books to read

[oyolar]

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@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

[close]

Wow, 2 years is a long period of time, but I see where you're coming from. I tried to read Ulysses after attending a Joyce seminar at university (where we delved into Dubliners Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man), but I just read it like a regular novel, which I guess, isn't really the way to do it. I love Joyce though, and maybe close reading Ulysses a piece at a time makes sense. Did you use any secondary literature?

Speaking of long reads, I'm almost done with My Struggle 6. I enjoyed it much more than when I first tried reading it and stopped somewhere in the Celan essay. Now, I read the Celan poem he talks about beforehand and took away more from that part. The Hitler essay was really interesting, even though I'm not exactly sure how it relates to the rest of the book. I understand that Knausgaard felt like he had to address the topic due to the similarity of the title and he connects his own background to Hitler's and the theme of authenticity, but it still feels like a bit of a stretch. Still, I just thought it was interesting to learn so much I didn't know about Hitler's youth and the Weimar era. I'm in the middle of the last part and reading about his relationship to his (now ex-)wife is heartbreaking. This is where Knausgaard is strongest as a writer IMO: Touching readers on an emotional level, being brutally honest, talking about everyday experiences. It's all there.

Glad you’re liking Book 6 a lot more and I agree with you 100%. The Hitler part does touch on how mundane his like was and how easily someone can become awful - same why he mentioned Breivik. Like, how evil isn’t always a once in a generation, born a monster type thing it instead a close accumulation of problems and deviancy and then suddenly you’re lost.

I can definitely find some secondary things to share about Ulysses. They’re somewhere in this thread. I’ve read it 3 times (once on my own, twice through two different undergrad classes) and the supplemental material really enriched the experience. I have it on my list to re-read again actually...

[birdplops]

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@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

[close]

Wow, 2 years is a long period of time, but I see where you're coming from. I tried to read Ulysses after attending a Joyce seminar at university (where we delved into Dubliners Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man), but I just read it like a regular novel, which I guess, isn't really the way to do it. I love Joyce though, and maybe close reading Ulysses a piece at a time makes sense. Did you use any secondary literature?

Speaking of long reads, I'm almost done with My Struggle 6. I enjoyed it much more than when I first tried reading it and stopped somewhere in the Celan essay. Now, I read the Celan poem he talks about beforehand and took away more from that part. The Hitler essay was really interesting, even though I'm not exactly sure how it relates to the rest of the book. I understand that Knausgaard felt like he had to address the topic due to the similarity of the title and he connects his own background to Hitler's and the theme of authenticity, but it still feels like a bit of a stretch. Still, I just thought it was interesting to learn so much I didn't know about Hitler's youth and the Weimar era. I'm in the middle of the last part and reading about his relationship to his (now ex-)wife is heartbreaking. This is where Knausgaard is strongest as a writer IMO: Touching readers on an emotional level, being brutally honest, talking about everyday experiences. It's all there.

[close]

Glad you’re liking Book 6 a lot more and I agree with you 100%. The Hitler part does touch on how mundane his like was and how easily someone can become awful - same why he mentioned Breivik. Like, how evil isn’t always a once in a generation, born a monster type thing it instead a close accumulation of problems and deviancy and then suddenly you’re lost.

I can definitely find some secondary things to share about Ulysses. They’re somewhere in this thread. I’ve read it 3 times (once on my own, twice through two different undergrad classes) and the supplemental material really enriched the experience. I have it on my list to re-read again actually...

I've read a few of the KOK books and number 6 is a total wank. Read the first part and after skimming the second I decided to pass on the third. A Man in Love and A Death in the Family were a joy to read and refreshingly insightful- I don't need to drag myself to the end of The End because it's there and especially when the sole focus casts doubt over the contents of the rest of the series.

When I'm not being a moany trollop, I take great pleasure in reading pairs of books that meaningfully coalesce, like Treasure Island before Swallows and Amazons, though it's mostly coincidence. Having said that, I intentionally finished An Intro to AI for Thinking Humans as I start to get into Klara and the Sun and think I've ruined it.

[AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice]

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@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

[close]

Wow, 2 years is a long period of time, but I see where you're coming from. I tried to read Ulysses after attending a Joyce seminar at university (where we delved into Dubliners Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man), but I just read it like a regular novel, which I guess, isn't really the way to do it. I love Joyce though, and maybe close reading Ulysses a piece at a time makes sense. Did you use any secondary literature?

Speaking of long reads, I'm almost done with My Struggle 6. I enjoyed it much more than when I first tried reading it and stopped somewhere in the Celan essay. Now, I read the Celan poem he talks about beforehand and took away more from that part. The Hitler essay was really interesting, even though I'm not exactly sure how it relates to the rest of the book. I understand that Knausgaard felt like he had to address the topic due to the similarity of the title and he connects his own background to Hitler's and the theme of authenticity, but it still feels like a bit of a stretch. Still, I just thought it was interesting to learn so much I didn't know about Hitler's youth and the Weimar era. I'm in the middle of the last part and reading about his relationship to his (now ex-)wife is heartbreaking. This is where Knausgaard is strongest as a writer IMO: Touching readers on an emotional level, being brutally honest, talking about everyday experiences. It's all there.

[close]

Glad you’re liking Book 6 a lot more and I agree with you 100%. The Hitler part does touch on how mundane his like was and how easily someone can become awful - same why he mentioned Breivik. Like, how evil isn’t always a once in a generation, born a monster type thing it instead a close accumulation of problems and deviancy and then suddenly you’re lost.

I can definitely find some secondary things to share about Ulysses. They’re somewhere in this thread. I’ve read it 3 times (once on my own, twice through two different undergrad classes) and the supplemental material really enriched the experience. I have it on my list to re-read again actually...

At long last, I'm done with Book 6 now. I'm glad I re-read it, and that last part was heartbreaking to take in. Still, it's a book with obvious weaknesses. If you spend 400 pages on Hilter and still don't make your point clear, there might be something wrong with the writing as such. Knausgaard's a terrific writer when he talks about everyday experiences and self-consciousness, but I'm not a fan of his non-fiction. It'll be a while until I pick up one of the Seasons books or one of his first novels.

Ulysses sounds intriguing and I hope to read it one day (thanks for the suggestions!), but I'm not feeling like reading a long book anytime soon. After the Obama memoir and Knausgaard, both of which I read in English (which is not my native tongue), I somehow yearn for short pageturners. Just went to the bookstore and bought the newest novel from one of Germany's best contemporary authors.

[Frank]

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@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

[close]

Wow, 2 years is a long period of time, but I see where you're coming from. I tried to read Ulysses after attending a Joyce seminar at university (where we delved into Dubliners Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man), but I just read it like a regular novel, which I guess, isn't really the way to do it. I love Joyce though, and maybe close reading Ulysses a piece at a time makes sense. Did you use any secondary literature?

Speaking of long reads, I'm almost done with My Struggle 6. I enjoyed it much more than when I first tried reading it and stopped somewhere in the Celan essay. Now, I read the Celan poem he talks about beforehand and took away more from that part. The Hitler essay was really interesting, even though I'm not exactly sure how it relates to the rest of the book. I understand that Knausgaard felt like he had to address the topic due to the similarity of the title and he connects his own background to Hitler's and the theme of authenticity, but it still feels like a bit of a stretch. Still, I just thought it was interesting to learn so much I didn't know about Hitler's youth and the Weimar era. I'm in the middle of the last part and reading about his relationship to his (now ex-)wife is heartbreaking. This is where Knausgaard is strongest as a writer IMO: Touching readers on an emotional level, being brutally honest, talking about everyday experiences. It's all there.

[close]

Glad you’re liking Book 6 a lot more and I agree with you 100%. The Hitler part does touch on how mundane his like was and how easily someone can become awful - same why he mentioned Breivik. Like, how evil isn’t always a once in a generation, born a monster type thing it instead a close accumulation of problems and deviancy and then suddenly you’re lost.

I can definitely find some secondary things to share about Ulysses. They’re somewhere in this thread. I’ve read it 3 times (once on my own, twice through two different undergrad classes) and the supplemental material really enriched the experience. I have it on my list to re-read again actually...

