Books Part V, featuring Benny Profane and the Whole Sick Crew

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When I was a kid I used to be scared off by books that were over 300 pages because I thought they would take me forever to read. The lengthier novels that I read at the time had taken me forever to read, but then I read some books over that particular page count that I actually liked, and realized that the number of pages has far less to do with the amount of time I'll spend reading it. Much more a factor is how much I like the book, and how easy it is to get into the story/hard it is to put down. Given that a large portion of the novels I've read lately are part of trilogies, I'm not so much intimidated by 1000 page books when I know I'm coming up on that number after the series is over. The only real downside in my mind now is small, thick paperbacks that are hard to hold open without wrecking the spine and beating them up some.
 
I'm trying to think of 1,000+ page novels I've read or tried to read. I don't remember The Witching Hour being that long, but I loved that sucker.

I tried reading a historical novel about Sacagajewa because I remember my mom reading it when I was little, and barely got 100 pages into it. That was a long sucker.

Infinite Jest continues to languish on my bookshelf and on my Kindle.
 
I'm trying to think of 1,000+ page novels I've read or tried to read. I don't remember The Witching Hour being that long, but I loved that sucker.

I tried reading a historical novel about Sacagajewa because I remember my mom reading it when I was little, and barely got 100 pages into it. That was a long sucker.

Infinite Jest continues to languish on my bookshelf and on my Kindle.

The Stand or It? Not sure if they're 1,000 but they're long and were widely read.
 
:wave: just dropping in

Hopefully in a few months my life will be more balanced and can try reading more books again.... mostly i read my "touchstone" books.

Infinite Jest, cori? :lol: NOT laughting at you at all, it was sort of I "recognized" it once you said it ....as one of those around 1,000 page books.

I first thought of Gravity's Rainbow.

huh...one or 2 more are scincillating at the edge of my conciousness.... probably from the years I was buying the Sunday NY Times and reading The Book Review section (among other things)!

I suppose running through the Trilogy of Lord Of the Rings at 12 yrs doesn't count. :lol:


On a different note i think i might have mentioned him before SF author David Brin's>
The Uplift Universe books: 1 stand alone (earlier in the "history"); 2 that are sort of stand alone but occur in same time period and events reference and sometimes effect each other in the 2 books; and the "latest" (as in he plans to return to that universe...) 3 are a definate trilogy.

The worlds/Civilization and universe he creates is mind-bending and time-spanning. Serious science (he's a physisist) fascinating sapients with full personalities, same for his humans, lots of humur too. The Uplift concept is no space-faring species gets that way alone. Some other race has "uplifted" them: patrons and clients.

Except no one knows who uplifted us Earth/Terrans. We insist we did it ourselves. We escappe being clients because we have our own clients: the neo-dolphns annd neo-chimps.

I highly reccomend it!
We are :waiting: for the next piece of the puzzle!

PS:
Googling (images) for what i think were the original Covers paperback releases for SK's "Dark Tower" series.
 
Aha! Mystery solved! Unexpectedly.

Found several opf the (SK's) The Dark Tower series covers doneby Michael Whelan-- triggered by talk of The Stand. A great cover illo by an artist who knows enough about the book to either create an overview piece
or a well-realized major event from the book that will stay with me to I did recognize several covers when i saw them. BUT....

...there was one i could not find at all. Dawned on me that maaaaybe it was because it was th same artist, different author!
That is... the 4(?) book series by Tad William's called Otherland.

Three of the covers i remembered as part of being in that series were there; and the one I thought was with TDT was with this series instead.

The book is OL: Moutain of Black Glass.
Now I see why I mixed them up! Pretty much way in the the background with only the sky behind it was a tall dark "Tower". That was cool initself
though it was not the same outline (relooking more closely) of the other tower in TDT illos MW did.

It's everything in front of the tower that forms this amazing cover!
:love::drool::love:

Anyway if anyone has read either The Dark Tower Series, or the Otherland series please post your experience! :)
 
You know what I haven't read that's +1000 pages? War and Peace. I've red parts of it in English, parts of it in Russian, but never have I or will I ever read that entire book. I hate Tolstoy.
 
