The Books/Reading Thread

[Dak]

Finished American Nations. Started 12 Rules for Life although I imagine I already know most of the content of the main book. However, the Foreward has been excellent. Anyone who hates JP as a person does so as an anti-humanist or as an ignoramus.

 

[CiG]

Currently reading:

View attachment 15354

Roughly just over a chapter in thus far, the lore is a little dense but I'm slowly getting over the terminological barriers. The book is part of the Iron Hands series who are a group within Warhammer 40k who ritualistically slowly replace their biology with machinery, so there's a hyper-futuristic transbiological element which necessitates a pretty crazy use of technical language that takes some time to get used to.

Slowly getting over feeling burned out and getting back to this, roughly just over 6 chapters in and the story is really picking up so good timing. With all the talk of walls these days I noticed an interesting and amusing passage in chapter 5:

"The Iron Hands have no love for walls.
Walls encourage the weak to prosper."

As a fan of the Iron Hands specifically I had no idea until now that they're basically social Darwinists.

 

[viewerfromnihil]

Doing some more readings for an upcoming interview after receiving a positive reply from a potential adviser.

Finished the introduction of this. Provocative and intriguing. I'm looking forward to flipping through the rest.

Will be reading through this next. Looks very promising.

 

[Matt]

Current reading.

 

[Dak]

Current reading.

Ah, I see you're a man of conspiracy culture as well.

 

[Dak]

"The Iron Hands have no love for walls.
Walls encourage the weak to prosper."

So basically just the opposite of the Imperial Fists?

 

[The Ozzman]

Current reading.

This seems interesting and I would probably read this after everything else on my bookshelf I need to read

Doing some more readings for an upcoming interview after receiving a positive reply from a potential adviser.

Finished the introduction of this. Provocative and intriguing. I'm looking forward to flipping through the rest.

Will be reading through this next. Looks very promising.

Both of these seem up my alley given my collegiate background (Finance) but I imagine the bottom would put me to sleep lol. I still have some finance books I bought years ago that I have yet to read since my interests are on other things at the moment. I should probably move them up on my list.

 

[Matt]

Ah, I see you're a man of conspiracy culture as well.

I'm not really getting that kind of vibe from it honestly. There are direct correlations to Buchanan's ideas and the Koch Brother's actions.

 

[CiG]

So basically just the opposite of the Imperial Fists?

Pretty much. Though instead of having a single fortress-monastery like most legions, they have 10 land-behemoth mobile fortresses which is... pretty fucking pro-wall.

 

[no country for old wainds]

enjoyed murakami's HARD BOILED WONDERLAND... a lot more than i expected to (i feared one of those postmodern ironic spot-the-reference things, but this actually seemed classical and sincere in the ways i care about). begins as a very readable pastiche of chandler, kafka, gibson and some other stuff, but with a bittersweet existential throughline that really sneaked up on me over the last quarter.

 

[Einherjar86]

Man, Murakami is someone I really should like, but I haven't been able to get into. I tried Kafka on the Shore and it didn't take, then tried 1Q84 and it really didn't take.

 

[no country for old wainds]

this is my first murakami so i can't really comment, but if you could explain why you didn't like them i could say whether the same qualities apply to this one. i might check out one of those soon anyway and find out for myself, though.

 

[TageRyche]

I finished reading an advance copy of the Marcia Muller mystery The Breakers.

You can read my Mystery Scene magazine review of the book HERE!

 

[TageRyche]

Here's my Mystery Scene review of the Peter Blauner thriller Sunrise Highway.

 

[TageRyche]

Here's my Mystery Scene review of the R.J. Jagger novel Shot Of Love.

 

[Matt]

This seems interesting and I would probably read this after everything else on my bookshelf I need to read

It's interesting but pretty dry. I usually do my reading at night when I'm already tired and I've been reading a few pages and falling asleep.

 

[Einherjar86]

this is my first murakami so i can't really comment, but if you could explain why you didn't like them i could say whether the same qualities apply to this one. i might check out one of those soon anyway and find out for myself, though.

Just realized I missed this.

I'd have to go back and look at those books again, it was so long ago. Both failed to hold my interest, although Kafka was a bit more pleasantly written. It just felt somewhat meandering. 1Q84 was rather clunky--one of those cases where a writer thinks to themselves "I'm going to write a mammoth book!" but doesn't have the endurance for it. Some of this could be the result of translation, I'm not exactly sure how hands-on Murakami is (if at all).

You're also right when you describe his work as existential, which is something I'm not fond of in most writing. I find it too personalized in a psychological way (the fragile ego, the authentic self, etc.). Language is already alienating, so I'm somewhat suspicious of literature that tries to overcome that quality by searching for something like sincerity, confession, or honesty.

 

[no country for old wainds]

hard boiled was 200+ pages shorter than kafka and 500+ shorter than 1Q84, so it probably has greater economy in its favour for what that's worth.

it's also very couched in genre and stylisation (it's basically alternately riffing on kafka and chandler in its writing style), and the existential resonance kinda gradually crept up through the cracks of that style rather than being delivered directly, for me anyway. i'm not sure i fully appreciate what you mean though re: language being alienating.

 

[Einherjar86]

Cool, thanks. Maybe I'll give it a try at some point.

I meant that language calcifies lived experience, e.g. the word "love" isn't love, etc. etc. Sure it connects us, but it also acts a screen between us. I tend to be interested in writers who explore the dynamics of that screen. Writers invested in authenticity/sincerity and related principles tend to downplay language's alienating potential.

 

[Blurry_Dreams]