[close]

At long last, I'm done with Book 6 now. I'm glad I re-read it, and that last part was heartbreaking to take in. Still, it's a book with obvious weaknesses. If you spend 400 pages on Hilter and still don't make your point clear, there might be something wrong with the writing as such. Knausgaard's a terrific writer when he talks about everyday experiences and self-consciousness, but I'm not a fan of his non-fiction. It'll be a while until I pick up one of the Seasons books or one of his first novels.

Ulysses sounds intriguing and I hope to read it one day (thanks for the suggestions!), but I'm not feeling like reading a long book anytime soon. After the Obama memoir and Knausgaard, both of which I read in English (which is not my native tongue), I somehow yearn for short pageturners. Just went to the bookstore and bought the newest novel from one of Germany's best contemporary authors.

i love 1979. i actually haven't read anything else from him, but that is one of my favorite books ever. i read it when i was 16 and it was pretty new at the time, probably not even a year old. couldn't stop talking to my friends and even teachers at school about it.

[Peter Zagreus]

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@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

[close]

Wow, 2 years is a long period of time, but I see where you're coming from. I tried to read Ulysses after attending a Joyce seminar at university (where we delved into Dubliners Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man), but I just read it like a regular novel, which I guess, isn't really the way to do it. I love Joyce though, and maybe close reading Ulysses a piece at a time makes sense. Did you use any secondary literature?

Speaking of long reads, I'm almost done with My Struggle 6. I enjoyed it much more than when I first tried reading it and stopped somewhere in the Celan essay. Now, I read the Celan poem he talks about beforehand and took away more from that part. The Hitler essay was really interesting, even though I'm not exactly sure how it relates to the rest of the book. I understand that Knausgaard felt like he had to address the topic due to the similarity of the title and he connects his own background to Hitler's and the theme of authenticity, but it still feels like a bit of a stretch. Still, I just thought it was interesting to learn so much I didn't know about Hitler's youth and the Weimar era. I'm in the middle of the last part and reading about his relationship to his (now ex-)wife is heartbreaking. This is where Knausgaard is strongest as a writer IMO: Touching readers on an emotional level, being brutally honest, talking about everyday experiences. It's all there.

[close]

Glad you’re liking Book 6 a lot more and I agree with you 100%. The Hitler part does touch on how mundane his like was and how easily someone can become awful - same why he mentioned Breivik. Like, how evil isn’t always a once in a generation, born a monster type thing it instead a close accumulation of problems and deviancy and then suddenly you’re lost.

I can definitely find some secondary things to share about Ulysses. They’re somewhere in this thread. I’ve read it 3 times (once on my own, twice through two different undergrad classes) and the supplemental material really enriched the experience. I have it on my list to re-read again actually...

[close]

At long last, I'm done with Book 6 now. I'm glad I re-read it, and that last part was heartbreaking to take in. Still, it's a book with obvious weaknesses. If you spend 400 pages on Hilter and still don't make your point clear, there might be something wrong with the writing as such. Knausgaard's a terrific writer when he talks about everyday experiences and self-consciousness, but I'm not a fan of his non-fiction. It'll be a while until I pick up one of the Seasons books or one of his first novels.

Ulysses sounds intriguing and I hope to read it one day (thanks for the suggestions!), but I'm not feeling like reading a long book anytime soon. After the Obama memoir and Knausgaard, both of which I read in English (which is not my native tongue), I somehow yearn for short pageturners. Just went to the bookstore and bought the newest novel from one of Germany's best contemporary authors.

[close]

i love 1979. i actually haven't read anything else from him, but that is one of my favorite books ever. i read it when i was 16 and it was pretty new at the time, probably not even a year old. couldn't stop talking to my friends and even teachers at school about it.

Shoot! Wish my German was good enough to read that. I read Imperium years ago, and really dug it. I've got a a promotional copy of The Dead that I've been sitting on for a while, so maybe I'll read that now that I'm out of school for the summer.

Actually! Speaking of German literature, and long novels, I've been wanting to read Musil's The Man Without Qualities for a while now, and this summer might be the time to do it.

[AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice]

I had no idea Kracht was an author people read around the world. Wow. That's unexpected I guess.

