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[Loud Whispers]

I am also reading Moby Dick.

It is frustrating because it is simultaneously very interesting and WHY ARE YOU GIVING ME 70 MILLION EXAMPLES OF WHY SOMETHING BEING WHITE MAKES IT MORE TERRIFYING FUCK

BECAUSE PURITAN THEOLOGY SOWN WITH DOUBT STRIKES YOU WHITE WITH TERROR

[Yoink]

Now I'm back to reading The Mosquito Coast...

Okay, this book is good. Some of the themes kind of give me DF/Rimworld vibes.
Reckon I might have to acquire my own copy.

[Vattic]

While eating at work I've been reading The Pillow Book by Sei Shonagon. It's really odd and often touching. I especially enjoy how much of a snob she is. Bemoaning that snow and moonlight falls onto and into the houses of the poor for example.

[Enemy post]

I'm finally done reading Moby Dick. It was...often slow, but that seemed essential to building up the story. I enjoyed the final hunt.

Now that I'm finished with that, I'm looking forward to rereading Jurassic Park.

[Arx]

Finished Gardens of the Moon (Stephen Erikson; first book in the Malazan Book of the Fallen). It's... good epic-type/length fantasy? Very little about it... sucked me in, as it were, except quite a bit towards the end, but it's well-written and the ideas are well-executed. It's hard to write fantasy on a grand scale well, so I'm happy to cut Erikson a pass on the bits that didn't thrill me. Now for the next two million or however many books...

Finally got around to reading The Traitor Baru Cormorant (Seth Dickinson; sold as just The Traitor in the UK). I'd be lying if I said I wasn't concerned some of the rave reviews were just because the protagonist is a queer black woman, but the book is fantastic and I highly recommend it.

Also re-reading The Three Body Problem by Liú Cíxīn / Cixin Liu. It's great fringe-of-plausibility hard sci-fi with a lot of compelling characters. It's also got a lot of unique Chinese flavour, which Ken Liu does a fantastic job of translating; it's a little like Russian media that plays with the USSR and its aftereffects, except with the Cultural Revolution and general Chinese isolationism instead.

[heydude6]

Finally got around to reading The Traitor Baru Cormorant (Seth Dickinson; sold as just The Traitor in the UK). I'd be lying if I said I wasn't concerned some of the rave reviews were just because the protagonist is a queer black woman, but the book is fantastic and I highly recommend it.

Speaking of overhyped books, I recently finished reading Foe by Lain Reid. It has a good ending but otherwise it’s nothing special. It does a good job at making you uncomfortable with the situation the protagonist is in, but the characters themselves don’t do much to get you emotionally invested in them.

My fundamental problem with this book is that it isn’t a pleasure to read. The prose isn’t particularly compelling and the plot moves so slowly that interesting developments aren’t enough to keep you engaged. It does read quickly though, but I think that’s just a consequence of the simple language.

[Arx]

I feel I should point out, just in case, that I don't think The Traitor was overhyped. In fact, I honestly feel like the reviews that highlighted the protagonist being a queer woman of colour do it something of a disservice - she's very well written, and it is very important to her character and the story, but focusing on that leaves out how excellent the rest of the novel is. I kinda feel like the less I say about it, the better, in many ways. Suffice it to say that I, who will often finish one book and immediately start another, was sufficiently struck by it that it was some time before I wanted to move on and read another book.

[Yoink]

I've been reading The Wild Ass's Skin by Balzac - which is wonderful so far with its sumptuous prose and wit, even if it is slow going and does require some suspension of disbelief when one character turns to another and starts spewing forth page upon page upon page of his life story to a friend mid-drinking binge, with the latter somehow remaining an attentive listener throughout - but most recently I have been distracted reading Jasper Jones, an Australian novel from a few years back that I picked up cheaply at work.
I remember it causing a bit of fuss when it came out, and at this point it is living up to the hype! Quite an enjoyable read so far, even if the quotes from gushing critics calling it the "Australian 'To Kill a Mockingbird'" might be laying it on a bit thick.

