Sunday Morning Book Thread - 08-04-2024 ["Perfessor" Squirrel]

Welcome to the prestigious, internationally acclaimed, stately, and illustrious Sunday Morning Book Thread! The place where all readers are welcome, regardless of whatever guilty pleasure we feel like reading. Here is where we can discuss, argue, bicker, quibble, consider, debate, confabulate, converse, and jaw about our latest fancy in reading material. As always, pants are required, unless you are wearing these pants...

So relax, find yourself a warm kitty (or warm puppy--I won't judge) to curl up in your lap, sharpen those #2 pencils, and dive into a new book. What are YOU reading this fine morning?

PIC NOTE

Found this pic in an article about the "5 best public libraries from around the world in 2021." This particular picture is from the interior of the Oslo Public Library in Norway.

MORE ON FICTION GENRES

OrangEnt sent me a follow-up email last week mentioning the YouTuber above. Because I use Gmail for the Sunday Morning Book Thread, this YouTuber suddenly showed up in my YouTube feed. Weird coincidence, Google!

Although her delivery is a bit on the dry side, she does describe the different categories of books accurately and also has some useful tips on how aspiring authors can categorize their own works into a genre that may be of interest to literary agents and editors. Marketing a book is HARD, so it helps to find the useful tips and tricks that can make your book stand above and beyond the other books that are being published right now.

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CHANGE AS A CATALYST FOR STORIES

NOTE: This may be a bit lengthy, but I thought it worth commenting on...

A.H. Lloyd posted a great series of comments last week. I've copied them into a single blockquote for your reading convenience:

Suggested future book thread topic: Books on the edge of some great change, like a war.
Tolkien's Lord of the Rings naturally comes to mind, and one of the most evocative elements is that it starts in a peaceful calm world that is steadily coming apart. Tolkien handles this masterfully, having lived through the runup to both world wars. People try to muddle through, make plans like normal, but there comes a revelation that things will not be as they were. One of my (many favorite lines): "Many hopes will wither in this bitter spring."
Herman Wouk's The Winds of War likewise captures the tension of late summer 1939 and the weird way that war crept through Europe, bit by bit, nation by nation. We Americans seem to think that either Sept. 1, 1939 or Dec. 7, 1941 are the big dates, but it actually started in fits and starts. Yes, Poland, Germany, England and France were at war in 1939, but Italy and the Balkans were at peace. The Soviets attacked Finland, in the winter, but that war never linked to the other one. (Con't)
While Wouk is evocative, he's also a bigot, and all Germans are bullies with room-temperature IQs who are hypnotized by Beethoven or something. On, and tiny genitals. Really, Herman?
Volume I of Winston Churchill's The Second World War is a non-fiction example, and it's gripping reading even if you know what's going on. The failed opportunities, grim sense that Germany is building an insurmountable lead in military strength are things that bear close examination.
I will also point out that all the people who scream "MUNICH! CHAMBERLAIN! APPEASEMENT!" need to read this because it is very specific. Sometimes aggression has to be tolerated because fighting everywhere and always "on principle" (which increasingly means globalist oligarchs) is untenable and immoral. What set Munich apart was that the Western Allies had the edge in military strength, the possibility of Soviet aid and therefore the means to stop Hitler. Post-war documents show that the Wehrmacht could not assault the Czechs while holding off any kind of French pressure. This is vastly different than fighting to maintain the integrity of Stalin's internal borders.
Bruce Catton's The Coming Fury is a detailed look at the year before the Civil War kicked off, and demolishes many of the happy myths that slavery was a side issue. It destroyed the Democracy, which if it could have been unified, would easily have won the 1860 election.
In terms of fiction, Gone with the Wind is popular in part because Scarlett doesn't care about politics and tries to ignore them, but that doesn't matter once the armies gather. Yes, drama, but it really brings home the total transformation the US went through and how fast it all happened. It must really have seemed like an instant to those who lived through it.
I think we are in a similar place, unsure if this is a passing crisis that will be forgotten or a hinge point where we'll tell younger folks things that will seem fantastic to them.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at July 28, 2024 09:58 AM (llXky)

Most of the books listed above are epics in that that scope of the story is far grander than just a handful of people chatting with each other over tea. There is drama, conflict, struggle, romance, and final resolutions against a backdrop that is world-shattering in its effects on society and culture.

We look back now at WWII and the American Civil War as historical events, but because we are so far removed from them and we have the benefit of hindsight, it's difficult for us to really wrap our heads around the challenges that the people who lived through those times faced. There was no guarantee that the North would win the Civil War, though that may have become inevitable after a certain point. Just as there was no guarantee that the Allies would win World War II. Although in hindsight, it's possible that we have eventually lost thanks to the influence of Communism and Fascism that plague us now.

I read a lot of epic fantasy (so you don't have to) and I can see that Great Change does form the basis for many, many stories, which draw upon real-life events for inspiration.

Tad Williams' Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn, one of my favorite epic fantasies (not least because of its influences from Tolkien), features "The Conqueror's Star" a bloodred comet that appears in they sky every 500 years or so. It's seen as a herald of change because of the massive transformations in the world that take place when it reappears. In the context of this story, it's heralding the Storm King's impending war against the mortal and Sithi realms. In the past, it marked the downfall of Ineluki when he transformed into the Storm King at the fall of Asu'a (now the Hayholt). It was also in the sky when Usires Aedon (i.e., their version of Jesus Christ) was crucified upside down on the Execution Tree. Although the Conqueror's Star is a mere background detail, its presence in the story is still felt because people can see it in the sky during the years of turmoil within the story. Naturally, it fills the sky at the climax, just before the Storm King's triumph, as it's a part of his master plan...

A classic science fiction example is Frank Herbert's Dune, where a young man becomes the hope of the universe as he struggle to understand the powers and gifts that have been bestowed upon him against his will. In the end, his son is the one that enables humanity to break free of its stagnation and begin progressing towards a better future once again (the Golden Path). But there is quite a lot of pain and destruction along the way.

And of course, one of my favorite examples is Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time, another epic fantasy series inspired by Tolkien. Here, the world cycles through endless Ages. In the Third Age, the Dragon is Reborn, heralding the Final Battle between the living avatar of Creation and the Dark One, which promises to reshape the world. The end of the Second Age was marked by the Breaking of the World, when the last attempt to chain the Dark One was only partially successful. His backlash caused all male magic-wielders to go insane and they destroyed the world in their madness. The current residents of the world are still dealing with the aftermath of the destruction some three thousand years later.

Although all of these examples are quite fictional, the authors still draw upon real-world inspiration to tell their stories. Williams draws upon European history and culture in his story, as well as the cultures of various indigenous people such as the Inuit (portrayed as the Qanuc). Herbert is inspired by Middle-Eastern culture and history with the Fremen, who are an offshoot of ancient Bedouin tribes. Jordan is all over the map, mixing and matching cultures with abandon. The Aiel, for instance, look like tall Irishmen, but behave a lot like Zulu or Maasai warriors from Africa.

Change is at the heart of these examples as well, because each story revolves around titanic changes within the greater societies and cultures in which the stories are told. Ineluki, the Storm King, seeks to return the world to a prior state of being, when humans were no more than insignificant gnats on the outskirts of Sithi society. Paul Muad'dib, the Kwisatz Haderach, ascends to the throne of the Empire, sending shockwaves throughout thousands of worlds, as he now has an absolute monopoly over the spice that keeps society functioning. And Rand al'Thor, the Dragon Reborn, is destined to destroy the world again--perhaps for all time--even as his blood is the key to saving it.

MORON RECOMMENDATIONS

My book this week was C.S. Lewis' The Great Divorce. It's a short book, an allegory of people "choosing" heaven or hell. My takeaway is that most folks don't understand what it means to be a Christian, or how salvation works - they look on it as a cultural group to join or be born into.
What struck me about it is the arguments and protests against "Christianity" by some of the characters is exactly the same as the arguments and protests we hear today. Nothing has changed in their rebuttals in 78 years (from the writing of this book in 1946. But it's the same argument from the first sin.) Highly recommend!
Posted by: Moki at July 28, 2024 09:44 AM (wLjpr)

Comment: C.S. Lewis always has great commentary about Christianity. He was converted by his best friend J.R.R. Tolkien, and became a firm, devout believer. And yes, the arguments and protest against Christianity have been raging since 1st century A.D.... Those who believe "get it" while those who reject belief struggle with their faith or refuse to adopt a faith in anything greater than themselves. It took me quite a number of years before I accepted Christianity and it took a number of weird experiences that could not be explained rationally to get my attention.

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Good morning, Horde. I started reading The Coast Watchers by Patrick Lindsay. It's about the men on Japanese-occupied islands in the Pacific during WW2 who relayed information via radio back to Australia regarding enemy movements. I'm about 20% through, so the war is just getting started and the Japanese are kicking ass and taking names while the Allies are scrambling to catch up. One interesting point for me: the radio sets, and all the supporting equipment, weighed up to 300 lbs, and they had teams of natives to haul it all around (and they had to move frequently). Today, with a shoebox of equipment and a solar panel, you could set up a comparable station.
Posted by: PabloD at July 28, 2024 09:55 AM (yhCZc)

Comment: When I read the blurb on Amazon about this book, it sounded pretty insane. A bunch of men were tasked with keeping an eye on what was happening in the Pacific and had to report back what they saw. They hid among the natives and moved frequently to avoid detection, but as Pablo points out, this was a fairly massive undertaking. They didn't exactly have smartphones to record and report. They didn't even have transistor radios.

It's incredible the level of technological advances that have been made since WWII. Things they could never have dreamed of back then are now commonplace in our lives. It's notable that the transistor was invented just two years after the end of the war in 1947. However, it took a few more years to work out the kinks and start mass production of transistors for everyday objects like AM radios. According to Wikipedia, there were an estimated 13 sextillion (1.3 x 10²²) MOSFETs (a type of transistor) manufactured between 1960 and 2018. They are in just about everything we use today...

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Three quarters of the way through The Scarlett Letter. It is deservedly a classic but I can't imagine a standard issue high school kid getting anything out of it but bored. That is probably a sign of the decline of standards in modern America. But since I'm not a standard issue high school kid, and haven't been for over 50 years, I'm really liking it.
Posted by: who knew at July 28, 2024 11:23 AM (+ViXu)

Comment: This is a good reminder that our tastes and interests change and mature as we grow older and--presumably--wiser. I remember reading John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men in school and not really get much out of it at that time. However, when I was assigned to read it as part of my graduate degree curriculum, I had a lot more knowledge and experience to bring to my reading and I thoroughly enjoyed the story.

More Moron-recommended reading material can be found HERE! (1000+ Moron-recommended books!)

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WHAT I'VE BEEN READING THIS PAST WEEK:

After reviewing some of OregonMuse's old Book Threads, I thought I'd try something a bit different. Instead of just listing WHAT I'm reading, I'll include commentary as well. Unless otherwise specified, you can interpret this as an implied recommendation, though as always your mileage may vary.

Nightwatch by Sergei Lukyanenko

This a series of novellas packaged into a single volume. The stories in this book revolve around Anton, a mid-level functionary of the Night Watch, a mystical organization that keeps an eye on those who follow the path of Darkness. For a thousand years, the Night Watch and their counterpart the Day Watch have maintained an uneasy truce to avoid complete Armageddon if the two sides ever truly went to war. It's an interesting take on the urban fantasy genre, as the different books in the series focus on the varying factions that are dancing around each other, scheming, plotting, and striving to take down the other factions without ever declaring open war. The stories take place in Moscow for the most part, after the Soviet Union collapsed, so we get to see daily life of the citizens in that world.

Sandman Slim Book 5 - Kill City Blues by Richard Kadrey

Sandman Slim is no longer the new Lucifer, having relinquished that title to a sliver of God. In the process he lost the Qomrama Om Ya, a powerful weapon that can slay not only God but the Older Gods that came before Him. Those Older Gods are seeking to reclaim the universe that was stolen from them. Now James Stark--a.k.a. Sandman Slim--must recover the lost artifact before it can be used to destroy our universe...

As with the previous entries in the Sandman Slim series, Stark goes on a rampage around LA, kicking ass and chewing bubble gum, and he's all out of bubble gum. He's mostly unkillable, but certainly not invulnerable. He's accompanied by his usual cohort of colorful lunatics that assist him on his adventures, even when he doesn't want them tagging along for the ride. He's the type of anti-hero that is only marginally interested in keeping the current universe going, though a part of him would be content to let the whole world burn.

The Servants of Twilight by Dean Koontz

A doomsday cult seeks the death of an innocent six-year-old boy because they believe he's the Antichrist. His mom, of course, is not too thrilled about this. In typically Koontz style, there is at least one dog in the story. While the overall plot is fairly basic--a cult wants to kill a boy--there are also the standard Koontz hidden mysteries from the past that will return to haunt the main characters in some way. There is always some significant connection between the antagonists and protagonists. Enjoyable Koontz.

PREVIOUS SUNDAY MORNING BOOK THREAD - 07-28-24 (NOTE: Do NOT comment on old threads!)

Disclaimer: No Morons were harmed in the making of this Sunday Morning Book Thread. The county fair has been declared officially LAME by the American Brotherhood of Parking Attendants Local 252.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 09:00 AM

Comments

(Jump to bottom of comments)

1 Didn't read this week. Gotta find something.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 08:59 AM (0eaVi)

2 First?

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 08:59 AM (omVj0)

3 Aaaannnd, now to take the wife to work....

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 08:59 AM (0eaVi)

4 Good morning bookworms

Posted by: Skip at August 04, 2024 09:00 AM (fwDg9)

5 I did not read this week.

Posted by: rhennigantx at August 04, 2024 09:00 AM (gbOdA)

6 Tolle Lege - reading and probably halfway in
Dimitri Volkogonov's biography of Lenin
Getting the start of the Russian revolution that Lenin always wanted to start against the upper class, and will do it with a vengeance

Posted by: Skip at August 04, 2024 09:02 AM (fwDg9)

7 This particular picture is from the interior of the Oslo Public Library in Norway.

Was it built by IKEA?

Posted by: Helena Handbasket at August 04, 2024 09:02 AM (FnneF)

8 BOOKZZZZ

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 09:02 AM (Ka3bZ)

9 Morning, Book Folken!

I'm a third of the way into Clarke's Imperial Earth from 1976. It's a novel, about the tension between Terra and the colonies on the outer planets' moons, primarily Titan. Titan has an atmosphere (though it's methane and ammonia) and is much warmer than the scientists expected. It appears also to be a generational story, though the generations in question, the Makenzie (sic) family, are clones of each other -- the grandfather, who started the economic trade in hydrogen between Titan and Earth, his "son," and Duncan, the third gen clone. Fine details and description, as usual with Clarke.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 09:05 AM (omVj0)

10 I'm not a big fan of modern architecture. The library in the pic looks almost oppressively bright and open.
It could pass for a mall.

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 09:05 AM (Ka3bZ)

11
has some useful tips on how aspiring authors can categorize their own works into a genre that may be of interest to literary agents and editors.

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I've never had any interest in writing a book or being published. But after listening to many of those who do, it's not so much the genre that counts. It sounds like you have to represent yourself as a young woke female with a womanuscript, or it ain't happening for ypu.

Posted by: Yudhishthira's Dice at August 04, 2024 09:06 AM (0FoWg)

12 Hi, gang.

Reading this week? Finished Julie Phillips bio of Alice Sheldon/James Tiptree Jr. Not a lot else -- the eyes have been by turns watery/dry and subject to bad strain the last couple of weeks and it's only now starting to clear up.

Maybe I can catch up on some reading soon...

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 09:06 AM (q3u5l)

13 Volume I of Winston Churchill's The Second World War is a non-fiction example, and it's gripping reading even if you know what's going on. The failed opportunities, grim sense that Germany is building an insurmountable lead in military strength are things that bear close examination.
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Well worth the read, all of them. I feel that the first volume, 'The Gathering Storm' is the most insightful by far, and especially merits reading even if the others are not read.

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at August 04, 2024 09:06 AM (XeU6L)

14 Still reading Gambling With Armageddon: Nuclear Roulette from Hiroshima to the Cuban Missile Crisis by Martin J. Sherwin

reading about the evolution of the US nuclear weapons doctrine after WWII

apparently, it was Eisenhower who came up with the policy of having more H-bombs than anyone else, and a Strategic Air Command to rain nuclear hell on the Soviets and destroy them in a single afternoon

Posted by: Don Black at August 04, 2024 09:06 AM (/7KEl)

15 Aaaannnd, now to take the wife to work....
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 08:59 AM (0eaVi)
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How far is it to the kitchen to make a sammich?

Posted by: Biden's Dog sniffs a whole lotta malarkey, at August 04, 2024 09:07 AM (i5qaN)

16 Also from the library this week, a John D. MacDonald from the Fifties that I think I've read; I'm taking a chance on an early Lew Archer private-eye story from Ross MacDonald (I've never been a super fan of his work, good though it may be). And Dan Simmons's first novel, Song of Kali, which boldly starts by saying there is evil in the world and specifies Calcutta as a city that "should be expunged."

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 09:07 AM (omVj0)

17 and that's my comment fwiw
have a nice morning

Posted by: Don Black at August 04, 2024 09:07 AM (/7KEl)

18 I think we are in a similar place, unsure if this is a passing crisis that will be forgotten or a hinge point where we'll tell younger folks things that will seem fantastic to them.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at July 28, 2024 09:58 AM (llXky)

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Great analysis A.H. Lloyd, and the last paragraph made the little hairs on the back of my neck stand up

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 09:08 AM (Ka3bZ)

19 #6 Ebook, about 750 pages but think around 600 in text, the rest biography

Posted by: Skip at August 04, 2024 09:09 AM (fwDg9)

20 Eons since I read Simmons' Song of Kali, but that first page is one of the best openings ever.

(Another one I should revisit, along with Tiptree's stories and who knows how many more)

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 09:09 AM (q3u5l)

21 Y'know, I was just wondering about something,
and this looks like the place to ask

I wonder

wonder who

who-oo-ooh, who

who wrote the Book of Love?

G'morn, weird literati.

Posted by: mindful webworker - on chapter three at August 04, 2024 09:09 AM (tIWUF)

22 Morning, all.

I have spent the week plowing my way through Erotic Vagrancy: Everything about Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor by Roger Lewis.

It is most definitely a slog, even if you like Taylor and Burton, running at over 600 pages. It's also not a traditional biography, as Lewis admits - it's more of a sequence of events interspersed with Lewis' own comments about the movies they made, separately and together.

