@nance My library just got the Jeff VanderMeer trilogy on Kindle, and I really want to read them, but I'm debating if doing so will ruin the soon to be released movie. I often find it better to see the movie first. Any thoughts now that you read Annihilation?
the book is pretty short with a lot of internal monologuing. based on what i've seen in the previews, i didn't feel like the book will negatively impact my viewing experience. i definitely made a point to read it before seeing the movie, though, as i usually like to go book before movie when possible.
the movie, i assume, will lose some of that monologuing; i'll be siked to go in with that in mind. and to be honest, even after reading it, one still isn't really sure what the fuck is going on. is the movie going to cover all three books, or just annihilation?
just finished john scalzi's delightful and smart first encounter novel, agent to the stars. tom stein is the hottest up-and-coming agent in hollywood. can even he, with his persuasive abilities, help earth accept slimy, foul-smeling, friendly, sentient globs of snot from outer space? scalzi once again proves to have the perfect combo of humor, wisdom, and really interesting sci-fi. in fact, i would say his sci-fi concepts--alien organisms, space travel, neuropsychology--are rather brilliant, too say nothing of his understanding of sociology. scalzi creates delightfully likeable characters, as well as delightfully unlikeable ones, and puts them in engagingly realized premises. this is my third scalzi book, and i absolutely adored it.
The Rooster Bar - John Grisham. Grisham's latest is probably one of his most unbelievable tales, but nonetheless one of the better, funniest ones he's penned in a while. Three near the end of law school law students discover they're in a ;diploma mill' unlikely to lead to passing the bar and good jobs post graduation, so they decide to drop out and become street hustler lawyers. Antics and complications ensue.
just finished wake of vultures by lila bowen, who is delilah dawson. holy XXXX, this book is amazing. it'd be easy to compare it to joe lansdale--it's a horror western coming of age kind of story about a non-traditional protagonist--but bowen is very much her own writer, creating an authentic tale of nettie lonesome, half-breed cattle hand who finds herself on a quest to seek out and kill the creature that may be have answers to her past...and may have been responsible for its' destruction. bowen writes breezy and smooth, setting the scene in late 1800's texas, as nettie encounters all manner of monster, all the while struggling to learn the nature of her true self. nettie is an absolutely amazing character, who brings with her the baggage of being an unloved slave, but also an emergent being of feeling and confusion. wake of vultures brilliantly explores questions of gender, attraction, race, status, and friendship. it's absolutely stunning.
Fight Club - Chuck Palahniuk. I'd review it, but the first rule of fight club is, you do not talk about fight club. Still, considering this was a short novel that's told in a sort of back-and-forth random thought kind of style, it's amazing the job David Fincher did turning it into such an incredible film. Pretty much most of the scenes and memorable lines are all in the book, but the movie took what seemed more like a treatment and turned it into a flowing narrative that hides the big twist a lot better and tells the story in a much more fleshed out fashion. However, considering the book began as a short story, which ended up as chapter six in the novel, it was still very enjoyable.
Blindsighted - Karin Slaughter. Slaughter in an outstanding voice in the thriller field. The book was compelling from the get-go and wove an intriguing mystery throughout. My big contention with the novel, however, was, I figured out the killer long before there was any reason to think of him, and the reasons for killing and the way he did it were pretty contrived and not of the quality the book had been to that point.
@Mayday i loved blindsighted, but i agree the kiler was sort of obvious. i wouldn't have minded if it had been somebody else obvious, but who it actually was was a little reminiscent of pretty girls. still, i loved blindsighted, and her characterizations are top notch.
@nance I really dug the book until near the end. It almost seemed like she had this great story but didn't know how to finish it so she let Hollywood producers slap an ending on, and instead of having an interesting killer, just made it someone not obvious (though totally obvious) who had a tacked on excuse that had never been discussed previously. Still, this was an early book, so she eventually became a better writer.
hit by delilah dawson, who is lila bowen. in a world where banks rule the land, a young woman is among who knows how many young people are coerced into being collections assassins in order to work off their parents' debt. dawson is just a wonderful writer, and tonally, this one is quite different from wake of vultures, much more brisk and precise. patty klein (heh, heh) is a great character, coming of age, as so many do, in the face of grand tumult, not the least of which is her burgeoning sense of self. can't wait to keep reading ms. dawson/bowen.
100 Creepy Little Creature Stories - selected by Robert Weinberg, Martin H. Greenberg, Stefan R. Dziemianowicz. - Really, a misleading title, as it gives the impression the stories are all about creepy little creatures. However, it's more of a collection of little stories that all have a creature of some sort in them, albeit the creatures, in addition to things like snakes and frogs and bugs, include vampires, ghosts, werewolves, cats, dogs and even people. Aside from two from H.P. Lovecraft, most of them are pretty forgettable.
just finished g.a. bradshaw's brilliant, brave and dangerous carnivore minds: who these fearsome animals really are. in it, bradshaw vividly details the psychological and emotional characteristics of predatory animals, brings to light the murderous hypocrisy committed by us that's driven most of these animals crazy and to the brink of extinction, makes very clear that the similarities between our vaunted human brains and those of our vertebrate kin, in the case of this book, great white sharks, orcas, sperm whales, grizzly bears, rattlesnakes, pumas, and coyotes, are matters of degree, not kind, type, or ability, using a beautiful mixture of hard, data-driven science and field observation that yield a little more to scientific intuition. bradshaw takes all of these pieces and puts together a picture of our fellow earthlings, the ways we've failed them, and how important the recognition of their psychological, emotional and cultural well-being is in getting humans to wake-up. but she also makes it abundantly clear that there are many people working hard to better understand other-than-human animals, and do whatever it takes to improve their--and by extension, our--lot. i found this book to be a beautiful, hard science revelation, one that validates much of what i've felt my entire life: that we have much more in common with all animals then we know, or often care to acknowledge.
