Iggy's Book Nook

[Martin]

I disliked the 1st book as I thought it was poorly written. Heh...

[IggytheBorg]

Don't get me wrong, these two ain't exactly Shakespeare. But the first two books were fun reads.

[IggytheBorg]

I also forgot to mention I finished "Lovecraft's Monsters", a short story collection of Lovecraft imitators writing about the creatures mentioned in the mythos stories. Most of them were kind of "meh", to be honest. There were a couple that stood out a bit, however. Lot of Deep Ones and Hounds of Tindalos and Shoggoths. Big C himself pops up once, as does the King in Yellow (I was kind of surprised by that one, as he wasn't strictly a Lovecraft invention). A fun read, but not as fun as I thought it would be.

[Martin]

I'm all good for fun reads, believe me. But Chuck Whatever liked spending his time explaining how trivial details works for several pages while missing beats elsewhere.

And Eph... at least his TV version has a cool roadkill on his head to entertain.

[IggytheBorg]

Last night I finished Stephen King's "Mr. Mercedes". This book can be easily nutshelled: think "Insomnia" without the Dark Tower tie in stuff. It had King's easily readable style going for it, and some really quality characters. Every character was interesting in some way, the villain perhaps most of all. But he seems to be recycling plot ideas here. This read more like a detective/police procedural thriller than a horror story, as well. No supernatural elements to it at all.

[Timothy225]

Saw this, thought of this thread...

[B_Metal]

Finished American Gods, enjoyed it but felt the ending was a tad rushed. Didn't quite see all the anti-feminist stuff that others have but I'm not looking for causes to champion either sooooo.....

Also finished The Martian, one of the easiest reads I've ever had. And as somebody else pointed out, it's a story of HOW you get to the ending, not about the ending. Really liked this one.

[IggytheBorg]

American Gods was great. Liked it much better than Good Omens, and I liked that one a lot.

[IggytheBorg]

Finished Rum Punch, the Elmore Leonard book Jackie Brown was based on. Tarantino was pretty faithful to the excellent source material, which may be why that seems like the least Tarantino-like of his films. The book was a tight little thriller. You find yourself totally "with" all the characters almost instantly, even though Leonard doesn't seem to spend that much time fleshing many of them out. What time he does spend doing this is done wisely, though, as we feel we know these people pretty well with only minimal verbiage used to get us to that point. A testament to Leonard's skill as a writer. Perhaps Jackie, however, is somewhat inscrutable. On purpose. We get to know her only a little, and along with her strength, smarts, and daring, she's got an air of mystery to her that has us wondering at her intentions and her motivations right along with Max. And speaking of Max, he's one of the best protagonists I've run across in recent years. Noble and tarnished, protective, gentle, and violent by turns . . . you can't help rooting for him. Masterful bits of character building, both. Even if you've seen Jackie Brown a million times, this is worth reading anyway.

[IggytheBorg]

Just finished Michael Witwer's "Empire of Imagination: Gary Gygax and the Birth of Dungeons and Dragons". I liked this book a lot. Mainly because of the subject matter, I guess. This is the more detailed biography of Gary & D&D of the two I have read to date, "Of Dice and Men" being the other. They had similarities, apart from the subject, that worked for them. Both tended to start new sections off with interludes told in the style of a DM narrating to a bunch of players, and the players reactions in dialogue, the plot of the interlude foreshadowing what was to come in the book. Witwer's were fanciful exchanges between Gary and some unidentified DM. The other book's interludes were recollections of the author's own gaming sessions, dramatized for the printed page. Both pay fitting homage to the inventor of such colloquies. Another area in which they differ, however, is the use of imagined dramatic exchanges between Gary and some of the other principals at TSR or members of his family, in addition to the interludes. In his introduction, the author admits to basing exchanges like this on factual events, with the dialogue his own invention. These portions were part of the main narrative, biographical portion of the book, and made the book seem a bit awkwardly structured, in my opinion, since the balance read like a more standard, factual reporting biography. Nonetheless, awkwardness aside, this book had me mesmerized for its entire length. And it blew my mind on no less than four - count 'em, four - occasions with some of the details revealed about Gary's private life. The LEAST of them being that he enlisted in the Marines in 1958. "Of Dice and Men" was more hero worship, depicting Gary as the noble victim in the hostile take over of TSR in 1986, with little attention paid to the underlying causes and Gary's role in them. Witwer's work was more of a "Warts and All" kind of coverage. Gary, it seems, was as flawed as the best modern day anti-heroes, and Witwer doesn't shrink from showing them to us. But even with all the flaws, Gary is depicted - in both works, really - as larger than life. While I enjoyed this book immensely, and would recommend it to anyone with an interest in the subject (such as those who commented on the post about me getting this w/ my X-mas gift cards), I confess to enjoying "Of Dice and Men" more. Maybe it's the starry eyed idealist in me, that likes his heroes to remain unblemished AND larger than life. But the analysis at the end of the book of D&D's - and by extension, Gary Gygax' - contribution to and legacy in our culture (and not just pop culture, either) is something to be discussed, debated and admired.

