the strictly come reading 2023 reading challenge thread
- Thread starter Pickman's model
- Start date
hitmouse
music obfuscation technology
1/45 - Katherine Angel - Tomorrow Sex Will Be Good Again (re-read)
2/45 - Martin Lux - Anti-Fascist (re-read)
Possibly not the most obvious pairing, but both fit into the category of "short enjoyable books that work to take on holiday and other people might plausibly want to borrow". Currently on:
3/45 - Margaret Atwood - The Robber Bride (re-read)
I will get around to finishing Making of the English Working Class some time before the end of 2023, hopefully.
2/45 - Martin Lux - Anti-Fascist (re-read)
Possibly not the most obvious pairing, but both fit into the category of "short enjoyable books that work to take on holiday and other people might plausibly want to borrow". Currently on:
3/45 - Margaret Atwood - The Robber Bride (re-read)
I will get around to finishing Making of the English Working Class some time before the end of 2023, hopefully.
PursuedByBears
Go stick your head in a pig
1/45 Joe Abercrombie - Half a King
2/45 Joe Abercrombie - Half the World
3/45 - George Orwell - Down and Out in Paris and London
Really didn't like this, it comes across as a Polly Toynbee-style fake poverty to write a newspaper column job. A cheap holiday in other people's misery with added antisemitism, misogyny and sneering classism. It's also quite boring. I signed up for it on Substack and got sent a chapter or so a day by email; I think I probably would have abandoned it if I was reading the book. Very disappointing.
2/45 Joe Abercrombie - Half the World
3/45 - George Orwell - Down and Out in Paris and London
Really didn't like this, it comes across as a Polly Toynbee-style fake poverty to write a newspaper column job. A cheap holiday in other people's misery with added antisemitism, misogyny and sneering classism. It's also quite boring. I signed up for it on Substack and got sent a chapter or so a day by email; I think I probably would have abandoned it if I was reading the book. Very disappointing.
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AnnO'Neemus
Is so vanilla
I didn't realise that was a thing. I've just subscribed.
There's also a Dracula daily.
Dracula Daily
Get the classic novel Dracula, emailed to you in real time as it happens. Click to read Dracula Daily, by DraculaDaily, a Substack publication with hundreds of thousands of readers.
draculadaily.substack.com
Any other recommendations?
PursuedByBears
Go stick your head in a pig
Most of the ones I've looked at are part-way through and I want to read one from the start every day. The Orwell substack is starting up again at the end of Jan but I don't know what they're serializing (and I've probably read most of his books now).
BoatieBird
Well-Known Member
1/52 - Ruth Rendell - Tigerlilly's Orchids (re-read)
2/52 - Shehan Karunatilaka - The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida
2/52 - Shehan Karunatilaka - The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida
shifting gears
Well-Known Member
1/30 - Russell Hoban - Riddley Walker
2/30 - Philip K. Dick - A Maze of Death
2/30 - Philip K. Dick - A Maze of Death
Fozzie Bear
Well-Known Member
1/29 Fred and Judy Vermorel - Malcolm Poynter: Violent Genius
About the sculptor, whose work was used for one of Test Dept’s best album covers. He’s in the big book about them I read at the end of 2022. This is pretty great and has lots of photos of his eerie early work. And an interview about his life which is south London, working class mod who forces his way into Goldsmiths and the Royal College. I’m mildly obsessed with the Vermorels too - this is a bit more straightforward than some of their later books.
About the sculptor, whose work was used for one of Test Dept’s best album covers. He’s in the big book about them I read at the end of 2022. This is pretty great and has lots of photos of his eerie early work. And an interview about his life which is south London, working class mod who forces his way into Goldsmiths and the Royal College. I’m mildly obsessed with the Vermorels too - this is a bit more straightforward than some of their later books.
