Reading Is Sexy: Books Part III

[corianderstem]

The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

You know, it's a shame he declined Oprah's selection of his book. I'd have loved to hear what she had to say about a talking turd.

It's funny - sometimes I kind of gleefully enjoy reading about really unlikable people. This book had them in droves! I was with the book for about the first half, and then it got to be too much (and this really was before the turd thing), and I started skimming big chunks of it.

 

[martha]

High Rising by Angela Thirkell. She takes the Barsetshire families of Trollope and extends them into contemporary times, which was from 1931 to around 1951 for her. Her characters are the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of Trollope's characters. This is her first Barsetshire novel (there are maybe 20 of them) and while she hasn't hit her stride yet here, it's still charming and funny and wonderful.

Persuasion by Jane Austen. A goddess, no argument. I hadn't read this one yet, but my niece has to read it for a history class, so I thought I'd give it a go. I love Jane Austen. This one started a little slow, but then unfolded beautifully.

I thought I was going to go out West with some non-fiction, but apparently I'm on a fiction kick. I think I'll go back to Barsetshire between the wars.

 

[Casamares]

At the moment I'm reading Sting's 'The Broken Music. Memory'.

Sting can write nearly as good as sing and play bass Especially first chapter is brilliant - the extremely poetic description of the Brazilian religious ritual which Sting and his wife took part in to overcome the fear connected with a human mortality.

 

[anitram]

The Girl Who Played With Fire.

It wasn't good. There isn't much more to say about it. The plot was way too predictable (who didn't see the Zala thing coming a mile away?), took too long to resolve, and there were far too many extraneous characters that were completely unnecessary. I now have no inclination to read the third book, though it will annoy me not to finish a series.

Picked up The Shadow of the Wind as I've heard great things about it. But now I have a pile of work stuff to read so who knows when I'll have time.

 

[corianderstem]

Out of Africa by Isak Dinesen

So all I knew about the book was that there was a big ol' epic movie with Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. After reading it, I kind of want to see the movie to see how the hell they made an entire movie where Robert Redford figures into it, because if the person in the book I'm assuming was Redford's character, he's barely a blip on the radar.

Anyway!

Interesting read, reading it with the historical perspective of it being 80 years later and knowing how Africa is now and wondering how all the colonialism came to be, and gee maybe I should find a book that will tell me more about all of that, because I sure don't know much about it.

Mainly just vignettes and tales of her time with a coffee farm in Africa. Some really beautiful passages. Quite enjoyed it.

 

[Ms The Edge]

Out of Africa by Isak Dinesen

I've had this sitting on my bookshelf for ages, I really need to get around to reading it!

I just picked up Buzz Aldrin's autobiography, Magnificent Desolation. I'm still on the second chapter about the moon landing, which is pretty interesting, but I'm not sure the rest of the book will be all that fascinating. Hopeful, though!

 

[anitram]

Interesting read, reading it with the historical perspective of it being 80 years later and knowing how Africa is now and wondering how all the colonialism came to be, and gee maybe I should find a book that will tell me more about all of that, because I sure don't know much about it.

If you want to read an excellent book about Africa, the I'd really recommend Paul Theroux's "Dark Star Safari". He lived in Africa in the 60s and worked as a teacher in Uganda. 40+ years later he returns to Africa and completes an overland trip from Cairo to Cape Town, and along the way finds a much different Africa than the one he remembers. It's an absolutely wonderful read (he's very curmudgeonly, which I happen to like) and it did a lot to push me to go and spend some time in Africa.

 

[corianderstem]

Ooh, interesting. Thanks for the rec! I think I have another nonfiction book on my list at home that's about the way Africa has been used/treated by the rest of the world as well, I'll have to check them both out. I think it's called something like A Continent For the Taking?

 

[LemonMelon]

So...Red Badge of Courage was assigned to me this week. I have no idea how or why my professor assumed my classmates had skipped high school completely, but this book is essentially a requisite.

However, for whatever reason, I hadn't read it yet. Wish I never had...what fucking dross. Crane is a competent writer; I've really enjoyed most of his work to date, but this is overwritten (lapsing occasionally into Simple Jack-esque drawling inanities), naval-gazing bullshit. The protagonist is Robert Smith in a Union uniform. 65 of 70 pages has been about how deeply the despair of The Youth (zomg ambiguity) extends. The other 5 is obligatory (albeit passable) descriptions of gore/scenery. It wouldn't be too bad if a character with some testicular fortitude were guiding the action, and that's the truly sad part of this affair. Shit, it almost makes me want to root for the Confederacy. Rise again and put him out of his misery.

I relate to his despair, but only because 72 pages remain.

 

[lazarus]

Out of Africa by Isak Dinesen

So all I knew about the book was that there was a big ol' epic movie with Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. After reading it, I kind of want to see the movie to see how the hell they made an entire movie where Robert Redford figures into it, because if the person in the book I'm assuming was Redford's character, he's barely a blip on the radar.

