November's Nefarious Navigations of Notorious Novels (and other literary forms).

[fjeronimo]

I'm currently reading Why I write and other essays by George Orwell.

 

[Lacivetta]

I'm currently reading Why I write and other essays by George Orwell.

Have that sitting on my desk. Love it.

 

[mosaix]

Just started The Painted Veil by Somerset Maugham.

 

[murphy]

Now reading Towers of Midnight by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson.

 

[Talysia]

Now reading Towers of Midnight by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson.

Me, too. My copy arrived this morning, so I'm settling down to read it.

 

[murphy]

Me, too. My copy arrived this morning, so I'm settling down to read it.

I'm very happy with the way it's going and the fact that the characters are finally developing rapidly and growing up.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

I've finished The Knight Of The Swords, now reading The Queen Of The Swords. Also halfway through The Hearing Trumpet which is taking a very strange turn with a long digression about an 18th century abbess who stole a magical musk from the tomb of Mary Magadalene and performed unnatural acts with the Holy Grail (among other things).

 

[Talysia]

I'm very happy with the way it's going and the fact that the characters are finally developing rapidly and growing up.

Same here - I'm about a quarter of the way in, and there seems to be a fair bit of character development. The story is moving briskly along, too, and I'm really pleased with the way things are coming together. If the rest of the book is as good, then it's going to be one of my favourites.

 

[Pedro Del Mar]

Started reading The Malazan Books of the Fallen last last night, started book one - only ten to go!

 

[Toby Frost]

Just finished Jennifer Government by Max Barry, a story set in a world where everything is privatised and there is no state control of anything. It revolves around a Nike marketing campaign that involves shooting people to demonstrate how exclusive their new trainers are.

Overall, pretty good. It's interesting to see a dystopia based on something other than the Nazi-Soviet pact, and one which is much more likely to happen now. Barry's world is very much like our own rather than a bog-standard neon cyberpunk future, and by sticking to rather flawed people he creates characters that are at once more likeable and less hip than might be expected. The main problem for me was that the book couldn't decide whether to be a serious, weighty satire about American capitalism or a jolly adventure. The ending is fine if it's the latter but less satisfactory if the book is really a satire.

But that said I'd cheerfully reccomend this book. It could have been angrier and nastier, but it isn't. If parody of rampant capitalism makes you want to scream "Commie!" then this isn't the book for you: otherwise, it's certainly worth a look.

 

[dask]

Managed to finish "The Rats In The Walls" by H.P. Lovecraft (from THE CALL OF CTHULHU AND OTHER WEIRD STORIES edited by S.T Joshi) before Halloween night came to a scary close. I really enjoyed this, especially the strong sense of history which made me think if Lovecraft wrote history books (not historical novels but the real thing) they'd be something very much worth reading. Unfortunately, the ending struck me as being a bit rushed. Not because of any literary recklessness on Lovecraft's part, but the story was developing so well along certain lines I had expectations where it might be heading and when the narrator (SPOILER ALERT!---sort of) suddenly took a hard right on where's-the-beef boulevard, I felt a little let down. The main character went to no small trouble to gather a team of experts to explore a "vault deeper than the deepest known masonry of the Romans...a subterraneous world of limitless mystery and horrible suggestion" where the potential for prolonged colorful intrigue was extremely strong, but for me never realized. What was realized was a story written just the way Lovecraft wanted it. Not going to bash a guy a hundred times better than me. Recommended, especially on a jet and windy evening.

 

[elvet]

After Hyperion and Fall of Hyperion, I'm enjoying Endymion. This series by Dan Simmons reminds me of Otherland by Tad Williams. Even though the former is SF and the latter is more fantasy, they share a similar story of adventure to the unknown and the linking together of multiple viewpoints as the larger story is unfolding.

 

[thatollie]

To curb my book buying mania, I went to the library. I need that weighty feel in my bag to stop me from going crazy. I hired out A Clash of Kings by George R.R. Martin, The Scar by China Meiville, and The Prince of Mist by Carlos Ruiz Zafon.

I'm starting with Martin.

 

[dask]

Now reading VATHEK (1786) by William Beckford. Dubbed "the greatest mock-Arabian Nights tale of them all" by editor David Stuart Davies, the beautifully wrought English serenades the mind's eye. Gonna be a masterpiece, methinks.

 

[woodsman]

Just finished Jennifer Government by Max Barry, a story set in a world where everything is privatised and there is no state control of anything. It revolves around a Nike marketing campaign that involves shooting people to demonstrate how exclusive their new trainers are.

Overall, pretty good. It's interesting to see a dystopia based on something other than the Nazi-Soviet pact, and one which is much more likely to happen now. Barry's world is very much like our own rather than a bog-standard neon cyberpunk future, and by sticking to rather flawed people he creates characters that are at once more likeable and less hip than might be expected. The main problem for me was that the book couldn't decide whether to be a serious, weighty satire about American capitalism or a jolly adventure. The ending is fine if it's the latter but less satisfactory if the book is really a satire.

