June Reading Thread

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The New Gothic: A Collection of Contemporary Gothic Fiction edited by Bradford Morrow and Patrick McGrath
This is a collection of short stories and a few excerpts from novels, such as the one from Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire. The majority of the selection did not appeal to me. Apparently I like my Gothic fiction to be the old fashioned kind with "dark forests and dripping cellars, ruined abbeys riddled with secret passages, clanking chains, skeletons, thunderstorms, and moonlight*", preferably also with supernatural entities and monsters; not this "contemporary" (the book was published in 1991) gothic that apparently explores the "extreme states of psychological disturbance*" that left me wonder what the hell I had just read most of the time. The stories I enjoyed the most were The Road to Nadeja by Bradford Morrow and The Smell by Patrick McGarth. I found the remainder of the stories to be generally forgettable.

*direct quote from the Introduction by B. Morrow and P. McGarth.
 
This morning I'm starting The Death Watcher, the latest in the Robert Hunter crime series, written by Chris Carter.
 
HareBrain said:
Thomas Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles, which I haven't read since school. So I started that too.
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I've decided to drop this, because I remember it being so depressing. So I've swapped it for The Mayor of Casterbridge, in which the protagonist's fate is at least their own fault (well, and the weather's).
 
EVERYTHING IS EVENTUAL, by Stephen King.5 Dark tales ,audio.2002.

I wonder how his new book of short
Stories is?
 
hitmouse said:
Hilarious bullsh** cult hippy nonsense.
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And without it we wouldn't have had Johnny Cash voicing a cartoon coyote.

HareBrain said:
So I've swapped it for The Mayor of Casterbridge, in which the protagonist's fate is at least their own fault (well, and the weather's).
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I'm coming to the conclusion that this might be one of the best-constructed novels ever.
 
Rereading some of Bill Bryson's quirky travel books - just finished The Road to Little Dribbling.
 
One Halloween when I was young, I got sick either too much sugar or probably
someone didn't wash there hands.
 
Heechee Rendevous and Annals of the Heechee by Frederik Pohl, books 3 and 4 of the  Gateway series. These books continue to be strong on sci-fi ideas, providing examples of what futuristic technology could be and how our world could benefit from these concepts. There are also some very good explanations of scientific concepts intended for lay-people. However, characters are one-dimensional and only serve as examples for the settings rather than being interesting people in themselves. Some of the potentially most interesting events happen in the background, while actual dialogue is reduced to repetative drivel. The Gateway series started off strong, but diminishes in quality as the books progress.
 
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