The B&B Book Review - The Bear and Badger

tigersgogrrr

The Daddy wrote:

New Pullman came out yesterday. I shall be getting on that ASAP. The last book was top tier.

Yup, starting it tonight!

The Daddy

I’m just finishing up The Blade Itself (cheers). Will be straight onto Pullman after.

I went audiobook on the last one cos I was training for a half marathon. Was really well read by Michael Sheen. Tempted to do the same again.

Facewon

Marx bio is slow going. Lol.

Author snuck some zingers into the chapter on his personal life though.

Its my at work morning reading.

Doing Ursula le guin The Disposessed at home.

Hella fun.

Silke

Facewon wrote:

Doing Ursula le guin The Disposessed at home. Hella fun.

Teenage me wouldn't have been the same without that book. Nowadays, some decades later, "Hella fun" is probably more apt. Still, the memories.

Facewon

I mean, like 3 pages in she's giving shit to laser guns as phallic symbols. Awesome.

Moot_Geeza

@Nick_md Any chance I could borrow your copy of First Blood if it's handy? Just checked Amazon and they're going for £18 pre-owned. Nope.

Almost finished Hell's Angels by HST. Crazy stuff, very readable.

dynamiteReady

Have started reading Yanis Varoufakis' Adults in The Room.

I'm not all that far in, but it's a confusing read for a left-leaning UK national...

Not in terms of writing... His writing is excellent. He makes some exceptionally complicated ideas very clear, with a variety of unforced and lucid references. And while his vanity shines bright in this, he comes across as nice enough. In addition to that, the writing is generally objective and detailed enough to allow him his somewhat frequent indulgences.

What is a bit confusing, is his opinion of the EU project...

From what I've managed to glean so far, he essentially believes that the EU, as it stands, is a piece of shit, and that leaving it is not the worst idea. But he also strongly believes it can be reformed, and feels that UK would be the best country to lead the change (not any more! - rofl)...

Interestingly, one of the primary reasons why he himself argued against a 'Grexit' (ugh!... fucking buzzwords... obvs' a 'Greek exit from the EU'), was because of the difficulty inherent in ditching the Euro and reintroducing the Drachma...

That would be a problem that the UK obviously wouldn't have.

But then the other key reason, was that the country had fuck all money in the first place, ~~ergo, fuck all to build on~~ and needed to solve that problem first. Whereas right now, the UK is more than just relatively stable... It's near enough a model economy, believe it, or not...

To say the book is really telling me something new is a bit of a stretch. I mean, some of these issues are encoded in the UK's current political schism. But with the way the world is right now, I probably was looking for a detailed explanation of global macroeconomics (for dummies).

And this book seems pretty good for that.

cockbeard

dynamiteReady wrote:

Have started reading Yanis Varoufakis' Adults in The Room. I'm not all that far in, but it's a confusing read for a left-leaning UK national... Not in terms of writing... His writing is excellent. He makes some exceptionally complicated ideas very clear, with a variety of unforced and lucid references. And while his vanity shines bright in this, he comes across as nice enough. In addition to that, the writing is generally objective and detailed enough to allow him his somewhat frequent indulgences. What is a bit confusing, is his opinion of the EU project... From what I've managed to glean so far, he essentially believes that the EU, as it stands, is a piece of shit, and that leaving it is not the worst idea. But he also strongly believes it can be reformed, and feels that UK would be the best country to lead the change (not any more! - rofl)... Interestingly, one of the primary reasons why he himself argued against a 'Grexit' (ugh!... fucking buzzwords... obvs' a 'Greek exit from the EU'), was because of the difficulty inherent in ditching the Euro and reintroducing the Drachma... That would be a problem that the UK obviously wouldn't have. But then the other key reason, was that the country had fuck all money in the first place, ~~ergo, fuck all to build on~~ and needed to solve that problem first. Whereas right now, the UK is more than just relatively stable... It's near enough a model economy, believe it, or not... To say the book is really telling me something new is a bit of a stretch. I mean, some of these issues are encoded in the UK's current political schism. But with the way the world is right now, I probably was looking for a detailed explanation of global macroeconomics (for dummies). And this book seems pretty good for that.

That sounds pretty interesting. I'm not surprised by his point of view though. The EU imposed austerity on Greece, and it has cost many many lives. I personally agree with him about UK taking a lead in Europe but that couldn't happen until we took the EU seriously, which means not voting BNP and later UKIP into seats in Brussels. There was a decent piece on the LSE podcasts about it recently so it's fresh-ish in my mind

http://www.lse.ac.uk/lse-player?id=4737

LivDiv

I have that book but need to start ot still.

It is an interesting difference between the two nations.
Greece, financially fucked with EU forcing austerity, stayed in the EU.
UK financially well off, self imposed austerity, wants to leave EU.

I dont a Greek with Yanis on everything I have heard from him but he seemed to be doing what he was doing for the people of Greece and that I do have time for.

Edit: agree/a Greek typo is too good to correct.

Lord_Griff

The testament and Girl, Woman, Other jointly won the Booker prize. I will no doubt pick these up as I too have heard good things. Interestingly the author of Girl, Bernadine Evaristo, intimated that there win was a result of having 4 women and only one man on the judging panel. Which got me thinking about the objective determination of the quality of writing and whether it even exists? I mean, if the judges were B&B member the winner may likely be a colouring-in book...

