Recommended books.

[KTS]

Just thought I'd give a mention to four novels I've recently read and recommend. Maybe we can use this topic to recommend books in general, not necessarily just gay novels. It might be interesting to see the varied and possibly random books people read and why - and what they thought about them. Anyhow, here's the 4

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"Going Out" by Scarlett Thomas. Thought the plot sounded cool so that's why I bought it. It's quite simply written and enjoyable. The best thing about it is that it's fresh and original.

This is from the back cover

He wants to go out. She wants to stay in. For some reason, they are best friends.

Luke is allergic to the sun. 25 and housebound, he's stuck in his bedroom where the world comes to him through TV, the Internet and Julie's nightly visits. It is October 2000, and he vowed to find a cure for his allergy by the end of the year.

While Luke searches the Internet for healers, Julie is happy living with her dad, working on the local retail park and thinking about maths theorems that no one else understands. As long as she doesn't have to leave home, everything's OK.

When a healer contacts Luke and claims that he can cure him, the two have to face their fears and embark on a journey that might just change their lives. With four friends - Charlotte, David, Leanne and Chantel, and armed with rolls of tin foil, wellies and a homemade space suit - they set off in a VW Camper van in the rain, driving on B-roads through Britian, through the October floods, not knowing what they might find.

Check out the author's funky site here http//www.bookgirl.org

http//images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/1841157627.02.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

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"Girlfriend in a Coma" by Douglas Coupland. Got this because I loved Coupland's "Generation X" which I read years ago, and also because it has a cool funky cover. I know, I know - never judge a book by its cover.

From the back cover

Karen goes into a coma one night in 1979. Whilst in it, she gives birth to a healthy baby daughter; once out of it, 18 years later, she finds herself a middle-aged mother whose friends have all gone through all the normal marital, social and political traumas and back again.

http//images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/0006551270.02.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

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"The Hellfire Club" by Peter Straub. Just re-read this for like the millionth time. Straub is one of my favourite authors and I'll put up a post about him soon. This is one of his best books.

From the back cover

From the award-winning author of MR X and BLACK HOUSE -- a nerve-jangling thriller of astonishing pace, featuring one of the most hypnotic and compelling killers ever created. Now reissued in a new cover style. THE HELLFIRE CLUB has at its heart a long-standing literary mystery. Family-run publishers Chancel House suddenly faces financial ruin when disturbing rumours surface about the true origins of their cult fantasy bestseller -- Night Journey. Yet the Chancel family's nightmare has only just begun. For brilliant and brutal killer Dick Dart is about to kidnap Nora Chancel, taking her on a terrifying trip that has alarming echoes of the story of Night Journey. Nora soon realises that to escape her obsessed captor she must first unravel the truth behind this mysterious book.

http//www.net-site.com/straub/images/thc.jpg
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"Slammerkin" by Emma Donoghue. This one caught my attention because I'm a fan of her lesbian novels (this isn't one of them) and I thought the bodice-ripping-style cover looked cool. Not really the type of book or story I'd normally be into, but a few pages in I was hooked and stayed up all night reading it.

About the book, from barnesandnoble.com

Mary Saunders, a lower-class London schoolgirl, was born into rough cloth but hungered for lace and the trappings of a higher station than her family would ever know. In 18th-century England, Mary's shrewd instincts will get her only so far, and she despairs of the plans made for her to carve out a trade as a seamstress or a maid. Unwilling to bend to such a destiny, Mary strikes out on a painful, fateful journey all her own. Inspired by the obscure historical figure Mary Saunders, Slammerkin is a provocative, graphic tale and a rich feast of an historical novel. Author Emma Donoghue probes the gap between a young girl's quest for freedom and a better life and the shackles that society imposes on her. "Never give up your liberty," Mary's closest friend Doll, instructs. But as Mary's journey takes her from the seedy streets of London, where she is forced to toil as a prostitute, to a small town in Wales, where she works as a dressmaker's assistant, she learns just how difficult it is to follow her friend's advice. The term "slammerkin" refers to both a loose gown and a loose woman, and this intelligent work is filled with rich images of dressmaking, detailing the painfully stiff stays the wearers endured and the fabrics and trims that served as features and as demarcations between the social classes. Another piece of wisdom Doll offered Mary was, "Clothes make the woman," but, as Mary Saunders discovers herself, the desire for fine clothes makes her a woman she could never have imagined.


http//images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/186049899X.02.LZZZZZZZ

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KTS

[damien]

I like Douglas Couplands stuff. I've read Shampoo Planet , Generation X and Girlfriend in a Coma. Girlfriend in a Coma is also a Smiths song and he has many Smiths lyrics in it ( http//www.eeggs.com/items/2908.html lists loads)

GIAC is creepy at times and the imagery is really good. Its probably my fav Coupland book so far. Gen X and Shampoo planet were fun reads too but GIAC is a lot more serious. I'd recommend it.

I'll read MicroSerfs next, I've heard good things about it.

[Slayer]

Wuthering Heights- An oldie but a fucking classic.

It'll make you cry and laugh.

It will hurt your heart the emotions in it are so strong, and the characters are so complex and tortured.

READ IT NOW.

[odyssey_scot]

i hear ya, slayer..
read it on holidays once when i was younger. chose to read out a particularly spooky bit to my sister (who woulda been about 12). she actually physically gasped at one stage cos she was so damn scared by it, and then made me stop reading cos she couldnt bear it.

just shows how strong a book it really is!


my favourites (in no particular order)
1) 1984 - George Orwell (forget everything you've heard about this book, and just read it, for yourself. At the end, I thought about the book and a few months past and I was still thinking about it...it has that kinda effect)

2) Satanic Verses - Salman Rushdie (this one was so good, it made me almost completely ignore my family for three days!! I couldnt put it down, it was gutwrenchingly good, i kid you not. I had the most fantastic dreams after I read it).

3) The Catcher in the Rye - J.D Salinger (mostly because I really do feel some link to Holden, the main character...read it, lads, you'll see what I mean. Holden encompasses the essence of teenage life. Nothing happens, but everything happens....)

4)On the Road - Jack Kerouac. (this made me so itchy to move on and start my life...weird effect of a piece of literature!)

5) The Birth of Tragedy - Friedrich Nietzsche (if you thought I was pretentious, this proves it! the thing is, books like this take such damn effort, i'm still not finished it! but there's something that draws me back everytime....)

[Disco_Kev]

finally got around to reading 1984 a few years ago. I have heard some many references (Big Brother being the one that got me to see where that really came from). Anyway loved it, thought provoking alright. Went on to read Huxley's "Brave New World".

At the moment I have just finished Bill Bryson's "Down Under". I love his writing. I can't read his books in public places, I always laugh out loud.
Everyone who has InterRailed or thought about it has to read "Neither here nor there" also by Bryson. I bought it when i came back from my own European adventure.

[KTS]

I agree, Bill Bryson is cool, just finished reading "Notes from a Big Country" and ... wow! It's fantastic! Hilarious bite-sized essays that'll have you flipping through the book so fast you'll leave burn marks on the pages. A treat. Recommended.

Link to a pic
http//www.penrithcity.nsw.gov.au/libim/bookreviews/bryson.gif

[KTS]

Just wanted to recommend this excellent, witty novel. It's available for a very attractive price in Waterstones at the moment. Hardback retails at 18.45, but in Waterstones there's 12.00 off - so only 6.45; this is a steal, especially for a brand new hardback.

It's on the table that says Hardbacks - Save Lots of Lolly just inside the front of the shop.

Link to a pic
http//images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/0007139411.02.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

[solice]

i dont know KTS, i thought "notes from a big country" and "letters from a small island" were kind of boring. yeah sure there were some good ones in them, i particularly liked the one where he goes to fix his computer and rings the helpline. but overall i would have to say that they become tedious. he is trying too hard to be too funny all of the time, its not comming naturally from him. i will admit that after reading half of the book i only took brief looks at the rest of it. i was that entertained.

on the other hand "down under", that was a book. i read it on the plane to australia and i laughed so hard i was asked to shut up by the lovely air steward (i wasnt complaining [p])
i know its childish but the song he makes up going to the same tune as waltzing matilda, oh it was commical. i laughed out loud for a solid ten minutes.
i am truly childish and sad

[Disco_Kev]

quoteOriginally posted by solice
i dont know KTS, i thought "notes from a big country" and "letters from a small island" were kind of boring. yeah sure there were some good ones in them, i particularly liked the one where he goes to fix his computer and rings the helpline. but overall i would have to say that they become tedious. he is trying too hard to be too funny all of the time, its not comming naturally from him. i will admit that after reading half of the book i only took brief looks at the rest of it. i was that entertained.

on the other hand "down under", that was a book. i read it on the plane to australia and i laughed so hard i was asked to shut up by the lovely air steward (i wasnt complaining [p])
i know its childish but the song he makes up going to the same tune as waltzing matilda, oh it was commical. i laughed out loud for a solid ten minutes.
i am truly childish and sad


The first Bryson book I read was "Neiher here nor there". I read it shortly after I returned home from my own European adventure (Inter Rail) so I could relate to a lot of it. I finished the book in a matter of hours, staying up 'till some ungodly hour in the morning. I had a pain in my ribs from trying to hold in my laughter. I rarely finish a book in a single session like that. By the time I finished it I wanted more. So I bought "Notes from a small Island" and I was disappointed with it. It was a let down after the laugh out loud NHNT. "Small Island" didn't really inspire me to go and see any of the places he wrote about. On the other hand, I do want to visit Hammerfest, Norway. Saying that I did recently re-read "Small Island". I wanted to give it a second chance, I enjoyed it. As for Down Under. You are right Solice, he can get a bit repetitive at times. It began to grate on me a bit by the end of Down Under. But that's not to take away from a great read. I don't agree with you "Being Bill Bryson" theory. "Notes from a Big country" is a different fish altogether. You have to take into account that the essays in that were first printed in a UK Sunday paper supplement (can't remember which one off hand).
Anyway its a personal thing. I loved NHNT cause I went to the some of the places he wrote about. Solice reading Down Under on the way to Aus.
Well I gotta get back and do some work before the day is gone.

