What are you reading?

[Vincent_Vodevil]

I just got my hands on:

Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs
Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk
Satan Burger by Carlton Mellick III
The Steel Breakfast Era by Carlton Mellick III

Now that I've got my term paper behind me I can free up some (admittedly limited) time to read for pleasure again, finally. I'm starting with Naked Lunch but I'm most looking forward to Mellick's stuff. I've always wanted to read his books but had never gathered up the initiative. Apparently he's written successful, intelligent stories detaling the lives of sex toys and similarly bizarre subject matter. Very interesting.

I will post reviews as I go along.

[Vincent_Vodevil]

Naked Lunch by William S Burroughs:
Weeeeiiiiiiiird shit, indeed. The books starts off as an extremely stylized narrative from a heroin addict but soon erupts into pure insanity. There's not really any sort of linear storyline, although certain characters do reappear routinely throughout the novel (the most interesting of whom is the hilariously demented Doctor Benway, who performs absurd, phenomenally cruel experiments on his patients but still manages to maintain a high reputation in the medical community). But for the most part it seems to be an intensely brutal look at society, represented by a setting called the Interzone, in which special focus is put on addiction and solipsistic desperation in all it's many forms. There are corrupt political factions, bizarre creatures bred by Burroughs to live out the darkest human pathos, completely off the wall tangeant plots, and lots and lots of graphic prose. At times the satire is a riot, while in other parts of the novel the real honesty of what Burroughs is trying to convey really moves me. For a first step into this kind of impressionistic modernism I have to say I'm impressed. Definitely an author I'll be looking into.

Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk:
Most probably know Palahniuk through the movie Fight Club, which was an adaptation of his novel of the same name. Lullaby is the first thing I've read by him. It's essentially a story about four characters looking to track down and destroy every copy of a book containing what's known as a culling song. The culling song, when read to its victim, results in instant death. The story is really creative in how it's all played out and the writing style itself is a wonderful pleasure. It's leisurely and loose, structured almost like a journal but not to such an extent that the plot becomes distant. I hear a lot of the same sort of attitude in Lullaby that I heard in Fight Club. A lot of poignant observations are made throughout, including a recurring theme that our culture is one obsessed with a constant onslaught of media meant to prevent us from fully grasping our reality. All in all, a very entertaining read and another author who's sparked my interest.

[J A Eyers]

The bit that really summed up Naked Lunch for me was when the guy's asshole started talking, then started talking for him, and then took over as principal personality. After Naked Lunch, however, you might find the rest of WSB's output anticlimactic.

As for Chuck Palahniuk, check out Survivor. Better than the Fight Club novel, which was in itself better than the Fight Club movie.

[SM]

After finishing Lord Of The Rings a little while back I've started re-reading Clive Barker's Books of Blood. Forgotten how good a writer Barker is. Just finished Rawhead Rex in Book 3.

[J A Eyers]

I forgot to put it in the last post, but I'm reading The Rule Of Four by someone Caldwell and someone Thomason. It got a load of press as being "The Da Vinci Code for people with brains"... I hate pretension, but they're certainly better at character development and dialogue than Dan Brown.

[noodle boy]

let's see, watchmen (graphic novel), if chins could kill: confession of a B-movie actor, hitchhikers guide to the galaxy and all 22 collected volumes of astroboy

[Vincent_Vodevil]

Originally posted by J A Eyers
The bit that really summed up Naked Lunch for me was when the guy's asshole started talking, then started talking for him, and then took over as principal personality.

Indeed. One thing I liked about the book was the way it built off seemingly absurd, ridiculous sub-plots like the one mentioned.

I finished Satan Burger and The Steel Breakfast Era by Carlton Mellick III a while ago. The Steel Breakfast Era was more of a novella than a full-fledged book. Clever little story about a guy living in a zombie infested future who makes himself a wife out of body parts Frankenstein style.

Satan Burger, however, was awesome. Awesome isn't a term I'd usually be too quick to apply to literature, but I think for Mellick it fits. Here's a quick plot sketch:

God, becoming bored with humans, opens up a portal in our narrator's Canadian city allowing more attractive creatures to come and take root in our bland dimension. The portal has the annoying side-effect of slowly sucking the "soul" out of the city inhabitants and bloating the population, but eventually fails to entertain God the way he had hoped. So he abandones mankind altogether and closes the doors to heaven. Those who die are cursed to an eternity in rotting zombie-bodies. Satan (who is flambouyantly gay) opens up a fast-food restaurant with burgers so good they cost customers their souls. Our super-cynical narrator, who just so happens to be gifted with the ability to look at himself in a disembodied third-person viewpoint, gets a job at Satan Burger. While employed he befriends Jesus (an overwieght custodian), gets impregnated by an alien lover, and begins to rebel against the apathy of God and his city.