I was really looking forward to the chapter "I.T.A.L.Y.," which is ostensibly about the farrago of Cleopatra, but it told me nothing I didn't already know.

This is one of those books you either need to preview or flip through at the store or library - Lewis is a very idiosyncratic writer and you'll either like or hate the book.

https://tinyurl.com/mpauz467

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at August 04, 2024 09:10 AM (Q0kLU)

23 I'm early into "Shadow Warrior: The CIA Hero of a Hundred Unknown Battles," an autobiography by Felix Rodriguez with John Weisman. A bombastic title, to be sure, but maybe Rodriguez earned it. He opens with his encounter with the captive Che Guevara hours before Che's execution. He says that Washington wanted Che alive, but Bolivia wanted him dead -- so bang!

Rodriguez came to public notice during the Iran-Contra hearings. I remember someone mentioning his "workname" -- that's a LeCarre term, we would say "alias" or "cover name" -- Max Gomez and then disclosing his true name. Maybe that's why I bought the book; it's been so long ago that I don't remember.

Rodriguez, a Cuban exile, joined Cuban freedom fighters while a teenager, dropping out of high school to do so. That first effort went nowhere, so he finished school and then joined another group, this one run (poorly, he says -- management was devoid of Cubans) by the CIA. He was in an infiltration team in Cuba to prepare for an invasion that would lead to liberation. Unfortunately, that was at the Bay of Pigs. He fled to the Venezuelan Embassy. (How times have changed.) Ahead lies 20 years of covert operations.

(continued)

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 04, 2024 09:11 AM (p/isN)

24 Raconteur Press, who published a short story of mine in their All Will Burn: At All Costs anthology, has a "Wyrd West" call for submissions going. I have several stories in that genre. After reading the other AWB stories, I see the editors like stories with some action or movement -- these are not literary stories where "nothing happens." This suggests to me to send them the one of my weird West stories that opens with action and keeps it up.

The tough part is making sure my manuscript fits their submission format guidelines. They are specific: Times New Roman 12 pt., no headers or footers, format the title and byline as "Heading 1," use "..." for ellipses, etc.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 09:12 AM (omVj0)

25 It sounds like you have to represent yourself as a young woke female with a womanuscript, or it ain't happening for ypu.

Which is why I self-publish.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at August 04, 2024 09:12 AM (Q0kLU)

26 (From 23)

Rodriguez is still alive, so at least he's outlived Castro, whom he hated. But Cuba is still in chains, and the commies are gaining power here, so he probably is not happy.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 04, 2024 09:12 AM (p/isN)

27 I'm glad Perfesser's reading a lot of Koontz
I like his books

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 09:12 AM (Ka3bZ)

28 This is one of those books you either need to preview or flip through at the store or library - Lewis is a very idiosyncratic writer and you'll either like or hate the book.

https://tinyurl.com/mpauz467
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at August 04, 2024

***
A style like Tom Wolfe or Hunter S. Thompson?

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 09:12 AM (omVj0)

29 This week I read the original Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy radio scripts (with notes by Douglas Adams about the production). Great stuff. I never got to hear the radio version, and it's fascinating to see how it differed from the TV version and the novel. Things which we now consider key parts of the Hitchikerverse (towels, the Kill-o-Zap gun, etc.) were introduced very late or just as side gags. An entire plot thread about clone archaeologists vanished completely.

Fun trivia: Adams invented the Improbability Drive as a way to "lampshade" and justify all the wildly improbable things which happen in the story. Instead of trying to make them seem plausible, he just straight-out said to the listener/reader "this is an amazingly unlikely coincidence, but then this machine literally manufactures unlikely coincidences."

Oh, and Adams was having the most amazingly creative year since Newton went home from Cambridge to get away from the plague. While he was writing the Hitchiker radio series he also scripted the Dr. Who episodes "City of Death" and "The Pirate Planet" which are some of Western Civilization's highest achievements.

Recommended.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 09:13 AM (78a2H)

30 It's been a while, but it seems to me we've seen that library pic before. Kinda memorable.

I don't recall seeing those pants before, though, and I'm sure I'd remember them... unless I blocked them out.

Posted by: mindful webworker - memory can be tricky at August 04, 2024 09:13 AM (tIWUF)

31 Good Sunday morning, horde!

I read Nightwatch some years ago. One of the things I found interesting was that the night people keep an eye on the day people (in a policing sense), and vice versa.

Dreary, but interesting Russian fiction.

I didn't find Daywatch as interesting, and I didn't realize that there were more in the series after that.

Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 04, 2024 09:13 AM (OX9vb)

32 Who wrote the Book of Love?

From a quick title search in Amazon's kindle store, you can choose from Kelly Link, Meara Platt, or Kathleen McGowan.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 09:13 AM (q3u5l)

33 who wrote the Book of Love?

Posted by: mindful webworker - on chapter three

Do you have faith in God above?

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 09:13 AM (Ka3bZ)

34 I forgot all about looking for some Dean Koontz at the library. Need to remedy that on my next visit.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 09:14 AM (omVj0)

35 Both The Winds Of War and War And Remembrance were made into excellent mini series starring Robert Mitchum.
You can find them free of charge on the UToobz. But pace yourself. They total out to more than 40 hours of screen time.

Posted by: Quarter Twenty at August 04, 2024 09:14 AM (dg+HA)

36 I'm glad Perfesser's reading a lot of Koontz
I like his books
Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 09:12 AM (Ka3bZ)
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By this time, I've read enough Koontz to have a pretty good understanding of his style. I like it. The pacing is fairly quick, the characters are always interesting (both good guys and bad guys), and there is a fair amount of action. While they do have a lot of horrific elements in them, the aftermath is usually pretty upbeat.

Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel at August 04, 2024 09:14 AM (BpYfr)

37 Maximo gomez was the lead military commander in the revolution against the spanish he was defamed by lurchj john kerry

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 09:15 AM (PXvVL)

38 I'm not a big fan of modern architecture.

Something important was lost when architecture started to be seen as primarily a form of "art" instead of engineering. Mostpeople who piously spout "form follows function" don't actually believe it.

/mini-rant

Posted by: Oddbob at August 04, 2024 09:15 AM (/y8xj)

39 Antonio maceo was the mulatto guerilla leader hus name was taken up by a lefty outfit

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 09:16 AM (PXvVL)

40 Larry Correia has a great rant on x a few days ago about classics and required reading in HS

The gist of which was -assign fun books geared toward the individual kids rastes, there's no one book that they will all find interesting

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 09:16 AM (Ka3bZ)

41 Traveling cross country listening to the audiobook of "Bank Shot" by Donald Westlake. I actually found myself driving more conservatively, as if I was worried about being noticed by the cops. As if I were complicit in the criminal conspiracy unfolding in the story.

Posted by: Toad-0 at August 04, 2024 09:17 AM (gLYRU)

42 Aaaannnd, now to take the wife to work....
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 08:59 AM (0eaVi)
-
How far is it to the kitchen to make a sammich?
Posted by: Biden's Dog sniffs a whole lotta malarkey
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Reminds me of when my husband would ask me why I wasn't in the kitchen and point at me and say, "what is that on your feet?" I'd respond, I'm not pregnant either!
He has a moron sense of humor.

Posted by: lin-duh at August 04, 2024 09:17 AM (PZo5T)

43 While they do have a lot of horrific elements in them, the aftermath is usually pretty upbeat.
Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel

Yes, he is a comfort read to me

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 09:17 AM (Ka3bZ)

44 Been a while since I read Koontz, but he was always fun. There were a few early titles he did under pseudonyms (K R Dwyer, Brian Coffey) that I thought were dynamite suspense novels. Think he's reissued them under his own name since then. If you haven't already, check out The Face of Fear, Shattered, and The Voice of the Night.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 09:17 AM (q3u5l)

45 A style like Tom Wolfe or Hunter S. Thompson?
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 09:12 AM (omVj0)

A combination of both, I'd say, though filtered through a very upper-class English attitude (which is funny, because Lewis was born in South Wales).

I've also learned more about Taylor's sexual preferences than I ever cared to know.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at August 04, 2024 09:17 AM (Q0kLU)

46 Recently finished, after several major stops and starts, Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton. Cover blurb "savagely satirical thriller", given to me by my daughter.
The stops all came because this author loves her dialogue, and would often insert far too much of it to the detriment of moving the plot, which was fairly captivating, along.
So i kept at it, until I reached the end. Which was possibly the most dissatisfying ending I have ever reached. Maybe Ellie's got another job offer or something, and she decided "let's just kill them all".
And she did. Not recommended.

Posted by: From about That Time at August 04, 2024 09:18 AM (4780s)

47 The method of the slander the acciuntant for the cartel who got immunity for testifying for kerry

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 09:18 AM (PXvVL)

48 don't know where this one came from but I read Sherwood Smith's Tribute, a story set in an East Asian-like culture. It's book 1 of his Sagacious series and recounts the events of a musical Talent (note the capital) and her teacher as the empire changes. There's a demon as well, who derives her existence from music. Highly recommended.

I also read Sage Empress I, the second book, which concentrates on the events in a princess of the empire who inherits a charmed sword and has to adapt to events, again as the politics of the empire deteriorate.

And The Attenbury Emeralds, from Dorothy Sayers and Jill Paton Walsh. If you're a Peter Wimsey fan, this one is worth getting into.

Posted by: yara at August 04, 2024 09:18 AM (TPDHd)

49 Wolfus, Re: format: you'll find that spelled out somewhere on the internet for both Times New Roman and Courier. The text on the page explains what's required. You just print out the page and have it to refer to.

Re the swiftness of progress: a tech installing Starlink said that the first i-phone came out in 2008. That's not even 20 years ago.

Posted by: Wenda at August 04, 2024 09:19 AM (ZDr7Y)

50 Been perusing "Ancient Faces, Mummy Portraits From Roman Egypt" edited by Susan Walker. Some of the portraits are so life like you feel like you could start a conversation with them. I love the little details. The hairdos, necklaces, earrings and clothing. All in all a fascinating book.

Posted by: Tuna at August 04, 2024 09:20 AM (oaGWv)

51 I liked Tailchaser's Song a lot, so I should check out Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn.

Still slogging through the ebook collection of myths and fairy tales I mentioned last time. I'm in the Lang color fairy books now, which are generally easy enough to get through, but sometimes it's hard to be inspired to grab my ereader.

It's also hard to be inspired to spend 15 hours of my weekend working, but I have so many meetings that I'm not sure when else I can do my actual work...

Posted by: Mrs. Peel at August 04, 2024 09:20 AM (Y+AMd)

52 Mostpeople who piously spout "form follows function" don't actually believe it.

------

Became very popular during brutalism and afterwards.

Funny how the butt ugly buildings they made are less functional and durable than the ones before, and frequently get demolished simply *because* of their ugliness, huh?

People who say that form follows function usually achieve neither.

I think it's usually just code for "let's do this thing on the cheap. Nice and lazy, too. Just tell 'em it's cutting edge, and all that jazz."

Posted by: Yudhishthira's Dice at August 04, 2024 09:21 AM (0FoWg)

53 A generation later another polished kingpin john riberts defamed rick prado in a memoir ghosted by a dog trainer reporter accusing him of a being a hitman for a local miami figure

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 09:21 AM (PXvVL)

54 Been a while since I read Koontz, but he was always fun. There were a few early titles he did under pseudonyms (K R Dwyer, Brian Coffey) that I thought were dynamite suspense novels. Think he's reissued them under his own name since then. If you haven't already, check out The Face of Fear, Shattered, and The Voice of the Night.
Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 09:17 AM (q3u5l)
---
*sigh*

Welp. Just spent some more money....

Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel at August 04, 2024 09:21 AM (BpYfr)

55 Rick had gone from the green berets to the counter terror center to blackwater

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 09:22 AM (PXvVL)

56 Good morning. I've been reading but not book threading. My choices lately have been stuff by Michael Lewis. The Michael Lewis of "The Blind Side," "Moneyball" and "The Big Short."

However, I've been diving into his books on finance more and more and let's just say the corruption on Wall Street is staggering. But, while Mr. Lewis does a great job of chronicling the astounding cupidity and stupidity of Wall Street, i'm not sure he really steps back and sees the big picture lessons of his books.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (tT6L1) at August 04, 2024 09:22 AM (tT6L1)

57 "Form Follows Function" is one of those buzzword phrases that nobody actually believes. What possible function could require a Frank Gehry building?

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 09:23 AM (78a2H)

58 'Just spent some more money...'

Sorry about that, Perfessor -- not trying to bankrupt any fellow hordelings.

But if it helps any, I know what you're going through...

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 09:23 AM (q3u5l)

59 'Surprised by Joy' by C.S. Lewis is also good if you are interested in his upbringing. I didn't know he was wounded during WWI.

Posted by: dantesed at August 04, 2024 09:23 AM (Oy/m2)

60 Koontz has several books in kindle unlimited.

Posted by: lin-duh at August 04, 2024 09:23 AM (PZo5T)

61 @41 --

I got "Bank Shot" a few weeks ago. Two more and I'll have all of the Dortmunder books except the last ine, "Get Real," which I found dissatisfying and not worthy of remaining on my shelves.

I love online ordering.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 04, 2024 09:24 AM (p/isN)

62 'Just spent some more money...'

Sorry about that, Perfessor -- not trying to bankrupt any fellow hordelings.

But if it helps any, I know what you're going through...

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 09:23 AM (q3u5l)
---
No worries! I enjoy his books, so it's not a problem. Other than the fact I will have to find shelf space for them...

Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel at August 04, 2024 09:24 AM (BpYfr)

63 The Winds of War sequel, War and Remembrance, contains a great analogy? metaphor? I don't know, onomatopoeia? about the Battle of Leyte Gulf. The sea was filled with American ships filled with cutting edge technology and yet a single man's error almost lead to disaster. Technology won't save us. We will still be the masters of our own fate.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, I got 99 problems but Vance ain't one at August 04, 2024 09:25 AM (L/fGl)

64 No he hasnt he was written at least one hagiography of obama and an attack on the trump cabinet

The big short was interesting but incomplete in many respects as to what drove the subprime bubble

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 09:26 AM (PXvVL)

65 Birnam Wood, Eleanor Catton. Probably should have mentioned the plot. Set in New Zealand.
Sustainable farming co-op specializing in planting food gardens on other peoples property get involved with billionaire American drone manufacturer. Everybody dies.

Posted by: From about That Time at August 04, 2024 09:26 AM (4780s)

66 I do remember C.S. Lewis mentioning that he preferred service in the trenches in WWI to the boarding school he attended a few years earlier in England. In the Army, at least, nobody had to pretend to be enjoying it.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 09:26 AM (78a2H)

67 I read Barons: Money, Power and the Corruption of America's Food Industry by Austin Frederick. Despite the author's far-left slant, the stories of how seven companies in our food chain came to dominate their respective industries is very interesting. How their dominance affects our communities and what we eat is also edifying. This book gives one a new perspective on one of life's basic necessities.

Posted by: Zoltan at August 04, 2024 09:27 AM (pmNv2)

68 A fun (in a macabre way) look at the cycles of history is "A Canticle for Liebowitz." After a thousand years of a nuclear winter, which sends most of humanity into primitive, dark-ages sort of existence, man becomes technological again, only to blow up the world again.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 09:27 AM (+H2BX)

69 Yes captain told me about eleanor cattons magnus opus

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 09:28 AM (PXvVL)

70
* scans webcams and other surveillance devices *

* records lack-of-pants or leopard skin print onesies in Permanent Records *

* Prepares summary report for Bob *

Posted by: Bob from NSA's AI Assistant at August 04, 2024 09:30 AM (g07/a)

71 I watched the video. Now I am suffering from genre dysphoria.

But it's okay, I picked up a Harry Potter book and am getting some Hermione therapy

Posted by: muldoon at August 04, 2024 09:30 AM (uCfKO)

72 I don't know that Leyte was an example of the Americans trying to rely on technology. After all, the Japanese showed up with the most powerful battleships ever built.

Personally I think that the battle off Samar was when Japan really lost the war. Until then they could console themselves with the fantasy that their "warrior spirit" and raw courage could overcome American material advantages. But Samar showed that Americans were just as capable of mad suicidal bravery as any kamikaze.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 09:30 AM (78a2H)

73 Found this pic in an article about the "5 best public libraries from around the world in 2021." This particular picture is from the interior of the Oslo Public Library in Norway.

==

Deichman bibliotek ! I like it !

Posted by: runner at August 04, 2024 09:31 AM (V13WU)

74 I am reading "The Last Gentleman" by Walker Percy. Somewhere I read that it is "the great American novel."

Parts of it seem familiar, but I don't remember reading the whole thing. Oh well, I got a cheap download to my Kindle Fire. I will continue.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 09:31 AM (+H2BX)

75 Finally finished People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks. It purports to be based on something true but that is pretty irrelevant to what makes this a great book. The story is about the origins and travels through history of an illustrated copy of the Haggadah, the telling of the story of Passover. What is unique is that this particular ancient book is thought to be the first with illustrations.
The person tasked with repairing this ancient book sets out to discover the history of every clue in order to do a perfect restoration. Tracing an insect wing, a wine stain, some salt crystals, silver clasps all flash back to a period in time.
Jews, Christians, Muslims all play a role. The people jump out of the page and the history of the times feels real.
Highly recommended.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 09:31 AM (t/2Uw)

76 Shelf space was the main reason why the ultra-nifty Mrs Some Guy and I moved to ebooks. Bezos may be a twit, but imho he bought his way into heaven with the Kindle.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 09:32 AM (q3u5l)

77 Yay Book Thread!

Been too busy doing class prep for the fall semester to do any pleasure reading, but I did have a nice chat this week with a former student who wants to self-publish. I also re-read "Learning in War-time" by CSL before adding it to my students' reading assignments for next week--kind of like A. H. Lloyd, I get the feeling that we're at the "deep breath before the plunge" stage, and I wanted to head off any comments about "Why are we wasting our time studying the arts when the world's falling apart?"

Oh, and apropos of book threads past, a friend of mine recently told me that he's contributed an essay to a scholarly book about... Star Trek tie-in novels. Perfesser, if you'd like the details, I'll try to find them again and send them to you.

Posted by: Elisabeth G. Wolfe at August 04, 2024 09:32 AM (m7xHQ)

78 Disclaimer: No Morons were harmed in the making of this Sunday Morning Book Thread.

What about those of us expecting to see a purple hat complete with faux-tiger band atop Mr. Squirrel, who are now spiraling into angst?

Posted by: Duncanthrax at August 04, 2024 09:35 AM (g07/a)

79 The story is about the origins and travels through history of an illustrated copy of the Haggadah, the telling of the story of Passover.

