What are you reading right now?

[Val Bach the Cobbler]

"River of Darkness: Francisco Orellana's Legendary Voyage" by Buddy Levy. I find Orellana's story more compelling than Pizarros or Cortes'. I think because he was battling nature and the unknown a bit more than the rest. They never knew when they would reach the ocean. Reading Pizarro's trek back after the split with Orellana actually gave me some bad dreams. Can't imagine the pain hunger, and general discomfort for months on end.
Very easily readable and a good narration style. It doesn't really feel like a story book or history book. Orellana comes across as a really good leader but one that realized their lives at the slightest misstep. He was also like most successful conquistadors were, a great politician. I do think he had a natural way with language with did help his crew navigate a lot of situations. I always thought that was a meme that some people just have a way with languages. Multiple sources (including hostile) have said Orellana had a natural way with learning languages.

 

[Healthy Boy Brand]

Picked up a collection of Flannery O'Connor's short stories, this segment made me think of the 'Farms immediately:

 

[Gaear Grimsrud]

I'm 108 pages into Wuthering Heights, by Emily Brontë.

It's pretty engaging.

 

[Nick Obre]

I'm 108 pages into Wuthering Heights, by Emily Brontë.

It's pretty engaging.

I had to read that in highschool.

Maybe it was my teenage mind but I found it to be one the worst slogs I've ever read through.

By now, though, I remember very little.

 

[glass_houses]

I had to read that in highschool.

Maybe it was my teenage mind but I found it to be one the worst slogs I've ever read through.

By now, though, I remember very little.

Wuthering Heights is the best argument for book burning ever written.

 

[Meth Dick]

I'm guessing it's been said to death but I'm booze-posting and I looked up Edgar Allan Poe to get here but I wanted to gush over Annabelle Lee.

Spoiler: The entirety of Annabelle Lee and my less than sober rantings

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child, [I think the italicizing of "I" and "SHE" could have been in reference to the age difference of Poe and Virginia Clemm? Though I don't think such an age difference was out of place at that time. Clemm being 13 and Poe 27. And cousins. Perhaps him trying to rationalize it?]
In this kingdom by the sea,
But we loved with a love that was more than love—
I and my Annabel Lee—
With a love that the wingèd seraphs of Heaven
Coveted her and me. [the "coveted" bit is interesting because he mentions jealousy of the angels again. Seems like an important detail]

And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee; [the "wind" being the consumption that sickened his wife, came from nowhere, out of a cloud]
So that her highborn kinsmen came
And bore her away from me, [her family, "highborn kinsman" that didn't approve of the marriage perhaps? Wanted to take her home, away from Poe?"]
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in Heaven,
Went envying her and me—
Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea) [There's the "coveting" again; maybe Poe had believed the angels had actually grew jealous of the love Poe and Clemm had, and decided to take her away from him. and the 'as all men know in this kingdom by the sea' was Poe's willingness to share these ideas with whoever would listen to his cries. All the men knew, because Poe said it to them.]
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we—
Of many far wiser than we— [again challenging the ideals of those opposed to their marriage; they were not as old, nor as wise, but their love made up the difference]
And neither the angels in Heaven above
Nor the demons down under the sea
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; [Neither man, God, Devil, nor Sea can keep me from our love]

For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; [I cannot sleep soundly without her]
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; [I can feel her watching me]
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea—
In her tomb by the sounding sea.[I gladly lay beside my bride and join her wherever]

It's a powerful poem to say the least.

 

[Cougar Pump]

"Dad's Army: The Story of a Classic Television Show"
Really interesting. I caught reruns of this show when I was a kid and the insight into it's production enriches the whole thing immensely. Lots of interesting trivia like how Arthur Lowe (who played Cpt. Mainwaring) had an actual contractual stipulation that he would never remove his trousers. There's a scene in the movie where they march along the street in long-johns, and hence Arthur Lowe is not in the movie.
Interestingly the death of James Beck (Private Walker) in 1973 didn't kill the show, but the death of a somewhat more minor character's actor (Edward Sinclair, who played the Verger) did. It happened just after the end of the 6th season filming and consequently one of the cast members at the gathering after the funeral said 'I suppose that's it then', and everyone agreed.

 

[AnsemSoD1]

The Star Wars Prequel Trilogy novelizations, I can't fucking wait to get to Mathew Stover's Revenge of The Sith.

 

[Safir]

Reading comprehension: Non-existent.
But I'm sure you'd prefer to read the gay relationship in Wind and Truth which is celebrated by the other characters. Seems right up your alley, nigger.

1. I don't read Sanderson, it's Worst Korea webnovel level trash. I promised someone on here to try and get through a book and failed on page 1. Fatrick, Chris-chan, dinosaur rape guy, and KJ Parker at his worst (Kangs 2-3, JQ 3) all write better. Even that white woman's dogfucking international bestseller was just mercifully boring.

