/lit/ - Literature

Adherence and dedication to a political philosophy does not mean one need take leave of a sense of humor, nor take oneself so seriously as an author.

With tongue firmly in cheek Smith tells the story of a first contact culture clash. The not so committedly Marxist human mining expedition discovers libertarian capitalist claim jumping aliens camping out on their asteroid.

Smith trots out every classic Science Fiction trope he can cram in, along with his usual bits of preaching libertarian refrains, with zingers aimed at the failings of modern civilization. Wouldn't be complete without some jammin firearm visualizations; he renders the gun descriptions with more care than the gorgeous female love interests bouncing around. To be fair there are more guns than women to describe, and what with the expedition suffering under the unyielding cold dead hand of the Tsiolkovsky rocket equation, where every quarter ounce of mass must be accounted and budgeted for, we are treated to the sight of each crew member busting out and strapping on a smuggled handgun at the first hint of crisis. Plus enough ammunition to do a bit of policing, though not quite enough to fight a proper war.

Oh, and cigarettes. Smuggled a ton of them, too.

For the aliens we get plenty of evolutionary paths that might have been. These claim jumpers bear tales of edgy progenitors who fought the good fight that they might gift their children hints of civilization, only to jet off into a distant long night. Somewhere, out there, the progenitors continue on in a grand crusade of hunting down Lovecraftian horrors that are their own progenitors in turn.

For the humans and the aliens both there is no time for disputing property rights, for the progenitor's progenitors have arisen again!

And if that is not enough, we have a nasty tea toting robotic trilobite with a penchant for hanging bodies on the wall, an ironclad mother of hive minded macroscopic single celled organisms here for the chat of a lifetime, and the very spirit of Americana heroically parading on to save the day at the forefront of … the yellow peril?

Oh, uh, don't forget the revealed history of the real Atlantis apocalypse. Bit of Star Trek wedged in there too.

In short, one hell of a humorously fun ride with plenty of surprises and a bit of something for almost everyone.

I'm currently going through a book an old friend gave me for my birthday. It's called Shinehawk, and from what little I've read, it's a story of sin and depravity, as well as salvation. Told through a series of flashbacks. I'll post more if I have time to finish it this weekend.

Other than that, I've been reading poetry by Rainer Maria Rilke. The Swan is my favorite.

Nolan takes us on a journalists eye view of one of the defining moments of the Vietnam war from the American marines perspective.

As I like to approach things as a fiction writer, I find this book useful. Nolan's presentation nails a dryish non-fictional chronicle style he was aiming for, but some of his battle descriptions leave a lot to be desired. They mimic errors I commonly see beginners make in trying to write battle scenes, which makes for a good comparison to fictional styles which use finer techniques. That is not a criticism of Nolan as he was not attempting a novel. I will make use of them though, as examples when I run across writing questions involving this.

Again, to be absolutely clear a fictional novel was not his goal and his writing serves well as an account of the battle. The writing does manage to capture a bit of the feel of being there. He gives a good overview of the tactics, and the kind of weapons in use. Much detailing is spent showing the confusion and friction between the different power players, and their disparate approaches to the same goal. Highlighted is the weirdness the marines experienced, needing to switch gears from their wide ranging and meandering rice paddy ambush lifestyle, to crashing into the claustrophobic Stalingrad-like confines of fighting across Hue.

A solid and educational wartime historic account.

This one. Invisible Cities by Calvino. I liked it a lot. It's a collection of short stories about cities presented as Marco Polo telling Kublai Khan about his travels. It's sort of a dream/fairytale hybrid about symbols and how we think about the world and stuff like that. Very cozy.

Glad this thread is back, its a nice staple of 8chan lit.

Like an extremely abbreviated version of Foucault's Pendulum. Enjoyable, but it left me wanting more. The conspiracy theory about Il Duce seemed pretty convincing.

A beautiful ballet of life among the caged featuring four socialite protagonists trying to sort their passionate combinatorial problème des ménages. The confines of their playground, or sprawling zoo, being New York City and the greater metropolitan area, circa nineteen forty one.

Delia, gorgeous wife married to a lifestyle planned out through to the grave, and paved in bland. Lydia, lithe dark beauty of the vagabond ballet company, always on the lookout for the main chance at freedom – from herself. Pierre, an opportunistic French artist working to launch his career while on sabbatical from the war ravaged continent. And Jonathan, something of a stand-in for the author – recently returned from Europe – and jogging a good five steps ahead of all the wartime troubles.

Jonathan as Prokosch, or Prokosch as Jonathan, on the lookout for making a career as … something. An architect? A master of those safely drafted to be comfortably stuck in stateside logistics? Mostly, as is the privilege of his class, his is a calling of plain looking.

World War Two draws out to a distant nothing as seen from these circles. The only invasions are perpetuated by those few who fled Europe to vacation among the Americans, acting merely as more exotic and self possessed chess pieces. The real battles are fought by the American elites across the fields of cocktail parties and dinner gatherings, barbing and slashing at peers in a game of pure entertainment without goal, or end.

