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Very short recommendations thread

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All Acting Regiment

09:20 / 18.09.06

So this thread works like this. I say:

"So, Book X, is it worth reading?"

And you can say:

"No, reactionary balls" or "Yes, lovely".

So to start: Rabbit Run, by John Updike.

Continue.

Dull.

Stephen King's The Dead Zone

Whisky Priestess

12:27 / 18.09.06

Like the film. Haven't read it but all the King I have read is shit, so:

Watch the film instead.

pointless & uncalled for

12:46 / 18.09.06

Jeff Noon - Vurt

pointless & uncalled for

12:53 / 18.09.06

By which I actually meant The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini.

I know Vurt is good and was my first thought when reading the abstract rather than the post. There was this annoying delay in getting a coherent signal to my fingers and all went down hill from there.

So

Kite Runner

Subway fiction du jour or inspired genius?

Orange

18:40 / 18.09.06

Kite Runner

I liked it.

StarWhisper

18:46 / 18.09.06

Steven King. Not good

StarWhisper

18:47 / 18.09.06

The Fountainhead?

Orange

18:59 / 18.09.06

Gleeush. Certainly not for pleasure, although it's interesting enough to keep reading, I suppose.

8===>Q: alyn

20:16 / 18.09.06

Stephen King is often good, you nids. The Dead Zone is good. Pet Sematery is good. Dolores Claiborne is good.

Tsuga

20:31 / 18.09.06

Ayn Rand is a freak, sorry. Or, rather, a total monkey-style hierarchist freak. Again, sorry.

How about "The Abortion" by Richard Brautigan.

Tsuga

20:34 / 18.09.06

I hasten to add, though, Ayn Rand is not a bad writer.

All Acting Regiment

11:57 / 19.09.06

Which Burroughs to read after I've finished Naked Lunch and Soft Machine?

Regrettable Juvenilia

12:06 / 19.09.06

Cities Of The Red Night: detective noir, pirates, identity shifts, drugs, weapons, disease, virus control, hangings and gay porn. It's like The Illuminatus! Trilogy for people who are cool.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

12:14 / 19.09.06

Yes, Red Night is your best move.

All Acting Regiment

13:04 / 19.09.06

Ah shit, sorry, forgot to say I've got that one...so, apart form that one then.

GogMickGog

13:55 / 19.09.06

Would it be too obvious to say "Junky"? Less of the cut-up excesses found in "Nova Express" and oddly touching, for my money.

So, Jung: Where to start?

StarWhisper

15:59 / 19.09.06

Richard Brautigan is good. The Hawkline Monster is arguably his best. I do not endorse Ayn Rand.

sorenson

04:26 / 20.09.06

Apart from anything else, Ayn Rand is insufferably boring. Don't bother.

JOY NO WRY

16:55 / 20.09.06

Apart from anything else, Ayn Rand is insufferably boring.

This is far from true. Personal opinions on her philosophy aside, she's worth reading both for the quality of her thought and her writing.

sorenson

20:54 / 20.09.06

Ah well, I guess it's a matter of personal opinion then. I didn't find her writing to be anything special at all, and I was so bored and irritated by the characters and storyline in Atlas Shrugged that I really struggled to finish it.

Shrug

09:44 / 21.09.06

House of Leaves, the print is fun, words in ever decreasing circles, dotted, jabbed around the page, etc. A po-faced Poe-esque horror story.

GogMickGog

10:06 / 21.09.06

Um, I repeat...Jung?

ghadis

10:45 / 21.09.06

Jung - His autobiography, 'Memories, Dreams, Reflections'. A good starting point i feel.

Modern Arabic literature?

Any suggestions apart from Naguib Mahfouz who i've already read.

All Acting Regiment

13:43 / 21.09.06

Hmm. I suggest people read M/F by Anthony Burgess. It's good.

All Acting Regiment

13:44 / 21.09.06

Urm, not Arabic, mind. Just generally.

The Piano Teacher?

Not bad. Defo worth a punt.

All Acting Regiment

11:43 / 07.10.06

Maldoror?

ghadis

11:55 / 07.10.06

Beautifully sexy.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

13:05 / 07.10.06

Maldoror rocks.

ORA ORA ORA ORAAAA!!

10:00 / 08.10.06

With Burgess, I'd say Earthly Powers. Tremendous book, in more than one way (weighs about a kilo, for example).

Burroughs: If you can get your hands on Burroughs live : the collected interviews of William S. Burroughs, 1960-1997 / [edited by Sylvère Lotringer], do so. It's not his writings, exactly, but it is him as a human, which is interesting.

Jawsus-son Starship

16:46 / 08.10.06

What do people think of Tobias Wolff's Old School?

Alex's Grandma

18:02 / 08.10.06

LR,

'Exterminator' would be your best bet, I think.

The collected Letters (for the most part written to Allen Ginsberg, and just before 'Naked Lunch' got off the ground, when on a number of levels Burroughs was in a fairly bad way,) are excellent also.

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