dinozoa
SENATOR BABYHEAD  Posts: 319 Registered: 7/18/2004 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 02:24 |
Has anybody read any modern fiction published within the last five years, 2003-2007 (or even 2008)? I know we already have a book thread, and my response to the book thread is- I'm never gonna read all the classics, but maybe I can KEEP MY HEAD ABOVE WATER (and you can too) if we all share what we know about modern fiction.
The motivation: I want to tell people "yes, I read X, blah blah blah" or "no, I didn't read X, but I read a reasonably insightful review of X at Linkswarm.com, home of the 2008 Post-Facto Literary Discussion."
And it's five years for me because 2003 is really when I Should Have started reading modern fiction but I Didn't and I've been Struggling To Catch Up ever since. If you want to go further back in time, feel free to do so, but consider if your post might be better off in the other book thread.
The rules: I want it to be like the other book thread, where most people just posted lists of books with only the briefest annotations ("You read X too? Fuck yeah!") If I want to know more, I can ask in the thread, or compose a Private Message.
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dinozoa
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 319 Registered: 7/18/2004 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 02:29 |
Ooh ooh me first call on me!
I have read:
Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami, 2002 (but the English translation didn't show up until 2004, I believe)
Consider the Lobster by David Foster Wallace, 2005
What is the What by David Eggers, 2006
and I think that's it. Only one of those is really fiction, so I feel inadequate and in need of a helping hand. If I think of anything else, or if I read anything else, I'll be sure to post it ASAP.
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ragoo
We are not amused.   SSHOLEPosts: 650 Registered: 9/4/2004 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 03:49 |
The last fiction I read was The Da Vinci Code, because I wanted to see wtf everyone was yammering about. Of course I was thoroughly unimpressed by it. No, it was worse than that. I actively disliked that book, because it sucked so bad. The writing was unartful, the characters thinner than the paper they were written on, the historical connections so preposterous as to be LOLable. Yet it was all packaged with an almost solemn air of authenticity. Blecchh.
It's a case study in why I prefer non-fiction.
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dent
Slipping it into the wrong hole any chance I get  SSHOLEPosts: 831 Registered: 10/20/2004 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 04:16 |
Oddly, I absolutely loved The Da Vinci Code. I thought it was filled to the brim with mystery, and it was intelligently plotted. If you read the book and complained about it's authenticity, then you may have missed the point entirely.
I've read most of the HP series, I'm in the midst of book 4. I can't even describe how fun these books are.
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ragoo
We are not amused. SSHOLEPosts: 650 Registered: 9/4/2004 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 05:37 |
dent: ...you may have missed the point entirely.
Perhaps. I dunnolol, but I respect the fact that you and lotsa other folks liked it. It's just not my thing, I suppose.
That being said, however...SWORDHANDS!
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Interjections show excitement or emotion. They're generally set apart from a sentence by an exclamation point, or by a comma when the feeling's not as strong. |
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ghostrider
liberal exit  SSHOLEPosts: 2411 Registered: 7/29/2004 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 13:13 |
It's not fiction, But I recently read The Nasty Bits by Anthony Bourdain. I highly recommend it to anyone, as this guy rocks 100%.
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i feed my dog (Magic Man) Kraft Singles cheese slices for a week.one slice over each of his food dishes a day. then i take him backyard and place a cheese slice over his shit piles.he consumes the cheese and waste. ~tantrum |
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vasudeva
Bad Taste in your Mouth  SSHOLEPosts: 4398 Registered: 3/8/2002 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 16:20 |
dinozoa: Consider the Lobster by David Foster Wallace, 2005
Thanks, I didn't know this existed. Good?
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freakmachine
Web Fucko Extraordinaire  SSHOLEPosts: 588 Registered: 4/15/2004 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 18:07 |
Dance, Dance, Dance by Haruki Murakami
Liked it.
That's about it for anything you might call literary fiction, which doesn't include DaVinci Code or HP, both of which I also liked.
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BigDinWaunakee
SENATOR BABYHEAD  Posts: 103 Registered: 1/24/2007 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 18:50 |
Cormac McCarthy's The Road and No Country for Old Men
Many graphic novels, if you are into those, I'll expound
and not fiction, but still interesting...
Houellebecq's
H. P. Lovecraft: Against the World, Against Life
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acheron
Cynical_Malcontent  SSHOLEPosts: 555 Registered: 4/29/2004 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 19:59 |
Saturday-Ian McEwan, liked it a lot even though I'm not a big novel fan
Kite Runner-Khalid whatever, it was good.
Harry Potter-I'm on book 5, you can tear through these and they are so enjoyable.
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mundhra
dread pirate neckbeard  SSHOLEPosts: 1618 Registered: 3/25/2002 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 20:57 |
i don't read much newer stuff, cause there are so many good older books. i hardly buy anything when it first comes out.
i asked for books from 1949 and 1960 for christmas (earth abides and a canticle for leibowitz).
anyway, the only recent books i've read:
BigDinWaunakee: Cormac McCarthy's The Road
i enjoyed gibson's pattern recognition and world war z as well.
