What are you currently reading?

[tragabigzanda]

Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

[4/5]

Nah. I appreciate this writeup -- I actually did immediately think of Travels with Charley, and I wondered if this would be like a Russian version of that. But I'm not super interested in 1947 Russia (or rather, I don't have the bandwidth to pursue an interest in that right now).

Appreciate your taking the time to respond.

Haha, I definitely don't blame you for that.

[lennytheweedwhacker]

the house of the spirits

[BurtReynolds]

[Simple Torture]

I routinely cite that collection as a publishing/marketing mystery--all of the stories are eminently forgettable except for the last one, which is the only one that breaks from the like, mid-century model of brooding domestic strife by being about Vikings. That last story totally fucking rules, but the book itself sucks.

I had a similar feeling after finally finishing this--like I said above, I don't recall what caused me to put it on my reading list like 10 years ago, but I was underwhelmed in general. I did like the second-to-last story, too, about the carnival. The Viking story was great. But forgettable overall.

[epilogue]

So... turns out Zadie Smith can really fucking write, huh?

Holy shit.

Reading 'On Beauty' and it's wonderful!

ahem

Don't worry, I haven't forgotten.

Sorry Stat,I picked up something else again.

[Strat]

So... turns out Zadie Smith can really fucking write, huh?

Holy shit.

Reading 'On Beauty' and it's wonderful!

ahem

Don't worry, I haven't forgotten.

Sorry Stat,I picked up something else again.

Nah i get it. You dont like me anymore.

[Mickey]

[BurtReynolds]

[Strat]

Finally starting up the Splendid at the Vile.

Ive read some fluff for the past couple of months so we'll see how this goes.

[invention]

Keeping it going:

High-octane paranoia deranges a writer and fuels a dangerous plan to return home at the tail end of El Salvador’s long civil war.

Is the plan a dream or a nightmare?

Is he courageous, foolhardy, or just plain dumb?

Is the bubbling brew of horrors and threats actual or imagined?

After he seeks relief for liver pain through hypnosis (while drinking more than ever, despite the treatments), his few impulse-control mechanisms rapidly dissolve, and reality only rarely intrudes on his cogitations. Harebrained murder plots, half-mad arguments, hysterical rants: the narrative escalates at a maniacal pace, infused with Horacio Castellanos Moya’s uniquely outlandish and acerbic sense of humor.

I’ve had this one since it came out but haven’t read it yet. I loved Senselessness.

[LetMeSleep]

Siddhartha, Hermann Hesse

[ghost]

[invention]

I just bought this but the thiccness intimidates me.

[The Argonaut]

I just bought this but the thiccness intimidates me.

2021 is going to be the Year of Reading Long Books for me. I'm finally going to read all the long books I've been intimidated by, or re-read the books I've never picked up again because it would take too long to get through. I'm finally going to read Infinite Jest and Robert Caro. I'm finally going to re-read Underworld and What It Takes. I'll actually read Stamped by Ibram Kendi and Jill Lepore's These Truths. Maybe I'll look at some Doris Kearns Godwin or Jean Edward Smith. Maybe I'll look at Don Quixote, or Moby Dick, or Dostoevsky. I'm going to read The Aeneid and that big book of boxing essays that I bought at the Borders closing sale. It's going to be a good year

[Simple Torture]

Keeping it going:

High-octane paranoia deranges a writer and fuels a dangerous plan to return home at the tail end of El Salvador’s long civil war.

Is the plan a dream or a nightmare?

Is he courageous, foolhardy, or just plain dumb?

Is the bubbling brew of horrors and threats actual or imagined?

After he seeks relief for liver pain through hypnosis (while drinking more than ever, despite the treatments), his few impulse-control mechanisms rapidly dissolve, and reality only rarely intrudes on his cogitations. Harebrained murder plots, half-mad arguments, hysterical rants: the narrative escalates at a maniacal pace, infused with Horacio Castellanos Moya’s uniquely outlandish and acerbic sense of humor.

I’ve had this one since it came out but haven’t read it yet. I loved Senselessness.

I really liked this one, a bit more than Revulsion.

[Mickey]

Keeping it going:

High-octane paranoia deranges a writer and fuels a dangerous plan to return home at the tail end of El Salvador’s long civil war.

Is the plan a dream or a nightmare?

Is he courageous, foolhardy, or just plain dumb?

Is the bubbling brew of horrors and threats actual or imagined?

After he seeks relief for liver pain through hypnosis (while drinking more than ever, despite the treatments), his few impulse-control mechanisms rapidly dissolve, and reality only rarely intrudes on his cogitations. Harebrained murder plots, half-mad arguments, hysterical rants: the narrative escalates at a maniacal pace, infused with Horacio Castellanos Moya’s uniquely outlandish and acerbic sense of humor.

I’ve had this one since it came out but haven’t read it yet. I loved Senselessness.

Paul!

[BurtReynolds]

[invention]

Keeping it going:

High-octane paranoia deranges a writer and fuels a dangerous plan to return home at the tail end of El Salvador’s long civil war.

Is the plan a dream or a nightmare?

Is he courageous, foolhardy, or just plain dumb?

Is the bubbling brew of horrors and threats actual or imagined?

After he seeks relief for liver pain through hypnosis (while drinking more than ever, despite the treatments), his few impulse-control mechanisms rapidly dissolve, and reality only rarely intrudes on his cogitations. Harebrained murder plots, half-mad arguments, hysterical rants: the narrative escalates at a maniacal pace, infused with Horacio Castellanos Moya’s uniquely outlandish and acerbic sense of humor.

I’ve had this one since it came out but haven’t read it yet. I loved Senselessness.

Paul!

Wut up

[invention]

I just bought this but the thiccness intimidates me.

2021 is going to be the Year of Reading Long Books for me. I'm finally going to read all the long books I've been intimidated by, or re-read the books I've never picked up again because it would take too long to get through. I'm finally going to read Infinite Jest and Robert Caro. I'm finally going to re-read Underworld and What It Takes. I'll actually read Stamped by Ibram Kendi and Jill Lepore's These Truths. Maybe I'll look at some Doris Kearns Godwin or Jean Edward Smith. Maybe I'll look at Don Quixote, or Moby Dick, or Dostoevsky. I'm going to read The Aeneid and that big book of boxing essays that I bought at the Borders closing sale. It's going to be a good year

That’s cool. I like this idea. I always tell myself I’m going to rotate between long and short, fiction and non-fiction, but it never seems to work.