*Ramble off*

[Bootyzilla]

I have to agree with Solice, I tried 'Notes' once and thought Bill Bryson was kind of overrated. And what is the big fuss over Christopher Rice? I read 'The Snow Garden' and it was okay but not the New Gay Literary Cannon that lots of people made it out to be.

My favourite favourites are

Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden. Simply because of the evocative nature of the story and the fact that this is the only book I have ever read in which a man writes so convincingly as a woman. It's bizarre and beautiful and deceptively simplistic.

Blackwood Farm by Anne Rice. The only Vampire Chronicle (and I'm a fan but not an anorak -) of the last fifteen years or so to make any kind of impact whatsoever. It's wonderful, chilling and very, very lush. If prose were food then this would be foie gras.

Ten Thousand Sorrows by Elizabeth Kim. Just beautiful; a real testament to the power of forgiveness. Autobiographical and very, very brave.

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte. For its sense of utter isolation and subsequent redemption.

Redbirds Memories of the South by Rick Bragg. Autobiography containing a deeply moving portrait of a mother who may as well have been an Irish Mammy.

The Woman In Black by Susan Hill. No gore, no violence, no action, and 160 pages. A two-hour read that is without doubt the scariest thing I have ever read in my entire life. And I've read the Anne Robinson book. Which was very good -)

[KTS]

THE LOVELY BONES

BY ALICE SEBOLD


ABOUT THE BOOK On her way home from school on a snowy December day in the 70's, 14-year-old Susie Salmon is raped and murdered. What follows is as novel told from her perspective in Heaven, as she watches down on the world, including her family and the events that occur on Earth.

WHAT I THOUGHT An unusual narrative fuels this haunting and, at times, heartbreaking novel. Sebold's lyrical, descriptive prose turns a potentially dismal novel into a tender one. Gripping. Highly recommended.


LINK TO A PIC
http//images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/0330485385.02.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by Tank_Girl
2) Satanic Verses - Salman Rushdie (this one was so good, it made me almost completely ignore my family for three days!! I couldnt put it down, it was gutwrenchingly good, i kid you not. I had the most fantastic dreams after I read it).



Tank Girl, because of this I went to buy this the other day in the bookshop I work in. But the guy I worked with recommended I read Rushdie's other novel "Midnight's Children" first (as I've never read Rushdie before) so I bought it, plan to read it first and then buy "Satanic Verses".

- Have you read any of his other books?

[odyssey_scot]

KTS, I've read Midnights Children. Personally, I didnt like it as much as Satanic Verses. Not quite as mindblowing, though still well written. I dunno, I have a soft spot for an epic tale, and thats what Satanic Verses is.

Though, half the reason I was so unbelieveabley impressed by S.Verses was because I was new to Rushdie. So his style took me by surprise. Perhaps if you read Midnights Children first, then S. Verses has a different affect on you.

Forgive me I'm rambling, Rushdie is a fabulous storyteller, hence why I gush about him so much.

[KTS]

No problems Tank Girl, I'm glad you mentioned him to be because I've been meaning to read him for ages, but your post inspired me to finally get around to it!

By the way, just also wanted to mentioned the children's books "Artemis Fowl" by Wexford author Eoin Colfer. There's three of them so far - "Artemis Fowl" (Book 1) and "Artemis Fowl The Artic Incident" (Book 2) - both in paperback; and "Artemis Fowl Eternity Code" (Book 3) - currently in hardback, Waterstones have a good deal of €5 off, normally €18.45 but with the discount only €13.45.

They're not as good as Harry Potter, but they're quite good fun. I'm sure damien mentioned them before also ...

Link to pics and info about Artemis Fowl books on amazon.co.uk
http//www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/search-handle-form/026-9379049-4829255

Link to pics and info about Salman Rushdie books on amazon.co.uk
http//www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/search-handle-form/026-9379049-4829255

[damien]

Is this turning into a bookstore pimping thread ?

I've read the First Artemis and its really good. Reading the Dark materials trilogy at the moment too and on the train back from Dublin today I read "Snapshots" by Jarlath Gregory, a cool young gay writer from Crossmaglen.

[candlemansa]

Ive just read the first two in the dark materials trilogy and really enjoyed them both. At the moment im reading A socerers treason by Sarah Zettel. It is book one of the isavalta trilogy. It tells the tale of Bridget a lighthouse keeper in the late 1800's on lake superior. During one storm she rescues an odd man who tells her that he is from another world and that in that world she is a great mystical force of unknown power and only she can save the royal family from destruction. Another book im after getting is Barbara Erskines latest. I'll give a reveiw about a few of her novels at a later date for she is without a doubt one of the greatest writers of our time.

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by damien
Is this turning into a bookstore pimping thread ?



Nope. I just like pointing out good deals when I see them, so people can avail of them. For instance, there's a Peter Straub book called "The Throat" (an excellent psychological thriller - sadly now out of print) available in paperback for only €3.99 in the Porters in Paul St. Shopping Centre.

[damien]

Thats a yes then. [)]

[KTS]

Well, ok I guess so ... but not for any one particular bookstore, i.e. the one I work in. I just think it's nice to point out good deals on books. [8D] Or on CDs, DVDs, etc... [;)]

[odyssey_scot]

Just started another book, Beowulf, the seamus heaney translation..
will do a review once I've finished it.

[redbulljunkie]

noticed a load of classic books on amazon.co.uk for 1.50GB each. Might get a few of those

[capo]

Hey Tank Girl - we should get that review sometime around christmas then.

[Disco_Kev]

This is a little off-topic but I just found out that an Inquest is finally been held for the Australian prime minister Harold Holt. For any one who has read Bill Bryson's "Down Under", he was the guy who went for a swim in 1967 and vanished. A change in law in Victoria means an Inquest can now be held without the recovery of a body.
[I] Looks like I'm having on of those days where I'm just going to waste time on-line.

[KTS]

THE BLUE DAY BOOK
BY BRADLEY TREVOR GREIVE


http//www.quilteddragon.com/Books/thebluedaybook.jpg


YOU CAN GET THIS BOOK EVERYWHERE, A LITTLE HARDBACK, FOR APPROX 7 QUID. IT'S BRILLIANT, FILLED WITH FUNNY PICTURES OF ANIMALS (NO NAUGHTY JOKES PLEASE), GUARANTEED TO CHEER YOU UP!

KTS

[solice]

he was eaten by sharks kev. or salt water crocs or maybe got stung by some box jelly fish or stood on one of those spikey fish. i think bill did a little bit too much research when he wrote that book

[odyssey_scot]

quoteOriginally posted by capo
Hey Tank Girl - we should get that review sometime around christmas then.



lol.
quite likely

[KTS]

Halfway through Allen Carr's Easy Way to Stop Smoking. It's OK, but very repetitive - more when I finish it ...

08/09/03 - FINISHED THE BOOK SO EDITING THIS PARAGRAPH THAT I ALSO PUT IN THE TOPIC "ALLEN CARR" IN HERE

I finished the book, I read it very slowly on purpose, about a chapter a two a day, as somebody told me it was best to read it this way (maybe to let it sink in better? I dunno). It's good, but hardly life-changing. It's really up to what kind of person and smoker you are. For example, he doesn't believe in nictoine substitues (patches, gum, etc.) whereas I do. It's a good, common-sense read regardless of whether you've already quit, or are thinking about it, or even if you're a non-smoker who wants to understand a smoker you know better. But like all hype, it's really not as good as it's made out to be. See also, the topic "Quitting Smoking" - maybe I'm just being more critical cos I'm currently finding it really hard to stay off them.



http//images.byobs.co.uk/00D60BF3.jpg

[redbulljunkie]

quoteIt's OK but very repetitive

Probably choc full of subliminal advertising

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by redbulljunkie
quoteIt's OK but very repetitive

Probably choc full of subliminal advertising


Yes ... true. He blatantly advertises his other books, but he's so blantant about the plugs for them it's hard to snigger.