I was on the fence between Eurotrash and 1979. I simply picked the first because it's readily available at bookstore's counters outside (you can't enter bookstores due lockdown restrictions) and the lure of reading a book that just came out. 1979 is at the top of my list though.

I've only heard good things about The Man without Qualities from people who are into Modernist literature. It sounds exciting, but also like a difficult read. I'd be curious to learn what you take away from it.

[Frank]

I had no idea Kracht was an author people read around the world. Wow. That's unexpected I guess.

I was on the fence between Eurotrash and 1979. I simply picked the first because it's readily available at bookstore's counters outside (you can't enter bookstores due lockdown restrictions) and the lure of reading a book that just came out. 1979 is at the top of my list though.

I've only heard good things about The Man without Qualities from people who are into Modernist literature. It sounds exciting, but also like a difficult read. I'd be curious to learn what you take away from it.

1979 is super short, i reckon you can finish it in one sitting, that's what i did. german original isn't even a 100 pages irc.

i'm just getting back into books and i think i want to catch up on kracht now. i remember i wanted to start reading musil, too, way back. but my adhd makes it hard for me to even start works that big like the man without qualities, because it always intimidates me.

ashamed to admit i haven't even started reading the last book i purchased, terranauts by t.c. boyle. i'm a big fan of water music and world's end. i just bought it on a whim when i had a coupon for the book store. got another coupon, if you guys have suggestions for authors similar to t.c. boyle, or thomas pynchon maybe, that would be much appreciated. i like that light beatnik flavor and weirdness without everything going overboard or becoming too incoherent.

[white guy in a durag]

I've been thinkin about this book a lot recently. An excellent haunted house novel for those into horror. I regret giving my copy to my mom because I'm itching to read it again.

[MichaelJacksonsGhost]

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shout out to whomever recommended The Big Goodbye and You Can't Win.

Working through those two now

[close]

I just downloaded You Can't Win cause it was referenced a few times in that opium book I just read. I love books about crimes & drugs, and that sounds like a good one.

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Started reading The Fire Next Time on recommendation from @Deputy Wendell on this very page. It's good. Short too, I'm almost finished. Makes me feel like a braniac. Also picked up Confederacy of Dunces but it's way longer than I expected. I'll give it an honest try. Picked up a compilation of Groucho Marx letters, that one I'm really looking forward to.

[close]

Confederacy of Dunces is funny cause if Ignatius was born in the 90s and skated, he would totally post on Slap.

[close]

I thought the same about Confederacy of Dunces, not necessarily about being a Slap Pal, but he reminded me of disillusioned skaters from my generation.

This is a bit of an older post but I thought I’d respond nonetheless. I read CoD a couple times in college, and actually got the chance to go to New Orleans on this “research grant” to look at Toole’s old haunts and sort of connect Ignatius’ experiences to the actual city. After that, and reading some
biographies about the author (which is an interesting story in and of itself, not to mention the convoluted process of getting CoD published) the book got a lot sadder for me. Almost like the tears of a clown, if that makes sense—using irony as a way to really mask a lot of discontent or Weltschmerz.

On another note, after almost four months of reading, I’m down to the last fifty pages of the last volume of In Remembrance of Things Past. My god had it been a journey of a book. I feel like Proust has just totally hijacked my brain and revamped my thinking and the general structure of my thoughts. That being said, I already know I’m going to have to give it another perusal in a couple years; there’s just so much going on, so many things throughout the book that connect seemingly innocuous yet intricate ways. Anyone read Proust and have any takeaways from their experience? I’m keen to hear what other people got out of it.

[botefdunn]

I read several volumes of Proust, not all of them, that was never the intention. I was pretty young and I remember it had a calming effect on me, kind of inspiring a sort of comfort that life isn't just a series of disparate, lost moments. I thought maybe it would be a good idea to try and emulate this work, but I stopped thinking that long ago, I like moving around too much.

[TheLurper]

Picked up a copy of The Redneck Manifesto by Jim Goad at the used bookstore yesterday. I'm about half-way through and it is pretty terrible so far.The author leans heavily on partial truths and is purposefully offensive in a dumb way.

