She republished her play, The Wife if Willesden (a retelling of Chaucer's "The Wife of Bath" tale). I have that on my desk now to read when I get the chance. I read White Teeth in college. I cant remember much about it now, just the characters and i liking it enough to stick with it
I wanted to read Discworld but I ended up watching the pt. one of The colour of magic. I thought it was innovative but I probably should have read it when I was a kid. And I enjoyed the humor.
The Tiffany Girls by Shelley Noble and The Grave Maurice by Martha Grimes. Also a variety of sources on the Ft. Mims massacre of 1813.
That the one where the woman disappeared from a horse ranch? I remember liking it. Unless that was just in the pile I grabbed from my mom and it was another book where that happened.
The book is much better than the show. Of the Discworld books put on film. Hogsfather is better than the colour of magic.
Reading Carrie like a Writer Much of the time (most?) he seems to be in Telling—doing everything through narration, but he makes it intense and vivid through a few techniques he used consistently in the first decade or two of his career. He does establish a setting through very vivid and brief description. And he uses incredibly specific details. Usually just one such detail is enough to ground the setting solidly. In the infamous shower scene at the beginning he stresses several times that every sound in the tiled shower room echoes resoundingly, but he never does it with boring standard language. It's always unexpected and powerful, sometimes verging on over-the-top. But that's sort of his thing. Check it in the Sample if you want. A lot of it is stream-of-consciousness, but unlike in much litfic, he keeps even that tight and intense rather than lengthy meandering. He works mainly through narration, but his other 'thing' is that he explores the deep dark aspects of human nature. It's often hard to pin down whose POV we're in. Sometimes we're in one, sometimes we seem to be floating between characters in what's either objective or some kind of omniscient-lite. I say that because he briefly darts into each character's thoughts or feelings, usually just for one very brief sentence, or part of one. And I mean, in one sentence we see the deep dark inner thoughts of one character, and three sentences later another character, with no transition in between. He sets out to explore the dark thoughts in everyone's soul, the ones that rise up from some inner well (the unconscious) with no volition or control on our part. And at his most overpowering he does his signature move, where a sudden thought intrudes (sick what's this sick-heat inside am I dying) in parentheses, with no capitols or punctuation, right in the middle of a sentence of surface-thought. These are the secret super-dark thoughts, the ones so intense we're afraid to even admit they're there, and we immediately pretend they aren't and try to forget them. Only in Kingworld you can't forget them, and they rise up and overwhelm you or someone close to you. He also, in these early stories, wasted no time and no words getting to the intense stuff. He often cuts people's inner thoughts off in mid-sentence, as he also does for dialogue if it's part of a crowd scene, like the shower-room sequence. All of this—the intensity, the immediacy of details of setting, and the intimate presentation of forbidden dark inner fears or impulses—make his writing almost shocking at times. Frequently. Plus he uses such non-standard techniques. I don't think he abuses adjectives and adverbs, and without checking, it seems he rarely uses them. Very direct sentences. The first thing I decided to check on, that launched me on reading it like a writer, was dialogue tags. I've been having some trouble settling between over-using said (is it really invisible, if it shows up a dozen times on a page?) and using tags many consider purple prose, like stated or mumbled. He does use said probably the most, but isn't afraid of other tags, including some that would have the Cult Of Said up in arms today. But usually he avoids tags altogether. Instead he uses mostly action beats, and with powerful verbs like startled, exploded, seethed, etc. No-one has yet ejaculated though. He also uses a lot of dirty language. People fling vulgarities, often with bizarre wording. And people frequently wax poetic, usually in dark and unsettling ways, in their thoughts and their dialogue. In ways people don't in the real world. But his stories take place in a heightened world where everyone is ultra-focused on these frightening inner ideas and fears. It somehow feels right in his world, largely because he has the skills/talent to make it work and make you like it. If you're able to do that, then anything goes. That's always been one of my main principles—learn the rules, but feel free to break them if you can make it work. If you can't then keep studying and messing around, but in your stories you'll need to follow the rules until you find acceptable ways to break them. Or, as in King's case, execptional ways.
I finished The Tiffany Girls by Shelley Noble. The peeks inside the workings Tiffany's glassworks and the early struggles of female political cartoonists were interesting, and the writing was pretty decent, but I felt cheated by the ending. I don't object to happy endings per se, but I do object to "and they all lived happily ever after" wrap ups that can be seen coming for a dozen chapters. This one is going to the Friends of the Library book sale instead of onto my shelves for a rereading.
After seeing the movie "Unbroken" I picked up the book. Even at two hours, long for modern movies, the movie was a cliff notes version of an incredible man's life. From wild youth, to Olympic track star. To bomber on an army aircraft in the pacific in WWII. To around forty days adrift in a lifeboat in the pacific, a survival record for the time. To Japanese POW at the same camp as Pappy Boyington. This story reminds you of what humans can achieve, and endure.
Un Lun Dun by China Mieville. He's a great writer, but I didn't know that this skewed hard on the younger side of YA so it's not really what I was after. Still okay, but I need some more red meat after this.
You could read The Jungle by Sinclair Lewis. That should... do something for your desire for red meat.
Reading through Mark Edward Lewis' series about Imperial Chinese history. I figured that it would be good for me to have a basic grasp on Chinese history.
Ugh. Duh. Yes, I mean Upton Sinclair. Another brain cell dead along the way without my noticing it was gone.
I always mix up those two. It's so easy to do. I read "Babbit" by Upton Sinclair (or was in Sinclair Lewis?). It was pretty good. Reminded me of Updike's "Rabbit" books but with the hedonism subdued. Practically the same plot from a more polite time. Well, as polite as mid-life infidelities can get, I guess. edit: See? It was Sinclair Lewis, haha. I really did mess that up and I was even thinking about the choice.
Just finished reading My Life as Author and Editor by H.L. Mencken, a book I seemed to have carried around unread for 20 or so years. A fascinating insider view of the American literary scene of the 1920s and '30s. He had stroke in 1948 that left him unable to write for the rest of his life, so his views of the '40s are mostly lost. And he does talk about Sinclair Lewis . . . or was it Upton Sinclair?
I can't recall which one, seriously and can't be bothered to go back and look, even though the book is indexed.
I have been rereading Tolkien, and have to say the man invented a new genre. I would describe it as musical fantasy. Most of the songs don't seem to add to the song, or relevant back story.
One of the reasons I dislike Tolkien is the never ending stream of inconsequential poetry. I want to like Tolkien. I've tried to like Tolkien since I was in the seventh grade and everyone else was adoring Tolkien. But I don't like Tolkien.
I love that stuff. For me it adds enormous depth and pathos. And Glenn Yarbrough did a great job with some of these songs for the Rankin-Bass productions, e.g.
It helps to understand Tolkien wrote melieu, which is all about a strange place and/or the customs and mores of that place. Including their songs and poetry. If you come to it looking for development of plot or character you'll be sorely disppointed. Melieu was pretty common at one time as I understand it.
I appreciate the insight, Xoic. Abandonment of plot or character development in favor of melieu might indeed put me off.
