books, books, books

mood swung · Post by **mood swung** » Sat Feb 12, 2005 8:44 pm

don't forget Ulyssess.

laughingcrow · Post by **laughingcrow** » Mon Feb 14, 2005 1:03 pm

If you have the Peel biog with the blue cover SLL, it is now out of print due to it being slanderous and recalled of the shelves! Collectors edition?

pophead2k · Post by **pophead2k** » Mon Feb 14, 2005 2:46 pm

Catching up on the classics time for me: just read All Quiet on the Western Front for the first time. What a beautifully written novel.

El Vez · Post by **El Vez** » Mon Feb 14, 2005 2:48 pm

Joe by Larry Brown. Brilliant book.

so lacklustre · Post by **so lacklustre** » Tue Feb 15, 2005 4:52 am

Crow - No it's black with a picture of Peel in grey beard mode on front and that picture of him with long hair wearing stripey football shirt on the back. It's by someone called Michael Heatley.

Are you morphing from a bird expert to a book expert? You'll have to change your board name to worm ha ha. How's the new digs?

pip_52 · Post by **pip_52** » Tue Feb 15, 2005 9:49 am

Im working my way through Nabokov's Pale Fire right now ... Im gonna need a break from unreliable narrators after this one ...

laughingcrow · Post by **laughingcrow** » Wed Feb 16, 2005 1:31 pm

so lacklustre wrote:Crow - No it's black with a picture of Peel in grey beard mode on front and that picture of him with long hair wearing stripey football shirt on the back. It's by someone called Michael Heatley.

Are you morphing from a bird expert to a book expert? You'll have to change your board name to worm ha ha. How's the new digs?

I am becoming a bit more bookish...but then again I was always like this, aren't we all the same, who here sympathises with any character in High fidelity? Exactly.

I just read Napoleon by Max Gallo....okay....and am now going to read Will Self's Great Apes. I really want to get into him cos his columns are good, and he wrote a really great set of liner notes on the Warren Zevon 'genius' album.

miss buenos aires · Post by **miss buenos aires** » Wed Feb 16, 2005 2:14 pm

My friend had to read Great Apes for a class once, and we mocked it for a solid year. Just saying.

so lacklustre · Post by **so lacklustre** » Thu Feb 17, 2005 4:00 am

Crow - I thought the same about Self and read one of his novels a couple of years back. I won't be reading any more in a hurry.

ReadyToHearTheWorst · Post by **ReadyToHearTheWorst** » Thu Feb 17, 2005 5:07 am

Don't get to read much, but on a recent holiday managed:

I Just Wasn't Made For These Times - Charles L Granata
A fine description of the making of Pet Sounds. Sensibly avoids the private life & rumour mill, concentrating instead on influences & musicians & sessions (but without getting too technical).

Tishomingo Blues - Elmore Leonard
Hamment & Chandler can rest assured that their legacy is in safe hands.

Eric - Terry Prachett
The usual DiscWorld shenanigans. By turns funny & clever, without leaving me gagging to read another one in a hurry.

Clerkenwell Tales - Peter Ackroyd
Marvellous tale of intrigue, set in Chaucer's London (and with his characters too), with tons of period detail.

Have a shelf full of other stuff to be read - need another holiday!

laughingcrow · Post by **laughingcrow** » Thu Feb 17, 2005 4:15 pm

hmm, well I guess I'll just have to see...my flatmate who is very well read doesn't rate him either...

clairequilty · Post by **clairequilty** » Thu Feb 17, 2005 10:00 pm

Currently reading Dylan's Chronicles also, and like Crash and Stranger, I have to agree that it is wonderful.

Dylan has a Faulkner like quality to his writing, cept he's not portraying anyone. He's simply recanting.

There is no hidden agenda or proselytizing in this book. It is pure history as he remembers it. I wouldn't be surprised if he was keeping detailed diaries at the time, but his remembrances roll off his pen like it was yesterday.

The prose is exciting, regardless of whether you're a 60's beatnik, or a 21st century yuppie.

This book should be required reading in junior high, like Red Badge of Courage, Mockingbird, and Lord of The Flies.