It is basically a book written by everyone's angry racist white uncle that somehow thinks the best way of bringing attention to the problems of poor white men is to belittle the problems of everyone else. He also thinks throwing out racial slurs to support his belief that accusations of racism (not racism, which doesn't exist or matter as of 1997) are the real problem in society. And, he pretends that only poor white men are made fun of in society.

It is terrible as a completed book, but it is an interesting look into the angry world view of Goad and those like him. Sadly, it reinforces the stereotype that Goad supposedly wanted to break when writing this book. Goad is very much the angry, violent, dumb, and hateful person rednecks get stereotyped to be and his book is evidence of his poor character.

Working class white dudes need a better advocate/voice than this dipshit.

[slappies]

Picked up a copy of The Redneck Manifesto by Jim Goad at the used bookstore yesterday. I'm about half-way through and it is pretty terrible so far.The author leans heavily on partial truths and is purposefully offensive in a dumb way.

It is basically a book written by everyone's angry racist white uncle that somehow thinks the best way of bringing attention to the problems of poor white men is to belittle the problems of everyone else. He also thinks throwing out racial slurs to support his belief that accusations of racism (not racism, which doesn't exist or matter as of 1997) are the real problem in society. And, he pretends that only poor white men are made fun of in society.

It is terrible as a completed book, but it is an interesting look into the angry world view of Goad and those like him. Sadly, it reinforces the stereotype that Goad supposedly wanted to break when writing this book. Goad is very much the angry, violent, dumb, and hateful person rednecks get stereotyped to be and his book is evidence of his poor character.

Working class white dudes need a better advocate/voice than this dipshit.

Jim Goad is the blueprint for guys like Gavin McInnes. It's interesting hearing how much Answer Me! ended up influencing people that ended up leading very, very different careers than Goad.

[TheLurper]

Jim Goad is the blueprint for guys like Gavin McInnes. It's interesting hearing how much Answer Me! ended up influencing people that ended up leading very, very different careers than Goad.

I had no clue who this guy was before you posted this. I found an interview of McInnes interviewing Goad. What a shit show.

Also, this book is a wild ride. Overall it is terrible. The first few chapters are the absolute worst, but at times, he can be an interesting story teller: His discussion of the "working-class" bar is interesting, although it is framed through a lens that promotes/normalizes the worst aspects of "working-class" life and contradicts itself. And, I'm now at the part where he is comparing being raped by Bigfoot to wanting Jesus's love or (the stereotype of) a white woman wanting (the hyper sexualized/masculine) black guy's dick over his emasculated down trodden white working class counterpart. The book is fucking stupid, but I get why Simon and Schuster gave this huckster a book (same publisher that was going to give Milo a book).

It is weird some of his critiques of capitalism could be found in Marx and Engels. This I think this the most interesting aspect of this form of far-right conservatism. It hates capitalism and it hates the bosses, but its proponents wouldn't have it any other way.

[oyolar]

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Jim Goad is the blueprint for guys like Gavin McInnes. It's interesting hearing how much Answer Me! ended up influencing people that ended up leading very, very different careers than Goad.

[close]

I had no clue who this guy was before you posted this. I found an interview of McInnes interviewing Goad. What a shit show.

Also, this book is a wild ride. Overall it is terrible. The first few chapters are the absolute worst, but at times, he can be an interesting story teller: His discussion of the "working-class" bar is interesting, although it is framed through a lens that promotes/normalizes the worst aspects of "working-class" life and contradicts itself. And, I'm now at the part where he is comparing being raped by Bigfoot to wanting Jesus's love or (the stereotype of) a white woman wanting (the hyper sexualized/masculine) black guy's dick over his emasculated down trodden white working class counterpart. The book is fucking stupid, but I get why Simon and Schuster gave this huckster a book (same publisher that was going to give Milo a book).

It is weird some of his critiques of capitalism could be found in Marx and Engels. This I think this the most interesting aspect of this form of far-right conservatism. It hates capitalism and it hates the bosses, but its proponents wouldn't have it any other way.

