What Did You Read Today?

[Guest Mr. Potato Head]

Finally read "The Hunger Games".

It's good, but it's pretty easy to see where the idea came from.

[fr34k]

I haven't posted here in a while. Between lots of stuff to read for university, which I have to do because we have to hand in a summary or comment all the time, I don't get much time to read anything fun. However, I still managed to read a couple of things.

Oblivion: Stories by David Foster Wallace

I'm still working myself through Infinite Jest (about a third done, absolutely love it) so I decided to read some short stories by Wallace in my spare time at uni. The story "Good Old Neon" is basically the best short story I've ever read. I loved every bit of it. The others are great (or at least good) too, but they seem bad in comparison, at least for me. You should definitely read "Good Old Neon", the others are worth checking out too.

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Also a very good read. I wasn't excited about this at first, because books that get a lot of praise tend to be pretty boring in my opinion (e.g. To Kill a Mockingbird) but I soon found myself completely caught up in the story. The most interesting thing for me was to think about how I would deal withh the situation. It also got more and more intense with every page and some things that happen are just sick and had me shocked. I couldn't believe some of the stuff that happened. Read it.

[NM!]

So I finished reading Catcher in the Rye, and honestly, I don't see the big deal. Just a downright horrible book in my opinion.

I've been reading sex, drugs, and cocoa puffs on my ipod recently, and its a decent read. Nothing spectacular but if you're in a slump of finding good books, its a good time consumer until you find a better book.

[Your Mom]

I'm working my way through Bret Hart's book right now. I guess it was his character but I didnt imagine him snorting coke with the boys and fucking anything that moves but it's made for an interesting read.

[fr34k]

So I finished reading Catcher in the Rye, and honestly, I don't see the big deal. Just a downright horrible book in my opinion.

Seriously? I know people have different tastes and all, but it's definitely one of my favorite books. It portrays the teenage mindset so well in my opinion and handles the whole situation so well, I can't understand how one can dislike it. I'm not trying to downplay your opinion, don't get me wrong, I just like to hear some more insight.

[Timmoru Suzuki]

From Russia with Love. Really enjoying it so far; and I like Ian Fleming's crisp and concise writing style. He manages to perfectly sum up in one sentence what some writers use a paragraph to a page to say. I'm a slow reader, so I'll be reading it for another week or so yet, but I can't see it failing to hold my attention.

[stokeriño]

You know those silly lists asking how many of some 100 books you've read?

I'm purposefully hacking my way through books that tend to appear on those sort of lists. Finished reading The Great Gatsby yesterday. Going to start on Brave New World tomorrow.

TAKE THAT, LISTS!

[Guest The EWOompa Loompa]

Read Daemon by Daniel Suarez over the weekend.

Needless to say I'm now very paranoid about Julian Assange.

[Meacon Keaton]

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Also a very good read. I wasn't excited about this at first, because books that get a lot of praise tend to be pretty boring in my opinion (e.g. To Kill a Mockingbird) but I soon found myself completely caught up in the story. The most interesting thing for me was to think about how I would deal withh the situation. It also got more and more intense with every page and some things that happen are just sick and had me shocked. I couldn't believe some of the stuff that happened. Read it.

PIGGY!

I'm working my way through Bret Hart's book right now. I guess it was his character but I didnt imagine him snorting coke with the boys and fucking anything that moves but it's made for an interesting read.

Yeah, a lot of things in his book really caught me by suprise. I loved it though, and have read it a few more times.

You know those silly lists asking how many of some 100 books you've read?

I'm purposefully hacking my way through books that tend to appear on those sort of lists. Finished reading The Great Gatsby yesterday. Going to start on Brave New World tomorrow.

TAKE THAT, LISTS!

That's actually a good idea. I may start doing that. Because the last book I read was "The Hungry Caterpillar".

[SRN]

Churning on Moby-Dick by Herman Melville (so what is its the first time I've read it, sue me) and just as all the hype goes, it is really good. Even though I find myself lost in a translation some times, since I am reading it in English, I am still thoroughly entertained by Ishmael, his quirks and views on the world, and the men he follows and works with on the Peqoud. Everyone should obviously read this book, even though it is quite a mouthful if you aren't used to reading.

[Timmoru Suzuki]

I picked that up in a Library once and the first page of lines and lines of small printed text basically just said, "I like sailing. I do it when I'm bored." I put it down. Though, I do know it's meant to be excellent when you get into it.

I'm reading a Warhammer 40K book a friend got me for Christmas, the book title being Horus Rising. It's good, and the author, Dan Abnett has a nack for engaging battle scenes, but a lot of it feels drawn out and slightly redundant. It is the intro book to a LARGE series of novels, so I guess it has a lot of backstory about the universe itself and the key players to get in before the main story starts; but I feel that as such it could be significantly shorter. I'll finish it, and I'll almost certainly read more in the series, so it's obviously doing a lot right.

[Trench]

I just finished Stephen King's Full Dark, No Stars. I enjoy Stephen King in general so I may be bias but I really enjoyed this. I think the stories were realistic in the way the characters reacted to what happened to them in the stories and it flowed very well. I will admit that it was difficult to read at some points and possibly even disturbing but that is where the realism comes in. I recommend it for any King fan or anyone that enjoys dark and thrilling pieces.

I am now working on Brian Keene's The Rising and as an avid zombie fan, I hope all the reviews were true!

On a kind of unrelated note, I hope to start my own book soon and maybe fans will be talking about that in the future!

