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Thought I'd start up this topic, not sure if there is one like it already but I am going to find myself to be unemployed soon and will need some stuff other than games and trolling facebook and myspace and looking for a job to keep myself occupied, so what are you all reading? Please be sure to note genre and maybe a small plot synopsis if it doesn't spoil too much of the book.

I'm currently reading Breaking Dawn by Stephanie Meyer. It's the fourth book in the Twilight series, a vampire love story. So far I have enjoyed the series though each book tends to start off a little slow, but by the end it gets pretty exciting. I've heard that the end of this one that I am reading isn't very good but time will tell.

Other series I have enjoyed are:

Dragonlance - Good Fantasy series
Artemis Fowl - Intriguing Childrens Fantasy Series
Harry Potter - Need I say more
Kinsey Milhone mystery series - Main character is pretty rough and tumble and crude but in a hilarious way.

And several books written by members of my church and church leaders - always inspiring and insightful

The Five Love Languages for Singles by Gary Chapman - a great theory and one that I definitely buy in to about love and relationships

The Five Languages of the Apology also by Gary Chapman and another author in the same field. - similar to the love languages but a little bit more blurred between each of the different languages of apology more so than the love languages.

His Dark Materials (The Golden Compass, the Subtle Knife, the Amber Spyglass). Not sure I would particularly recommend this series. It had some good writing in it but I wasn't particularly impressed by the story itself and it is anit-Christian, though not quite as flamingly so as people make it out to be. I think any good Christian that knows the doctrine of their church and has faith will not be swayed by what it has to say.

So what are you reading or do you have any questions about what I am reading.

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Elena Indurain

Currently Playing: Suikoden II

I just finished First Among Sequels by Jasper Fforde. It's the fifth book in the Thursday Next series, which is basically part sci-fi, part dry British humor, and part literary criticism. Fforde is one of my favorite authors in large part due to Thursday Next. His other series, Nursery Crime, is just as good, with better action and maybe better plot but not quite as ridiculously imaginative and original a setting as Thursday Next. Also, Thursday is a much better protagonist than Detective Jack Sprat.

I'm also reading a mystery by Laurie King called The Beekeeper's Apprentice, about a teenage girl that becomes Sherlock Holmes's protege. It's pretty good so far, and if I keep enjoying it as much as I have I might try out the other books in the series.

I'm still slogging through A Feast For Crows. It's good, really good, but I just can't read it quickly. Twice in the past two years I've started it, gotten pretty far, and then forgot most of it and had to start over from the beginning to jog my memory.

And Elena, Dragonlance is... usually pretty good but I like some of Weis and Hickman's other works better. The Death Gate Cycle in particular was really entertaining; try and check that out if you haven't already.

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this is a blog mostly about comics and videogames
END SPOILER

I actually just discovered my new favorite author during the past couple months in R.A. Salvatore. A fantasy author (natch), he writes through several perspectives of unknowing characters that eventually meet up later in the book. A solid writer, he develops his characters with authenticity and stays true to his the roots of the books. Most of his books are in series or trilogies, however each title works as its own separate book with simple allusions to the other titles that won't throw off the reader. Just as important, he actually knows how to finish strongly. How often have I read a book that has captivated me for two-thirds of the book only to be horribly disappointing by the time I reach the last 20 pages.

The Ancient was the first one of his I read, telling the tale of a brutal war between two mystical religions, and a Highwayman who with no ties to either side becomes the key to finishing the war.

I just finished Promise of the Witch King, which continues the series of The Sellswords (and having not read the first book, I again point to the mastery of the title being its own story though also the second in a series). A charismatic dark elf and his human assassin partner head to the brutal northern terrain to become top-notch bounty hunters. Only they find themselves dragged into a battle against the uprising of a witch king, who wasn't as dead as people thought.

Currently, I'm reading The Assassins of Tamurin by J.D. Tower. I haven't been too far into it, but from what I gather, a fostered girl is thrown into the den of a group of assassins. Raised to be one, she flourishes at her new job. But things spiral out of control due to a series of unfortunate events.