Which reminds me, the local printing museum has a new Biblical display which I need to visit.

https://tinyurl.com/4w3mwawc

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 04, 2024 09:35 AM (Q0kLU)

80 Form Follows Function" is one of those buzzword phrases that nobody actually believes.

==

It's a principle that lays in the foundation of every skyscraper (including the first one) ever built.

Posted by: runner at August 04, 2024 09:36 AM (V13WU)

81 Oh, and apropos of book threads past, a friend of mine recently told me that he's contributed an essay to a scholarly book about... Star Trek tie-in novels. Perfesser, if you'd like the details, I'll try to find them again and send them to you.
Posted by: Elisabeth G. Wolfe at August 04, 2024 09:32 AM (m7xHQ)
----
Sure, sounds great!

Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel at August 04, 2024 09:36 AM (BpYfr)

82 “ See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.”

1 John 3:1

Posted by: Marcus T at August 04, 2024 09:37 AM (ZSrej)

83 I mentioned the computer game Nightingale before as having an interesting literary component. I have found a mobile game that takes the concept even further.

Called Sherlock. A match-3 and hidden object game in which Holmes and Watson find that Moriarty has found a way to enter classics of literature and bring their resources into the real world so they are trying to stop him. The setting is an absolutely gorgeous library and the art and characters are all attractive,which I appreciate.

It's free to play with in-game purchases and ads for other games from the same company. It is quite playable without purchases as long as one can withstand a certain amount of frustration. I have made less than $10 in purchases and no longer get any ads at all.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 04, 2024 09:37 AM (s9EYN)

84 What about those of us expecting to see a purple hat complete with faux-tiger band atop Mr. Squirrel, who are now spiraling into angst?
Posted by: Duncanthrax at August 04, 2024 09:35 AM (g07/a)
----
I guess I should change the standard disclaimer to "physically harmed." Emotional harm costs extra.

Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel at August 04, 2024 09:37 AM (BpYfr)

85 When we see the trainwrecks that major media companies are making of our favorite "franchises" and characters, I think we all need to remember how C.S. Lewis reacted to a similar situation a century ago. "Well, Tollers, if they won't write the kind of books we want to read, we shall have to write them ourselves."

That conversation spawned the Space trilogy and The Lord of the Rings.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 09:38 AM (78a2H)

86 That Alyssa Matesic video - feel like I need to listen to it again, slowed down just a notch. And yes, her delivery is a bit monotonous. Also has a touch of vocal fry that creeps in annoyingly.

Cute, though.

Posted by: mindful webworker - science friction at August 04, 2024 09:38 AM (tIWUF)

87 Oh, and apropos of book threads past, a friend of mine recently told me that he's contributed an essay to a scholarly book about... Star Trek tie-in novels. Perfesser, if you'd like the details, I'll try to find them again and send them to you.
Posted by: Elisabeth G. Wolfe at August 04, 2024 09:32 AM (m7xHQ)
----
Sure, sounds great!
Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel at August 04, 2024 09:36 AM (BpYfr)
====

Nothing including Wesley Crusher, of course.

Posted by: San Franpsycho at August 04, 2024 09:38 AM (JvZF+)

88 I'd like to extend my thanks to the *cough*forgotten*cough* person who recommended Forrest McDonald's Alexander Hamilton: A Biography a few weeks ago. I know that not all of you would be interested enough in the topic to want to read yet another bio, but if you are a fan, trust me, it's worth it. Rather than focusing on his life as such, as in the excellent bio by Ron Chernow, this is much more about the economics and financing of the nascent US federal government. For those perceptive individuals among us who are Hamilton fans, it was a wonderful discussion of his policies and the various philosophical approaches and philosophers that formed them, especially Hume. I anticipate reading a lot more of McDonald's prolific output. He was a serious scholar, sadly now dead.

I note that the few negative reviews on Amazon claim that he is only a Hamilton fanboy, but they're all Jefferson apologists and are not to be taken seriously.

Posted by: Archimedes at August 04, 2024 09:38 AM (xCA6C)

89 By this time, I've read enough Koontz to have a pretty good understanding of his style. I like it. The pacing is fairly quick, the characters are always interesting (both good guys and bad guys), and there is a fair amount of action. While they do have a lot of horrific elements in them, the aftermath is usually pretty upbeat.
Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel

He is generally classified as a horror author but, if so, his books are very pro life horror books. I don't mean anti-abortion (although I suspect that is true, too). I mean they are not just splatter fests. One book of his I quite liked was One Day Away From Heaven. Although it is a full blown action /horror novel, it is filled with humor. A fugitive alien attempts to fit in to our society which he doesn't understand.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, I got 99 problems but Vance ain't one at August 04, 2024 09:38 AM (L/fGl)

90 A rambling comment. I get daily BookBub emails with many cheap Kindle books for free or low cost. I try many of them but am constantly frustrated by the trivial plots and infantile writing. I start one and it has some interest even though it is filled with stock characters and a mundane plot. At some point I have to decide if I want to waste anymore time on the story. I am old school and hate to not finish a book but lately I am bailing out of these type books more often. When you have read really good writing (like Raymond Chandler) it is hard to read the poor stuff. Thanks for reading my rant.

Posted by: zogger at August 04, 2024 09:40 AM (HGKOZ)

91 we see the trainwrecks that major media companies are making of our favorite "franchises"

-
A headline from today.

Woke Disney Cuts More Jobs As Company Struggles, Is Now "Shrinking"

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, I got 99 problems but Vance ain't one at August 04, 2024 09:41 AM (L/fGl)

92 I agree with Vmom about the library up top. I don't think I've ever seen an escalator in a library.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 09:42 AM (t/2Uw)

93 Ace says he is reading LOTR. Maybe we can get a review if he ever finishes it?

Posted by: fd at August 04, 2024 09:42 AM (vFG9F)

94 The Winds of War sequel, War and Remembrance, contains a great analogy? metaphor? I don't know, onomatopoeia? about the Battle of Leyte Gulf. The sea was filled with American ships filled with cutting edge technology and yet a single man's error almost lead to disaster. Technology won't save us. We will still be the masters of our own fate.

Halsey's removal was seriously contemplated for that error, but TPTB decided it would be too dispiriting for the fleet. He ended up as a five-star fleet admiral of the United States Navy.

Posted by: Archimedes at August 04, 2024 09:44 AM (xCA6C)

95 There's a fairly obvious reason why libraries like elevators instead of escalators. Ever try to get a shelving cart up an escalator?

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 09:44 AM (78a2H)

96 A friend gives me books after he has read them. He gave me Brad Thor's "Dead Fall." I just could not get into it. After watching "Jack Ryan" and "Reacher", I just want all these CIA guys shot in the head.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 09:44 AM (+H2BX)

97 I am old school and hate to not finish a book but lately I am bailing out of these type books more often. When you have read really good writing (like Raymond Chandler) it is hard to read the poor stuff. Thanks for reading my rant.
Posted by: zogger at August 04, 2024

***
Seconded. I don't do Kindle and I buy few books unless I know the author's work, or have read them and want them for my library. Most of my stuff comes from a couple of local public or university libraries. Free means I have lower expectations; if I've spent $15 or more for a book I want it to be good.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 09:44 AM (omVj0)

98 Anyway, I mention reading Michael Lewis because I thought it tied in with the "inflection point in history" theme of the thread.

I see Wall Street as a dancing drunk on the edge of a precipice while people stand by watching and waiting for the inevitable disaster.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (tT6L1) at August 04, 2024 09:45 AM (tT6L1)

99 Yay book thread!

I'm about halfway through The Big Sleep and the differences with the movie are now quite stark. Without the Hayes Code, Chandler can be pretty blunt and so Marlowe comments on the nude photos Carmen, makes it clear that there was a rent boy at the house on Laverne Terrace, etc. I can see why the film elided past that and became more of a Bogey and Bacall vehicle because that's what the public wanted. And it's really good for that.

I've watched it repeatedly and the plot is besides the point, it's just fun to watch the set-pieces with immersive characters. That's part of why modern movies suck - no actual actors in them.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 09:45 AM (llXky)

100 Friction genres:

The resistance to relative linear movement of two solid surfaces. Types of friction include dry, fluid, lubricated, skin, and internal.

To quote Wm. Shakespeare:

"To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub..."

Posted by: muldoon at August 04, 2024 09:45 AM (uCfKO)

101 Life is too short to read crap. That is why I love classics.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 09:45 AM (+H2BX)

102 By the way, when I saw the top photo I thought the Perfesser was going to reference Logan's Run, because that looks a lot like the movie set.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 09:46 AM (llXky)

103 Speaking of epics in the thread, I've noticed that each book in Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive series has a *major* twist that changes the understanding of the world for both the characters and the reader. One effect is that each book has enough of a conclusion that it would be possible to set the series down and be fairly satisfied even if it weren't possible to get the subsequent books.

It is a Cosmere series though, so I understood some pretty important characters and actions *much* better after reading Warbreaker and refreshing my knowledge of the Mistborn world through reading The Lost Metal.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 04, 2024 09:46 AM (s9EYN)

104 A rambling comment. I get daily BookBub emails with many cheap Kindle books for free or low cost. I try many of them but am constantly frustrated by the trivial plots and infantile writing. I start one and it has some interest even though it is filled with stock characters and a mundane plot. At some point I have to decide if I want to waste anymore time on the story. I am old school and hate to not finish a book but lately I am bailing out of these type books more often. When you have read really good writing (like Raymond Chandler) it is hard to read the poor stuff. Thanks for reading my rant.
Posted by: zogger at August 04, 2024 09:40 AM (HGKOZ)
----
Remember Sturgeon's Law: 90% of everything is crap.

Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel at August 04, 2024 09:47 AM (BpYfr)

105 Update: I'm almost through with "The Coast Watchers." At this point, the Japanese have expanded their efforts to hunt down the watchers, but the watchers are a crafty bunch. The key is the allegiance of the native population; if the Japanese could obtain assistance from the islanders, then the watchers were in peril. Other natives were fiercely loyal to the watchers and became brutal jungle fighters who counter-ambushed Japanese patrols. Also, the watchers helped rescue a young lieutenant whose PT boat was struck by an IJN cruiser; apparently he gained political prominence in the 1960s but lost his head over some business in Dallas.

Posted by: PabloD at August 04, 2024 09:47 AM (nbhYK)

106 OK, folks, think I'll make a cup of tea and sit on the porch for a while. Hope you all have a lovely weekend.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 04, 2024 09:47 AM (Q0kLU)

107 Thank you Perfessor.

I'm currently busy living the Forgotten Realms books via "free" video game. I'm quickly finding out that "free" is not exactly free. Also they want you to have friends and for some sort of "party". Well there is only one seat in my Bar and I have no friends.
So, not much reading this week.

"Oh, and Adams was having the most amazingly creative year since Newton went home from Cambridge to get away from the plague. While he was writing the Hitchiker radio series he also scripted the Dr. Who episodes "City of Death" and "The Pirate Planet" which are some of Western Civilization's highest achievements."

Recommended.
Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 09:13 AM (78a2H)

I really truly believe that way back in 1983 had I not received a hacked version of the game Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy for the Apple IIc I probably would not have developed my love of reading.
A DnD player friend refused to tell me how to get past one part and made me find it in the books. Whithin days I was immersed into the world created by DA.
Somewhere around here I have the cassettes of the original radio shows. Used to drive out into the sticks and listen while stargazing.

Posted by: Reforger at August 04, 2024 09:48 AM (xcIvR)

108 Big black tank cat Stirling won't stay off my lap

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 09:48 AM (omVj0)

109 There is a version of "The Big Sleep" with Robert Mitchum, set in England. Jimmy Stewart plays the role of Gen. Sternwood. And there is nudity.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 09:48 AM (+H2BX)

110 I started reading Hemingway’s “A Farewell To Arms”, that was published on the day of the ‘29 stock market crash, in keeping with today’s topic. It’s based on his experience as an ambulance driver in WWI, as many here are probably aware. He wrote the ending 39 times, and the edition I’m reading has all versions, encouraging me to be more painstaking in my own writing.

Posted by: Norrin Radd, sojourner of the spaceways at August 04, 2024 09:49 AM (hsWtj)

111 I went back to my pile of recently-purchased used-kids-novels by Jim Kjelgaard. This time I went straight to his most iconic novel, "Big Red." It stars a teenager, the sone of a backwoods hillbilly who lives on the edge of a mountain-ranch owned by some rich guy. The teenager does odd jobs for the ranch, and eventually the rich guy notices that the kid is good with dogs, so he entrusts the teen with his prize-winning Irish Setting show-dog, the titular Red. The teen then proceeds to teach Red how to be a working/hunting dog, in addition to just a show-dog.

The book is oddly paced. The first third is a typical narrative, that introduces the character and sets up the status quo. But then it turns into a series of single-chapter vignettes as we follow the kid and his dog as they go through the daily life of a backwoods hillbilly. They get into a series of scrapes (the backwoods are dangerous) but get out of them because of the sheer awesomeness of Red, or (occasionally) the cleverness of our teenage hero.

(continued, because I got cut off)

Posted by: Castle Guy at August 04, 2024 09:49 AM (Lhaco)

112 When we see the trainwrecks that major media companies are making of our favorite "franchises" and characters, I think we all need to remember how C.S. Lewis reacted to a similar situation a century ago. "Well, Tollers, if they won't write the kind of books we want to read, we shall have to write them ourselves."

That conversation spawned the Space trilogy and The Lord of the Rings.
Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 09:38 AM (78a2H)
---
I'm doing my part. I wrote the Man of Destiny series to "correct" the Star Wars prequels. B.O. Wolf was a reaction against all the Beowulf films that totally sucked.

And Long Live Death was to correct the record in regards to the Spanish Civil War. Wall of Men was written is a primer for US officers who may have to plan vs China. And so on.

The other books were just for fun.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 09:49 AM (llXky)

113 *Halsey's removal was seriously contemplated for that error, but TPTB decided it would be too dispiriting for the fleet.*

I think passive voice is a fifteen yard penalty in the book thread.

Posted by: But I'm just as guilty as anyone at August 04, 2024 09:49 AM (dg+HA)

114 I'm with zogger and Wolfus when it comes to finishing books any more. I've had some I wanted to throw across the room, they were so stupid.I started one series, first book was okay, mystery, second was pornographic 50 shades of gray that happened to involve a dead body. I circular filed it, it annoyed me so badly.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (tT6L1) at August 04, 2024 09:50 AM (tT6L1)

115 Concerning the topic change as a catalyst for stories, I'd include From Here to Eternity. I can't stand the book myself, but it's a prime example of a story set on the edge of massive change.

Posted by: Archimedes at August 04, 2024 09:50 AM (xCA6C)

116 This may be an unpopular opinion, but I think Halsey was much better as a rear admiral than a full admiral. He was at his best commanding what we would now call a "carrier strike group" but with someone more level-headed above him to tell him where and when to fight.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 09:50 AM (78a2H)

117 Ace says he is reading LOTR. Maybe we can get a review if he ever finishes it?
Posted by: fd

********

Don't tell him there's a volcano scene...

...so we can tell if he's faking it.

Posted by: muldoon at August 04, 2024 09:50 AM (uCfKO)

118 I really liked The Big Sleep book but you don't get how absolutely brilliant it is until you read the last couple of pages.
The movie was boring. I never got why Bogart was considered a sex symbol and never would have had any idea what was happening plot wise if I hadn't read the book.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 09:50 AM (t/2Uw)

119 Concerning the topic change as a catalyst for stories, I'd include From Here to Eternity. I can't stand the book myself, but it's a prime example of a story set on the edge of massive change.
Posted by: Archimedes at August 04, 2024 09:50 AM (xCA6C)
---
The movie is brilliant, and has the same vibe. Full immersion into peacetime military venality and corruption and then war happens.

And the bit about the absentee company commander and everything run by the NCOs rings so true.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 09:51 AM (llXky)

120 Who is Wm. Shakespeare? Is he related to William?

Posted by: Catch Thirty-Thr33 at August 04, 2024 09:51 AM (8sMut)

121 OK, folks, think I'll make a cup of tea and sit on the porch for a while. Hope you all have a lovely weekend.
-------

This is probably the best advice for anyone, if you really think about it.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 09:52 AM (TBJqQ)

122 The movie that contains the scene with Dorothy Malone in the bookstore may have many flaws, but boring it isn't.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 09:52 AM (78a2H)

123 Posted by: Weak Geek at August 04, 2024 09:11 AM (p/isN)

Does he say *why* the US wanted Che alive? Good on Bolivia for offing the bastard.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 04, 2024 09:52 AM (s9EYN)

124 The article on the 5 libraries had some nice pics, but it seemed to me that for all the space those buildings had, there sure didn't seem to be a huge amount of it allocated to books.

Worked 9 years in the bookstore, 14 as a librarian, and the rest in IT; loved library work, but I don't think I'd be a good fit for the job these days.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 09:53 AM (q3u5l)

125 Happy Sunday!

>>This is a good reminder that our tastes and interests change and mature as we grow older and--presumably--wiser.

Yes!! I read Wuthering Heights for the first time in my 40's, and wow, hated it. Must have to be an adolescent girl to find anything to swoon over.

Posted by: Lizzy at August 04, 2024 09:53 AM (Pijte)

126 We Americans seem to think that either Sept. 1, 1939 or Dec. 7, 1941 are the big dates, but it actually started in fits and starts. Yes, Poland, Germany, England and France were at war in 1939, but Italy and the Balkans were at peace. The Soviets attacked Finland, in the winter, but that war never linked to the other one. (Con't)

There are a number of parts of WWII that aren't really covered in your average American schooling - the Soviet invasion of Finland a big one, but most American schools also gloss over the fact the invasion of Poland was by Germany and the USSR.

Another interesting part is the Japanese invasion of Manchuria (then China proper later) after the Mukden incident which started well before the war in Europe.

Posted by: 18-1 at August 04, 2024 09:54 AM (oZhjI)

127 The movie was boring. I never got why Bogart was considered a sex symbol and never would have had any idea what was happening plot wise if I hadn't read the book.
Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 09:50 AM (t/2Uw)
---
It's something to chill out to. Snappy dialogue, evocative music.

I can't speak for the ladies, but guys like Bogart because he's not much to look at but can dominate a room. And gets hot chicks. The ultimate male fantasy.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 09:54 AM (llXky)

128 >>OK, folks, think I'll make a cup of tea and sit on the porch for a while. Hope you all have a lovely weekend.

Coffee, on the patio, watchin' birdies!

