What are you reading?

Burque

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you put this guy with carrie brownstein and fred armisen, portlandia would've won an emmy. I am liberal and love the PNW but don't think I could live in Portland.

Sorry to have gone on a tangent. I OD'ed on literature in grad school trying and realizing it was a fool's errand trying to get even an associate professorship in the States after spending all the money and time on a Ph.D, so I only read non-fiction out of spite these days, and am a fan of military history for some reason. I adore this military historian mostly for his editorializations like 'Kesselring could be considered to be a hemorrhoid on the backside of civilization' and his new book just came out:


I have enjoyed a few books about the code talkers and the south pacific. Mainly just stuff people pointed me towards, I like the way voices of the pacific read simply because it was a lot of memories from the guys actually there lined up into a cohesive story.
 

Burque

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His book 'Choke' is one of my favorite books ever and where I got my screenname.
I think that Choke was my favorite as well, followed by invisible monsters. Fight club was great but I read it after seeing the movie and it was basically just the movie with a few additional scenes.
 

Penny Traitor

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Fight club was great but I read it after seeing the movie and it was basically just the movie with a few additional scenes.

The above mentioned potato farmer insisted I had to check out the book first and it may be the very rare instance of me liking the movie better.

The first meeting of Tyler Durden in the book is some weird homoerotic dream like scene where Tyler is sitting naked on a beach. It immediately makes you question his very existence, where the movie hides that secret far better and their meeting on the airplane is brilliant.

OTOH, I did not like the movie adaptation of 'Choke' as much as I wanted to. It felt like everything they should have cut got left in and everything they should have left in got cut....if that makes any sense.
 

Burque

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The above mentioned potato farmer insisted I had to check out the book first and it may be the very rare instance of me liking the movie better.

The first meeting of Tyler Durden in the book is some weird homoerotic dream like scene where Tyler is sitting naked on a beach. It immediately makes you question his very existence, where the movie hides that secret far better and their meeting on the airplane is brilliant.

OTOH, I did not like the movie adaptation of 'Choke' as much as I wanted to. It felt like everything they should have cut got left in and everything they should have left in got cut....if that makes any sense.
I was super excited for choke the movie, but was disappointed when it came out. I've watched it again since a couple of times (it was on a cycle of television for a month or so) and it wasn't as bad the second time around, still did not live up to the book at all.
 

dogzop

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I’m currently about 200 pages into Game of Thrones. I’ve been about 200 pages into it since February. I put it down and never picked it back up because I got busy with other things. I plan on getting back to it this summer. tomzpot mobdro
 

remydat

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Cradle continues to be a good read. Just finished Book 10 Reaper.


Also finished 2 books by Kristoff. Empire of the Vampire which is his new series and Aurora's end which is the conclusion of his collaboration with Amie Kaufman.
 

Anytime45

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The Score of a Lifetime - Terry Boers
 

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After a long hiatus from reading, I decided to try and read 100 books this year. Shooting for a mixture of stuff I typically read, along with re-reading some "classics" that I haven't read in 20+ years, along with some non-fiction mixed in. A little over a week into the New Year and I've already knocked out 5, so on a decent pace.
 

pseudonym

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FINALcover_PW.jpeg

My new short story collection, SPONTANEOUS HUMAN COMBUSTION, is out on 2/22/22. It's getting great reviews, including starred reviews at Publishers Weekly and Library Journal. If you like dark fantasy, SF, and horror stories, pick up your copy today. Chuck Palahniuk, of Fight Club fame, gave it a nice blurb (see the cover).



 

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The last great book I read was The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones. Horror. Loved it.
 

Omeletpants

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After a long hiatus from reading, I decided to try and read 100 books this year. Shooting for a mixture of stuff I typically read, along with re-reading some "classics" that I haven't read in 20+ years, along with some non-fiction mixed in. A little over a week into the New Year and I've already knocked out 5, so on a decent pace.
You never seemed like the intellectual type to me, but here is a suggestion which towers above all of the 15 books I have read on Henry VIII.