Anyway!

Interesting read, reading it with the historical perspective of it being 80 years later and knowing how Africa is now and wondering how all the colonialism came to be, and gee maybe I should find a book that will tell me more about all of that, because I sure don't know much about it.

Mainly just vignettes and tales of her time with a coffee farm in Africa. Some really beautiful passages. Quite enjoyed it.

The film is very much worth watching, though a lot of film snobs think it's cheesy Hollywood trash. Streep is fantastic and the photography and musical score are breathtaking. Redford seems a bit out of place but despite not attempting an accent he does a good job.

I've only read Isak Denisen's short stories but they are very good for the most part. Seven Gothic Tales and Winter's Tales both have some fantastic stories.

 

[bono_212]

I have finally finished the *expletive* Dark Tower.

Time to move onto....anything else. God, so so bad. Not sure why I forced my way through all of that, but now it's over.

 

[lazarus]

Ok, that's weird. I just finshed Book 7 myself a few hours ago.

 

[bono_212]

Ka is a wheel, or some shit, Laz.

What did you think?

 

[lazarus]

Well I was pretty engrossed. I probably read the last three books in the last couple weeks. I find King's humor to be pretty eye-rolling most of the time (and there's certainly way too much of it), and the meta stuff wore thin quickly. But I can't say it wasn't a fun and occasionally moving ride, and a pretty creative one at times.

I think my favorite of the books was Wizard & Glass, which was just good old fantasy for most of its length. And I really liked the setting and story of Wolves of the Calla up until the big WTF ending.

 

[bono_212]

As for me, unfortunately, I knew how it ended, though I didn't quite realize I did (a friend told me back in '03, and I'd blocked the memory). So, that definitely made the last few books a little harder to read, once I remembered how it ended. What kills me, is that he wrote a great ending for what he was trying to make: A Western Lord of the Rings. And then that epilogue made me actually cry, something other events in the book couldn't do because King just DRIPS foreshadowing for hundreds of pages in advance to the point where I was numb to the subsequent events. And then that damn coda comes in.

Anyways, I really despised Wizard and Glass unfortunately. It took me two years to read it, which is why it took me four years to read the series as a whole. There were aspects of it I loved, and as a stand-alone book, I probably would've had no problem with it.

Wolves was good, but I feel like it came way too late in the series and just served to make me anxious for the ending and felt like such a road bump.

Hands down favorites were 2 and 3.

 

[No spoken words]

I've mentioned this before but I'll say it again.....it kills me that I had to bail on the series because it took such a fucking nosedive. Very disappointing to have something you were really liking and eagerly awaiting further installments go to shit. The early books were truly enjoyable.

Laz, if any part of you was considering reading Under the Dome cos you wanted some more King, avoid at all costs.

 

[bono_212]

That's another thing. Boy does it feel like he rushed out 6 and 7. Like, he really was like, "Fuck, I just don't care anymore, why won't you people leave me alone?" Like with Mordred and the Crimson King. It's like he regretted putting them in there and then wrote them back out as quickly and painlessly as he could. Felt like SUCH a cop-out.

 

[No spoken words]

What happened to you, Stephen King?

You were never a man of letters but you used to at least know how to tell a story.

 

[bono_212]

I literally threw the book across the room after I finished it. I was so angry.

Salem's Lot, It, The Shining. Amazing, chilling stories. No intrusive narrator, just a story. Hell, I even love Cell, though I know I'm in the minority. I don't know when he decided that he needed to be such a VOICE in his books.

 

[No spoken words]

It and The Stand are my two favorites. The Dead Zone is up there. The Shining is likely right below the first two.

 

[bono_212]

It is one of my all-time favorites. Though, I looked through some of it the other day, and some of the things he was writing, the style, hinted at some of the things to come in his career, and I'm afraid I'm never going to be able to read that book again. Never mind that Stephen himself had to shit all over it in Song of Susannah, referring to it as merely a "sketch-work".

I'm sure I'll stop being so upset (and what a silly thing to be upset about) once I go back to some of his older books I've missed (I've read next to none of his Castle Rock stories) but it's going to be a while before I venture back.

 

[No spoken words]

Well, like we discussed earlier, I'll never read a book of his again, be it new or me revisiting a title. Not after my Under the Dome experience. That book almost made every attack and criticism launched against King completely and undeniably valid.

 

[bono_212]

I'll avoid it at all costs then. I'm trying so hard to still like him, but the last few books I've read of his have made it so hard: Eyes of the Dragon, the last four books of The Dark Tower, The Dark Half (oh my God, wtf), and he even managed to fuck up a short stories collection (and I've always loved those) in Just After Sunset.

