Recommend some Reading

[michaelrw]

Well, I'm reading "Seven Ancient Wonders" by Matthew Reilly at the moment, although I'm not sure I'd recommend it to anyone... It's certainly popular, and it's easy to digest, but it's definately written for the masses, and he uses exclamation marks in the text, which I just can't get behind. He reminds me of Dan Brown, but worse. Make of that what you will.

As for GOOD books- The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman is DEFINATELY worth checking out. Its great!

[Suzanne]

I wrote a blog that took me about four hours to write concerning the best books i read this year. It's epic. It's awesome. Please read it and justify my massive effort.

hogsandwich.blogspot.com/2008/12/i-stole-this-idea-from-grug-yet-cannot.html

[bridget]

Good list, Suzanne. I will definitely have to check some of those books out.

Nice call on The Bell Jar. I finally read it a couple years ago and I had the same feelings about it you did. I LOVE "The Yellow Wallpaper." I get something new out of it every time I read it.

[michaelrw]

Suzanne, that blog inspired me to finally pick up The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay. I bought it months ago, but it kept getting pushed aside on the reading pile- I'll let you know what I think.

Oh, what did you think of The Book Thief, by the way?

[Suzanne]

I had trouble with book thief. The first half I kind of found boring. The second half was absolutely devastating. And I loved the narrator voice through it, that was genius. Unfortunately I have an aversion to Holocaust books which didn't help.

In summary: Very well done and inventive, could have done with a hell of an edit.

[stryderwolfe]

oh yeah books....I'm reading book 3 of "A Song of Ice and Fire" by George R.R. Martin and it's amazing. The first book is called "A Game of Thrones". Highly recommended to anyone who's into medieval stuff or politics, as it's sort of a political thriller disguised as a medieval adventure.

[Luke]

Grug recommends (or should I say lends) a lot of reading to me, mostly graphic novels, and I am enjoying the hell out of them.

I have just started book 2 of Isaac the Pirate which is a pretty engrossing, badass story about a painter that ends up on what turns out to be a pirate ship and goes on a pretty harrowing adventure that ends in blood and badassery. I have no idea where this thing is going to wind up but it's a pretty white knuckle read where I am very involved in all the characters. Many unexpected events too. It's by French badass Christophe Blain who must eat swords for breakfast and shit viking battleships. Brilliant.

Now I am gainfully employed there will be far more book purchasing in my future. I will buy as many books as I can and maybe build a fort out of them.

I should paste all this stuff in my blog so I have things to talk about.

[grug]

I am so glad you're enjoying Isaac. I wish they'd hurry up and release the next book already! I hear it's been out in France for a couple of years... (never bothered to check if that's true)

Blain's most recent book, Gus & his Gang is probably my favourite book of last year! I'll pass that on to you next if you don't pick it up yourself.

Also, here is a video clip of animated Blain work:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=hd8YIeeJ9WY

It's not quite as good as Sfar's video, but it's still really great.

[Luke]

French people always draw such wonderful women. What a bunch of smooth motherfuckers.

[Suzanne]

I just finished a book called Spirit Gate by Kate Elliot. It was a piece of crap, and it really takes alot for me to dislike fantasy. I'm pretty forgiving.

I just bought Wishful Drinking by Carrie Fisher so I think I'll read that first then plow back into the third book in a series I've been dying to finish. Prolong the anticipation with some Princess Leia.

[grug]

Hehe, I just listened to an interview with Carrie about that book. They asked if she had any goss about Alec Guinness. She said, "Well, he once paid Mark Hamill twenty pounds to leave him a lone."

[michaelrw]

Wishful Drinking was SO much freaking fun! I had a blast! It was one of the first times I'd ever read a biography (normally I can't stand em) but the cover drew me in, and you know what they say, about always judging a book by its cover...

But yeah, finishing it just made me realise. I really, REALLY want to have a drink with Carrie Fisher. Because she's awesome.

I'm reading Incendiary by Chris Cleave at the moment, and it's so good it hurts. Everyone needs to read it. Now.

[andreib]

"The Corrections" by Jonathan Franzen is a modern classic and features some of the most wonderfully horrible, broken but endearing fictional characters I've ever gotten to know in a book (and you do feel like you know these people). Totally awesome. It's like reading four fantastically grim but uplifting tales in one huge saga about the banality of modern life.

[sharkwilleatyou]

I'm definitely checking out some of the aforementioned recommendations!

My favorite's 100 Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. It's really confusing at some times, especially when it comes to keeping track of characters, but for all its weird mysticism and supernatural inclinations, I can definitively say this book is at the least worth a try.

[grasshopper]

I don't know what it is, but for the past year or so I'm had no patience or actual word novels (as opposed to word+picture novels like comics)

I've been reading a lot of manga lately. Well, specifically the individual upon whom I have a massive man crush; Osamu Tezuka.
Besides the obligatory recommendation of his Astro Boy, I would highly recommend Phoenix (twelve parts to it), Dororo (three parts) and Black Jack (third volume was just released, and there will be something like 20 total.

Phoenix: Tells the story of individuals over centuries who fates are intertwined, all have the goal of eternal life, represented in the form of the Phoenix. The first story takes place thousands of years in the future, the next takes place thousands of years in the pass, the books go in the same order back and forth getting closer and closer to the present. Unfortunately, despite working on the series for 20 years, Tezuka died before finishing it, but each story stands on it's own.

Dororo: A man makes a deal with 48 demons that, in return for power to take over the world, he would give each of them a piece of his unborn son. The abomination that is born without limbs, vocal chords, eyes, ears, nose and just about everything else, manages to grow up and, armed with prosthetic limbs and swords goes after the demons, learning that each one he kills returns one of his body parts (the ironic bit being that as he get's each body part back he actually becomes weaker as he could easy throw up a fake arm to defend himself against a blast, but with a real one he'd have to be far more careful).

Black Jack: The worlds greatest doctor, is unlicensed from performing medicine, but does so for those who can afford his 6 figure salary per consultation and surgery. Lot's of weird medical stuff going on in it. That fact that he also has an unknown, dark past makes him cool too.

Also been reading lots of horror manga from Junji Ito (creepy as hell stuff, especially Uzumaki {3 volumes}) and Kazuo Umezu (Cat Eyed Boy), considered the godfather of horror manga.