What are you reading?

[stePH]

Finished The Graveyard Book last night.

Today started The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick, a children's or YA "novel" that came into my hands when my brother-in-law bought a car and found a bunch of crap left behind in it. It's very picture-heavy, frequently using the illustrations to carry the narrative over several pages (with no text at all) to give a more "cinematic" feel (or like a graphic novel without word balloons).

[BlueLu]

Today started The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick, a children's or YA "novel" that came into my hands when my brother-in-law bought a car and found a bunch of crap left behind in it. It's very picture-heavy, frequently using the illustrations to carry the narrative over several pages (with no text at all) to give a more "cinematic" feel (or like a graphic novel without word balloons).

Martin Scorsese is making the movie.  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0970179/

[DKT]

Today started The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick, a children's or YA "novel" that came into my hands when my brother-in-law bought a car and found a bunch of crap left behind in it. It's very picture-heavy, frequently using the illustrations to carry the narrative over several pages (with no text at all) to give a more "cinematic" feel (or like a graphic novel without word balloons).

Martin Scorsese is making the movie.  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0970179/

I read the book sometime last year. I thought I'd really like it because of my love for comics and movies, but this is one of those tings where lots of people love it, but it just made me shrug my shoulders. The way he Selznick switched between pictures and text didn't do that much for me, and the storyline and characters seemed a bit flat.

Kind of curious to see the movie, mostly because of Scorcese, and heard about another of Selznick's books that sounded cool (The Boy of a Thousand Faces, about a kid who loved Lon Cheney), but this one just left me cold. At least it was a quick read.

[Talia]

Re-reading 'The Neverending Story.' I love this book! My copy I picked up at the library book sale - its the old hardcover edition with illustrations at the start of each chapter, with all the text in either red (real world) or green (Fantastica). It's lovely (if a bit grubby).

[Scattercat]

Read "The Terror" by Dan Simmons.  I usually don't like his stuff much, but this was highly enjoyable.  (Mind you, you have to be able to appreciate the slow boil of archaic novels; I love the old stuff and stuff in that vein, like "Johnathan Strange and Mr. Norrell.")  Also read "We Never Talk About My Brother," which reminded me how badly I wish I was Peter S. Beagle, and some more Rudyard Kipling short stories.  Also "Returning My Sister's Face," Eugie Foster's short story book, which was fun but I got a little asian-folk-taled-out by the end of it.  Reminded me of when I used to read the collected works of Grimm and Andersen and eventually it all starts blurring together.

Right now I am reading "Proofiness," which is about numbers and the myriad ways people can lie with them.  Interesting stuff.

[Listener]

"Assassins of Gor", by John Norman

(I don't promise not to review these on the blog... but I probably won't.)

[Scattercat]

"Assassins of Gor", by John Norman

(I don't promise not to review these on the blog... but I probably won't.)

I have already read far more about Gor than I ever, ever needed to know.  What possessed you to pick those up?

[stePH]

Just finished Stark's (Westlake's) The Jugger; not a typical Parker story in that there's no heist... he's just in a desperate struggle to maintain his cover in the aftermath of his contact's death. And a hell of a twist in the epilogue. Next on deck, The Seventh (funny coincidence, given today's date.)

[kibitzer]

Read "The Terror" by Dan Simmons.  I usually don't like his stuff much, but this was highly enjoyable.  (Mind you, you have to be able to appreciate the slow boil of archaic novels; I love the old stuff and stuff in that vein, like "Johnathan Strange and Mr. Norrell.")...

Simmons is one of my author heroes -- his prose is great and his ideas fabulous, and he crosses genres with ease. Myself, I thought this one was overlong but thinking back, I did enjoy it. Another long one is Drood. You'll probably get the most out of Drood if you're familiar with Dickens and Wilkie Collins but it's a good read.

[kibitzer]

Finished Stephen King Goes To The Movies. The stories it contains:

1408: Pretty average. Most of the action is in the manager's office before entering The Room. Very different ending to the movie.

The Mangler: Never heard of it before. Short and as scary as a story about a demon-possessed pressing (ironing) machine could be.

Low Men in Yellow Coats: Brilliant and easily my favourite of the five. I've not seen the movie (which, from reviews, seems to be a good thing) and nor have I read any of the Dark Tower series. Hugely enjoyable story with very sympathetic MC. Loved it.

Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption: as I said above, brilliant. The story is great and the adaptation very true to the spirit of the story.

Children of the Corn: I've not seen the movie. The story was short and creepy. I imagine corn-fields are creepy?

[Devoted135]

Children of the Corn: I've not seen the movie. The story was short and creepy. I imagine corn-fields are creepy?

As a native midwesterner who went to college in central Illinois, I can vouch that yes, corn-fields have a very high creepy factor.

[eytanz]

The Mangler: Never heard of it before. Short and as scary as a story about a demon-possessed pressing (ironing) machine could be.

I don't think I ever read the story, but the movie was one of my favourite "so bad it's good" movies during my late teens. The first half involves several people who go out of their way to be swallowed by the big, inanimate killing machine.

[tinygaia]

The Mangler: Never heard of it before. Short and as scary as a story about a demon-possessed pressing (ironing) machine could be.

I don't think I ever read the story, but the movie was one of my favourite "so bad it's good" movies during my late teens. The first half involves several people who go out of their way to be swallowed by the big, inanimate killing machine.

Oh, yes! The bit with the squishing? I loved the bit with the squishing.

[tinygaia]

Disclaimer: As a school librarian, I try to read whatever is most popular with the kids - no matter how painful it may be. If a child says “Mrs. Library-lady-teacher!” (yes, some of them call me that. Names are overrated.) “You have to read this book!” then I read the book. These are not always worth sharing.