[skysabove]

But does it actually have good advice on how to stop smoking?

[Slayer]

Sorry I just have to mention an often overlooked form of literature when people think of entertainment- Shakespeare's plays.

I've read Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Merchant of Venice and Macbeth and they're absolutely brilliant.

I've just started King Lear.

Shakespeare's ability to craft characters is something most writers can only dream of.

His stuff gives me shivers its so enjoyable.

His tragedies are devestating, his comedies are funny, his characters and situations are REAL, and they can be placed in any era you like.

I adore Shakespeare

[odyssey_scot]

must disagree, I found 'Othello' to be very basic. i mean simplistic characterisation, weak dialogue...
I know we expect a lot, given that people like Shakespeare provided the foundation for modern playwrighting. but still...Othello bored the hell outta me.

Hamlet, Macbeth, etcetera, all absolutely magnificent...I just wish he'd not decided that a 'moor' who was crafted to be stupid, gullible and malleable should be in such a play as Othello. Iago was fantastic, but Othello wasn't exactly a challenge for him.

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by bill
But does it actually have good advice on how to stop smoking?



Sort of ... not so much advice, he just keeps telling you how stupid and pointless it is (which is true). It depends on the person whether it works, but it only costs like 11 quid (less than 40 cigs) so it's worth a shot. If it doesn't work for you, you can always give it to someone else.

KTS

[KTS]

I've mentioned the gay author Robert Rodi, and some of his books, in passing from time to time. But I had forgotten, apart from being an openly gay novelist with a taste for outrageously funny gay books, how good a writer he can be.

I've recently just re-read Fag Hag. I won't bore you with my review of it, suffice it to say I enjoyed it immensely, and it's so trippy, like Will & Grace meets Misery. Here's what it says on the back cover so you can judge for yourselves if you'd be interested in reading it or not

fag hag n. (slang) A woman who prefers the company of 'gay' men over that of heterosexuals. Fag hags have also been known to desire sexual relations with gay men.

Natalie and best friend Peter cruise the gay bars of Chicago looking for love. The things is, Natalie has alreay found it in Peter, if only he realised it. So she sets out to poison his fledgling relationships, succeeding every time until Peter falls for gun-toting gay survivalist Lloyd Hood. Despite her best efforts, Peter won't give him up, so Natalie decides to get nasty ...

Rodi's other novels include What They Did To Princess Paragon, about a gay cartoonist who updates a 50's comic-book heroine by turning her into a lesbian; Closet Case, about a corporate worker who pretends to be straight but finally comes flying out of the closet in the most unpredictable way; Drag Queen, a novel about a conservative gay man (think David from Six Feet Under) who finds out he's got a long-lost twin brother - also gay - and a drag queen; Kept Boy, about a thirty-something kept man (hence the title) feeling threatened when his elderly keeper meets a new stud; The Birdcage, the novelization of the movie; and Bitch Goddess, a novel told in a series of e-mails/notes/faxes/postcards/interviews about a fledging Hollywood wannabe starlet.

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by damien
Is this turning into a bookstore pimping thread ?

I've read the First Artemis and its really good. Reading the Dark materials trilogy at the moment


quoteOriginally posted by candlemansa
Ive just read the first two in the dark materials trilogy and really enjoyed them both.

Dark Materials ... oh my god, fantastic! I've just read the first volume recently, "Northern Lights", and hope to get around to the second volume "The Subtle Knife" soon. I think the third volume is called "The Spyglass" or something ...

[redbulljunkie]

the amber spyglass. It's really anti-religion

[Slayer]

quoteOriginally posted by Tank_Girl
must disagree, I found 'Othello' to be very basic. i mean simplistic characterisation, weak dialogue...
I know we expect a lot, given that people like Shakespeare provided the foundation for modern playwrighting. but still...Othello bored the hell outta me.

Hamlet, Macbeth, etcetera, all absolutely magnificent...I just wish he'd not decided that a 'moor' who was crafted to be stupid, gullible and malleable should be in such a play as Othello. Iago was fantastic, but Othello wasn't exactly a challenge for him.




I have to say, I haven't read Othello, so I can't really comment on the characters or dialogue.

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by redbulljunkie
the amber spyglass. It's really anti-religion


That's it! The Amber Spyglass. Anti-religion, really? I was quite surprised by the first one, seeing as it was published by the bland/very american values company Scholastic (who were responsible for changing Harry Potter's "Philosoper" into "Sorcerer") - and yet it had some rather out-there going-ons, and a 12-year-old girl smoking a cigarette! Ye, Gads, what has happened to American cenorship?


By the way, All Families Are Psychotic by Douglas Coupland is fantastic ... read it!

[redbulljunkie]

American censorship has gotten to the stage where they make the subversive books their own, print an american flag on the cover of the booke etc. (saw it done to one book i like, there was nothing pro-american in the book, in fact the author had published some really anti-american shit in his other books).

[KTS]

I remember this publishing company, can't recall it's name, but it was so funny, it was the opposite - it was a british company that printed american books but changed words like "trunk" to "boot" and stupid things like that, it was so idiotic.

Coming back to the censorship part, at one stage in America apparently it was strongly considered to add age-ratings on books!

[KTS]

LIGHTNING
BY DEAN KOONTZ

About the book A storm struck on the night Laura Shane was born, and there was a strangeness about the weather that people would remember for years. Even more mysterious was the blond-haired stranger who appeared out of nowhere again and again to save Laura from tragedy. But was he the guardian angel he seemed?

What I thought A rollercoaster ride of a book! Koontz mixes sci-fi, fantasy, horror and mystery together with beautiful prose to create suspenseful classic. Highly recommended, and great fun!

[Viruswriter]

Hi I rarely post on this board, I tend to lurk it more than anything else. But some topics catch my eye and I quite like this one. You all seem to have good taste. KTS hope I'm not stepping on your toes but I don't think the plot summary you put in for "Lightning" by Dean Koontz does it much justice, so I'm going to type what's on the back of my copy of it

A storm strikes on the night Laura Shane is born in 1955, and there is a strangeness about the weather that people will remember for years. As the dazzling blue-white jagged bolts of lightning split the heavens, a stranger materialises out of the raging blizzard to guard Laura from the not so tender mercies of a drunken doctor and ensure her safe passage into the world, before disappearing back into the night. Eight years later, Laura meets her mysterious saviour again, when he saves her from the perverted and deadly intentions of a drug-crazed robber.

Throughout her childhood, ever more terrifying troubles beset the young girl, but with increasing courage, she finds the strength to prevail - even without the intervention of the stranger.

In time she marries and has a son, while also finding success as a novelist. Gradually the memory of her strange guardian and the troubles of her youth dim in the light of her happiness. Until the lightning strikes once more and shatters her world.

This time the stranger has become the angel of death. As Laura flees with her young son, Chris, she knows she must prepare for the final confrontation that will come with the powerful forces that stalk her. The adventure - and the terror - has only just begun.

Dean Koontz's best books are the ones published between 1986 and 1994. Check the copyright pages if you're not sure. The ones published before 1986 are shite, and the ones published between 1994 and now (like his new one THE FACE) are really only fans-only material.

By the way, I'd like to say that I think Salimn Rushdie is CRAP, sorry just my opinion.

[redbulljunkie]

Reading the second of the hyperion books (by Dan Simmons) at the moment. Really good. It's sci-fi, but has a lot of surprises that you don't expect judging from the genre. The author is a big fan of Keats and this thread runs throughout the books.

[Viruswriter]

yep i like this author - i'm a big fantasy/sci-fi fan but also like horror and crime writers like cornwell or p.d. james love that old english mystery writer shit, like agatha christie and stuff it's so wicked like in another time

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by Viruswriter
KTS hope I'm not stepping on your toes but I don't think the plot summary you put in for "Lightning" by Dean Koontz does it much justice, so I'm going to type what's on the back of my copy of it

Not at all, VW, I fully agree - it gives a much better idea of what the book's about, but I just couldn't be arsed typing it all out. [)]

quote
Originally posted by Viruswriter

Dean Koontz's best books are the ones published between 1986 and 1994. Check the copyright pages if you're not sure. The ones published before 1986 are shite, and the ones published between 1994 and now (like his new one THE FACE) are really only fans-only material.

Couldn't have put it better myself! Nice to meet a fellow Koontz fan. His best novels are LIGHTNING, THE BAD PLACE, STRANGERS, INTENSITY, and COLD FIRE.

http//www.deankoontz.com for more info

[jaymze]

a great book i read recently is "wrong rooms" by mark sanderson. it is a confession about (mercy) killing his boyfriend who was dying from cancer, the great life they enjoyed before, how his life fell apart afterwards and how he eventually came to terms with what he did. a happy, hopeful and miserable read all at the same time. defo worth a look.

[Viruswriter]

http//www.nnbh.com/0141013052.jpg

Not sure if I got the hang of the image thingy but think i've put a pic above. "The Secret History" by Donna Tartt, this is just a fucking brilliant book I don't often read books for entertainment but I love a mystery. This was cool. After finishing it I couldn't get it out of my mind. Kept going back. Think will try her other book "The Little Friend" next.