Posted by: Lizzy at August 04, 2024 09:54 AM (Pijte)

129 (Continued from 101, commentary on "Big Red" by Jim Kjelgaard)

The ending of the book felt a little weak, because it was just another vignette. Sure, it was a more epic vignette, that tied back to an event at the start of the book, and altered the status quo of our main characters....but it was still just a vignette. There narrative wasn't driving towards an inevitable conclusion, we just hit the end after a series of unrelated episodes.

The vignette format may be okay in a kids book (just keep the kid's attention for a single nearly-stand-alone chapter at a time) but it was a little unsatisfying for me.

Given that, I dove straight into the sequel, "Irish Red," which is a nice continuation, but is still narratively choppy. I'll soon start "Outlaw Red" which will likely be more of the same.

Posted by: Castle Guy at August 04, 2024 09:55 AM (Lhaco)

130 I hated "Wuthering Heights" too. I read it a few years ago.

Heathcliff was such an asshole. I makes a fortune in America. He should have written Cindy off and found a good American wife.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 09:55 AM (+H2BX)

131 I've never had any interest in writing a book or being published. But after listening to many of those who do, it's not so much the genre that counts. It sounds like you have to represent yourself as a young woke female with a womanuscript, or it ain't happening for ypu.
Posted by: Yudhishthira's Dice at August 04, 2024 09:06 AM (0FoWg)

Back.

That is correct, it appears, if you're looking for a Big 5 contract. Indie publishing is open to everyone. You may or may not get the sales numbers, but it seems those who read you want to read you, and not buying your book for others to see you with it.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 09:55 AM (0eaVi)

132 I am at Cape Cod, so I'm reading old novels by Joseph Lincoln. Humorous stories about Cape characters set in the early 1900s. Very light, but enjoyable books. I also have Hillbily Elegy in my beach bag, I'll get to it soon enough.

Posted by: Lincolntf at August 04, 2024 09:55 AM (x+zNV)

133 35 Both The Winds Of War and War And Remembrance were made into excellent mini series starring Robert Mitchum.
You can find them free of charge on the UToobz. But pace yourself. They total out to more than 40 hours of screen time.
Posted by: Quarter Twenty at August 04, 2024 09:14 AM (dg+HA)

The former contains a segment that I like to call The Fifteen Minutes of Television that Previewed The Next Forty Plus Years of My Life. I may not have understood what was going on as a young boy seeing it, but I would, and sooner than anyone would have expected. The latter is one of Those Moments to which I referred to earlier, remember, it was so massive, they broke it into two: shown in November 1988 and May 1989.

I used both miniseries extensively in my history classes when we got to WWII.

Posted by: Catch Thirty-Thr33 at August 04, 2024 09:56 AM (8sMut)

134 They wanted info on fidels deliberations the bolivian werent having that the real tanya an east german killed the onsite commander who was ambassador to france

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 09:57 AM (PXvVL)

135 Aaaannnd, now to take the wife to work....
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 08:59 AM (0eaVi)
-

How far is it to the kitchen to make a sammich?
Posted by: Biden's Dog sniffs a whole lotta malarkey, at August 04, 2024 09:07 AM (i5qaN)

She's from a provincial fam in Mindanao, they never had need to drive. She's too adobo to drive because someone hit us once. Besides, she needs to go to Seafood City to get the fixins!

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 09:59 AM (0eaVi)

136 There are a number of parts of WWII that aren't really covered in your average American schooling - the Soviet invasion of Finland a big one, but most American schools also gloss over the fact the invasion of Poland was by Germany and the USSR.

Posted by: 18-1 at August 04, 2024 09:54 AM (oZhjI)
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There was a halting, gradual process of conflicts erupting and the global order collapsing. The Japanese takeover of Manchuria in 1933 was followed by Italy's grab for Ethiopia in 1935. Spain erupts in 1936, and looks like it could spill over so desperate efforts were made to contain a conflict that nevertheless involved all the major Western powers.

Japan wasn't involved, but that was because she was slicing China apart, and threatening the international concessions. Then the Rhineland, Sudetenland, Marco Polo Bridge Incident...drip by drip, it just starts to crumble.

We tend to think of wars as sort of hermetically sealed events, but it's a continuous string and people in one war go on to fight in the next.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 09:59 AM (llXky)

137 Carnegie built a lot of libraries in the USA. I should do a quick dive on that, back when the rich didn't try to emulate the poor in their habits, so to speak. I remember a couple "educators" back in Junior high and high school really had a sore spot with the "Robber Baron" age, and how horrible it was America produced such wealthy industrialists and such. Sure, Jan.

I lived in a town that had an east/west river divide and the city fathers couldn't decide where the new library was going to be built. Carnegie paid for two libraries, one on each side of the city. I don't know how often that happened. Or whether any Carnegie libraries are still in use.

One was torn down, I think. The other, a nice building, is law offices. The original post office is now the library. Our original county courthouse, a wonderful architectural gem, was by the 1960s "too small" and they razed it completely. Same with all the schools, they were built to last and replaced by obscenely expensive modern buildings that one suspects won't last but a fraction.

I've been in bars and restaurants in Europe that predate the formation of the United States by 300 years.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 09:59 AM (TBJqQ)

138 I think I can forgive Herman Wouk writing the German characters as he did. He was, after all, an Orthodox Jew. So I am going to cut him some slack.

Posted by: Catch Thirty-Thr33 at August 04, 2024 09:59 AM (8sMut)

139 Fidel considered che expendable thats why he let him slough off to bolivia

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 10:00 AM (PXvVL)

140 Thanks for reading my rant.
Posted by: zogger at August 04, 2024 09:40 AM (HGKOZ)

That's exactly why I abandoned Book Bub!

So many good recommendations here, I can't even keep up with them. I don't need the substandard fare I found on BookBub.

Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 04, 2024 10:00 AM (OX9vb)

141 The movie was boring. I never got why Bogart was considered a sex symbol and never would have had any idea what was happening plot wise if I hadn't read the book.
Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 09:50 AM (t/2Uw)
---
It's something to chill out to. Snappy dialogue, evocative music.

I can't speak for the ladies, but guys like Bogart because he's not much to look at but can dominate a room. And gets hot chicks. The ultimate male fantasy.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd
Exactly. Male fantasy. It is probably why I enjoyed the book as I could imagine Marlowe.
I actually do that a lot when reading something. Who would I cast as the leading characters?

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 10:00 AM (t/2Uw)

142 I start one and it has some interest even though it is filled with stock characters and a mundane plot.

You gotta wonder how many of those are "written" partially or completely by AI. I'm sure the answer is greater than zero, maybe much greater.

Posted by: Oddbob at August 04, 2024 10:00 AM (/y8xj)

143 Posted by: Mrs. Peel at August 04, 2024 09:20 AM (Y+AMd)

It's been quite a while but I remember really liking Tailchaser's Song as well.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 04, 2024 10:00 AM (s9EYN)

144 Thx "Professor". The Coast Watchers seems like a good read. I'll have to pick that up. As I recall it was a coast watcher who picked up the fake American signal about Midway having problems with it's water desalinization plant.

Posted by: Smell the Glove at August 04, 2024 10:00 AM (+Fe1w)

145 I wonder

wonder who

who-oo-ooh, who

who wrote the Book of Love?

G'morn, weird literati.
Posted by: mindful webworker - on chapter three at August 04, 2024 09:09 AM (tIWUF)

Guy upstairs.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 10:01 AM (0eaVi)

146 Web griffin took a different route in his special forces series on the same topic

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 10:01 AM (PXvVL)

147 That's exactly why I abandoned Book Bub!

So many good recommendations here, I can't even keep up with them. I don't need the substandard fare I found on BookBub.
Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 04, 2024 10:00 AM (OX9vb)
----
Yep. Same here. I tried BookBub for a while, but I never found anything that grabbed my attention. Tried Kindle Unlimited with similar results.

Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel at August 04, 2024 10:01 AM (BpYfr)

148 I'm normally staunchly anti-censorship, but the following passage (from kids-book "Big Red" by Jim Kjelgaard) has given me pause:

"I think so," Danny answered gravely. "They aren't alike. A dog wants to be big and strong and husky, same's a man. A bitch can be strong but...There's a difference between them as there is between a man and a woman. It would be hard to judge them together."

I bought this book to relive a bit of my childhood, but also to give as a gift to my nieces. But, will my nieces understand that the author uses 'bitch' to refer to a female dog, without any further connotations? Will my brother be annoyed that I'm even bringing up the topic to them? Will anyone but me even notice the passage?

Ah, 'joys' of language shifting over time....

Posted by: Castle Guy at August 04, 2024 10:01 AM (Lhaco)

149 It's been quite a while but I remember really liking Tailchaser's Song as well.
Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 04, 2024 10:00 AM (s9EYN)
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Impulse buy many years ago, still on my shelf.

Which is saying something, because a lot of random fiction (especially sci-fi and fantasy) I picked up did not survive the test of time. I'm pretty ruthless on what I keep.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:02 AM (llXky)

150 I remember a couple "educators" back in Junior high and high school really had a sore spot with the "Robber Baron" age, and how horrible it was America produced such wealthy industrialists and such. Sure, Jan.

American and Europe looked better and was better for the average citizen after the Robber Baron age.

You can't say that about our current Oligarch/Soviet age.

Posted by: 18-1 at August 04, 2024 10:03 AM (oZhjI)

151 okhtablOvWEC

Posted by: yglVYNqEIkBnGw at August 04, 2024 10:04 AM (Uh4CK)

152 There's a great line in (I think) the Caine Mutiny in which (IIRC) Lt. Barney Greenwald says something to the effect of how men like Capt. Queeg were all that prevented Goering from making soap out of his aunt.

Posted by: Archimedes at August 04, 2024 10:05 AM (xCA6C)

153
Ah, 'joys' of language shifting over time....

How old are the readers?

Posted by: 18-1 at August 04, 2024 10:05 AM (oZhjI)

154 Years ago I told myself 'you should read important books'

so I read A Farewell To Arms, Moby Dick, Wuthering Heights, A Tale Of Two Cities

and after that experience, I can say right now, that I have read those books

Posted by: Don Black at August 04, 2024 10:05 AM (/7KEl)

155 I actually do that a lot when reading something. Who would I cast as the leading characters?
Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 10:00 AM (t/2Uw)
---
That's another topic we could discuss in depth on a future thread. My contention is that it is possible to remake and "reboot" book adaptations because the character is independent of the actor. Sherlock Holmes can have many different takes on him, but Magnum p.i. is Tom Selleck.

This is why Hollywood remakes of film/tv characters always fail - the original actor IS the character, and in fact the actor is often why people come to see the film or watch the show. When people do novelizations, they are doing the character as played by the actor, not some new, abstract version.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:06 AM (llXky)

156 Adams invented the Improbability Drive as a way to "lampshade" and justify all the wildly improbable things which happen in the story. Instead of trying to make them seem plausible, he just straight-out said to the listener/reader "this is an amazingly unlikely coincidence, but then this machine literally manufactures unlikely coincidences."

-
Imma gonna stray over into movies (since we had no movie thread last evening). Often I am uncomfortable with black actors in traditionally white roles or circumstances but a BBC production of A Midsummer Night's Dream is filled with black actors and it really works. The play is essentially a fantasy, anyway, and this production plays it almost like a '30s style screwball comedy (and it's set in a '30s style fascist Athens). The character Bottom is particularly good as a self absorbed actor. (I guess Shakespeare knew some actors and they were like our actors of today.) Anyway, the lampshade of ridiculous from beginning to end really worked.

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt5051278/

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, I got 99 problems but Vance ain't one at August 04, 2024 10:06 AM (L/fGl)

157 and Moby Dick was unabridged too- no small feat

I liked the part where the guy hates the whale

Posted by: Don Black at August 04, 2024 10:06 AM (/7KEl)

158 That library reminds me of M.C. Escher for some reason.

Posted by: Eromero at August 04, 2024 10:07 AM (DXbAa)

159 and top pic does look like it could be a mall in LA

Posted by: Don Black at August 04, 2024 10:07 AM (/7KEl)

160 I've also learned more about Taylor's sexual preferences than I ever cared to know.
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at August 04, 2024 09:17 AM (Q0kLU)

Yeah, what a kinky weirdo.

Posted by: Michael Jackson at August 04, 2024 10:07 AM (0eaVi)

161 >>A friend gives me books after he has read them. He gave me Brad Thor's "Dead Fall." I just could not get into it.

I have read some of Thor's books. Some of these 'special forces dudes saving the (whatever)' book series have leads that are a bit. . . Marysue-ish? They are perfect! Nothing stops them! They can badazzz their way out of any situation and still be so cooooool! Honestly, not that different from the female leads in romance novels, who are smart, accomplished independent women who just need a man who can recognize this. Books serving up wish fulfillment comes in many flavors, I guess. . .

Posted by: Lizzy at August 04, 2024 10:07 AM (Pijte)

162 I think I can forgive Herman Wouk writing the German characters as he did. He was, after all, an Orthodox Jew. So I am going to cut him some slack.
Posted by: Catch Thirty-Thr33 at August 04, 2024 09:59 AM (8sMut)
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Disagree. You have this well-written, descriptive story and then it shudders to a halt while the author works out his racial animus. Consult Evelyn Waugh for how to skillfully perform literary character assassinations. The man was a master of his craft.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:08 AM (llXky)

163 sfpDqjMcBirG

Posted by: azVmgfiA at August 04, 2024 10:08 AM (P/df/)

164 OH

also Atlas Shrugged and Fountainhead

she could have used a ruthless editor

Posted by: Don Black at August 04, 2024 10:08 AM (/7KEl)

165 139 Fidel considered che expendable thats why he let him slough off to bolivia
Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 10:00 AM (PXvVL)

I still want the Dead Che t-Shirt.

Posted by: Catch Thirty-Thr33 at August 04, 2024 10:08 AM (8sMut)

166 re #59, C. S. Lewis told the story of when he was in the hospital after being wounded in WW I he was visited by an aunt. Lewis explained to her how his wounds were the result of what we would now call "friendly fire" (a British artillery round had fallen short). She exclaimed "Oh, thank goodness!" Lewis was initially puzzled by her reaction but then realized that, because his wounds were in his back, she had feared he had dishonored the family by cowardice and had been hit while running away. She was much relieved to find his wounds were honorable ones!

Posted by: John F. MacMichael at August 04, 2024 10:08 AM (jjfDF)

167 " However, when I was assigned to read it as part of my graduate degree curriculum, I had a lot more knowledge and experience to bring to my reading and I thoroughly enjoyed the story."

The thrift store where I volunteer had Free Book July, just to get rid of stock. I picked up a copy of "My Name is Asher Lev", which I read as very young adult when it first came out. I remember thinking it was okay.

Fifty years later, the topics of family and tribal loyalty versus fulfilling a God-given talent resonate so much more deeply and I can appreciate the work in a way impossible back then.
I can't understand people who will not re-read good books.

Posted by: sal at August 04, 2024 10:08 AM (4lnL8)

168 A 1930s Fascist Athens? But it's racially diverse!

WHY? You can literally do that play on a bare stage with everyone in sweatpants and t-shirts.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 10:09 AM (78a2H)

169 I will say one word in defense of Kindle, or e-readers in general:

Gutenberg.

You can download literally lifetimes of reading (including classics). So, having said that, I do prefer paper.

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at August 04, 2024 10:10 AM (PiwSw)

170 74 I am reading "The Last Gentleman" by Walker Percy. Somewhere I read that it is "the great American novel."

Parts of it seem familiar, but I don't remember reading the whole thing. Oh well, I got a cheap download to my Kindle Fire. I will continue.
Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 09:31 AM (+H2BX)

I made that claim here not too long ago. Thanks for remembering. Perhaps when you've finished I'll posit why I said what I said.

Posted by: Ordinary American at August 04, 2024 10:11 AM (tf4XU)

171 I never got why Bogart was considered a sex symbol

-
He got a very young Lauren Bacall so he must've been doing something right.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, I got 99 problems but Vance ain't one at August 04, 2024 10:11 AM (L/fGl)

172 Posted by: Zoltan at August 04, 2024 09:27 AM (pmNv2)

If the author is a lefty I'm sure he missed the cause of all that. Fascism. A tiny number of big companies are easy to control. The CEOs can also be induced to donate large amounts in order to be sure to remain "the chosen" while all the small businesses in the country are both a bureaucratic headache and probably don't donate as much *combined* to the "correct" party as one major corporation.

Which is why dems say they are for small businesses, but their policies always help the major players instead.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 04, 2024 10:11 AM (s9EYN)

173 Re-reading Larry McMurtry's 'Lonesome Dove' books. Starting from the "beginning" it just doesn't seem like McMurtry has the gumption and wry humor he did when he was writing the original book. Thus it reads fairly dull, like an outline. I shall keep slogging through...

Posted by: Brewingfrog at August 04, 2024 10:11 AM (2fmK3)

174 The town where I live had a Carnegie library -- the collection outgrew the building quite a while back and the library is in a new building now. With bigger meeting room, much larger seating areas, computers, etc; most of the books I thought I'd catch up on when I retired got weeded.

The Carnegie is still standing -- it's been used for the occasional play, art exhibit, etc, but what they're planning to do with it next I have no idea.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 10:12 AM (q3u5l)

175 I have found myself more and more watching shows made in foreign countries so I don't know who the actors are. Just watched season 2 of a show called Troppo made in Australia. It is fantastic well written crime drama and I have no idea what the politics of the actors are.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 10:12 AM (t/2Uw)

176 132 I also have Hillbily Elegy in my beach bag, I'll get to it soon enough.
Posted by: Lincolntf at August 04, 2024 09:55 AM (x+zNV)

I started reading this one this week. It's been in my TBR list since he wrote it. I seem to remember all of the social work lib types praising it at the time. They're probably all busy erasing any such accolades now.

It's similar to some other bios I've read of people who grew up in abusive homes. I am always impressed with people who were formed in adversity and triumphed over it.

Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 04, 2024 10:12 AM (OX9vb)

177 Well.metaxa was fasicist like

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 10:13 AM (PXvVL)

178 Aristotle Onassis got Jackie O but I never thought it was because he was a sex symbol.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 10:14 AM (t/2Uw)

179 I read a couple of the Brad Thor books, but, as noted above, once you've read one or two then you've read them all. I can enjoy a Bond film with a "hero who never fails" because it's two hours of mental cotton candy. I read a couple of the Scott Harvath books while traveling, and they were OK for passing time on an airplane, but overall just not good enough to make me want to read the whole series.