May Kasahara
take me to the feeling
1. Melissa Harrison - All Among The Barley.
shifting gears
Well-Known Member
1/30 - Russell Hoban - Riddley Walker
2/30 - Philip K. Dick - A Maze of Death
3/30 - William McIlvanney & Ian Rankin - The Dark Remains
2/30 - Philip K. Dick - A Maze of Death
3/30 - William McIlvanney & Ian Rankin - The Dark Remains
nogojones
spelling is overrated
1/45 Ken MacLeod - The Human Front
2/45 Edward Bunker - Death Row Breakout
3/45 Ian Bone - Bash the Rich
Much more thoughtful than I imagined and was particularly fond of the earlier stuff in South Wales. Still recognise some of the names. Cheers again ska invita
2/45 Edward Bunker - Death Row Breakout
3/45 Ian Bone - Bash the Rich
Much more thoughtful than I imagined and was particularly fond of the earlier stuff in South Wales. Still recognise some of the names. Cheers again ska invita
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
if you liked bash the rich try 'anti-fascist' by martin lux
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
you've read their book about the sex pistols, i'm sure - the revised edition that came out about 1988 influenced me a great deal, particularly the sections about the situationists.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
3/50 reggie oliver, maze for the minotaur and other stories
hitmouse
music obfuscation technology
I was trying to think where I recognise the name from, I feel like the Wise Brothers probably slagged them off but that doesn't really narrow it down at all.
Paired with Katherine Angel?
Fozzie Bear
Well-Known Member
I've read most things by them I think...
hitmouse Fred Vermorel was around Malcolm McLaren and King Mob in the late 60s and early 70s. The Sex Pistols book he did with his then wife Judy is brilliant and includes interviews with the group's parents, excerpts from Sophie Richmond's diaries and as Pickman's Model has said, included a really interesting afterword about the Situationists in a later edition which is probably where a lot of people read about them for the first time in any depth.
Fred and Judy did a couple of books about the sexual mania of pop fans (Starlust, Fandemonium). Plus some really odd cash in biographies of Adam Ant (with loads of stuff about Nietzsche and pirates) and Gary Numan (allededly the text was all generated by computer).
Fred's subsequent work became even odder with a couple of Kate Bush biogs that veer into obsession (chapters about her relatives in the 1600s iirc). They are all incredible works, partly because you're never sure how they managed to get away with it.
His 2019 "Dead Fashion Girl: A Situationist Detective Story" is a brilliant true crime thing that digs deep into the underbelly of 1950s London. And "Queen Victoria's Lovers: Erotomania and Fantasy" does for Royal obsessives what the early books did for pop fans. Mucho derangement.
Fozzie Bear
Well-Known Member
Yes I shall have to revisit that...
nogojones
spelling is overrated
1/45 Ken MacLeod - The Human Front
2/45 Edward Bunker - Death Row Breakout
3/45 Ian Bone - Bash the Rich
4/45 Joan Didion - The Year of Magical Thinking
Didn't enjoy this one as much as the others I've read by her. The writing is still top rate, but the subject is a lot more personal, dealing with the grief around her husbands death.
2/45 Edward Bunker - Death Row Breakout
3/45 Ian Bone - Bash the Rich
4/45 Joan Didion - The Year of Magical Thinking
Didn't enjoy this one as much as the others I've read by her. The writing is still top rate, but the subject is a lot more personal, dealing with the grief around her husbands death.
QueenOfGoths
Fuck you Dave!
1. 'The Death of Mrs. Westaway" - Ruth Ware
2. "The Paris Apartment" - Lucy Foley. It was alright, a bit slow but alright!
eta.Actually it's my second book
2. "The Paris Apartment" - Lucy Foley. It was alright, a bit slow but alright!
eta.Actually it's my second book
Shippou-Sensei
4:1:2.5
Never sure what to put for this. I read so much serialised content it throws off my count.
In terms of books, I have read.
1. Beyond the burn line - Paul McAuley
2. Project hail Mary - Andy Weir
2.1 Randomize - Andy Weir (it's only about 35 pages long.)
I'll edit to add my thoughts at a time that isn't 1 in the morning.