Well, they just hate the bosses in charge now. They'd be fine with bullies and strongmen in charge - or at least bosses/politicians who match them ethnically/ideologically/etc. That's why fascism is actually an anti-capitalist politics as well: the far right think that the free market can be manipulated by "lesser" people so they need to be removed from the equation because it harms the "better" people and that if we didn't have capitalism, the strongest people who are currently most oppressed despite being the most deserving would be in better socioeconomic positions. Goad's (and people like him, McInnes', etc.) criticisms of capitalism aren't about how they oppress everyone and we all need liberation from an oppressive structure - their problems are that capitalism oppresses people like them and they don't deserve it - capitalism should only be allowed to oppress other people.

[AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice]

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I had no idea Kracht was an author people read around the world. Wow. That's unexpected I guess.

I was on the fence between Eurotrash and 1979. I simply picked the first because it's readily available at bookstore's counters outside (you can't enter bookstores due lockdown restrictions) and the lure of reading a book that just came out. 1979 is at the top of my list though.

I've only heard good things about The Man without Qualities from people who are into Modernist literature. It sounds exciting, but also like a difficult read. I'd be curious to learn what you take away from it.

[close]

1979 is super short, i reckon you can finish it in one sitting, that's what i did. german original isn't even a 100 pages irc.

i'm just getting back into books and i think i want to catch up on kracht now. i remember i wanted to start reading musil, too, way back. but my adhd makes it hard for me to even start works that big like the man without qualities, because it always intimidates me.

ashamed to admit i haven't even started reading the last book i purchased, terranauts by t.c. boyle. i'm a big fan of water music and world's end. i just bought it on a whim when i had a coupon for the book store. got another coupon, if you guys have suggestions for authors similar to t.c. boyle, or thomas pynchon maybe, that would be much appreciated. i like that light beatnik flavor and weirdness without everything going overboard or becoming too incoherent.

Yeah, I'll definitely pick up 1979 some time soon. The only book by Kracht I had read was Faserland and I feel like I'd prefer Eurotrash over it, even though that's the novel that put him on the map and everyone's raving about it. That might be a silly starting point, but the narrator in Faserland was too much of snob for me. Eurotrash is a much more human and mature, but is just as sarcastic.

Haven't read any TC Boyle book since high school. We discussed The Tortilla Curtain in my English class and I was too young to get it, I guess. Which of his novels would you suggest though? Based on your description, I feel like I could be into his writing.

[Carrolls Chesthairs]

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/44436221-interior-chinatown

[SFblah]

Someone a few pages back asked about Latin American author recommendations and you should look at Charco Press publishing. They are a Scottish based publisher of contemporary Latin writers. Ariana Harwicz’s Die My Love is great. Everything is about 200pg or less.

Also, Mario Levrero is a Uruguayan author about to have his second book translated into English.

[matty_c]

Praise and 1988 are seminal works and for the good of shared experiences I wanna send these two to somebody that will send them to another member when they done reading

Let’s turn this shit into a kind of book club but only one person gets the copy at a time just one big fucked up web?

[Kumiko]

Someone a few pages back asked about Latin American author recommendations and you should look at Charco Press publishing. They are a Scottish based publisher of contemporary Latin writers. Ariana Harwicz’s Die My Love is great. Everything is about 200pg or less.

Also, Mario Levrero is a Uruguayan author about to have his second book translated into English.

Woah, just started Die, My Love yesterday. Backing this post. Also have Dead Girls by Selva Almada and Fish Soup by Margarita Garcia Robayo on deck from Charco.

Besides those I've also been reading The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis. They're solid flash fiction, but I'm not falling in love with her writing. It's worth checking out, but not heading into the whole collection. Of what I've read so far, the stories from "Samuel Johnson Is Indignant" have been the most enjoyable to me.

[childhood]

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shout out to whomever recommended The Big Goodbye and You Can't Win.

Working through those two now

[close]

I just downloaded You Can't Win cause it was referenced a few times in that opium book I just read. I love books about crimes & drugs, and that sounds like a good one.

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Started reading The Fire Next Time on recommendation from @Deputy Wendell on this very page. It's good. Short too, I'm almost finished. Makes me feel like a braniac. Also picked up Confederacy of Dunces but it's way longer than I expected. I'll give it an honest try. Picked up a compilation of Groucho Marx letters, that one I'm really looking forward to.