But that said I'd cheerfully reccomend this book. It could have been angrier and nastier, but it isn't. If parody of rampant capitalism makes you want to scream "Commie!" then this isn't the book for you: otherwise, it's certainly worth a look.

This sounds interesting, will have a look round see if I can get hold of it, thanks.

Just finished Clarke's Childhood's End which I really enjoyed. Whilst Clarke isn't the greatest writer in the world, there is something so readable about his work. A mix of easy reading, combined with big ideas, that gives me something to think about when I put the book down or head for the caffettier. This is one of his less hopeful novels and really embraces, as he said in the post script, the supernatural. A little scary as well.

Dropped everything to read Robert Jordan/Brendon Sanderson's Towers of Midnight which I'm now digesting. A great penultimate book, although I worry about how large the final tome is going to have to be.

 

[soulsinging]

Just finished Jennifer Government by Max Barry, a story set in a world where everything is privatised and there is no state control of anything. It revolves around a Nike marketing campaign that involves shooting people to demonstrate how exclusive their new trainers are.

Overall, pretty good. It's interesting to see a dystopia based on something other than the Nazi-Soviet pact, and one which is much more likely to happen now. Barry's world is very much like our own rather than a bog-standard neon cyberpunk future, and by sticking to rather flawed people he creates characters that are at once more likeable and less hip than might be expected. The main problem for me was that the book couldn't decide whether to be a serious, weighty satire about American capitalism or a jolly adventure. The ending is fine if it's the latter but less satisfactory if the book is really a satire.

But that said I'd cheerfully reccomend this book. It could have been angrier and nastier, but it isn't. If parody of rampant capitalism makes you want to scream "Commie!" then this isn't the book for you: otherwise, it's certainly worth a look.

Don't you hate it when you think you've got a great idea for a novel and then find out someone's already used it? Of course, the idea I was mulling over would have been far angrier and nastier... but then, I am a commie of sorts.

 

[Pyan]

Enjoying a change of genre with the Tales of the City series by Armistead Maupin.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Just finished Havemercy by Jaida Jones and Danielle Bennett. Despite steampunkish mechanical dragon on cover and somewhat misleading cover copy, more fantasy-of-manners than anything.

Just starting Native Star, fantasy set in reconstruction era US.

 

[GOLLUM]

I've just completed the Stefan Zweig novella collection Fanastic Night and other stories published by Pushkin Press. I'll post a more detailed review later but the stories featured here were all excellent potrayals of the "human condition" as observed by a master stroyteller as is everything I've so far read by Zweig. Whislt Zweig's work does not contain in the main elements of the fantastic it's a shame not more people here and in the wider populace are not discovering his marvelous body of work given his justifiable fame in the 1920s and 30s and the premise that still holds true today that he was clearly one of Europe's best 20th Century writers.

Now I'm starting Juan Rulfo's masterpiece Pedro Paramo. For those who may not be aware this rather slim volume by the engimatic Rulfo has long been considered one of the moxt influential novels of Latin American literature, predating as it did the magic realism boom of the 1960s and 1970s. This novel has therefore had a major influence on writers including Jose Donoso, Carlos Fuentes, Isabele Allende, Garcia Marquez and the recent nobel laureate Maria Vargas Llosa. I'm only a little way into this so far but it already has all the hallmarks of a classic read.

Here's a blurb to hopefully pique some further interest....

A masterpiece of the surreal, this stunning novel from Mexico depicts a man's strange quest for his heritage. Beseeched by his dying mother to locate his father, Pedro Paramo, whom they fled from years ago, Juan Preciado sets out for Comala. Comala is a town alive with whispers and shadows--a place seemingly populated only by memory and hallucinations. Built on the tyranny of the Paramo family, its barren and broken-down streets echo the voices of tormented spirits sharing the secrets of the past.

First published to both critical and popular acclaim in 1955, Pedro Paramo represented a distinct break with earlier, largely "realist" novels from Latin America. Rulfo's entrancing mixture of vivid sensory images, violent passions, and inexplicable sorcery--a style that has come to be known as "magical realism"--has exerted a profound influence on subsequent Latin American writers, from Jose Donoso and Carlos Fuentes to Mario Vargas Llosa and Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

 

[fjeronimo]

I've just completed the Stefan Zweig novella collection Fanastic Night and other stories published by Pushkin Press.[...]

Now I'm starting Juan Rulfo's masterpiece Pedro Paramo.[...]

I think you will enjoy Juan Rulfo. He is a great writer but sadly with a very short collection of works. So far, I've only read (with great pleasure) The Burning Plain and other stories (El Llano en llamas) although I have 2 other books (Pedro Paramo and El gallo de oro y otros textos para cine).

As for Zweig, he is an author I'm eager to discover and I already have Fear and Beware of Pity in my to-read pile.