I poke a problem at this book though because it is first person. I realize that first person is good on some levels, such as you get a much closer insight to the protagonist's thoughts. I just prefer having a global perspective that you get in third person.

And finally, I'm on and off reading I Am America (And So Can You!) by THE Stephen Colbert. It really is just like reading a transcript of his on-air show. Hell, I even have his voice in my head as I read it. It's good as a time-waster or comic relief read.

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"When I turn the page
The corner bends into the perfect dog ear
As if the words knew I'd need them again
But at the time, I didn't see it."

~"This Ain't a Surfin' Movie" - Minus the Bear

I've actually been reading a lot lately, and very uncharacteristically for me, none of my current reads are works of fiction.

First, I'm reading The Complete Guide to Day Trading as I try to get more involved in the stock market. I would love to do Day Trading as a job before I'm old, like Josh. I'm not too far into it, but the first thirty pages haven't impressed me so far...it's a lot of rah-rah-rah and not a lot of facts.

Second, I'm reading The Braindead Megaphone, by George Saunders. I was at a book event for David Sedaris and he recommended this book, so I picked it up after the show. It's pretty interesting so far - a lot of disjointed, random essays that range from political to humorous. I'm enjoying it.

Third, I recently finished reading When You Are Engulfed In Flames, by the aforementioned David Sedaris. The book was positively hysterical, and I'd recommend it to anybody. He writes about his own personal experiences - each essay that he presents is always funny. He was an awesome speaker and I got my copy signed - he actually talks to each person requesting a signing for a few minutes. It was very personal and a nice touch.

This post has been edited by Neal on 28th October 2008 17:59

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Hey, put the cellphone down for a while
In the night there is something wild
Can you hear it breathing?
And hey, put the laptop down for a while
In the night there is something wild
I feel it, it's leaving me

I just finished reading One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, a classic and all that. I really enjoyed it. It was simple, fairly brief, but at the same time there was so much there. I read an obit of the author, Solzhenitsyn, and so I decided it was worth a shot. As said before, it is a very up-front, simple tale of one day in a Soviet workcamp.

In class, we just finished 1984 by George Orwell, another classic. I can't get enough of the dystopia setting. Of course, the plot twist in the middle is insane, and it's really interesting to see Winston first grow as an independant person and then finally retract until becoming a lifeless pawn.

As an assignment last year (busy work), I was required to compile a list of books in a certain topic that I found interesting. (I am almost certainly the only member of the class to actually use my list) The book I most recently completed off this list was Slaughterhouse 5. It was an... interesting read. Anyone here familiar with the book will find Billy Pilgrim's (the main character) antics to be somewhat entertaining, while set in grim circumstances.

Since I only just finished these three books, I am not actually reading anything currently... Most likely I will pick up one of Orwell's other books from the school library.

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Currently Playing : Final Fantasy V
Most Recently Beat : Elder Scrolls: Skyrim
Favorite Game : Final Fantasy X

The newest CoNcast is up! Have a listen!

I'm always reading, both scholastically and for my own personal pleasure. Really, it has become such a fundamental part of my nightly routine that I couldn't imagine what I'd do with all that spare time. (I don't sleep much.)

I just recently finished a novel called The Farewell Waltz by Milan Kundera. He is, by far, one of the best writers I've ever had the pleasure of reading. This particular work follows an eccentric group of people dealing with varying and random experiences through their day to day lives. While not nearly as poignant as his most celebrated work, The Unbearable Lightness of Being, it is still well worth reading and definitely enjoyable.

I've stumbled around the first few chapters of Chuck Palahnuik's Snuff, as I've always been a big fan of his writing. Unless you have a rather dark sense of humor, I wouldn't recommend it. It's brilliantly sarcastic, though and great for anyone with the stomach for it.

For school, I'm being made to read through a few 17th century works. First is John Milton's Paradise Lost. That's essentially the tale of Lucifer, his fall from heaven and the eventual first sin of man. It, for a poem, is massive in length but still fairly enjoyable. Second is the collected essays and pastorals of Johnathan Swift, perhaps one of the most skilled essayists of the time. A Modest Proposal especially is worth a good many chuckles.

