FROM THE GUT

nyarlathotep · Joined: 18 Jan 2007 Posts: 648

i'm on bed rest for a while, and there's an awesome library around the corner from my house, plus two bookstores within 15 minutes. give me suggestions of something to read since i'm off work for the next two weeks and stuck in bed. the internet bores me.

last thing i read was the secret agent by joseph conrad, and it sucked.

statas · Joined: 14 Jun 2007 Posts: 216

house of leaves
spook country
anything by haruki murakami- especially wind up bird chronicles

vasculator · Joined: 17 May 2007 Posts: 312

funny...i'm about 3/4 of the way thru the Wind Up Bird Chronicle right now actually. it is fantastic.

divineaudio · Posted: Fri Dec 21, 2007 7:40 pm Post subject:

the last two books i read were "zen in the art of archery" by eugen herrigel and "under a cruel star" by heda margolius kovaly.

eastern philosophy and a personal account of living under communism in poland in the 40's/50's. neither are my usual fare but they were both really good.

tacopunch · Joined: 10 Jul 2007 Posts: 242

Oh schizer. Working at a book store I've knocked back (non-economic text wise)

33.3 series books on Pauls Botique, Loveless and Daydream Nation. All were fun and took me back to high school.

Crooked Little Vein by Warren Ellis. It's a hilarious romp through America's subcultures all in the name of a fun detective story. Not mind bending but an extremely enjoyable and quick book.

Spook Country + Pattern Recognition by William Gibson. Both are wonderfully stripped down, thoughtful, near future speculative fiction. If I was to pick one I'd go for Pattern Recognition being Gibson's best IMHO but Spook Country is more "fun".

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski. It's my 10th or so reading through it and I keep on finding new parts I love.

nyarlathotep · Joined: 18 Jan 2007 Posts: 648

thanks for the suggestions guys. being stuck in bed was a lot more tolerable with some good reads.

ive had house of leaves on my list for YEARS, but never managed to finish it because of time or what have you. i started it again though. hopefully i finish it this time, though every time i reread the first half, i find new stuff that i didn't pick up on before, like was mentioned by someone else. it's a very interesting book.

some one also suggested the illuminatus trilogy, but that whole illuminati thing doesn't really interest me anymore these days.

comic books....any good graphic novel suggestions on that tip, because after some heavy reading i totally wanna look at some awesome pictures. ive read through the first volume of akira like twenty times, and i have some graphic novels on the computer that ive downloaded, but ive read them all.

tacopunch · Joined: 10 Jul 2007 Posts: 242

Comic Book / Graphic Novel Stuff:

Shade the Changing Man. This might be hard to find but it's Peter Milligan exploring american culture through voice who can bend reality. Every time over the 70 issue run the book becomes predicitable Milligan reinvents the rules and throws some of the best visual plot twists ever.

Enigma. This is a quick 7 issue/1 trade early vertigo book by Milligan. Early ideas of how to use a untruthful narrator that he used later in Shade in an even weirder story. Grant Morrision writes in the intro that this is one of the most out there books he's ever read.

The Filth by Grant Morrison. 13 issue/1 trade maxiseries about the status quo, preceptions of reality, and rebelion in a heavy psychadelic mixer. This is grade A awesome.

Desolation Jones by Warren Ellis and JHWilliamsIII. Used up "retired" intelligence agents are trapped in LA to "retire". This follows Jones as he investigates where the false humanity of LA intersects with intelligence community. One of my fav graphic novels ever.

as far as superhero stuff I like Powers by Bendis and Omeng (noir story following police officers who investigate superpower related crimes), Grant Morrison's New X Men run and Nextwave By Warren Ellis and Immolen (Nextwave is hyper ADD post-chiptunes kick splode comics)

You can find previews of most of these over at http://community.livejournal.com/scans_daily/

charlie · Joined: 05 Nov 2006 Posts: 355 Location: DETROIT

nyarlathotep · Joined: 18 Jan 2007 Posts: 648

ive read through part of it, and it was interesting only in how it was written. the actual content bored me.

charlie · Joined: 05 Nov 2006 Posts: 355 Location: DETROIT

statas · Joined: 14 Jun 2007 Posts: 216

i also found the illuminatus trilogy quite boring. very self-fellatio. very much absorbed in itself.

syphilissauna · Joined: 27 Mar 2007 Posts: 398 Location: Pittsburgh

speaking of self-fellatio pretty much anything by Henry Miller is gold in my opinion ..
also :
The Secret Life of Plants
Botany of Desire

both of those ones are about more recent studies that prove that plants are much much more sentient than were generally apt to believe

The original Pinocchio (really really good ..he kills jimeny cricket in the second chapter)

High Rise by JG Ballard
Crash by Ballard

On Alturism by Ayn Rand is really good as far as the concept she puts forth .. which is one i ultimately agree with

{{{[[[0-]]}][3[]][]]}] · Posted: Wed Jan 02, 2008 5:41 am Post subject:

Thucydides- History of the Peloponnesian War

charlie · Joined: 05 Nov 2006 Posts: 355 Location: DETROIT

RichDickNaugga · Joined: 08 Jan 2008 Posts: 5

I'm on a Henry Rollins kick lately. Been reading anything i can find by him. Its all fueled by hatred. Right now I'm on Black Coffee Blues.