What are you reading?

[aphineday]

About 1/2 way through. Very dark comedy, typical Klosterman. If you are a fan of his, shouldn't be disappointed. If you haven't read Klosterman, I probably wouldn't start here. Try out Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs, or Fargo: Rock City as a good first Klosterman read.

[gainesvillegreen]

I'm currently reading a compilation of Pynchon's short stories called Slow Learner.
Much easier on the brain than his massive novels.

Didn't realize he wrote any short stories.  All I've read is Gravity's Rainbow.  What are his short stories like?  Seems like he'd almost have to have a completely different style to write something short.

This compilation is made up of his early works, pre-GR. The density is still present but its easier to take in small bites. He takes many of the same themes he includes in his longer works and displays them individually in the  short stories. Does that make sense?

That volume is also important in that he wrote the introduction and tells us a little about his writing process, influences, and background on each story. He is quite hard on himself and those stories, save for the last one whose title escapes me at the moment. A good place to start for anyone wanting to read Pynchon.

[sprobeck]

I'm reading an incredible novel right now called 2666 by Roberto Bolano. Amazing to read.

[gainesvillegreen]

I'm reading an incredible novel right now called 2666 by Roberto Bolano. Amazing to read.

Nice, is this the first Bolano you've read?

[sprobeck]

I'm reading an incredible novel right now called 2666 by Roberto Bolano. Amazing to read.

Nice, is this the first Bolano you've read?

It is. I saw it and Borders and thought the cover looked cool. Has he written other good ones?

[gainesvillegreen]

I'm reading an incredible novel right now called 2666 by Roberto Bolano. Amazing to read.

Nice, is this the first Bolano you've read?

It is. I saw it and Borders and thought the cover looked cool. Has he written other good ones?

Absolutely, once you've finished that monstrosity, they all get smaller from there  :lol:

Be happy to make recommendations when you reach that point.

[sprobeck]

I'm reading an incredible novel right now called 2666 by Roberto Bolano. Amazing to read.

Nice, is this the first Bolano you've read?

It is. I saw it and Borders and thought the cover looked cool. Has he written other good ones?

Absolutely, once you've finished that monstrosity, they all get smaller from there  :lol:

Be happy to make recommendations when you reach that point.

Thanks. I'm on page 300 right now. Only 600 to go!!

[sophist]

I'm reading an incredible novel right now called 2666 by Roberto Bolano. Amazing to read.

Nice, is this the first Bolano you've read?

It is. I saw it and Borders and thought the cover looked cool. Has he written other good ones?

Absolutely, once you've finished that monstrosity, they all get smaller from there  :lol:

Be happy to make recommendations when you reach that point.

Thanks. I'm on page 300 right now. Only 600 to go!!

Rand'd

[cactusfan]

I'm reading an incredible novel right now called 2666 by Roberto Bolano. Amazing to read.

Nice, is this the first Bolano you've read?

It is. I saw it and Borders and thought the cover looked cool. Has he written other good ones?

Absolutely, once you've finished that monstrosity, they all get smaller from there  :lol:

Be happy to make recommendations when you reach that point.

Thanks. I'm on page 300 right now. Only 600 to go!!

read it earlier this year and fucking LOVED IT. as soon as i finished, i felt compelled to immediately re-read it. which i didn't, of course. i'm not insane. but it sure struck me as unusual that that's what i felt like doing.

i've also read his book The Savage Detectives. also great, but not quite as great as 2666.

[justjezmund]

my pop dukes threw this my way gunna start it tonight.  good short read it looks like.

[aphineday]

my pop dukes threw this my way gunna start it tonight.  good short read it looks like.

I'm in a minority of people that really dig Grisham. In fact, I've read almost everything he has ever written. This book is a departure from his style, but very welcomed. Just a good story told very well. Enjoy it.

[fauxpaxfauxreal]

If by minority, you mean one of the millions padding his expense account...ok!

Heh.  Grisham was cool, in High School...he knew how to work suspense.

[gainesvillegreen]

For those reading Bolano, this is an author with whom he was a friend, and this is the book I am currently reading. From Amazon.com:

Salvadorean society is shocked by the gruesome murder of a young upper-class woman, and no one more so than her best friend Laura.  In her first-person solo narration, Laura rattles on and on about her disbelief and horror at the evils all around her—but who's that in the mirror? Laura Rivera can't believe what has happened. Her best friend has been killed in cold blood in the living room of her home, in front of her two young daughters! Nobody knows who pulled the trigger, but Laura will not rest easy until she finds out. Her dizzying, delirious, hilarious, and blood-curdling one-sided dialogue carries the reader on a rough and tumble ride through the social, political, economic, and sexual chaos of post-civil war San Salvador. A detective story of pulse-quickening suspense, The She-Devil in the Mirror is also a sober reminder that justice and truth are more often than not illusive. Castellanos Moya's relentless, obsessive narrator—female, rich, paranoid, wonderfully perceptive, and, in the end, fabulously unreliable—paints with frivolous profundity a society in a state of collapse.

[sprobeck]

For those reading Bolano, this is an author with whom he was a friend, and this is the book I am currently reading. From Amazon.com:

Salvadorean society is shocked by the gruesome murder of a young upper-class woman, and no one more so than her best friend Laura.  In her first-person solo narration, Laura rattles on and on about her disbelief and horror at the evils all around her—but who's that in the mirror? Laura Rivera can't believe what has happened. Her best friend has been killed in cold blood in the living room of her home, in front of her two young daughters! Nobody knows who pulled the trigger, but Laura will not rest easy until she finds out. Her dizzying, delirious, hilarious, and blood-curdling one-sided dialogue carries the reader on a rough and tumble ride through the social, political, economic, and sexual chaos of post-civil war San Salvador. A detective story of pulse-quickening suspense, The She-Devil in the Mirror is also a sober reminder that justice and truth are more often than not illusive. Castellanos Moya's relentless, obsessive narrator—female, rich, paranoid, wonderfully perceptive, and, in the end, fabulously unreliable—paints with frivolous profundity a society in a state of collapse.

Cool. That sounds good, thanks!

[gainesvillegreen]

Besides studying for a maternal-newborn final, this is what I'm currently reading:

In the late summer of 1831, in a remote section of southeastern Virginia, there took place the only effective, sustained revolt in the annals of American Negro slavery...

The revolt was led by a remarkable Negro preacher named Nat Turner, an educated slave who felt himself divinely ordained to annihilate all the white people in the region.

The Confessions of Nat Turner is narrated by Nat himself as he lingers in jail through the cold autumnal days before his execution. The compelling story ranges over the whole of Nat's Life, reaching its inevitable and shattering climax that bloody day in August.

The Confessions of Nat Turner is not only a masterpiece of storytelling; is also reveals in unforgettable human terms the agonizing essence of Negro slavery. Through the mind of a slave, Willie Styron has re-created a catastrophic event, and dramatized the intermingled miseries, frustrations--and hopes--which caused this extraordinary black man to rise up out of the early mists of our history and strike down those who held his people in bondage.