Just finished The Left Hand of God - Paul Hoffman, and didn;t really know what to think about it! Couldnt put it down but wasn't really sure why. just started Robert Jordans The Eye of The World, which I believe has 12 books to read after it! So i'm hoping I'll love them all!
That's IMO, bear in mind. I just found it so chock full of unremitting strangeness that it resembled something that Clive Barker and Neil Gaiman might produce if locked in a room full of drugs for a month. Perdido St Station and The Scar are masterworks so I'm hoping Kraken is just a blip.
The Stand by Stephen King (third read already) The Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy. Both are read in group. Wonderful to discuss what you've read.
Abridged or unabridged? I tried reading the unabridged version, and put it down after "Book 1" (maybe 360 pages or so). It was just endlessly digressive and dull. It was the first King I ever tried to read and I was not impressed.
I quite enjoyed The Shining and so purchased The Stand ebook for my iPad quite impulsively. I'm wishing I hadn't. I know the genre is horror but its incredibly bleak and extremely long winded. There are almost whole chapters I have skim read because in hadn't a clue what he was talking about. Also, why the constant barrage of new characters? I get the feeling he's a supreme show off. Also, his description of black people is quite offensive....
The issue with King is you need to accept he's not a horror writer. He couldn't write good horror to save his life. He has very limited imagination. What he enjoys writing about and what he writes about about very well are social issues - how people interact in extreme situations - but he lacks the consistent ability to construct an appropriate framework without resorting to the paranormal. The most extreme example is 'The Dome' where King simply uses this paranormal, impenetrable dome as a blunt tool to isolate a town full of people and see how they deal with conflict. For the vast majority of the book nobody even mentions the dome, they just continue with their squabbling. In the end he finds he has no idea how to explain the presence of the dome and therefore there's no satisfactory conclusion. (Not to mention that the premise is directly lifted from John Wyndam's 'Midwich Cuckoos")
I finished The Quiet Room by Lori Schiller and Amanda Bennett on Thursday. I originally didnt think I'd like it, but it was a very compelling read about a woman with schizophrenia and how it affected her, family members, friends, and doctors. Parts of the book were just repulsive and terrifying, and yet I couldnt pull myself away from the book until the end. I highly recommend this book to everyone here; it was insightful and brilliantly written.
Today I went book shopping in some charity shops, and bought Memoirs Of A Geisha for £1, and The Time Traveller's Wife for 80p! Both were books I was going to pay full price for in Waterstones, and instead paid £1.80 for both whilst simultaniously giving to charity! Who's a shopping genius? Ashleigh's a shopping genius! I've started Memoirs Of A Geisha tonight.....seems good so far!
Currently reading To Kill A Mockingbird, and also reading America: The Book (the last of which I highly recommend, absolutely hysterical--you don't need a rec to read the first, it's a classic!).
I'm reading Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov and rereading The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. Warning, Lolita will leave you feeling like you really need a shower.
I loved Lolita. I've read it twice, and it's one of my favorite books. Also, I've got a copy of Nabokov's Pnin that I'm going to start soon.
Just finished Stewart Lee's, How I Escaped My Certain Fate. If you've watched - and enjoyed - his stand-up, you'll likely love this.
Lolita is a great book Right now I am reading: 1. Clan of the Cave Bear - Jean Auel 2. A collection of A.E. van Vogt SF short stories going back to the late 1930s 3. A history of the Maya and Aztec civlizations. 4. Hunger Games 5. 2666 - Robert Bolano 6. Justine - Laurence Durrell They've each proven to be quite good.
I just finished Harry Potter and the Bible: The Menace Behind the Magick and Arguing with Idiots. I'm also working on The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest and A Storm of Swords (still...I'm taking my time with that one...). I have two more books (A Reliable Wife and Little Bee) on my "currently reading" bookshelf, but I haven't actually started them yet...
I read Lolita recently. Nabokov was a virtuoso of language. I can't say I really liked the book - it seemed like Nabokov was more interested in playing literary games for his own amusement than in telling his story. Still, it's a feast for language lovers (and I am one).
Actually, I would argue that the complex language was one way of establishing an unreliable narrator, not to play games or anything like that. There's an old thread here somewhere in which we had a great discussion about this.
Word games and patterns and puzzles are a huge part of all Nabokov's fiction; the playfulness of his language (as contrary as that sounds) is one of the reasons he is so highly regarded. Admittedly it can be a little exhausting to unravel all the games and allusions and intertextualities, but if you're willing to attempt it it's very rewarding. It's definitely the kind of book that has to be read multiple times, once just to get the story out of the way, then again and again to really get through all the layers.
i just finished reading "Moneyball"... and looking at re-reading "Christine" by Mr King, yet again for prob the dozen time...
Lots of Reading I usually have a few books on the go, so I'll see what I can remember... The book I'm reading in bed at the moment is Fire Spirit by Graham Masterton. The book I'm reading in the car while I'm waiting for the kids to finish school is Colony by Rob Grant. The book I'm reading in the loo (I have digestive problems, so unfortunately I spend quite a lot of time there!) is A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson. I also walk for 2-3 hours a day which is a perfect excuse to listen to audio books, and today I started Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett. The iPod is also use to help me go to sleep at night, and the book I use for that at the moment is Ancestor by Scott Sigler. So, funny or horror are what I'm happiest with
