Book recommendations

[MrRant]

Current books I'm reading.

 

Hunters of Dune - Finished this in a day.

Ender's Game - Half way through, just started a day ago. Haven't gotten around to it.

Wizard's Rule - haven't read, blind buy.

[Giuseppe Zangara]

Though I had previously seen and held a copy in a bookstore, having this new, hardcover version of War and Peace in my home really impresses me with just how large it is. It's nearly four pounds!

[Gary Floyd]

Finished up Lords of Chaos about a week ago. The first half is the good part: the part explaining why Satanism, heathenism, fascism, and other anti-establishment/anti-Christian sentiments are so much a part of black metal (and to a lesser extent death metal), especially in Europe, and detailing the events that gave the Norwegian scene its infamy. The second half reads more like a "So, you want to be a Satanist" how-to manual, or a beginner's course for various anti-Christian spiritual beliefs. Outside of the parts in the second half where Anton LaVey is interviewed, or other members of various Satanist groups, it's pretty bland.

I read that two months ago. Not a bad read if I do say so myself.

 

Almost done reading Richard Matheson's "Hell House." I've read it before, but I decided to give it another go since I love Matheson's work so much.

[Guest Tzar Lysergic]

I finished Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential.

 

Thing was a riot. Insane junkie pirates cooking gourmet food. His stories about his sous-chef are wonderful. Anectdotes about the chef coming to work with jizz on his shoes, calling a religious dishwater in the middle of the night while fucking some woman saying "Pedro...pant..guess what I'm..gasp* slap* squish*..doing right now?"

[Cheech Tremendous]

I read The Road in three days. Great book. Color me a McCarthy fan.

 

 

As did I. Three quick sessions and I was finished.

 

I liked the book, but I'm not gushing over it like a lot of other people.

[snuffbox]

I liked the Roth book. Im reading a biography of Margaret Fuller now. Cormac McCarthy will have to wait some more.

[Giuseppe Zangara]

I'm sure I've expressed this before, but The Plot Against America is wonderful book nearly ruined by that ridiculous deux ex machina that unfolds in the the last 30-something pages.

 

This week, I'm going to start that War and Peace I recently acquired. It's my goal to have it finished by the end of the year. I think I can I think I can I think I can. When I do, it'll officially be the longest book I've ever read. (This edition, minus all the supplemental material, is 1215 pages long. It'll beat out my previous record holder, the 1085 page Against the Day. [However, if the 90+ pages of endnotes at the end of Infinite Jest were converted to 10- or 12-point font, it'd likely surpass the Pynchon novel in terms of length.])

[godthedog]

i got through 600 pages of 'war and peace' (out of a possible 1500 in my paperback edition). then i stopped having free time for a few weeks and by the time i picked the book back up i'd forgotten who most of the names referred to & there was no point reading anymore. single most frustrating event of my literary life.

[Guest My Pal, the Tortoise]

Man, I totally forgot I even had Against the Day. I had to read Gravity's Rainbow first.

[Giuseppe Zangara]

Upon reflection, I find myself more forgiving of Against the Day's flaws, and have actually considered rereading it. But man, that's 1100 pages. Not to say the experience wasn't worthwhile, because it was.

 

That said, Against the Day is an "easier" read than Gravity's Rainbow.

[Hank Kingsley]

When I'm done with exams next week, I have The Road (finally) lined up, along with The Last Great Ride, an autobiography of NBC exec Brandon Tartikoff.

[PUT THAT DICK IN MY MOUTH!]

Has anyone here had any contact with Anthony Powell? I think I want to read A Dance to the Music of Time but I'm not sure I want to invest my money/time in another multi-volume novel that I might only sorta enjoy (shout out to Marcel Proust).

[snuffbox]

The Fuller biography ended up being really good.

 

Paula Blanchard - Margaret Fuller, From Transcendentalism to Revolution

[Giuseppe Zangara]

Anna Karenina is probably the best book ever.

I ended up starting with this over W&P. Roughly 80 pages into it and it is very, very good.

[PUT THAT DICK IN MY MOUTH!]

It gets better. I read the last 600 or so pages in a single weekend because I couldn't bring myself to put it down for more than like 3 hours at a time. Who would have thought that extended discussions of Russian wheat farming could be so utterly enthralling?

[Henry Spencer]

I didn't have nearly the attention span to get through War & Peace the first time I tried, but I'll third the Karenina love.

 

I just finished rereading The Fall by Camus, an old favorite of mine. Now, I'm torn between Knut Hamsun's Victoria and Phillip K. Dick's Flow My Tears The Policeman Said.

[snuffbox]

I like Camus.

[Big Ol' Smitty]

Me too. So does our hero, allegedly.

[snuffbox]

Which hero is that?

[Big Ol' Smitty]

[Big Ol' Smitty]

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/8197.html

[snuffbox]

Oh.

 

He probably got as much from reading Camus as he did from reading all those Lyndon Johnson biographies.

[Giuseppe Zangara]

Slacked quite a bit recently on Anna Karenina, but I made up for lost time today. It's so very, very good.

 

Also, right before semester's end, I got to read a passage from Gravity's Rainbow in front of a crowd. It only further reinforced for me how, with the right mindset, GR is a very approachable, inclusive novel.

[snuffbox]

Any fans of Spoon River Anthology ere?

[Henry Spencer]

I had to perform a few monologues from that book in my high school drama class. Never read the whole thing.

[The Buzz]

I'm a popular fiction type of guy, so I wanted to recommend a few books, and ask if anyone has read the series they based the tv series Dexter on by Jeff Lindsay. How are they?

 

 

Evil Harvest by Anthony Izzo is a really good creature feature style horror novel with clearly defined heroes and villians. Good page turner.

 

Creepers by David Morrell is another good page turner, it's a thriller about "Urban Explorers" that break into old abandoned buildings to catch a glimpse of the past. It turns into a thriller and isn't quite what you'd expect going in, but that's a good thing.

[PUT THAT DICK IN MY MOUTH!]

 

I got that War & Peace translation for Christmas. I'll probably start reading it sometime soon. Wish me luck!

[Giuseppe Zangara]

I'm probably not going to read it anytime soon. Maybe in the summer.

 

I started Cormac McCarthy's The Crossing yesterday. 100+ pages into it and it is a strong effort so far, but not up there with his very best novels.

[Giuseppe Zangara]

Also, got a Barnes & Noble gift card for Christmas. I'd like to pick up some hardcover books, but I cannot think of any recent releases I've a desire to get. I considered Junot Diaz's The Brief, Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, but my roommate got it for Christmas so I'll probably borrow it once he's read it.

 

Still, as far as hardcovers go, there's always the hc editions of books under the Modern Libray line or Everyman Library line, but I don't know how much I'll find at the store. Paperbacks it is, then.

[Hank Kingsley]

Got Youth in Revolt for Christmas and breezed through it in two days. Obviously I wish I had read it about 5 years ago, but I still loved it. Are the sequels any good?