And no, it's not some cleverly disguised sermon that turns around and tacks a Christian moral on at the end. This is some trully twisted, sacreligious shit. Three thumbs up. Three thumbs and a half-devoured fetus.

[The Drunkk Machine]

I finished Dead Air by Iain Banks a few weeks ago. It was very good, far more interesting and witty than the Wasp Factory. Essentially it follows the life of a shock-rock DJ in the months following 9/11. It drove me on to pick up Canal Dreams, but so far that is reminding me of what I felt was wrong with the Wasp Factory. When all is said and done, it's just a bit dull.

[MacCabbe]

Right into Robin Hobb's Assassin saga... Best stuff I've read in fantasy since a hell of a long time.

[SM]

I'm back onto wading through Hero With A Thousand Faces.

[Vincent_Vodevil]

Just finished Chuck Palahniuk's Haunted. Of the four things I've read by him so far, this is probably my favorite. Some of the shock tactics are over played, and at times his scenarios are almost too cynical to be realistic, but everything comes together nicely. Funny as hell at the very least.

Starting on Franz Kafka: The Complete Stories.

[J A Eyers]

I'm currently reading Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis, the last of his books I haven't read (before his new one, Lunar Park, comes out in a few months). It's the story of vain It-Boy Victor (BEE fans will remember he was the one Lauren was obsessing over in Rules Of Attraction) who accepts a job to find another girl who was in love with him but has vanished in Europe, but more out of the money they're offering and the big ego boost rather than any concern for her welfare.

So far I prefer it to The Informers and the much-overrated American Psycho, but it's not having the impact on me that Less Than Zero and Rules Of Attraction did three years ago.

[SM]

Finally finished Hero... and while I'll admit a lot of it went straight through to the keeper, it was ultimately an interesting read. Might try it again in a few years and see if it's any easier.

Been a bit sceptical, but finally succumbed and borrowed Da Vinci Code off my Dad, and while Dan Brown can (so far) spin a good yarn, he's hardly a wordsmith. Mind you last piece of fiction I read was Clive Barker, who's something of a master. That said, JA's use of language far outstrips Brown, and he's yet to have anything of note published.

[J A Eyers]

"Anything of note"? I'll have you know that my 500-word ghost story was 500 words purely of NOTE (a ?50 note, to be precise).

I agree that Dan Brown's prose makes Ernest Hemingway's look like Will Self's.

[The Idiot]

Originally posted by SM
That said, JA's use of language far outstrips Brown, and he's yet to have anything of note published.

ah... if only the world worked this way. publishing is a tricky business. lots of luck involved.

[The Idiot]

i've given up on the literature because of work, but here's what i'm working on now. some may find it interesting.


Cypertypes: Race, Ethnicity, and Idnetity on the Internet
Lisa Nakamura
------------------------------------------------
the thesis is that race does exist on the internet, contrary to traditional research. when the internet first got off its ass, it was heralded as a place of perfect colorblind democracy. you can't see people or hear an acccent, so they must all be potentially treated equally. nakamura argues that this is a fallacy.

one of her most compelling arguments is the notion that the default race online is white. in the absence of (undefined) cues, intenet uses assume that their interlocutors are white males. she also discusses how gender in MMORPGs and on MUDs is binary, either because of program design or because of user choice. she argues that this limitation reinforces traditional notions of gender that do not match the complexities found in the physical world.

while it may not appeal to many of you because of its academic nature, it's not theory heavy and i'd imagine it wouldn't be too hard to read for the casual academic.

[J A Eyers]

Hmm, interesting, but on the fantasy MUD my old high school buddies have run now for the five years since we've left, there are three genders and as default races go, it's human (irrespective of colour), though most players, we find, want to play as something they're not, so choose elf, sitha, dwarf, titan, lynx, groll, arachnid and some others of our own devising. We often find male players playing as female characters, but the rare female player you find never ever plays as male.

Though that point about assuming those you are communicating with are white males is very interesting, because I've done that on frequent occasions, only to find out otherwise. I'm rarely surprised (Siege101 being an exception). Though GG is international, it seems to be rather homogenous in the kind of person it attracts. Select a random group of people and give an uninitiated person a selection of their posts and I don't reckon they could work out where people came from.

Actually, there's a very interesting debate to be had spawned by what you've read. Care to make a thread in Serious?

[The Idiot]

sure. i'll move it over there, but i've started these kinds of threads before and they usually never go very far.