[close]

Confederacy of Dunces is funny cause if Ignatius was born in the 90s and skated, he would totally post on Slap.

[close]

I thought the same about Confederacy of Dunces, not necessarily about being a Slap Pal, but he reminded me of disillusioned skaters from my generation.

[close]

This is a bit of an older post but I thought I’d respond nonetheless. I read CoD a couple times in college, and actually got the chance to go to New Orleans on this “research grant” to look at Toole’s old haunts and sort of connect Ignatius’ experiences to the actual city. After that, and reading some
biographies about the author (which is an interesting story in and of itself, not to mention the convoluted process of getting CoD published) the book got a lot sadder for me. Almost like the tears of a clown, if that makes sense—using irony as a way to really mask a lot of discontent or Weltschmerz.

On another note, after almost four months of reading, I’m down to the last fifty pages of the last volume of In Remembrance of Things Past. My god had it been a journey of a book. I feel like Proust has just totally hijacked my brain and revamped my thinking and the general structure of my thoughts. That being said, I already know I’m going to have to give it another perusal in a couple years; there’s just so much going on, so many things throughout the book that connect seemingly innocuous yet intricate ways. Anyone read Proust and have any takeaways from their experience? I’m keen to hear what other people got out of it.

I recently read the first book that Toole wrote, The Neon Bible, and the forward to it has a description of all that his mom had to go through to get his writings published posthumously. Considering that he was only 15 when he wrote TNB, it's really impressive. Basically about a weirdo loner teenager who was mostly raised by his eccentric aunt and kinda-crazy mom, I'm assuming a lot of it was semi-autobiographical.


Other stuff I've read & enjoyed this past month:


Maniac: The Bath School Disaster and the Birth of the Modern Mass Killer

Harold Schechter's latest true crime book, about the Bath, Michigan school bombing in the late 1920s:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_School_disaster
The thesis of the book is essentially that this incident is both weirdly forgotten in modern times, but also oddly prescient to our current world. Couldn't find an online copy yet.


Foe
https://1lib.us/book/5031065/3c14fa
Iain Reid's follow up to I'm Thinking of Ending Things. Like IToET, it deals with issues of memory & identity, but this time within the framework of a SF story. I stayed up stupid late reading it, cause I didn't wanna go to sleep before I figured out what happened in it.


The Philosophy of the Coen Brothers
https://1lib.us/book/733790/99ce43
A collection of essays by different writers (mainly academics) analyzing the themes and messages of Coen bros movies. For example, one is about the role of shame in Fargo & another looks at No Country for Old Men as "The Coen's Tragic Western".

There's another book I really liked in the same series, that's on Charlie Kaufman's movies:
https://1lib.us/book/1196749/2f63d9

[birdplops]

Someone a few pages back asked about Latin American author recommendations and you should look at Charco Press publishing. They are a Scottish based publisher of contemporary Latin writers. Ariana Harwicz’s Die My Love is great. Everything is about 200pg or less.

Also, Mario Levrero is a Uruguayan author about to have his second book translated into English.

The Charco books are great- really smashable. I've also read Trout, Belly Up and The President's Room from them and am pleased to see there are loads more available now.

I recently read Dracula, which was fun but what a mess. Could have done with a bloody good edit. I've also just finished Algorithms to Live By, which explores the thinking behind efficient sorting, optimal stopping, randomness and a bunch of other computer science malarkey. I've read a few stats and computer science books and this is head and shoulders the most accessible and rewarding of the bunch.

[Hinna]

my fav literary excerpt. from the island of dr moreau

...i fell indeed into a morbid state, deep and enduring, and alien to fear, which has left permanent scars upon my mind. i must confess that i lost my faith in the sanity of the world when i saw it suffering the painful disorder of this island. a blind fate, a vast pitiless mechanism, seemed to cut and shape the fabric of existence and i, moreau (by his passion for research), montgomery (by his passion for drink), the beast people with their instincts and mental restrictions, were torn and crushed, ruthlessly, inevitably, amid the infinite complexity of its incessant wheels...

