The All-New Books Thread

[neveragain]

I thought it was alright. Bit muddled but interesting. Haven't read the book yet.

However I have just read Shaun Micallef's The President's Desk, a surreal history of the United States. Some great hilarious stuff, each chapter its own routine really - one a detective thriller parody, another an extended Alice In Wonderland pastiche - but with recurring characters as time dictates. Best parts include a cannibal ship captain's letter home and a transcript of Nixon's meeting with Elvis. Clearly well researched in spite of the whimsy and with a (perhaps unnecessary) section at the end which separates fact from fiction; interesting but an odd stylistic choice, why not just stick to the fantasy? Besides that point, terrific and can't wait to reread.

[MoonDust]

Finished reading Your Republic Is Calling You last night. Blitzed through it. Fastest I've read a book in years.

It's really good. It starts off pretty slow and to be honest I found it a bit of a chore and it wasn't really grabbing me, but then it picks up pace and it's very good, full of thrills and that.

Also it's quite educational, referring to historical events in S. Korea, but they're written like it's common knowledge, so I had to Wikipedia a lot of what it's referring to. Like, I didn't know until reading this book that S. Korea was a military dictatorship as late as the 80s, and there was a huge student protest movement demanding democracy, but also a large faction supportive of Juche ideology (the N. Korean ideology of Kim-Il Sung, which was - and maybe still is - illegal to espouse in the South).

I'd highly recommend this book.

[Serge]

I've just had a mini John le Carré binge, starting with his first novel, Call For The Dead, and then his breakthrough, The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, and rounding it off by spending the last two weeks ploughing through the recent biography of the Great Man by Adam Sisman.

I knew the plot of 'Call For The Dead', having seen the film based upon it ('renamed 'The Deadly Affair', apparently because the producers thought the original title made it sound like a horror movie), though they did change a lot for the film (and not just Smiley's name), not least the fact that his wife, Ann, is offstage throughout the book, whereas she's a major character in the film. I've never got around to seeing the film of 'The Spy Who Came In From The Cold', despite having owned the DVD for a while, so I had no expectations of plot when I read it, and of course, it's bloody fantastic. Almost unrelentingly bleak -

Spoiler alert

the most sympathetic and entirely innocent character is sacrificed near the end

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- and it's obvious why le Carré's former employers were unhappy about the way they were portrayed in the book, even if the portrayal is pretty accurate. I suppose nobody likes to be told they're a cunt.

Sisman's biography is brilliant. I was staggered to find that the fictitious portrayal of le Carré/Cornwell's father in 'A Perfect Spy' was, if anything, restrained. If you invented a character like Ronnie Cornwell for a book, nobody would believe the half of it, but if anybody could be fairly described as a monster, he could. (Cornwell's first wife - oddly, she was called Ann, despite having nothing in common with Smiley's Ann - described him as the only truly evil person she'd met.) It's interesting that, as well as Rick in 'A Perfect Spy', similar Ronnie figures appear in other books, even up to those written in recent years.

Sisman is completely even-handed, and doesn't flinch from criticizing le Carré where he feels it's necessary - for instance, drawing parallels between Ronnie's court of crooks and the people that Cornwell employed to manage his tax affairs in probably legal but morally dubious ways. (To be fair, Cornwell himself would bring an end to these arrangements through his own sense of shame, a fairly rare stance to take, possibly even unique.) He's also rightly angry about some of Cornwell's secret service activities, which included spying on his friends at university, which is a pretty shitty thing to do.

But some of the most interesting stuff is about the books themselves. The mutating form of 'Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy' is a good example - Smiley wasn't even in the first draft, which seems amazing when you consider that he's the main character in the final version. 'Tinker..' was also going to be the first part of a series of anything between 7-15 books, though even when he scaled back his ambitions, he made a start on a proposed third book which would have fit in between 'The Honourable Schoolboy' and 'Smiley's People' and sent Smiley to the Middle East. It's also a continuing source of amusement just how many of his books could have ended up with the title, 'The Pigeon Tunnel'.

Cornwell seems to have become more left-wing with age - although he was always on the liberal left-leaning side of things, and is a life-long Labour voter - and does seem to learn from his mistakes. He's not perfect, and never tries to present himself as such, but is an endlessly fascinating character. The book has also confirmed what I have long suspected - Salman Rushdie and Clive James are both arseholes of the highest order. And we dodged a bullet - if a proposed '90s version of 'The Night Manager' had been made, we would have had Stephen Fry as Corky. Don't tell mook...