Posted by: PabloD at August 04, 2024 10:14 AM (nbhYK)

180 Imma gonna stray over into movies (since we had no movie thread last evening). Often I am uncomfortable with black actors in traditionally white roles or circumstances but a BBC production of A Midsummer Night's Dream is filled with black actors and it really works.

YouTube has an "adaptation" of Boccaccio's Decameron running now. I was really looking forward to it, but turned it off midway through the first episode. My first hint that this was just another woke treatment was the presence of black actors...in medieval, plague-ravaged Italy. Their presence simply takes you right out of the story, and are an early indicator of worse to come. Sure enough, the gay stuff started up big-time. Many of the rest of the cast appear to be Indian or Arabic.

I was furious. Can't you a***oles for once just play it straight? I was really looking forward to an honest treatment, but NOOOOO, apparently that's just too much to ask.

Posted by: Archimedes at August 04, 2024 10:14 AM (xCA6C)

181 @123 --

I think it was for interrogation.

Every owner of a Che T-shirt should see the photo of him with Rodriguez. Dirty, scruffy, hair an absolutely tangled mess. You wouldn't give him 50 cents.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 04, 2024 10:14 AM (p/isN)

182 Jacqueline but you got what I meant.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 10:14 AM (t/2Uw)

183 Reading Amy Tan's "Backyard Bird Chronicles". I'm impressed. I don't read much modern fiction and never read any of hers but the lady can write, at least in this journal approach. As someone who is a bit of a bird watcher her descriptions of the birds and circumstances from, beginner to more knowledgeable, will be familiar to others.

But it is the drawings that make the book for me. Some are rough, quick sketches and others are finished efforts that took hours. The woman has a real talent for the subjects. She succeeds in capturing the various postures and habitats of her subjects. It helps that she gt instruction and guidance from John Muir Laws, renowned expert of bird and nature drawing.

This is a library copy but I expect to get my own copy when the price (too damn high) comes down.

Posted by: JTB at August 04, 2024 10:15 AM (zudum)

184 C. S. Lewis told the story of when he was in the hospital after being wounded in WW I he was visited by an aunt.
Posted by: John F. MacMichael at August 04, 2024 10:08 AM (jjfDF)
---
Something contemporary society has completely lost is that the average trooper of WW I actually took things in stride. The Wipers Times is again available in reprint and it's a great amazing and funny read. Even in the mud, the troops were cracking jokes and having a laugh here or there.

Both Lewis and Tolkien got this - that men who believed in their cause, who had something to live for, were also able to approach death without cowering in fear.

Arguably the most gripping passage of Lord of the Rings is the Siege of Gondor, where Tolkien illustrates how morale slowly collapses and otherwise solid units fall apart as their spirits fail. Yet while the militia and line units falter, the Guards are impervious (Knights of Dol Amroth = Guards regiments).

Read that portion of the book as a strong point being hammered by German artillery during the Kaiserschlacht and it takes on a whole new level.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:15 AM (llXky)

185 173 Re-reading Larry McMurtry's 'Lonesome Dove' books. Starting from the "beginning" it just doesn't seem like McMurtry has the gumption and wry humor he did when he was writing the original book.
Posted by: Brewingfrog at August 04, 2024 10:11 AM (2fmK3)

One of those books you remember when and where you were reading it. In my case, highly pregnant lying on the couch with it propped up on # 4.
Might have chosen something else, in retrospect. A little intense under the circs.

Posted by: sal at August 04, 2024 10:15 AM (4lnL8)

186 Ayers fancied himself a guevara sadly the bureau did not oblige

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 10:16 AM (PXvVL)

187 I started reading this one this week. It's been in my TBR list since he wrote it. I seem to remember all of the social work lib types praising it at the time. They're probably all busy erasing any such accolades now.

Heh, that's an excellent point.

Posted by: Archimedes at August 04, 2024 10:17 AM (xCA6C)

188 There is a version of "The Big Sleep" with Robert Mitchum, set in England. Jimmy Stewart plays the role of Gen. Sternwood. And there is nudity.
Posted by: no one of any consequence

Jimmy Stewart and Robert Mitchum nude? Pass.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, I got 99 problems but Vance ain't one at August 04, 2024 10:17 AM (L/fGl)

189 Thats why he has the fivd oclock shadow

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 10:18 AM (PXvVL)

190 That library in the top photo seems to emphasize everything EXCEPT books. Not impressed. But it doesn't surprise me that some self-styled experts thinks it is terrific. I wonder if they can read or have any real books of their own.

Posted by: JTB at August 04, 2024 10:18 AM (zudum)

191 Disagree. You have this well-written, descriptive story and then it shudders to a halt while the author works out his racial animus. Consult Evelyn Waugh for how to skillfully perform literary character assassinations. The man was a master of his craft.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:08 AM (llXky)

Well, we’ll have to agree to disagree. You can hold all authors to an extremely high standard then get angry when they fail to reach your lofty expectations. Or you can take the good with the bad with the understanding that not everyone will be Shakespeare. (Hell, for all his faults I still read older Stephen King works. The man has zero artistic restraint and cannot close the sale, nor does he know when to finally shut up, but his imagination is first-rate. I can get pissed off at him for his failings or read him knowing what is failings are and enjoy his writing warts and all. I choose the latter.). I guess next I can bitch and moan about how Wouk made no references to Enigma in his books but what good what that do?

Posted by: Catch Thirty-Thr33 at August 04, 2024 10:18 AM (8sMut)

192 I was furious. Can't you a***oles for once just play it straight? I was really looking forward to an honest treatment, but NOOOOO, apparently that's just too much to ask.
Posted by: Archimedes at August 04, 2024 10:14 AM (xCA6C)
---
A conventional performance would have to rely on acting and direction to make it stand out.

Far easier to have DEI casting to make it Brave and also Stunning.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:19 AM (llXky)

193 Well not exactly now mitchum was younger than stewart

Posted by: Miguel cervantes at August 04, 2024 10:20 AM (PXvVL)

194 The story is about the origins and travels through history of an illustrated copy of the Haggadah, the telling of the story of Passover. What is unique is that this particular ancient book is thought to be the first with illustrations.
Highly recommended.
Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 09:31 AM (t/2Uw)

This sounds wonderful- thank you for the rec. I love "items through time" novels.
Introduced to them via Norah Loft's "House" books, which follow the lives of various persons living in a particular house over centuries. "Bless This House" is my personal favorite, but they are all good.

Posted by: sal at August 04, 2024 10:21 AM (4lnL8)

195 @137 --

The town where I went to school is acknowledged as being the smallest burg in the U.S. to have a Carnegie library. It's still in use, although greatly expanded.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 04, 2024 10:22 AM (p/isN)

196 Yes!! I read Wuthering Heights for the first time in my 40's, and wow, hated it. Must have to be an adolescent girl to find anything to swoon over.
Posted by: Lizzy at August 04, 2024 09:53 AM (Pijte)

The last book I was assigned in HS. Hated it.

Posted by: Catch Thirty-Thr33 at August 04, 2024 10:22 AM (8sMut)

197 She's too adobo to drive because someone hit us once.

Posted by: OrangeEnt

lol
Being from Mindanao I bet she is extra stabby
*nods approvingly *

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 10:23 AM (Ka3bZ)

198 Well, we’ll have to agree to disagree. You can hold all authors to an extremely high standard then get angry when they fail to reach your lofty expectations.
Posted by: Catch Thirty-Thr33 at August 04, 2024 10:18 AM (8sMut)
---
My expectations weren't lofty. The guy could clearly write and write well. What he needed was an editor to tell him to dial down the anti-German hate.

It was an easy fix. Write them like normal people, not brain-damaged untermenschen.

Again, I'm not saying he can't tear into the Germans, he just should have done it in a less jarring, "angry kid with a spray can" way.

That's why I have to qualify my praise for the books because that element is why I never went back to them.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:23 AM (llXky)

199 I'm with zogger and Wolfus when it comes to finishing books any more. I've had some I wanted to throw across the room, they were so stupid.I started one series, first book was okay, mystery, second was pornographic 50 shades of gray that happened to involve a dead body. I circular filed it, it annoyed me so badly.
Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (tT6L1) at August 04, 2024 09:50 AM (tT6L1)

So, how does one go from a pretty good writer, to a writer of crap that makes a reader want to throw the book across the room?

Posted by: Michael Jackson at August 04, 2024 10:24 AM (0eaVi)

200 I can't speak for the ladies, but guys like Bogart because he's not much to look at but can dominate a room. And gets hot chicks. The ultimate male fantasy.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd
Exactly. Male fantasy. It is probably why I enjoyed the book as I could imagine Marlowe.
I actually do that a lot when reading something. Who would I cast as the leading characters?
Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024

***
In the film, Marlowe's "disguise" when he goes into the bookstore is to push up his hat brim, don a pair of glasses, and speak with an affected lisp. I'm not sure that's in the novel, but it seems like the kind of thing Chandler would have enjoyed having Marlowe do.

Sharon, I do indeed cast the characters in reading (as well as in my own stuff). If the story or novel is really good, I wind up casting some of the supporting cast as well.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:24 AM (omVj0)

201 A classic book is one that should be read, whether or not modern society wnts to ban it. One such classic is The Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. Written at the turn of the twentieth century, the tale is a harsh look at Africa, not only of the natives, but more importantly of the white exploiters who dealt in ivory there.

Charlie Marlow is a young man looking for adventure, and signs on to captain a riverboat on the Congo to bring the booty out of the dark continent. Everything needed to do his job is impossible to obtain, and it takes weeks just to make his vessel operational. As soon as it is ready, he is called to the most remote station to rescue Kurtz, the apex predator of people and ivory in the region, and a legend in the company.

As Charlie goes further into the jungle, the atmosphere and the people become more and more sinister. The atmosphere and prose are complex, like an extended Poe tale, full of description and foreboding. Conrad has a way of expressing the terror of the unknown and keeping the reader enraptured like few others can do. Highly recommended.

Posted by: Thomas Paine at August 04, 2024 10:25 AM (M5nbT)

202 137 the town I live in has an original functioning Carnegie library. Much of the architecture is preserved, although an extension was added.
It's also haunted.

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 10:25 AM (Ka3bZ)

203 Mixing Book thread to absentee Movie thread...Night Watch 2006 Bekmambetov movie will knock you out of your rut...absolutely insane cinematography!!! popcorn up!!!

Posted by: qmark at August 04, 2024 10:26 AM (+t9Oi)

204 Not into film noir too much, but if you like Bogie and Bacall, they had a radio show for a little while, old time radio. No commercials on the OTR, from Fibber Magee to Suspense and X and Space Patrol. (Well, unless Chesterfield commercials bother you.)

Bogart has a restaurant and bar in Cuba, if I remember right. And they get into all sorts of dangerous situations. Not a bad radio show. It has a haunting intro of spy intrigue, and exotic locale. "Radio" was pictures in your head, not on your screen.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:27 AM (TBJqQ)

205 Alyssa's newer videos are put together better. This one above was from over three years ago.

She's been an editor for a Big 5 house, so I give her more credit than other younger YTers doing vids on how to write.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 10:27 AM (0eaVi)

206 In the film, Marlowe's "disguise" when he goes into the bookstore is to push up his hat brim, don a pair of glasses, and speak with an affected lisp. I'm not sure that's in the novel, but it seems like the kind of thing Chandler would have enjoyed having Marlowe do.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:24 AM (omVj0)
---
It's similar, and in the book that effeminate thing is amusing because it's clear that the store sells pornography. He's trying to act gay.

The book is peppered with gay slurs, btw. Quite amusing.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:27 AM (llXky)

207 The library seems to be a classic case of form without function. The architect should have started at “this is a library” and let everything flow from there. He didn’t.

Posted by: Catch Thirty-Thr33 at August 04, 2024 10:28 AM (8sMut)

208 "Woke" casting is one of my pet hates.
But I was really surprised by a recent "David Copperfield" that had an Indian David and a black Agnes that was not horrible. The "Queen's Gambit" girl had a dual role as David's mother and Dora, who instead of dying, just faded out of the picture- that was annoying.
But the rest worked pretty well.

Posted by: sal at August 04, 2024 10:28 AM (4lnL8)

209 Wolfus and Perfessor:

https://is.gd/rf46T5

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at August 04, 2024 10:29 AM (PiwSw)

210 I read Leave the Gun, Take the Cannoli by Mark Seal. It's about the writing and making of The Godfather. He draws from a lot of sources and there was a lot more drama involved in making the movie than I knew about. Well written and moves right along. I'd recommend it

Posted by: Notsothoreau at August 04, 2024 10:29 AM (MdjE1)

211 Another egregious example of mistaken diverse casting: the film "Wicked Little Letters" about a real-life case involving harassing poison-pen letters in a small English town, and how everyone suspects a woman who recently moved in from Ireland.

Which the film utterly throws in the trash by making the villagers (and the police!) as racially diverse as a NYU college recruitment mailing. So this small-minded close-knit community is racially diverse . . . but bigoted about the Irish? Huh?

Oh, and of course when I say the cast is diverse I mean all the sympathetic characters. The villains, naturally, are as white as the ski slopes in Davos.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 04, 2024 10:29 AM (78a2H)

212 The movie was boring. I never got why Bogart was considered a sex symbol and never would have had any idea what was happening plot wise if I hadn't read the book.
Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 09:50 AM (t/2Uw)

Aahhhh!

(recoils in horror)

I think it was just his roles with Bacall that made him seem that way. He's the archetypical tough guy. Well, him and Cagney.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 10:29 AM (0eaVi)

213 The other thing about the library pic up top is all the sunlight - sunlight is one of the top enemies of printed books
The other is humidity

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 10:30 AM (Ka3bZ)

214 As Charlie goes further into the jungle, the atmosphere and the people become more and more sinister. The atmosphere and prose are complex, like an extended Poe tale, full of description and foreboding. Conrad has a way of expressing the terror of the unknown and keeping the reader enraptured like few others can do. Highly recommended.
Posted by: Thomas Paine at August 04, 2024 10:25 AM (M5nbT)
---
A favorite of mine. I'm a big Conrad fan.

What helps make the story are the bits of details and absurdity, like the fact that the steamboat's native 'firemen' (the guys who keep the boiler going) are all cannibals, and there's a humorous aside when the narrator wonders which white man will get eaten first if they go feral. Is it vain to hope he's their choice?

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:31 AM (llXky)

215 Wolfus and Perfessor:

https://is.gd/rf46T5
Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at August 04, 2024

***
Classic.

(Of course my cats are not interested in my writing. I'm a genre guy. They prefer more literary works.)

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:32 AM (omVj0)

216 Morning Hordemates.
I'm rereading Mary Stewart's "The Hallowed Hills."
A great story and she can make a paragraph so real you can feel yourself standing in the scene.
Highly recommend!

Posted by: Diogenes at August 04, 2024 10:32 AM (anNNv)

217 @161 --

You gave me the opening I needed to remark on last week's thread!

I was thinking about Mary Sue / Gary Stu after church, and it hit me -- Simon Templar, "the Saint," is just that. Crack shot, expert knife-thrower, fluent in a dozen languages, strong, witty, intelligent -- he checks every box.

But I sure enjoy those stories.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 04, 2024 10:33 AM (p/isN)

218 Whatever you do, do not watch Marlowe with Liam Neeson.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 10:33 AM (t/2Uw)

219 75 Finally finished People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks. I
Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 09:31 AM (t/2Uw)

I started that book but lost interest in the first few pages due to the romance book feeling of the book. I'll try again since I didn't know it would develop into a historical novel.

Posted by: Hedley Lamarr at August 04, 2024 10:33 AM (UWRAE)

220 Now, this isn't really on topic for the Book Thread, but since I brought up theme songs for radio programs earlier, I would submit that the theme song for Johnny Quest was among the best for a television program.

A guy by the name of John Hoyt, if I recall correctly and I may not. He purposefully scored the horn section piece as too fast to physically play, and they had a lot of trouble with it. If you listen, you can tell they kind of said "F it". LOL. But it has that energy.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:33 AM (TBJqQ)

221 206 In the film, Marlowe's "disguise" when he goes into the bookstore is to push up his hat brim, don a pair of glasses, and speak with an affected lisp.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:24 AM (omVj0)

The bookstore clerk is the young Dorothy Malone.

Ironic about Bogart, his background was upper-class Easterner.

Posted by: Ordinary American at August 04, 2024 10:34 AM (tf4XU)

222 "Fidel considered che expendable thats why he let him slough off to bolivia"

I think that Fidel considered Che to be a loose cannon (maniac) and wanted to get rid of him.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 10:34 AM (+H2BX)

223 Not into film noir too much, but if you like Bogie and Bacall, they had a radio show for a little while, old time radio.

Radio theater is, IMO, a hugely under-appreciated art form. I remember listening to NBC Radio Theater (I may be misremembering the exact name) and recording some of them on my dad's reel-to-reel tape recorder. Some of them where original productions but the ones I liked best were dramatic readings of classics like Dr. Jeykll.

Posted by: Oddbob at August 04, 2024 10:34 AM (/y8xj)

224 "The Great Divorce" was Lewis's answer to Blake's "Marriage". I seriously doubt Lewis intended us to think we actually are capable of choosing one or the other, but the brilliance of his piece lies in the imagery: the solidity of Heaven being impenetrable to those who are from Hell; the scale that both realms exist upon; the self-loving loneliness of Hell. Also, if you've never read Lewis's "The Pilgrim's Regress", you seriously need to go back and visit that one! It's dark and self-incriminating (or humble, if you prefer) but it is one of the most frank and open confessions I've ever read.

Posted by: normal at August 04, 2024 10:34 AM (bg2DR)

225 90 A rambling comment. I get daily BookBub emails with many cheap Kindle books for free or low cost. I try many of them but am constantly frustrated by the trivial plots and infantile writing. I start one and it has some interest even though it is filled with stock characters and a mundane plot. At some point I have to decide if I want to waste anymore time on the story. I am old school and hate to not finish a book but lately I am bailing out of these type books more often. When you have read really good writing (like Raymond Chandler) it is hard to read the poor stuff. Thanks for reading my rant.
Posted by: zogger at August 04, 2024 09:40 AM (HGKOZ)

I share the aversion to quitting, but I find it fairly easy to bail out of a book in the first few chapters. If you do it early enough, you're not giving up on a book, you're reading the preview and deciding it wasn't for you.

One moment in particular that made me give up on a story was high fantasy story where the teenaged protagonist was going to school. School in a medeval village? You could make that work if you tried, but I just didn't trust the author to justify it.

