What book is everyone reading at the moment? Part 2.

AmyStrange said:
James (written by Percival Everett) is an interesting one, because it's a complementary novel that gives Jim (the runaway slave in Huckleberry Finn) a voice, and I immediately went to put it on hold at my local library.

Percival Everett wrote it like the Far Side joke where the cows are all cool, while the one watching for cars, sees one, gives the warning, and then all the cows get down and start eating grass. Well, in the book, the slaves all act dumb and gullible while white folks are around, but as soon as they're all alone, they have intelligent conversations. It sounds really good.


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I liked James; I had to go back to Huckleberry Finn first to remind myself of the story given it must be fifty years since I had read it.

The idea of giving other characters from classic novels a voice, like Geraldine Brooks' March or Jean Rhys' Wide Sargasso Sea is a difficult line to walk without retelling the original story but I think Percival Everett succeeds.

Currently I'm reading L'Invention de Nos Vies (The Age of Reinvention) by Karine Tuil; it's a story of a man who on a whim steals a friend's identity, moves to the USA and becomes incredibly successful while his friend is stuck in a miserable life in France. Then the lie comes crashing down.
 
Agatha said:
I liked James; I had to go back to Huckleberry Finn first to remind myself of the story given it must be fifty years since I had read it.
The idea of giving other characters from classic novels a voice, like Geraldine Brooks' March or Jean Rhys' Wide Sargasso Sea is a difficult line to walk without retelling the original story but I think Percival Everett succeeds.

Currently I'm reading L'Invention de Nos Vies (The Age of Reinvention) by Karine Tuil; it's a story of a man who on a whim steals a friend's identity, moves to the USA and becomes incredibly successful while his friend is stuck in a miserable life in France. Then the lie comes crashing down.
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I know what you mean, I read Huckleberry Finn in high school, and when I reread it again, I didn't realize how much of it I'd forgotten.

The last hundred pages of Huckleberry were simply outrageously hilarious for me as Tom and Huck make plans to break Jim out of the prison he's in because he's a runaway slave, but they have to do it a certain way, because of the way they did it in the books Tom read about prisoners escaping.

He has to have pets (rats and snakes), and they also have to dig into his prison from the outside (even though they had access to the inside every day), while Jim had to carve some weird s**** onto a grindstone, like a calendar and a coat of arms. He also had to write a diary on an old shirt in some kind of secret code, and after they spring him, they also had to leave behind a straw man in a women's dress and all kinds of crazy stuff like that.

They also had to leave anonymous notes around saying someone was going to spring Jim soon, and the folks keeping him locked up needed to keep watch etc, etc. It was simply insane, and the funniest part was the very end, but I won't spoil it for anyone else who hasn't read it yet.

When I googled the date it was published is when I found the book James.

Also, thanks for the book suggestion, L'Invention de Nos Vies. I'll have to add it to my list of books.

I'll also leave you with a couple of book series suggestions:

Each one is about a woman in law enforcement (the first one is with the FBI, and the second is a LE officer in Canada) that somehow end up going back in time (from the 2000s to the 1800s), and once there, they're confronted with having to solve some serial killer murders, but during those old times, women weren't permitted to do anything that would sully their sensibilities, especially solving murders.

The second one is my favorite, especially since she's forced to prove she's from the future, and she did it by telling the truth and talking the way we do today (slang and all) compared to the way women talked back then. It was simply hilarious.

Kendra Donovan from Julie McElwain's A Murder in Time, and Mallory Atkinson from Kelley Armstrong's Rip Through Time series.

Anyway, thanks again.


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I'm just starting The Warmth of Other Suns about the great migration. I have high expectations as it has been highly rec'd by many friends, plus the whole Pulitzer thing!
 
chrispy said:
I'm just starting The Warmth of Other Suns about the great migration. I have high expectations as it has been highly rec'd by many friends, plus the whole Pulitzer thing!
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I looked it up on Goodreads and yes, that does sound good! I'll be interested to hear what you think.
 
I am just getting around to reading David Weber's 14th book in the Honor Harrington series, Uncompromising Honor, published in 2018. After reading about 65% of it, I am considering not bothering with the rest of it.

First, and most annoying, he has added many new characters with names that require various non-English letter combinations or diacritics. I suspect Weber was amusing himself with these, having gotten bored with more-usual names. Every time I saw one, I had to stop reading to figure out its pronunciation; I was not amused.

Second, I am tired of reading about how many hundreds of thousands of missiles are launched, how many are destroyed by anti-missile defenses, and how many hit any given ship. The answer is "lots, and lots, and not very many," to vaguely paraphrase Tolkien.

Third, and not unusual for Weber's writing, there were long explanations either as narration or as monologues by various characters. Background information is necessary, of course, but a novel whose blurb on fantasticfiction.com includes

[Harrington's] is the voice of caution and compromise no longer, and the galaxy is about to see something it has never imagined. "The Salamander is coming for the Solarian League, and Hell is coming in her wake.
​
has so far not delivered.