Lastly, I'm about to start reading a short play by John Gay, The Beggar's Opera.


Also, whoever was reading Vonnegut above me gets bonus points.




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Okay, but there was a goat!

I've been waiting for my copy of The Amber Spyglass, but apart from that I haven't been reading anything other than a few comics.

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"You know that feeling you get when you're on a merry go 'round, and you want to jump off to make the spinning stop, but you know it'll suck when you land? I feel like that all the time"- Keno

"I stab my girl until I fall down"
-Yukari
Do you like Horny Bunnies?

I'm reading a lot more than I have in awhile, with something like 8 books going.

A Thousand Splendid Suns-
I loved The Kite Runner, and so far this book has been living up to the precedent it set. Hosseini is great at making little victories stand out amid ridiculous tragedies.

Twilight -
I'm slowly slogging through it, mainly because my wife loves the books and I would like to have read it before the movie comes out. I knew going in the first half of the book is more CW drama than vampire story, but need at least a little garlic-and-silver action here.

Three Bags Full-
I picked it up at the bookstore after reading the back. It's a mystery about a flock of sheep whose shepard is murdered, and the sheep try to solve the case. It's really funny, mainly because the sheep's world view is formed entirely by what they overhear people say, and the romance novels the shepard used to read them. I pick this book up for awhile whenever something depressing happens in Splendid Suns.

Youth in Revolt-
Another book I want to get in before the movie comes out. I'm not too far into it, but so far the author is doing a nice job of capturing what being a 14 year-old boy is like, even if the story has been somewhat absurd.

A Spot of Bother-
I'm not far into this one either, but am excited for it when I have less standing in the way. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time was an excellent book . It's written from a first-person perspective by a boy with Asperger's, which I'm going to have a student I have with Asperger's read soon. A Spot of Bother does the same thing for Anxiety Disorder, so I'm hoping it will be as enlightening.

Cirque du Freak(whatever the first book is called-
Pretty popular among students, and I try to relate when possible. Harry Potter has kind of ruined me for children's book series, though.

World War Z-
I'm not big on the whole horror genre, but World War Z was really interesting. The style (it's written significantly after an apocalyptic zombie war as a series of interviews with the survivors) gives it a really unique perspective while still telling a good narrative.

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Hip-Hop QOTW:

"Yeah, where I'ma start it at, look I'ma part of that
Downtown Philly where it's realer than a heart attack
It wasn't really that ill until the start of crack
Now it's a body caught every night on the Almanac"

"Game Theory"
The Roots

World War Z... I believe I've read some pretty good reviews about that. Is it worth picking up? How long is it, and does it stand out from the competition in the now-overpopulated apocolyptic war/zombie infestation genre?

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Currently Playing : Final Fantasy V
Most Recently Beat : Elder Scrolls: Skyrim
Favorite Game : Final Fantasy X

The newest CoNcast is up! Have a listen!

Quote (Death Penalty @ 29th October 2008 22:35)

World War Z... I believe I've read some pretty good reviews about that. Is it worth picking up? How long is it, and does it stand out from the competition in the now-overpopulated apocolyptic war/zombie infestation genre?

It's awesome. I was a big fan of The Zombie Survival Guide by the same author (Max Brooks, who's the son of famous comedy director Mel Brooks), and World War Z is a dramatized collection of fictional firsthand accounts pretty much exactly as Gears described it. It's only vaguely satirical; it treats the subject matter with such gravity that it's easy to lose yourself in it. What results is a quite possibly the best artistic achievement involving zombies since Shaun of the Dead.

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this is a blog mostly about comics and videogames
END SPOILER

death penalty and no-name hit a couple nice books. Slaughter House 5 is a classic and the entire His Dark Materials trilogy is amazing. I definitely recommend that series to anyone, great read.

since i studied history as an undergrad, im pretty into those sorts of books =) mostly read stuff about Mexican history. at the moment, the only book im reading for leisure is Fight Club.