Well I think I was mostly talking about loooooong books, didn't have to necessarily be 1,000 pages......oh, and I do agree that schlepping huge books around sucks but that's the price of literacy, capitalism, freedom and justice.
 
Speaking of long books, I caught a reference to a novel that piqued my interest, so I got a used copy off Amazon for $5 or so. It's called 2666 and the author is Chilean writer Roberto Bolaño. Apparently he has a fairly well-known work called The Savage Detectives but I'm not familiar with it.

He was very ill when finishing this masterwork and died before it was technically "completed" in terms of polishing and rewrites. It's divided into five parts (which he had intended to be published separately) and runs close to 900 pages.

I'm excited to plow through this one. Will report back.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2666_(novel)
 
Speaking of long books, I caught a reference to a novel that piqued my interest, so I got a used copy off Amazon for $5 or so. It's called 2666 and the author is Chilean writer Roberto Bolaño. Apparently he has a fairly well-known work called The Savage Detectives but I'm not familiar with it.

He was very ill when finishing this masterwork and died before it was technically "completed" in terms of polishing and rewrites. It's divided into five parts (which he had intended to be published separately) and runs close to 900 pages.

I'm excited to plow through this one. Will report back.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2666_(novel)

Looks interesting.
 
Which 1000 page books have you read and found unworthy? And if the answer is "none" then this is a silly conversation. To each their own of course, but yeah, this just makes zero sense to me.

I wanted to read Haruki Murakami's IQ84 but a few I know who read it didn't think it was that great, just OK. However, I'm still intrigued by it and not because its very long. I may read it.

Cori - the copy of The Witching Hour that I read was a pocket size, so that's why it was 1000 pages. If it wasn't, it had to be very close to it.
 
Speaking of long books, I caught a reference to a novel that piqued my interest, so I got a used copy off Amazon for $5 or so. It's called 2666 and the author is Chilean writer Roberto Bolaño. Apparently he has a fairly well-known work called The Savage Detectives but I'm not familiar with it.

He was very ill when finishing this masterwork and died before it was technically "completed" in terms of polishing and rewrites. It's divided into five parts (which he had intended to be published separately) and runs close to 900 pages.

I'm excited to plow through this one. Will report back.


Bolaño is fantástico! I read The Savage Detectives (LOVED) and some of his essays, and have been staring at 2666 on my bookshelf for nearly three years waiting for a chunk of time when I can focus on it. Maybe later this summer.
 
"the Da Vinci Code" or "Death and the Compass"? Which is the better read? Whaddaya think, eh?

I think that the writer of the DVC, Dan Brown, has practically inexhaustible contempt for the intelligence of his readership, hence this shoddily written crap masquerading as a book. Which has been at the top of the bestseller list for 453 years.

On the other hand, Jose Luis Borges is a very well respected writer who has a (relatively) small, but intelligent, loyal readership throughout the world. No competition, really.
 
If you like unimaginative, predictable storytelling and overall pedestrian, dull writing, Dan Brown is the author for you. Why even consider reading it when you know this already?
 
I just wanted to see what all the fuss was about. I think I can see myself finally reading 50 Shades Of Grey for the same reason despite me promising in this thread that I wouldn't read it. Erotica is a bit of a naughty/guilty pleasure for me. There's quite a lot of fan fiction of it online.

Did you hear that Bono's daughter Eve was in the running to play Anastasia Steele in the film adaptation?
 
I've been reading a lot of young adult fiction lately because I like to be able to recommend books to the teens who come into the library. I never want to be the young person's librarian who doesn't know anything about young people.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

Light the sixth and final book in the Gone Series by Michael Grant

Trinkets by Kristen Smith

Now I am trying to finish Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins


However, I do three story times a week so I read more picture books than anything else.
 
I just wanted to see what all the fuss was about. I think I can see myself finally reading 50 Shades Of Grey for the same reason despite me promising in this thread that I wouldn't read it. Erotica is a bit of a naughty/guilty pleasure for me. There's quite a lot of fan fiction of it online.

Did you hear that Bono's daughter Eve was in the running to play Anastasia Steele in the film adaptation?

