O/T Book review thread.

[jackos]

Bear in mind I need to find 52 books that I actually want to read .

Hmm there is that

Still it might be my description that made "The Hunger" sound crap though. Anyway if you are going to read J.Nesbo could you let me have a review, cheers. Im interested in getting hold of some but always a little suspicious when a publisher says that their writer is the next ... Somebody or other (Stieg Larsson in this case). Not that I liked the Millenium trilogy particularly. Its true they were fairly compelling but his description of things was pretty clunky (like the computers and software Salander used). I always felt like the writer was putting extra detail in unecassarily as if to say Ive really researched this subject and I want you to know I have so I will now over-describe things.

Will do once I get to that book, have to admit to never having read Stieg Larsson though so my review will have to be taken with that in mind.

The translation of the millennium series is terrible I'm afraid, as are the Hollywood versions of the films, the Swedish films are okay. Guess the translation was done with Walt Disney in mind, you can't go upsetting Mr Disney with feminist lefty crap a activist like Mr Larson wrote. Silly fuck didn't leave a will, his brothers nicked the rights from his Missus (you have no rights at all as a common law wife in Sweden) , n are selling anything they think they can make a penny out of .. You'd be proud of hm Si

Suppose that's a problem with all translations, some are even better than the original, shame we can't just chip ourselves to understand owt ..

[SimonB]

The translation of the millennium series is terrible I'm afraid, as are the Hollywood versions of the films, the Swedish films are okay. Guess the translation was done with Walt Disney in mind, you can't go upsetting Mr Disney with feminist lefty crap a activist like Mr Larson wrote. Silly fuck didn't leave a will, his brothers nicked the rights from his Missus (you have no rights at all as a common law wife in Sweden) , n are selling anything they think they can make a penny out of .. You'd be proud of hm Si

Suppose that's a problem with all translations, some are even better than the original, shame we can't just chip ourselves to understand owt ..

I will always have that problem of not knowing how good or otherwise a translation is as my skills with foreign languages are practically non existent. I was aware of the problem with the lack of a will, very tough on his missus (and wrong obviously) so no not that proud mate

[eric olthwaite]

Been thinking (with all the shit on the telly recently) that I've never really had a proper go at Dickens. I'm thinking maybe Bleak House or A Tale Of Two Cities?

Anyone read the cunt, and got any recommendations?

[Quiffy]

after all that shit on the telly, i downloaded the whole works for 99p.

great expectations was the first period drama i've watched since i left school. it was alright. when i get round to it i think david copperfield is supposed to be a good starting point as it's meant to be a bit autobiographical.

i recently finished this, which, like dickens is set in london, but modern day london, and is a fine, easy reading, page turning, enjoyable yarn.. it's not a life changer, but if you want a good read on the bog i'd advise it.

[Man Called Sun]

Oliver Twist is worth the effort, but effort is the word.

I just finished reading Breakfast of Champions by Vonnegut the other day. Proper good, I'm thirsty for more, any recommendations?

[Quiffy]

Oliver Twist is worth the effort, but effort is the word.

I just finished reading Breakfast of Champions by Vonnegut the other day. Proper good, I'm thirsty for more, any recommendations?

most of vonnegut is good. slaughterhouse 5 is genius, there's only a couple of ropey ones amidst his output. he's possibly his best critic and this is what he gave his books...

Player Piano: B
The Sirens of Titan: A
Mother Night: A
Cat's Cradle: A-plus
God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater: A
Slaughterhouse-Five: A-plus
Welcome to the Monkey House: B-minus
Happy Birthday, Wanda June: D
Breakfast of Champions: C
Slapstick: D
Jailbird: A
Palm Sunday: C

i'd also strongly recommend his short stories, a lot of which were written before he became a novelist, so they're not quite as stylised but are blinding.

if you fancy a more modern, techno, zeitgeisty sort of vonnegut read then i'd advise douglas coupland. and start with 'generation A' [not x, which is a bit shite compared to his later stuff]

[Jovo Simanic]

Just about to start with the goodreads.com's 52 books around the world challenge for 2012, my aim is to read books from 52 authors each from a different country during the year. Should be fun I hope

