Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Current Reading - Books best thread

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    Originally posted by gt3 View Post

    You might enjoy this then: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03bdsnt
    I did, very much. Thank you for bringing it to my attention.

    Comment


      Originally posted by ad hoc View Post
      I've tried a few times to start threads on particular authors, or genres, but we always seem to end up back here (I'm as guilty of it as anyone). And it;s impossible to find anything here. (This is happening with the "current watching" thread in Film and TV too. I understand the appeal, but fuck it makes the idea of a messageboard pretty unworkable, I reckon)

      Anyway, complaining about it won't fix it. I'd petition Snake to lock this, but someone will just start Current Reading II.
      100%. I've tried a bit, and conspicuously failed, to build genre based threads. Trouble is on a board with, I'm guessing, a relatively small membership they maybe come across as exclusionary. They flourish on The Well, for example, which also has a more diverse membership, or at least many more female participants than we do here.

      I think the current "lock-in" is a factor too. Speaking personally I'm reading more than I have done in decades, but I don't feel much like discussing books at present (or much else if I'm honest.) Which is strange as logic would suggest the opposite should be the case — and, in the early months it was, but not now. It's as if I'm in a mental bunker, waiting for the door to creak open again.

      Comment


        Originally posted by Amor de Cosmos View Post
        I think the current "lock-in" is a factor too. Speaking personally I'm reading more than I have done in decades, but I don't feel much like discussing books at present (or much else if I'm honest.) Which is strange as logic would suggest the opposite should be the case — and, in the early months it was, but not now. It's as if I'm in a mental bunker, waiting for the door to creak open again.
        I've found myself much less inclined to stay in touch with people in the latter months of lockdown too - I feel like I'm going to have nothing to offer because nothing's going on, and like most everyone else I haven't been anywhere, haven't done anything much. And the chances of anyone having read the same books as me to talk about are also going to be pretty minimal. Also, conversations quickly get reduced to platitudes about hoping 'things get back to normal', even though in reality I'm hoping for a social and environmental revolution, not a resumption of the car-obsessed, profit- and consumption-driven, planet-destroying normal of before. But I don't feel like expressing that in a mundane conversation which is revolving around who we know with Covid and how quickly the vaccine rollout is going in my part of the world.

        Conversations with my mum for some years now (once we've done the weather) end up with her listing the dead, the dying and the demented of her wider circle. I know the medical intimacies of her oldest friends better than their GPs. I fear this is how we all end up - if death doesn't get us first, we end up in an ever-diminishing universe focused on nothing but the deterioration of all our relatives, friends and acquaintances. And the weather. And food. It doesn't help that she can't read books any more due to macular degeneration, and absolutely refuses to entertain the notion of audio books, except for poetry - this is a shame not just for her, obviously, but also because books have always been something for us to discuss together at length. When I was a teenager she put me on to Steinbeck and Zola, among many others. Now, to tell her about books I've been reading seems almost like taunting her, and in any case she's not interested.

        My dad stopped reading books four or five years ago too - he's lost the ability to concentrate, and dementia is setting in. Again, books were something we could always talk about, and when I was young he put me on to numerous writers - to name a few off the top of my head, Philip Roth, Bernard Malamud, Salinger, Josef Skvorecky, Kundera and Mikhail Sholokhov (and he turned a bemused blind eye to me pinching Erica Jong off his shelf when I was 15). This is something I can barely contemplate - being alive and either not being able to read books, or not wanting to read books. What would be the point?

        Comment


          I think ad hoc's close to the nub of it with his comments about the varying 'current' threads which of course aren't called that on Football: on a board like this, with the possible exception of threads like the Libertadores/Sudamericana one, we all know that everyone will be looking at the same thing at the same time. Perhaps not everyone's going to be watching the same non-League match simultaneously, of course, but enough people are paying attention to the competition as a whole to keep up a good pace of conversation. For big Premier League, FA Cup, European Cup or international matches it's practically a live conversation. The same goes for World. In the US or UK politics threads especially, different people have differing levels of involvement and expertise, but we're all basically looking at the same news and trying to make our own sort of sense of it, so the conversation flows in something like real time.

