Current Reading - Books best thread

[imp]

I just read 'Twelve' by Nick McDonnell, which he wrote when he was 17 - an east coast 'Less Than Zero' set in NYC around the turn of the millennium. I picked it up second hand because I was intrigued at all the plaudits for a writer who'd completely passed me by, despite me living in the US at the time and (at least so I thought) paying attention to new literary releases. His wikipedia entry mentions all the family's literary connections, implying that someone so young would not have been published otherwise - that's probably true, but it's still a really accomplished piece of writing for a teenager. I'd have guessed it was written by a jaded sceptic in his 30s. You could see where the book was going, but the portrait of hedonistic, super-spoilt, super-rich Manhattan brats is very well done.

Now reading another writer I'd never heard of but feel I should have - William Cooper, 'Scenes From Provincial Life'. He has that slightly inflated style that seemed to characterise certain writers of the pre- and post-WW2 era, like Waugh. Where you think, "Bloody hell, this bloke can write a sentence, again and again." Where all the characters are described physically and mentally, but you're still not sure what to expect of them. So far, I'm loving it.

[Sam]

Finished The Hound of the Baskervilles last night. It's very good. I think this Doyle chap has a future in crime fiction, if he puts his mind to it.

[Sam]

This afternoon I started The Unvanquished by William Faulkner. I've only read As I Lay Dying by him before, and the main thing I came away from was that his senses of place and people are very strong. In the few pages I've read so far of this one, that's continued here.

[imp]

Finished Scenes From Provincial Life - just superb. Here's William Cooper's obituary from The Guardian (he died in 2002).

[WOM]

Finished The Kon-Tiki Expedition by Thor Heyerdahl. Damn, but I love books like that. I'm so my father's son in that regard.

In a nutshell, in 1947 Heyerdahl has a theory that Polynesia was populated by Peruvians, but 'experts' tell him that there's no way they could have made the voyage across the Pacific on the only craft they had - balsa-log rafts. So Heyerdahl sets out to test his theory.

Just gripping, engaging and educational. You can probably find a copy in any charity shop.

[Lang Spoon]

It's almost definitely not true but. Genetics, archeology and linguistics point to a Taiwan origin (along with being the seed for much of South East Asia's current population) for Polynesians.

[WOM]

I'd imagine a lot has been discovered / deduced since 1947, but Heyerdahl lays out a pretty good case in the book.

[WOM]

Apparently both are correct.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/scie...can-roots.html

[Lang Spoon]

Is Faulkner readable without intense possibly unrewarding effort, Sam? I think I may have been too young when I tried to read him before, was either Absalom, Absalom or As I Lay Dying, but it hurt my head for twenty pages and then I gave up. Not Finnegan's Wake for inscrutable or obscure bollocks, but no fun.

[Sam]

I've had a fair bit of work today (for a change) so haven't got any further into it yet, but I shall report back.

Oh, and there's no apostrophe in Finnegans Wake (the title, I mean, I'm sure the book itself contains a few).

[Lang Spoon]

Apparently both are correct.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/scie...can-roots.html

Interesting. And why not, at least a few groups of rafters making it to Easter Island if not further in large numbers (I think the winds are with you coming from Asia much more and there's a lot of blank nothing between Easter Island (and Hawaii/NZ) and the rest of Polynesia).

But the stone carvings do have precedents elsewhere in Polynesia, Heyerdahl seemed to get a bit 40's racialist as to what the natives could achieve. There's also the small matter that since European ships started docking there, disease ravaged the population, and the sailors probably ravaged the natives as well. I'd be very skeptical that anyone 100% pure "native" existed on Easter Island in 2008. That might be optimistic for 100 years earlier even. How do we know we aren't looking at the DNA of a Native American Crew member from the 1700s?

[imp]

I read As I Lay Dying in my mid-20s and raced through it - not because I was enjoying it, but because I wanted to get to the end as quickly as possible as I muttered "Just die, you fucker - die!"

[Incandenza]

Finished two books in recent weeks:

Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton's Doomed Campaign by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes. This is the 2016 presidential election postmortem buzz book (it always seems that there's one). They had a lot of access to Clinton's aides and campaign staff (none of which are on the record). And it is gripping in parts, with a lot of inside information that you may have already read about elsewhere (the first interview that Clinton gave as a candidate was a disaster because the person on her staff booking the interview misheard the name of the interviewer that Clinton wanted to talk to, so she was booked on the wrong show, with a hostile interviewer).

