What Book Did You Read Last Night??? (10 Viewers)

[ruttiger]

I've been reading Orlando Figes' "The Whisperers: Private Life in Stalin's Russia" for a while now. It's a biggish one and absolutely fascinating. Quite moving at times, a litany of absolute heartbreak and loneliness and the supression of anything natural. What a kip.

reading this too at the moment it's crazy

 

[Mormon Nailer]

Just finished "A Man in Full" by Tom Wolfe. I really don't know what to make of him. Sometimes I think he's really stylish in important and sometimes I think that he is the airport fiction it's OK to like.

Flicked through a book of essays by Clive James last night. Good essay on The West Wing and Sopranos and a great talk at the end on celebrity. On W "it's hard not to admire a democracy prepared to elect a mentally handicapped man as president".

But the best essay was a revier of two biographys of Primo Levi - he absolutely skewers the Carol Aungier book in a single sentence. About how her book was longer due to her powers of mental telepathy with her interviewees.

Half way throug The Dirt on Clean, a history of cleanliness and washing - quite interesting.

I also picked up that book by Alan Wiseman yeaterday - The World Without Us, about what would happen if humans disappeared tomorrow, I can't wait to start that one, I have seen him interviewed and he is very interesting.

 

[Moods For Mallards]

This thread is broken.

 

[timbot]

Tristam Shandy - very funny, very clever. I dont know how to describe it in a way...

 

[Lili Marlene]

why is this book so freaking difficult to read??

 

[BC]

over the last week:

william burroughs: the soft machine, nova express, the ticket that exploded, queer.

re-reading these after a few years. i had forgotten how tough to get into the "cut-up trilogy" is to get into. soft machine is a bit of a slog, though peppered with some vividly poetic phrases and an often hypnotic repetative nature. just when i thought it was an example of the dangers of experimental writing - golden ideas but unenjoyable in anything other than a purely intellectual sense - it all clicks together beautifully in nova express, certainly the highlight of the trilogy (though i'm not sure how well it would work on its own). however, i do think the burroughs + gysin cut-up theory worked much more effectively in the mediums of audio and film than in writing.

queer on the other hand is superb. very much picks up where junky left off, and its rather abrupt end leads perfectly into the yage letters. whereas junky was wonderful for the clinical, reporter-like delivery, queer sees the first introduction of burroughs' outrageous and hilarious passages of humour. it appears to be that burroughs' works are all individually strands of a entire narrative, his body of work being a tapestry. the more difficult of his works certainly make the most sense when seen as a piece of a jigsaw.

trevor brown: my alphabet.

a perverse and hilarious take on children's alphabet books by the much misunderstood and terribly under-rated artist. the epitome of his unique exploration of "sinister innocence", and worth every penny of the admittedly hefty price tag attached to this now out-of-print and very rare work.

donal ruane: i'm irish get me out of here!

a terrible title and a dreadful cover, but this was actually quite an enjoyable and aggreable read, albeit in a somewhat understanded manner.

peter sotos: comfort and critique.

an absolute masterpiece. certainly his most coherent, focused and mature work. principally based around the reports regarding the sarah payne murder in the british press, and the subsequent vigilante madness, it also diverges into fascinating tangents regarding such topics as anabelle chong in both pornography and documentary, and the world of magazines marketed towards young teenage girls. the structure and pacing of the book is incredible, and the whole thing totally transcends the trappings of so-called "transgressive" writing.

drew daniel: 20 jazz funk greats.

i usually hate books about music, even when its about artists i am passionate about, but this is excellent, and an absolute treat for 70s/80s experimental music nerds such as myself.

 

[Scientician 0.8]

The last week and a bit I've read Fastfood Nation, a much much better book than I would have thought. I recommend it to anyone interested in American culture and the like. It came out at around the same time as No Logo but I reckon it's the stronger of the two. Certain chapters cover similar material.

I also read World War Z: An Oral History Of The Zombie War. It was a good laugh, throwaway enough with some interesting ideas. I'll be interested to see how they make a film out of it.

New Perspectives On The Irish Diaspora is an interesting enough but patchy anthology of essays on diasporic matters.

Alas, Babylon was a rivetting read. A classic nuclear war novel. I recommend it.

 

[dunderhead]

very good

 

[BC]

The last week and a bit I've read Fastfood Nation, a much much better book than I would have thought. I recommend it to anyone interested in American culture and the like. It came out at around the same time as No Logo but I reckon it's the stronger of the two. Certain chapters cover similar material.

it's a good one, his "reefer madness" (which is actually just as much about the exploitation of illegal immigrants on califonian strawberry farms and the economics of the pornography industry as it as about cannabis legislation) is well worth reading as well. i found the information about slaughterhouse workers far more disturbing than anything about the food itself in "fastfood nation".

also just remembered another book i read this week but had forgotten about, cormac mccarthy's "the road". after hearing so much praise about it i was rather underwhelmed. there are some affecting moments, but i was left asking "is that it?" when i finished it. its good but it lacks something i cant quite put my finger on...

 

[Scientician 0.8]

I liked The Road but I know what ya mean.

 

[Mormon Nailer]

True Enough: Learing to live in post fact society.

Not finished yet but very interesting, one of these boost that is very prescient and points out something that is at the back of your mind and that seems pretty obvious only after someone has pointed it out.

 

[bombidol]

Dark Tower Vol 4

 

[Jill Hives]

I'm not Hayworth, but I thought this book was gas, especially the first half or so.

very good

 

[ITalkShite]

I'm not Hayworth, but

 

[MDR]

I'm reading My Uncle Napolean by Iraj Pezeshkzad. It basically a comic novel set in tehran in around 1940, where the patriarch of the family imagines his minor military career as being of the scale of Napolean's and tries to rule the family and a long list of comic characters. Told from the point of view of a young boy in love with his cousin, it's basically a series of farces but a good light read.

 

[flashback]

I have been reading this yoke :

Pillars of the Earth for the last few weeks.


I think I have lost it on the subway or something now. I'm quite happy. It was fucking unrelentingly shit. Amazingly bad.

Now I'm reading Drown, by Junot Diaz.
It was a huge relief to not read terrible hackneyed cheesy pointless literature. I read about 10 pages into it, and was a little elated to have escaped Ken Follet's "Masterpiece" work.

Brutal.
Yeah. So, Drown, by Junot Diaz gets both .|..|.|..|

 

[IFF]

donal ruane: i'm irish get me out of here!

a terrible title and a dreadful cover, but this was actually quite an enjoyable and aggreable read, albeit in a somewhat understanded manner.

read his book WLTM last year. i like his narrative style. very good writer.

 

[BC]

read his book WLTM last year. i like his narrative style. very good writer.

aye, it's conversational without being contrived or condescending in any way. he knows what he's talking about and says it well, and its got personality without coming across as trying too hard, a trait that is rare these days.

 

[Error]

"Socialismast and Future" by Michael Harrington
Makes me sound terribly educated haha

 

[sugar_referee]

Treasure Island, because I've never read it before .|..|