 

[lazarus]

That's another thing. Boy does it feel like he rushed out 6 and 7. Like, he really was like, "Fuck, I just don't care anymore, why won't you people leave me alone?" Like with Mordred and the Crimson King. It's like he regretted putting them in there and then wrote them back out as quickly and painlessly as he could. Felt like SUCH a cop-out.

6 definitely seemed rushed. And I was getting pretty sick of them hanging around in New York, didn't like the divided narrative, etc.

And the whole Mordred storyline was ridiculous. In fact, it was odd how he started shifting to his point of view after not doing anything like that in previous books. I liked the Patrick Danville character but too much importance seemed placed on a someone that showed up in the home stretch.

The Crimson King seemed more cartoonish than menacing.

But I did like the Coda in the tower, for what it's worth.

I've mentioned this before but I'll say it again.....it kills me that I had to bail on the series because it took such a fucking nosedive. Very disappointing to have something you were really liking and eagerly awaiting further installments go to shit. The early books were truly enjoyable.

When did you abandon it? Did you get through Wolves of the Calla? I thought it was a great old-fashioned western yarn with some interesting sci-fi elements. It was just the ending that got a little too much for me.

It and The Stand are my two favorites. The Dead Zone is up there. The Shining is likely right below the first two.

I'm not planning on reading too much more King. The Stand was mostly good, and I was very moved by Hearts in Atlantis. I'm planning on reading It and will probably call it a day after that. I still have a lot of Clive Barker to read and he's a far superior writer, not to mention one with a much more disturbing imagination.

In fact, many times during The Dark Tower I was thinking that Barker created a distinctly more fascinating and original world in Imajica, and that didn't even take 1,000 pages. I just finished The Great and Secret Show and will probably go back to Weave World next, which I started but didn't get far into.

 

[No spoken words]

Oh my god do I ever love me some Clive Barker. Imajica is fantastic.

I read The Great and Secret Show as well as Weave World too.

I stopped right in the middle of whatever book it was where King wrote himself into the story. Like, literally, when that happened, I was out. I was already contemplating stopping but that was the straw that broke the camel's back right there.

 

[bono_212]

6 definitely seemed rushed. And I was getting pretty sick of them hanging around in New York, didn't like the divided narrative, etc.

And the whole Mordred storyline was ridiculous. In fact, it was odd how he started shifting to his point of view after not doing anything like that in previous books. I liked the Patrick Danville character but too much importance seemed placed on a someone that showed up in the home stretch.

The Crimson King seemed more cartoonish than menacing.

But I did like the Coda in the tower, for what it's worth.

6 was so...pointless. The return trips to New York became so passe after awhile. "oh, there they go...off to New York again." Whereas, the first time they did it, I was like, "HOLY sHIT!"

The problem with Patrick Danville is, I think you'd need to have read Insomnia to have even had 1% of the understanding of why he was so significant. Which is another reason why I want to kill King right now, since I've never read Insomnia and he told how it ends.



When did you abandon it? Did you get through Wolves of the Calla? I thought it was a great old-fashioned western yarn with some interesting sci-fi elements. It was just the ending that got a little too much for me.

I'm not planning on reading too much more King. The Stand was mostly good, and I was very moved by Hearts in Atlantis. I'm planning on reading It and will probably call it a day after that. I still have a lot of Clive Barker to read and he's a far superior writer, not to mention one with a much more disturbing imagination.

In fact, many times during The Dark Tower I was thinking that Barker created a distinctly more fascinating and original world in Imajica, and that didn't even take 1,000 pages. I just finished The Great and Secret Show and will probably go back to Weave World next, which I started but didn't get far into.

I hope you'll at least take the time to read The Shining someday, especially since Kubrick's film is a completely different beast from the book.

I'm assuming then, that Barker's work would be something you'd recommend?

 

[No spoken words]

I think we'd both recommend Barker wholeheartedly.

 

[bono_212]

so I see, now that I've read your above post.

 

[lazarus]

Yeah, heartily recommended, but Barker's writing is extremely dense. You can't plow through his stuff in the same why you can with King, and it's a little harder to get "hooked" into the stuff. The language is more difficult, but with that comes a wealth of unique imagery.

Of course, a lot of it is also very, very disgusting. If you don't have the stomach for the more grotesque anatomical descriptions (think of the Mordred stuff times ten), it may not be for you.

Anyway, it might be best to start with some of his short stories, like his Books of Blood. Or perhaps the novella Cabal. He also has a great children's book The Thief of Always. Imajica is his likely masterpiece, but I'm not sure if it's the best entry point.


NSW, did you read the sequel to Great & Secret Show? Not sure if I should go right to that or to Weave World.

 

[No spoken words]

I haven't read Everville yet and likely will not until Barker releases the 3rd book in the trilogy.....which I'm not holding my breath over.