[KTS]

I've never read either of Donna Tartt's two novels, but they do sell very well and a lot of people rave about her. Then again, some people say she's little more than a crime writer dabbling in "serious literature" ... but I ask you, is that a bad thing? Variety, is after all, what I tend to look for in books, particularly novels.

The book I'd like to recommend for this week, which I just finished reading last night, is "Veronika Decides to Die" by Pablo Coelho. I'm not really a big fan of his work, "The Alchemist", etc. People love his books, but I wouldn't consider myself to be one of them. However I found "Verokina Decides to Die" a beautiful contemplation of life and death, a book that made me simultaneously sad and happy. Delightful.

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This is what it's about
Veronika has everything she could wish for. She is young and pretty, has plenty of boyfriends, a steady job, a loving family. Yet she is not happy; something is lacking in her life, and one morning she decides to die. She takes an overdose of sleeping pills, only to wake up some time later in the local hospital. There she is told that her heart is damaged and she has only a few days to live. The story follows Veronika through these intense days as to her surprise she finds herself experiencing feelings she has never really felt before. Against all odds she finds herself falling in love and even wanting to live again...

[Taibhse]

I know this is recommended books not favourite novel of all time but my favourite novel of all time is this one so I guess that means I also want to recommend it [insert smiley here]

I NEVER PROMISED YOU A ROSE GARDEN BY HANNAH GREEN

[amnesiac]

I think every citizen should amke an effort to read a copy of our constitution Bunreacht na hÉireann,
[)]

[KTS]

I'm only working part-time in Waterstone's so I was quite chuffed today when the manager asked me to order some of my favourite novels in.

They'll be in within a couple of weeks so I'm going to shelve them under the recommendations section of the shop.

I've probably mentioned them before, but I love them so much, here are just 3 (I've ordered 10 in total but not going to list them all!) of them again


"CLOSET CASE" by Robert Rodi - Hilarious novel about a gay guy who's in the closet and working for a large homophobic corporate firm, with possibly the best coming-out ending ever!

"FAG HAG" by Robert Rodi - A darker look at fag hags. "Will & Grace" meets "Misery" or "Psycho" as a fag hag starts stalking her best friend and his boyfriend.

"THE HELLFIRE CLUB" by Peter Straub - A complex psychological thriller, involving a publishing company, plagerism, a successful novel, an underground sex club, a serial killer, and a kidnapper! Fantastic. I cannot say enough about it. Read it!

[KTS]

Just started reading "Life After God" by Douglas Coupland. It's excellent!

Has anyone ever read Paul Auster? And if so, what did you think? His books include "Book of Illusions", "Timbuktu", and "The New York Trilogy" - I've only read the latter and I really enjoyed it; people in work rave about him, so I was just wondering if anyone here has read him?

[KTS]

This is the book I'm reading at the moment. It's very entertaining and extremely suspenseful.

"City of Masks" by Daniel Hecht

A spine-tingling psychological thriller from the bestselling author of PUPPETS Seattle-based Lucretia (Cree) Black is a parapsychologist a professional ghost-hunter. Her company, Psi Research Associates, takes a scientific approach to investigating hauntings, applying in-depth historical research, psychological analysis and empathic techniques. Hired by Ronald Beauforte, a most reluctant client, to investigate the alleged haunting of his ancestral New Orleans home and save the sanity of his tormented sister Lila, Cree finds herself having to face up to her own haunted past. As she gets closer to the truth and the proverbial bones in the closet of the prestigious Beauforte family come crashing down around her, Cree must struggle to keep her own ghosts at bay.

Daniel Hecht's other books include "Puppets", "Skull Session", and "The Babel Effect".

"Skull Session" is also excellent. Part police procedural and crime scene thriller, part supernatural horror and Gothic suspense, and romance ... ETC. ETC. You name it - this book has it, even some minor queer interest! A truly fine novel, and the best thing is the prose is sublime, and the characterization deep. And the main character suffers from Tourette's syndrom, so it's quite insightful about this condition - and also many psychological conditions, including psychopathological tendancies towards violence.

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by amnesiac
I think every citizen should amke an effort to read a copy of our constitution Bunreacht na hÉireann,
[)]


Yes I agree, and it's available free online and in a nice little edition in most bookshops for only €2, approx.

[Disco_Kev]

http//www.taoiseach.gov.ie/upload/static/256.pdf

[Alistair K]

Are there any gay novels in Easons Patricks St?

[damien]

Might be some Christopher Rice ones.

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by Alistair K
Are there any gay novels in Easons Patricks St?


Yes. "True Enough" by Stephen Mccauley. Also, in Waterstones "Fag Hag" and "Closet Case" by Robert Rodi. And "The Virgin Gay Guide" by Tim Lamming, not a novel but a book all about being gay. You can also find many at either amazon.co.uk or amazon.com - and if you don't want to buy them online or can't, then just jot them down, and Waterstones or Easons can order them in for you. Hope this helps.

[Slayer]

They have Tipping the Velvet in Easons alright.

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by Slayer
They have Tipping the Velvet in Easons alright.


Of course! How could I forget Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters. Brilliant book, brilliant TV series too!

[Karma_Slave]

yep the constituion is a good read plus its the owners manual for the country and if u like to slid along the edge of the leagl its great just see how many loopholes you can find. it makes a great drinking game, yes I am serious.

[KTS]

THE DONNIE DARKO BOOK

A great movie and now a great book about the movie, available in most bookshops for €18.45 (if not on the shelves, it can be ordered in) or online.

Book Description An indispensable guide to one of the most memorable films of recent times.

From the Back Cover The critical and audience response made Donnie Darko the cult film of the year - one whose dark ambiguities caused audiences to go back to the film again and again trying to fathom its mysteries.

This book brings its readers further into the world of Donnie Darko and its creator Richard Kelly. Contained within these pages are an in-depth interview with Richard Kelly who recounts the gestation of the film; the screenplay; photos and drawings from the film and artwork inspired by it. Donnie Darko will never surrender up all its mysteries, but this book will be an indispensable guide into its intriguing world.

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[KTS]

These are two novels I've just finished reading, and I highly recommend both.

NOW IT'S TIME TO SAY GOODBYE by DALE PECK (1999)

Story A story of violence and prejudice in small-time America, from the author of "Fucking Martin". On the run from the AIDS epidemic, gay couple Colin and Justin move to the tiny Kansas city of Galatea/Galatia (you have to read the book to understand why it has two names). When a young girl is kidnapped, they are drawn into the town's dark web of hatred and fear.

This book has a wonderfully convoluted plot, with lots of third-person narratives from several different characters. Violent and at times even repugnant, it is nevertheless a ferociously entertaining novel. Think "Twin Peaks" meets "Pulp Fiction".

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LOST BOY LOST GIRL by PETER STRAUB (2003)

Story A woman kills herself for no apparent reason. A week later, her teenage son disappears. The vanished boy's uncle, Timothy Underhill is compelled to return to his hometown of Millhaven to discover what he can. A madman known as the Sherman Park Killer has been haunting the neighbourhood, but Underhill believes that Mark's obsession with a local abandoned house is at the root of his disappearance. He fears that in peeling back the house's hideous secrets, Mark came across its last and greatest secret -- a lost girl, one who has coaxed Mark deeper and deeper into her mysterious domain where he must encounter a fearsome adversary.

A new psychological thriller by Peter Straub. It's not as good as most of his older books, this one is a bit too short and workmanlike but he's still better than most other thriller writers out there. If you haven't read Straub before, this is probably an ideal introduction.

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[opus]

I read Astonishing Splashes of Colour by Clare Morrall
(one of the Booker nominees) a week or two ago. Found it a good read, kept me interested until the end. It's a bit over-dramatic in places with lots of family revelations towards the end but having said that it's one of the few books where I actually cared what happened to the main character.

Set in Birmingham the story is told in the first person by the
main character Kitty who has never come to terms with a miscarriage
and hysterectomy years before. She works reviewing kid's books
and lives in the apartment next door to her tidyness obsessed
husband. Throw in child abduction & the death of her grandparents
and her life starts to spiral out of control...

[gingerniffy]

im in the middle of reading jeffrey eugenides new novel middlesex. cant seem to put it down. if anyone has read the virgin suicides you'll know what a great writer he is.bascically the story is about a greek american haermaphrodite, he won this years pulitzer prize for it!

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by gingerniffy
im in the middle of reading jeffrey eugenides new novel middlesex. cant seem to put it down. if anyone has read the virgin suicides you'll know what a great writer he is.bascically the story is about a greek american haermaphrodite, he won this years pulitzer prize for it!


I've just started reading this too! Came across a signed paperback edition through work; only a couple of chapters in, but really enjoying it!

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[Slayer]

I'm reading All Quiet on the Western Front at the moment.

This is a story about World War 1, told from the viewpoint of a young German soldier.

It is absolutely amazing. Its language and imagery are powerful, and its characters compelling, hateful yet compassionate, struggling with the circumstances life has thrown at them.

