i made one, then someone else (sam?) made one, and neither are easily findable, unless i'm missing the search feature. but over the past couple of weeks i've been booking it up.
the life of pi by yann martel--critics who called it "lite" are not entirely wrong, but it's a good book. it emulates some of the ideas of divinity i have long had, so it didn't change anything or "make me believe in god" as it claims. lacks verisimilitude at parts. good twist at the end. decent writing. several STUPID spelling errors ("racked with pain" and "over the gunnel" are two which memorably come to mind, although "gunnel" might be a neo-okayism) which makes me think the editor didn't spend much time going over it because he figured it would be a beach book for "common folk", so i was disturbed by its condescension.
the lion of boaz-jachim and jachim-boaz by russell hoban--from the writer of one of my favourite books of all time (riddley walker), this book is based on the gospel of thomas and promised to be really phenomenal. it turned out to be only pretty good, probably largely because it got very metaphysical and tough to understand, but also partially because the writing at times is a bit self-conscious and forced.
the qur'an by god--i read this in college, and i'm about halfway through it now. it's tough to read the arabic version i have because it's written in thulth and i can only really understand the simple baby writing (qarim, or something like that?). pretty interesting. it's a phenomenal book in the same way the bible is--namely, it's infinitely interpretable. i can read a section that condemns those who drive muslims apart and apply it to insurgents in iraq trying to foment sunni-shiite war, but an insurgent could read it and apply it to westerners to broke the caliphate centuries ago and continue to occupy arab lands. there's soooo much that agrees with the jewish and christian scriptures and honestly i haven't found much i don't believe that isn't also present in those scriptures. notably however, i'm really disturbed by the running tone of anti-feminism which exceeds the other texts, and i can only explain it by thinking that god probably directed this toward a culture that was exceedingly anti-feminist and was "speaking their language".
moby-dick by herman melville--i remember thinking this was a great book in high school but still having trouble getting through all parts of it, esp. the parts where they just list the contents of the ship. but i'm over a hundred pages in this time around and it's fucking amazing. soooo referential to pretty much ALL of western cultural history, comic, action-packed, and tons else!
couple others comin' down the pike, too.
the life of pi by yann martel--critics who called it "lite" are not entirely wrong, but it's a good book. it emulates some of the ideas of divinity i have long had, so it didn't change anything or "make me believe in god" as it claims. lacks verisimilitude at parts. good twist at the end. decent writing. several STUPID spelling errors ("racked with pain" and "over the gunnel" are two which memorably come to mind, although "gunnel" might be a neo-okayism) which makes me think the editor didn't spend much time going over it because he figured it would be a beach book for "common folk", so i was disturbed by its condescension.
the lion of boaz-jachim and jachim-boaz by russell hoban--from the writer of one of my favourite books of all time (riddley walker), this book is based on the gospel of thomas and promised to be really phenomenal. it turned out to be only pretty good, probably largely because it got very metaphysical and tough to understand, but also partially because the writing at times is a bit self-conscious and forced.
the qur'an by god--i read this in college, and i'm about halfway through it now. it's tough to read the arabic version i have because it's written in thulth and i can only really understand the simple baby writing (qarim, or something like that?). pretty interesting. it's a phenomenal book in the same way the bible is--namely, it's infinitely interpretable. i can read a section that condemns those who drive muslims apart and apply it to insurgents in iraq trying to foment sunni-shiite war, but an insurgent could read it and apply it to westerners to broke the caliphate centuries ago and continue to occupy arab lands. there's soooo much that agrees with the jewish and christian scriptures and honestly i haven't found much i don't believe that isn't also present in those scriptures. notably however, i'm really disturbed by the running tone of anti-feminism which exceeds the other texts, and i can only explain it by thinking that god probably directed this toward a culture that was exceedingly anti-feminist and was "speaking their language".
moby-dick by herman melville--i remember thinking this was a great book in high school but still having trouble getting through all parts of it, esp. the parts where they just list the contents of the ship. but i'm over a hundred pages in this time around and it's fucking amazing. soooo referential to pretty much ALL of western cultural history, comic, action-packed, and tons else!
couple others comin' down the pike, too.
