Unofficial What are you Reading Thread?

[Cramulus]

Illuminatus opens talking about the Ringmaster. The Ringmaster (narrator) is everybody at once, throughout time, including that squirrel. Waaaaay later in the book he comes back to that idea when the narrative really starts to come apart.

As I recall, the Shrodinger's Cat trilogy delves a lot deeper into that idea of simultaneously nonlocality.

I recall it being really frustrating and confusing the first time I read it, but really cool and beautiful when I came back to it knowing what he was going for.


As for me, right now I'm reading PKD's The Man in the High Castle, which I am borrowing from Darth Cupcake.

[Cain]

Currently reading Foucault's Pendulum, because I finally bothered to order it off of Amazon.  So far, so good.  A little slow, in the start, but I do like the dialogue.

[LMNO]

It's a little slow in the middle and the end, too.

After all, it's Eco.

[Cain]

True.  Still, its nice to read while I wait for my computer (not my mega-fast laptop but the other one) to load its shit.  Or recover from a crash.

[LMNO]

Oh, I agree, it's not a bad read, it's just not like, say, Pratchett.

[Cain]

Yeah.  It actually reminds me of a lot of my tutorials, unsurprisingly I suppose.  meandering, vaguely academic, but pretty interesting and occasionally humourous.

[P3nT4gR4m]

Oh, I agree, it's not a bad read, it's just not like, say, Pratchett.

you really got the bug then? Good luck finding time to do things like eat and sleep for the next couple of months 

[bubz_the_troll]

no see, he can change mid-paragraph the point of view, narrator, location AND time

because um

i guess if you can get past that, it gets you in the mood to accept the other stuff as well

Strangely enough I find the mid paragraph POV changes easier to understand than when they switch after a new paragraph.  It's only when there is no obvious cue that the POV has changed that I get confused.  The multiple "I"'s are the most confusing.

It's, like, non-linear post-modernism.

If you can do a jump cut in a film or a video, why can't you do it in a book?

Actually this is exactly what the writing reminds me of.  However RS and RAW keep breaking the 180¬? rule.

[That One Guy]

Breaking rules and altering from the expected (even the expected "unexpected") is pretty much the point of the whole thing. RS and RAW managed to work that into every little weird angle at many, many levels of the books.

All in all a fun read 

[Jasper]

It impressed a 16 year old Felix, at any rate.

[LMNO]

Yeah.

I know we like to slam it now, but when I read it, all those years ago, i really got into it.


But we grow, and move on.

[Cain]

Lukyanenko, The Night Watch.

Big in Russia, both the film and the book.  And most of E. Europe, IIRC.

Not bad.  Bit, well, standard action fare-ish, but mixed with some genuinely interesting stuff.  And vampires.  Can't forget the vampires.  First 2 chapters are good hooks, too.

[Mangrove]

what i am not reading:

a dead tree version of 'complete golden dawn'. why? because i ordered it, got charged, was told it 'shipped' and then weeks later, told that the book didn't exist and thus i was left to go fuck myself.

so double thanks to cain for the PDF because now that's the only version i have.

otherwise reading: 'supernatural' by graham hancock.

[Deepthroat Chopra]

I'm just finishing John Pilger's "Freedon next Time". There's chapters on American/British treatment of the Chagos Islanders, a critique of the "new" India, a deconstruction of the New South Africa, and more on Palestine/Israel. I'm just starting the chapter on Afghanistan.

A problem I have with Pilger is that I tend to agree with bloody everything he writes just about. Does anyone know a good place that critiques him? Most critiques I've read are hollow, and don't address the substance.

[Payne]

I haven't found anything that offers a good critique on the substance of pilgers work, but if I come across something, I'll let you know.