*What book are you reading? (part 2)

[izz]

The Ballad of Halo Jones

Awesome. I approve

 

[izz]

I'm on The Law and the Lady by Wilkie Collins, my favouritist author, and just finished re-reading The Road, McCarthy.

Rough Guide does a guide to classic novels, which is in itself most excellent and I'm hoping to acquaint myself with many of its entries.

 

[machine cat]

Anyone read 1Q84? I've just realised it's been sat unread on my bookshelf for months.

 

[Limerick Red]

the shining path of peru by David Scott Palmer.

pretty interesting so far.

 

[DotCommunist]

I've just finished reading the City and the City by China Mieville. I'll probably go back and read it again at some point.

I thought that throughout the book there was a very strong sense of place and it definitely reminded me of the former Soviet Union and some of the craziness of it all, the characters' accents sounded just right in my head. It reminded me of a place like Chisinau where I lived, where there are definitely "two cities" (perhaps more than two) and to speak russian or romanian to somebody can be like committing this terrible anti-social crime, and to an extent people live in very separate worlds despite living together. But yet they can't live completely separately.One of the things it also reminded me of was Transnistria where people live under separate laws, have a separate currency and "passport" despite living in Moldova.

There's also a theme about class in there too, the whole idea that the middle class often have absolutely no idea (and vice versa) about how the working class live, definitely true in many parts of the former soviet union where speaking the two languages mixed together is often only something that working class people do. I think he captured some of the whole insanity of lots of aspects of this type of society perfectly.

As for the Breach thing I thought they were quite cool, they were very realistic and it's like an exaggerated version of what actually happens. The unificationists were universally loathed and completely out of touch and actually the two cities were a lot more intertwined than anyone liked to admit, they all needed this ridiculous situation to continue. There is a line towards the end where one of the "avatars of Breach" says that they don't need to stop people breaking the rule but they do it themselves because they're scared of the consequences.

It's like loads of social rules which people follow and nobody knows why and they don't really matter at all, but actually in some ways they do. Both about capitalism like the "value of money" and so on and about other things.

I liked Borlu and the other characters, especially Dhatt who reminds me a lot of some of the people I met out there. I also liked the way that none of the characters were given strong political opinions that we were meant to agree or disagree with, you could even understand the point of view of the far-right characters who weren't really villains, they were doing what they did in their way. In a lot of contemporary detective fiction I feel like the author puts their views into the characters' mouths so you're meant to agree with it. The nationalist's line about "there's only one city and that's Beszel" that's so true, that's exactly what they would say and the type of thing I've heard people saying.

It's such a great book, it's so realistic, a lot more so than many people would want to think. I am sure I'll go back and read it again and think of something I haven't thought of before.

DotCommunist

One of the essential themes in the book is indeed the 'unseeing' the respect for borders and arbitrary lines that people do themselves, unaided but backed by the fear of Breach. An amorphous frightening thing that will grab you should you violate these borders. Recall that China spends a lot of time in all his works obsessing over unnoficial and official demarcations and the real forces that enforce them.

But in the end what binds the two cities in a chaste embrace is the willingness of the people to flow with the idea that Ul Quoma is Ul Quoma and Beszel is Beszel. They have to train foreigners to get the paragdim before they let them in for a visit!

The interesection of borders in such a city that could surely never really exist (or could it?) is his way of throwing up his favourite topic and making a story within it. There are other factors to the story of course, the essential murder mystery, the strange unknown origins of this weird city and its ties to outside states (see, the impovrished beszel backed by the US and thriving Ul Quoma backed by well, everyone despite the US blockade)

You know better than I the feeling of a post soviet eastern european city but he makes it live right?

In some ways I was annoyed at how things were not fleshed out, just asides left as markers. Worker-Priests with sickle and rood tatoos? lots of little off hand things unexplained. But thats how he does I suppose. <3

 

[DrRingDing]

the shining path of peru by David Scott Palmer.

pretty interesting so far.

I thought about buying that but was put off. What's your thoughts?

 

[seventh bullet]

the shining path of peru by David Scott Palmer.

pretty interesting so far.

Not bad. Lewis Taylor's Shining Path: Guerrilla War in Peru's Northern Highlands is excellent and worth getting hold of, although focusing on one area of the country. It also gives an easy to understand general overview of PCP-SL history and politics, influences etc for the uninitiated.

 

[Dillinger4]

Not bad. Lewis Taylor's Shining Path: Guerrilla War in Peru's Northern Highlands is excellent and worth getting hold of, although focusing on one area of the country. It also gives an easy to understand general overview of PCP-SL history and politics, influences etc for the uninitiated.

Something I have been meaning to read about. That is going on my list.

 

[stuffarondyou]

50 shades of grey! Sorry, I'm not ashamed to admit that I read that book.

 

[Limerick Red]

I thought about buying that but was put off. What's your thoughts?

Only halfway through, but definitely worth a read, I knew very little bout the SL except for, well the usual, Marxist professors taking over a university, something,something,something,1000s dead, this does fill in the gaps well. Its basically just 6 or 7 short essays, from an anthropological fieldwork perspective mostly.Very interesting bits on the intricacies of Andean culture, although Im not taking that part as gospel.

will let ya know what I make of it when I finish it.