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"The answer is, of course, that it would be best to be both loved and feared. But since the two rarely come together, anyone compelled to choose will find greater security in being feared than in being loved."
- Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince

I started the gigantic Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter over the summer and finished it the first few weeks of school. It's an amazing book and everyone should read it. Douglas Hofstadter is a cognitive scientist at Indiana University, and this book is 1.) his most famous and amazing book and 2.) a wonderful insight into consciousness. Each chapter is prefaced with a dialogue between Tortoise and Achilles, and each dialogue is based on a fugue by Bach. The whole book is riddled with hilarity and amazingness. READ IT.

That got me interested in Kurt Gödel and his life's work, so I read Gödel's Proof by philosophers Nagel and Newman.

I learned recently that Douglas Hofstadter has a new book out now, called I Am A Strange Loop, so I picked that up and I've been reading it. This is basically a continuation of Gödel, Escher, Bach, but written almost 30 years later. The maturity is noticable.

I also read lots and lots of mathematics.

Godel, Escher, Bach was on my summer reading list, but never made it off of the scribbled notebook page. Oh, well- next summer.

I'm currently reading The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin as I am writing a paper on it for my Gay and Lesbian Lit class. It's a highly polarizing science fiction novella about an earth-born diplomat working to bring a planet populated with a hermaphroditic race into what could be best described as a galactic EU. It is really well written and contains a brilliant mythology on par with Frank Herbert's Dune .

Seeing I'm on a book-of-ideas-meets-science-fiction kick; I am also reading The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick. It takes place in 1962 and presupposes that the Allies lost WWII and the world is split into Nazi and Japanese colonies. The west coast of the US has largely been absorbed by japanese culture and the east coast is a nazi genocidal wasteland, especially the american south. The action of the novel centers around a work of philosophy written by a doctor in Idaho that presupposes that the Allies did in fact win WWII and instead of the course of events that we know to be true, went on to make great humanitarian leaps, creating a virtual world utopia. Quite absorbing.


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"You broke my f***ing sitar, mother f***er."
-Anton A. Newcombe

"Yet another 'use your sword to magically deliver death from above' character comes in somewhere between the Living Cabbage and Milkmaid character options." -red_beard_neo

I'm currently reading a 4-book anthology from the Diablo PC game series. It is actually good reading!

I want to pick up a romance novel, even though I've always found that stuff to be kinda' gay. However, it would provide some inspiration for a novel I'm currently writing.

Sooner or later, Stephen Colbert's I Am America And So Can You is a book I wanna' pick up, too.

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"Thought I was dead, eh? Not until I fulfill my dream!"
Seifer Almasy


"The most important part of the story is the ending."
Secret Window


"Peace is but a shadow of death."
Kuja

Quote (Gears @ 30th October 2008 02:16)

A Thousand Splendid Suns-
I loved The Kite Runner, and so far this book has been living up to the precedent it set. Hosseini is great at making little victories stand out amid ridiculous tragedies.

I must pick that up. The Kite Runner is probably the best book I've read all year.

I'm mostly reading non-fiction right now. After reading The Spanish Civil War by Anthony Beevor, I had to make a start on his Stalingrad. He's my top historian without any doubt. To me, Eric Hobsbawm is the only other history writer who can match his intelligence and subliminal dark humour. I've also made a start on Mohammad by Martin Lings. I also dip into a book about dreams that I don't know the author or title of. It's really interesting.

The only fiction I've been reading recently is Small Island by Andrea Levy and A Farewell To Arms by Hemingway. He worked in a medical unit on the Italian front in the First World War, and it's great to get a perspective of Verdun and the Somme from someone there. There's much more in the book but that is what stands out. Small Island is a very popular and very readable book about racism in Britain and the U.S. by extension. It takes place in Jamaica and Britain during World War Two and then the post-war era. The best part so far is when Gilbert, a black Royal Air Force technician, is driving two black American soldiers to their base. They don't understand that Britain doesn't have segregation and they don't know where Jamaica is. They finally accept that Jamaica must be where Britain keeps its "negroes".

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Scepticism, that dry rot of the intellect, had not left one entire idea in his mind.