          Whereas here the conversation moves much more slowly because we're not all reading the same thing at the same time, or even in the same year or decade as others. So I could start a thread about how visceral and visual I find Marlon James's writing, or how Carmen Mar?a Machado is an utter genius, or how deeply unfair and yet very historically understandable it is that a novel like Oreo written by Fran Ross, a Black woman, gets almost totally forgotten about for nearly half a century after publication when if Kurt Vonnegut had come up with something similar it would be on reading lists the length and breadth of the western hemisphere and we'd all have heard of it (not that I don't enjoy Kurt Vonnegut. You know what I mean) ... but that (hypothetical) thread might not get picked up for a few years by someone else who a) reads something by them and then b) thinks to go looking to see if there's a thread. And that's if it ever gets a reply.

          Genres are obviously easier. We can trade recommendations, observations and so on. Even then they'll go much more slowly, though, and on message boards conversations that remain 'alive' are much more fun than dormant ones.

          I dunno. It's odd. On the one hand I've enjoyed reading all my life (my parents have both always claimed I could read before I could speak) and part of me would love to discuss it more. On the other it's something I do on my own, and I'm kind of happy with that. I like reading others' thoughts on books first and foremost. And I suppose as readers, that might be true of a higher proportion of those who populate Books than the general population on the rest of OTF.

          Comment


            I would vote to keep this thread going. This thread, by its very nature means that it isn't as fast moving as the other forums on OTF. I love the serendipity of just clicking on and going through the last few pages and seeing what everyone is reading. If this thread was closed and we went to author/genre I do wonder if I would have read some of the books I have discovered here. Like many people, if a genre/author doesn't strike me as interesting, I'm less likely to go to that thread. Whereas coming across a book I might otherwise not have read is one of the joys of this thread. Just saying like...

            Comment


              Just to be clear, I don't think we should close this thread, I just think it sucks the life - and more importantly, the usefulness - out of the forum. But I do take gt3's serendipity argument - though I have to say that I think it;s had the opposite effect on me. I sometimes don;t open this thread for months because it's so random, and presumably miss interesting things. And going back to read old pages of it seems incredibly daunting because it's so long. I imagine in the 100 pages of the thread I would find some real nuggets that i haven;t seen or have forgotten about, but just going back to page 1 and starting to skim through it ... well...even the thought of that makes me tired.

              My feeling is that this page of meta-discussion about the thread itself is the best of the 99 pages so far

              I think the other possible problem with this forum is that it can be a bit intimidating, purely because it's books, and books are serious and themselves written (as would any commentary be). Writing about football, or politics, or films, doesn't seem so scary. Not that everyone agrees, obviously they don't, but because I always feel I need to write something a bit more insightful than "This was a good book" or even "I like the way the narrative is broken up". There's a reason that the book review pages of things like the LRB and even the New Statesman and so on are so deeply critical and thoughtful, in a way that match reports, even in something like The Blizzard, aren't.

              Comment


                Originally posted by ad hoc View Post
                I think the other possible problem with this forum is that it can be a bit intimidating, purely because it's books, and books are serious and themselves written (as would any commentary be). Writing about football, or politics, or films, doesn't seem so scary. Not that everyone agrees, obviously they don't, but because I always feel I need to write something a bit more insightful than "This was a good book" or even "I like the way the narrative is broken up".
                I agree, which is one reason for me shying away from sharing my unoriginal and superficial opinion on certain subjects.

                Comment


                  Originally posted by Sam View Post
                  I like reading others' thoughts on books first and foremost. ... I could start a thread about ... how Carmen Maria Machado is an utter genius
                  i'd love this, for the reason given, and because it's true.

                  ... but that (hypothetical) thread might not get picked up for a few years by someone else who a) reads something by them and then b) thinks to go looking to see if there's a thread. And that's if it ever gets a reply.
                  i think the Like button is useful for that. i try to use it unsparingly on posts where i haven't anything to add. It might make you feel a little less like you're typing into a void.