Read it, but beware of fairly graphic battle scenes.

[LovePuppy]

I'm afraid i don't like novels! And so my fave book is "The Origins of Virtue Human Instincts and the Evolution of Cooperation" by Matt Ridley.

Transports you back in time in search of who we really are!

[damien]

Have you read Genome by Matt Ridley ?

[KTS]

This book was mentioned in a post before by myself and Damien

http//www.gaycork.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=679&SearchTerms=CURIOUS,INCIDENT

- but I wanted to mention it again here, cos I'm re-reading it at the moment. The first time I read it, I didn't read all of it, only half of it, and forgot about it. Now I'm almost finished it, and I just think it's amazing, one of the best books I've read in a long time. I can't understand why I didn't love (even though I thought it was good before) it before, maybe I was just in a mood or something, but now I'm completely sucked into it. I feel like I'm living in Christopher's (the main character) mind.


THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE DOG IN THE NIGHT-TIME
BY MARK HADDON

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[Disco_Kev]

Currently reading Matt Ridley's latest Nature via Nurture. I loved Genome, read it a good few times. This one is a bit more heavy going, I think. Although I first read Genome while I was doing my Dip. in Molecular Biology so it tied in with a lot of my lectures at the time. I'm kinda out of the loop now so I'm finding "nature via nurture" a bit heavy going.

I've never been a huge fan of novels. I have alway gone for more tangible stuff like popular science and travel writing. My fav author of the moment, no surprise, in Bill Byrson. I really respond to his sense of humour.

[KTS]

I've got a huge pile of books I'm trying to wade through. I almost always try to finish one book before starting on the next, and am loath to abandon some books half-unread. I did this with Curious Incident ... but then abandoned Middlesex to re-read it. I meant to go back to Middlesex but then found ANOTHER book in the pile (said pile is towering beside my bed - I use it as a nightstand sometimes!) which took me away from Middlesex once again. And the book is

THE INSTANCE OF THE FINGERPOST
BY IAIN PEARS

An intellectual thriller set in the Oxford of the 1660s, a time of great ferment - intellectual, religious and political. The action takes place around the suspicious death of Robert Grove, a Fellow of New College.

This is not normally my type of book, but I am finding it strangely compelling and fascinating. It's heavy going at times but worth it. A fiction based on true accounts and people, it is a truly great, historical, literary novel. It is also of great scientific interest, especially the scenes that contain some of the first ever blood tranfusion procedures. Highly recommended.

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[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by Viruswriter


Not sure if I got the hang of the image thingy but think i've put a pic above. "The Secret History" by Donna Tartt, this is just a fucking brilliant book I don't often read books for entertainment but I love a mystery. This was cool. After finishing it I couldn't get it out of my mind. Kept going back. Think will try her other book "The Little Friend" next.



Did you read "The Little Friend", VW? I'm half-way through it at the moment. Awesome book. It's so creepy and funny and brilliantly written.



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[jicey]

Does Middlesex a real good book?
Is it only a contemporary Tiresia, or is it more than that with a strong and fascinating story?
thank you.

[Bootyzilla]

I thought the Fingerpost was wonderful! Has anyone read The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides? It's brilliant...

[KTS]

The Virgin Suicides is better than Middlesex. However, I do think Middlesex is more than a contemporary Tiresia, but then agan I never finished it, though I'm meaning to go back to it. An Instance of the Fingerpost was wonderful, but did you find it heavy-going and pretentious at times, Bootyzilla? I did. I can't say enough wonderful things about The Little Friend , which I'm still consumed by. Quite simply, marvellous, for lack of waxing lyrical for a page or two!

[damien]

Do you finish any books ?

[KTS]

Yes about 99% of them. Sometimes I abandon them for ahwile to read something else, but I always go back to them.

[Bootyzilla]

To be honest, I find so much contemporary fiction dull and pretentious. Ben Elton and that 'About A Boy' man ought to be shot. Cock-Rock made Book and dwelt amongst us. Give me Classics or give me nothing. Or Children's novels, they're usually a strong narrative that hasn't been weighed down by 'WHAT THE AUTHOR FEELS'. I think that might have been part of the reason for the Asian Invasion into novels a few years ago, so many of them are emotionally minimalist - I just finished 'Norwegian Wood' by Murakami (sic) and it's really excellent. Oh, and Margaret Atwood's 'Surfacing', not as good as Alias Grace but still a nice read.

Has anyone read any Tracey Chevalier? Falling Angels is one of my all-time favourite stories.

[Bootyzilla]

And Deborah Moggach! 'Final Demand' is so different to 'Tulip Fever' but they're both concise, unadorned and very, very well-written books.

[KTS]

I've heard that "The Girl With A Pearl Earring" by Tracey Chevalier is sublime.

[Karma_Slave]

new recommendation, the prelude to dune trilogy, houses atreides, harkonen and corrino, they rock, completely amazing as good as the origional dune novels, but in a totally different way.

[damien]

http//www.customizedclassics.com/

Take a classic book and add have a characters name changed to a friends name.

[KTS]

Donna Tartt has become my newest favourite author! Visit The Donna Tartt Shrine at http//www.purpleglitter.com/donna_tartt/

Recently finished reading her second novel, "The Little Friend" (2002). An amazing novel, the best I've read this year. It has a frustrating ending which is extremely abrupt. (Some of the rest of this is in spoiler tags, in case you haven't read the book and don't want the ending spoiled - highlight to read.) After 555 pages, the book ends abruptly, not revealing the identity of the murderer, despite the fact that the whole book is hinged on the murder. (It's not really a whodunnit though, rather the murder is used as a catchpin to explore deeper threads - of relationships, family, life, death, so much more!) Other things, such as what happens to certain characters, are also left unrevealed. At first, the ending really frustrated me and I felt like hurling the book at the nearest wall. Then I started to think that it was a great ending, so untypical, so anti-Hollywood, not to tie it all up in the end. And god, a happy ending to this book would have been awful! The abrupt ending is there not because the author ran out of ideas as some critics claim, but because like life, things aren't neatly wrapped up in the end, and there is no ending to this story. Like life, it goes on. It also leaves you thinking about the book more, poring over it, wanting to read it again, and also makes a great subject for internet message boards, as everyone's idea of the killer's identity is completely different! I highly recommend this book. Has anyone else read it? If so what did you think?

Having finished "The Little Friend", am now halfway through her first novel, "The Secret History" (1992). An awesome book. Greek tragedy meets intelligent whodunnit with a fantastic Vermont college/campus-based setting, a real page-turner!

[KTS]

MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA
BY ARTHUR GOLDEN

Synopsis Summoning up more than 20 years of Japan's most dramatic history, the geisha's story uncovers a hidden world of eroticism and enchantment, exploitation and degradation. It moves from a small fishing village in 1929 to the glamorous and decadent Kyoto of the 30s and on to postwar New York.
THIS IS A GREAT BOOK! I'M ABOUT HALF-WAY THROUGH IT. EVOCATIVE AND BEAUTIFULLY WRITTEN, IT'S A MUST-READ IF YOU'RE A FAN OF INTELLIGENT AND WELL-WRITTEN NOVELS.

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[damien]

Finally got the Gay Guide from Virgin and a book called "Coming Out - Irish Gay Experiences" , I got Coraline by Neil Gaiman too and a few graphic novels. I'll not bother posting the usual crap amazon reviews about them though.

[Bootyzilla]

Yes, KTS, isn't Geisha the best book ever?? Or, at least, one of the best? I read it in 1998, I think, and it sort of became a metaphor for my first summer as a fully-fledged Homo. I'll always remember it.

To move the train of thought for just a second, isn't 'Jane Eyre' just such a wonderful novel? I'm re-reading it now after a few years and I have to say I'm appreciating things in it I never saw there before.

[amnesiac]

I can't wait for Christmas... I'll actually have the time to read!

[KTS]

Bootyzilla, "Jane Eyre" is wonderful, and - as I said - so is "Memoirs of a Geisha". What do you think of "The Virgin Gay Guide", Damien?

Topic about the "The Virgin Gay Guide"

http//www.gaycork.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=563&SearchTerms=,The,Virgin,Gay,Guide

And, Solice, I know you HATED it!

[KTS]

"The Page Turner" by David Leavitt

An 18-year-old male has an affair with a forty-year-old male, who happens to be a famous pianist he worships. The affair affects both their lives in many ways ...

This is a simple story, but beautifully written. A nice, breezy light read.

[Alistair K]

Where sells the Virgin Gay Guide, I can't find it in Waterstones or Easons

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by Alistair K
Where sells the Virgin Gay Guide, I can't find it in Waterstones or Easons


They can order it in for you, Alistair. But your best bet is probably to get it on http//www.amazon.co.uk

I used to work in Waterstone's and when I left they had one copy of it in stock, so it's worth asking there first if you'd rather not buy it online.

[Alistair K]

Thanks, KTS. Would Vibes and Scribes have it does anyone know?

