Books - What are you reading?

Hammo Re-reading
and Franz Kafka, The Metamorphosis

his other novels are much better, I like the one about the Banker Herr K (cant remember the title) and America.

Meant to add Ian Sinclair,
Lights out for the territories, Downriver and London orbital, not really fiction and difficult to get into but if you have any interest in London, you might enjoy them.

Also looking to whip through Aldous Huxley, Don DeLillo and some Stoppard plays in the coming months.

(And i will finish the Bell Jar, if i can just keep the rope from my neck and the pill bottles away for five minutes.)

chris crash [quote]Hammo Re-reading
and Franz Kafka, The Metamorphosis

his other novels are much better, I like the one about the Banker Herr K (cant remember the title) and America.[/quote]

It feels like i'm re-reading all my art-school books at the moment, i'll check out his others as i can't remember what i've read and what i haven't. Found myself in the kitchen the other night with a copy of a Susan Sontag text. That was pure college. Ah.......Ray's jazz, a coffee and a book.

What happened?

tomasito Fav new book of 2007: The Little Girl and the Cigarette by Benoit Duteurtre - I seriously recommend this guys, damn fine novel. Rips the heart out of everything we hate in contemporary society, and makes you laugh.

All time fav authors: Hemingway, early Auster, early McEwan, Vonnegut, Robertson Davies, Philp K Dick, David Foster Wallace, Siri Hustvedt, McSweeney's.

Thanks for the recommendation. As a fellow 'Dickhead', I'm happy to act on it - despite the use of the word 'guys' which I can't tolerate whether it's used genre-specifically or otherwise. But I'm allowed my idiosyncracies, I hope.

I'm currently in charge of the fiction section at City & Islington 6th Form College's library, so I'll order one and get it on the shelves (after being the virgin borrower).

reading London: The Biography: Peter Ackroyd. good read but then i like history n stufff like...

BringMeMyFix: ... so I'll order one and get it on the shelves (after being the virgin borrower).

Ahh, books, yes virgin books.......

tomasito [quote]Hammo Re-reading
Michel Houellebecq, Atomised

Man that book is a load of pretentious wank. [/quote]
Pretentious? Maybe. Wank? No way, damn good book, damn good writer,

andyp [quote]fakenger35 Just finished "Wildwood: a journey through trees" by Roger Deakin. Part travel book, part study of trees. A lot of folk history, natural history, sociology and environmentalism. All about trees obviously. Really good read.

Have you read his previous book, "Waterlog"? If not, then I'd recommend it.[/quote]

Haven't read Waterlog, but will add it to my list. Thanks! Roger Deakin died last year; I'm going to dig out everything he's written.

rg37 reading London: The Biography: Peter Ackroyd. good read but then i like history n stufff like...

Probably the most interesting book I've ever read. Enjoy!

Fred Vargas - Have Mercy On Us All.
Great noir crimmy based in Paris.

bigben [quote]tomasito [quote]Hammo Re-reading
Michel Houellebecq, Atomised

Man that book is a load of pretentious wank. [/quote]
Pretentious? Maybe. Wank? No way, damn good book, damn good writer,[/quote]

Wank maybe, (lowering the tone) i sure did...!

Ah, rgere

Hammo [quote]bigben [quote]tomasito [quote]Hammo Re-reading
Michel Houellebecq, Atomised

Man that book is a load of pretentious wank. [/quote]
Pretentious? Maybe. Wank? No way, damn good book, damn good writer,[/quote]
Wank maybe, (lowering the tone) i sure did...![/quote]
Very mild lowering the tone. I tried to youtube the old not the nine o'clock sketch about bad titnipplebumfuck language creeping into arse conversation without our spank being aware buttock of it.

:)

Just finished (for the umpteenth time) The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler, and about to start William Gibson's Pattern Recognition, as I seem to be on a bit of a pulp theme right now.

Just to add a couple of bits to some comments above, The Kafka novel with K was The Trial and if you like Roger Deakin you could try Robert Macfarlane who dedicated his last book The Wild Places to him. He also wrote Mountains of the Mind which was bloody good from memory.

cheers i thought it might be something like the court but knew it wasn't the court

any other sherlock holmes fans?

repeatclicks
Oh and anything by Haruki Murakami (Norweigan Wood is a great start).

Second that, reading After Dark at the moment. Norwegian wood is one of the best but my favourites are Hard Boiled Wonderland, Wind Up Bird Chronicle and Wild Sheep Chase (I really wish they'd translate the whole of the trilogy of the rat...) Oh and Kafka on the shore.

J. G. Ballard - high rise

Terry Pratchett! The discworld series is excellent, and it's so sad he's been diagnosed with alzheimers...

Re-reading
Michel Houellebecq, Atomised

Definitely not a load of wank. I can see why people may find t pretentious though. A very enjoyable read. Although he does try too hard to be like Camus.

The Outsider, now that is a great book

I was infuriated by the outsider, gave up after he was sent to jail. However this was more down to the fact that the copy of the book I had was disintegrating and to 'find my page' I had to rifle through a box of the ones that had fallen out.

Tiny Deaths by Robert Shearman

rg37 reading London: The Biography: Peter Ackroyd. good read but then i like history n stufff like...

Peter Ackroyd tried to suck me off in a taxi, but that's another story...

fakenger35 [quote]rg37 reading London: The Biography: Peter Ackroyd. good read but then i like history n stufff like...

Probably the most interesting book I've ever read. Enjoy![/quote]

cheers fakenger im really enjoying it but its big bugger to lug about...i keep wanting to cross reference everything with the map to find the streets.

BringMeMyFix I'm currently in charge of the fiction section at City & Islington 6th Form College's library, so I'll order one and get it on the shelves (after being the virgin borrower).

excellent! let me know how you get on.

tomasito [quote]rg37 reading London: The Biography: Peter Ackroyd. good read but then i like history n stufff like...

Peter Ackroyd tried to suck me off in a taxi, but that's another story...[/quote]

eh!

mikec [quote]Re-reading
Michel Houellebecq, Atomised

Definitely not a load of wank.[/quote]
agreed, I'm a fan. His other books too.
On the shelf now are:
not be genes alone, Boyd and Richerson
Bicycling science, 2ne Ed. Whitt and Wilson.
finished On Chesil Beach lately, probably not worth the bother.
think il have to track "Wildwood: a journey through trees" down now too...

The Universe: A Biography - John Gribbin
In Search of Schrodingers Cat - John Gibbon
Rashomon & Other stories - Ryunosuke Akutagawa
The End Of Mr Y - Scarlett Thomas
And finally...
Number9Dream - David Mitchell