Posted by: Castle Guy at August 04, 2024 10:34 AM (Lhaco)

226 There are times when I think civilization really got going into the downhill slide when we started seeing libraries being described more and more frequently as "more than just books."

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 10:35 AM (q3u5l)

227 I'm rereading Mary Stewart's "The Hallowed Hills."
A great story and she can make a paragraph so real you can feel yourself standing in the scene.
Highly recommend!
Posted by: Diogenes at August 04, 2024

***
Her trilogy about Merlin, set in a realistic England after the Romans have left but before the Norman Conquest, is very well done. Isn't that one of them, The Hollow Hills?

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:35 AM (omVj0)

228 A guy by the name of John Hoyt, if I recall correctly and I may not. He purposefully scored the horn section piece as too fast to physically play, and they had a lot of trouble with it. If you listen, you can tell they kind of said "F it". LOL. But it has that energy.
Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:33 AM (TBJqQ)

Hoyt Curtin. He composed a number of brassy cartoon themes at the time. Quite an accomplished guy.

Posted by: Ordinary American at August 04, 2024 10:35 AM (tf4XU)

229 >>The movie was boring. I never got why Bogart was considered a sex symbol and never would have had any idea what was happening plot wise if I hadn't read the book.

Re-watched The African Queen recently, including dvd extras with more info about the actors, how it was made, etc.. Bogart sounded like a force of nature, so it must've been his personality that made women swoon back then. Becall was in Africa the whole time, too, to make sure Bogart didn't drink too much with John Huston. Seems like she was a force of nature, too, as she got busy caring for/mothering the entire film crew (tending to injuries, sickness, etc..). Hollywood suffers a lack of personality and character in its current crop of actors, etc..

Posted by: Lizzy at August 04, 2024 10:37 AM (Pijte)

230 That Mary Stewart book sounds familiar. Think I read several of her books.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 10:37 AM (t/2Uw)

231 The bookstore clerk is the young Dorothy Malone.

Posted by: Ordinary American at August 04, 2024 10:34 AM (tf4XU)
---
"Well, HELLO!"

That scene helps make the film. Who doesn't want to duck into a books store and meet a total smokeshow who'd like to pull down the blinds, lock the door and share that rye you've got in your pocket?

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:37 AM (llXky)

232 In Delaware on my commute I saw a lite up but not open lage building that I think had rows of books. Now wonder why they were there

Posted by: Skip at August 04, 2024 10:38 AM (fwDg9)

233 "Woke" casting is one of my pet hates.

-
I like Agatha Christie so I bought Marple: Twelve New Mysteries by numerous authors other than Christie. I should've known. A bunch of woke crap inserted into the Marple universe.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, I got 99 problems but Vance ain't one at August 04, 2024 10:39 AM (L/fGl)

234 In the film, Marlowe's "disguise" when he goes into the bookstore is to push up his hat brim, don a pair of glasses, and speak with an affected lisp.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024
*
The bookstore clerk is the young Dorothy Malone.

Ironic about Bogart, his background was upper-class Easterner.
Posted by: Ordinary American at August 04, 2024

***
Right; his early stage roles, he said, consisted of young upper-class guys in whites wandering into the scene and asking, "Anyone for tennis?" And of course he did have a faint lisp of his own, from lip damage when he was young, or something like that. It aided his "tough-guy, tight-lipped" roles, as being gassed in WWI helped Walter Brennan's voice.

Obviously the young girl clerk saw through Marlowe's disguise right away.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:39 AM (omVj0)

235 "Jimmy Stewart and Robert Mitchum nude? Pass."

Mercifully, neither. The younger of the two Sternwood sisters.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 10:39 AM (+H2BX)

236
There are times when I think civilization really got going into the downhill slide when we started seeing libraries being described more and more frequently as "more than just books."

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 10:35 AM

I was at a local library recently on the lower floor where the children's books are located. I saw a lot of young moms with children and I felt pleased with that. Some sort of story hour might have been going on. Some children were on computers.

Of course the library has a reputation for being haunted too. That's a lot of more then just books.

Posted by: Divide by Zero at August 04, 2024 10:39 AM (RKVpM)

237 Radio theater is, IMO, a hugely under-appreciated art form. I remember listening to NBC Radio Theater (I may be misremembering the exact name) and recording some of them on my dad's reel-to-reel tape recorder. Some of them where original productions but the ones I liked best were dramatic readings of classics like Dr. Jeykll.
Posted by: Oddbob at August 04, 2024 10:34 AM (/y8xj)
---
There are some Peter Lorre radio shows on youtube that are pure awesomeness.

Lorre has a great way of starting calm and normal and then working himself up into an absolute lunatic frenzy before catching himself mid-performance and apologizing to the audience. So cool.

Who does that today? Who can go from quiet, urbane, sophistication to I'M GOING ABSOLUTELY NUTS And...oh, sorry about that.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:40 AM (llXky)

238 I might do a bit of rest and reading today

Posted by: Skip at August 04, 2024 10:40 AM (fwDg9)

239 I share the aversion to quitting, but I find it fairly easy to bail out of a book in the first few chapters.

Honestly, I do that with most fiction books. The good ones are the ones I go back and try again with. Took me three tries to get into Neuromancer which is now my all-time favorite SF novel.

Posted by: Oddbob at August 04, 2024 10:40 AM (/y8xj)

240 226: As a "persun of dignity" who works at a library, you're not wrong. It's not that all of the other things are bad, per se, but taking the focus off of the written word, and the universality (and eternity cf Rev 22:18-19) hasn't been good.

Posted by: normal at August 04, 2024 10:41 AM (bg2DR)

241 so Sternwood is really Doheny, they even filmed the Colonel's mansion on the old estate, Chandler set his stories in the bright lights, like Lisa Marklund and Gomez Jurado, who I name check in my novel's chapter about Marbella, much like Agatha Christie used recognizable reference points like Colonel Campbell, Lindbergh in Orient Express,

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 10:41 AM (PXvVL)

242 The only annoying thing about the Bogart-Malone scene is that he doesn't seem to notice that she's a total smoke show until she takes off her glasses. Really?

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 10:41 AM (q3u5l)

243 Every cowboy has to have an amiable, addled and perhaps even crazy sidekick, dependable. Tonto was the faithful Injun, but there was Walter Brennan, and Andy Devine, and several others. I think it was required. Dillon had Chester Proudfoot, and later, Festus Hagen

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:42 AM (TBJqQ)

244 That Mary Stewart book sounds familiar. Think I read several of her books.
Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 202

***
I looked them up: The Crystal Cave, The Hollow Hills, and The Last Enchantment constitute the Merlin trilogy. She also wrote The Moon-Spinners, made into an adventure film by Disney in the '60s. She had good titles: Madam, Will You Talk? and Touch Not the Cat.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:42 AM (omVj0)

245 L. Ron Hubbard taught me that I didn't have to finish a book, just because I started reading it. Oh, the regrets I have!

Posted by: normal at August 04, 2024 10:43 AM (bg2DR)

246 Peter Lorre loses his shit in everything, doesn't he? Did they ever check the crawlspace on that guy I wonder

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:43 AM (TBJqQ)

247 the plot as much as one can discern in the big lebowski has elements of the younger Sternwood daughters

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 10:43 AM (PXvVL)

248 If a book, fiction or not, uses change as a catalyst, I need the context to make it effective. Simms' biography of Francis Marion, written in 1844, is effective because he can provide the atmosphere and conditions that led to the Swamp Fox. Similar with Foote's Civil War books and Shaara's The Killer Angels. The Count of Monte Cristo is not just a series of dramatic events as another example. Dumas provides realistic detail of the time and places and how matters evolve in response to them.

My Rhode Island hometown has one of the best natural deep water ports in the world and was prosperous from its founding in the 1640s. It was occupied and almost ruined by the British during the Revolution then recovered. (I'm still kinda pissed off at the Brits for that.) I thought an interesting saga could be written about the place and the people who had to face the challenges of war and commerce. Just a thought.

Posted by: JTB at August 04, 2024 10:44 AM (zudum)

249 The only annoying thing about the Bogart-Malone scene is that he doesn't seem to notice that she's a total smoke show until she takes off her glasses. Really?
Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 10:41 AM (q3u5l)
---
I'm not sure if this was an actual thing, but glasses were not considered attractive back in the day. Even in my youth, there was a sense that they were things you wore as rarely as possible and you get an echo of this in Star Trek II where Kirk curses under his breath because he has to put his glasses on to read a console.

I think better (and cheaper) eye care has normalized it and of course we have the Sexy Librarian look.

Agree about Malone though. She's smokin' either way.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:45 AM (llXky)

250 Bogie and Bacall, they had a radio show for a little while, old time radio.

-
Bold Venture. He owns a hotel in Havana and his boat is the Bold Venture. They're constantly running into spies, criminals, and other low lifes. Many episodes are available free on YouTube.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, I got 99 problems but Vance ain't one at August 04, 2024 10:45 AM (L/fGl)

251 153
Ah, 'joys' of language shifting over time....

How old are the readers?
Posted by: 18-1 at August 04, 2024 10:05 AM (oZhjI)

The nieces are approaching 10.

The books were written in the 40's and 50's. I'm leaning on holding the books for a little while longer. Maybe I'll find a different kid-and-their-animal story. Maybe that way I'll find a girl-and-her-dog story, instead of a boy-and-his-dog story...

Posted by: Castle Guy at August 04, 2024 10:45 AM (Lhaco)

252 I think it is implied that they did more than share a small bottle of rye.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 10:46 AM (+H2BX)

253 Every cowboy has to have an amiable, addled and perhaps even crazy sidekick, dependable. Tonto was the faithful Injun, but there was Walter Brennan, and Andy Devine, and several others. I think it was required. Dillon had Chester Proudfoot, and later, Festus Hagen
Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:42 AM (TBJqQ)

See also: pretty protagonist and plain, quirky friend.

Posted by: sal at August 04, 2024 10:46 AM (4lnL8)

254 Men don't make passes to girls who wear glasses.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 10:47 AM (+H2BX)

255 lol
Being from Mindanao I bet she is extra stabby
*nods approvingly *
Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 10:23 AM (Ka3bZ)

Not so stabby, but she does wield a mean cleaver....

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 10:47 AM (0eaVi)

256 thats why some of the best current noirs are foreign, I mention jens lapidus before, even though his swedish noir is very critty,

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 10:47 AM (PXvVL)

257 I think it is implied that they did more than share a small bottle of rye.
Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 10:46 AM (+H2BX)
---
Another nice thing about the Hayes Code was that it left you to fill in the blanks. Much better storytelling.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:48 AM (llXky)

258 Yeah, everything is available streaming 24/7, the old time radio shows. I used to listen to them because of tinnitus, or just something to have on in the background.

I've heard every Dragnet and Gunsmoke, for sure. LOL. Bold Venture is pretty good, indeed.

Jack Webb is actually better in a couple shows he did before Dragnet. They are so bad, they are good, if that makes sense. "I walked in the room, and there she was - so humid it was like rolling a cigarette in a rainstorm". Just total throwaway lines like that. The budgets were so tight, they didn't do re-takes. Just read through everything.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:49 AM (TBJqQ)

259 Both of my very young granddaughters aged5 and 7,who have frequented libraries from almost the time they could walk are hardly ever without a book in hand, in book bag. Even got a picture of them reading walking home from school.
It is not the library's fault if parents don't do their job.
Libraries do plenty of great activities for kids that don't include drag queens.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 10:49 AM (t/2Uw)

260 Men don't make passes to girls who wear glasses.
Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024

***
Ah, Mrs.Parker, you were wrong on that one. It all depends on the guy and the girl.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:49 AM (omVj0)

261 "I walked in the room, and there she was - so humid it was like rolling a cigarette in a rainstorm". Just total throwaway lines like that. The budgets were so tight, they didn't do re-takes. Just read through everything.
Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:49 AM (TBJqQ)
---
That is just so much more interesting than our "Oh, uh, AWKWARD" dialog. Everyone talks like it's a cell phone commercial.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:50 AM (llXky)

262 LOTR update- almost finished. !Only another 278 pages to go!!

Posted by: LASue at August 04, 2024 10:50 AM (cMCMv)

263 250 ... "Bold Venture. He owns a hotel in Havana and his boat is the Bold Venture. They're constantly running into spies, criminals, and other low lifes. Many episodes are available free on YouTube."

Thanks, AW,

Bogie and Becall on radio? Hot damn! And there are episodes on YT. I love those old radio shows whether comedy, variety, or drama. The dramas are especially good to listen to at night in a dimly lit room.

Posted by: JTB at August 04, 2024 10:51 AM (zudum)

264 Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:42 AM (omVj0)

I think I have all of her mystery/suspense books on Kindle. I read and enjoyed her Arthurian series, but Moonspinners and Touch Not the Cat are what I reread.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 04, 2024 10:52 AM (s9EYN)

265 Jack Webb had a small role in "Sunset Boulevard."

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 10:52 AM (+H2BX)

266 I do remember glasses being regarded as unattractive (what was the line? - Guys don't make passes at girls who wear glasses).

Never bought into that notion myself.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 10:52 AM (q3u5l)

267 I'm reading through the Gospel of John in the English translation of the Peshitta, which is the standard Bible ot the Syriac Catholic Church. It is allegedly the most accurate English Bible translation because it's only been translated once, from its original Aramaic, to English.

The publishers blurb:

"This handsome new edition of the authoritative English translation of the Aramaic (Syriac) Old and New Testaments--the language of Jesus--clarifies difficult passages and offers fresh insight on the Bible's message".

My goal as I get older (61) is to discover and read the most authentic writings about Jesus.

Posted by: Sharkman at August 04, 2024 10:52 AM (/RHNq)

268 yes you don't have to spell it out, say a recent offering by patterson ghost shan serafin, the paris vendetta, the protagonist adam macias is at the eiffel tower when things go horribly wrong, he is framed for his bossses grizzly death,

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 10:53 AM (PXvVL)

269 Every cowboy has to have an amiable, addled and perhaps even crazy sidekick, dependable. Tonto was the faithful Injun, but there was Walter Brennan, and Andy Devine, and several others. I think it was required. Dillon had Chester Proudfoot, and later, Festus Hagen
Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:42 AM (TBJqQ)

See also: pretty protagonist and plain, quirky friend.
Posted by: sal at August 04, 2024

***
Gabby Hayes, and (later, on TV) Pat Brady.

Paladin in Have Gun -- Will Travel operated alone, though in two episodes he's forced to work with Ken Curtis's annoying and smelly hillbilly character, a forerunner -- down to the accent and beard -- of Festus. (The second ep has an amazing moment, when Curtis opens his mouth and astonishes all with his beautiful singing voice, a la Jim Nabors later on.)

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:53 AM (omVj0)

270 We have a Carnegie Library here. Not used for anything. It was the Historical Society for I don't know how long. Locked up, but still standing.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 10:54 AM (+H2BX)

271 some of the best current noirs are foreign

-
Both of two good noir video games are foreign, Nobody Wants To Die and Blacksad, although both are set in NYC.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, I got 99 problems but Vance ain't one at August 04, 2024 10:54 AM (L/fGl)

272 Wolfus and Perfessor:

https://is.gd/rf46T5
Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at August 04, 2024 10:29 AM (PiwSw)

Goes to open link.

Wait, dare I look?

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 10:54 AM (0eaVi)

273 "I smoked a joint with Jack Webb". Hm, things that probably never happened.

Maybe. He had one of the largest Jazz record collections extant, at one time. He probably had some experience with that "lettuce" stuff.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:54 AM (TBJqQ)

274 long story short, as he finds his way to Amsterdam, he encounters a cult a little like eyes wide shut, or taken

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 10:55 AM (PXvVL)

275 good morning Perfessor, Horde

Posted by: callsign claymore at August 04, 2024 10:56 AM (JcnCJ)

276 Wait, dare I look?
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 10:54 AM (0eaVi)

Certainly. I'm not Ackbar.

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at August 04, 2024 10:56 AM (PiwSw)

277 Jack Webb had a small role in "Sunset Boulevard."
Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024

***
And he seems so un-Joe Friday-like, kind of fresh and friendly and excitable, like a big puppy. Especially compared to William Holden's dry-humored and cynical Joe Gillis.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:56 AM (omVj0)

278 Perfessor,

You mentioned Tad Williams' Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn series in the post. My attempts at modern (compared to the LOTR and older) epics usually leave me cold. Too derivative or lacking depth. Do you think the Williams series is good enough to change that view?

Posted by: JTB at August 04, 2024 10:57 AM (zudum)

279
We have a Carnegie Library here. Not used for anything. It was the Historical Society for I don't know how long. Locked up, but still standing.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 10:54 AM

Without giving location, unless you want to... is the library connected to the steel industry in some way, like mill or mining, etc. The one in my area *had* (past tense) both. I was sorta wondering if there was a method to what towns received them.

Posted by: Divide by Zero at August 04, 2024 10:57 AM (RKVpM)

280 You gave me the opening I needed to remark on last week's thread!

I was thinking about Mary Sue / Gary Stu after church, and it hit me -- Simon Templar, "the Saint," is just that. Crack shot, expert knife-thrower, fluent in a dozen languages, strong, witty, intelligent -- he checks every box.

But I sure enjoy those stories.
Posted by: Weak Geek at August 04, 2024 10:33 AM (p/isN)

Not only that, he's pretty invulnerable. Charteris wouldn't let anyone have rights to the character unless they never had Simon badly hurt or shot.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 10:58 AM (0eaVi)

281 That guy on Petticoat Junction maybe? Pat Guidry, or something like that.

I'll tell you a pretty good radio show - Lum n' Abner maybe? It had some gooood jokes, pretty sophisticated for a couple of hicks. Took me a while to get some of them, maybe the context is now lost.

A lot of the World War II radio comedies and programs, some of the jokes make no sense at all, unless one understands wartime restriction and rationing.

One of them, about getting lost and running out of gas in rural Maine, the punchline was "Never mind "who's Hitler", just fill 'er up and put on 4 new tires!" kind of thing.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:58 AM (TBJqQ)

282 Felt a bit trepidatious about my original Book of Love question comment, but the cute and clever replies made me glad. The Horde doth not disappoint.

Posted by: mindful webworker - baby baby baby at August 04, 2024 10:58 AM (tIWUF)

283 do remember glasses being regarded as unattractive (what was the line? - Guys don't make passes at girls who wear glasses).

Never bought into that notion myself.
Posted by: Just Some Guy
Smart man.❤️
I never found it to be a problem for me and I started wearing glasses at age 8.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 10:59 AM (t/2Uw)

284 and Moby Dick was unabridged too- no small feat

I liked the part where the guy hates the whale
Posted by: Don Black at August 04, 2024 10:06 AM (/7KEl)

I read an updated, critically-acclaimed version titled-

"DICK" by trans woman author Calpernia Grozzbottom.

