What are you reading right now?

innerspaceboy · 05-25-2015, 09:20 AM

My review of the new (and first-ever) biography of Manuel Gottsching.

innerspaceboy · 05-29-2015, 05:51 PM

Crazy - The Guardian reports that Finnegans Wake has become a bestseller in China.

One more Finnegans piece and I'll kindly shut up. This turned up on eBay today. The first appearance of the manuscript in print, titled, "An Unnamed Work" and published in Two World’s Quarterly in 1925. This surfaced in California and is presently offered for sale on eBay for $1,250.00 USD.

Honesty a steal at that price. An incredible keepsake of one of the most important literary works of the 20th century.

/bookporn

Chula Vista · 05-31-2015, 02:28 PM

The Forge of God - Greg Bear

The guy has won Hugo and Nebula awards and basically created Comic-Con.

High hopes.

TrapManiac · 06-26-2015, 06:51 PM

I just started Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel.
I like stories about kings & queens

, and this won "Man Booker" and "National Book Critics Circle" awards.

innerspaceboy · 06-27-2015, 10:12 AM

Just picked up HOW MUSIC GOT FREE: The End of an Industry, The Turn of the Century, and the Patient Zero of Piracy by Stephen Witt. Read it cover to cover in one sitting and damn it was fascinating.

My book review here.

grindy · 06-27-2015, 10:26 AM

I've read Dracula recently and holy crap was it annoying.
Starts of really cool and interesting, but then it gets so sappy and the pace is bad.
The whole letters and diary entries shtick gets on one's nerves after a while as well.
And Van Helsing's frickin accent. Ugh.
And it's not that I have a problem with older literature, I've read and enjoyed plenty of books from that time and before that.

Golden Lights · 06-28-2015, 11:54 AM

Decided to go through the classics! The sun also rises by Hemingway.
Anyone else?

Chula Vista · 06-28-2015, 01:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chula Vista

The Forge of God - Greg Bear

This has been epic.

Quote:

The Forge of God is Greg Bear's best novel and one of the best, if not the best, alien invasion novels written since H.G. Wells got the ball rolling with The War of the Worlds. Long but not overlong, the story is told with a grim and powerful sense of inevitability that gives its climax a tremendous jolt of authenticity and emotional force. And despite the fact you pretty much know how the book is going to end by the time you're halfway through, it still has the power to bring readers to tears. The novel is also a fine melding of hard SF and character driven, "triumph of the human spirit" drama, related without any Hollywoodish sentimentalism or treacly preachifying. Christ, how did Greg Bear pull this off anyway!?

The plot kicks off with the discovery of various geological anomalies — like mountains that weren't there just a little while ago — peppered around the Earth in remote locations like the Australian outback and Death Valley. It is gradually discovered that these strange oddities are in fact artificial creations planted here by extraterrestrials; the Death Valley location even coughs up a real ET, who gives the bewildered Americans (and soon the world) the frightening story that the Earth is under siege by an unknown alien force that literally eats worlds from the core out, like worms in an apple. Worse, it seems that there is no defense — zip, zilch, nada — against this destruction. The Earth itself is faced with an extinction event about which it can do nothing.

The news stuns the world; the fact that the devoutly religious President of the U.S. comes out publically and and tells everyone we're all ****ed does nothing for humanity's morale, to say the least. But then an unpredicted player enters the fray; another alien race, which has been scouring space seeking out the planet-eaters, arrives in the solar system. Earth has an ally, and though they say they can do nothing to stop the imminent destruction of the planet, they set about rounding up thousands of human candidates (as well as records of Earth's history, literature, etc.) for rescue in "arks."

Throughout The Forge of God, Greg Bear makes remarkable storytelling decisions that keep his tale from sloshing through the quagmire of formula predictability. Most interesting is his depiction of humanity's reaction to news of its upcoming extinction; whereas the clichéd approach would lead towards riots, chaos, and destruction, Bear very convincingly portrays us exhibiting everything from plain old denial to overwrought religious revivalism that actually embraces the upcoming apocalypse as the will of God. "Life goes on," sadly intones one character. Faced with the inevitable, most of Bear's people fall back upon introspection, a final devotion to family, friends, loved ones, those crucial memories that define our lives. And all of this is thankfully depicted without mawkishness of any kind. Of course, there are many who try to fight for the Earth; plans are made secretly to nuke the Death Valley invader. And while all this is going on, a select group of people, conscripted telepathically by our mysterious saviors, are moving resolutely to get the arks ready before the Earth's final hours draw nigh.