[Satori]

I'm currently reading a book called "The Last Lord of the Rings" written by the Russian writer Kiril Yeskov. Original title is "Poslednij Kolcenosiec". I don't think it's available in english, I have the Polish version, released in 1999 (I know also of a spanish translation and a czech one). Anyways here's a short recap,

Basically it's the war of the ring but told from Mordor's point of view. The war is caused by economical reasons, being Mordor an industrialised country opposed by the ecological and medieval Elves and Men, directed by Gandalf. The book is not a mere parody but a decent read in the "sword and sorcery" genre, and it turns Tolkiens work on it's head ( some may consider this sacrilege, I don't, it's not even official ).

I've made a separate, and detailed post here for those interested.

[SM]

I finished Da Vinci last night. As I said earlier Brown's use of English is extraordinarily basic (he lazily describes a sound "texture" at one point rather than creating at atmosphere), but he kept it exciting right to the last page and even surprised me when the end was fairly satisfying. With everything that had gone before I felt there was no way the end could be anything but a cop out. But I think he did a pretty good job for all that.

Changing gears have now moved on to Hawking's A Brief History Of Time. One on my list of "Books I've always meant to read".

[J A Eyers]

Though I like The Da Vinci Code as far better than average airport thriller kinda thing, I disagree there and thought the ending was a cop-out. SPOILERS! First there was a treasure, then there wasn't, then there was, and he doesn't let us see it.

[SM]

SPOILERS








I think if he did get the treasure it woulda been disappointing. How could it live up to the what preceeded. Even if he did get it what could he conceivably do with it? I found it to be a bit like Raiders in that he wins, but it's not an ultimate win.

[J A Eyers]

Quite.

Though according to Dan Brown on his website, his next book (another Robert Langdon one) will start right where The Da Vinci Code finished, and be about the Knight Templars, and 'twill be set in the US. One can only assume that Langdon breaks into the treasure chamber beneath the Louvre and find it's all gone. The story sounds a bit too close to National Treasure as it is...

[SM]

MORE SPOILERS








I was thinking something like that might happen in the existing book. The last clue leads him to the resting place - and it's gone. Which kinda did happen in Scotland I suppose... Yet if the Grail is the bloodline, he found that in the first couple of chapters.

[J A Eyers]

That's what I meant, though. First there is a physical treasure, then it's all about the bloodline, then it turns out there IS a physical treasure, after all. Yet as you say, he met Sophie Neveu a smattering of chapters (and Dan Brown's chapters are a tenth the size of your average chapter, let's remember) into the book, so the conclusion is somewhat anti-climactic. I mean, the treasure's THERE, he's standing right on top of it. I'm all for using my imagination, but it's not like Dan Brown gave me much scope for that in the rest of the book, so it smells like a cop-out.

[SM]

Well he might be well researched but he's still a pretty immature writer, so maybe that's just it coming to the fore.

Hopefully he didn't get anywhere near the script for the film. Some of the dialogue exchanges were appalling. I've read better fan fic, and I've read some really shite fan fic.

[J A Eyers]

Oh, yes, the dialogue almost made stop reading. It was sub-Lucas, without any of the inate quotability. "In the House of the Lord," a baddie snarls a few pages in. "How they mock us."

I don't know whether I just got used to it, or whether he found himself able to write more naturalistic dialogue in later scenes.

[SM]

I found I was able to tune out the shoddy dialogue the more I read. A couple of flashback passages when he's explaining things to his students were truly excreble.

Wonder how the film will handle the massive amounts of exposition? LOTR had exposition problems and I remember Walsh, Boyens and Jackson constantly re-writing dialogue - mainly for Gandalf - trying to explain as much they could without getting too bogged down. They had the bonus of Ian McKellen to deliver it though. You kinda expect wizards to expound all sorts of wise lore type things.

Langdon is certainly learned, but I think they'll be wanting a bit more Indiana Jones for the film.

[J A Eyers]

Then they shouldn't have cast podgy waddler Tom Hanks in the role. I didn't think there was a terrible amount of exposition for what is effectively a mystery thriller anyway. It depends if they try and turn it into an action movie, whereas the most action-led scene in the book is where they jump out of a window at the Louvre. The other Robert Langdon book, Angels And Demons, has far more running around.

[Renegade 2501]

I'm just about finished with The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty. Very good book. As you can imagine, the film followed the book very closely, but there is a lot of extra character development that the film left out, especially with Karl (one of the servants that lives with Regan and her mother). There is a load of extra dialogue between Karras and the demon that wasn't in the film, all of which is pretty engrossing stuff. I'm right at the part where Merrin and Karras are about to do their thing, which I'm sure will be great (even though I know the story already).