[Skummy]

I found Catcher In The Rye really dull too. Maybe I didn't read it at the right age. Maybe it'd be better if I were American - the people I know who insist it's one of the all-time greats are all a lot older than me and American. But it just wasn't compelling.

[mattman1624]

I'm about 80 or so pages into The Boys of Summer by Roger Kahn. It's about Kahn covering the Brooklyn Dodgers in the early 1950's, and reconnecting with the players after they'd retired. I'm enjoying it so far.

[Skummy]

I just finished reading Christopher Lee's autobiography. It loses its way a little bit towards the end, as a lot of it was already published in the late '70s, and the rest has just kind of been tacked on, but it's great as a whole.

His life is absolutely incredible, he's wonderfully witty, and will be the first to admit when was of his films wasn't especially good, and freely confesses to having no innate acting talent when he started out and just picking it up as he goes along. It's just a very charming and interesting book, with a lot of laugh out loud moments, and an insane amount of namedropping, which is all you want from this kind of thing. Maybe it's just the Lee fanboy in me talking, but I'd say it's one of the best actor's autobiographies I've ever read.

[Skummy]

Read Etgar Keret's "Kneller's Happy Campers" yesterday. It's very short, and I read it in one sitting - took me a cup of coffee to finish it, basically. It was good, but I was a little disappointed - I love the film adaptation, "Wristcutters: A Love Story", and hoped that the book would add more depth to it but, if anything, it's a little shallow. There are concepts only touched upon in the book that are fleshed out fully in the film, and while a couple of characters have their backstory changed for the film, I think on the whole it works out better. The film's ending is a little sappier and more sentimental too, but...it works, it feels more complete, the book just kind of peters out.

It's a good, fun, surreal little story, and certainly not a bad book by any means, but it's one of the few instances where I'd say that you're better off seeing the film.

[fr34k]

I haven't posted in this topic in what seems like ages and I think I read about 10-20 books since then. I'm going to try to post more in here. For the meanwhile, has anybody read The Illuminatus! Trilogy and is it any good? No spoilers please .

[Timmoru Suzuki]

I picked that up in a Library once and the first page of lines and lines of small printed text basically just said, "I like sailing. I do it when I'm bored." I put it down. Though, I do know it's meant to be excellent when you get into it.

I'm reading a Warhammer 40K book a friend got me for Christmas, the book title being Horus Rising. It's good, and the author, Dan Abnett has a nack for engaging battle scenes, but a lot of it feels drawn out and slightly redundant. It is the intro book to a LARGE series of novels, so I guess it has a lot of backstory about the universe itself and the key players to get in before the main story starts; but I feel that as such it could be significantly shorter. I'll finish it, and I'll almost certainly read more in the series, so it's obviously doing a lot right.

Finally finished this, it really wasn't a book I could fly through. I basically stand by what I said before. The 412 page book was split into three parts, the last being the shortest at about 70 pages. I basically feel like the first two parts (say 340 pages combined) were a 200 page introduction 'Horus Heresy' series of books that was padded out to make a larger book; whereas it should have been a smaller novella or just the first part of whatever book book two in the series is.

Conversely, the third part felt rushed, in contrast to the drawn out style of the previous two parts, and probably could easily have been 150-200 pages, but was reduced to 70. It also has little (maybe even NOTHING) to do with the previous two parts; it exists only so a character who isn't in the first two parts at all can come by some sort of magical sword (basically a maguffin) that becomes integral to the story in book three/four of the series, whatever; so the entire thing felt like a tacked-on diversion that wasn't related to the main story of the book at all. It could have just been included as a pre-lude in the novel where the item becomes important, or this section could have been expanded into 150-200 page story it could have been and released as a seperate novella. That also means the series as a whole could have been launched with two smaller ('bite-sized' even) chunks to lure people in.

While novel eneded very well in it's last 'full' chapter, the four-page mini 'aftermath' chapter at the actual end of the book annoyed me too, it basically being a four-page advert for the rest of the series. I understand the need to drop more hooks to tempt people into carrying on reading but it felt like such a blunt hammer blow, a screaming, "BUY OUR PRODUCT LINE," message that I'd have been more inclined to rush out and buy the next book if it hadn't have been included.

Anyway, as I said in my previous post, the writer is good if not very good at battle scenes and he has some neat ideas. I've not been put off reading more in the Horus Heresy series, but I'd hope that the other books feel more like rounded novels rather than a series of disperate sections that seem to exist just to give backstory to things that are going to happen in 'BOOK X/Y/Z.'

I do also have a omnibus of three more Warhammer novels, written by the same writer but not from the 'Horus Heresy' series, so I'm probably more eager to give those a go; although the next few books I read won't be Warhammer related at all. I've made a list of things I intend to read, so I'll pop down to the library this week and see what I can get hold of.

[Guest Mr. Potato Head]

If anybody hasn't read the Stieg Larsson trilogy, do so immediately.

Incidentally, anyone have recommendations for somebody who isn't sure there could be any better contemporary fiction than the Stieg Larsson trilogy?

[hot rod]

I decided to pick up Fight Club last week since the movie is one of my favorites, and I will be damned, the book was so much better. I honestly could not put this book down for the life of me, I definitely do recommend it, especially if you enjoyed the movie, since the book goes into so much more details to characters and everything. And the ending of the book is just really emotional. Now I am half through World War Z and I am really enjoying it, took me a while to get used to the interview way the book is written, but the more I read the more I enjoy the style of writing.