                  Originally posted by imp
                  This is something I can barely contemplate - being alive and either not being able to read books, or not wanting to read books. What would be the point?
                  This is something i'm reckoning with. My eyesight has been degenerating for a while and i've forced myself to shift towards audiobooks. It's a whole different experience, so much more fiddly to re-play that sentence, that arrangement of words which dangles itself in front of you and asks to be dwelt upon. So much harder to control the pace of the reading: a gripping thriller and Lost children archive zip by at the same speed. Beckett plays as a whitehall farce, words become drizzle like every day is Glasgow in autumn. But you acclimatise.

                  Now i'm starting to find i don't have the energy for stories. (i have MS: fatigue is a frequent symptom/side-effect.) Three, four paragraphs in and my brain is closing down. Words possess a heaviness. i feel their weight on me, pressing in, liquefying. All that ink.

                  Is my life becoming less rich as a result? i don't know. i'm terrified, and sort of relieved. i've always gone through cycles of reading prolifically and then coasting or slow paddling for a bit. So maybe it won't make a lot of difference. i've never really had anyone to talk about books with: i talk with myself. It'll be okay, then; we have other things in common.

                  (Not) The end.

                  Comment


                    I don't know what to say. That's the saddest thing I've heard in some time.

                    Comment


                      Sorry to hear that @laverte...music and reading, hearing and sight...are so important to me.

                      Pretty certain every post I have put on this thread has been unoriginal and superficial Sporting But I take the view that it's a safe space. I'll either be challenged, and get into a conversation with one of the other posters, or I'll be ignored. Either is fine by me tbh..

                      Comment


                        Originally posted by ad hoc View Post
                        Writing about football, or politics, or films, doesn't seem so scary. Not that everyone agrees, obviously they don't, but because I always feel I need to write something a bit more insightful than "This was a good book" or even "I like the way the narrative is broken up". There's a reason that the book review pages of things like the LRB and even the New Statesman and so on are so deeply critical and thoughtful, in a way that match reports, even in something like The Blizzard, aren't.
                        But I'm not a professional critic/writer. I read for pleasure. And I will look to the LRB or some such for for more critical insight. This is a place where you can say "I like this book", and if anyone follows up on that, based on previous recommendations, then that's ok.

                        Comment


                          Originally posted by laverte View Post
                          i think the Like button is useful for that. i try to use it unsparingly on posts where i haven't anything to add. It might make you feel a little less like you're typing into a void.
                          I agree with this. And I feel for you on the reading thing. I haven't been able to read a book for a decade. It's a concentration thing.

                          Comment


                            i feel for you too, Gangster O. i've always been quick to abandon when books aren't giving me enough in return for the effort it takes to read them. All that has changed is the threshold, for now. It must require a more intense adjustment to go so long without reading. i can't imagine how that feels.

                            There is sadness in being ill, of course, Amor, and days when it seems overwhelming. But it's not the whole story. i'm listening to more music than i used to, and taking it more seriously, thinking about it when i might once have let it wash over me. And there's something thrilling about reading the blurb of some worthy-looking novel, and saying to myself: i don't have the will to read that. i'm happy to let my failing body exercise control over the to-read pile, if it keeps out of more important decisions.

                            i made my first OTF post in Books and always find it welcoming down here. A few posters use it pretty much to log what they're reading, and during lockdown that kind of diary-keeping has in fact spread to other sub-fora. Books is the avant-garde! i don't have a problem with that; not everything has to be part of a conversation. i suppose i could throw out some baity topics – Saul Bellow is shit! Can any of Kipling be salvaged? Save our schoolkids from Romeo and Juliet! – but i think i prefer the library-like atmosphere of the way it is.

                            i don't contribute much to the forum because i don't expect my reading matter to be of interest. But i read every post in Current Reading, and always with pleasure.

                            Comment


                              laverte Really sorry to hear about your MS and your declining eyesight. My mum mentions the latter almost every single time I talk to her, about how she misses driving (to get out the house) and reading (to pass the time when living alone at the age of 83). I feel terrible because there's nothing I can do about it (except offer to buy the audio books she's so adamantly opposed to), and I haven't even been able to visit her for a year now. If there's been one single thing that's helped millions of us through lockdown, it's been books, and I know they would have made her much happier this past 12 months.

