Reply With QuoteSound of the Beast: The Complete Headbanging History of Heavy Metal--Ian Christe
Yeah, I was going to suggest these but assumed he would have read them.Originally Posted by dethtoll
the_grip if you haven't, do yourself a favour and read these.
Nothing better has ever been written. (well except for anything by Ray Bradbury)
Sound of the Beast: The Complete Headbanging History of Heavy Metal--Ian Christe
I've just started rereading 'Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee'.
It's been sat in my pile for a year but I've shied away as I couldn't face the pain.
The litany of death and broken promises.
The blood sacrifice that birthed a nation.
Manifest Destiny?
Just finished reading Neuromancer for the first time.
The Tale of Genji
The Demolished Man, which is shaping up as probably the best SF book I've read after Solaris and The Martian Chronicles. Definitely better than The Stars My Destination so far, and I liked that one a lot, too. It's part of the anthology "A Science Fiction Argosy" by Damon Knight, which also contains a lot of great short stories.
How was it? It's one of my favourite books of all time, so I always look forward to hearing what other people think. Even if they hate it (as long as they have a good reason.)
World War Z.
So far so good. These days I can't seem to stick with anything that is non-sci fi.
I loved it. I've only recently started getting into hard sci-fi (thanks to Peter Watt's BlindSight and Rifters Trilogy) so I've been playing catch-up.
What impressed me most wasn't the book, but how long ago it was written and how many of the concepts and ideas haven't become outdated, and rather have become sci-fi staples.
The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss (fantasy). 58 pages in and enjoying. Plays up the mystery of the main character(s) a bit too much, but that's a minor quibble. The man has a talent for making me want to read more, that's for damn sure.
Just finished Vonnegut's Welcome to the Monkey House, which I found while digging around in an acquintace's bookshelf. I don't really like his short stories that much, but it was one of the few of his that I hadn't read so I thought I should read it. I've been rationing his books for the last decade or so because I figured he wouldn't be writing many more (and now he certainly isn't), but I've recently realized that that was a needless concern as I've forgotten everything about the ones I've read anyway. Hooray for a crappy memory!
"White Noise" by Don DeLillo. Excellent, funny stuff.
"Duma Key" by Stephen King. NOT excellent; I might not finish.
I'm slugging my way through Klingsor's Last Summer by Hermann Hesse. I was delighted to find it because it's in that ubiquitous Bantam books edition and it was one entry in my collection I somehow overlooked.
Compared to other Hesse books its really quite different, and I'm not so sure I like it but it's interesting to see. I believe it was written in the period before Demian/Siddhartha/Steppenwolf but after his 'romantic artist struggles to come to terms with himself' phase Beneath the Wheel/Peter Camenzind/fuck all the early books
What's interesting is that the stories in it have such a different tone from the rest his body of work. With Demian and so on he definitely acquired a more esoteric scope, but the way it was written still remained the same from his earlier books. In Klingsor's Last Summer, which I guess is bookended by these two periods, the prose is so tangential and psychotic it sounds like a different author altogether. Lots of internal dialogue and so forth.
Still the most amazing author I have ever read. There's the saying that a really good book is like holding up a mirror to the reader in which they see parts of themselves- what's magnificent about Siddhartha is that you can't HELP but see yourself in the character. The most perfect mirror.
The guy is about as smart as they come. I think I'm smart. I read him and I think I'm the stupidest person alive.
Chuck Palaljfadlskfjalkjf's Fight Club.
I like it more than the movie.
Huh, interesting. It's one of the few books where I thought the movie version was actually better.
Salem's Lot, Isaac Asimov's The End of Eternity, and Arthur C. Clarke's 2061: Odyssey Three.
What? I get bored, so I just flip from one book to the next; sometimes, I even hit all three in the space of fifteen minutes. Achievement unlocked! *flush*
Lord of the Rings
PHILISTINE!
though eowyn is hotter in the films than the books no doubt
Dan Simmons' Drood
It's a horror novel about the last few years of Charles Dickens' life. Seriously.
Pretty excellent, though I'm only about a quarter of the way in (aka 200 pages). It's mostly been family history and flashbacks so far, though it's obviously gearing up to take a nosedive into Dark Madness soon. Fun times.
Like the Dr. Who episode? Anyway, thanks to whoever suggested Enders Game. I ripped through that one so fast I thought somebody else read it. Instantly identify with the protagonist.
I ripped through book one of The Walking dead and I'll order two after I finish World Without End which is the sequel to Pillars of the Earth they are making the tv series of. My sister bought it for me so I'm obligated but it's not too bad for a medieval soap.
I'd probably put LotR on that list too (well, Fellowship, certainly).
I was reading through Jack Vance's Demon Princes series of space operas a couple of days ago, and noticed that one of the characters used the alias "Spock". It's copyright 2 years prior to the TV debut of Star Trek, so I wonder if one of the show's writers was a fan.
Not at all. It's told as a memoir by a close friend and confidant of Dickens, Wilkie Collins, who has ensured that said memoir will not be published until 125 years after his death. It's about how Dickens was in a train accident where he met the mysterious Drood, after which he started becoming more and more obsessed with death. Dickens may or may not be planning to kill someone just to see if he can resurrect them.
Wilkie's great as an unreliable narrator; He completely believes everything he says, but he's also very forthright about how his "rheumatic gout" requires that he takes massive amounts of laudanum (aka liquid opium) every day.
I'd agree with dethtoll. Although I really don't think Palahniuk is a particularly good author, in Fight Club he did manage to do more than just pad out a book with pop culture factoids and edginess. The film really removed a lot of the nuances from the book and is more memorable for its twist (which isn't a twist in the book) and the snarky comments it makes about IKEA culture.
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