So, sharing personal mundanities on the interweb is not, like, in the highest echelon of personal preference. So I won't.
I will, however, outline the result of what would be yet another story about the women, and the Solar Coronas, and the little Danish Gypsies with square toes, and Western Pennsylvanian Blue Crabgrass.
I GOT THE BOREDOM POWERUP AND CAN READ THE BOOK!
In the event that doesn't make any sense, I can now, and for the next while read books. With words. And not pictures. Anymore. For eight hours straight each day.
I fancy myself a fairly prolific reader, but what I'd like, from such a fanciful and diverse group as yourselves, is a bunch of fanciful and diverse reading picks. Except from Jeff. I don't need suggestions about "Deer Killing For Dummies" or "Lego Anonymous: Self Help in twelve easy instruction steps."
Please?
Choose like, the best books, you've, like, ever read or shit, yo. Like maybe the 5 that made you consider to shun the female loving for the stead of finishing the bookies.
[ June 24, 2002, 17:11: Message edited by: Ultimate Magnus ]
Posted by Vogon Poet (Member # 393) on :
Well, I'd suggest a whole load of UK SF authors you'd never be able to get hold of, but instead I'l just suggest Tad Williams' Otherland series. 4 nice long books, should keep you going.
Posted by Thoughtchopper (Member # 480) on :
What type you want? There's a different section for each genre, and of each sub-genre of the sub-genre.
Crime fiction is my current thing.
Thus: American Tabloid ranks highly. But only if you wish to know such things as why Hoffa called JFK the 2.4 minute man, or how many bullets it takes to win an election. The Cold Six Thousand is it's sorta kinda sequel.
Science fiction is in a drought right now. So I've been reading the Jack Williamson collections, named, uh, The Jack Williamson Collection, Vol 1-4. It's like reading a time warp into the Gernsback Continuity, what with the special Bismuth Coils and evil multi-faceted eyes.
The Selfish Gene is always good for heavy thinking on a monday. It sets up the whole meme of the Meme, which you'll hear about a lot about on the net by psuedo-intellectuals who never read the book that started it.
Elves make some people puke blood. So if you read Fantasy: George R. R. Martin's Song of Fire and Ice is pretty good. No elves at all. Based upon the War of the Roses, but with really explicit murders, it's more than decent.
Ask me again tomorrow and those recommendations will likely all change.
Posted by Ultimate Magnus (Member # 239) on :
Every genre up to and not including Midget Sex.
I'm on a Ludlum spree, right now, but I'm looking for the good old fashioned horizon expansion.
Posted by First of Two (Member # 16) on :
The Complete Stories of Roald Dahl. Not for kids!
"How Few Remain" -- Harry Turtledove (If you like it, there's sequels)
Posted by Thoughtchopper (Member # 480) on :
Never read Ludlum. Was going to go to the movie later tonight though...
James Ellroy is probably my favorite author right now. Based upon the synopsis of some of Ludlum's books at Amazon, you'd probably like him, if you haven't tried it yet.
The first one of his I read was Killer on the Road, which is written from the serial killers POV. Far better than Thomas Harris' superman Hannibal Lecter books, where Lecter might as well be one of Batman's archenemies. (Red Dragon wasn't that bad, though)
Ellroy makes Los Angeles of yesteryear a hard boiled nightmare, where killers walk the streets and the police are even worse. One of the fantastic things is that there never are happy endings for the protagonists. They may win, but they don't come out clean, like they always seem to in Dean Koontz's books.
Eh.
Posted by Ultimate Magnus (Member # 239) on :
Fotty: I did read How Few Remain. I liked it. And then I made the mistake of reading the first book of the whole Aliens Attack The Hitler. I'll read the What If? compendiums if I need alternative speculative historical alternate history speculation, I think.
"Never read Ludlum."
Lousy dual-prounciation/dual-meaning English.
[ June 24, 2002, 19:45: Message edited by: Ultimate Magnus ]
Posted by Thoughtchopper (Member # 480) on :
true.
Posted by Ultimate Magnus (Member # 239) on :
The film doesn't do the novel much justice, I'm afraid. Although it's not without merit.
Posted by Shik (Member # 343) on :
I have a thing for Peter H�eg. Other than Smilla's Sense Of Snow, however, he is entirely very abstract. Borderliners is very much like that, so you might enjoy that as well. H�eg writes about the aberrations of the psyche very well.
I also like Martin Cruz Smith, specifically his Arkady Renko series (Gorky Park, Polar Star, Red Square, Havana Bay). They're Soviet murder mysteries. Very cool to me.
For escapism, there's Clive Cussler's NUMA books--all the Dirk Pitt novels & the newer Kurt Austin books. He's...starting to repeat himself, but like I said. Escapism.
