Author Topic: books to read  (Read 431218 times)

0 Members and 3 Guests are viewing this topic.

Gene_Harrogate

  • Trade Count: (+5)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 1113
  • Rep: 632
Re: books to read
« Reply #3720 on: August 30, 2022, 10:20:15 AM »
I'm about two hours in to the Satanic Verses audio book in solidarity with ol Salman losing an eye for it.  But I think I'm in over my head, it's tough to follow.

Get hungry on it!

codymacfan

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 147
  • Rep: 21
Re: books to read
« Reply #3721 on: August 30, 2022, 09:08:43 PM »
Making my way through the Phillip Marlowe novels by Raymond Chandler. Very fun and easy to read detective stories if you are looking for something lighter.

steezenking

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 126
  • Rep: 12
Re: books to read
« Reply #3722 on: August 31, 2022, 06:50:18 AM »
6 more days till Fairy Tale by Stephen King comes out. Pretty excited.

oyolar

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 11060
  • Rep: 380
  • SLAP OG SLAP OG : Been around since SLAP was a mag.
Re: books to read
« Reply #3723 on: August 31, 2022, 12:34:39 PM »
I'm about two hours in to the Satanic Verses audio book in solidarity with ol Salman losing an eye for it.  But I think I'm in over my head, it's tough to follow.

I can't do fiction audiobooks as I know I'll feel the same way, regardless of what book it is.

Gene_Harrogate

  • Trade Count: (+5)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 1113
  • Rep: 632
Re: books to read
« Reply #3724 on: August 31, 2022, 01:08:32 PM »
Expand Quote
I'm about two hours in to the Satanic Verses audio book in solidarity with ol Salman losing an eye for it.  But I think I'm in over my head, it's tough to follow.
[close]

I can't do fiction audiobooks as I know I'll feel the same way, regardless of what book it is.
Ah that's all I do, really to pass the time on my commute.

Get hungry on it!

Crailslideyoface

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 222
  • Rep: 37
Re: books to read
« Reply #3725 on: September 03, 2022, 02:04:10 AM »
Just finished “The Most Fun Thing” by Kyle Beachy and it was really good
Getting cucked by your hero on acid is TIGHT.

manysnakes

  • Trade Count: (+3)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 6626
  • Rep: 1118
Re: books to read
« Reply #3726 on: September 03, 2022, 07:26:12 AM »
Someone here said "Most Fun Thing" was a sort of attempt to create a skateboarding version of "Barbarian Days", so I skipped the Beachy version and went straight to Finnegan (also my mom had a copy and I took it from her last time I visited). It was a tremendous book and Finnegan is a great writer (which is I guess how he came to get a Pulitzer) who really captures a certain time at the end of an era, when the world was a much bigger place and there were still some new things to discover for someone as committed as were he and his surfing partners. Honestly I haven't enjoyed a non-fiction book as much in a very long time and anyone who cares enough about skateboarding to post here will probably relate to his passion and drive.
This is not my SOTY. I'm telling my kids there was no SOTY for 2021

manysnakes

  • Trade Count: (+3)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 6626
  • Rep: 1118
Re: books to read
« Reply #3727 on: September 03, 2022, 07:30:12 AM »
I'm about two hours in to the Satanic Verses audio book in solidarity with ol Salman losing an eye for it.  But I think I'm in over my head, it's tough to follow.

"Midnight's Children" is a much easier read and helps contextualize the disaster that was Partition. I've tried with "Satanic Verses" but could never catch any thread to hold onto.
This is not my SOTY. I'm telling my kids there was no SOTY for 2021

childhood

  • Trade Count: (+4)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 4066
  • Rep: 663
Re: books to read
« Reply #3728 on: September 03, 2022, 09:16:12 AM »
Anyone started/finished Heat 2?

I'm feeling kinda sick today so I'm gonna start it later

Gene_Harrogate

  • Trade Count: (+5)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 1113
  • Rep: 632
Re: books to read
« Reply #3729 on: September 03, 2022, 12:54:43 PM »
Expand Quote
I'm about two hours in to the Satanic Verses audio book in solidarity with ol Salman losing an eye for it.  But I think I'm in over my head, it's tough to follow.
[close]

"Midnight's Children" is a much easier read and helps contextualize the disaster that was Partition. I've tried with "Satanic Verses" but could never catch any thread to hold onto.
Gotcha maybe I’ll give that a try then.

