like this one a bit more, but eh. There are shades of In the Penal Colony here, as well as The Tartar Steppe. The prose is, again, a little stiff in places, though some of that is obviously intentional given the setting. An interesting look at complicity in empire - Coetzee seems to tend toward the allegorical. The Strange Library by Haruki Murakami - (7/10): I've always liked Murakami's short stories and been pretty meh about his novels. This is a really short novella, I guess, with illustrations. I actually thought it was a children's book at first, because the prose feels very stripped down, even for him, but it definitely gets pretty dark as it goes on (I guess it might still be?). A goofy but fun premise, some interesting imagery, not a whole lot of room for any characterization. Still a bit of emotional punch at the end, and it has that same dreamy quality that a lot of his stuff has, but unless you're a big Murakami fan you can very safely skip this one. Concrete Island by J.G. Ballard - (5/10): Read this on a friend's suggestion. Another case where I'd read some of the author's short stories, but never any novels. If this is representative of his longer stuff, he definitely seems better suited to short-form writing. The premise here is just sorta dumb, to the point where it seemed to be inviting some fantastical element that never appears. The prose is mostly clunky, and sometimes downright bad. The characters are largely uninteresting and the narrator is so unlikable that I honestly didn't care what happened to him, which in a story like this is pretty much untenable. This feels like a short story that he decided to pad out to novel length for no good reason - it starts out interesting enough, but it starts to drag pretty quickly, and parts of it feel repetitive, until by the end it's just a slog and at times feels almost incoherent. 1) Read some books. Set a number and go hog wild. 5/40 2) Of the books you read this year, make sure at least 20% of them are written by women. 0/8 3) Of the books you read this year, make sure at least 20% of them are written by someone non-white. 2/8 4) Read at least one book by an LGBT author. ]5) Read at least one TBB BoTM and post in the monthly thread about it. 6) Read a book someone else in the thread recommends (a wildcard!) 7) Read something that was recently published (after 1/1/2016) 9) Read something in translation. 10) Read something from somewhere you want to travel. 11) Read something political. 12) Read something historical. 12a) Read something about the First World War. 13) Read something biographical. 14) Read some poetry. 15) Read a play. 16) Read a collection of short stories. 18) Read something which was banned or censored. 19) Read a satire. 20) Read something about honour. 21) Read something about fear. 22) Read something about one (or more!) of the seven sins. 23) Read something that you love. 24) Read something from a non-human perspective. Grizzled Patriarch fucked around with this message at 06:22 on Mar 4, 2017 |
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Mar 4, 2017 05:57
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March: Numero Zero by Umberto Eco - a fun little book about a fake newspaper and conspiracies surrounding the death (or not) of Mussolini. The pacing is pretty good, which is impressive given the subject matter and the amount of exposition, and he does an admirable job of balancing tension with some of the more absurd elements. Prose was a little clunkier than usual for Eco, but if you like his other stuff you'll almost assuredly enjoy this one, too. 8/10 Human Acts by Han Kang - Went in blind, not nearly as strange as I was expecting based on The Vegetarian. Still a very interesting look into a specific moment in history that I had only the most passing familiarity with. The prose is a little odd - I think part of it is probably because the translator is from England and it shows - the book is written from multiple POVs with informal voices, and some of it will probably feel stilted or a little off to an American reader, but I'd say it's more of a quirk than a fault. There are parts that verge on being emotionally overwrought, but overall I enjoyed it quite a bit. 8.5/10 So You've Been Publicly Shamed by Jon Ronson - A pop-sci look at public shaming in the internet age that follows around a few different people who've been on the receiving end, sandwiched between reflections on what makes people do it and what kind of impact it really has. Pretty interesting, but even though it's obviously written for a layman audience, it would have been nice to dig a little deeper in places. It feels like he throws out all these little threads and then doesn't quite follow through with any of them all the way. Still a very breezy, compelling read, and Ronson has a strong voice for this kind of writing. 8/10 Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel - I thought I would like this more than I did, based on all the rave reviews I've seen for it. I dunno, it wasn't bad. The biggest issue is that the front half of the book is much stronger and more interesting in terms of characterization and actually having something interesting to say about the way we deal with loss, memory, etc. About halfway through it just kinda becomes a paint-by-numbers post-apocalyptic novel that just doesn't really do a good enough job of ratcheting up the tension or making me care about the bloated cast of characters. The end of the world just felt a bit perfunctory here, like it was an overarching symbol more than an actual living, breathing world. A lot of people were selling it as "literary post-apocalyptic fiction" and I just didn't get that from it. There are some pretty bits of prose, but also a lot of clunkiness - barely disguised exposition dumps, multiple "little did they know..." moments, so on. It was a fun page-turner, but in the end I don't think it really any prettier or more poignant than say, The Stand. 