The B&B Book Review - The Bear and Badger

TheDJR

Sharp Ends by Abercrombie, its great to be back in that world again.

acemuzzy

City of Mirrors by Justin Conin, it's great to be back in that world again.

Tempy

High-Rise by J.G. Ballard, it's great to be back in the world again.

acemuzzy

Well at least two of us can use apostrophe's

regmcfly

Whats going on in thi's thread I hate's not knowing I used's to teach English

Bollockoff

HEATHCLIFF

regmcfly

regmcfly

Fuck it -
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kqiUGjghlzU

Bollockoff

Plodding along with Pale Fire. I don't know why but before I read PF I had the impression it was a kind of dark, subversive murder/mystery. Not something that's producing belly laughs in me reading this conceited dicksack character derail for pages yet again into stories of idiot kings. I'm quite enjoying it.

"I think there must exist a special subversive group of psuedocupids - plump hairless little devils whom Satan commissions to make disgusting mischief in sacrosanct places."

Bollockoff

The Essex Serpent is a decent story on the dynamics between science/faith friendship/love/lust if anyone sees it laying it about.

davyK

Forgot to post again when I finished Spycatcher. Interesting right up to the end. Still a good read despite its age.

Reading "The Corrections" by Jonathan Franzen. Not sure where it's going but enjoyable so far.

Lord_Griff

Working my way through The Divine Comedy. Fooking brilliant.

Bollockoff

Pale Fire finito.

What a messed up unique book. FEEL BLESSED M8s to have read Invisible Cities and this within the span of months as they're so structurally different from typical lit. A proper good insane comedy on the most unreliable narrator's megalomania.

Bollockoff

I forget who recommended it to me ages ago in this thread but I got Station Eleven voted in for this months' book club read so that's my next dive.

Nina

Started reading Wolf in White Van after finishing the Hydrogen Sontata (very good that one).

Writing style doesn't flow as easily for me as I think it should, but I'm still fairly early in. It keeps on skipping between different story lines, but as they all have the same main character it can be a bit confusing at times. Have a feeling it will get more interesting soon.

Facewon

Finished bad pharma. Amazing. Stone cold brutal. Here are my arguments, here are the facts that back them up, here's where the evidence is a bit weak, so I'll not go over the top, here's what should be done, give me a reason outside of raw greed why we shouldn't. No? STFU and fix shit then.

Started "why I am not a feminist: a feminist manifesto."

Good read. Total opposite of bad pharma in method though. 150 pages of semi-rant. Many more generalised arguments, but that's fine. She Makes some great points and I'm pretty sure Brooks would be very happy that one of the overarching themes is that Feminism should be part of a wider struggle with some other isms.

An arvos read if I didn't have interruptions.

Gremill

Reading The Islanders, by Christopher Priest. It's quite unusual - a kind of lonely planet type guide to a fictional island archipelago that tells you the history of The Dream Archipelago through its inhabitants and their history/stories.

trippy

Read A Clockwork Orange. It was pretty horrorshow.

The language is cleverly used to both mute and heighten the violence. It hasn't really dated and bits of it felt quite prescient.

The ending didn't quite work for me but as an overall experience it was quite special.

Lord_Griff

I like how the vernacular needles its way into your brain.

trippy

Aye, totally. Words like tolchock, bezoomny and chepooka were floating around in my dreams last night.

I picked up the book years ago but the language put me off. It clicks quickly though and works really well, my version didn't have a glossary but I never felt I needed one.

Lord_Griff

Exactly

Bollockoff

We did CO for A level and I still use droog irl to this day. The invisible transition when you become fluent about halfway through is a great thing.

Tempy

Gremill wrote:

Reading The Islanders, by Christopher Priest. It's quite unusual - a kind of lonely planet type guide to a fictional island archipelago that tells you the history of The Dream Archipelago through its inhabitants and their history/stories.

Last time I met H he was reading this, it seemed fucking wild. Gotta love it when an author has got so far into his own fictional headspace that he's started referencing himself.

davyK

trippy wrote:

Read A Clockwork Orange. It was pretty horrorshow. The language is cleverly used to both mute and heighten the violence. It hasn't really dated and bits of it felt quite prescient. The ending didn't quite work for me but as an overall experience it was quite special.

There are two endings. One version of the book ends just like the film does, whilst the author's "cut" sees Alex growing up and realising what a cunt he had been - but of his own free will. The US version has the 21st chapter cut out. Burgess was further incensed because having 21 chapters was deliberate.

trippy

Aye, I read about that, pretty interesting. Heretically, I think 20 chapters might have been better.

EvilRedEye

Finished Pale Fire. Enjoyed it by the end, kind of feel I'd need to read it again having gone through the whole thing and having read some commentary about it (read: read the Wikipedia article about it) in order to form a definitive opinion though.

Bollockoff

What was your hot Zemblan take?

Spoiler:

WorKid

Stopharage wrote:

Amazing news. (Hyperbole Alert).

Neil Gaiman's next book will be a sequel to Neverwhere. That follows from the news earlier in the week that Pullman is doing a follow-up trilogy to His Dark Materials. Excite.

Ah brilliant. A proper one at last then.

I haven't read the short story spinoffs, I may care about them again now.

regmcfly

Gremill wrote:

Reading The Islanders, by Christopher Priest. It's quite unusual - a kind of lonely planet type guide to a fictional island archipelago that tells you the history of The Dream Archipelago through its inhabitants and their history/stories.

Hey I read that recently too. I'm onto the gradual which is his newest, also set on the dream archipelago. Remember the one about the drones exploding? That's where it's set

Scout

I just finished East of Eden by Steinbeck. Bit of a mammoth. Took me yonks. Really enjoyed it.

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