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But the whole of modern so-called civilized existence is an attempt to deny reality insofar as it exists. When did Don last look at the stars, when did Norman last get soaked in a rainstorm? |
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dinozoa
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 319 Registered: 7/18/2004 Offline
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1/12/2008 at 22:15 |
Consider the Lobster is a collection of essays. Some highlights include the title essay, published in Gourmet magazine and an increasingly pertinent acct of John McCain's run for the GOP presidential nomination in 2000, published in Rolling Stone.
Check it out from your library. Chances are you're not going to be interested in all the essays in the collection.
I am curious about Ian McEwan. His name is thrown around a lot (isn't there a movie coming out based on one of his books?). What's his writing style like? What stuff does he write about? Would I like his books? Ian McEwan is perfectly representative of the type of modern English language author who I feel I Should know about but I Don't.
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freakmachine
Web Fucko Extraordinaire SSHOLEPosts: 588 Registered: 4/15/2004 Offline
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1/13/2008 at 03:41 |
I read On The Road by Jack Kerouac a while back, that might count as recent. Recommended.
And, Lolita by Nabokov, also almost recent. Recommended too.
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vasudeva
Bad Taste in your Mouth SSHOLEPosts: 4398 Registered: 3/8/2002 Offline
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1/13/2008 at 04:18 |
dinozoa: Consider the Lobster is a collection of essays. Some highlights include the title essay, published in Gourmet magazine and an increasingly pertinent acct of John McCain's run for the GOP presidential nomination in 2000, published in Rolling Stone.
Sweet. I loved 'A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again' and might have even read it at some point within the last couple years. The bit on the cruise Ship, and on David Lynch's filming, are tits, as is basically everything else in it, even the tennis.
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mundhra: And its crocobody is made of dile. |
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Dumbskull
I'm assuming the position!  SSHOLEPosts: 1894 Registered: 4/22/2004 Offline
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1/13/2008 at 20:38 |
Checkpoint by Nicholson Baker. It is a short book big on LOL's.
I did wade through The Da Vinci Code crap. Did anyone else notice the main characters were too busy to eat or pee?
I am currently chewing through Rant: An Oral Biography of Buster Casey by Chuck Palahniuk. His Survivor was also a great read.
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middle_age_man
Mostly Harmless  SSHOLEPosts: 427 Registered: 1/11/2005 Offline
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1/13/2008 at 21:22 |
I read the Southern Victory series by Harry Turtledove. It starts out with the United States losing the Civil War, suing for peace and recognizing the Confederacy. There are later wars over Confederate territorial expansion and the first and second world wars are fought in North America as well. Good reading for war buffs.
On 2008-01-13 at 15:23:23, middle_age_man asked to smell your dick
On 2008-01-13 at 15:25:52, middle_age_man asked to smell your dick
On 2008-01-13 at 15:31:23, middle_age_man asked to smell your dick
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dinozoa
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 319 Registered: 7/18/2004 Offline
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1/16/2008 at 00:17 |
I just finished Against the Day, by Thomas Pynchon.
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vasudeva
Bad Taste in your Mouth SSHOLEPosts: 4398 Registered: 3/8/2002 Offline
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1/16/2008 at 00:20 |
dinozoa: I just finished Against the Day, by Thomas Pynchon.
Thoughts? He and DFW supposedly go together like peas and carrots. I tried reading his Mason & Dixon book and wanted to stab my face off.
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mundhra: And its crocobody is made of dile. |
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dinozoa
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 319 Registered: 7/18/2004 Offline
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1/18/2008 at 20:20 |
Peas and Carrots.
The similarities between David Foster Wallace and Thomas Pynchon, as far as I am aware start and end with they both write long books. Oh, and they both write in English, and are American, but really.
Of DFW's fiction, I've only read Infinite Jest and two or three short stories. I admire his elaborate paragraph structure, his excellent vocabulary, the way he works you into his syntax idiosyncrasies, so reading his work is more pleasure than effort. He builds a context of language in his essays, kind of like Hunter Thompson did with relentless references to the Raoul Duke persona, the 'fear and loathing/decadent and depraved' vocabulary, etc. DFW is, in my eyes, a modern, looking ahead type of writer.
Thomas Pynchon, as far as I can tell, is looking backwards, squarely at Dickens, Hawthorne, Milton even. Long, hard to read sentences written in an anachronistic syntax and vocabulary. He is so good at evoking, in Mason & Dixon, for example, the 18th century culture, not as they saw it, but as we see it looking back. Same thing for Against the Day and the late 19th, early 20th century.
Son & Xon was confusing. I liked it, but it was more work than play. Against the Day is maybe the best book I've ever read. I can't recommend it more thoroughly. Read the first five pages at a book store.
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