It is particularly interesting that Bear chose not to identify firmly either the Earth's destroyers or its rescuers. Such a choice might annoy hard-SF purists who insist upon solid explanations for absolutely everything; yet as it stands, the mystery surrounding both good and evil aliens puts the reader squarely on the same playing field as the novel's characters — helpless, frightened, always tense.

But what is most powerful here is quite simply Bear's prose. Very few hard-SF epics can match the stunning power of this novel's last fifty pages. Even the most jaded readers should allow themselves to feel the awe of what's being presented here. If you can't do it, you might as well give up reading as a hobby altogether. You just don't get it.

In this humble reviewer's estimation, this is the novel that brought Greg Bear into the same league as the Masters: Asimov, Clarke, Heinlein, Herbert, Niven, and Sturgeon.

innerspaceboy · 07-02-2015, 08:48 PM

I couldn't be happier - this week I firmly decided that I want to really immerse myself into the dark-humored linguistic labyrinth that is Finnegans Wake. Not just superficially - read-aloud gatherings are jovial exercises in social theater where attendees discover more about the reader than of the text. Instead, I've secured gorgeous hardcover editions of Joseph Campbell's A Skeleton Key to Finnegans Wake and McHugh's similar Annotations to Finnegans Wake. These are the two most exhaustive analytical and scholarly texts on Joyce's masterwork.

I want to explore the world's least-read great novel and develop a concrete appreciation of Joyce's sharp wit and of the novel's legendary morphemic acrobatics.

This is an exercise I aim to lose myself within. I've an addiction to cerebral projects and find myself ever-searching for the next big challenge. It is in part escapism from the "dumbed-down" mass-culture I so actively avoid. Independent academic ventures are a realm of safety where all knowledge shines brightly and wisdom is the ultimate virtue. But it is also an activity which simply appeals to my core values - my love of learning, challenges, and discovery. I am, as Cage once said, "a student from the school from which we'll never graduate."

riverrun, past Eve and Adam's, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to Howth Castle and Environs...

[EDIT] A side note to fellow readers - Annotations is considered an academic text and as such commands an $85 price from all sellers. Astonishingly, if you visit the John Hopkins University Press website, you can purchase a new copy of the 648pp Hardback for 71% OFF - only $25! (LESS than the price of the paperback!) Today is my lucky day.

**Frownland** · 07-02-2015, 08:55 PM

I've tried and failed to read Finnegan's Wake all the way through. These days I just flip to a page and read it aloud. The rest of Joyce's books are great as well.

05-31-2015, 02:28 PM	#5283 (permalink)
Chula Vista Toasted Poster Join Date: Oct 2014 Location: SoCal by way of Boston Posts: 11,332	The Forge of God - Greg Bear The guy has won Hugo and Nebula awards and basically created Comic-Con. High hopes. __________________ “The fact that we live at the bottom of a deep gravity well, on the surface of a gas covered planet going around a nuclear fireball 90 million miles away and think this to be normal is obviously some indication of how skewed our perspective tends to be.”

06-27-2015, 10:26 AM	#5286 (permalink)
grindy . Join Date: Oct 2014 Location: . Posts: 7,201	I've read Dracula recently and holy crap was it annoying. Starts of really cool and interesting, but then it gets so sappy and the pace is bad. The whole letters and diary entries shtick gets on one's nerves after a while as well. And Van Helsing's frickin accent. Ugh. And it's not that I have a problem with older literature, I've read and enjoyed plenty of books from that time and before that. __________________ *A smell of petroleum prevails throughout.*

07-02-2015, 08:55 PM	#5290 (permalink)
Frownland SOPHIE FOREVER Join Date: Aug 2011 Location: East of the Southern North American West Posts: 35,548	I've tried and failed to read Finnegan's Wake all the way through. These days I just flip to a page and read it aloud. The rest of Joyce's books are great as well. __________________ Studies show that when a given norm is changed in the face of the unchanging, the remaining contradictions will parallel the truth. d e a f b o x

06-26-2015, 06:51 PM	#5284 (permalink)
TrapManiac Groupie Join Date: Jun 2015 Posts: 3	I just started Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel. I like stories about kings & queens , and this won "Man Booker" and "National Book Critics Circle" awards.

06-28-2015, 11:54 AM	#5287 (permalink)
Golden Lights Groupie Join Date: Jun 2015 Location: Spain Posts: 11	Decided to go through the classics! The sun also rises by Hemingway. Anyone else?