Now Reading

I really liked the ritual by Adam Nevill, at least until it went off the rails in the final third.

I dunno if I ever mentioned it here but I also read The Fisherman recently. Pretty solid story overall, definitely some creepy sections. Good mood throughout.

Did anyone say Ligotti yet? Sort of a given I guess these days but still, often creepy and always weird. If you can handle his style of writing, of course. I still haven't touched too much of his earlier work.

Thanks guys! Hadn’t heard of The Fisherman; will definitely find meself a copy of that one. Not too optimistic about Adam Nevill based on the excerpts I just read, but I’ll give him a shot.

About halfway through Powers of Darkness (the translator-tweaked Dracula I mentioned above). Turns out it’s really different. Lots of details and weird occurrences that give it sort of an Irish/Scandinavian folklore feel, to my mind—nothing heavy-handed, just reads a bit less modern Gothic in tone (Henry James, Mary Shelley stuff). It’s also got loads of footnotes which are occasionally interesting but mostly not. Good for a dreary evening or two in any case.

Finally got around to reading an Umberto Eco book, "Numero Zero". I was worried when I read it was his weakest novel, but it made for a nice afternoon read the other day. Just picked up "The Name of the Rose" and have begun to dig in.

  On 9/21/2017 at 12:31 AM, zaphod said:

I really liked the ritual by Adam Nevill, at least until it went off the rails in the final third.

It really did, I'll be intrigued to see if they kept this section in the film.

Halfway through The Pale King. Loved the chapter on his involuntary sweating. The book sits on the right side of misanthropy and cynicism so not to be nasty as.

  On 9/20/2017 at 2:40 AM, doorjamb said:

Alright fellas, help me put together a kickass pile of spooky books to read this autumn.

 

I dug out Stephen King's Cycle of the Werewolf last night (it was next to a bunch of old Goosebumps books—hell yeah), and before that I reread Alan Moore's From Hell. Plus I got this thing called Powers of Darkness, which I guess is what happened when Bram Stoker's Icelandic translator for Dracula decided to blood-and-gore things up a bit. So that could be fun. or crap, but maybe fun crap.

 

Suggestions? I hunger for fresh blood

The Visible Filth by Nathan Ballingrud

Experimental Film by Gemma Files

Almost anything by Jack Ketchum (if you want really nasty blood+guts stuff)

A Head Full Of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay

The Least Of My Scars by Stephen Graham Jones

Penpal by Dathan Auerbach 

Any short stories by Thomas Ligotti 

Anything at all by Brian Evenson 

Sorry, I realize this is a bit of a weird question, but is anyone familiar with Dostoyevsky's works? I was hoping to get a recommendation for one of his books other than "Crime and Punishment".

I know that's uh, a bit of a weird leap from me reading Stephen King and Ken Kesey novels lol.

I’d start with The Double and/or Notes From Underground (I think you can get them in a single volume).

Nice, thank you very much. In an intense moment of sobriety I remembered how much I enjoyed reading Tolstoy, thought it a good idea to explore Dostoyevsky as well. 

Amazon has Notes for $6, paperback. Ordered!

th king in yellow

Robert Chambers? Unfamiliar with him, is it a similar vein (existentialism etc)?

welcome back btw mr inactive Troony for-EVER

  On 9/24/2017 at 2:02 AM, Bulk VanderHooj said:

Sorry, I realize this is a bit of a weird question, but is anyone familiar with Dostoyevsky's works? I was hoping to get a recommendation for one of his books other than "Crime and Punishment".

 

I know that's uh, a bit of a weird leap from me reading Stephen King and Ken Kesey novels lol.

why not crime and punishment? if you haven't read it, you should. 

otherwise brothers karamazov is his best, but very different. notes requires some amount of context to really come to grips with. 

btw tolstoy is a completely different writer in almost every way possible. so if you enjoyed one that doesn't mean you'll like the other. 

Thank you for the advice, for whatever reason I figured they would be similar writers, perhaps because they gave each other accolades? Maybe Crime and Punishment isn't a terrible place to start, it's not too long. 

Keep seeing really old editions of The Brothers Karamazov on Amazon for dirt cheap, tempted to get one and see how moldy and rancid they are.

Also, Huuge, if you have a kindle or digital device, all those books are available for free from their digital store. No copyright and shit. I have Karamazov and Proust's In Search of Lost Time, for zilch.