It is a masterpiece.

Post by **BlueChair** » Thu Feb 17, 2005 10:43 pm

Agreed, Mr. Quilty... I can't wait for Chronicles Vol 2!

Otis Westinghouse · Post by **Otis Westinghouse** » Sat Feb 19, 2005 12:30 am

Am just about to start reading Chronicles, so this is nice to see. It got loads of 'best book I've read this year' plaudits in the Christmas round-ups in UK newspapers, including from novelists of repute. Got it free with my lovely new Word subscription, and it came promptamundo.

Just finishing the Philip Pullman His Dark Materials trilogy, which I've been reading (slowly, like everything) for a while. It's a massive achievement, and a book supposedly aimed at teens which is fantastic reading for adults too. PP has a huge belief in the value of storytelling, and puts his money where his mouth is. The ideas are fantastical, it spans universes, its reach even involves a trip to the world of the dead, but its intent is grounded and serious. It's very well written too, and has a brilliant range of textual refs (in the third and best book, The Amber Spyglass) to texts by Milton (whose Paradise Lost spawns the HDM trilogy title), Blake and others. And its cool to be reading the same author as my 12 year old boy and being equally turned on by him.

Who Shot Sam? · Post by **Who Shot Sam?** » Sun Feb 20, 2005 11:21 pm

I've been reading an outstanding series of Japanese graphic novels, or manga, written by Kazuo Koike and illustrated by Goseki Kojima, called "Lone Wolf and Cub". The series, which was originally put out in the early 1970s, is considered one of the classics of the genre, and for good reason.

It concerns a wandering samurai and former executioner, Ogami-Itto, who travels through Edo-period Japan with his three year-old son, Daigoro, taking on assassination jobs (that's little Daigoro in my avatar). There's a larger story arc too, which concerns the evil Yagyu clan, who were responsible for his wife's death. Occasionally the assassin uses his son to lure his victims, and he wheels the little tyke around in a baby cart outfitted with a pretty frightening array of weaponry.

It's bloody, but the stories are fantastic and human and concern a wide range of characters, male and female, from corrupt officials to other samurai to yakuza to suffering widows to prostitutes. It's not all slicing and dicing, though the fight sequences are presented magnificently as well and the artwork throughout is top-notch. I'm about half way through the 28-volume series now, but it's been a pleasure and goes by quickly. Each volume is only about $9, so it's good value as well.

I've come full circle - I'm wasting my money on comic books again!

Tim(e) · Post by **Tim(e)** » Sun Feb 20, 2005 11:31 pm

Who Shot Sam? wrote:I've been reading an outstanding series of Japanese graphic novels, or manga, written by Kazuo Koike and illustrated by Goseki Kojima, called "Lone Wolf and Cub". The series, which was originally put out in the early 1970s, is considered one of the classics of the genre, and for good reason.

This series is also available on DVD... the films were made in the early to mid '70's and are available for around CA$19.98 each from DVDSoon.

There are six in total:
Lone Wolf and Cub: Sword Of Vengeance
Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart to Hades
Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in Peril
Lone Wolf And Cub: White Heaven In Hell
Lone Wolf And Cub: Baby Cart At The River Styx
Lone Wolf And Cub: Baby Cart In The Land Of Demons

Who Shot Sam? · Post by **Who Shot Sam?** » Sun Feb 20, 2005 11:34 pm

Thanks. I'll have to check those out when I'm finished with the manga and see how they compare. Have you seen them?

miss buenos aires · Post by **miss buenos aires** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 6:26 pm

Spent a long weekend in Vermont, and on the train ride home today I read Spies, by Michael Frayn (engrossing) and half of The Life of Pi, by Yann Martel (also engrossing). While I was up there I picked up a set of the Chronicles of Narnia for $6 (the cashier beamed with approbation) and a copy of Helene Stapinski's Five-Finger Discount: A Crooked Family History (the cashier regarded me worriedly when I told her it was about my hometown).