[childhood]

The Once Upon a Time in Hollywood novelization that QT wrote just came out
https://1lib.us/book/16577854/3c296c

[notmikerusczyk]

Just picking up reading again for the first time since high school. What are some must-reads? For the record I always loved fantasy books but I'm open to reading anything

[Deputy Wendell]

i'm 2 chapters into my dissertation--in the area of "literary and cultural studies"--and this is the first time i've ever even entered this thread, which i think says a lot about the negative side of researching, writing about, and teaching literature. i usually teach a 1 or 2 "composition" courses each semester, and 1 literature course, so combined with my diss work, i have to go out of my way to make simply reading a book a leisurely/relaxing experience.

anyway, this is the last story that we're tussling with in the "World Masterpieces 2" course i'm teaching this insane semester (we have 3 class meeting left on Zoom), and i've never read it before, and it's incredible, and a little intimidating to teach:



i'm sure it's been mentioned in here before, but i highly recommend...

edit: wow, sorry about the hugeness of the image, but i'll leave it because it's a cool cover...

apologies for quoting myself (again), but i just finished teaching a 10-week summer lit course, and we ended with Exit West again, and i continue to be blown away by what an incredible story this is and how directly it speaks to our current world...it continues to excite the most reluctant students in my courses and i highly recommend it...

[birdplops]

Expand Quote

i'm 2 chapters into my dissertation--in the area of "literary and cultural studies"--and this is the first time i've ever even entered this thread, which i think says a lot about the negative side of researching, writing about, and teaching literature. i usually teach a 1 or 2 "composition" courses each semester, and 1 literature course, so combined with my diss work, i have to go out of my way to make simply reading a book a leisurely/relaxing experience.

anyway, this is the last story that we're tussling with in the "World Masterpieces 2" course i'm teaching this insane semester (we have 3 class meeting left on Zoom), and i've never read it before, and it's incredible, and a little intimidating to teach:



i'm sure it's been mentioned in here before, but i highly recommend...

edit: wow, sorry about the hugeness of the image, but i'll leave it because it's a cool cover...

[close]

apologies for quoting myself (again), but i just finished teaching a 10-week summer lit course, and we ended with Exit West again, and i continue to be blown away by what an incredible story this is and how directly it speaks to our current world...it continues to excite the most reluctant students in my courses and i highly recommend it...

Some of the reviews on good reads are pretty full on, but I'm tempted to add it to my pile under the nightstand. Funnily, one reviewer suggests that it's the same story as Monsters Inc.

I'm having a run of tremendous books at the moment: The great Railway Bazaar by Paul Theroux was exceptional. I'm just wrapping up The Moth and the Mountain, which is truly gripping and the Lonely Londoners was described to me as a book that sings and I completely agree- it has an inescapable timbre.

[formula420]

Currently reading the lost secret by dan brown (the davinci code guy). First book ive read for pleasure in a decade. Im digging it.

[oyolar]

Just picking up reading again for the first time since high school. What are some must-reads? For the record I always loved fantasy books but I'm open to reading anything

Fantasy or sci-fi esque, you can’t go wrong with Vonnegut’s science fiction novels. Slaughterhouse-Five and Cat’s Cradle are classics but The Sirens of Titan is good but a little different from his other stuff because it’s early in his career. I liked Galápagos. For non-fantasy, I like Mother Night and Bluebeard.

I feel like Dune is the sci-fi/fantasy book of the moment though.

[SLAPASONIC]

Been reading quite a lot this year, this year I’ve read

• Snow Country - Yasunari Kawabata
  The Nickel Boys - Colson Whitehead
  Kokoro - Natsume Soseki
  A Little History of Economics - Niall Kishitainy
  The Paper Menagerie - Ken Liu
  Mindset - Carole S Dweck
  A Fire Next Time - James Baldwin
  The Stranger - Albert Camus

Currently reading The Sympathizer and another called Thinking Fast and Slow.

Kokoro was a brutal read for me going through a breakup after a serious relationship, also Paper Menagerie is an amazing book of short stories, especially the self titled short story hit me hard.
[/list]

[oyolar]

I bought The Sympathizer a few years ago but still haven’t gotten to it. Is it as good as people have said?