[non capisco]

Anyone else read 'Unfaithful Music & Disappearing Ink', Elvis Costello's memoirs? Fuck man, the chapter where he writes about his father's death absolutely slayed me.

[newbridge]

Thoughts around these parts on Jonathan Coe?

[Glebe]

Reread I, Partridge, and am rereading Disgusting Bliss at the moment.

[Serge]

Thoughts around these parts on Jonathan Coe?

I read 'What A Carve Up!' about 20 years ago and loved it, and always meant to get around to reading more of his stuff....but never did. He is a big Robert Wyatt fan and wrote the introduction to the marvellous biography of the Great Man that came out a couple of years ago, so for that alone, he's got a free pass in my eyes. Yes, basically, I'll like anybody if they like the same music as I do.

[Blinder Data]

I read Kim Stanley Robinson's Red Mars. It was fucking fantastic; totally believable and really makes you think about societies, the future, collective organisation, etc. Just packed full of thought-provoking stuff with some great characters (and some not so great ones - Nadia was a bit of a bore).

Barely any of it felt dated considering it was written 20 years ago - the man has clearly done his homework. KSR only dropped one clanger, claiming they'll be using videotapes on Mars. Come on authorman, they had CDs in the 1990s!

I would argue the book could really benefit from illustrations. Great swathes of text are dedicated to precisely describing the geology and environment of the planet, much of which was lost on me. Just one illustration in between each chapter would have helped me visualise the planet and the buildings better. But other than that, well done, 9/10.

Considering everything seems to have to gone to shit by the end, I'm very interested in what happens in the next two instalments, which apparently deepen the mythology and story. Looking forward to it.

Now onto Watership Down for the first time. Bit of a palate cleanser!

[Obel]

I read Kim Stanley Robinson's Red Mars. It was fucking fantastic; totally believable and really makes you think about societies, the future, collective organisation, etc. Just packed full of thought-provoking stuff with some great characters (and some not so great ones - Nadia was a bit of a bore).

Barely any of it felt dated considering it was written 20 years ago - the man has clearly done his homework. KSR only dropped one clanger, claiming they'll be using videotapes on Mars. Come on authorman, they had CDs in the 1990s!

I would argue the book could really benefit from illustrations. Great swathes of text are dedicated to precisely describing the geology and environment of the planet, much of which was lost on me. Just one illustration in between each chapter would have helped me visualise the planet and the buildings better. But other than that, well done, 9/10.

Considering everything seems to have to gone to shit by the end, I'm very interested in what happens in the next two instalments, which apparently deepen the mythology and story. Looking forward to it.

Now onto Watership Down for the first time. Bit of a palate cleanser!

I'm 350 pages into Green Mars now, it's excellent and already I prefer it to Red Mars. Highly recommended. No way you won't enjoy it.

[Dannyhood91]

I'm currently reading Jonathan Sacks' Not In Gods Name, all about religious violence and the danger of the 'them v us' mentality. This is the sort of thing they should be teaching in schools.

[kittens]

today i read story of the eye
it is rude!!

[GeeWhiz]

I've been reading Douglas Coupland's Worst. Person. Ever

It took a heck of a kicking in the press but, as an undemanding slice of picaresque could, with a little less shock humour, easily pass for early Vonnegut (definite shades of Cat's Cradle here, folks).

Also, Cain by the horrendously talented Luke Kennard. By turns goofy, playful and gosh-darned bleak. Quite the talent.

[Serge]

I've just finished reading Don Winslow's two epic dope-war novels, The Power Of The Dog and The Cartel. Although they were written ten years apart, reading them as I did does make it feel like I actually read one 1100 page novel, although only three characters from the first reappear in the second (admittedly, two of them are the two main characters, Art Keller and Adan Barrera). Amazing stuff, though also makes for a depressing read at times with the relentless violence, murder and corruption, all of which is pretty much taken from real life - it's noted on more than one occasion that Mexico is being destroyed to feed the USA's drug habit.

A few things to nitpick about - the first twenty pages of 'Dog' nearly put me off going any further, as they make Keller come across as a Marlboro Man, squinting intensely into the distance as he makes his way through life. The first hundred or so pages of 'The Cartel', while not actually bad, did make me wonder why he'd bothered writing a sequel, but then

Spoiler alert

Eddie Ruiz and Jesus The Kid

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turn up and things start going crazy. And the ending of 'The Cartel' is basically ridiculous -

Spoiler alert

Keller turns into Rambo and lots of things blow up in the jungle; I did think that he had one eye on a future film adaptation with this.