 

[seventh bullet]

Only halfway through, but definitely worth a read, I knew very little bout the SL except for, well the usual, Marxist professors taking over a university, something,something,something,1000s dead, this does fill in the gaps well. Its basically just 6 or 7 short essays, from an anthropological fieldwork perspective mostly.Very interesting bits on the intricacies of Andean culture, although Im not taking that part as gospel.

will let ya know what I make of it when I finish it.

The 1992 Channel 4 Dispatches documentary, People of the Shining Path, is still available to watch on YouTube. It's also interesting, although reveals that some militants were not so hot on the actual situation their movement faced by that time (to use their own jargon, they were nowhere near 'strategic equilibrium' when faced with Fujimori's government and increased military involvement).

There's a great performance by rebels to celebrate Women's Day while held in the Canto Grande prison, also the scene of a bloodbath when it was stormed by government forces.

 

[Dillinger4]

I am finding choosing new books to read quite difficult at the moment. I have so many half read books on my shelf (which is no bad thing). I can identify a few general themes with the books that I have chosen to read though.

1) Walking / Psychogeography / Whatever: I have been buying loads and loads of books about the experience of walking, and the 'theory' of walking as well. This includes:

A lot of Iain Sinclair
Baudelaire
Walter Benjamin
Any situationist / situationist inspired writers on psychogeography
Journal of a Plague Year by Daniel Defoe
Wanderlust (and other books) by Rebecca Solnit (who is excellent)
And loads and loads of others that I can't remember off the top of my head

2) Stuff about Intelligence Services

I think I can trace how I became interested in this. It began whilst I was reading Treasure Islands by Nicholas Shaxson and also Blood Bankers: Tales from the Global Underground Economy by James Henry. After that I read Chatter, by Patrick Keefe, and a few books by Peter Dale Scott, as well as a few books about Gladio / MKULTRA etc. I wanted to find out more about the world of the 'elites' (for want of a better term), the world that connects finance with intelligence services and all the criminal things they are guilty of. But since reading these books I have been finding it harder and harder to find anything that is what I am looking for. I have bought books about the NSA and GCHQ but I am not especially interested in the sanitized histories of those agencies.

3) The Classics

I have been reading a lot of Ancient Greek / Roman stuff. Books about Dionysus and the Eleusinian Mysteries in particular, but a lot of philosophy / poetry / theater / whatever in general. It is fascinating.

4) Poetry

Loads and loads and loads of poetry. I won't even start on that one.

5) Very little fiction.

I find it really difficult to find fiction satisfying now. I have read a few crime stories by Leonard Scissia recently, which were quite good. But overall I find a lot of fiction deeply unsatisfying. I can see how it all works.

I am currently re-reading Vineland by Thomas Pynchon though, which is great.

I think 2666 by Roberto Bolano ruined it for me, years ago. I have still not read anything that I have liked as much. There is a quote from that which perhaps sums up a little bit of how I feel about fiction:

The mention of Trakl made Amalfitano think, as he went through the motions of teaching a class, about a drugstore near where he lived in Barcelona, a place he used to go when he needed medicine for Rosa. One of the employees was a young pharmacist, barely out of his teens, extremely thin and with big glasses, who would sit up at night reading a book when the pharmacy was open twenty-four hours. One night, while the kid was scanning the shelves, Amalfitano asked him what books he liked and what book he was reading, just to make conversation. Without turning, the pharmacist answered that he liked books like The Metamorphosis, Bartleby, A Simple Heart, A Christmas Carol. And then he said he was reading Capote’s Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Leaving aside the fact that A Simple Heart and A Christmas Carol were stories, not books, there was something revelatory about the taste of this bookish young pharmacist, who in another life might have been Trakl or who in this life might still be writing poems as desparate as those of this distant Austrian counterpart, and who clearly and inarguably preferred minor works to major ones. He chose Metamorphosis over The Trial, he choseBartleby over Moby Dick, he chose A Simple Heart over Bouvard and Pecuchet, and A Christmas Carol over A Tale of Two Cities or The Pickwick Papers. What a sad paradox, thought Amalfitano. Now even bookish pharmacists are afraid to take on the great, imperfect, torrential works, books that blaze paths into the unknown. They choose the perfect exercises of the great masters. Or what amounts to the same thing: they want to watch the great masters spar, but they have no interest in real combat, when the great masters struggle against that something, that something that terrifies us all, that something that cows us and spurs us on, amid blood and mortal wounds and stench.

6) and lots and lots of other stuff.

 

[Dillinger4]

oh I also bought this recently which I have been dipping in an out of:

The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories

Which is a 1000 page plus of 'Weird Fiction' by lots of well known (and less well know) writers. Weird Fiction is pretty popular at the moment. None of the stories have really satisfied my craving for a truly weird story though. My favourite ones are by anonymous people on the internet telling 'true weird' stories.

 

[october_lost]

2) Stuff about Intelligence Services

I have been reading this. Quite interesting in places, but it's startling how the guy gets a way with murder, quite literally.

