The GF book thread

[Sugar Ape]

Reading L.A. Requiem now. You read the flashback with Krantz Paul? Ace scene.

[gingerhulk]

Reading Dominion by CJ Sansom, it's bloody good.

 

Ever wonder what could of happened if Halifax would of became prime minster 1940 and we would of 'surrendered' to the nazi's? We'll read this book.

[Sut]

Has anyone read anything by Dan Simmons?

 

I've read Song of Kali (harrowing account of Kali worship, reanimated corpses and mad cultists) and Ilium (robots from Jupiter investigate temporal buggerings up perpetrated by Greek Gods on Mars while the Trojan War is played out for the benefit of their amusement, observed by a 20th century Aeneid scholar who decides to rebel) and am about 100 pages from the end of Days of Summer (which reads like a companion piece to Stephen King's It and is absolutely gripping). He's well worth checking out.

[Sugar Ape]

Yeah, Carrion Comfort is a horror masterpiece. I seriously recommend you read it

 

He also wrote a trilogy of hard boiled detective fiction; Hardcase, Hard Freeze and Hard As Nails. They are very good, deffo worth a look if you're into that kind of thing.

[Paul]

Reading L.A. Requiem now. You read the flashback with Krantz Paul? Ace scene.

 

Finished that one. I'm on the one about Elvis' dad now. Remind me about the Krantz scene - I can't remember who Krantz is.

[Sugar Ape]

Shits-his-pants Krantz. The scene where Pike shoves him against the wall and whispers something in his ear. I'm thinking of having a break after this one and reading something else next.

[Sut]

Yeah, Carrion Comfort is a horror masterpiece. I seriously recommend you read it

 

He also wrote a trilogy of hard boiled detective fiction; Hardcase, Hard Freeze and Hard As Nails. They are very good, deffo worth a look if you're into that kind of thing.

Carrion Comfort and The Terror are both on my bookshelf. I'll be having a go at CC next, I think.

[SpeedyG]

Has anyone read anything by Dan Simmons?

 

I've read Song of Kali (harrowing account of Kali worship, reanimated corpses and mad cultists) and Ilium (robots from Jupiter investigate temporal buggerings up perpetrated by Greek Gods on Mars while the Trojan War is played out for the benefit of their amusement, observed by a 20th century Aeneid scholar who decides to rebel) and am about 100 pages from the end of Days of Summer (which reads like a companion piece to Stephen King's It and is absolutely gripping). He's well worth checking out.

I'll give that a go.  Sounds very Gene Wolfe and Book of the New Sun.

[General Dryness]

Carrion Comfort and The Terror are both on my bookshelf. I'll be having a go at CC next, I think.

 

I've read The Terror, really enjoyed it but got a little bit long winded towards the end I thought. I would definately recommend it though. Also bought Carrion Comfort on the strength of how much I enjoyed The Terror, but haven't got around to starting that one yet.

[General Dryness]

Double post.

 

[Sut]

I've read The Terror, really enjoyed it but got a little bit long winded towards the end I thought. I would definately recommend it though. Also bought Carrion Comfort on the strength of how much I enjoyed The Terror, but haven't got around to starting that one yet.

 

I picked up Summer of Night for about 99p on ebay. I can't believe it's out of print over here and recommend it highly. I'm slowing down reading it as I don't want it to end.

[mattyq]

Has anyone read anything by Dan Simmons?

 

I've read Song of Kali (harrowing account of Kali worship, reanimated corpses and mad cultists) and Ilium (robots from Jupiter investigate temporal buggerings up perpetrated by Greek Gods on Mars while the Trojan War is played out for the benefit of their amusement, observed by a 20th century Aeneid scholar who decides to rebel) and am about 100 pages from the end of Days of Summer (which reads like a companion piece to Stephen King's It and is absolutely gripping). He's well worth checking out.

 

His Hyperion Cantos are the best Sci-Fi i've ever read and up there with the the best of any genre...brilliant stuff

Went off him a bit when somebody told me's he's a bit of a racist...not quite sure how true this is

[Sut]

Just looked up the racism stuff. He apparently held forth with his rather right wing views in Flashback.

[Paulie Dangerously]

Been a bit North Korea mad lately and just finished a brilliant memoir by a bloke caller Charles Robert Jenkins 'the reluctant communist' In a nutshell he was posted to the Korean border in the 60s got depressed and crossed into the north where he stayed for 40 years.

 

I liked that it wasn't one of these 'Misery Porn' books like Escape from camp 14 or aquariums of Pyongyang (the latter I gave up reading but will complete) it's about a normal guy who dropped a bollock and suffeed his consequences.