Otis Westinghouse · Post by **Otis Westinghouse** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 6:58 pm

You read all of Spies and half of Pi just from Vermont? I would need to ride from California to NJ to do that. Pi is fun, very original, and with some lovely bits in it. Interesting take on religion. You shold read some atheist Pullman to counteract the Christian Lewis. Finally finished the His Dark Materials trilogy, didn't want it to end, and can't recommend it enough. the last sentence makes it all worth it. Apprently, though, it seems the US printings of The Amber Spyglass don't contain the citations at the opening of each chapter, many of which are to Blake and Milton, and my current signature is one from Pindar, which stopped me in my tracks. This is abominable. I would love to read the dialogue that led to that description. I can handle Northern Lights being retitled The Golden Compass, especially as it actually matches the second and third volumes in being the name of the central object, but this amendment just seems deeply patronising and depriving US readers of one of the many immense strengths of the book. I took huge pleasure in re-reading each one at the end of the chapter to marvel at how well chosen they were.

miss buenos aires · Post by **miss buenos aires** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 7:30 pm

Well, Otis, it was almost a six-hour ride. I would try to get my hands on the UK Pullman editions for those epigraphs, but I think my mother has them all (and has been raving about them for ages), so maybe you can just email the quotes to me! Want to reread Lewis mostly because 100% of the Christian stuff sailed right over my head as a youngster, and I want to see how evident it is to me now.

King Hoarse · Post by **King Hoarse** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 5:25 am

I was visiting my parents for Christmas and my mom got me the English version of Chronicles, which I read in my old bed on Christmas day while listening to dad's Johnny Cash records. Every once in awhile mom would come in with coffee, milk and cookies or the like. I highly recommend the great book as well as the experience.

Currently alternating between Bukowski short stories and the tales of the Moomin family by Tove Jansson, both of which I read aloud to my girlfriend who has trouble sleeping. Also great.

Otis Westinghouse · Post by **Otis Westinghouse** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 5:13 pm

miss buenos aires wrote:Well, Otis, it was almost a six-hour ride. I would try to get my hands on the UK Pullman editions for those epigraphs, but I think my mother has them all (and has been raving about them for ages), so maybe you can just email the quotes to me! Want to reread Lewis mostly because 100% of the Christian stuff sailed right over my head as a youngster, and I want to see how evident it is to me now.

Good reason to read it, would like to do that myself.

No need for me to send quotes, here they are:

http://www.hisdarkmaterials.org/content-7.html

Quite handy even with the UK printing as some of them are far from clear due to the small type, reversed out white on black.

strangerinthehouse · Post by **strangerinthehouse** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 6:23 pm

I finished Chronicles a good while ago and found myself starting a Bob Dylan record collection, kind of filling in the blanks between my copy of Highway 61 Revisited through Blood On the Tracks, Desire, and hopefully find them all before Time Out of Mind and Love and Theft. I loved reading his book, it was so easy yet at the same time so rare and complex. he works in these lists of descriptions that fill half a page his ramblin' makes so much sense.

I kept myself busy reading a collection of short stories from Raymond Carter based on the ones used in Robert Altman's grat film Short Cuts. Carter's prose is so much clean cut and straight forward that it is seems to just hit you in a much deeper psychological level than anything else i read.

still have to reread Heart of Darkness for a class.

miss buenos aires · Post by **miss buenos aires** » Mon Feb 28, 2005 11:10 am

The Chronicles of Narnia are like Sex & the City in that it's very easy to finish one episode and say to yourself, "That was enjoyable. I could go for another." The books are only about a hundred pages each, so I went through five this weekend. The Christian stuff really is quite apparent, but not really offensive. What did raise my eyebrows was the book ("The Horse and his Boy") which was set in the barbaric lands to the south, where men are cruel and swarthy, wear turbans and reject Aslan. They have wonderful baths, though...

ReadyToHearTheWorst · Post by **ReadyToHearTheWorst** » Wed Mar 02, 2005 9:35 am

Lord of the Rings has similar geography to The Chronicles of Narnia. In the South live swarthy men (again) who come to battle with their Olifaunts.

West & North are good, South & East are bad.

When asked what lay to the East in Middle Earth, Tolkien replied 'Bulgaria'.