[damien]

Alistair you can borrow my copy if you so wish, or if you do not have an Amazon account due to lack of creditcard I can order it for you and you can deposit the cash in my account or give it to me in person.

[KTS]

Two highly recommended comedy/drama novels I've just read

"The Gay Decameron" by Christopher Whyte

From the back cover Ten gay men gather for a dinner party, but the conversation leaves a lot unsaid. Into the gaps, the author weaves the untold stories of the guests Gavin's trip to Ireland to find the place where Colin died; and how Nicholas' ad in the classifieds led him to the hairiest body in Edinburgh.

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"All Families Are Psychotic" by Douglas Coupland

From the back cover In a cheap motel an hour from Cape Canaveral, Janet Drummond takes her medication, and does a rapid tally of the whereabouts of her children. Wade has spent the night in jail; suicidal Bryan is due to arrive at any moment with his vowel-free girlfriend, Shw; and then there is Sarah, 'a bolt of lightning frozen in midflash' -- here in Orlando to be the star of Friday's shuttle mission. With Janet's ex-husband and his trophy wife also in town, Janet spends a moment contemplating her family, and where it all went wrong. Or did it?

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[Mgm]

"The Chosen" by Chaim Potok (Jewish thing. this book makes me feel good)

"Mara, daughter of the Nile" Eloise Jarvis McGraw I had to read it for school, but there's alot of spy stiff in ancient egypt, and a couple love things goin on. awesome book.

[Rec]

Ok I've just read thru most of this thread so now time to make my contribution )

Popular science writers
Matt Ridley never read him - must now to see what all the fuss is about.
I love anything by Stephen Jay Gould - an absolutely amazing man!
I always found Richard Dawkins really turgid - I could never finish a book by him, which is bad as it tied in with my course (zoology) a huge amount. I actually had to get his theories explained to me by other people, because it was such a slog.

Shakespeare
Did Othello for my leaving, I enjoyed it - yes Othello isn't the shiniest penny in the box, but for the time such a positive portrayal of a black man in power was really controversial as it was. And Iago was such a class character - I loved his deviousness, and I felt his raw bitterness throughout the play.

Gay Writers
Robert Rodi is fantastically funny! I have read all his stuff except Bitch Goddess and the novelisation of the Birdcage. If you like him you'd like Christian McLaughlin - Glamourpuss

[Rec]

Oh forgot to post my recommendation. Doh!

I'll recommend Clive Barker one of my fave authors, he's gay himself and often has a good few gay characters in wonderfully rich and bizarre worlds. Sometimes called a fabulist as he usually deals with worlds that cross over with ours, his Villians are the best I've ever come across - Mr hood and his four servants in "The Thief of Always", Kissoon in "The Great and Secret Show" and "Everville" The book I got into Clive Barker with is Weaveworld and the villians in that are so vivid -Immacolata and her sisters- like evil leprous psychotic nuns! You've gotta read it!
Here's a pic (i hope) and a review

http//www.clivebarker.com/images/books/150/Weaveworld2001-150.jpg

A magical loom weaves the world of the seerkind into a carpet, to hide them from human and not-so-human persecutors. When the carpet's custodian dies, everything starts to unravel. Rules are broken and chaos takes over. This is a giant fantasy epic, with good versus evil, magical powers, human frailties, rich imagination and a complex plot. Nothing is as it seems.

The Scourge, Shadwell, Immacolata and her sisters are forever burned into your memory after reading this book. Clive Barker is an extraordinary storyteller, in the fullest sense of the word. This is not a book for a light dalliance - it's a main meal. Don't read it for enlightenment. Read it if you want to escape into a foreign, powerfully original, and dark world

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by Rec

Gay Writers
Robert Rodi is fantastically funny! I have read all his stuff except Bitch Goddess and the novelisation of the Birdcage. If you like him you'd like Christian McLaughlin - Glamourpuss


I agree. Robert Rodi is great. Some of his novels (especially "Fag Hag", "What They Did To Princess Paragon", and "Closet Case") are brilliant. The two you mentioned Rec are his weakest novels, but still worth reading if you're a fan. You can also read some unpublished stuff on his website http//www.robertrodi.com

At the moment I'm reading "The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay" by Michael Chabon. Winner of the 2001 Pulitzer Prize, it's awesome and is currently being made into a movie by Stephen "The Hours" Daldry.

From the back cover

One night in 1939, Josef Kavalier shuffles into his cousin Sam Clay's cramped New York bedroom, his arduous and nerve-wracking escape from Prague finally achieved - with the help of his mentor, the master illusionist Kornblum. But little does he realise that this uneasy first meeting is the start of an extraordinary friendship and even more fruitful business partnership.

For Sam, Joe's formidable artistic skills are a chance to liberate them both from lives as inventory clerks at the Empire Novelties Incorporated Company. Together, they create a comic strip called The Escapist, its superhero a Nazi-busting saviour who liberates the oppressed around the world with his Golden Key. The Escapist makes them their fortune and their name, but, as the situation worsens in Europe, Joe can only think of one thing. How can he effect a real-life escape, and free his family from the tyranny of Hitler?

KTS

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[Bootyzilla]

I'm halfway through 'The Subtle Knife' by Philip Pullman, and having just read 'The Northern Lights', I have to say, this 'His Dark Materials' trilogy has beaten Harry Potter hands down! They read like Artemis Fowl on Speed without the horrible cliches! They are so original, imaginative, funny, dark and just about any other complementary adjective you'd care to mention.

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by Bootyzilla
I'm halfway through 'The Subtle Knife' by Philip Pullman, and having just read 'The Northern Lights', I have to say, this 'His Dark Materials' trilogy has beaten Harry Potter hands down! They read like Artemis Fowl on Speed without the horrible cliches! They are so original, imaginative, funny, dark and just about any other complementary adjective you'd care to mention.


I completely agree. "His Dark Materials" beats Harry Potter hands down, and also - in my opinion anyhow - "Lord of the Rings".

[Bootyzilla]

I loved the movies but I HATED the books! I had to put it away halfway through the second book. I was all like 'The midgets are riding around on a talking Tree. Riiiight. '. And yet, in the movie, it all made perfect sense -) I thought the books were long-winded and lacked characterisation. Mind you, did anyone find Frodo's constant Gwyneth Paltrow impersonations in The Return of the King annoying? Step-Faint. Step-Faint. Step-Step-Tantrum. Etc.

[Rec]

I like that Tolkien opened up the fantasy genre, but just cause someone starts something doesn't necessarily make it good - if he was around today his books would be edited to half the length! I found LOTR books and films precisely that - too long. Give me Poppy Z Brite any day! SO hear's another recommended book

Exquisite Corpse --- Poppy Z Brite
Genre Gay Horror
Not for the faint of heart, this is a love story between two men - a cannibal serial-killer and a necrophiliac. Great to read as a teen in secondary school and delight in the secret knowledge of "what would the teachers think if they knew what you were reading...blah blah blah".As an adult it's great to read to get an insight into the that kind of teenager and their angsty PATM (Pay Attention To Me) behaviour. A must read for gore-loving Minigoths (ie the teens that hang around Paul Street) everywhere
Anyways it is very entertaining and stomach churning


Here's a posted review
To serial slayer Andrew Compton, murder is an art, the most intimate art. After feigning his own death to escape from prison, Compton makes his way to the United States with the sole ambition of bringing his "art" to new heights. Tortured by his own perverse desires, and drawn to possess and destroy young boys, Compton inadvertently joins forces with Jay Byrne, a dissolute playboy who has pushed his "art" to limits even Compton hadn't previously imagined. Together, Compton and Byrne set their sights on an exquisite young Vietnamese-American runaway. Tran, whom they deem to be the perfect victim. Swiftly moving from the grimy streets of London's Piccadilly Circus to the decadence of the New Orleans French Quarter, and punctuated by rants from radio talk show host Lush Rimbaud, a.k.a. Luke Ransom, Tran's ex-lover, who is dying of AIDS and who intends to wreak ultimate havoc before leaving this world, Exquisite Corpse unfolds into a labyrinth of murder and love. Ultimately all four characters converge on a singular bloody night after which their lives will be irrevocably changed - or terminated.

[KTS]

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[Rec]

Just started Northern Lights by Phil Pullman (I kept on getting him confused with Harold Shipman) So far so good (only 20 pages in)

[KTS]

I highly recommend "Wonder Boys" by Michael Chabon (the film version with Michael Douglas et al is pretty great too).

[Dick Dart]

Mmmm yes. Dark humour. Wonderful.

[KTS]

Been rereading some of my favourite thrillers again recently. "The Hellfire Club" by Peter Straub. I've mentioned it before in this topic and I'll mention it again. Excellent book! Dick Dart, what did you think of it, seeing as you've named your GC self after a character in it?

I've never been a huge fan of Anne Rice (though I know a lot of gay men in particular are) but love "The Witching Hour", a huge book I'm devouring for a second time. Can anyone tell me, are the follow-ups to it ("Lasher" and "Taltos") worth reading?

KTS

[Rec]

Lasher's probably the best of the lot of them KTS I read them in reverse order by accident - not advisable in any trilogy.