In it Ahab's obsession with Moby Dick comes not from hatred but from his forbidden love, as the captain of a whaling vessel, for the great white whale.

In the end, Ahab and Dick swim away together to Tahiti to live their rainbow-lit life of cross-species love.

It's a masterpiece. Be sure to read it!

Posted by: naturalfake at August 04, 2024 10:59 AM (eDfFs)

285 yes Holden is very pointedly putting a sign on the industry that keeps joe gillis down,

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 10:59 AM (PXvVL)

286 Jack Webb is actually better in a couple shows he did before Dragnet. They are so bad, they are good, if that makes sense. "I walked in the room, and there she was - so humid it was like rolling a cigarette in a rainstorm". Just total throwaway lines like that. The budgets were so tight, they didn't do re-takes. Just read through everything.
Posted by: Common Tater

Two good ones are Jeff Reagan, Investigator aka The Lyon's Eye and Pat Novak For Hire. Both are available on YouTube.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, I got 99 problems but Vance ain't one at August 04, 2024 11:00 AM (L/fGl)

287 Glasses on girls that don’t need glasses I definitely do not make passes.

Posted by: polynikes at August 04, 2024 11:00 AM (B1dzx)

288 We have a Carnegie Library here. Not used for anything. It was the Historical Society for I don't know how long. Locked up, but still standing.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 10:54 AM

Without giving location, unless you want to... is the library connected to the steel industry in some way, like mill or mining, etc. The one in my area *had* (past tense) both. I was sorta wondering if there was a method to what towns received them.
Posted by: Divide by Zero at August 04, 2024

***
Evansville has two Carnegies, still operating as libraries, according to Wiki. And they had a major-league shipyard in one neighborhood (Reitz Hill) during WWII, building LSTs. But both libraries longe predated the war.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 11:00 AM (omVj0)

289 Thanks, "Perfessor"! Wrote down a lot of good recs.
Mr. S went on an Elizabeth Peters non-Amelia Peabody buying spree, so books are arriving daily.
The mailman is annoyed that they won't all fit into the box.

Posted by: sal at August 04, 2024 11:00 AM (4lnL8)

290 Bogart weren't nothin' but a

skinny

lunger

I kid of course
he had cool

Posted by: Don Black at August 04, 2024 11:02 AM (/7KEl)

291 Not only that, he's pretty invulnerable. Charteris wouldn't let anyone have rights to the character unless they never had Simon badly hurt or shot.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 10:58 AM (0eaVi)
---
The key to a character like that working is that they have intense charm and charisma, and leave the reader/viewer feeling good about the outcome.

As opposed to lecturing the audience.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 11:02 AM (llXky)

292 oh my god, pass the idocaine,

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 11:02 AM (PXvVL)

293 My kittehs are named Bogie and Bacall.

Posted by: polynikes at August 04, 2024 11:03 AM (B1dzx)

294 That guy on Petticoat Junction maybe? Pat Guidry, or something like that. . . .
Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024

***
Edgar Buchanan played Uncle Joe ("He's a-movin' kinda slow . . . at The Junction"). Pat Buttram was Mr. Haney on its spinoff, Green Acres. But both of them had played Western sidekicks in movies long before that.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 11:04 AM (omVj0)

295 Jack Webb -

Yeah, Dragnet. But when I think Webb, the next thing that comes to mind is his movie The D.I. in which he plays a Marine Corps drill instructor. If you haven't seen it, it's worth a watch just for the sand flea sequence.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:04 AM (q3u5l)

296 I do remember glasses being regarded as unattractive (what was the line? - Guys don't make passes at girls who wear glasses).

Never bought into that notion myself.

Obligatory:
https://tinyurl.com/mr2uy8b4

Posted by: Archimedes at August 04, 2024 11:05 AM (xCA6C)

297 There are only maybe 20 or 30 "Bold Venture" episodes, just guessing. Most of the extant radio programs from the past only exist, or many I should say, because they were transcribed onto large records so they could be mailed and played overseas via AFRTS.

Some are almost completely forgotten. A huge program that ran for 20 years or thereabouts was called Mr. Keen, who would investigate things and problems for people. Only about 45 episodes exist, but they must have made several hundred over the years.

Nightwatch was a genuine police program, they had a guy with a tape recorder who would ride along, Donn Reed, in Burbank and other cities in California. "This is real". Domestic disturbances, drunks, the usual, but in 1950s speak and attitudes.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:05 AM (TBJqQ)

298 Every cowboy has to have an amiable, addled and perhaps even crazy sidekick, dependable. Tonto was the faithful Injun, but there was Walter Brennan, and Andy Devine, and several others. I think it was required. Dillon had Chester Proudfoot, and later, Festus Hagen
Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:42 AM (TBJqQ)

I don't do that. The one completed western has the MC interact with others who can fill that role, but for different things. He doesn't have a permanent sidekick.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:05 AM (0eaVi)

299 Not only that, he's pretty invulnerable. Charteris wouldn't let anyone have rights to the character unless they never had Simon badly hurt or shot.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 10:58 AM (0eaVi)
---
The key to a character like that working is that they have intense charm and charisma, and leave the reader/viewer feeling good about the outcome.

As opposed to lecturing the audience.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024

***
True. Simon carries off his adventures with amazing style (referring to the evil guys as "the ungodly," for example).

James Bond's adventures (in print) are very different; he gets banged up, beaten, slashed by coral, steamed, has a finger broken deliberately, and more during the first six books.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 11:07 AM (omVj0)

300 Yeah - Pat Buttram! High pitched annoying feller.

I think he was Gene Autry's radio program. Gene was a good guy, but he couldn't sing. He sure made a hell of a pile doing it though.

He owned quite a bit of California real estate, TV stations, and a Baseball team or two.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:07 AM (TBJqQ)

301 so Kaspar Guttman, Greenstreets character is based on maury Gregory, an English information broker, among other things, thats more Hammett then marlowe

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 11:07 AM (PXvVL)

302 Just read Sister Wendy’s art book , 1000 Masterpieces. She is definitely the stereotypical art connoisseur with the word salad defense of some of the drek considered masterpieces.

Posted by: polynikes at August 04, 2024 11:07 AM (B1dzx)

303 Jack Webb -

Yeah, Dragnet. But when I think Webb, the next thing that comes to mind is his movie The D.I. in which he plays a Marine Corps drill instructor. If you haven't seen it, it's worth a watch just for the sand flea sequence.
Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024

***
"Male or female sand flea, soldier?"

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 11:08 AM (omVj0)

304 The only annoying thing about the Bogart-Malone scene is that he doesn't seem to notice that she's a total smoke show until she takes off her glasses. Really?
Posted by: Just Some Guy
====
That seems to be a thing back then, glasses as a disguise/game changer. Same scene Bogart's disguise is a hat brim and glasses.
Continued at least thru the George Reeves Superman show of the late fifties.

Posted by: From about That Time at August 04, 2024 11:10 AM (4780s)

305 I'm not sure if this was an actual thing, but glasses were not considered attractive back in the day. Even in my youth, there was a sense that they were things you wore as rarely as possible and you get an echo of this in Star Trek II where Kirk curses under his breath because he has to put his glasses on to read a console.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 10:45 AM (llXky)

It's the design of glasses, I think, that did that. The metal frame type, or the frameless look better than horn-rimmed. And it seems women's glasses were all cat's eye. Those don't look good. I know it's a joke with all the large lensed "smart girl" glasses these days, but I think those type are attractive looking and women who wear them aren't bad looking.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:10 AM (0eaVi)

306 No steel. No mining. Small city in the South. County seat.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 11:10 AM (+H2BX)

307 I heard about a writer (can't recall his name) who was researching for a comprehensive account of Sasquatch and who spent two whole years living in the deep backwoods of the Pacific Northwest. He finally happened to get some photos of the creature. Turned out to be no small feet.

Posted by: muldoon at August 04, 2024 11:11 AM (uCfKO)

308 Archimedes, I went to that site and to my horror, there was a Kamala Harris ad.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 04, 2024 11:12 AM (t/2Uw)

309 Archimedes, I went to that site and to my horror, there was a Kamala Harris ad.

Yeah, they seem to be ubiquitous on YT. I just mute it for 5s and then skip.

Posted by: Archimedes at August 04, 2024 11:13 AM (xCA6C)

310 that was a long way for a punchline,

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 11:13 AM (PXvVL)

311 "Male or female sand flea?"

Wolfus, there are times when I think you and I grew up in the same neighborhoods, read most of the same books, and saw most of the same movies and tv shows.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:13 AM (q3u5l)

312 Seems like every small town in Texas standing in about 1900 got a Carnegie Library. Although few are still used as libraries, they’re easy to spot because they used the same design and the same brick and stonework for each one. Ours is downtown and used by the Historical Society, across the street from the new library.

Posted by: Tom Servo at August 04, 2024 11:13 AM (W4qJF)

313 I'm not a big fan of modern architecture. The library in the pic looks almost oppressively bright and open.
It could pass for a mall.
Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabby stabamillion at August 04, 2024 09:05 AM (Ka3bZ)

Based on the pic, it does not look too inviting.

Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at August 04, 2024 11:14 AM (qSmRQ)

314 291 Not only that, he's pretty invulnerable. Charteris wouldn't let anyone have rights to the character unless they never had Simon badly hurt or shot.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 10:58 AM (0eaVi)
---
The key to a character like that working is that they have intense charm and charisma, and leave the reader/viewer feeling good about the outcome.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 11:02 AM (llXky)

To get further into the weeds of storycraft, another key to the super-awesome protagonist is to keep it believable, and to not break the rules of the world. Give the character a backstory that explains, or at least don't contradict, their awesome abilities: they are naturally fit, they are obsessive about training/preparing, they are single-minded about the mission...Then you structure the story around the hero's quest. Not about personal growth, not about seeking validation or acknowledgement, just about thwarting evil and finishing the mission...

A lot of things have to go wrong for a character to truly deserve the epithet 'Mary Sue.'

Posted by: Castle Guy at August 04, 2024 11:14 AM (Lhaco)

315 I am old school and hate to not finish a book but lately I am bailing out of these type books more often. When you have read really good writing (like Raymond Chandler) it is hard to read the poor stuff. Thanks for reading my rant.
Posted by: zogger at August 04, 2024 09:40 AM (HGKOZ)

After a year of tapping into Kindle, I find it quite easy to bail on a book. As soon as they mention anything about conservatives, Trump, global warming, or capitalism, (and always in a bad light) I quit reading it. And the review.reflects that. Usually see it in Sci-Fy but not always.

Posted by: Diogenes at August 04, 2024 11:15 AM (W/lyH)

316 Like when Clark Kent takes off his glasses, Lois finally recognizes him.

Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024 11:15 AM (+H2BX)

317 "Male or female sand flea?"

Wolfus, there are times when I think you and I grew up in the same neighborhoods, read most of the same books, and saw most of the same movies and tv shows.
Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024

***
Could be. I just have an annoyingly stubborn memory for things I've seen - and things I've only read or heard about, too.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 11:16 AM (omVj0)

318 well fleming was a desk man, but many of the men that made up the bond archetype, reilly popov glen et al, did operate in the field,

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 11:16 AM (PXvVL)

319 Mostly writing this week, so I haven't been reading as much.

I may dip into some of Conrad's short stories, then dive into something like "The Book of the New Sun".

It's about time to read that again.

Posted by: naturalfake at August 04, 2024 11:17 AM (eDfFs)

320 SFWA's President has suddenly resigned. She copiously cites family issues as the reason. Then cryptically cites respect for confidentiality about SFWA issues.

Methinks there is much rotten in the state of SWFA.

Posted by: Anna Puma at August 04, 2024 11:17 AM (KfXOG)

321 like gus march phipps which the ministry movie didn't show his denouement in france at the end of the war

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 11:17 AM (PXvVL)

322 Speaking of noirs, here's an article extolling the virtues of the Cohen Bros. first feature, Blood Simple.

https://is.gd/kWcwqw

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, I got 99 problems but Vance ain't one at August 04, 2024 11:17 AM (L/fGl)

323 Just finished End Times by Peter Turchin -- he's an entomologist who applies a principle called Cliodynamics to societal growth and disintegration. He's notable in that back in 2010 he said the 20s would be extremely turbulent, which has been confirmed by facts. Interested in his works and the Strauss-Howe generational theory. Recommend but will make you pessimistic about the 2024 election -- his view is that the Plutocracy/Ruling Class will get their way come hell or high water.

After watching the footage from England, I wish we still had our weapons supply networks for the IRA operating out of the American RAF bases. I can't imagine what it's like to be stationed there -- I used to have respect for British cops but these are unhinged depraved animals.

Posted by: Big Fat Meanie at August 04, 2024 11:18 AM (YIxO9)

324 Government issue prescription eyeglasses were an inspectable, accountable item. You didn't have to wear them, but you had to have them if reading glasses were required.

These were known in the vernacular as "RPGs" or "Rape Prevention Glasses" or something like that. Even in those days, the nerdy glasses were not considered attractive especially. Except on Librarians, naturally.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:19 AM (TBJqQ)

325 Jack Webb had a small role in "Sunset Boulevard."
Posted by: no one of any consequence at August 04, 2024

***
And he seems so un-Joe Friday-like, kind of fresh and friendly and excitable, like a big puppy. Especially compared to William Holden's dry-humored and cynical Joe Gillis.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 10:56 AM (omVj0)

I watched the Dragnet movie from the 50s. Lieutenant Friday is nothing like Sergeant Friday. He gets into a fist fight, he smiles, he laughs. Weird.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:19 AM (0eaVi)

326 Posted by: Diogenes at August 04, 2024 11:15 AM (W/lyH)

I will stick with a book if it’s effortless to read even if I have issues with the story line. On the other hand I will abandon books with good reviews that just don’t flow for me. For example, Lucifer’s Hammer.

Posted by: polynikes at August 04, 2024 11:19 AM (B1dzx)

327 BCGs - Birth Control Glasses.

Posted by: Anna Puma at August 04, 2024 11:20 AM (KfXOG)

328 I get the bookbub emails, but I seldom buy from them unless they're offering a good price on something I'd been meaning to buy anyway.

I purchase fewer and fewer titles these days unless the author's a known quantity. No doubt I'm missing some good stuff, but at my age I no longer care; there's plenty of good stuff out there to revisit or finally get around to after letting it sit in the TBR pile for umpteen years.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:21 AM (q3u5l)

329 Dragnet with Dan Aykroyd taught me that you should introduce your girlfriend as the "Virgin, Miss Connie Swail."

Posted by: Big Fat Meanie at August 04, 2024 11:21 AM (YIxO9)

330 I'll tell you a pretty good radio show - Lum n' Abner maybe? It had some gooood jokes, pretty sophisticated for a couple of hicks. Took me a while to get some of them, maybe the context is now lost.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 10:58 AM (TBJqQ)

The past is a foreign place.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:22 AM (0eaVi)

331 Dan AcK-royd didn't like Jack Webb too much. His politics, so they went out of their way to show that in as bad of light possible.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:23 AM (TBJqQ)

332 Webb was considered briefly for Dean Wormer on Animal House, if I recall correctly. I think that would have worked. "A little-known codicil. Double secret probation!"

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:24 AM (TBJqQ)

333 RPG is either a report generating language or a rocket propelled grenade.

Posted by: Anna Puma at August 04, 2024 11:24 AM (KfXOG)

334 it wasn't a particularly good film, with tom hanks as they young whipper snapper,

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 11:27 AM (PXvVL)

335 BCGs - that was it! LOL. They issued two pair, among other things. Boxers, or briefs. Redolent of moth balls and whatever other odors anti-fungal chemicals might have.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:28 AM (TBJqQ)

336 Ah, RPG. Spent years writing RPG code in my IT job. The fun part of it was writing the library catalog programs for book search and catalog card printing -- exasperating at times, but fun.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:28 AM (q3u5l)

337 john vernon was sort of a parody, in animal house, a decade before he was a menacing mob boss in payback I forget whose novel they adopted,

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 11:29 AM (PXvVL)

338 For example, Lucifer’s Hammer.

Posted by: polynikes at August 04, 2024 11:19 AM (B1dzx)

Great idea, but a clunky and awkwardly written book.

Posted by: CharlieBrown'sDildo at August 04, 2024 11:30 AM (d9fT1)

339 Vernon did great, he was believable enough.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:30 AM (TBJqQ)

340 Fetterman saying Kamala shouldn't pick Shapiro as he's a backstabber and will push her out within a couple years.

Then he said something about Fire! Bad!

Posted by: Big Fat Meanie at August 04, 2024 11:32 AM (YIxO9)

341 Payback was adapted from the first Richard Stark/Donald Westlake book in the Parker series.

Vernon was also one of the heavies in a nifty little Walter Matthau flick called Charley Varrick.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:32 AM (q3u5l)

342 People forget, but they didn't hire any big names other than Don Sutherland, to get the green light for it. I mean I assume it cost a fair bit of money, but it was a gamble or whatever on a lower budget film or something like that.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:32 AM (TBJqQ)

343 Could be. I just have an annoyingly stubborn memory for things I've seen - and things I've only read or heard about, too.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 11:16 AM (omVj0)

I used to be the same way. It seems the older I get, the less I remember.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:33 AM (0eaVi)

344 thanks for that,

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 11:35 AM (PXvVL)

345 I finished Andy Weir's The Martian, the story of an astronaut stranded on Mars by accident. It is a story of determination, optimism and hacking million dollars worth of aerospace equipment into the basics needed to keep him alive until he can be rescued. Mark Watney is the Biology/engineer specialist for Ares 3 mission to Mars. When the mission is aborted due to a threat to the lander, Mark is swept away by flying storm debris and left. On waking he discovers he is alone, and has a year's worth of supplies. He has to figure out how to keep in Oxygen, water, increase his food supply to stretch til the follow mission, and establish communications with Earth with no equipment. At times hacking the equipment means re-writing code, and sometimes it means banging on it with a rock.

The Martian is like a golden age Sci-Fi with the enthusiastic optimism and lateral thinking. It resemble the Venus Equilateral series by George O Smith, and though Mark never turns the hull of the lander into a giant cathode ray tube, he does burn its Hydrazine fuel in his living hab to make water to raise potatoes.
It is a good fast read and not gloomy grey goo.