Get hungry on it!

doctorkickflip

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 580
  • Rep: 44
Re: books to read
« Reply #3730 on: September 03, 2022, 06:43:32 PM »
Someone here said "Most Fun Thing" was a sort of attempt to create a skateboarding version of "Barbarian Days", so I skipped the Beachy version and went straight to Finnegan (also my mom had a copy and I took it from her last time I visited). It was a tremendous book and Finnegan is a great writer (which is I guess how he came to get a Pulitzer) who really captures a certain time at the end of an era, when the world was a much bigger place and there were still some new things to discover for someone as committed as were he and his surfing partners. Honestly I haven't enjoyed a non-fiction book as much in a very long time and anyone who cares enough about skateboarding to post here will probably relate to his passion and drive.
Hell yeah. That book rocks. I think I my have to even go back and read it again.

Atiba Applebum

  • Trade Count: (+1)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 14240
  • Rep: 282
Re: books to read
« Reply #3731 on: September 04, 2022, 03:50:45 AM »
Expand Quote
Expand Quote
I'm about two hours in to the Satanic Verses audio book in solidarity with ol Salman losing an eye for it.  But I think I'm in over my head, it's tough to follow.
[close]

"Midnight's Children" is a much easier read and helps contextualize the disaster that was Partition. I've tried with "Satanic Verses" but could never catch any thread to hold onto.
[close]
Gotcha maybe I’ll give that a try then.

Ms Marvel episode 5 also does a decent job

Carrolls Chesthairs

  • Trade Count: (+2)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 2413
  • Rep: 117
  • SLAP OG SLAP OG : Been around since SLAP was a mag.
Re: books to read
« Reply #3732 on: September 04, 2022, 04:22:52 AM »
Anyone started/finished Heat 2?

I'm feeling kinda sick today so I'm gonna start it later

yes.
I finished it.
I watched the movie again in preparation of reading this even though there's a recap if you haven't seen the movie.
I liked it.

Kumiko

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 99
  • Rep: 54
Re: books to read
« Reply #3733 on: September 17, 2022, 05:18:05 PM »
Been re-reading Vonnegut's Deadeye Dick. I think it's his best novel and highly underrated. The characters, plot, dialogue - all of it is so bleak but Vonnegut's humor still shines through. It's a really nice balance.

Also asking if William Gibson is worth checking out beyond his Sprawl series. I really loved all of those books, but some sci-fi writers can be pretty hit or miss...
i love skateboarding all the time, but sometimes i wish i was one of those douchebags who hangs out with hot girls and parties every week

Skatetron580

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Newbie
  • *
  • Posts: 37
  • Rep: -12
Re: books to read
« Reply #3734 on: September 17, 2022, 08:40:41 PM »
cixin Liu three body problem

sacking rails

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 805
  • Rep: -221
  • sacking rails
Re: books to read
« Reply #3735 on: September 21, 2022, 07:42:06 AM »
the bible

Carrolls Chesthairs

  • Trade Count: (+2)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 2413
  • Rep: 117
  • SLAP OG SLAP OG : Been around since SLAP was a mag.
Re: books to read
« Reply #3736 on: November 27, 2022, 07:30:15 AM »
What's everybody reading?

read if you're a gamer and kind of down for self help books.

read if you're transitioning into a new field/job, curious about protocols for leaving jobs, and how to be in a limbo between jobs.

modern life is war

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 1338
  • Rep: -617
Re: books to read
« Reply #3737 on: November 27, 2022, 07:51:28 AM »
Currently read Dune, it's hard to put it down
You’re a Florida native, aren’t you?

Kumiko

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 99
  • Rep: 54
Re: books to read
« Reply #3738 on: November 27, 2022, 09:03:34 AM »
Presently reading Virtual Light by William Gibson and The Die Is Cast by Robert Desnos.

The Die Is Cast is lovely so far. Only about 30 pages in at the moment. Just introducing this ring of junkies, how they met, what their relationship to each other is.