Finished Brandon Sanderson's third and newest book Oathbringer in his fantasy epic the Stormlight Archive. Not much else needs to be said other than Sanderson is one of today's greatest fantasy writers. A modern Tolkien, there is a reason Robert Jordan had him finish his very own Wheel of Time series.
The series is fantastic, one of the most creative worlds ever conceived in modern fiction. If anyone is a fan of giant, epic fantasy storytelling than do not miss this franchise. It's only a matter of time before someone decides to make it television's next Game of Thrones if you ask me.
Gone Tomorrow - Lee Child. ANother cray-cray Jack Reacher adventure, but anohter very entertaining one.
The Lottery and Other Stories - Shirley Jackson. Pretty disappointed in this one. Aside from The Lottery none of the tales were remotely horror. While I'm aware she wrote across and between genres, this one reminded me of the a lot of Ray Bradbury's works. Not horror/sc-fi or really anything else, just stories about people in 'different' situations. But many of those were just really queer and unsatisfying, and often had ambiguous endings, but not in a good way.
kisscut by karin slaughter. slaughter again takes us on a dark journey through the most unpleasant, twisted underbelly of georgia, as our heroes from blindsighted must confront more hideous evils lurking beneath their noses. another excellent novel of unadulterated horror, made more so by the trusts that are broken. i absolutely love dr. sara linton. i also applaud slaughter's bravery in addressing lena's post-traumatic stress from the prior novel. nothing comes easily to anyone in slaughter's dark, disturbed world. loved it.
Comments
Jury. Executioner. Judge.
Jury. Executioner. Judge.
Jury. Executioner. Judge.
The Rooster Bar - John Grisham. Grisham's latest is probably one of his most unbelievable tales, but nonetheless one of the better, funniest ones he's penned in a while. Three near the end of law school law students discover they're in a ;diploma mill' unlikely to lead to passing the bar and good jobs post graduation, so they decide to drop out and become street hustler lawyers. Antics and complications ensue.
Jury. Executioner. Judge.
Fight Club - Chuck Palahniuk. I'd review it, but the first rule of fight club is, you do not talk about fight club. Still, considering this was a short novel that's told in a sort of back-and-forth random thought kind of style, it's amazing the job David Fincher did turning it into such an incredible film. Pretty much most of the scenes and memorable lines are all in the book, but the movie took what seemed more like a treatment and turned it into a flowing narrative that hides the big twist a lot better and tells the story in a much more fleshed out fashion. However, considering the book began as a short story, which ended up as chapter six in the novel, it was still very enjoyable.
Jury. Executioner. Judge.
Blindsighted - Karin Slaughter. Slaughter in an outstanding voice in the thriller field. The book was compelling from the get-go and wove an intriguing mystery throughout. My big contention with the novel, however, was, I figured out the killer long before there was any reason to think of him, and the reasons for killing and the way he did it were pretty contrived and not of the quality the book had been to that point.
Jury. Executioner. Judge.
Jury. Executioner. Judge.
pretty damn funny
100 Creepy Little Creature Stories - selected by Robert Weinberg, Martin H. Greenberg, Stefan R. Dziemianowicz. - Really, a misleading title, as it gives the impression the stories are all about creepy little creatures. However, it's more of a collection of little stories that all have a creature of some sort in them, albeit the creatures, in addition to things like snakes and frogs and bugs, include vampires, ghosts, werewolves, cats, dogs and even people. Aside from two from H.P. Lovecraft, most of them are pretty forgettable.
Jury. Executioner. Judge.
Finished Brandon Sanderson's third and newest book Oathbringer in his fantasy epic the Stormlight Archive. Not much else needs to be said other than Sanderson is one of today's greatest fantasy writers. A modern Tolkien, there is a reason Robert Jordan had him finish his very own Wheel of Time series.
The series is fantastic, one of the most creative worlds ever conceived in modern fiction. If anyone is a fan of giant, epic fantasy storytelling than do not miss this franchise. It's only a matter of time before someone decides to make it television's next Game of Thrones if you ask me.
Gone Tomorrow - Lee Child. ANother cray-cray Jack Reacher adventure, but anohter very entertaining one.
The Lottery and Other Stories - Shirley Jackson. Pretty disappointed in this one. Aside from The Lottery none of the tales were remotely horror. While I'm aware she wrote across and between genres, this one reminded me of the a lot of Ray Bradbury's works. Not horror/sc-fi or really anything else, just stories about people in 'different' situations. But many of those were just really queer and unsatisfying, and often had ambiguous endings, but not in a good way.
Jury. Executioner. Judge.