The climax of the promenade comes from the failures of three to flee the caves, or cages, of their existence. One maneuvers into the princely, prisonly embrace of a more affable oriental gilding. A second is ripped free of attachments only to wander on in puzzled confinement to mid-level-high society. A third is convinced by a beneficent player to execute the knight's jump home; a move as correct as it is too late.

Only the fourth gains a real, final, lasting means of escape.

Prokosch makes for a good study in how to inject mood into the story through landscape, showing especially how the static city changes its presentation along with the ups and downs of the characters. His agreeable choice of chapter pacing and length make another choice for the would be novelist to attentively ponder.

I hoped this would be like Accelerando. It's not, but makes up for it by being a good thriller, complete with a explanation of who did what at the end.

The sequel, Rule 34, does try to be more dense by focusing more on AIs and their role in the setting. The result is more confusing, as it isn't clear what exactly happened or why do AIs function the way they do. Why, exactly, do they need a sense of identity? Why does self-awareness pose ethical and legal problems, but an AI's equivalent of pain does not?

The Samurai Banner of Furin Kazan is in an unusual place. Most of the books I add to this list I would recommend for most everyone, but I'm not so sure about this one. The setting is easily the strongest element, and Sengoku Japan is brought to life very well. The characters were alright and I admit I basically only picked up this book because it stars Takeda Shingen, and I've wanted more stories about him ever since watching Kagemusha. The story is ok, if fairly predictable. There were a few moments when it seemed like the narration ought to have been more 'in character,' especially during tactical blunders (where, as it stands, the narration seems to suggest that splitting an overwhelming force into two weaker forces than the enemy and putting them on either side of a river is a genius plan), but that may be the fault of the translator more than of Inoue.

The quality of the translation is the biggest strike against it. I'm not sure if it was intentional to reflect the original Japanese, or if Yoko Riley is just not a very good writer, but there were more than a few sentences and paragraphs that were tortuously laid out in English. This extends even to paragraph arrangement sometimes. There were several cases where a paragraph would talk about one thing for 3/4 of a page, then break off for a single sentence paragraph about events and chronology in other areas, then flip back for another single sentence paragraph to wrap up the thought of the original paragraph. It feels like Yoko Riley either didn't have an editor, or that her editor wasn't paying very much attention. There's no editor listed in the acknowledgements, so maybe she just didn't have one.

So overall, it's OK. Not great by any means, but it's not as though I wasn't able to finish it. If you are a big fan of Samurai/feudal Japan, and want a more political sort of historical fiction, you might check it out. Otherwise, there are probably better things to read.

The sound of the mountain by yasunari Kawabata

Book tells of an old withering man who struggles with his memory and the relationships with his family. This all takes a toll on him especially the looming fear of death that the man sees and dreams all the time, adding to it the rumbling of a nearby mountain that reminds him of death.

He finds solace in his daughter in law kikuko which he finds attractive, tender and seems like the only persons in his life that tries to understand him and console him in his old age.

As a young guy it was rather interesting albeit a tad bit perplexing to see through the eyes of an old man, it seems scary to be that age and be scared of every little physical disease or accident might bring upon one's death. The main character the old man Shingo despite his old age is easy to like and understand his fears and his heartwarming moments

I won't give away any more of the story but I really enjoyed it, the book is about ~250 pages long, pretty short but very enjoyable but an awesome read and seeing the complex relationships in his life unfold and hear his struggle with them and his fears makes for a book that inspires a good range of emotions with plenty of food for thought.

I actually finished it today. It's a pretty short read - only about 210 pages with a fairly big fontsize - about Jim Carroll's early teens, in which he played basketball, fucked around and cruised for heroin with his friends. Considering it was written when he was 12-16, the writing is pretty impressive, coming off as very natural while also being fluent and vivid. (That being said, I'm really curious to know just how much of the book was edited by Carroll before publication, because I sincerely doubt it was just spelling and grammar errors that were… corrected, for lack of a better word.) I'd recommend it to anyone who's really interested in learning about people and their individual lives, but it's not something you'll want to read if you're looking for practical information, or escapism.

I'll say the same for Johnny Cash's Man in Black, which I finished only a few days before The Basketball Diaries. Cash was a pretty good song writer, so it makes sense he had an adequate understanding of written communication, but Man in Black certainly has it's flaws, mostly with pacing and fluency. At the same time, there's kind a charm in the fact Man in Black doesn't seem to have been written by a ghost-writer, and it comes off as more natural and honest as a result. Cash also had a pretty interesting life, and there are some pretty hilarious anecdotes in here. (Well, one particularly comes to mind.) Overall, I'd recommend it for the same reason I recommend The Basketball Diaries, but only to a lesser extent. It's pretty good, but there are better books to spend your time on.