Virtual Light is good, but I feel that I haven't read it with the proper attention necessary. Gibson has a style where each chapter is a different thread that can seem totally unrelated to the other plot lines going on, but they slowly start weaving together as the book progresses. It can be pretty easy to lose track of who is who and what they're doing and I've been reading it on the train to and from work so my mind's been elsewhere at times. I'm still enjoying it nonetheless.

One book I've read since I last posted in here that I'd highly recommend is Margaret Killjoy's We Won't Be Here Tomorrow and Other Stories. It's a marvelous collection of short stories that feature a rad anarchist perspective, but the stories themselves are just really cool and good. Shit like a music interviewer interviewing a musician that murdered another musician in their scene of "goblincore" or a sci-fi bit about these people whose prison sentence is to live in a different time period and how they're trying to pull a heist on the time guards, one about a person who joined a death cult but is aiming to continue living now that they've gotten a bit older. Just really cool shit.
i love skateboarding all the time, but sometimes i wish i was one of those douchebags who hangs out with hot girls and parties every week

Alexactly

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 2780
  • Rep: 262
  • RIP
  • SLAP OG SLAP OG : Been around since SLAP was a mag.
Re: books to read
« Reply #3739 on: December 05, 2022, 02:45:45 PM »
Recent reads:


Anyhow, I was able to break through in September, and here’s what I’ve read lately.

A Door Behind a Door - Yelena Moskovich

A very weird book about a Russian immigrant to the US who gets roped into a… scheme or something, by her old neighbor from Moscow who just got out of prison for killing another of their neighbors. It’s kind of a prose-poem novel, where every paragraph is preceded by a kind of headline. Lots of references to Pushkin and Lermentov, ultimately it feels most influenced by Lynch - there is a very Mulholland Drive-esque confusion of identities. I’d give it a B.

Yesterday - Juan Emar

Truly incredible, a hidden Chilean modernist gem from the 1930s that deserves to be famous. It’s just one dude’s recounting of the events of a day wandering around a city with his wife, either witnessing outlandish events or getting caught up in his mind about paradoxes regarding mundane and trivial things. A lot like Flann O’Brien or Borges in full comedic mode. Cannot recommend it highly enough. A+

When we Cease to Understand the World - Benjamin Labatut

This is good stuff. it got a lot of hype, but it’s well deserved. Bafflingly showed up on Obama’s reading list, but w/e. A kind of non-fiction novel or collection of fictitious essays about various 20th Century scientists and how their discoveries alienated them from the world or disturbed the idea that science can shed light on the reality of the universe. It’s written (or at least translated) in elegant, crisp prose and conjures an incredible, slightly gothic atmosphere of Pre-, inter-war, and post-war Europe. It occasionally lapses into TeenGoth-style darkness, but overall it’s extremely compelling. I give in an A.

Crossroads - Jonathan Franzen

I fucking loved this book. I’m a lil bitch for some Franzen, but this may be his best novel. Whenever I wasn’t reading it, all I wanted to do was get back to it. If you don’t like him, this probably won’t change your mind, but he avoids the pitfalls of topicality that bogged down Freedom and Purity by setting this one all in the past - which is great, since I always found the best parts of his novels to the be the analepses set in oldtimes. As always, the great strength is the characters - Marion, the mother of the family, is incredible, and I’ve found myself thinking about her sections of the book a lot since I finished it last month. There is an awkward unevenness to how much each time we spend with each character, which I chalk up to the fact that this is meant to be the first in a trilogy and we’ll see more of them later. A+/A.

oyolar

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 11060
  • Rep: 380
  • SLAP OG SLAP OG : Been around since SLAP was a mag.
Re: books to read
« Reply #3740 on: December 05, 2022, 02:59:18 PM »
Moskovich is odd. I read that as well as her first novel The Natashas which I enjoyed. I liked The Natashas better but it had a much clearer and more direct narrative to it. I just thought A Door Behind a Door was too loose for me. I know that was the point but her style is so atmospheric and Lynchian that there needs a little bit of something to ground it even if that something is abstract. I have her 2019 novel Virtuoso somewhere in my stack of books to read. I like her when reading her but don’t feel the need to hunt it down. Maybe I’ll lead it now that you reminded me.