 

Really fascinating look into the world of NK and seems to track from when the country was relatively efficient, albeit backwards, nation to it falling to its knees under famine, isolation and internal corruption

[AngryOfTuebrook]

Just read The Alchemist by Paolo Coelho.  God knows why.  Utter fucking garbage, from start to finish.  Hackneyed, poorly-written and pretentious, it's self-consciously straining to be profound, but it is too weighed down by its own all-consuming shitness to ever rise above the level of a cartoon off one of the TV evangelist channels.  Did I mention it's shite?  Seriously, the main character (who is introduced in the opening sentence - "The boy's name was Santiago" but is then referred to as "the boy" for the rest of the book) learns to "listen to his heart".  That's how trite it is.  The Alchemist says to him "listen to your heart" and so he starts having dialogues with his heart.  He also has dialogues with "the soul of the world".  And with the desert.  And the wind.  

 

Oh yeah, he's on a quest to find his "treasure".  And guess what - it was in his home town all along.

 

Awful.

 

Imagine someone with no charm, wit, imagination or talent with language trying to re-work The Little Prince, with a more overtly Christian message and four times as long.  Well, you're not even close to how bad this steaming heap is.

 

Never, ever read this book.

 

FA²/10

[mattyq]

Just re-read American Gods by Neil Gaiman.

One of my favourite books, i think, thoroughly recomended

[Paulie Dangerously]

Read Wool after seeing it on here and now 2/3 through Shift. Some fucking good sci-fi this v

[El Rojo]

Just read The Alchemist by Paolo Coelho.  God knows why.  Utter fucking garbage, from start to finish.  Hackneyed, poorly-written and pretentious, it's self-consciously straining to be profound, but it is too weighed down by its own all-consuming shitness to ever rise above the level of a cartoon off one of the TV evangelist channels.  Did I mention it's shite?  Seriously, the main character (who is introduced in the opening sentence - "The boy's name was Santiago" but is then referred to as "the boy" for the rest of the book) learns to "listen to his heart".  That's how trite it is.  The Alchemist says to him "listen to your heart" and so he starts having dialogues with his heart.  He also has dialogues with "the soul of the world".  And with the desert.  And the wind.  

 

Oh yeah, he's on a quest to find his "treasure".  And guess what - it was in his home town all along.

 

Awful.

 

Imagine someone with no charm, wit, imagination or talent with language trying to re-work The Little Prince, with a more overtly Christian message and four times as long.  Well, you're not even close to how bad this steaming heap is.

 

Never, ever read this book.

 

FA²/10

 

Some recent reviews of The Alchemist:

 

'Charm, wit, imagination...' - Angry of Tuebrook

[Ian Sea]

Read Wool after seeing it on here and now 2/3 through Shift. Some fucking good sci-fi this v

Got Shift there myself, looking forward to it. Currently reading 1984 for the first time; absolutely brilliant.

[mars]

The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch - best fantasy book I have read for a long while; any novel with a gang called the Gentlemen Bastards has to be good.

 

Many thanks for the Elvis Cole recommendation. I have read the lot and a few of the related novels and thoroughly enjoyed them.

[Paul]

The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch - best fantasy book I have read for a long while; any novel with a gang called the Gentlemen Bastards has to be good.

 

Many thanks for the Elvis Cole recommendation. I have read the lot and a few of the related novels and thoroughly enjoyed them.

I recently finished Republic of Thieves, the third Gentleman Bastards novel. It was boss. I'm now reading the sample of Wool on my Kindle.

[Sugar Ape]

I'm working my way through the Nightside books by Simon R.Green. Concept is there is a secret city within London called the Nightside - as it is permanently 3AM - a bit like Neverwhere by Gaiman. Gods, monsters, advanced technology and plain old humans abound there.

 

He maybe tries a bit too hard to make the books funny but there are some good ideas knocking about and the second one about the search for the Unholy grail whilst angels from above and below lay waste to the Nightside was very good. You can get through one in a day or two so I'm flying through them.

[sh#t waffle]

Enjoyed Straight White Male by John Niven recently. VERY Martin Amis (back when he was good).

[Stu Monty]

Polished off Chris Mullins' diary (MP from Sunderland) from the end days of New Labour. Quite an interesting read with, often, a different perspective on a lot of the stuff that went on at the time.

[Rotpeter]

Some recent reviews of The Alchemist:

 

'Charm, wit, imagination...' - Angry of Tuebrook

Click here for more reviews by Angry Of Tuebrook

 

Animal Farm.

'The pigs talk for fucks sake.'

 

The Castle.

'Some dumb fuck, pretentiously called only K, walks around forever trying to get in a castle. Pointless.'

 

Lolita.

'An old guy, (Humbert Humbert, oh pur-lease), tries a bit of the old Ian Watkins on some sweeter than sugar kid.'