Negatory, no e-reader here. But perhaps I should invest!

I don't know, I like the way a book feels in the hands, the grain of the paper, sound of turning to the next page. I'm lame, I know. lol.

To be clear, I am not experienced with classic literature or anything, I just really enjoyed War and Peace, despite not remembering most of it, and felt motivated to explore that domain a bit more. Thank you guys for sharing the recommendations. =)

Me too, but I also like not carrying 4000 pages of melancholic French literature around. But then again, what would build better muscles than a log with words printed in it?

I read paper too, but when it's something that's free, like Moby Dick (read it on kindle), I see no reason to buy a £12 copy. I mainly bought a kindle for books I could not get for a reasonable price, and that I could download and transfer to that. It's a nice option, but not essential.

(That said, some of those hardcover editions of the classics sure look lovely...)

I'm back into reading for pleasure now, I took  years off due to school (hard to read for pleasure after staring at textbooks for 6-10hrs right?). So I MAY just look into a kindle or similar now, might be worth the investment =)

you have to be careful about old editions of russian writers. there's a lot of debate on translations. the pevear and volokhonsky ones are the most widely read and the most "modern" but they're also very literal and quite awkward, resulting in a kind of halting, flat reading experience, though it's supposedly the most similar to the way dostoevsky actually wrote in russian. i recommend the oliver ready translation of crime and punishment if you're going to read that. otherwise p&v are probably the best for dostoevsky given what's available. the constance garnett translations are written in the tone of the english upper class and often leave out details found in the newer editions. i'm not a fan of magarshack either. a bad translation can be a major disservice to a good book. happened to me with master and margarita, a book i read in college (ginsburg) and hated and then reread a couple years ago (o'connor and burgin) and loved. with russian lit other than tolstoy, historical context is very important too. i don't think dostoevsky is as effective without some sense of history and biography (this could probably be said of literally all writers).

Wow, really interesting. Now that I think about it a bit more, the translation would be critical to tone/intent, flow of the reading, etc. Must provide for an extremely different reading experience from one translator to the next. 

Makes me wish I could read Russian to just go with the originals. I think the War and Peace I read was a P&V translation, but that was almost a decade ago. 

Thank you again, much appreciated.

I feel a bit plebby not having thought of that before, sorry.

Tim Lane's Abandoned Cars. Whilst reading this I asked a girlfriend "Reckon I could get away with giving this to my brother's son (14 yrs old)?"

Anyway it seems Tim was pre-emptive about my question with his cover.

If you believe in the tried and tested this book is not for you. Insight into a life of free thinking and may destroy some children's learned beliefs.

A fair way into Richard North Patterson - Protect & Defend, got it for jury service after being recommended it. I'm liking the flow between the two stories which are now starting to intertwine. Maybe I've just not read decent fiction before but this seems so much more in depth and much better at getting you to know each character. An enjoyable read so far, would be better if the girl doing jury duty too who loves the sound of her own voice would tone it down though cause it's difficult to block out and read when she's constantly at such a volume. Cunt.

Got it for 70p at a charity shop, all 70p for one and so many books.

Saw another one which I'm sure was simply called "Mars", and I think there was a second one there too. Wich I bought them now but not sure whether I've found them here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_trilogy 

I'm sure it didn't say "Red", "Green" or anything, just Mars. Maybe an old edition? Anyone know?

i have Red Mars which i'm yet to read. i've heard good things but it's a weighty tome and i haven't got in the mood to invest the time into it yet.

i've just finished The Western Lands by Burroughs and completed the trilogy. imo this was the weakest of the 3 and the most difficult to read. still a good book and i'm sure it'd sink in more after a few passes, but when the other books in the trilogy are as strong as they are i can't see myself returning to it any time soon.

i'm reading Solaris now which is a lot easier to read - breezed through more than half in a couple of days.

Cool, might pop back and see if it's still there. Still need to watch Solaris (Tarkovsky), got it on dvd but just haven't got round to it. Maybe should even invest in the book first, not sure from previous experience whether to read before watching.

I didn't really want to say anything on WATMM since it's in Slovenian language but fuck it - I wrote a novel and published it :) Just saying:

https://blazh.bandcamp.com/merch/tat-not

Anyway, carry on with more international material!

Actually, this weekend I read Ham On Rye by Bukowski after a decade or so. It was my first Bukowski novel and it still holds up. The guy knows how to write even tho there is no structure.