Finally finished this very dense book of Bataillean analysis that I just kept dragging out so I’m excited to dive into Knausgaard’s The Morningstar. I read the first chapter and it’s very smooth reading if that makes sense. But it’s weird to read something from him that is fully fictional and not autofiction. It’s the same style but I have to keep reminding myself the narrator is a character and not Karl Ove.

Alexactly

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 2780
  • Rep: 262
  • RIP
  • SLAP OG SLAP OG : Been around since SLAP was a mag.
Re: books to read
« Reply #3741 on: December 05, 2022, 03:11:19 PM »
I really like Knausgaard and Ben Lerner, but I'm not sure I can stomach another book length auto-fiction again in my life. All fiction is already a kind of meta-fiction; all narrative germinates from some firsthand perceptions of an actual experience; all art is inherently masturbatory. This is known! Joyce and Proust already blasted this kind of things out of the stratosphere over a century ago! Accept that there's nothing new and just make something good for fuck's sake...


Anyways.
 

Peter Zagreus

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 572
  • Rep: 85
Re: books to read
« Reply #3742 on: December 05, 2022, 06:12:45 PM »
Been re-reading Vonnegut's Deadeye Dick. I think it's his best novel and highly underrated. The characters, plot, dialogue - all of it is so bleak but Vonnegut's humor still shines through. It's a really nice balance.

Man, I don't think I've ever heard anyone talk about Deadeye Dick, but it was one of my favorites back in my Vonnegut phase (probably 21 or 22 years old). I skipped work one day, picked up a little paperback copy and read it in one day. I don't remember the particulars, but I liked it, and I'm glad to hear that you enjoyed it too.

I just finished my PhD qualifying exams and I'm going to do some free-reading when I get tired of video games. I've never been much for fantasy, but this one seems promising:

Description from Amazon (I didn't buy it - checked it out from the library):
Piranesi’s house is no ordinary building: its rooms are infinite, its corridors endless, its walls are lined with thousands upon thousands of statues, each one different from all the others. Within the labyrinth of halls an ocean is imprisoned; waves thunder up staircases, rooms are flooded in an instant. But Piranesi is not afraid; he understands the tides as he understands the pattern of the labyrinth itself. He lives to explore the house.

There is one other person in the house―a man called The Other, who visits Piranesi twice a week and asks for help with research into A Great and Secret Knowledge. But as Piranesi explores, evidence emerges of another person, and a terrible truth begins to unravel, revealing a world beyond the one Piranesi has always known.

modern life is war

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 1338
  • Rep: -617
Re: books to read
« Reply #3743 on: December 05, 2022, 08:38:17 PM »
I finished dune, it was amazing. Now i'm reading Dune: the messiah and i can't put it down but i don't know if i am actually enjoying it.

Does anyone have any sci-fi recs? Dune was the first book of the genre that i've ever read and i was surprised at how much i loved the way that the world was created. I picked up 'stranger in a strange land' by Robert A. Heinlein from the second hand bookstore so i'll read that soon too. I feel like i could really get into sci-fi as a genre which is unexpected because i was at one point in my life a hugely arrogant literary snob.
You’re a Florida native, aren’t you?

MichaelJacksonsGhost

  • Trade Count: (+8)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 120
  • Rep: 44
Re: books to read
« Reply #3744 on: December 22, 2022, 08:32:31 PM »
Read John Fante’s Arturo Bandini series. The humor is almost manic, and the stories so clearly inspired Bukowski that they make me reconsider my understanding of creative writing. By no means do I want to be a Bukowski clone , but it’s refreshing to read some of the stuff that inspired him and see how he really didn’t deviate from his source material all of that much.

It’s  awesome to get into things I really want to respond to in my own work.

Seriously, if you like any American minimalism (Carver, Sherwood Anderson, Hemingway), I’d recommend John Fante. Or, if you just want to laugh at someone’s delusions of grandeur, read it. (Is it delusional when his books circle around the aspiration to be a writer? Do the published books not sort of confirm his sense of self and this theme of writing and genius? Is his understanding of himself actually delusional, or just sort of pompous?). He also really paints a “cool” picture of the struggling writer, which I’m just sort of a sucker for.

I will say though, he’s definitely objectifies women, and he’s got some ideas about Nazism which I don’t jive with at all, even though I think they’re included as a sort of satire on American life ca. 1930. With a little historical distance the novels are still a fun time.