Standalone books: One Last Time by John Edward; Mister Roberts by Thomas Heggen (what the play & the film were based on); Private, Parents Keep Out! by Austin Stevens (great if you have kids, but fun nonetheless); Warday by Whitley Streiber & James Kunetka (not an alien book, but a nuclear war book); Future Noir: The Making Of Blade Runner, Paul M. Sammon; Dream Brother: The Lives Of Jeff & Tim Buckley, David Browne
[ June 24, 2002, 20:05: Message edited by: Shik ]
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
"I can now, and for the next while read books. ... For eight hours straight each day."
What, did you get fired, or something?
Anyway, read anything by Neal Stephenson. Except maybe The Big U, which I haven't read and therefore can't speak for. And maybe Zodiac, of which I've only read ten pages. But it seems good so far.
Also, read anything by Douglas Adams.
And, if you happened to like Fight Club (even the movie), I understand Chuck Palahniuk's other books are of the same mind-boggling sort.
That covers just about everything I can see offhand looking around my room from my chair. If I think of anything else, I might let you know.
Posted by Ultimate Magnus (Member # 239) on :
Rest assured that I have not been fired.
Posted by Thoughtchopper (Member # 480) on :
The Big U was written before Neal figured out how smart he was. Or before he started reading Umberto Eco.
Posted by The_Tom (Member # 38) on :
Just finished "Syrup" by Max Barry, who ever-so-cleverly went by Maxx Barry for the purposes of the book, the reasoning for which is abundantly obvious after reading it. But I'm recommending it quite highly. And he's Australian, so you can feel all internationalist by reading it. Even though the book takes place in LA..
Posted by Vogon Poet (Member # 393) on :
Well, if it's crime you want, then Dennis Lehane:
A Drink Before the War Darkness, Take my Hand Sacred Gone, Baby, Gone Prayers for Rain
. . . but don't bother with Mystic River as it's not part of the above series, and is shite to boot.
Posted by First of Two (Member # 16) on :
Ummie: I agree, the Worldwar books are stank. They're just silly, a contrived Alt. history.
The Great War and American Empire books, however, which were the successors to How Few Remain, I enjoy quite a bit (Just got the newest one, The Center Cannot Hold.
[ June 25, 2002, 13:25: Message edited by: First of Two ]
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
This is were I get to chime in with examples of my smartness and hipness and out-thereness, and say everyone should read Either/Or, and The Gay Science (and not snigger and chuckle and guffaw, damn you!), and that book about the cheese moving. But no. I will suggest, humbly, based on what very little I know of Mr. Magnus, that he may, or may not, enjoy a brief novel by Jonathan Lethem entitled Gun, With Occasional Music, which is about drugs and detectives and talking sheep, and so on, and is not so stupid as I have just made it out to be.
I would also humbly disagree regarding The Big U, which is Stephenson's first novel, which shows, but which is also Stephenson's first novel, which also shows. So it's, like, smart and funny and stuff. Also features: non-abrupt ending!
Posted by Jernau Morat Gurgeh (Member # 318) on :
For something rather strange and touching, try "100 years of Solitude" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
For an insightful exploration of philosophy, you might want to read "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance", by Robert M. Pirsig. The whole book is online here.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
Wait, so you mean the ability to write a proper ending is something that Stephenson lost, not something he has yet to gain? Well, that's disappointing...
Posted by Thoughtchopper (Member # 480) on :
Just saw The Bourne Identity. Was the book incredibly different? Did he hold onto a corpse while flying down a stairwell and picking off assassins with a shotgun in it?
Ah, well, it was okay. Some well placed comedy would have made it better. Matt Damon saying "How the Fuck did I do THAT!" would be great.
Posted by Ultra Magnus Pym (Member # 239) on :
"Did he hold onto a corpse while flying down a stairwell and picking off assassins with a shotgun in it?"
No. If the movie were likened to Prison Rape, the book is like a milkshake.
Posted by Thoughtchopper (Member # 480) on :
So I'll check it out then. Good concept, anyway.
While waiting for the movie I read the first two chapters of the book at a nearby bookstore. Looks cool. I got psyched up to see the movie...
I noticed they changed a bunch, just on the boat. Like all the cool dialogue where the drunken doc was telling amnesia man he's a bad ass, based on medical observation. Gone. Poof!
Ah well. An old woman really jumped at one point because of a Hollywood suprise orchestra hit when a baddie unexpectedly flys at the camera, and spilled her coke all over herself...so It wasn't that bad.
Posted by Ultra Magnus Pym (Member # 239) on :
I was fairly surprised at how decently the boat/healing sequences were adapted, in the interest of time and such for the movie. And then I saw the rest of it and weeped. After he finds the moneys and the passports (Which, I have no clue where they pulled those out of), the movie turns into Dolph-esque fare, although the same can be said for the Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum. I sure hope noone has a mind to movify those. Leave that to me.
Posted by Thoughtchopper (Member # 480) on :
It's pretty much a cliche that IF you happen to get a Swiss bank account number, when you go to check it out there will be a safety deposit box. When you open it up, there will ALWAYS be a gun, various monies, and passports.
I have seen this no less than five times in teh movies.