[Bootyzilla]

'Interview with the Vampire' and 'Queen of the Damned' - two of my favourite all-time novels, and two of the worst movies in the history of everything ever. Sigh.

I'm reading 'Geisha' by Lesley Downer at the moment and it's bloody fascinating. I want to be Japanese, now! It's an anthropological and observational book on the most secretive form of performance art around, and extremely well-written.

[Bootyzilla]

Here's my Amazon review of a favourite - 'Bette and Joan The Divine Feud', by Shaun Considine.

Oh, my, a book chronicling the legendary feud between Bette Davis and Joan Crawford! The same feud that inspired such quotes as 'Hollywood's first case of syphillis, I wouldn;t sit on her toilet' (Bette on Joan) and 'Some would call it Art. I would call it camouflage' (Joan on Bette's makeup)! A book chronicling not only the face-to-face fights but also the lives of the two most enduring legends of the Hollywood Machine??

Sign me up!!

When I got my hands on this book, I had expected it to be a sycophantically-observed tirade on Who Did What To Whom (A bit like Andrew Morton's Madonna, or Christina Crawford's Mommie Dearest), but happily Sean Considine has more than enough intelligence and talent not to allow this to happen. A huge, absorbing book, it literally takes each of these Uber-Divas in turn, and, chapter by chapter, charts their meteoric rise from very different beginnings to Hollywood Royalty-status, right to the lonely end of Ms. Crawford (she died first). Included are several wonderful asides about certain movies, and light is shed on some of the more over-exaggerated aspects of the stars' lives (such as Joan's children and Bette's fracas with Warner Bros). First-hand interviews with each of the stars preface the book, and I challenge anyone who is a fan not to find something new in here (for example, did you know that Joan was supposed to play Christopher Reeve's mother in Superman? Except she died before the movie casting people found out?).

Considine is clearly a fan of both women, but does a commendable job of keeping commentary unbiased and even, and, happily, gives it a hefty dose of dry observational humour, to boot. It's a meandering, hugely-detailed style of writing, and one, while not perhaps best suited to a stereotypical biography, here it works better than anything else could have. We know already pretty much everything we can know about these two women, and thanks to Considine's wit and superior talent as a biographer, we re-read it without being bored.

Photos are nothing special (though there are some lovely shots of young Bette, who, despite popular opinion, was a very beautiful young woman), but that's secondary when a story is so absorbing and well-told. Curl up with a hefty glass of vodka, send the children to bed (or give them to Carol-Anne to tie up, whatever -), and enjoy this intelligently-told, totally engrossing story.

Highly recommended.

[Rec]

Sounds like a treat Booty

[KTS]

I liked "Interview With The Vampire", "The Witching Hour", and "The Mummy (or Ramses the Damned)" by Anne Rice but couldn't get into the other ones I tried by her ("Violin", "Queen of the Damned", etc).

Booty, is that Geisha book you mentioned above the one about the only American geisha?

[Rec]

Rightio every sci-fi/fantasy reader's been there, where you've seen a book that looks really good but then you find out it's part of an epic and you don't want to invest into a huge series cause it could turn out to be a pile of rubbish - well here's an amazing epic series to get into

"A game of thrones" by George R. R. Martin
Book Description
A Game of Thrones is a contemporary masterpiece of fantasy. The cold is returning to Winterfell, where summers can last decades and winters a lifetime. A time of conflict has arisen in the Stark family, as they are pulled from the safety of their home into a whirlpool of tragedy, betrayal, assassination, plots and counterplots. Each decision and action carries with it the potential for conflict as several prominent families, comprised of lords, ladies, soldiers, sorcerers, assassins and bastards, are pulled together in the most deadly game of all--the game of thrones.

It's a fantasy book comprised of medieval political intrigue and it was researched from the War of the Roses, and the complexity and attention to detail is astounding. The complexity to the characters and machiavellian twists to the plot is wonderful. I well recommend it
Rec.

[Bootyzilla]

quoteOriginally posted by KTS
I liked "Interview With The Vampire", "The Witching Hour", and "The Mummy (or Ramses the Damned)" by Anne Rice but couldn't get into the other ones I tried by her ("Violin", "Queen of the Damned", etc).

Booty, is that Geisha book you mentioned above the one about the only American geisha?


Violin was awful, I'll grant you -) her last one, Blackwood Farm, was amazing, though.

And no, Lesley Downer isn't the woman you're thinking of, KTS, her name is Liza Dalby. Actually, must get her book too...

[KTS]

Yes me too, I've recently lent "Memoirs of a Geisha" by Arthur Golden to my friend Jean and now we're both mad to read more Geisha-type books!

[nutty tart]

Try Exit to eden, memnoch the devil and servant of the bones by Anne Rice, I've read most of her books and those are my favourites. If anyone's into conspiracy thoeries or fact-based historic fantasy, try anything by Stephen Lawhead, particularly 'Byzantium', or Robert Goddard and Barbera Erskine. Brill.

Has anyone read the 'the wheel of time' series by Robert Jordan? Would like to know what others think of his stuff.

And god bless Terry Pratchett!

[Rec]

Oh I'm with you there Nutty - what'd be your fave terry pratchett book - cause I'd say mine is Small Gods although it's hard to choose cause he's so funny. Although he was a bit off form for some of his later ones - eg thief of time, the truth.

I was told the Rob Jordan was good until he got so powerful he stopped getting edited and then there was a book where there's two characters talking and walking thru a camp and this takes them 300 pages to get thru the bloody camp! So I was forewarned by one friend about him although another said he's very good and I should give him a try. Is he good?

[nutty tart]

Small Gods, witches abroad, soul music, feet of clay and night watch, the latest one, are my top five, couldn't put them in order for you! Robert Jordan is a god, despite going on a bit on occasion. If you want, read New Spring which is the prequal, if you will, of the wheel of time series. I've just finished it and stayed awake till 4.30am in order to do so, despite much elbowing and grumbling. It's only out in hardback at the mo, but i'll lend it to you if u want

[KTS]

Going to plug a few Peter Straub titles here. He's one of my favourite authors, but I've only mentioned "The Hellfire Club" here. Also highly recommended (a lot of his work is out of print now so I'm only mentioning the readily-available ones)

"Koko" (Blue Rose Quartet, Part 1)
"Mystery" (Blue Rose Quartet, Part 2)
"The Throat" (Blue Rose Quartet, Part 3)
"Lost Boy Lost Girl (Blue Rose Quartet, Part 4)
*NB* These can be read separately or in any order.

"Ghost Story"
"Houses Without Doors"
"Shadowland"
"Floating Dragon"
"The Talisman" (with Stephen King)
"Mr. X"
"Black House" (with Stephen King)

www.peterstraub.net

By the way, is any one a Dean Koontz fan?

[Rec]

Cheers Nutty, thanks for the offer but I'd better decline as I've a ton of work and the third of Philip Pullman's Dark MAterial's trilogy to go thru.

Heard of DK Kts but haven't read anything by him.

[KTS]

Dean Koontz used to be fantastic. But lately he's gone downhill. I'd advise anyone thinking of starting reading him, to check the copyright page first, anything copyrighted between 1986 and 1994 is definitely a good read, before that just so-so, and after 1994 (with some exceptions) very iffy altogether. His latest "Odd Thomas" is a joke.

Btw, I loved "The Dark Materials" trilogy. We used to have an active topic about it here.

Rec, once you've read "The Amber Spyglass" make sure you get your hands on a copy of "Lyra's Oxford" which is a little cute book containing a short story taking place after the trilogy has ended and other bits and pieces, literally.

[nutty tart]

No hass, rec. Pullman rocks, read the first two a few years ago. Never heard of lara's oxford, is it still available, KTS?

[Bootyzilla]

quoteOriginally posted by KTS

By the way, is any one a Dean Koontz fan?


The only one of his I ever read was 'Black House'. I read the last third of it one night in Amalfi, when i couldn;t sleep because of the heat. Our guesthouse was on the sid eof a cliff and had these flimsy screen doors and windows so i could hear all these freaky foreign nighttime noises, and when I was finished all i could think about was escaped mental patients and the thing with one big eye. I was never so scared in my life -)

I fell out with Stephen King years ago but lately I read 'Rose Madder' and 'Bag of Bones' and they're fabulous.

Has anyone ever read 'The Woman In Black' by Susan Hill? Wonderful, wonderful book.

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by nutty tart
No hass, rec. Pullman rocks, read the first two a few years ago. Never heard of lara's oxford, is it still available, KTS?


Yep Lyra's Oxford can be got in most bookshops, it's a small little red cloth-bound hardcover book, priced between €9.99 and €12.99.

[chatelaine]

I invite you all to read Edmund White's trilogy "A Boy's Own Story", "The Beautiful Room is Empty" and "The Farewell Symphony"...I just love his work.

"Memoirs of a Geisha" is beautiful to behold, and impossible to put down.

Anything written by Jean Genet...

"The Hours" by Michael Cunningham

I don't understand people who say they don't enjoy reading. How could you not?