TLDR: if you like Bukowski, read John Fante.


PS: has anyone had time to read the news Cormac McCarthy novels? Hoping to get them for Christmas, at which point I’ll probably roll through them. One of my buds got an advance readers’ copy of both books, and all he’d say is that McCarthy deals with a trans character in a really empathetic and honest way. Something I definitely wouldn’t have thought McCarthy would deal with, but which I’m really interested in seeing how he works.

Alexactly

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 2780
  • Rep: 262
  • RIP
  • SLAP OG SLAP OG : Been around since SLAP was a mag.
Re: books to read
« Reply #3745 on: February 03, 2023, 10:14:23 AM »
Apologies for spamming another thread, but I’m recently out of a job and I’m selling off a few hundred books, as well as some clothes and shoes. If you’re interested, I’m happy to bundle multiple books together for a discount - you can PM me list and can sell em to you outside of eBay.

https://www.ebay.com/usr/ollihandroh

Just added a ton of really juicy New Directions stuff, if you’re into literature in translation and whatnot.

swellbowed

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • SLAP Pal
  • ******
  • Posts: 1420
  • Rep: 462
  • ow
  • Bronze Topic Start Bronze Topic Start : Start a topic with over 1,000 replies.

thanksgiving

  • Trade Count: (+1)
  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 416
  • Rep: 214
Re: books to read
« Reply #3747 on: February 09, 2023, 09:53:39 PM »
currently reading gary snyders the practice of the wild. absolutely fantastic. cant recommend it enough. i got about 10 pages in and already knew it was the best book ive ever read.

Kumiko

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 99
  • Rep: 54
Re: books to read
« Reply #3748 on: February 16, 2023, 09:08:52 PM »
I'm presently reading Missed. Better Still. by Peter Sotos. It's a collection of most of his writings over the years, all of which are out-of-print and expensive in physical form. Scans exist, but I'm not fond of reading books on screens so I was glad to get a nice sampler of Sotos.

It kinda sucks. Sotos only has appeal for edgelords, but even as one I find his writing unremarkable. There just isn't much more to it than it being moderately shocking or upsetting that he's talking about real cases of murder, cp, or various forms of sex abuse. And whatever attempts there are at illustrating a deeper message  (perhaps about popular media/news making tragedies a kind of pornography?) is so poorly articulated, I don't think Sotos himself knows what he's really trying to say beyond edgy bullshit. It really feels like any other true crime shit - just with generous use of some offensive words and slurs in a boring, fragmented first-person narrative.

I also read The Lathe of Heaven bu Ursula K. Le Guin recently and loved every page of it. Super rad sci-fi about a person whose dreams are able to alter reality and explores concepts of fantasy, reality, identity, desire, power, liberalism, etc. Definitely worth reading!
i love skateboarding all the time, but sometimes i wish i was one of those douchebags who hangs out with hot girls and parties every week

Jagr

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 747
  • Rep: 116
Re: books to read
« Reply #3749 on: February 17, 2023, 07:34:38 AM »
Read John Fante’s Arturo Bandini series. The humor is almost manic, and the stories so clearly inspired Bukowski that they make me reconsider my understanding of creative writing. By no means do I want to be a Bukowski clone , but it’s refreshing to read some of the stuff that inspired him and see how he really didn’t deviate from his source material all of that much.

It’s  awesome to get into things I really want to respond to in my own work.

Seriously, if you like any American minimalism (Carver, Sherwood Anderson, Hemingway), I’d recommend John Fante. Or, if you just want to laugh at someone’s delusions of grandeur, read it. (Is it delusional when his books circle around the aspiration to be a writer? Do the published books not sort of confirm his sense of self and this theme of writing and genius? Is his understanding of himself actually delusional, or just sort of pompous?). He also really paints a “cool” picture of the struggling writer, which I’m just sort of a sucker for.

I will say though, he’s definitely objectifies women, and he’s got some ideas about Nazism which I don’t jive with at all, even though I think they’re included as a sort of satire on American life ca. 1930. With a little historical distance the novels are still a fun time.

TLDR: if you like Bukowski, read John Fante.


Ask the Dust is a great book and Bandini is a great character. Have never read anything else by Fante - but this is a good reminder to do so.