[IggytheBorg]

Just finished Elmore Leonard's Freaky Deaky. This is nowhere near as good as the other books of his I've read, but it was still an enjoyable read. I guess my biggest problem with this book is that I couldn't tell where the main character was coming from. I didn't know what his plan or motivation was. The reason for this, I think, is the lack of inner monologues. I noticed this in Rum Punch as well, but it's even more starkly realized here. You don't get to get inside Leonard's characters' heads nearly as much as you do with many other authors. In Rum Punch, he was able to get the point across through dialogue or the characters' sensory impressions, economically developing the characters. But there wasn't much of that here, so the characters seemed less well drawn. They were sort of vague, inscrutable, and, frankly, a little hard to like or sympathize with. If you're a fan, you'd probably like its brand of quirky action and slick dialogue, both hallmarks of an Elmore Leonard crime novel. But otherwise, you get a much better flavor for his work from Rum Punch or 52 Pick Up.

[IggytheBorg]

ore through Michael Crichton's "The Terminal Man" in like three days. I had a hard time putting it down, because I wanted to see where he went with it, but I found this book uncharacteristically unfulfilling compared to the other book s of his I've read.
The basic premise is a medical team using the most advanced microsurgical techniques to implant a series of electrodes into the brain of an epileptic who has blackouts when he experiences seizures, in which he can commit violent crimes. It is thought the electrodes will sense the onset of a seizure, and initiate an electrical stimulation to the right part of the brain to defuse it.
Of course, shit goes wrong, and the patient ends up killing more people.
Sounds pretty cool, right? And I suppose the idea is cool, but the execution of this idea is deeply flawed. To begin with, the killer's "spree" totaled two people. Both of whom were killed "off camera", so to speak. We hear about one death through exposition, and the characters come upon the aftermath of the other. We also get to see very little of the killer post-surgery, and what we do see of him is not effectively menacing, IMO. So as a horror story (chronicling a "horrifying nightmare", according to the front cover blurb), it fails.
There are also allusions to the surgery being a form of mind control, and the ethical ramifications of this dilemma are barely touched upon. There are no lengthy debates, either between characters or in the inner monologue of a single character, over the issue. Such debates are a Crichton trademark, as anyone who's seen or read "Jurassic Park" or "Prey" can tell you. Perhaps he was leery of stepping on Anthony Burgess' toes?
What this book lacked was, more than anything else, was length. It needed MORE; MORE violence, terror, menace and social commentary would have served this novel well.
And lastly, it ended very abruptly, with no real denouement at all.
This book was adapted into a little known film, which I now want to see. Its premise was far enough ahead of its time that Hollywood could do so again, and for a change I'd be in favor of them wandering a little far afield from the source material.
Worth it if you're a fan of Crichton's work, but it ain't no "Eaters of the Dead".

[Martin]

Looking for a good Chtulu-inspired book. Something great, and recent. I mean, I read the Lovecraft, but it's a bit dated.

Any recommendation?

[IggytheBorg]

Peruse early entries in this thread. There's reference to quite a few. Cthulhu Unbound, and Cthulhu's Reign are probably my favorites.

[Martin]

sweet! thx Ig!