Me on the Starcraft.

As an assignment in my ENG 250 class i am currently reading Germinal by Zola, but in my free time i am going back to a couple of classics, Journey to the Center of the Earth, Othello the Moor of Venice, and Oedipus Rex.

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"There is not a liberal America and a conservative America - there is the United States of America. There is not a black America and a white America and latino America and asian America - there's the United States of America."
~Barack Obama

I read the His Dark Materials trilogy last year and I absolutely loved it. It was so creative and suspenseful, I read for hours on end. Every spare chance I had at school, I was reading one of these books.

I got Brisingr from the Inheritance... quartet? What do you call a series of 4 books? Anyway, I haven't finished it yet because we've been reading so many books in school that I haven't really had a chance to read it. Another great book from Christopher Paolini!

In English class we've been reading Lord of the Flies by William Golding. It's just gotten good, about 10 chapters in out of the 12 chapters. Nothing like a good book about a bunch of little boys stuck on an island killing pigs.

We also have to be reading an independant book for English class from the teacher's selection, so I've been reading No Great Mischief by Alistair MacLeod. I kinda got out of it and now I can't get back in; it's good, but not super exciting.

Now in French class, we've been reading Maria Chapdelaine by, I don't know, some old guy. I'm too lazy to go check who wrote it. It's kind of boring, but it's a pretty good love story. It's a good cure for my insomnia.

Today, I just bought Twilight and I'm looking forward to reading it. I've heard nothing but good things about it from my classmates. I also just bought the 17th volume of Fullmetal Alchemist, which I've been dying for.



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Why, hello guys! Haven't been around here in a loooong time!
http://dragcave.net/user/LadyTwi
http://www.backloggery.com/ladytwi

Quote (GooseKnight @ 30th October 2008 08:24)

I'm currently reading The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin

I read that for sci-fi class last year... I THINK I remember that one... It has an emissary who has come to the planet, and everyone's pretty much sexless and such? I remember it being pretty good, actually.

I'm currently on... book 7? Or 8? in Steven Erikson's Tales from the Malazan Book of the Fallen series, which is the best fantasy I have ever laid eyes upon in my life. The man is a fabulous writer, a fabulous creator of his realm, and uses language, and myths, and factual research to add such realism and depth to his world, characters, concepts and situations I am in awe throughout each read. The one I'm currently into is Toll the Hounds,

I just finished The Mote in God's Eye by Larry Niven and Steve Purnell. I really liked Beowulf's Children and my cousin recommended this one to me. It has a really interesting concept of the future that I really couldn't disbelieve, to be honest.

After this, I plan on getting to this new book called Procession of the Dead which seems to have this Sin City sorta' feel to it. It's a new series, so we'll see how it is.

In between all this, I read Jeff Smith's Bone series, though I'm waiting for the next one.

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Games on the Go
Final Fantasy VII
Final Fantasy: Four Warriors of Light
Baldur's Gate

Too much to play, so little time!

Greg

Quote (King Eddy @ 30th October 2008 18:26)

I read the His Dark Materials trilogy last year and I absolutely loved it. It was so creative and suspenseful, I read for hours on end. Every spare chance I had at school, I was reading one of these books.

I did enjoy reading this series and I feel that the author is a good writer but I have trouble with the idea of "recommending" it to others. Maybe because of the rumors encircling it that the intent of the author was to "kill God" in the minds children and other accusations just like the Harry Potter series recevied from Christians. This only made me even more interested in reading it because I wanted to judge how sucessful the writer was if that was his intent. As a person of Christian faith in one of the numerous denominations out there, I have to say that if his intent was to kill God in the minds of children, he failed in my opinion. There was too much mysticism and not scientific enough to be successful in that goal. Of course, I'm 27 and hopefully am smarter than the age group the series was directed at but that was just my thought on it. I have some thoughts on why it didn't work theologically as well but I can discuss those later if someone was curious.