[sprinkled chariot]

Tried reading Walden, can't understand why its usually desdribed as  must read tier book

Well, except probably most poetic depictions of growing beans.

[nenjin]

I got on a Henry Rollins kick on Youtube. Mentioned it to my roommate who is a big fan of his. So he gave me Solipsist, a "fiction" novel by Henry Rollins circa 1998. Rommate said he never had the courage to read it.

It's....intense. I say "fiction" because it's more of a disclaimer on Rollin's part than it actually relating to the narrative. It's basically paragraph after paragraph of Rollins' ranting, putting his damaged goods on display, gnashing his teeth at everyone and everything, going further and further down the rabbit hole of a singular, isolated existence where only strength and survival matter, and literally no one or nothing else does. It's not limped-wristed, laconic nihilism. It's a furious nihilism wrapped in utter, desperate selfishness. There's no traditional story here, just different moments and rants strung together.

It's plain awful at times and makes Rollins look a bit like a psychopath. He's clearly relating his personal experiences, and feelings and thoughts. I guess part of the reason I started getting back in to Rollins is I have a lot of directionless anger, so why not listen to the guy who has built a life on it, see where it's gotten him and how he handled. Turns out he had to grow up some. Solipsist was written in 1998 and 21 years can't help but change someone. Rollins now isn't the same guy that wrote the book then. I read some of what he says and it resonates deeply with me, how being alone by choice rather than playing "the game" and sociability in general has its drawbacks and consequences for people who feel pretty displaced, who are perhaps a wee bit too self-absorbed. Some of the things he says, I myself have thought and wished verbatim.

On the other hand the savagery with which he goes after the rest of existence, the sheer desire for violence just to exercise his own demons, the seething contempt he has for other people's choices in life and the arrogance of that, reading that has made me realize I'm not as angry as he was, or is. That I'm probably harder on myself for my anger than maybe I sometimes should be because I've not gone to these depths. That despite how I feel sometimes, I don't fundamentally reject people, or personal connections, or friendship. That I'm not so horribly damaged that I refuse to let people in for fear of what they'll see. This book might have done me some real harm as a younger guy, and driven me to some intense things. As an adult though, I think it's kinda helped contextualize my anger, and given me an example of what I might have started becoming but have moved away from.

So you know, a little light reading.

[Enemy post]

I finished Jurassic Park. Now I have to find something else to read. I think I'm going to read Kafka's The Metamorphosis, but that won't last long.

[birdy51]

Read a Zen book on Gardening. Insightful little goodie. My next book is an encyclopedia on the important/notable court cases in American History.

I have a weird and varied taste in literature.

[Yoink]

Been distracted from The Third Reich and am re-reading John Dies At the End, which I have forgotten many details of but found a new copy of the other day.
Honestly I just started reading a li'l to refresh my memory as to whether it would make a good recommendation for my mother to read.
The jury's still out, but it is an amazing and horrifying book and I feel as though it is either a perfect fit for my current, messed-up state of mind or a horrible mistake to read. Who knows. I might horf into my airport coffee at this rate.

[itisnotlogical]

My mom wasn't reading her borrowed copy of 1984 so I picked it up again. I'd forgotten what it was like to read a book that totally grips you with every word.

[Iduno]

Been distracted from The Third Reich and am re-reading John Dies At the End, which I have forgotten many details of but found a new copy of the other day.
Honestly I just started reading a li'l to refresh my memory as to whether it would make a good recommendation for my mother to read.
The jury's still out, but it is an amazing and horrifying book and I feel as though it is either a perfect fit for my current, messed-up state of mind or a horrible mistake to read. Who knows. I might horf into my airport coffee at this rate.

That sounds like a good headspace for reading a book titled "This book is full of spiders..."