 

[Dillinger4]

I have been reading this. Quite interesting in places, but it's startling how the guy gets a way with murder, quite literally.

I have been meaning to get a book about him for ages. I have read all about him on the internet but a book is always better.

 

[goldenecitrone]

Farewell, My Lovely. On a Raymond Chandler kick. Just got Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett to follow up with.

 

[el-ahrairah]

'Stone Gods' Jeannete Winterson

its...its brilliant. Some of the most archly funny SF I have read in a long time. Its not space opera. Prose style is brittle-pisstakey. Like harlan ellison or dicks without the paranoia. If the plotting holds up this could be a keeper.

cool, i want to read that.

 

[DotCommunist]

cool, i want to read that.

its a little bit feminism. Well, it concentrates on female characters but the overarching theme is the cyclical nature of capitalist society. This is quite refreshing. Last thing I read of similar ilk was 'Maul' by Tricia Sullivan

For more ladies of sci fi you can't go wrong with SF Mistressworks and I cannot help but plug this weird un Escape Plans cos it took me five years of searching to find the bugger from a half remembered daze of reading lol

 

[starfish]

The Cats Table by Michael Ondattje.
Really wish my sister would hurry up & send me the Ed McBain book i left at hers at Christmas, i cant continue with the others i have until i finish that one.

 

[Dillinger4]

I have just been reading Day of the Owl by Leanardo Sciascia. I have developed a bit of love for crime fiction, Italian crime fiction in particular. I am not that interested in police procedurals, I think the reason I like these ones is because they are so ambiguous, by the end you are sure of a bit less than when you started

Recenty Italian history is fascinating. All the secrets of the world are within it.

 

[DotCommunist]

Looking For Jake a collection of short stories by China Meiville. He really doesn't have the handle on short fiction imo but they are good peices despite that, there is that imagery and delivery style to save it. Talking about ill defined apocalypses, feral streets, trains that take you rather than you taking them, connections made from street detritus etc.

It sort of reads like 'stuff I left on in the pad half written' but its not too bad.

Some nicely dark touches.

 

[Dillinger4]

Looking For Jake a collection of short stories by China Meiville. He really doesn't have the handle on short fiction imo but they are good peices despite that, there is that imagery and delivery style to save it. Talking about ill defined apocalypses, feral streets, trains that take you rather than you taking them, connections made from street detritus etc.

It sort of reads like 'stuff I left on in the pad half written' but its not too bad.

Some nicely dark touches.

I know you know a lot about sci fi / fantasy, but do you know much about horror fiction? I have been having a bit of an urge recently to read weird / creepy stories. Some 'weird' fiction does it for me but I want to read more. Think more weird rather than outright horror, something somewhere inbetween that, if you see what I mean?

 

[Orang Utan]

Read some Raymond Carver short stories?

 

[DotCommunist]

I

I know you know a lot about sci fi / fantasy, but do you know much about horror fiction? I have been having a bit of an urge recently to read weird / creepy stories. Some 'weird' fiction does it for me but I want to read more. Think more weird rather than outright horror, something somewhere inbetween that, if you see what I mean?

I don't really know my horror genre that well at all dill, the obvious is Lovecraft and Poe but for modern stuff, no idea. Firky was on this vein not so long ago though. He might have a recc for you

My forays into horror fic have been along the lines of Stephen King and......hold on a mo, I just thought of one you'll really vibe on. It has literary merit as well as being weird fic. I often refer to it as 'The perfect american fantasy'

Peter Straub 'Shadowland'

I recon that will hit your needs as described. I'm assuming you already did Donna Tarrts's 'Secret History' which is waaaaaay middlebrow but does blend a bit

 

[Sprocket.]

Have obtained Ghost Stories by M R James. I have always loved the story 'The Casting of the Runes' since I saw and loved the fifties film with Dana Andrews called 'The Night of the Demon' which is based on this story.
Will review and post when done.

 

[Firky]

As per DotCommunist tag:

The Charlie Parker novels by John Connolly are good. They're a traditional thriller based around the believable supernatural and forces of good and evil. I don't want to give to much away but they're the creepiest books I have ever read. They didn't disturb me but they certainly unsettled me and I am quite unmovable when it comes to such things:

Start off with Every Dead Thing then jump a few novels and give The Black Angel a go. I thought The Black Angel was amongst his best... (many disagree) well it appealed to me the most as there's a bit of the occult in there, mixed up with some good old medieval theology and set in NYC.

But you must read Every Dead Thing first if you do setup on the CP series.


http://www.johnconnollybooks.com/novels_edt.php

 

[Orang Utan]

I would also recommend Clive Barker's Books Of Blood.
But not any of his novels

 

[JimW]

Re-reading Riddley Walker having found an electronic version. If anything even better than I remember and I loved it then.

 

[weltweit]

I am reading Terry Waite "Taken on Trust".. 10p from a charity shop.
I think it is quite well written, I am enjoying it anyhow.

 

[nogojones]

Flora Britannica by Richard Mabey and What is Opus Dei? by Noam Friedlander. It was only when I started reading it that I noticed it was published by Conspiracy Books