Book Hauls!

[AE35Unit]

A couple more Kate Mosse books from the charity shop. They sound interesting!

 

[Harpo]

Today I got two books: The Light Fantastic (Terry Pratchett) and Starmaker (Olaf Stapledon)

 

[Extollager]

The new translation of Sigrid Undset’s Master of Hestviken quartet.
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All told, the four books make up a story roughly the length of The Lord of the Rings, or so it appears to me. I'm halfway through the first book. It draws me in and makes me glad I already have a good collection of Undset since I would want to get more if I didn't have those books. Chronologically this comes a generation or two before the more famous Kristin Lavransdatter trilogy, but I think the Olav Audunsson quartet is regarded as darker. Anyway the seven books are all world-class fiction. (I read the Olav books about 20 years ago in the earlier translation, and have read the Kristin books in Nunnally's.)

 

[AE35Unit]

Picked up this collection of classics today, for 50p

 

[Dave Vicks]

SELECTED STORIES, By Theodore Sturgeon, 2000.
DVD Altered States.
Beethoven's 3rd symphony.
Mahler's 5th Symphony.
Howard Stern, COME AGAIN.
Peter Fonda, memoir DONT TELL DAD:

 

[Dave Vicks]

DVD ,EYES WIDE SHUT.

 

[JunkMonkey]

I do like a challenge:

His last published novel which, as far as I can tell, has yet to be published in English.

 

[Elentarri]

Interesting tail/legs

 

[Randy M.]

I'm unclear. Is the challenge having to translate, or just reading Van Vogt?

 

[AE35Unit]

I'm unclear. Is the challenge just reading Van Vogt?

If its Slan, well that works...

 

[JunkMonkey]

I'm unclear. Is the challenge having to translate, or just reading Van Vogt?

Both - simultaneously!

EDIT: but not translating - I don't want to be translating as I go along I want to be reading. My French is just about good enough for me to read cheap pulp fiction without being conscious all the time that I am reading in what, to me, is a foreign language. It's like when you first learned to ride a bike, or drive a car. At first you are totally 100% self-aware of every single thing that you do, then, after a while, things become automatic and instinctive. I'm wobbling along, just getting to the nonself-awarenesslike* stage of reading then I hit some metaphor or allusion I don't understand and fall off the bike.


*I have read too much van Vogt.

 

[hitmouse]

Both - simultaneously!

EDIT: but not translating - I don't want to be translating as I go along I want to be reading. My French is just about good enough for me to read cheap pulp fiction without being conscious all the time that I am reading in what, to me, is a foreign language. It's like when you first learned to ride a bike, or drive a car. At first you are totally 100% self-aware of every single thing that you do, then, after a while, things become automatic and instinctive. I'm wobbling along, just getting to the nonself-awarenesslike* stage of reading then I hit some metaphor or allusion I don't understand and fall off the bike.


*I have read too much van Vogt.

That transition, when learning a language, is delightful.

 

[Astro Pen]

Detail in that anthology which I'd never heard of. Some authors I know, many unheard of.

View attachment 124440

This prompts my memory of reading Rogue Male by Geoffrey Household 1939. It was a very good thriller but I didn't know he wrote SF.

 

[dask]

From the library, a couple of sf infused (or at least inspired) mainstreamers, the Pendergast $4, the Crichton free. The former appears to be a time travel adventure of sorts.

 

[AE35Unit]

If I remember rightly Sphere was a good one. When I read it years ago (library loan) the last page was missing. I've since acquired another copy

 

[AE35Unit]

2 very different books today. One with an unwelcome surprise or two ...

 

[AE35Unit]

Today from Abebooks. I need Dragondrums now as that is the third in a trilogy within the Pern series.
And so glad to get a copy of Dark again. I seem to remember it being really quite horrific when I read it years ago. Here's hoping it doesn't disappoint like Moon and the Jonah did.

 

[JunkMonkey]

2 very different books today. One with an unwelcome surprise or two ...
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View attachment 125195

My #2 daughter's favourite book is The Great Gatsby she has many copies. She buys them because of the underlinings and marginalia. She finds it fascinating seeing what other people thought important, interesting or puzzling about it.

Re the reading in foreign language thing. I think I hit some kind of milestone today. I was trying to remember the name of something and I recalled it in French first! which I then converted to English. The word was choucroute/sauerkraut.

 

[AE35Unit]

My #2 daughter's favourite book is The Great Gatsby she has many copies. She buys them because of the underlinings and marginalia. She finds it fascinating seeing what other people thought important, interesting or puzzling about it.

I absolutely loathed that book. I literally flung it across the room, I found it that annoying

 

[JunkMonkey]

I absolutely loathed that book. I literally flung it across the room, I found it that annoying

The book, or the people it portrayed? I don't think you were supposed to like any of the characters - apart maybe from the narrator Nick but even he doesn't like himself much.

It was all very careless and confused. They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made…​

Loathsome people. Great book.