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Read Any Good Books Lately?

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Hate it, hate it, hate it...

 

The death of bees is a bloody serious subject... And this book is nothing to do with that...

 

Why cant these silly writers just chose better titles and stop wasting people's time and effort on trying to understand the implications of such a mass extinction and its effect on the environment.

 

F'ing numpties...

 

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Hate it, hate it, hate it...

 

The death of bees is a bloody serious subject... And this book is nothing to do with that...

 

Why cant these silly writers just chose better titles and stop wasting people's time and effort on trying to understand the implications of such a mass extinction and its effect on the environment.

 

F'ing numpties...

 

You sound like the type of chap who is a literalist, best you avoid novels then and stick to non-fiction.

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Hate it, hate it, hate it...

 

The death of bees is a bloody serious subject... And this book is nothing to do with that...

 

Why cant these silly writers just chose better titles and stop wasting people's time and effort on trying to understand the implications of such a mass extinction and its effect on the environment.

 

F'ing numpties...

 

You sound like the type of chap who is a literalist, best you avoid novels then and stick to non-fiction.

He is actually one of the nicest people could could ever wish to meet.

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Hate it, hate it, hate it...

 

The death of bees is a bloody serious subject... And this book is nothing to do with that...

 

Why cant these silly writers just chose better titles and stop wasting people's time and effort on trying to understand the implications of such a mass extinction and its effect on the environment.

 

F'ing numpties...

 

You sound like the type of chap who is a literalist, best you avoid novels then and stick to non-fiction.

He is actually one of the nicest people could could ever wish to meet.

So, he's a nice literalist. What has that to do with anything?

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Hate it, hate it, hate it...

 

The death of bees is a bloody serious subject... And this book is nothing to do with that...

 

Why cant these silly writers just chose better titles and stop wasting people's time and effort on trying to understand the implications of such a mass extinction and its effect on the environment.

 

F'ing numpties...

 

You sound like the type of chap who is a literalist, best you avoid novels then and stick to non-fiction.

He is actually one of the nicest people could could ever wish to meet.

So, he's a nice literalist. What has that to do with anything?

Fuck all.

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Just finished Umberto Eco's The Prague Cemetery.

 

I know Eco isn't everybody's cuppa, but I quite enjoyed the read. As any good book, it's mainly about other books.

 

regards,

Hein

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I prefered 'Birdsong', by Sebastian Faulks, if you can get past the slow start.

 

I finally got to reading Birdsong. It's a good read, but not quite as good as I expected. Several bits seem a bit over the top.

 

 

regards,

Hein

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Facing the Other Way: The Story of 4AD - interesting, even if, like me, you consider most of their 80s output dreadful 'foundation and flangers' stuff.

 

Bob Stanley's Yeah Yeah Yeah - well, The Sweet were better than Led Zeppelin, obviously.

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Currently reading a character assassination - akin to Albert Goldman on Elvis - book entitled: Bing Crosby: The Hollow Man. It opens with a consideration of the death of his first wife, Dixie, and the dead pool run on the Paramount film lot in which her final month was divided up into sixty sections and people could punt $5 on morning or afternoon of any particular day. She died on 1 Nov 1952, and someone walked off with a few hundred dollars as a result.

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Character assassination of Bing? I was more shocked that Channel 5 thing about Christmas songs last year had one of his daughters talking him up as being great. I'm more used to everyone going on about what a miserable sod he was.

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In da hood, n***as don't have much tim to reed. Howevah, "Cash Money" http://www.amazon.co...ords=cash+money was a book I red a few yearz ago becuz it had da name of my label. It wuz made by a b***ch namd Mocha who wuz a bi**ch wit Missy Elliot in da 90's when da real Cash Money took da streetzi n New Orleans. Dis book iz a mystary about da powa of money. It wuz very inspring to me and it encourgagged me to keep on grindin when I turned 40.

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Forget reading good books, surely the latest online literary trend is well within the capabilities of some of the funnier posters hereabouts:

 

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/01/14/monster-porn-is-the-latest-wrinkle-in-self-published-smut.html

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Forget reading good books, surely the latest online literary trend is well within the capabilities of some of the funnier posters hereabouts:

 

http://www.thedailyb...ished-smut.html

 

But the publication underestimated just how niche this stuff gets. For example, a search for the Bigfoot series on Amazon yields related titles likeRavaged by the Hydra, Mounted by the Gryphon, Fertilized in Space, and—my personal favorite—Frankenstein’s Bitch.

 

FERTILIZED IN SPACE....... oh fuck. That's great.