Just browsing this thread as looking for some reading ideas and saw this - did a similar thing myself (although without the geography) in 2008 when I started a new job and decided to read a book a week as had a good length commute. Managed it for about 65 weeks before I moved and started cycling to work as well as doing some OU study but although it was a bit of an effort I can thoroughly recommend it. It becomes a habit after a while and I had forgotten what a great joy regular reading is as hadn't done it since school really. Makes you think a lot and drags you out of the daily grind. Also you can bang on endlessly about it and in that spirit I'd recommend the following out of the 65:

Nostromo - Joseph Conrad. Brilliantly written and very richly textured story about corruptibility and ambition. Controversial perhaps but Conrad really is (in my opinion) the greatest English novelist or at least one of the top handful and he was a Polish Ukrainian.
Steppenwolf - Herman Hesse. Strange, fantastical sort of book about a man who is bored by and thinks he is better than the world around him but has his preconceptions shattered.
Riddley Walker (which I decided to read after its good press on here and it didn't disappoint) - Russel Hoban
Last Post - Max Arthur. Series of biographies based on Interviews with the last (then) surviving veterans of the First World War. Interesting if only as a glimpse of a world that has long gone.
Metropole - Ferenc Kazinthy. Very strange hungarian novel where the hero is trapped in this kafka-esque world where he doesn't understand anything and is desperate to escape.
The Castle - Kafka. One man's struggle against a malign and indifferent power. Quite hard work but the continual cycle of the hero blithely thinking everything is going brilliantly and having his hopes raised only to have them cruelly dashed somehow strikes a chord.....
The Classical World - Robin Lane Fox. Pretty accessible quick tour through Ancient Greece and Rome.
The Damned United - David Peace. For obvious reasons.
The Daily Telegraph Book of Airman's Obituaries. Some amazing lives - my favourite being a guy called Thomson (I think) who was an engineer on a Lancaster bomber. An engine was hit and caught fire so (as I'm sure any of us would do......) in the middle of the night at a few thousand feet whilst being shot at by a Nazi night fighter, he climbed out of the plane onto the wing with a parachute and a fire extinguisher to put the fire out. Perhaps surprisingly, it didn't go well.
The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath. Almost all the books I read were by men and a good chunk were novels about dystopian futures so read this to restore some balance. Didn't expect much but actually enjoyed it.
Morvern Callar - Alan Warner. Odd story about a girl with a humdrum life who escapes it through some bizarre means!
Complicity - Iain Banks. Gripping.
We - Yevgeny Zemyatin. I always thought 1984 was brilliant until I read this and realised Orwell had ripped large chunks of it off although 1984's still a great book.
The Road - Cormack McCarthy. Couldn't understand how a book by the Archbishop of Westminster was a bestseller but then realised it was by the guy that wrote no country for old men. As dystopian futures go, this one's pretty bleak but it's all about the love between father and son and strangely compelling.
The Man in the High Castle - Philip K Dick. Novel about an alternate universe where the Nazis won and the Japanese rule America. Pretty much anything by Philip K Dick is worth reading though.
Scoop - Evelyn Waugh. Quite amusing piss take of newspaper men.
Gomorrah - Roberto Saviano. A look at the mafia in Napoli (and Aberdeen??!).

Hmm, looking at that again, it's not the cheeriest list but there are quite a few authors from different countries at least!

[Ontolly]

Been thinking (with all the shit on the telly recently) that I've never really had a proper go at Dickens. I'm thinking maybe Bleak House or A Tale Of Two Cities?

Anyone read the cunt, and got any recommendations?

Tale of two cities is the best of reads not the worst of reads in fact it's a far far better read than I have ever read etc

[the flying pig]

KOHOB
RRD

[the flying pig]

a q

[Man Called Sun]

i'd also strongly recommend his short stories, a lot of which were written before he became a novelist, so they're not quite as stylised but are blinding.

if you fancy a more modern, techno, zeitgeisty sort of vonnegut read then i'd advise douglas coupland. and start with 'generation A' [not x, which is a bit shite compared to his later stuff]

Cheers for that Quiffy, I nicked Breakfast of Champions off the mrs actually, she's bang into him and has been on at me to give him a try for a while. I wish I'd listened to her years ago now, but I'm sure there's a lot of blokes out there who could say that.