Posted by: Kindltot at August 04, 2024 11:35 AM (D7oie)

346 I'm finding these days that I can remember bits of dialog from movies I saw in the 60s, authors and titles of who-knows-how-many books and stories (though plot details tend to blur now), cast members and sometimes episode titles and writers of assorted tv shows I saw in high school...

That conversation from two days ago? Gone...

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:36 AM (q3u5l)

347 It is a good fast read and not gloomy grey goo.
Posted by: Kindltot at August 04, 2024 11:35 AM (D7oie)

I would consider it a modern classis except for the absolutely gratuitous profanity. I just couldn't get past that.

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at August 04, 2024 11:37 AM (PiwSw)

348 classic

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at August 04, 2024 11:38 AM (PiwSw)

349 Dan AcK-royd didn't like Jack Webb too much. His politics, so they went out of their way to show that in as bad of light possible.
Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:23 AM (TBJqQ)

Saw the movie. Didn't care for it. You can parody something you love or like, and it's ok. When you try to parody something you hate or dislike, it's garbage and comes across as hateful.

Funny, innit. Those who claim love is love and are the most tolerant, are the ones who act with such hate....

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:39 AM (0eaVi)

350 Mars is a completely different ball of wax. For the moon comms, there is at times about a 2.5 second delay between earth and the moon base.

Now imagine it taking a half an hour! That's just to communicate one way. Anyone on a Mars trip is literally "on their own" in a way that is almost off the chart. Mission Control can advise, but ....

It takes maybe two years to get there. And back. So the notion that "We'll just land real quick and pick up some rocks and go home" doesn't make any sense either. The realistic (so they think, maybe) planners consider it a one way trip?

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:39 AM (TBJqQ)

351 The town where I went to school is acknowledged as being the smallest burg in the U.S. to have a Carnegie library. It's still in use, although greatly expanded.
Posted by: Weak Geek at August 04, 2024 10:22 AM (p/isN)

Vancouver, B.C. had a Carnegie Library, right on Main Street, which was kind of a blighted area when I grew up there. Don't know if the building still stands. It was neo-Classical, IIRC.

Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at August 04, 2024 11:39 AM (naKkV)

352
Vernon was also one of the heavies in a nifty little Walter Matthau flick called Charley Varrick.
Posted by: Just Some Guy

He started out as Big Brother

https://tinyurl.com/5xc9tc27

Posted by: Bertram Cabot, Jr. at August 04, 2024 11:40 AM (63Dwl)

353 I'm finding these days that I can remember bits of dialog from movies I saw in the 60s, authors and titles of who-knows-how-many books and stories (though plot details tend to blur now), cast members and sometimes episode titles and writers of assorted tv shows I saw in high school...

That conversation from two days ago? Gone...
Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:36 AM (q3u5l)

What a memory you have! I use a word, and five seconds later when I want to use it again, I can't remember what the word is.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:43 AM (0eaVi)

354 That conversation from two days ago? Gone...
Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:36 AM (q3u5l)

The file cabinets are all full, there’s no room for anything more, but old pages are starting to fall apart…

Posted by: Tom Servo at August 04, 2024 11:43 AM (W4qJF)

355 Vernon "started out as Big Brother"

Thanks. Saw that version quite a while back, but missed Vernon completely.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:43 AM (q3u5l)

356 That conversation from two days ago? Gone...
Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:36 AM (q3u5l)
---
The conversations are probably less interesting.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 11:44 AM (llXky)

357 Now imagine it taking a half an hour! That's just to communicate one way. Anyone on a Mars trip is literally "on their own" in a way that is almost off the chart. Mission Control can advise, but ....

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:39 AM (TBJqQ)

Sort of like the explorers during the Age of Sail.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:45 AM (0eaVi)

358 A lot of things have to go wrong for a character to truly deserve the epithet 'Mary Sue.'
Posted by: Castle Guy at August 04, 2024 11:14 AM (Lhaco)
---
One of the conventions of film noir is that the main character be smart, tough, resourceful but also get badly beaten at some point, just to show he's human.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 11:46 AM (llXky)

359 The past is a foreign place.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024

***
. . . They do things differently there.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 11:47 AM (omVj0)

360 Thank you Perfessor for another great Book Thread.

Not much reading time lately, but I did finish Athenry: an Odyssey of Sacrifice, Survival, and Love by Cahal Dunne, recommended on the Book Thread. I put it aside for a while, afraid that it would be depressing. It turns out, although the author does not at all shy away from the injustices, the story never wallows in them. If anything, I might have liked it better if the extent of the suffering was brought home just a bit more. Maybe it reflects the attitude of people who survive such circumstances.

The book gave a very detailed look at life at that time, though I wonder if some were just a little bit off. The one that jumped out at me, was the baptism of the main characters’ baby at 6 weeks old. I’m by no means an expert, but would expect that it would have take place much sooner. Another quibble might be that things seemed to fall into place a little bit too readily at times. Just the same, it was one of those books that I could not put down and I did enjoy it very much.

Posted by: KatieFloyd at August 04, 2024 11:48 AM (05uLN)

361 74 I am reading "The Last Gentleman" by Walker Percy. Somewhere I read that it is "the great American novel."

I discovered Walker Percy in the late 1980s. Loved him.
Tracked down everything he ever wrote. "The Last Gentleman" is my favorite. Would love to hear what others think of it.

BTW, Percy was a lifelong friend of Shelby Foote.

Posted by: Linnet at August 04, 2024 11:48 AM (I+qzw)

362 Sort of like the explorers during the Age of Sail.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:45 AM (0eaVi)
---
Or going to Antarctica.

We've really gotten used to instant, global communication, which is unprecedented. It may not last all that long. We're one good solar storm from it being swept away.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 11:49 AM (llXky)

363 Well, it's getting late. Thanks again, Perfesser!

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 11:49 AM (llXky)

364 One of the conventions of film noir is that the main character be smart, tough, resourceful but also get badly beaten at some point, just to show he's human.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 11:46 AM (llXky)

What does it mean if he gets beaten two or three times in a story?

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:49 AM (0eaVi)

365 oh animal house, yes sutherland had some success in kelly's heros klute, and a bunch of other films, also mash

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 11:50 AM (PXvVL)

366 . . . They do things differently there.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 11:47 AM (omVj0)

I liked a lot of the things we did differently there....

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:50 AM (0eaVi)

367 These were known in the vernacular as "RPGs" or "Rape Prevention Glasses" or something like that. Even in those days, the nerdy glasses were not considered attractive especially. Except on Librarians, naturally.

Posted by: Common Tater

"BCGs" -- "Birth Control Glasses"

Posted by: Sharkman at August 04, 2024 11:50 AM (/RHNq)

368 ...Yes, drama, but it really brings home the total transformation the US went through and how fast it all happened. It must really have seemed like an instant to those who lived through it.

I think we are in a similar place, unsure if this is a passing crisis that will be forgotten or a hinge point where we'll tell younger folks things that will seem fantastic to them.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at July 28, 2024 09:58 AM (llXky)

Somewhat apropos: Father's homily dealt with not being a lukewarm Christian. While we are to love our neighbors, agape' does not mean being silent in the face of evil, or not giving good counsel to those we encounter that are not making good decisions.

Posted by: Retired Buckeye Cop is now an engineer at August 04, 2024 11:51 AM (pJWtt)

369 CS Lewis Great Divorce would be eye opening, at least for those with a grade school cartoon level understanding of the Christian faith.

He does well with allegory. But not so much in his LW&W fantasy and Space Trilogy science fiction. Good reads, but not what (IMHO) would consider references for those genres. I do like the last book of the latter, and will put That Hideous Strength in the pile of books I will read again.

Posted by: Chuck Martel at August 04, 2024 11:51 AM (fs1hN)

370 We've really gotten used to instant, global communication, which is unprecedented. It may not last all that long. We're one good solar storm from it being swept away.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 11:49 AM (llXky)

Would it really be so bad if it did?

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:52 AM (0eaVi)

371 Vernon "started out as Big Brother"
*
Thanks. Saw that version quite a while back, but missed Vernon completely.
Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024

***
Was that the 1984 film version? Vernon began in movies quite a while before that. He was in The Outlaw Josey Wales, for instance, about 1975.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 11:52 AM (omVj0)

372 bad luck I imagine,

Posted by: no 6 at August 04, 2024 11:52 AM (PXvVL)

373 The conversations less interesting? -- maybe. I don't remember...

File cabinets full and old pages are falling apart? Wish I could pick the pages -- the stuff I'd like to purge seems to hang in there.

But, hey, I can tell you that when Robert Heinlein's Glory Road first came out in paperback in the 60s, it was published by Avon Books and sold for 75 cents.

Go figure.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:52 AM (q3u5l)

374 On radio, Ralph Moody and Junious Mathews always played the "old cranky guy" or prospector type w/ mule, ignorant hick rubes were a longstanding necessity for most Westerns or anything really.

I like to try and identify the voices, and their names, although there were very few, age does make recall more difficult. Bill Conrad was in a lot of radio shows, as was Howard McNear, John Dehner, and Stacy Harris and just a few others. Apparently radio audiences weren't as skeptical about the same 5 or 10 actors being in everything. Sam Edwards. For young children voices, they used Richard Beale, who had a very young sounding voice used in lots of commercials - "Alka Seltzer'. "Gosh, Marshall Dillon. I didn't mean to shoot his dog, honest!"

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 11:53 AM (TBJqQ)

375 Wolfus -- the IMDb list at the link shows it's the version with Edmond O'Brien, Jan Sterling, and Michael Redgrave.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:55 AM (q3u5l)

376 (looks at clock and shakes head)

The end of the Book Thread. Again! Is that some sort of bad omen?

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:55 AM (0eaVi)

377 the book I am reading now is O K Burrel's Gold in the Woodpile, which is a series of articles about the history and attitude of banking and money in the Oregon Territory and the West, in generall.
the first chapter is about the finances of the Lee Mission in what is now Marion County Oregon, which was established in 1835, and touches on a number of once controversial occurrences in the Oregon territory.

Posted by: Kindltot at August 04, 2024 11:56 AM (D7oie)

378 Well, reality intrudes.

Thanks for the thread, Perfessor. Always a pleasure.

Have a good one, gang.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 04, 2024 11:56 AM (q3u5l)

379 Oh, okay; looked it up. John Vernon was "Big Brother" in the 1956 version of 1984 with Edmond O'Brien.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 04, 2024 11:58 AM (omVj0)

380 Nood.

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at August 04, 2024 12:00 PM (PiwSw)

381 >>> 370 We've really gotten used to instant, global communication, which is unprecedented. It may not last all that long. We're one good solar storm from it being swept away.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 04, 2024 11:49 AM (llXky)

Would it really be so bad if it did?
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 11:52 AM (0eaVi)

Any event powerful enough to disrupt 'instant, global communication' is probably powerful enough to disrupt modern energy production. *That* would be bad.

Posted by: Helena Handbasket at August 04, 2024 12:01 PM (FnneF)

382 This week I've been listening to Words of Radiance by Brandon Sanderson on audiobook, and reading Under My Skin, the 3rd (or at least 3rd that I've read) collection of short fiction by KJ Parker. Parker's short fiction features a bit more magic than his novels, and the humor is a bit lighter, though still darker and more mordant than his work under his real name (Tom Holt), and his take on bureaucracy is a (sad but) humorous thread throughout.

Posted by: tintex at August 04, 2024 12:01 PM (9/sKr)

383 Ironically I have ranted in the past about wishing for a magic OFF switch for all teewee and radio...

Posted by: Helena Handbasket at August 04, 2024 12:01 PM (FnneF)

384 What about those of us expecting to see a purple hat complete with faux-tiger band atop Mr. Squirrel, who are now spiraling into angst?
Posted by: Duncanthrax at August 04, 2024 09:35 AM (g07/a)

I think I have pointed out before that a Pimp's Hat is very different from that of a squirrel's

Posted by: Kindltot at August 04, 2024 12:02 PM (D7oie)

385 I do remember glasses being regarded as unattractive (what was the line? - Guys don't make passes at girls who wear glasses).

Never bought into that notion myself.

Obligatory:
https://tinyurl.com/mr2uy8b4
Posted by: Archimedes at August 04, 2024 11:05 AM (xCA6C)

LOL!! I love that show. My son bought me the boxed set, all 12 seasons for my birthday last year. Disclaimer:
Been an electronics nerd all my life.

Posted by: thatcrazyjerseyguy at August 04, 2024 12:03 PM (iODuv)

386 Thanks for the dandy Book Thread, Perfesser!

Sorry to be so late, but the morning was cool and the hummingbirds were flocking like crazy, so I stayed outside longer than usual.

Just started reading Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen. Similar to Pride and Prejudice and I am liking it so far.

Posted by: Legally Sufficient at August 04, 2024 12:03 PM (v/rAj)

387 14
'Eisenhower who came up with the policy of having more H-bombs than anyone else'

More bang for our buck.

Posted by: Greta Thunberg at August 04, 2024 12:04 PM (3wi/L)

388 Kindlot, a passage in Colin Fletcher's walk across the length of California book in 1958, he talks about an election held on the border in Nevada or nearby in the 1800s that was still being discussed in the local lore and history. It was a close one, but one of the inhabitants noticed that the names or signatures looked familiar. He talks about fishing in the Sierra, Bodie (the ghost town) and how to cache water when walking across the Mojave and things like that. A real nutcase, he was a Royal Marine during WWII and moved to Canada and then the US. He is considered by some to the be the "father" of backpacking. It wasn't too many people who did that in the 1950s.

Turns out it was a copy of a ships manifest of passengers. It took two years, but the matter was investigated and those erroneous names removed and the actual winner installed in office. So, it can happen.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 04, 2024 12:07 PM (TBJqQ)

389 For example, Lucifer’s Hammer.

Posted by: polynikes at August 04, 2024 11:19 AM (B1dzx)

Great idea, but a clunky and awkwardly written book.
Posted by: CharlieBrown'sDildo at August 04, 2024 11:30 AM (d9fT1)

Good description.

Posted by: polynikes at August 04, 2024 12:07 PM (B1dzx)

390 Testing

Posted by: Skip at August 04, 2024 12:09 PM (fwDg9)

391 Testing
Posted by: Skip at August 04, 2024 12:09 PM (fwDg9)

Passed.

Posted by: thatcrazyjerseyguy at August 04, 2024 12:10 PM (iODuv)

392 To me it’s fascinating that all the instability we’re going through could indicate the nearness of the end times. Trump’s survival of his shooting to me was clearly providential and a sign God is ultimately in charge, but it’d have been catastrophic if Trump didn’t turn his head in that second. But I know there are disagreements about such things so I’m not talking, I’m just talking. Not saying anything… be the ball, Danny. (Caddyshack)

Posted by: Norrin Radd, sojourner of the spaceways at August 04, 2024 12:12 PM (pmHeC)

393 also Atlas Shrugged and Fountainhead

she could have used a ruthless editor
Posted by: Don Black at August 04, 2024 10:08 AM (/7KEl)

I think her response to that criticism was that the Bible didn't need an editor either.
(No one asked her which edition she was talking about)

Posted by: Kindltot at August 04, 2024 12:12 PM (D7oie)

394 The SFFA's resigned President's first wiki line.

Jeffe Kennedy is a fantasy and erotic romance author who has published dozens of novels, including the fantasy romance series The Twelve Kingdoms, The Uncharted Realms and The Chroniclles of Dasnaria...

She seems to be a wellspring of original content.

Next will be a Sci-fi series called Star Battles, Hope Renewed.

Posted by: Reforger at August 04, 2024 12:13 PM (xcIvR)

395 Sorry to be so late, but the morning was cool and the hummingbirds were flocking like crazy, so I stayed outside longer than usual.

Posted by: Legally Sufficient at August 04, 2024 12:03 PM (v/rAj)

Well, I hope you shot them all. If they can't be bothered to learn the words....

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 12:17 PM (0eaVi)

396 Well, I hope you shot them all. If they can't be bothered to learn the words....
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 12:17 PM (0eaVi)
* * * *
Ha! Actually, I hung a fourth feeder. The hummingbird adoration gene is strong in my family...

Posted by: Legally Sufficient at August 04, 2024 12:36 PM (v/rAj)

397 Ha! Actually, I hung a fourth feeder. The hummingbird adoration gene is strong in my family...
Posted by: Legally Sufficient at August 04, 2024 12:36 PM (v/rAj)

We get a few around here on occasion. Anyway, BT over, time to focus on other stuff.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 04, 2024 12:39 PM (0eaVi)

398 Further to #24 by Wolfus Aurelius:

Raconteur Press has a SubStack page, and this is a good spot to see where all of their upcoming submission windows are, when things close, etc...
Here's the URL:
https://raconteurpress.substack.com/

See the "Calls for Submissions" tab if you want to see what's open for submissions and what's coming up.

Posted by: Grumpy and Recalcitrant at August 04, 2024 01:16 PM (O7YUW)

399 Took 10 minutes of searching to find a definition for SFWA.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 04, 2024 03:59 PM (p/isN)

400 Anyone eagerly awaiting _She Stoops to Conquer: The Kamala Harris Story_?

Posted by: logprof at August 04, 2024 04:18 PM (7x5AG)

401 The official English translation cuts out a lot of good stuff, and specifically a lot of commentary about various brands of goods, and about the protagonist's computer job. There was also a lot of divination and plot commentary by way of Walkman song references.

Personally, I found that this stuff was endearing and grounded the story nicely; but apparently the American editors ordered it all cut by the translator. (I mean, obviously the song lyrics were going to get cut, but Akvarium/Aquarium is a famous Russian band, so why cut out the protagonist listening to a song by them?)

The same guy translated several fantasy novels, in which he was ordered to cut out any actual fantasy-genre or medieval weaponry discussions. So instead of the guard wielding a bardiche-guisarme, the guard had a sword. It was ridiculous.

Posted by: Suburbanbanshee at August 04, 2024 05:00 PM (sF8WE)

402 The translation of Nightwatch by Lukyanenko, I mean.

Posted by: Suburbanbanshee at August 04, 2024 05:01 PM (sF8WE)

403 Oh, and Raconteur Press' YT channel, Old NFO, has said that they basically use the submission guidelines to find out if you're paying any attention whatsoever to their wishes.

So basically, if you submit something not to their guidelines, it goes to File 13.

And they do get a lot of submissions that are good, so it's a fair enough way to find out if you actually want to work with them, I guess.

OTOH, they publish and pay promptly by all that I've heard, and their sales are pretty darned decent. This is different from most small presses, so paying attention to the submission format sounds like a good plan.

Posted by: Suburbanbanshee at August 04, 2024 05:05 PM (sF8WE)

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