 

I've been pondering for a while that maybe writing some absolute dreck in an eBook that I could sell to all these hideous modern nerds who have absolutely no shame and a limitless bank account from all their computer IT-type wank jobs, might be my way out of the Fritzhole/lower middle class gutter I'm in. Not sure if I actually want to go through the process of really finding out what kind of stuff makes them "tick" and trying to train myself to write that, though.

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Simon Schama's The Embarrassment of Riches had been on my List of Books I Really Want to Read[1] for at least 15 years before I finally picked up a copy a few weeks ago. It didn't disappoint.

 

The book presents an important part of the history of my nation in a way that isn't taught in Dutch schools. I was taught Vaderlandse geschiedenis (national history) in which the heroes of the 17th century were described in flowery prose and an unmistakable odour of sanctity, similar to that of dead resistance fighters of WWII. Those days are over, but I expect the chapters about 17th century Dutch habits in food, drink and tobacco won't become part of history lessons. A Frenchman travelling by barge was horrified by the Dutch men and women smoking on board; he wrote that "[the smoke] drove foxes from their lairs as they passed."

 

Fine history, well written, good book.

 

[1]Containing works like The Art of Computer Programming, Berlin Alexanderplatz, Canto General, Civil Disobedience, Crime and Punishment, The Divine Comedy, Don Quixote, Earth Abides, Faust, Ficciones, Leaves of Grass, Madame Bovary, On Growth and Form, The Red and the Black, The Road to Stalingrad/The Road to Berlin, Schoon ende suverlijc boecxken inhoudende veel constige refereinen, Tractatus Theologico-Politicus, The Trial, War and Peace.

 

regards,

Hein

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Agreed. No home should be without one.

 

I've ordered it along with The Exorcism of Anneliese Michel and Solitude: A Year in the Patagonian Wilderness

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Agreed. No home should be without one.

 

I've ordered it along with The Exorcism of Anneliese Michel and Solitude: A Year in the Patagonian Wilderness

 

 

 

Awesome, a year in the wilderness with those 500 albums would leave you in need of exorcism from the strangest demons, I can see the logic of your shopping habits, though Amazon's computer guided shopping suggestions may struggle with you.

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I am currently reading Prime Minister Boris and Other Things That Never Happened (25p from The Works) which is a series of counterfactual essays discussing how things could have been different if events had changed (e.g if AV had been introduced with universal sufferage, Gordon Brown had stood for leader against Tony Blair when John Smith died). Most are quite informative and interesting but one "What would have happened if the Pope had been assassinated during his visit to Britain in 2010" essentially reads like an edgy (used in the best sense of Dr Z) political drama rejected by Channel 4. It describes a possible series of events designed to create a secular martyr (his chosen victim was Lalla Ward). Well written but left me feeling slightly uncomfortable.

 

Good reading for election time.

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Finished Viv Albertine's autobiography last week (which won awards from Mojo and NME as best music book last year), edgy, honest and insightful (she was nearly one of ours a few years ago). Currently reading Flat Earth News by Nick Davies (about how little truth there is in the press).

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I'm just about finished reading Kelly Oxford's Everything is Perfect when you're a Liar. Very funny book maybe more so if you are a Canuck.

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I've been reading Agatha Christie lately.

I read "The Mystery of the Blue Train" a few weeks ago, and just a few days ago I got a book of some of her short stories from the library.

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I have just finished The City of Death which (for those of you who don't know) is James Goss' adaptation of Douglas Adams' Doctor Who seriel from 1979. It is one of only four seriels from the original run that had not been adapted as books. James Goss is working on the other Douglas Adams script The Pirate Planet which leaves Eric Saward's two Dalek stories (Resurrection & Revelation).

 

The book is an absolute joy and Goss manages to capture a better essence of Adams (helped by the very witty original script) then Eoin Coifer managed in ...And Another Thing

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For work purposes I'm currently wading my way through a vast tonnage of Beatle releated trivia and turned up a couple of Lennon related curios.

 

Fenton Bresler's Who Killed John Lennon? - wherein he argues Mark Chapman is some Manchurian candidate stylee programmed assassin - is a thorough job of work and well-argued, right up to the point where he tries to link CIA/FBI shenanegins to Mark Chapman.

 

by contrast a book called The Lennon Prophecy which suggests - basically - the man sold his soul to Satan in return for his talent is a jaw-dropping pile of the worst written gormless shite I've read since Jacob Aranza and his cack-brained rants about backward masking in records corrupting the minds of youngsters.

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