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Elena Indurain

Currently Playing: Suikoden II

I finished reading A Dream of Eagles and The Golden Eagle series by Jack Whyte. The story is that of King Arthur and his struggle in uniting Britain after the withdrawal from the romans. This series is historical fiction, covering the lineage of Camulod and Arthur. A great read if you can find the time to read it.

Lately I've been reading comedy, Lamb and The Lust Lizard of Melencholy Cove are great books. Chris Moore is a comical genius.

Douglas Coupland is just as good in jPod, that was great. Although I didn't like his Microsurfs and lost interest about halfway through All Families are Psychotic.

I'm just begining The Templar Trilogy from Jack Whyte. I'm a tad skeptical on begining because the thirs novell hasn't been released. I don't want to wait after finishing the second.

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Yeah, I barely post.

In my English Lit. class we were going to study Hamlet, but it changed to the Glass Menagerie. I think I'm going to read it anyways.

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Praise Be To Helix!

Quote (BlitzSage @ 6th November 2008 19:44)

In my English Lit. class we were going to study Hamlet, but it changed to the Glass Menagerie. I think I'm going to read it anyways.

I vaguely rememer the Glass Menagerie but I think it's odd that they'd ditch hamlet to study it. Weird.

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Elena Indurain

Currently Playing: Suikoden II

Quote (Elena1999 @ 7th November 2008 18:53)

Quote (BlitzSage @ 6th November 2008 19:44)

In my English Lit. class we were going to study Hamlet, but it changed to the Glass Menagerie. I think I'm going to read it anyways.

I vaguely rememer the Glass Menagerie but I think it's odd that they'd ditch hamlet to study it. Weird.

yeah, for some reason our teacher let the class vote 4 it. i think they thought it would be easier 2 study. it sucks.

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Praise Be To Helix!

On The Road- Jack Kerouac
Islands In The Stream- Ernest Hemingway
The Picture of Dorian Grey- Oscar Wilde

Some goods books we have read in my British Literature class are Black Swan Green and The Uncommon Reader and if you like twisted love stories Talking it over

other than that i would recommend Orson Scott Card as an author just don't throw him aside at the Ender's series even though it is a good series. Look for his homecoming series or the alvin maker series. the alvin series is quite long though now that it has seven books i think.

Quote (Clock Doc @ 9th November 2008 02:02)

On The Road- Jack Kerouac
Islands In The Stream- Ernest Hemingway
The Picture of Dorian Grey- Oscar Wilde

gotta love Hemingway.

hey, has anybody read Alice in Wonderland? is it good? i was thinking bout traking it down and reading it, but i kinda wanted someone's opinion.

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Praise Be To Helix!

Quote (BlitzSage @ 19th November 2008 18:43)

Quote (Clock Doc @ 9th November 2008 02:02)

On The Road- Jack Kerouac
Islands In The Stream- Ernest Hemingway
The Picture of Dorian Grey- Oscar Wilde

gotta love Hemingway.

hey, has anybody read Alice in Wonderland? is it good? i was thinking bout traking it down and reading it, but i kinda wanted someone's opinion.

The original Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and it's sequel, Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There were two of my three favorite pieces as a boy and still have a huge place in my heart today, seconded only to Barrie's original Peter Pan works.

If you've only the more "Disney'd" version to go by, it's worth checking out just to see how much more different and truly twisted it is. Lewis Carroll was a spectacular writer.

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Okay, but there was a goat!

I have to have read Ulysses by tomorrow; I'm 110 pages in. I don't think it's gonna happen. Shame, really, because I'm really enjoying it. Just read the episode with Dignan's funeral - 'Hades,' I believe. I was struck by how funny it was, actually - Bloom noting that the coffin made it to the funeral before him, even though the guy's dead, the joking on the train, surreptitiously moving the bar of soap in his pocket, musing on life and death and then suddenly - 'O. My knee hurts. That's better.' As I often tend to do, I couldn't help but think about pop music when I was reading it - I expected it to be as abrasive, disjointed and impenetrable as Trout Mask Replica, but so far I'm finding it to be more like Van Morrison's Astral Weeks - not just in so much as they both paint a really vivid picture of Ireland, but in how well they hold together - Joyce's almost stream of conciousness style (that I've encountered so far), all the thoughts swirling round, kinda matches up with how the semi-improvised elements of the album work, Morrison's lyrics and how the whole thing, like Neil Young said, is 'one big song.' Actually, I doubt this is making much sense to anyone, but I'm in pretentious English student mode.