Henry VIII by Lacey Baldwin Smith. It delves deeply into the psyche of Henry in context to the Medieval age, morals and ethics of the time
 

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I'm currently reading "Treason in Tudor England" by one of my favorite authors Lacey Baldwin Smith. He was a professor at Northwestern that wrote the preeminent treatise on Henry VIII that I ever read and I have read over 20. When he was still teaching we used to communicate occasionally and share observations on Medieval life.

I'm a Medieval history expert focusing on the period from 1399 to 1603 (Plantagenet thru Tudor dynasties), with a minor interest in the Mongol dynasties spanning from 1206 to 1353

So, if anyone has any recommendations on these, let me know

You never seemed like the intellectual type to me, but here is a suggestion which towers above all of the 15 books I have read on Henry VIII.

Henry VIII by Lacey Baldwin Smith. It delves deeply into the psyche of Henry in context to the Medieval age, morals and ethics of the time

So you've read one book your entire life that you think makes you sound "smart" and you are using that multiple times in the same thread. Truly impressive.
 

Omeletpants

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So you've read one book your entire life that you think makes you sound "smart" and you are using that multiple times in the same thread. Truly impressive.
Read the book. If you don't understand something just ask me
 

nvanprooyen

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Read the book. If you don't understand something just ask me
I'm not that interested in doing deep historical dives into the time periods you were in high school. Pass.
 

nvanprooyen

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View attachment 16697

My new short story collection, SPONTANEOUS HUMAN COMBUSTION, is out on 2/22/22. It's getting great reviews, including starred reviews at Publishers Weekly and Library Journal. If you like dark fantasy, SF, and horror stories, pick up your copy today. Chuck Palahniuk, of Fight Club fame, gave it a nice blurb (see the cover).



That's a pretty strong endorsement from Chuck. Lovecraft, Bradbury and Gaiman are pretty strong company. Have you ever read any Peter Clines?

Another question for you. What do you think the best thing you've ever written is? I've only read one of your books, so I'd like to add another to my reading list.

Edit - the only one I read was Disintegration
 
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Omeletpants

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I'm not that interested in doing deep historical dives into the time periods you were in high school. Pass.
It's a pretty complicated psychological and historical exploration that you wouldn't understand anyway. I understand your hesitancy and your pass.
 

remydat

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View attachment 16697

My new short story collection, SPONTANEOUS HUMAN COMBUSTION, is out on 2/22/22. It's getting great reviews, including starred reviews at Publishers Weekly and Library Journal. If you like dark fantasy, SF, and horror stories, pick up your copy today. Chuck Palahniuk, of Fight Club fame, gave it a nice blurb (see the cover).




Definitely a dark fantasy and Sci Fi guy so will check this out.
 

pseudonym

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That's a pretty strong endorsement from Chuck. Lovecraft, Bradbury and Gaiman are pretty strong company. Have you ever read any Peter Clines?

Another question for you. What do you think the best thing you've ever written is? I've only read one of your books, so I'd like to add another to my reading list.

Edit - the only one I read was Disintegration
Thanks. I have not read any Peter Clines. What do you suggest? Yeah, the blurb shocked me, as I've known Chuck a long time and didn't think he liked my writing. Three amazing comparisons.

The best work I've written is probably this collection and then the arctic horror, sin-eater novel I turned into my agent over the holidays. But it'll be a few years until that's out. Thank you for reading Disintegration. I hope you enjoyed it. Breaker would be the next logical choice, but they're both out of print. We're trying to work a three-book deal with Disintegration, Breaker and the new one, Incarnate, since the last two were never in print.
 

pseudonym

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Definitely a dark fantasy and Sci Fi guy so will check this out.
Awesome! I hope you dig it. The biggest story in the collection is a 15,000-word novelette that I'd call science fiction / horror. Wide range of vibes in this collection.
 

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