I read quite a lot of Coupland a few years ago actually, starting with Generation X, which I liked. I can see the similarities between the two. I read one about a high school shooting (is that Hey Nostradamus?) that was really good, but after a couple more I got fed up of his Morrissey-esque pretentiousness.

I tell you what, if you haven't read Nick McDonell then I'd recommend his books, the ones I've read have that same kind of realist commentary, if that makes sense, but it reads a lot more like Bukowski. Which is always gonna be a winner with me.

[Quiffy]

I tell you what, if you haven't read Nick McDonell then I'd recommend his books.

ta. never heard of him, but whenever i've googled 'authors like coupland/vonnegut' i've ended up with something far more prosaic.

and your wife's right

[Son of Leeds]

Been thinking (with all the shit on the telly recently) that I've never really had a proper go at Dickens. I'm thinking maybe Bleak House or A Tale Of Two Cities?

Anyone read the cunt, and got any recommendations?

Not the best place to start imhumbleo. Work up to Bleak House.

David Copperfield is a good starter; funny, not too sentimental, a bit rambling around, but a cracking tale in a roundabout episodic way.

If you like it, then any of the last lot are v. good; Little Dorrit, Bleak House, Great Exectorations.

Avoid: Tale of Two Cities unless you like the period, Old Curiosity Shop, Hard Times, Dombey and Sun, Oliver Twist and Pickwick Papers, unless you're hooked.

[the flying pig]

Been thinking (with all the shit on the telly recently) that I've never really had a proper go at Dickens. I'm thinking maybe Bleak House or A Tale Of Two Cities?

Anyone read the cunt, and got any recommendations?

Not the best place to start imhumbleo. Work up to Bleak House.

David Copperfield is a good starter; funny, not too sentimental, a bit rambling around, but a cracking tale in a roundabout episodic way.

If you like it, then any of the last lot are v. good; Little Dorrit, Bleak House, Great Exectorations.

Avoid: Tale of Two Cities unless you like the period, Old Curiosity Shop, Hard Times, Dombey and Sun, Oliver Twist and Pickwick Papers, unless you're hooked.

dunno, i quite liked pickwick. thought at its best the freshest and funniest of his books [& thankfully free of daft over-sentimentality], although it does lose its way/tail off quite badly after a while. definitely over-long. it was his first effort, as a fairly young man [presumably broke & as i understand it publishing chapter by chapter] - i reckon a couple of months' more really solid work on it [maybe halving it in length, cutting out the unecessary stuff] with the help of a really good editor could have turned it into his very best book.

more generally, yeah, copperfieldl probably the best all round.

[Disco Dan]

I was bought the millennium trilogy for Xmas. Will report back in a few months. It's the English version.

[Blackwhite]

Over Christmas, read Jack London's People of the Abyss, an account of him rocking up in London and posing as a poverty-stricken US sailor to document the lot of the homeless and poor of 1902 London. It's journalistic, immediate, accessible and still almost totally relevant (although life is clearly much easier for poor folks now). The van Dyke-ish mannerisms he has them speaking with get a bit tiring, but the filth and exploitation are powerfully explored. Leaves you thinking on what still hasn't changed, and why not.

[eric olthwaite]

KOHOB
RRD

a q

Was this like a drugs interlude or summat?

[gazurtoids]

There was a thing in Sherlock tonight where someone was flashing out U M Q R A in morse code, and it turned out to be a dogging meeting.

So, draw your own conclusions...

[the flying pig]

KOHOB
RRD

a q

Was this like a drugs interlude or summat?

er, i was asleep at that time. i think the baby may have inputted that infomation via tapatalk by generally bashing the device and/or putting it in mouth. a useful contribution, already better than most of danny's.

[gazurtoids]

Finished Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer t'other night. Not much was.

Having implemented a one-book-at-a-time-policy last Jan, my batting average for the year was badly hit by the time it took me to trudge through this. The broken-english narrator conceit becomes tiring very quickly and -- while this might well be my own fault -- I wasn't at all sure what the point was supposed to be. Avoid.