The problem with being an English student is I hardly get to read for pleasure, so I've been having to trawl through a lot of Pope and Enlightenment philosophy lately. Screw Pope and his heroic couplets! I read Rudyard Kipling's Kim recently, which I really loved. Kipling's India is just so lively and vivid. I picked up Joyce's Dubliners the other day, too, as I sold my old copy, so I plan on re-reading that when I get a chance. Much more manageable than Ulysses - which I should really get back to!

Quote (Mimic @ 20th November 2008 20:50)

I have to have read Ulysses by tomorrow; I'm 110 pages in. I don't think it's gonna happen. Shame, really, because I'm really enjoying it. Just read the episode with Dignan's funeral - 'Hades,' I believe. I was struck by how funny it was, actually - Bloom noting that the coffin made it to the funeral before him, even though the guy's dead, the joking on the train, surreptitiously moving the bar of soap in his pocket, musing on life and death and then suddenly - 'O. My knee hurts. That's better.' As I often tend to do, I couldn't help but think about pop music when I was reading it - I expected it to be as abrasive, disjointed and impenetrable as Trout Mask Replica, but so far I'm finding it to be more like Van Morrison's Astral Weeks - not just in so much as they both paint a really vivid picture of Ireland, but in how well they hold together - Joyce's almost stream of conciousness style (that I've encountered so far), all the thoughts swirling round, kinda matches up with how the semi-improvised elements of the album work, Morrison's lyrics and how the whole thing, like Neil Young said, is 'one big song.' Actually, I doubt this is making much sense to anyone, but I'm in pretentious English student mode.

The problem with being an English student is I hardly get to read for pleasure, so I've been having to trawl through a lot of Pope and Enlightenment philosophy lately. Screw Pope and his heroic couplets! I read Rudyard Kipling's Kim recently, which I really loved. Kipling's India is just so lively and vivid. I picked up Joyce's Dubliners the other day, too, as I sold my old copy, so I plan on re-reading that when I get a chance. Much more manageable than Ulysses - which I should really get back to!

Hate Pope. Hate Kant. Heroic couplets were cute when I was 12, I've grown to hate them at an insane level these days. But you knew that already! Your pretentious English student is rivaled only by your pretentious music nut mode.

I really enjoy Joyce. His style in the stream of consciousness format makes the flow a lot easier for me to follow, certainly a lot more interesting to read! I absolutely love Dubliners, especially the newer prints that include his short story, The Dead.

I've always wanted to try to read and make sense of Finnegan's Wake. I've yet to meet a person who could boast as much. I expect it's the equivalent of modern day math rock; the dillinger escape plan of novels.

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Okay, but there was a goat!

Quote

I've always wanted to try to read and make sense of Finnegan's Wake. I've yet to meet a person who could boast as much. I expect it's the equivalent of modern day math rock; the dillinger escape plan of novels.

After many attempts at Finnegan's Wake, the last one being a few winters ago, I came to the conclusion that the literary world received this novel, attempted to decrypt it's meanings, were largely unsuccessful thus throwing up their hands and concluding that it must be brilliant as no one can read it. All of those people are afraid to admit as much.

So goes the literary world. I actually have yet to get through a James Joyce novel, which is unfortunate, because I pride myself in finding enjoyment in dense reads (see Gravity's Rainbow). Perhaps Finnegan's Wake is not meant to be grasped until I am in my death bed. Who knows?

Oh, and I did enjoy reading Mimics comparison of Ulysses to Astral Weeks. I am now slightly inspired to tackle Ulysses once more.

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"You broke my f***ing sitar, mother f***er."
-Anton A. Newcombe

"Yet another 'use your sword to magically deliver death from above' character comes in somewhere between the Living Cabbage and Milkmaid character options." -red_beard_neo