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Unofficial What are you Reading Thread?

Started by Thurnez Isa, December 03, 2006, 04:11:35 PM

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Juana

Quote from: Bu☆ns on May 21, 2012, 02:34:25 AM
Quote from: Secret Agent GARBO on May 20, 2012, 01:18:18 AM
Re-reading Kill the Dead by Richard Kadrey.

-style protagonist + Kabbalah-influenced setting + an interesting twist on zombies + a professional zombie killer Roma porn star = the book.

woah...wait...how can...all those things.....together?  REALLY?
Really. :D And it's pretty amazing.
"I dispose of obsolete meat machines.  Not because I hate them (I do) and not because they deserve it (they do), but because they are in the way and those older ones don't meet emissions codes.  They emit too much.  You don't like them and I don't like them, so spare me the hysteria."

Rococo Modem Basilisk

Reading George Dyson's Turing's Cathedral. True to form, the book has a picture of Turing as the front cover, and Turing never appears in the text proper (or hasn't yet except in passing, and I'm more than halfway through). I suppose if he had named it Von Neumann's Cathedral people would have been confused and he would get fewer sales, but it would be more accurate: the whole thing is about the development of the MANIAC, which could be considered to be the first solid-state electronic digital stored-program computer. The book is entertaining, though remarkably disorganized (after a chapter on the legal war with the creators of the ENIAC, he skips over to a chapter about the imprisonment of William Penn, only because both things were tangentially related to New Jersey). The technical details of the MANIAC are kind of incredible: this machine from the 1940s had 40-fold parallelism and used cathode ray tubes for RAM, and it was built using wire wrap and had no boards.


I am not "full of hate" as if I were some passive container. I am a generator of hate, and my rage is a renewable resource, like sunshine.

Cain

Cainad, R Scott Bakker has a blog, I thought you would like to know.

http://rsbakker.wordpress.com/

It's quite good reading, too.

Placid Dingo

Quote from: Anna Mae Bollocks on May 21, 2012, 02:45:36 AM
Quote from: Placid Dingo on April 19, 2012, 12:41:44 AM
Finished 'Think and Grow Rich', 'Game of Thrones' and 'Sense and Sensibility' recently.

Loved Thrones. TAGR was good but a bit new-agey at points. S&S was a bit painful at points but was decent for a Jane Austin work (unlike say, Emma.)

IMHO Austen's ok for orchestrating amusing clusterfucks, but her characters have a stick up their asses.

Yeah, agree.

When she decides to thrown in a horrible asshole, her work is really readable, but there's not enough of those characters in her work.
Haven't paid rent since 2014 with ONE WEIRD TRICK.

Cainad (dec.)

Cain: sweet, bookmarked.


Just picked up Christopher Moore's new book, Sacre Bleu. Have I mentioned that I love Christopher Moore? Well, I love Christopher Moore.

LMNO

Just wanted to thank Cain. I've started "Thinking, Fast and Slow", and it's a GREAT read. Easily readable in an engaging, conversational tone, packed full of verifiable information about how the brain seems to work.

So, thanks.

Cain

You're welcome.

And I agree with all of the above.  I'm taking notes on my Kindle, perhaps when we've both finished, we should throw up a discussion thread?  Oh so much of this has major O:MF potential.

LMNO


Faust

I recently read Grant morrisons Supergods and it really is a book with some excellent and awful material.

They good side of it is he goes into detail about his meticulous research into comic book and shares most of it.

The other side of it is the self congratulatory wank, how he insinuates inspiring such titles as the dark knight returns and watchmen while agreeing they are among the best comics while at the same time attacking them and calling them the dark age of comics.
Sleepless nights at the chateau

Cain

Cainad, it occurs to me: Kellhus is an AI, the Inchoroi are transhumanists.

Not literally, but you know what I mean, yes?

Juana

Just started Delusions of GenderHow Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference by Cordelia Fine. Very good so far and I'm enjoying how it nails to the wall the female brain/male brain dichotomy. I always thought that was a little fishy.
"I dispose of obsolete meat machines.  Not because I hate them (I do) and not because they deserve it (they do), but because they are in the way and those older ones don't meet emissions codes.  They emit too much.  You don't like them and I don't like them, so spare me the hysteria."

Mesozoic Mister Nigel

Quote from: Secret Agent GARBO on May 27, 2012, 08:25:57 PM
Just started Delusions of GenderHow Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference by Cordelia Fine. Very good so far and I'm enjoying how it nails to the wall the female brain/male brain dichotomy. I always thought that was a little fishy.

Ooh, that sounds really promising!
"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."


Juana

It is, so far. It's in that link I posted for ya - did you ever get it or did you want a quick torrent?
"I dispose of obsolete meat machines.  Not because I hate them (I do) and not because they deserve it (they do), but because they are in the way and those older ones don't meet emissions codes.  They emit too much.  You don't like them and I don't like them, so spare me the hysteria."

Mesozoic Mister Nigel

Quote from: Secret Agent GARBO on May 27, 2012, 11:26:16 PM
It is, so far. It's in that link I posted for ya - did you ever get it or did you want a quick torrent?

I never could get any of those to download for me, so if you wanted to hook me up, I would be in your debt.
"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."


EK WAFFLR

I bowed to the pressure and started reading House of Leaves.
"At first I lifted weights.  But then I asked myself, 'why not people?'  Now everyone runs for the fjord when they see me."


Horribly Oscillating Assbasket of Deliciousness
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