I would be interested in knowing what others think of this book.
 
Spektator said:
Back to Pratchett: re-read Eric (Rincewind in hell), now returning to the Watch with Jingo, in which war is impending in a surrogate Middle Eastern country.
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Jingo, and the wider Watch series are peak Pratchett for me. Far from perfect, but the interplay of motivations and characters is always interesting, and PTerry has a lot to say about the human condition.

Plus, they're just very funny :)
 
One of the books I just got done reading (right now I'm reading Robinson Crusoe) is Frankenstein (or The Modern Prometheus) by Mary Shelley. The book is nothing like all the movies I've ever seen to date. I'm glad because some of it is really heartbreaking (for me anyway), and a couple of the more interesting differences are explained by the following poster that I found:

AA1iTjxG.jpg



IMO, the ending sucked too.

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I'm shortly off on a long plane flight so I've loaded my Kindle up with a few books. I've got both Skeptics Guide to the Universe and Skeptics Guide to the Future, which I've been meaning to get around to for some time, and I've also got the 2005 version of Harry Frankfurt's On ◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊ which I'm sure will be fascinating.
 
AmyStrange said:
One of the books I just got done reading (right now I'm reading Robinson Crusoe) is Frankenstein (or The Modern Prometheus) by Mary Shelley. The book is nothing like all the movies I've ever seen to date. I'm glad because some of it is really heartbreaking (for me anyway), and a couple of the more interesting differences are explained by the following poster that I found:




IMO, the ending sucked too.

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Wasn't Frankenstein told like a letter in a flashback in a tale regaled by a third person? I seem to remember it being far removed from "present time". I may be conflating it with Dracula, which I think was mostly letters being sent back & forth. But considering they were written over 100 years ago, book presentations were probably generally different from what the evolved to.
 
alfaniner said:
Wasn't Frankenstein told like a letter in a flashback in a tale regaled by a third person? I seem to remember it being far removed from "present time". I may be conflating it with Dracula, which I think was mostly letters being sent back & forth. But considering they were written over 100 years ago, book presentations were probably generally different from what the evolved to.
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Dracula (I just read that one last week) was written in the form of Journal and Diary entries (on paper and on a phonograph recording device), letters, newspaper clippings, and (if I remember correctly) sent telegrams, but Frankenstein starts out with four letters from a brother to his sister.

In the letters, the brother is in Russia and explaining to his sister how he came to accomplish a lifelong dream of captaining a ship to find the Northwest Passage. By the fourth letter, he is actually in the middle of this adventure. Back then you couldn't just put letters in a mailbox, especially if you're up in the arctic trapped in ice waiting for a change in the weather so the ship can move forward.

In his fourth letter, he is explaining how he saw these two apparitions.

The first apparition is the monster, and the second apparition is Dr. Frankenstein who is chasing the monster. The captain picks up the Dr., who is in bad shape, and then nurses him back to health.

The rest of the book is in the form of a manuscript (or a Journal) detailing the Doctor's tale of who he is and why he is chasing the monster. The following quote is from the book itself (at the end of the fourth letter):

This manuscript will doubtless afford you the greatest pleasure; but to me, who know him, and who hear it from his lips--with what interest and sympathy shall I read it in some future day!

ETA: It also contains the monster's explanation to the Doctor as to what happened to him, why he was seeking vengeance, and what he could do to stop him from continuing his vengeance. The monster is huge and can actually move around fast and climb buildings like Spiderman (that was my impression anyway). It's kind of like the difference (in movies) between slow moving and fast-moving zombies.


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Lennart Hyland said:
My next book is a quite short swedish one about the capture of Adolf Eichmann, Operation Eichmann by Erik Åsard.
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Finished with Eichmann a while ago. Due to family issues I had a involuntarily break from reading.
But the issues has been resolved and I've just started with Grapes Of Wrath by John Steinbeck.
 
Mayhem and Madness: Chronicles of a Teenaged Supervillain

Young-adult novel of a high-schooler that finds an Iron Man-like suit, and the chaos that ensues. Told in the first person (I used to hate those as a kid -- "Geez... another 'I' book???") and mostly in flashback, which kind of takes away from the immediacy of the events. Nevertheless it's a fun, fairly fast read, although it does get a little exposition-y at the end. It wraps up nicely. I thought there might be a sequel out there even though it wasn't "set up" for one, but I find nothing else in that line by the author.
 
alfaniner said:
Mayhem and Madness: Chronicles of a Teenaged Supervillain

Young-adult novel of a high-schooler that finds an Iron Man-like suit, and the chaos that ensues. Told in the first person (I used to hate those as a kid -- "Geez... another 'I' book???") and mostly in flashback, which kind of takes away from the immediacy of the events.
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I used to think the same thing, (not picking on you, alfaniner) but do you know how many great works of literature (IMO of course) that are written that way, Dracula, Frankenstein, Flowers for Algernon, all the Sherlock Holme's stories, and so on and so on.