But the big problem for me is that the book is only focused on the campaign apparatus itself, so as a result any other sort of explanations for why Clinton lost aren't covered thoroughly. Yes, Clinton's campaign had it's problems, but what about Trump's campaign? I can't imagine that it was any more professional or organized. And while they are honest about Clinton's faults (many of which lead to the infighting and the warring parties only looking out for themselves in her campaign), I think they are pretty sympathetic towards her, so often times it's always someone else letting Hillary down. They are really harsh on Bernie Sanders, and they rightly blame Robbie Mook for a lot of failings, but (and here is another thing that got a lot of attention from the book) they talk about how Hillary couldn't ever really give a clear message why she wanted to be president other than "it's my turn." They talk about that for about a page, then move on. I mean, that's a pretty fucking huge problem for a candidate to have, and in the book they talk about it more that her speechwriters and the campaign let her down for not helping her out more with that.


The next book was Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood. She is a poet that gained a large following from Twitter. This is her memoir, about her family. As you might guess from the title, yes, her father is a priest. He was a married Lutheran minister who converted to Catholicism, and was allowed to remain married. He is not the center of the book on all of the pages, but he is such a force that even when she isn't writing about him, he is a presence. But the book is just as much about her mom, and their relationship

She's been compared to David Sedaris a lot, but while I love Sedaris, I don't think she goes for laughs as easily as he does. Which is not to say that the book isn't funny. There were several points where I was laughing out loud. But she can move from humor to darkness without warning. There is a lot of dark stuff that comes later in the book, but it isn't always dwelled on or explored in depth. Which some people didn't like, but I did not mind. It slows down a bit and there are some points where you might wonder if you need another description of her dad splayed out on the couch in tattered underwear or what her mom said, but overall I loved it. Like I said, she is a poet, and the language in the book is unlike any other family memoir that I've read, so that already sets it apart. The last chapter is beautiful, and I'm very glad that I found this book.

[Antepli Ejderha]

I've not been able to properly read for a few years due to work in particular and life in general but last night I got the bug back, ok it's a single swallow not making a summer, and picked up Bluebeard by Vonnegut. I think I'll be rereading more of him as he's without doubt my favourite author.

[Patrick Thistle]

I've finished the Jungle Book. I liked it a lot. It feels quite fresh for 120 year old book.

Anyway now on a thriller novel my Mum gave me because it's set in The Faroes. It's not great. Every paragraph seems to have a new analogy. Best* one so far: the wind hit the side of the plane like a wet towel hitting bare legs.

* best meaning memorably terrible

[Amor de Cosmos]

Finished Scenes From Provincial Life - just superb. Here's William Cooper's obituary from The Guardian (he died in 2002).

Many thanks for the heads up. I'd never heard of the book or author. It's quite stunning, the kind of quietly incisive, socially observant, novel that just doesn't seem to get written these days.

[imp]

Glad you picked up on it - I will get around to the final two in the trilogy at some point. Also realised that CP Snow completely passed me by as well.

[WOM]

Half way through The Gambler by Dostoevsky. Goddamn is it hard-going. I'll be justifiably proud of myself if I make it through.

[colinwasp]

Just started this - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gr...r_Civilisation - only halfway through Chapter One but it's bloody good.

[Lang Spoon]

Half way through The Gambler by Dostoevsky. Goddamn is it hard-going. I'll be justifiably proud of myself if I make it through.

The Idiot is a comparative page turner, it's well worth a go. There are moments of real hilarity among the Slavic Jesus bollocks. Just don't go with the old school translation you get in cheap paperback "Wordsworth Classics" editions. Was like a different book when I read the Everyman version.

[Levin]

I'm going to sound like a dick here aren't I?

But the Gambler is amazing, both funny and full of insight. Oh man, just all the interactions between the family and then the grandmother.

What translation is yours WOM?

I've stalled for nearly two weeks on chapter two of Albertine disparue. Even if I didn't know that we're into the bits that were never signed off for publication, indeed were only in a draft stage to some degree, it's a massive drop in quality to the first few volumes.

I got paid for the first time this year at the end of May and I've finally just bought some books. I got The Power, The 7th Function of Language and Compass. I don't know what to read first.

[WOM]

It's a revision/update of the CJ Hogarth translation. I'm not saying it's not funny or insightful; I just find the writing style slow-going. Reading Hemingway makes me want to read more Hemingway. Reading this does not make me want to read more FD.

As to your other question, I'd start with the Snap Bio.

/sarc

[Levin]

Well as long as it's not Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky.

I'd never considered it before now but I can't imagine anything that I find funny being slow going reading. Any other emotion engendered I would say fine, yes I can see that but funny? Funny has to be easy going doesn't it? Or at least flow?

[WOM]

I should note that right after I posted that, 'Grandmother' entered the story and shit got a lot funnier real fast.

[WOM]

Okay, that was worth sticking with. Slow going until Grandmother enters the story, though.

Now on to The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, which is already astounding a quarter of the way in. From the first page, really.