Dark Soldier

Reading my first Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale. Fuck me that lass can write.

After that it's a re-read of Lovecraft, first time.in 15 years.

Gremill

Dark Soldier wrote:

Reading my first Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale. Fuck me that lass can write.

After that it's a re-read of Lovecraft, first time.in 15 years.

Get onto Oryx & Crake, After The Flood and MaddAddam next - all fantastic.

dynamiteReady

Lord_Griff wrote:

The testament and Girl, Woman, Other jointly won the Booker prize. I will no doubt pick these up as I too have heard good things. Interestingly the author of Girl, Bernadine Evaristo, intimated that there win was a result of having 4 women and only one man on the judging panel. Which got me thinking about the objective determination of the quality of writing and whether it even exists? I mean, if the judges were B&B member the winner may likely be a colouring-in book...

It's all subjective for sure, but the value of any given Booker prize (and even the nominees, I've had the pleasure to find) is surely that much less contentious than the value of any given Turner Prize award.

For an international cultural award that's probably based on a fraction of a percent of all the works of fiction published in English each year, then asking for anything like objectivity is probably wishful thinking.

Kara_Jane_Adams

What’s wrong with colouring books?

Brooks

Skip Lovecraft, do Clark Ashton Smith instead, he's like the actually good Lovecraft.

Raiziel

CAS is on my read soon list. I’m still enjoying my read through of Lovecraft though. I’m one third through. So far The Colour Out of Space remains my favourite.

Dark Soldier

Grem and Brooks - I'll check those recs out. Loving Atwood's prose so much

davyK

Reading Bruce Lee : A Life by Matthew Polly.

An easy and interesting read. It jumps about a bit (!) but there was a period in his life when there was a hell of a lot going on so it's understandable. It covers an awful lot of ground and biogs aren't my favourite genre but Lee is a bit of mystery and being of a certain vintage it interests me.

Getting toward the end now so will see how his death is covered.

Going by this work he was a bit of an arsehole when younger but got away with a lot because of his charm. He was certainly loyal to his childhood friends etc when he became a success however.

Lord_Griff

I just walked past an Oxfam, and spotted a book my father used to own that I remember from childhood "the living world of history" so clearly had to buy it. I figured maybe grab some cheap books for the kids, then I saw an unused History of western science folio society so grabbed that for 12 quid. However at the till they had maybe 50 or so other folio society books. Apparently some chap got put into care and he gave all of them to Oxfam. Like a kids in a sweet shop.

davyK

Nice. Love me a Folio edition.

Pity he wasn't able to pass them on but at least someone else will enjoy them.

Lord_Griff

I may buy them all. C50% rrp

pantyfire

pantyfire wrote:

davyK wrote:

Finished the 3rd Jack Reacher novel. Tripwire Dependable stuff this. I've enjoyed this series so far. This sees Reacher more as a detective than a strongarm. Also dips into his history more. Seems to be a transitional book for the character. Good stuff. So easy to read and an interesting bad guy. Felt a bit more "filmic / movie-esque" but that is no bad thing. The books so far have covered different skill sets (prev book about marksmanship) and it is filling the Reacher character out nicely. I can see why there are 22 of these things as each so far has felt sufficiently different. I'll keep going with the series which is a rare thing for me. I'm reading them in sequence but I'm leaving a gap between them so they don't merge into one.

Oooh, I've just finished working on the latest Reacher hardback, Blue Moon, and it's sitting on my desk.
I was going to read it but wasn't sure book 23 (?) was a good place to start or not.
The synopsis struck me as a bit violent A-Team meets The Littlest Hobo.

So I decided to read a random Jack Reacher.
So far I'm 122 pages in and he hasn't punched or shot anybody yet. In fact he nearly got into a fight but managed to talk the 2 rednecks down.
I think I've been given a spoof millenial copy of a Jack Reacher book as bare jokes.

Lord_Griff

Sounds more like Jack Preacher, amarite?

davyK

The first one has fisticuffs. I love the way the fights are described in a world weary fashion. You can imagine him thinking "here we go again, sigh" before bashing someone.

Cruise portrays that world weariness very well I feel.

EvilRedEye

Ughhhh, love me a good Folio Society charity shop find. I got Lord of the Flies new and sealed for £6 from my local and In Patagonia (which has a lovely ribbed metallic cover design) also new and sealed for a fiver.

hylian_elf

The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa. Apparently an international bestseller and being made into a movie. I picked it up after judging its cover cos half price as I was buying another book I actually wanted. Glad I did.

Great story told alternately from a pet cat’s perspective and normal third person narrative. Struck an extremely personal chord with me in lots of ways. A very surprisingly good read. Sometimes random purchases really pay off. (It didn’t earlier in the year though with some shit called Lullaby.)

Onto some Dick and finally reading ‘Blade Runner’ and it’s a bloody brilliant start.

pantyfire

Oooh that's one of ours, I'll nab a copy next time it's reprinted.

Raiziel

Speaking of the Folio Society, I started their edition of Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes yesterday (coincidentally the same day, I noticed, as the carnival rolls into town in the story).

Great so far. Bradbury’s prose really pops and fizzes, reading almost like a baroque poem at times.

Brooks

hylian_elf wrote:

The Travelling Cat Chronicles

Yes please.

LivDiv

God bless Folio Society, Mama LivDiv xmas presents for life. Done, easy mode.

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