Anyway, Chronicles of a Teenaged Supervillain sounds good. A little like the Spy School series, which I found hilarious. I'll have to check it out and thanks.


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alfaniner said:
Mayhem and Madness: Chronicles of a Teenaged Supervillain

Young-adult novel of a high-schooler that finds an Iron Man-like suit, and the chaos that ensues. Told in the first person (I used to hate those as a kid -- "Geez... another 'I' book???") and mostly in flashback, which kind of takes away from the immediacy of the events. Nevertheless it's a fun, fairly fast read, although it does get a little exposition-y at the end. It wraps up nicely. I thought there might be a sequel out there even though it wasn't "set up" for one, but I find nothing else in that line by the author.
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That reminds me of Richard Roberts' Please Don't Tell My Parents.... series
 
xterra said:
I am just getting around to reading David Weber's 14th book in the Honor Harrington series, Uncompromising Honor, published in 2018. After reading about 65% of it, I am considering not bothering with the rest of it.

First, and most annoying, he has added many new characters with names that require various non-English letter combinations or diacritics. I suspect Weber was amusing himself with these, having gotten bored with more-usual names. Every time I saw one, I had to stop reading to figure out its pronunciation; I was not amused.

Second, I am tired of reading about how many hundreds of thousands of missiles are launched, how many are destroyed by anti-missile defenses, and how many hit any given ship. The answer is "lots, and lots, and not very many," to vaguely paraphrase Tolkien.

Third, and not unusual for Weber's writing, there were long explanations either as narration or as monologues by various characters. Background information is necessary, of course, but a novel whose blurb on fantasticfiction.com includes

[Harrington's] is the voice of caution and compromise no longer, and the galaxy is about to see something it has never imagined. "The Salamander is coming for the Solarian League, and Hell is coming in her wake.​
​
has so far not delivered.

I would be interested in knowing what others think of this book.
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I used to read a lot of fantasy novels and would often just read names as the first and last letters. S@#$@#$Y drew his sword!
 
AmyStrange said:
Dracula (I just read that one last week) was written in the form of Journal and Diary entries (on paper and on a phonograph recording device), letters, newspaper clippings, and (if I remember correctly) sent telegrams, but Frankenstein starts out with four letters from a brother to his sister.

In the letters, the brother is in Russia and explaining to his sister how he came to accomplish a lifelong dream of captaining a ship to find the Northwest Passage. By the fourth letter, he is actually in the middle of this adventure. Back then you couldn't just put letters in a mailbox, especially if you're up in the arctic trapped in ice waiting for a change in the weather so the ship can move forward.

In his fourth letter, he is explaining how he saw these two apparitions.

The first apparition is the monster, and the second apparition is Dr. Frankenstein who is chasing the monster. The captain picks up the Dr., who is in bad shape, and then nurses him back to health.

The rest of the book is in the form of a manuscript (or a Journal) detailing the Doctor's tale of who he is and why he is chasing the monster. The following quote is from the book itself (at the end of the fourth letter):

This manuscript will doubtless afford you the greatest pleasure; but to me, who know him, and who hear it from his lips--with what interest and sympathy shall I read it in some future day!

ETA: It also contains the monster's explanation to the Doctor as to what happened to him, why he was seeking vengeance, and what he could do to stop him from continuing his vengeance. The monster is huge and can actually move around fast and climb buildings like Spiderman (that was my impression anyway). It's kind of like the difference (in movies) between slow moving and fast-moving zombies.


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The monster is also very intelligent, taught himself to read while hiding out from humanity and such. I don't know that I've ever seen a movie version that comes near to the book regarding the monster. About the only thing most of the movies have in common with the source material is that Frankenstein creates the monster. IIRC, it's also much more sympathetic to the monster than most of the movie versions. Its been years since I read it though.
 
ahhell said:
The monster is also very intelligent, taught himself to read while hiding out from humanity and such. I don't know that I've ever seen a movie version that comes near to the book regarding the monster. About the only thing most of the movies have in common with the source material is that Frankenstein creates the monster. IIRC, it's also much more sympathetic to the monster than most of the movie versions. Its been years since I read it though.
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Weirdly enough, the one movie that comes closest (IMO anyway) is Young Frankenstein.


ETA: In the end of YF, the monster is very articulate and even has a girlfriend, and if you read the book, you'd know why that was very important, although, the Bride of Frankenstein does explore that a little.

SPOILER ALERT:

After killing his little brother and setting up his young cousin for the crime (that she was convicted of and hanged), it's what the monster asked for as a blackmail payment in exchange for leaving Dr. Frankenstein's family and friends alone. Thank God (IMO), the underlined part wasn't in any movie that I've ever seen.


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