7.5/10 1) Read some books. Set a number and go hog wild. 9/40 2) Of the books you read this year, make sure at least 20% of them are written by women. 2/8 3) Of the books you read this year, make sure at least 20% of them are written by someone non-white. 3/8 4) Read at least one book by an LGBT author. 5) Read at least one TBB BoTM and post in the monthly thread about it. 6) Read a book someone else in the thread recommends (a wildcard!) 7) 9) 10) Read something from somewhere you want to travel. 11) Read something political. 12) Read something historical. 12a) Read something about the First World War. 13) Read something biographical. 14) Read some poetry. 15) Read a play. 16) Read a collection of short stories. 18) Read something which was banned or censored. 19) Read a satire. 20) Read something about honour. 21) Read something about fear. 22) Read something about one (or more!) of the seven sins. 23) Read something that you love. 24) Read something from a non-human perspective. Grizzled Patriarch fucked around with this message at 01:11 on Apr 2, 2017 |
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Apr 2, 2017 01:07
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Chamberk posted:
Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin
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May 1, 2017 08:38
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| # ¿ Apr 27, 2024 07:15 |
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Here's what I finished for April: Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders I'm pretty much the biggest Saunders mark in the world, so of course I loved this. As with most of his work, trying to summarize it just makes you sound like a crazy person. Very funny and touching, and he has a real skill for skirting situations that should feel maudlin or sappy and turning them into a gut punch instead. Not my favorite work of his, but it's still excellent and I look forward to seeing whether or not he tries to tackle a novel again at some point. Fear and Trembling by Soren Kierkegaard I have been shamefully unfamiliar with Kierkegaard aside from the broadest, vaguest strokes, so I was pretty surprised by how strong his writing voice is. The central argument and the way it places Abraham in relation to Hegel is compelling, though there are a few places where it gets kind of hard to follow his argument, and I'm not sure if that's because of the translation (it seems like there are a few places where he uses some terms almost interchangeably or without regard to their exact meaning, though that could just be a side effect of language morphing over time), and there are a few spots in the back half where the allusions get very dense and (for me, at least) pretty drat obscure. Still one of the more pleasant philosophical works to just sit down and read. End-game by Samuel Beckett I haven't read much Beckett either, but so far this is my favorite of the 4 or 5 plays I've read. His fingerprints are all over modern lit, but nobody really does it the same way he does. Kind of amazing how funny this manages to be considering just how oppressive the atmosphere and the sense of doom is. I'd love to see this performed on a stage, it seems like it would be open to some really interesting and creative visual interpretations. We Should All Be Feminists and Dear Ijeawele by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Counting these as one book since it was probably like 140 pages altogether. Adichie has a wonderful voice and clarity in her position on modern feminism, and there is a lot of nuance here. It's hard to find fault with what she is saying, and although it's sad that such qualifiers are even necessary, she manages to be uncompromising and genuine enough that it I think it would be a good primer for people who are on the fence about feminism or feel personally attacked by the concept or something. I didn't realize We Should All Be Feminists was a transcription of a TED talk until afterward, but after seeing it, I think that's probably the ideal way to take it in. I still have to get around to reading some of her fiction, but if this is an indication, I feel like I'll probably enjoy it. 1) Read some books. Set a number and go hog wild. 13/40 2) Of the books you read this year, make sure at least 20% of them are written by women. 3/8 3) Of the books you read this year, make sure at least 20% of them are written by someone non-white. 4/8 4) Read at least one book by an LGBT author. 5) Read at least one TBB BoTM and post in the monthly thread about it. 6) Read a book someone else in the thread recommends (a wildcard!) 7) 8) 9) 10) Read something from somewhere you want to travel. 11) 12) Read something historical. 12a) Read something about the First World War. 13) Read something biographical. 14) Read some poetry. 15) 16) Read a collection of short stories. 18) Read something which was banned or censored. 19) Read a satire. 20) Read something about honour. 21) 22) Read something about one (or more!) of the seven sins. 23) 24) Read something from a non-human perspective. Grizzled Patriarch fucked around with this message at 23:40 on May 7, 2017 |
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May 7, 2017 23:34
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