[close]

But those things aside, they're fantastic. Although he never quite scales the heights of Ellroy's writing, the actual events that he's writing about are so off the scale, that I frequently found myself goggling as one page after another is filled with insane violence and events that would seem like too ridiculous to make up if they weren't taken straight from real life. He makes it clear that there are barely any good guys here - even

Spoiler alert

the nominal hero, Keller, kills or causes the deaths of so many people that it's hard to root for him at times.

[close]

Barrera is a bad bastard, but he does make him human, even if some of those around him might occasionally feel cartoonishly bad. Characters you like die - usually horribly - and there are at least two scenes in 'Dog' which actually shook me.

Incredible stuff.

[Pit-Pat]

Cheers Serge - might try giving those Don Winslow ones a go. Are they exceptionally unpleasant?

[Smeraldina Rima]

today i read story of the eye
it is rude!!

I liked this. The scene with the piss coming out of the wardrobe really stayed with me. I also think he looks like Patrick Marber.

[Madam Sexchrist]

Also, Cain by the horrendously talented Luke Kennard. By turns goofy, playful and gosh-darned bleak. Quite the talent.

Yeah, he's great. My favourite from some of our newer published poets.[nb]John Clegg is pretty good as well. Adam O'Riordan hits the sweet spot, sometimes, but he's not always very exciting.[/nb] Most new poetry leaves me indifferent, appalled, or makes me feel as if I'm several levels beneath the writer (which is almost certainly true), but I enjoy Kennard.[nb]This is not to say that he's an 'easy' author, or that I would want him to be an easy author.[/nb]

[Serge]

Cheers Serge - might try giving those Don Winslow ones a go. Are they exceptionally unpleasant?

Motherfuckingly so. In fact, I'd go so far as to say Cuntingly so.

[Pit-Pat]

Oo-err... I don't want to be put off my mixed grill...

[BritishHobo]

Recently finished End of Watch, the last instalment in Stephen King's crime/cat-and-mouse-thriller trilogy, and I don't think he's particularly good at writing either. As crime novels, all three fall down thanks to his desire to give all his secrets away as early as possible[nb]Inherited by his son - I read N0S4R2 last month and its most unique and interesting idea - Christmasland - is pushed out of the spotlight at every turn by the same desperation to over-explain and over-foreshadow. Shame, because I thought Horns was fantastic, a superb standalone novel about faith versus individual concern, with some lovely angry, layered and theologically interesting things to say about the nature of God, rather than the same-old 'good magic versus bad magic' of the newer books I mention..[/nb]. Every time, all three books, you're handed at great length the identity of the villain and the full details of his plan, and you simply sit around watching Bill Hodges and his team try to figure out who the villain is and what his plan entails. As with N0S4R2, the climax of each one is unsatisfyingly short and crammed onto the end of three hundred pages of the protagonists ambling naively and hopelessly towards it. Meh.

Anyway, onto Hack Attack, Nick Davies' account of the history of illegal practises at the News of the World running alongside the timeline of his own investigation into it, at all turns frustrating and seemingly futile, endlessly hampered by spiteful, childish spin from those desperately defending the establishment. Great book, but it's making me even angrier and more unsatisfied than End of Watch.

[marquis_de_sad]

Every time, all three books, you're handed at great length the identity of the villain and the full details of his plan, and you simply sit around watching Bill Hodges and his team try to figure out who the villain is and what his plan entails.

So it's like Columbo?

[Serge]

Oo-err... I don't want to be put off my mixed grill...

I wouldn't recommend trying to hold one of these doorstops in one hand whilst tackling a mixed grill with the other. Of course this joke doesn't work if you read things on a Kindle.