2. Getting a boner at the sight of men fucking is gay, news at 11. Happy coming out day, niggerfaggot.

---
I'm currently reading Soviet books but next up is Dark Heart, a Dragonlance prequel about a female villain of the main story. The classic prequels (Meetings Sextet) tend to be terrible to the point even pedditors consider them curiosities at best (not that pedditors are great judges of quality, it's just the two sleb writers have declared all other books heresy, and prequels have the least amount of valuable setting content), but Dark Heart (vol. 3 of 6) has a few female (XX) fans. I've never read it.

 

[Womble of Wimbledon]

Just read Satan in Goray by Isaac Bashevis Singer. By far the most Jewish thing I have ever read and it is funny how much Jews writing about Jews for Jews seems to have a pretty low opinion of Jews. The moral was a bit muddied; what I took away from it was that Jews are miserable regardless of whether they follow their own code or not.

 

[Nick Obre]

Last year I went to a medieval/fantasy-themed event with the kid, and in a contest I won a book by a local young writer lady, she autographed it for us, and it was a nice thing.

I tried to start reading it today, and I gave up two pages in because I had so many corrections to make already. Nothing stylistic, just grammar, so many grammar issues.

I know this is barely related to the thread but god damn. And she supposedly won an international young writers' competition with it (not sure if first place but top 3 at least, I recall). How bad are young aspiring writers today, then?

 

[Lord of the Large Pants]

Heart of the Mountain came out a few days ago. The final book in Saga of the Forgotten Warrior, the fantasy series written by the same guy as Monster Hunter International. And actually his better series, IMO, despite being far less popular.

I have a long weekend and I'm going in.

 

[Meat Target]

Re-reading some Lovecraft.

All Cthulhu wanted was to sleep. Go away, puny mortal assholes, it's 3 am for him.

 

[Count Dorku]

Dying Earth by Jack Vance. If I had realized it was a series of short stories and not a novel, I probably would have started sooner. A dark-skinned creature gets turned into a pile of viscera with the equivalent of a magic merry-go-round in one of the early stories, so, you know, it's right up my alley.

 

[Hweeks]

Just finished His Pain by Wrath James White - I found it on the messed up book thread here. It's about what I expected from this type of horror, but it was well written and pretty disgusting. I may pick up some more of this guys books in the future.

 

[Quence]

I’m about to start this book. I utterly loathe the Leftists, so this book better not disappoint me.

 

[Fapcop]

Theft of Fire.

A self published sci fi book (#1 in an upcoming series) that’s probably the best sci-fi I’ve read since the Expanse. And it’s not woke.

 

[Anteater Alien]

Currently re-reading Almost Transparent Blue by Ryu Murakami, one of my all time favorites and would recommend. I guess the translated version is hard to come by in certain areas but if you dig hard enough the PDF is out there.

 

[ScurvyRat]

I finished up Wind and Truth this week.
Oh man.
ah jeez.
fucking
1/10. Can NOT recommend.
I've been following this since 2010. 15 years. 15 God damned years of reading this series only for it to come to this? I might be done with Brandon Sanderson forever. He took one of the greatest, most original, most fascinating and interesting settings.....
And he turned it into fag slop.
I don't know what provokes a straight middle aged white mormon man to think that he can write a gay inter-species relationship, but holy FUCK did he miss the mark with this one.
There's just too much to talk about. Everything went wrong. He wrote himself into a corner and then threw up his hands and said "Fuck it! Everything is fucked!" in the least satisfying way possible.
I can't even recommend anything he wrote after this. Maybe ever.
This book was truly infected by Sanderson spending WAY too much time on reddit-- and it shows.

 

[Richter Belmont]

Just finished The Case of Jekyll and Hyde and Carmilla.

JandH was good, but the whole premise just felt like a lesser Frankenstein. The edition I had had an appendix that spoke of the brain theories that inspired the story. I don’t really have much more to say about it but I did earnestly like it!

Finished reading Carmilla about 20 mins ago and it was really good! It was fun reading and seeing all the inspiration for Dracula. Obviously the whole thing that she can only use a different name as long as it’s an anagram of the one she has already is pretty obvious at the start but it was a fun thing that the book actually explained that.
I liked it a ton, but I still think I prefer Dracula - I think the whole plotline with Lucy in that is more engaging than Laura’s.

I got a couple more books today and I’m kinda torn between started Turn of the Screw for more classic horror, but am also thinking about trying Franz Kafka Metamorphasis. The book I have of it is filled with a bunch of short stories (sometimes *just* half a page) that were all kind of iffy and I didn’t care for most of ‘em.

Anyway I’m looking foward to giving it a try!