                              I do miss the kind of suggested topics you cite in your third paragraph there, or rather the kind of debate that might go with them. But OTF Books has been around for the best part of 20 years now and it's never happened yet, so I think you're safe. It definitely does sometimes feel like you're talking to the wall down here. On the other hand, I agree with you - it's good to have a bolt-hole where things are not quite so robust (and at times unpleasant, and sometimes really, really unpleasant - and I was at times as much a part of that as anybody), and where you can say something without the feeling you're about to be judged/slammed.

                              Comment


                                Originally posted by Gangster Octopus View Post
                                I haven't been able to read a book for a decade. It's a concentration thing.
                                As previously reported, I have no powers of concentration for fiction, but I can plow through non-fiction like a trooper. I mean, good fiction is a joy, but these endless chum piles of mass market fiction...who could be bothered?

                                Comment


                                  Reading The Arrogance of Power again, Anthony Summers biography of Nixon. Had forgotten how amusing it was. I really should ring all the lies made but I fear i'd run out of ink.

                                  Comment


                                    Originally posted by WOM View Post

                                    As previously reported, I have no powers of concentration for fiction, but I can plow through non-fiction like a trooper. I mean, good fiction is a joy, but these endless chum piles of mass market fiction...who could be bothered?
                                    What is a chum pile?

                                    Comment


                                      Mass market books churned out like sausage. Recently all called 'The Girl With....', 'The Girl On...', 'The Girl Who...', 'The Girl That...' and so on.

                                      Comment


                                        The funny thing is that every now and again I pick up some landfill fiction, and can fly through it in hours, or a couple of days, but it is all so utterly unremarkable that my the time a week has passed I can't recall a thing about it. I actually don't really mind reading it, but it is absolutely the literary equivalent of watching House Hunters or Survivor or Gray's Anatomy. It's just fluff to fill the hours in a mildly entertaining but intellectually empty way. It is reading for those times when I do have no powers of concentration.

                                        The thing with fiction like that is that at least it has a narrative thread, no matter how flimsily constructed. And I find that's what I need most these days. I have real trouble with a lot of non-fiction that's either really just a series of essays, so there's nothing pulling me on to read the next thing; or is a chronological description (my current Hot Springs book is well enough written and the content is interesting, but there's nothing that leaves you asking "I wonder what happened next..."). And without that narrative drive I find I don't get caught up in a book and I'll read a page or two and put it down, and it takes me forever to battle through to the end.

                                        Comment


                                          Originally posted by WOM View Post
                                          Mass market books churned out like sausage. Recently all called 'The Girl With....', 'The Girl On...', 'The Girl Who...', 'The Girl That...' and so on.
                                          Don't forget 'The [Job title] of [Central or Eastern European, or at a push Middle Eastern, City]'!

                                          Comment


                                            Originally posted by Sam View Post
                                            Don't forget 'The [Job title] of [Central or Eastern European, or at a push Middle Eastern, City]'!
                                            Also, 'The [day of the week plus possibly time of day, followed by quirky concept] Club.'

                                            Comment


                                              laverte I am also sorry to hear you are no longer getting the maximum out of one of life greatest pleasures.

                                              On matter of recent discussion on balance I think current thread works best for keeping abreast of poster recommendations, appraisals, or even just bringing to attention. Saw a stat a number of years ago along the lines of 10% of readers account for 90% of literature read. Would put myself in such a grouping anecdotal or not. But its a vast literary world out there with no chance of being able to reference even a fraction of publications. This thread helps redress that inequity.

                                              Comment


                                                I'm now reading 'Missing Fay' by Adam Thorpe, and it's excellent so far. Also, very unusual to read a novel set in Lincolnshire, mentioning villages and coastal resorts I know so well.

                                                Comment


                                                  I finished A Visit From the Goon Squad this afternoon. It's really quite something. Cacophonous at first, until you work out what's going on and then it becomes symphonic. It's very entertaining and very, very good.

                                                  When I go to bed in a little while I'll be getting stuck in to Girl, Woman, Other.

                                                  Comment


                                                    Originally posted by Sam View Post
                                                    When I go to bed in a little while I'll be getting stuck in to Girl, Woman, Other.
                                                    TMI...

                                                    Comment

                                                    Working...
                                                    X