[Junglist]

Recently finished End of Watch, the last instalment in Stephen King's crime/cat-and-mouse-thriller trilogy, and I don't think he's particularly good at writing either. As crime novels, all three fall down thanks to his desire to give all his secrets away as early as possible[nb]Inherited by his son - I read N0S4R2 last month and its most unique and interesting idea - Christmasland - is pushed out of the spotlight at every turn by the same desperation to over-explain and over-foreshadow. Shame, because I thought Horns was fantastic, a superb standalone novel about faith versus individual concern, with some lovely angry, layered and theologically interesting things to say about the nature of God, rather than the same-old 'good magic versus bad magic' of the newer books I mention..[/nb]. Every time, all three books, you're handed at great length the identity of the villain and the full details of his plan, and you simply sit around watching Bill Hodges and his team try to figure out who the villain is and what his plan entails. As with N0S4R2, the climax of each one is unsatisfyingly short and crammed onto the end of three hundred pages of the protagonists ambling naively and hopelessly towards it. Meh.

Halfway through this right now. I enjoyed Mr Mercedes as it had some real dark themes running through it, and it felt like it zipped along, but its sequel, and especially End of Watch are just dull, tired and all in all boring.

Especially the stuff in End of Watch about

Spoiler alert

taking over others due to the random drug tests the 'genius' doc has been doing. Its like he had an idea for another novel and then just banged it into the Hodges universe for the sake of a trilogy.

[close]

[BOBBY FLOWERS]

Trying to remember a book from this vague description that's probably an inaccurate mishmash of various things:

I first heard of it through CaB when a couple of posters enthusiastically praised it. I can't remember much of the details but I think it was set in Hollywood (although I'm not even certain about that) and mainly focused on one man. There might have been a sequel or the author wrote a second similarly themed book. I think it had a name something like, "City of.." or "Rat City". I'm sure  the front cover on Wikipedia at the time or posted on here was a mostly black and white illustration of a sky scraper or buildings with hundreds of bats or crows flying about it.

My single karma for any help please.

[buttgammon]

Just a pure guess really but is it The Day of the Locust by Nathaniel West?

[BOBBY FLOWERS]

Just a pure guess really but is it The Day of the Locust by Nathaniel West?

Yes! Kind of. The cover I was thinking of is the cover of Miss Lonelyhearts. I said mostly black and white because I knew there was red on it, I've completely made up the bats though.

The sequel thing was because I knew I was thinking of two books rather than one. I knew there was something up with imagining a sky scraper and Hollywood but knew there was a connection.

Thank you!

Edit: I have reached my karma limit

[buttgammon]

Blimey! Really didn't expect that to be the one! Glad to be of (somewhat inadvertant) service.

[BOBBY FLOWERS]

Really didn't expect it to be got from my vague description that turned out to be two books. What a forum.

[OnBoardNavvy]

Just a pure guess really but is it The Day of the Locust by Nathaniel West?

Always tickles me that the name of the character who kicks the child star to death is

Spoiler alert

Homer Simpson

[close]

[buttgammon]

Always tickles me that the name of the character who kicks the child star to death is

Spoiler alert

Homer Simpson

[close]

Totally forgot about that until now!

Actually, I studied the book in university and I remember the lecturer saying the fact that the other

Spoiler alert

Homer Simpson

[close]

is called that is pure coincidence; I really thought he was named after it when I read it though.

[Retinend]

Cakes and Ale - Somerset Maugham



This novel is short but ambitious. In setting, it compares rural village life with London urbanity as they move through victorianism towards the americanized future. The book also addresses the difficulties of writers (Driffield) to capture their raw material (Rosie) when they are so occupied with hobnobbing in an independently moving literary subculture (Kear). Thirdly, the book wants us to think about how quickly modes of thought change.

Characterwise, the literary set (including painters, photographers and hosts etc.) stands against the ethics of the older generation, still abroad in the village, by their exuberance for art above all other values, but in turn stand against the working class spirit embodied by Rosie and "Lord" George Kemp - mocking named for his uppitiness.

The author moves through the prejudices of his uncle and aunt, through the aesthetic snobbishness of his own set, by becoming entranced by the nymphomaniac Rosie, who is the ideal mix of carefree abandon and intelligence - the author repeats twice that she knows nothing of modern literature, but adores the stories of the courts of the Lionhearted. She is also a keen contract whist player.

And despite her outrageous behaviour she never acts in ignorance of the consequences, but rather with happy defiance and a crafty but disarming shamelessness which is of the kind that also charms us in Maugham's "Moon and Sixpence" in the form of Charles Strickland. The character of Rosie stands in interesting contrast to Mildred in "Of Human Bondage."

This may not be a rival to that book, but it is definitely the second best book of his that I have read, coming just above "The Razor's Edge" - a similar tale but written in a later more americanized age: foretold on the last page of this book.