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by chatelaine
I invite you all to read Edmund White's trilogy "A Boy's Own Story", "The Beautiful Room is Empty" and "The Farewell Symphony"...I just love his work.

"Memoirs of a Geisha" is beautiful to behold, and impossible to put down.

Anything written by Jean Genet...

"The Hours" by Michael Cunningham


I don't understand people who say they don't enjoy reading. How could you not?



I agree, and also with a lot of your above recommendations. Incidentally, Chatelaine, have you seen the movie "The Hours"? How did you think it was compared to the book?

[chatelaine]

I thought it was very faithful. I loved the movie. My favourite scene is where Julianne Moore is on the bed and the water rushes in. I love the narration of Virginia Woolf's suicide note by Nicole Kidman.

[KTS]

quoteOriginally posted by chatelaine
My favourite scene is where Julianne Moore is on the bed and the water rushes in.


This is my favourite scene in the movie too [-)].

[amnesiac]

I loved the film version of THE HOURS so much. I've read Mrs. Dalloway but I really must get around to reading THE HOURS too. I was in John Grace's last night freaking all the chavs out with my Niocole Kidman impression!

Dear Leonard, To look life in the face, always, to look life in the face, and to know it for what it is. At last to know it, to love it, for what it is, and then, to put it away. Leonard, always the years between us, always the years, always the love, always... the hours...

[joeohara]

*cries* i think amnesiac should have an oscar for that

[amnesiac]

Almost got a slap for it in Grace's last night.

[KTS]

SEX AND THE CITY by CANDANCE BUSHNELL

Remember the very first episode of "Sex and the City"? It opens with Carrie telling the story of the English journalist who moves to New York and ends up being dumped by an asshole. The book that started the series opens the same way (the show pretty much took it all word for word in the opening, right down to the cool line "Cupid has flown the co-op").

Having only recently become a fan of "Sex and the City" (I know, I know, 5 or 6 years after everyone else!) and spending lots of time watching it from the beginning on the wonder that is DVD, I decided to get the book.

Candance (the author) is the main character, but you'll find most of the show's regulars in the book too Carrie (though she's a journalist, not a columnist); Mr. Big; Stanford; Miranda; and Samantha (a movie producer, not a PR exec). There is a character from called Charlotte, but she's not the Charlotte from the show - but rather the aforementioned English journalist!

It's a great read short, quick, snappy, broken down into twenty-something short chapters, which in turn are broken down into gleefully amusing bite-sized snippets.

If you're a fan of the show, or of the "Bridget Jones" books, or if you just fancy a funny, smart, enjoyable read, I highly recommend this. It's hardly great literature but it's not supposed to be!

KTS

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[Bootyzilla]

God, I thought it was very, very unimpressive. I don;t think she connected with any of her characters - none of them came across as very plausible, for me. Strange, then, that I like the show -)

[KTS]

I wrote the above post when I was halfway through the book, I stand by it, I still think it's good - though not AS good as I did. The show is much, much better (Candace Bushnell reportedly doesn't like it), but the book's good. If you compare to the show, though ... it's shit! -)

[Rec]

SOmething like interview with a vampire then
film = great, author = hated it, book = not so good.

[Mr.Intentional]

I couldn't be bothered reading this entire thread..
SoOo..I don't know if this author has been mentioned or not..
But I love Dean Koontz.
Especially
From The Corner Of His Eye..
And the Moonlight Bay series.

[Mr.Intentional]

Oh wait..
He was..
La la laa..ignore me.

[KTS]

Yes he has been mentioned by myself a couple of times. I've been a fan of his since I was 12 (11 years now) but the last few years he's been going downhill in my opinion. Have to disagree with you on the Christopher Snow/Moonlight Bay series Mr. International - I hate them.

My favourites are
INTENSITY
STRANGERS
WATCHERS
THE EYES OF DARKNESS

- His older stuff, pretty much.

Koontz is a writer in 3 stages. His early work is pretty bad, and I mean his really early work (most of it is out of print). Then there's the popular years, 1986 - 1995 (some of the above are from that). Then ever since 1995 it's been hit-and-miss (in my opinion).

Looking forward to discussing Koontz AND Tori with you, Mr. International!

http//www.deankoontz.com

[Bootyzilla]

quoteOriginally posted by Rec
SOmething like interview with a vampire then
film = great, author = hated it, book = not so good.


Urrrgh... must... reach... Rec's... choke... sense of... taste..... before.... grr... uuurgh.... it... implodes...

HOW COULD YOU SAY SUCH A THING?????

[Rec]

Like this
Interview with a vampire (the book) was rubbish.

See it's quite easy really!
Ok class repeat after me "Interview with a Vampire is rubbish!"
CLASS "Interview with a Vampire is wubbish!"

[Mr.Intentional]

*trys not to laugh*
Me..discussion..
La la laaa..
It's Intentional by the way!!!

[KTS]

Sorry Rec but I agree with Booty, I thought the book was better. But I didn't completely hate the film, it was good in an over-the-top Stylish way that only Neil Jordan can truly master, and Tom Cruise was good really liked the fact that Rice apologised to him publically for previously saying she thought he would be crap in the role.

[Bootyzilla]

SHE WAS WRONG!!!

Oh, Lord. Right, here you go, i proudly present...

"Booty's Big List O' Things Wrong With IWTV Movie"

1. Tom Cruise. More of a Leslie-Nielsen Vampire than the broody, melancholic boy-monster set down in the novel. All fangs and no trousers. No depth of character whatsoever. Tom Cruise was far too old for the part; Lestat was in his early twenties whern he was made.

2. Kirsten Dunst. Hammy, campy, over-the-top child 'actress' doing nothing emotionally to illustrate the fact that the main gripe Claudia had with Lestat was the fact that she'd never get a chance to grow up. Whereas Claudia's mind matured in the novel, Dunst seemed to remain permanently entrenched in Little Girl. Made no sense.

3. Antonio Banderas. A Latino fortysomething in whiteface will NEVER pass for an eternally-16-year-old Ayrean Russian boy. And the accent is, was, and ever shall be, present, Speedy Gonzales without Consonants, Amen.

4. Direction Not researched properly. Comparitively underdone and not anything like the lush, sensual feel in the majority of the Vampire Chronicles. The Theatre Des Vampires was overdone. The final Parisian scenes lacked cohesion and any sense of Louis and Armand sharing a bond.

5. The Ending. Did not happen in the novel at all. Does Hollywood really have such little respect for its moviegoing masses that they continually underestimate our expectations of a film? Did we really need to see Lestat again? Wouldn't the novel ending have been far more effective?

6. The score. IMO the only Vampire movie score to ever have worked was Wojciech Kilar's genius work on 'Bram Stoker's Dracula' (and do not get me started on THAT picture either!). IWTV's music could have been a feature in and of itself but instead, was neglected. Can anyone remember any of the pieces from it? besides the Guns & Roses track, I mean?

The only similarity in terms of characterisation and emotion between the movie and the novel was Brad Pitt as Louis. But then again, Louis isn't a particularly multi-faceted character anyway. When compared to the book, even if you didn't like the book, the potential for a gothic study in amorality and family values, or even an epic autobiographical story, was totally wasted by the bastard Hollywood machine spewing out yet another mindless serving of Claptrap-Complete-With-Histrionics.

[KTS]

Well, Booty, I'm not sure I can ever rewatch IWTV movie now and like it, what I've just read will be rattling in my brains!

[KTS]

I normally recommend novels here. But here are two books that have helped me a lot. I'm not a big fan of self-help books per se, but I recommend these if you're suffering from (or know someone who is) OCD and/or anxiety-panic and/or nervous illness (unfortunately I'm suffering from all three [(]).

"PEACE FROM NERVOUS SUFFERING" BY DR. CLAIRE WEEKES

Released in 1972, so it's a bit dated with lots of "the wife will ..." and "the husband feels he cannot help the wife" kind of stuff, but still good and inspirational, it gives an understanding into the pangs of nervous illness and offers some sound advice for relief or 'peace' as the title puts it.

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"THE BOY WHO COULDN'T STOP WASHING" BY DR. JUDITH RAPOPORT

First published in 1989, this is less dated than the above, but not as helpful when it comes to offering advice, relying more on specific case histories. Very interesting, but if you suffer from OCD you may find it hard going reading some of the case histories.

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*NB THE ABOVE TWO BOOKS ARE OUT OF PRINT IN THIS PART OF THE WORLD, AND IF YOU TRY TO GET THEM ORDERED IN FROM EASON'S OR WATERSONES IT CAN BE EXPENSIVE, LIKEWISE USING AMAZON.CO.UK. THE CHEAPEST AND EASIEST WAY OF GETTING THEM (IF YOU HAVE A CREDIT CARD OR KNOWS SOMEONE WHO DOES) IS ON AMAZON.COM, THEY'RE BOTH $6.99 AND POSTAGE FOR THE TWO TOGETHER WILL BE ABOUT $6, SO YOU'LL GET THEM BOTH AND POSTAGE FOR APPROX €15 OR LESS!