She better not. I hope she has enough sense to stay away from that horrible story just like Emma Watson is.
 
Well, it's only a rumour, and even if it was true can you imagine the audition list? It will be as long as your arm. Acting is a very tough business. I remember reading that she auditioned as Alice in Tim Burton's version of Alice In Wonderland, I saw that at the cinema.

I take it 50 Shades be erotica as I believe a story. I googled to see the difference from Erotic film and pornography, and according to wikipedia the difference is that erotic drama's and thrillers contain a plot.

There are much better erotic books than 50 Shades. It's not even supposed to be that exciting/arousing.
 
I read Great Gatsby in case I actually wanted to see the movie, which I don't really want to do anymore after reading the reviews...

Great book, but I gotta say, Nick's a boring character. I'm whatever about him. The positive is that he's the voice of Fitzgerald, whose prose is out of this world. I mean, let's face it, nothing about the plot here is that shocking or incredible, it's all about the writing itself. The last page or two was fucking unbelievable, especially the last paragraph.

Gatsby is a great character. I was stunned by how unpretentious and sweet he was, and his constantly shifting life story was highly entertaining to follow. It was easy to cheer for him, even when he had his douchey moments.

I really dug the book. It was a brilliantly written if silly soap opera with a knowing "look at these shallow pieces of shit they're everything wrong with America" subtext to it that wasn't painfully obvious or anything. It was there and I nodded along whenever it was alluded to, but it wasn't intrusive. I could enjoy it as social commentary or for the simple entertainment value of watching a bunch of rich douchebags squabble and fuck each other to oblivion.
 
Then you should hope for all their sakes that those 14 or 15 do not besmirch their names by even thinking of being in that shit-show.
 
I read The Great Gatsby in college and I really don't remember much about it, except something about a light in the distance and rich people having parties. It was one of those vague stories that drifted through my brain like a vapor and was quickly forgotten, and left me feeling like I missed something. But there was no time to think about it because I probably had to write a paper and then read something else right away.
 
Recently finished Bad Pharma by Ben Goldacre. A bit more challenging than his previous Bad Science (which was fantastic... you should read it), but the subject matter didn't leave much room for his usual wit and humour, though it was apparent in parts. A really eye opening read. It's full of information that is relevant to everyone and important to know, so I highly recommend it... you should read it.

Burned through The End of Faith by Sam Harris in a couple days. Another great book. He presents his arguments in a very straightforward and rational way. Love that guy. He's cool as a cucumber. You should read it.

Just picked up Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking by Daniel Dennett (his new one) and will be starting it tonight.
 
I read Great Gatsby in case I actually wanted to see the movie, which I don't really want to do anymore after reading the reviews...

Great book, but I gotta say, Nick's a boring character. I'm whatever about him. The positive is that he's the voice of Fitzgerald, whose prose is out of this world. I mean, let's face it, nothing about the plot here is that shocking or incredible, it's all about the writing itself. The last page or two was fucking unbelievable, especially the last paragraph.

Gatsby is a great character. I was stunned by how unpretentious and sweet he was, and his constantly shifting life story was highly entertaining to follow. It was easy to cheer for him, even when he had his douchey moments.

I really dug the book. It was a brilliantly written if silly soap opera with a knowing "look at these shallow pieces of shit they're everything wrong with America" subtext to it that wasn't painfully obvious or anything. It was there and I nodded along whenever it was alluded to, but it wasn't intrusive. I could enjoy it as social commentary or for the simple entertainment value of watching a bunch of rich douchebags squabble and fuck each other to oblivion.

A book I remember fondly from high school. I know Fitzgerald isn't everyone's cup of tea, but he may still be the finest pure writer this country has ever produced, his peaks eclipsing anyone else I can think of. And Gatsby has as much of a right as anything else to be considered The Great American Novel, so I don't think it's overrated in any sense.

He's also a master of the short story, and pretty much any collection of those will impress you for sure.

My favorite of his works is Tender Is The Night, which isn't as "perfect" as Gatsby but shows an amazing amount of growth, and is the hangover to the long party of the Jazz Age.

The new film is definitely worth seeing, BTW.
 
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