1. Beyond the burn line was decent. Set in far future earth long after humanity fell (leaving the burn line in the geological records) we follow the story of a scholar researching myths and legends of 'visitors' to try to determine if there is any truth in these tales.
About half way through the book we switch perspective and follow the investigation of an artifact uncovered by the scholar and this leads to dramatic new discoveries.
I liked the first half well enough as it explored the society of the raccoon descendants. I felt the were a bit too human in aspects but there society is meant to have a lot of their technology reverse engineered from human artifacts so that helped soften that issue. I also didn't really enjoy the personal drama that accompanied the first half.
The second half ramps up the action in a lot of ways but the switch in perspective is jarring.
Also after the big reveal at the end part of the story keeps going. It sets up a continuation then abruptly finishes on a cliff hanger.
This left me with mixed feelings about the story.
2. Project Hail Mary
This one I thoroughly enjoyed. I really liked The Martian so I was hoping this would be a worthy successor. I would say it managed it.
The story here is a little less down to earth (down to mars?) as The Martian with it being a bigger story about bigger events with larger consequences. However it is still very much on the hard end of hard sci-fi. Lots of stuff on near c travel, calculating trajectories, and sciencing the shit out of problems.
The story starts off in an very similar fashion to The Martian with a lone survivor of a mission stuck out in space needing to solve some seemingly insurmountable challenges.
The story mixes things up by starting in medias res with the main character coming out of a medically induced coma and suffering from amnesia. The back story then gets fleshed out in flashbacks as his memory comes back.
I was thinking it might be a little too close to The Martian as a story but quite quickly they show that the stakes are a lot higher this time around and then they add a twist to things that helps make it a bit more fresh.
Randomize is avaliable on amazon prime. Its to short to really review.
In terms of books, I have read.
1. Beyond the burn line - Paul McAuley
2. Project hail Mary - Andy Weir
2.1 Randomize - Andy Weir (it's only about 35 pages long.)
I'll edit to add my thoughts at a time that isn't 1 in the morning.
1. Beyond the burn line was decent. Set in far future earth long after humanity fell (leaving the burn line in the geological records) we follow the story of a scholar researching myths and legends of 'visitors' to try to determine if there is any truth in these tales.
About half way through the book we switch perspective and follow the investigation of an artifact uncovered by the scholar and this leads to dramatic new discoveries.
I liked the first half well enough as it explored the society of the raccoon descendants. I felt the were a bit too human in aspects but there society is meant to have a lot of their technology reverse engineered from human artifacts so that helped soften that issue. I also didn't really enjoy the personal drama that accompanied the first half.
The second half ramps up the action in a lot of ways but the switch in perspective is jarring.
Also after the big reveal at the end part of the story keeps going. It sets up a continuation then abruptly finishes on a cliff hanger.
This left me with mixed feelings about the story.
2. Project Hail Mary
This one I thoroughly enjoyed. I really liked The Martian so I was hoping this would be a worthy successor. I would say it managed it.
The story here is a little less down to earth (down to mars?) as The Martian with it being a bigger story about bigger events with larger consequences. However it is still very much on the hard end of hard sci-fi. Lots of stuff on near c travel, calculating trajectories, and sciencing the shit out of problems.
The story starts off in an very similar fashion to The Martian with a lone survivor of a mission stuck out in space needing to solve some seemingly insurmountable challenges.
The story mixes things up by starting in medias res with the main character coming out of a medically induced coma and suffering from amnesia. The back story then gets fleshed out in flashbacks as his memory comes back.
I was thinking it might be a little too close to The Martian as a story but quite quickly they show that the stakes are a lot higher this time around and then they add a twist to things that helps make it a bit more fresh.
Holy shit it has aliens in it!
The problem faced by the earth is also happening to another planet. They also sent a team to investigate.
it totally turns into an alien buddy movie.
The problem faced by the earth is also happening to another planet. They also sent a team to investigate.
it totally turns into an alien buddy movie.
Randomize is avaliable on amazon prime. Its to short to really review.
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