Books

For those of you into classic sci fi writing Frederik Pohl died yesterday. Get onto his Gateway novels and The Space Merchants.

 

Noonan, what was that book with the alternate grassy knoll story?

The Third Bullet by Stephen Hunter

 

another one is Tears of Autumn by Charles McCarry...although that's more an alternative doer.

 

Libra by Don De Lillo

 

Thanks

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZP-9BqEFs6o[/youtube]

I'm so getting this: http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Back-to-the-Future-2-GRAYS-SPORTS-ALMANAC-/290968734395?pt=AU_Movie_Memorabilia&hash=item43bf168abb

I just started this today...

 

 

 

So far it's a rip off of R Scott Bakker, Saladin Ahmed, thundercats and a dozen other things.

After reading the late Thomas Disch’s “On SF” I’ve been dipping into the genre more regularly and I’ve just finished his 1968 new wave (which is undoubtedly old wave now) classic “Camp Concentration”. It was easier going than I remember his other work, eg 334, but it’s certainly not a plot driven page turner. Still, like the work of my favourite SF writer P. K. ■■■■, it’s full of ideas and images that are still rattling around in my skull and are destined to stay with me for a while yet. If erudite, paranoiac, poetic SF is your bag, and in recent weeks it has been mine, you might be interested. The sort of book people used to read, and most likely write, when they were stoned and playing “In A Gadda Da Vida” in the background.
PS Part of the plot concerns the injecting of inmates with toxic mind expanding drugs without their knowledge in an underground prison, sort of like a drug dungeon.

"My Dark Places" by James Ellroy- autobiographical account of his life/Mum's murder by the author of LA Confidential, Black Dahlia and quite a few other ■■■■■■ good books. 

"My Dark Places" by James Ellroy- autobiographical account of his life/Mum's murder by the author of LA Confidential, Black Dahlia and quite a few other ■■■■■■ good books.

I found his latest stuff, Blood's a Rover, damn near unreadable. I'd read everything he'd written up to then. The Black Dahlia was the book that weaned me off those really twee English polite crime novels, and onto the far more diverse US crime fiction authors.
Still some quality UK writers -Rankin, Billingham, Craig, Hurley, Lawton, Martin, Dexter, Reg Hill -but prefer the Yanks.

In my continuing efforts to never have sex again I'm reading...

 

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In my continuing efforts to never have sex again I'm reading...

 

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Just googled that...seems like it would be pretty heavy read

In my continuing efforts to never have sex again I'm reading...
 
677001.jpg

Just googled that...seems like it would be pretty heavy read
Need to be on your mettle

You need to put a hilt to these jokes before someone pommels you.

Just finished The Guts, which is the fourth novel following the Rabbitte family after The Commitments, The Van and The Snapper.

It’s not as good as those three, but still not disappointing. Doyle writes his male characters with a lot of insight and sympathy, even in their worst moments. I don’t think I’ve ever come across a writer who expresses so much in the things his characters almost say.

I’m not a fan of all his work. The Woman Who Walked Into Doors was (understandably) ridiculously depressing, and The Dead Republic didn’t do anything for me at all.

But there’s so much heart in his Rabbitte books.

If you’ve read the other three, do yourself a favour, even though it’s been…fifteen, twenty years?

Just finished The Guts, which is the fourth novel following the Rabbitte family after The Commitments, The Van and The Snapper.
It's not as good as those three, but still not disappointing. Doyle writes his male characters with a lot of insight and sympathy, even in their worst moments. I don't think I've ever come across a writer who expresses so much in the things his characters almost say.
I'm not a fan of all his work. The Woman Who Walked Into Doors was (understandably) ridiculously depressing, and The Dead Republic didn't do anything for me at all.
But there's so much heart in his Rabbitte books.
If you've read the other three, do yourself a favour, even though it's been...fifteen, twenty years?

Didn't know about this one....If the Woman Who Walked Into Doors was depressing, then Paddy Clarke wasn't much better...and I had a VHS called The Family (?) which wasn't exactly a ball of cheer either.

 

Dunno if it's the alcoholism, the weather or the church, but I'm glad my ancestors came here 170-odd years ago.

Just finished The Guts, which is the fourth novel following the Rabbitte family after The Commitments, The Van and The Snapper.
It's not as good as those three, but still not disappointing. Doyle writes his male characters with a lot of insight and sympathy, even in their worst moments. I don't think I've ever come across a writer who expresses so much in the things his characters almost say.
I'm not a fan of all his work. The Woman Who Walked Into Doors was (understandably) ridiculously depressing, and The Dead Republic didn't do anything for me at all.
But there's so much heart in his Rabbitte books.
If you've read the other three, do yourself a favour, even though it's been...fifteen, twenty years?

Didn't know about this one....If the Woman Who Walked Into Doors was depressing, then Paddy Clarke wasn't much better...and I had a VHS called The Family (?) which wasn't exactly a ball of cheer either.
 
Dunno if it's the alcoholism, the weather or the church, but I'm glad my ancestors came here 170-odd years ago.

Haven't heard of The Family...to IMDB!
Okay, four episode TV series.
Paddy Clarke has enough of the joys of childhood to offset what's going on with his parents, for me.

But besides all of that, hasn't Colm Meaney kicked on? Ever since he declared Elvis was God. Delightfully underplayed role.

 

I've seen the Commitment-its in various shows...Natalie was Catherine of Aragon in The Tudors, Bronagh Gallagher had a small part in Pulp Fiction inter al, Angeline Ball has been in a couple of things...but I don't remember any of the other guys. I saw Decko the Bus Conductor doing a stage show at the Palais, but that's got to be 20 years ago.

 

Edit: I see they rejoined for tours around Ireland for charity 3 years ago...no Natalie, no Joey the Lips (illness).

First book I've read outside of school stuff for years, but Saturday Afternoon Fever by Matthew Hardy is a ■■■■■■ fantastic read.

Currently reading true crime by Kerry Greenwood...Tamam Shud, the story of the Somerton man who is one of Australia's biggest unsolved cases. He was a man found dead on Somerton beach in Adelaide in 1948, with all the labels cut out of his clothes and a piece of paper out of the Rubaiyyat of Oman Khayyam, which appeared to be code of some sort....but probably being a one-time cipher, almost impossible to crack.

Just finished Hilary Mantel's Eight Months on Ghazzah Street, a novel the nature of which was influenced by the author's 2 year stay in Saudi Arabia in the 80s where her husband was working as a geologist. It's edgy, quirky and unsettling and would not be appreciated by the Saudi Tourist dept, if one exists. Seemed like a difficult existence for the male Brit expat workers but absolute hell for their wives. Anyway I've crossed Jeddah off my go to list.

 

P.S. Hilary Mantel's Beyond Black is still the best novel I've read in recent years.

I am reading this; 23rd century Mars meets 18th century frigates in space....

 

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