That said, I recently finished Shiver (book 1) and Linger (book 2) of The Wolves of Mercy Falls by Maggie Stiefvater. Surprisingly, they're pretty good. These are romance novels with werewolves in (vampires are soooo last year, didn't you know?). The characters are spot-on believable. It perfectly captured the essence of being a teenager. At times, the emo tone was so thick I wanted to scream "Oh come on! Get over it!" but I remember feeling that way at that age. The main characters are 17-18 and so in love it hurts – my husband and I were high school sweethearts, so I really identified with their love story – but in this series, the werewolf thing is sort of a terminal illness, so there was an extra depth to it. The second book really gets into the “science” (for lack of a better term) of the werewolfism and was very well done.

Also, werewolves are a refreshing change. If I have to read another YA vampire-romance, I think I’ll stake someone.

[Bdoomed]

Why do that when you can simply cross them out?  It's not so hard, you'll get the fang of it with practice.

[stePH]

Finished Stephen King Goes To The Movies. The stories it contains:

1408: Pretty average. Most of the action is in the manager's office before entering The Room. Very different ending to the movie.

The Mangler: Never heard of it before. Short and as scary as a story about a demon-possessed pressing (ironing) machine could be.

Low Men in Yellow Coats: Brilliant and easily my favourite of the five. I've not seen the movie (which, from reviews, seems to be a good thing) and nor have I read any of the Dark Tower series. Hugely enjoyable story with very sympathetic MC. Loved it.

Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption: as I said above, brilliant. The story is great and the adaptation very true to the spirit of the story.

Children of the Corn: I've not seen the movie. The story was short and creepy. I imagine corn-fields are creepy?

"The Mangler" and "Children of the Corn" both appeared in the anthology Night Shift; I read most of it in elementary school (most editions have a cover depicting a bandaged hand with eyes all over it, representing the story "I Am the Doorway").

The only story above that I've never heard of is "1408".

[Faraway Ray]

Just started on Ursula Le Guin's "The Dispossessed." Only about fifty pages in but it's looking pretty typically Le Guinian at this point: society very different from our own but given a lot of detail and life such that you can understand the inner workings fairly well, even if they feel alien. I'm beginning to find her work to be more like reading National Geographic than fiction.

Not likely to displace "Paradises Lost" as my favorite story she's written.

[Listener]

"Assassins of Gor", by John Norman

(I don't promise not to review these on the blog... but I probably won't.)

I have already read far more about Gor than I ever, ever needed to know.  What possessed you to pick those up?

Without getting too detailed: I reconnected with a friend of mine who brought them up in conversation and thought I might appreciate some parts of them. And that's true... I appreciated some parts of them. The 4th and 5th books in particular were pretty enjoyable.

[Listener]

Finished the "Girl Genius" novelization, "Agatha H. and the Airship City" by Phil & Kaja Foglio.

Next up: "Dancing with Bears" by Michael Swanwick.

[stePH]

Between Richard Stark novels, been reading something that caught my eye at the library: a comic book called GØDLAND. I picked up the "Celestial Edition" One and Two, collecting (in hardcover) issues 1-12 and 13-24 respectively. Finished book one last night.

Need to resort to interlibrary loan to find Stark's The Damsel (the first to spin off Parker's sometime accomplice Alan Grofield as the lead character), as neither Multnomah nor Clackamas county has it.

[kibitzer]

Need to resort to interlibrary loan to find Stark's The Damsel (the first to spin off Parker's sometime accomplice Alan Grofield as the lead character), as neither Multnomah nor Clackamas county has it.

Would the library buy it in if you request it?

[stePH]

Need to resort to interlibrary loan to find Stark's The Damsel (the first to spin off Parker's sometime accomplice Alan Grofield as the lead character), as neither Multnomah nor Clackamas county has it.

Would the library buy it in if you request it?

dunno, prolly not. Got the loan request in this afternoon on the way home from work. In the meantime, GØDLAND Celestial Edition vol. 2.

[kibitzer]

I liked "Low Men in Yellow Coats" so much I borrowed Hearts In Atlantis -- two novellas and three short stories with the characters from "Low Men". I've nearly finished "Hearts In Atlantis" which is the other novella and it's very enjoyable. There's nothing supernatural or horrific, unless it's what people do to themselves when they should know better. Seems to me "Hearts In Atlantis" is a tribute to growing up in the Vietnam era, a way to capture that feeling. Whatever, it's great.

[stePH]

I liked "Low Men in Yellow Coats" so much I borrowed Hearts In Atlantis -- two novellas and three short stories with the characters from "Low Men". I've nearly finished "Hearts In Atlantis" which is the other novella and it's very enjoyable. There's nothing supernatural or horrific, unless it's what people do to themselves when they should know better. Seems to me "Hearts In Atlantis" is a tribute to growing up in the Vietnam era, a way to capture that feeling. Whatever, it's great.

Avoid the film. It takes a good story and makes it painfully lame.

[DKT]

I liked "Low Men in Yellow Coats" so much I borrowed Hearts In Atlantis -- two novellas and three short stories with the characters from "Low Men". I've nearly finished "Hearts In Atlantis" which is the other novella and it's very enjoyable. There's nothing supernatural or horrific, unless it's what people do to themselves when they should know better. Seems to me "Hearts In Atlantis" is a tribute to growing up in the Vietnam era, a way to capture that feeling. Whatever, it's great.

Yeah, those were both really good novellas and really struck a chord with me. I don't remember as much about the other one (or two) following it, but the final short was a nice way to end it.

I don't think I'd read any of the Dark Tower books at the time, but I remember really, really wanting to check them out after reading Low Men in Yellow Coats.