Book Thread

I have. I don't really remember much about it but I think it fits the bill for light easy reading. I liked the stuff about his late 60s and 70s output. I don't think I cared about the rest of his life.

Found this engrossing in the middle bits but thought it stopped short in the end; although maybe I just wanted to read more? Southeast England sounds like a terrifying place.

I was sure I posted about that book on here but I can't find it. Must have been on the old board.

Anyway, I know I really enjoyed it but I do remember feeling that the journey was a lot more rewarding than the destination. My abiding memories of it a few years later are flashes comic absurdity and a lingering malignance.

found it...

Bruegel wrote:I just ploughed through Nicola Barker's Darkmans:



So violent and motley was life that it bore the mixed smell of blood and roses

A hugely enjoyable 800+ page blast of linguistic energy, peopled by a procession of compellingly bizarre characters, not least the 500-year-old court-jester who haunts the entire tome. Loved the oozing creep of the past through the cracks in the crumbling reality of the present. Loved the carnival-like balance of the entertaining and the macabre. Found some of the linguistic devices a bit jarring at first but they soon justify themselves as an intrinsic fabric of the rich tapestry. Recommended.

   

Read the first fourteen pages in between halves at a sports pub. The writing didn't grab me but I should probably just start the whole thing again.

Keep going. A classic. Keith Talent is one of the most richly imagined comic figures in late 20th Century English letters.

Soma wrote:

Read the first fourteen pages in between halves at a sports pub. The writing didn't grab me but I should probably just start the whole thing again.

Keep going.  A classic.  Keith Talent is one of the most richly imagined comic figures in late 20th Century English letters.

Nick wrote:This weirdo on the train next to me is reading some shitty business book on a Monday morning and using Post-Its to mark shit he thinks is important.

I read some blog once where the author (some start-up founder) said the way to read business books is to just read the summary and a few of the reviews on Amazon that list the key takeaways when they are recommended to you. It was solid advice and now I can talk about "hedgehog" concepts with coworkers without having had to plow through 200 pages of shit I don't really care about.

Soma wrote:

Keep going.  A classic.  Keith Talent is one of the most richly imagined comic figures in late 20th Century English letters.

I was pretty confused about how these words I didn't type made their way into my post, lol. Will do!

London Fields is the rare book where I loathed every character but was never not fully engaged in the story. Kind of a neat trick for an author to pull.

Bruegel wrote:I was sure I posted about that book on here but I can't find it. Must have been on the old board.

Almost certainly how it got on my list - thanks.

raj gibson wrote: Southeast England sounds like a terrifying place.

This is not a statement that I imagined I would ever encounter about that region and it makes me wonder what you read about it. All the posh conservatives with their... scary voting habits?

Soma wrote:This is not a statement that I imagined I would ever encounter about that region and it makes me wonder what you read about it. All the posh conservatives with their... scary voting habits?

I don't know if I can do the book justice but it contrasts some characters who are super-conscious of history to the degree they are metaphorically (or arguably even literally) possessed by it, on one extreme, and then on the other, this weird post-Chunnel-construction modern era of forgotten history where Ashford is kind of this bland culture-less exurban space... it's never front and center in the story but it's always bleeding through with these historical buildings destroyed, all kinds of problems with overdevelopment of roads, issues with imitation and forgery, characters who are weirdly divorced from their own family/community histories...

raj gibson wrote:

Bruegel wrote:I was sure I posted about that book on here but I can't find it. Must have been on the old board.

Almost certainly how it got on my list - thanks.

I'm thinking I might have gotten this one from here as well. Extremely funny, couldn't put it down.

Someone wrote a book 200-page book about Juiceboxxx.

http://pitchfork.com/thepitch/787-when-you-love-juiceboxxx-so-much-you-write-a-book-about-him/

Initially thought this was about the Strokes song.

You're not alone.

Went on a bit of a book buying spree at my local second hand shop. Didn't really know anything about any of these titles when I purchased them:

Aphra Behn - Oroonoko, The Rover and Other Works
Sybille Bedford - A Legacy
Michael Allaby - Facing the Future: The Case for Science
Martin Amis - Experience
Alan Bennett - Three Stories

I read Oroonoko in a class at university. Thematically and historically super interesting, but it's old writing - from the late 1600s, I think - and more of a chore than most everything else I read in that class, stuff like Robinson Crusoe, William Blake, Coleridge/Wordsworth, Wuthering Heights, Robert Burns, etc. That's all I'm familiar w/ from your list though, though I'd be curious to hear if you like the other stuff as I'm currently in a book rut - starting everything and finishing very little. Any suggestions welcome from any direction. I'm looking for something fun, but w/ substance. Something that makes me feel smarter while I'm reading it, but is easy/compelling enough that I could devour it in 30-100pg chunks. Motherless Brooklyn, Moneyball, Watchmen, Tropic of Cancer - those all sorta fit the bill in one way or another.

I'm currently reading "I Sailed With Magellan" by Stuart Dybeck. Short stories about growing up in the Little Village area of Chicago in the 60's and 70's. I'd highly recommend it even though it doesn't have much in common with those books you mentioned.

Michael K. wrote:I read Oroonoko in a class at university. Thematically and historically super interesting, but it's old writing - from the late 1600s, I think - and more of a chore than most everything else I read in that class, stuff like Robinson Crusoe, William Blake, Coleridge/Wordsworth, Wuthering Heights, Robert Burns, etc.  That's all I'm familiar w/ from your list though, though I'd be curious to hear if you like the other stuff as I'm currently in a book rut - starting everything and finishing very little. Any suggestions welcome from any direction. I'm looking for something fun, but w/ substance. Something that makes me feel smarter while I'm reading it, but is easy/compelling enough that I could devour it in 30-100pg chunks. Motherless Brooklyn, Moneyball, Watchmen, Tropic of Cancer - those all sorta fit the bill in one way or another.  

Did you ever get around to 2666? It's super long but really approachable and super fun. That is probably the most fun I ever had reading a book. I think back on it all the time too.

I just started reading Satantango after a long break from literature. I haven't covered enough ground to offer a valuable opinion on it yet, has anyone read this book (Brugs)?

Michael K, I think Experience may be exactly what you're after. Really deftly written, but also fast paced and totally readable. I don't know if you've read any of Kingsley Amis's books, or if a pseudo biography that's really just a regular autobiography from his son would be of any interest to someone who hasn't, but I managed to snap out of my own reading drought for long enough to get tthough 60 pages in one sitting, so... Idk, maybe?

Changed my mind on Satantango, decided to read King of Capital about the growth of Blackstone and Stephen Schwarzman, of which the widely known branch of the New York public library is now named after. It isn't the most insightful read, not nearly as engaging as a Michael Lewis hit or Barbarians at the Gate, but for someone interested in Private Equity and the finance industry, its a quick and enjoyable read I guess.

The Blackstone book did, as WP64 call, turn out to be extremely boring. Not because of the subject matter, but in the droll, nearly pointless information that was highlighted. I've since switched over to reading Meet You In Hell, which details the relationship between Andrew Carnegie and Henry Clay Frick. As far as biographies go, this one is easy to read and informatively entertaining.

Getting back into reading again too, either going to tackle The Recognitions or Ulysses next unless I decide to re-buy and re-read Catch 22, a book I've never actually finished despite loving the first go around.

Joyce or Homer?

Joyce, my man. Read the Odyssey in preparation for the Joyce some time back but I highly doubt Im anywhere near prepared to get even a tenth of the latter on first read.