>>8593

That's up there, but I think >>8596 swayed me over to the Henriad plays since I never bothered to get into them. Thanks for the recommendations.

The title means Knights and Knights' Orders

It's a book written for the average people. I got it from the local main library's sale, it's almost as old as I am (printed in 1988) and someone used it as a learning book in the past.

Got some really interesting facts from it, like for example that the troubadour wasn't the actual singer or performer of the chasons de geste ("knight tales"), they were the authors, while the jugglers were the performers.

Enjoyed it, and now I know that there was a templar and a St. John's Order house in my city in the XII. or in the XIII. century

Covers various studies on psychopaths. Psychopaths may be either serial killers or highly functionally people, like CEOs, lawyers, special forces etc. In certain situations, they have some advantages over normal humans.

This was recommended at the back of The Empire of the Sun. Unfortunately I remembered seeing the (faithful) movie way back in the 90s almost immediately so the shock value wasn't there.

He didn't seem to quite capture the total abandonment setting Ballard could, but I really liked the parents as characters. The siblings seemed weaker and more like an excuse for musings on sexuality, but I only had one brother who was emotionally independent from us from age 12 so what the hell do I know.

I am curious about his novels (this a short story) but the blurbs are all "shouty".

Here are three I read, but haven't posted yet:

Faust by Goethe

Beowulf, Tolkien Translation

Aeschylus I

>>8990

>>8991

So I know that at least one of our regulars is a big Graham Greene fan. I hadn't read any before this one, but I enjoyed it a lot. I suppose I'll have to read some more of his. Anyway, it was good and I liked it.

I basically only read this one because I saw (and liked) the movie (although I thought it had some pretty serious flaws). After reading it, I'm really surprised at how much was changed for the movie. Honestly I think most of the changes were for the worse, especially considering that one of the big complaints about the movie is how Leo's character survives some ridiculous things. Basically, there's no riding over a cliff in the book, and the only time that he gets in the river and it's really cold out he makes a fire to dry off his clothes right away. Also, Glass doesn't have a kid in the book, which helps the story feel a lot more interesting, and he gets a fair bit of help at the points when he really needs it. There's even a scene where he chases a pack of wolves off a Buffalo calf carcass with a torch, that I couldn't believe was cut because it probably would have looked great on screen.

So if you liked the movie and aren't worried about what reading a more realistic version of the story might do to your experience, I'd recommend it. And if you're like me, you'll probably just enjoy imagining Tom Hardy in all the extra scenes with his character enough to make reading the entire novel worth it.

It's a very good read. Very few long chapters, interesting and complex story, but not too complicated.

Has some scientific gibberish in it, but it's not that hard to understand.

The concept of these uroboros people is really interesting: They are immortal, but not in the sense that they can't die. They do die, but after that, they are reborn again, in the same time, at the same place, as the same person. So their minds are really-really old.

I'm not saying any more, because those will be spoilers, but I do recommend this book!

January 3rd, 2059, the last day of the last lingering human survivor, and the last full day of the old world.

Born in desperation as a means to drag life and civilization past the ultimate extinction, with three hundred years to their credit carrying the world forward. Still, the genetically spliced Creatura remain culturally and religiously adrift among humanity's ruins. Too ready to define their lives and values in terms of their exposure and exploitation of what remains – theirs is a society dedicated to archaeological anthropology.

Shana Feles is a felinoid relic hunter looking for some fast credits earned on the side scouting for a fly by night mercenary company. An easy contract job of bump-and-scare turns into a bloody murder spree, and Shana finds herself on the run in a Maltese falcon hunt across the post apocalyptic cadaver of North America.

A adventurous furry-fictionalized tale of the future by Paul Lucas.

The end is tragic as is the tradition of all biographies.

He dies.

Known as a rising star of literary fame in the thirties, and lauded as a writer's writer thereafter. He lived the lifestyle precariously, and as well as he was able to. Sometimes scraping by, sometimes scamming by. His biography is something of a mirror to Thomas Pynchon's, sliding by life not through obscuring quietude, but a twisted reflection of constant misdirection and aggrandizing lies. He boasted that none knew who he truly was, or the places he had been, nor all he had done. In matters of the truth he saw himself as an alliance of one against the world.

His two earliest best selling novels were often mistaken as being autobiographical, as was his personal memoir thought to be a proper roman à clef. All were proven inventions of the purest form, and no less brilliant for being so.

Some amusing verifiable facts of his life do survive. He had a habit of sending nude photographic portraits of himself to literary idols as a means of introduction. A creatively personal form of self promotion that was not always appreciated, in spite of his remarkable athletic charms.

Robert M. Greenfield manages to put together a coherent guide to Prokosch's life, doing well with what remains verifiable, and mining what could be from those who otherwise knew Prokosch personally – if only in part.

Class science fiction story by the one and only C.S Lewis.