The Underground Railroad - Colson Whitehead

What if the Underground Railroad was actually a subterranean railroad? That is the hook that draws you in here, but it is the journey through antebellum America that really drives the narrative. This has strong vibes of The Odyssey, filtered through Cormac McCarthy. In my opinion this is/was a deserving winner of both the National Book Award and the Pulitzer for fiction. Whitehead really showed me something here. I think I'll read more of his stuff in the future.

I read this ahead of diving in to the Amazon Prime series based on it. The book is brutal. I'm not sure I have the stomach to watch the series after reading the book.

One of the things Whitehead does masterfully is to have asides where he will go back and show things from earlier in the book in a new light or from a different point of view. While Whitehead by no means is the first to do this, he does it so tactfully and so beautifully that it really elevates his narrative. I'll be curious how they handle that in the show, given how different the natural rhythms of reading a book are from watching a tv series.

Edited July 30, 20214 yr by TMoney

Thanks. If you want to venture over to a third medium, Dawoud Bey: Night Coming Tenderly, Black, is another modern look at the Underground Railroad.  

Just finished reading this interesting article about the "complex English spelling"

https://aeon.co/essays/why-is-the-english-spelling-system-so-weird-and-inconsistent

The little green book of chairman Rahma.

Very different book from Brian Herbert.

Sushi in America 

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/11/05/magazine/sushi-us.html?campaign_id=52&emc=edit_ma_20211106&instance_id=44772&nl=the-new-york-times-magazine&regi_id=78835134&segment_id=73747&te=1&user_id=d8e28ecb31abfc66412f87150dbdd4c4 

The annual list is out. NYTimes 100 Notable Books of 2021. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/11/22/books/notable-books.html?referringSource=articleShare Just picked up Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun. Need to get more. 

Just finished the Broken Earth trilogy by N.K. Jamisin.

Fabulous!

Each of the three books won the Hugo award the year it came out. All three are deserving winners.

I’d rank this as my second favorite sci-fi series of the last decade after the Three Body Problem books.

I read the first one and liked it, still need to read the other 2.

Also LOVED the 3BP series.

Reading The Wasp Factory now.

& Gravity's Rainbow.

Going full immersive on the Pynchon:

First I read the corresponding chapter in Weisenburger's Companion, then I read the actual chapter, then I read the online Wiki, then I listen to the chapter on audiobook, then, lastly, I look at the corresponding pages in Pictures Showing What Happens on Each Page of Thomas Pynchon's Novel Gravity's Rainbow.

Rex Stout - Fer-De-Lance.

My first Nero Wolfe. I like it! I think I’ll for sure be coming back to Nero and Archie for some more fun mysteries in the future.

-

At a friend’s suggestion I did an experiment and read this while listening to music in the background. The friend mentioned that having ambient music on while reading helped their brain having something to bounce off of when they inevitably lose focus on the book. There might be something to that. It seemed to work for me. I burned through the book a lot faster than I usually do in just two evenings.

Edited December 31, 20214 yr by TMoney

Started Station Eleven last night, but this morning Alex Steffen on discontinuity and the planetary crisis.  

https://alexsteffen.substack.com/p/discontinuity-is-the-job 

https://alexsteffen.substack.com/p/were-not-yet-ready-for-whats-already 

Learning fun new words like “transapocalyptic”.

 

Edited January 4, 20224 yr by blessingx

V for Vendetta

Why so serious?

Rebecca - Daphne du Maurier

I saw Rebecca listed as one of the top 10 crime books on a list somewhere so I was intrigued. I’ve also seen it on lots of people’s bookshelves over the years.

About halfway through I was not convinced. It felt like a gothic romance novel and I wasn’t sure where things were going.

What an ending though! I loved it. It’s place among the great crime novels is well deserved.

 

Now watch Hitchcock's film version. Claire needs to watch it a couple of times every year, and I can join for at least one per year. 😁

Project Hail Mary - Andy Weir

From the author of The Martian, this is another "science the shit out of it" book. It is extremely entertaining.

If you liked either the book or movie of Martian, this one is a no-brainer.

Wikipedia says the movie rights have already been snapped up. I'll be very curious how they make the movie work for reasons I won't spoil here.

^ I really enjoyed PHM. The audiobook narration is excellent.

Finally finished Bobiverse books 1, 2, & 3 -- excellent series, love the premise, love the variety of stories

Started Gideon the Ninth -- snarky necromancers in space what's not to like?

Bobiverse & Project Hail Mary = same narrator (Ray Porter).

I’ve never been able to shake the habit of subvocalization so I’ve been stuck with the same narrator for every book I’ve read. 🙃

So you took Stephen Fry's and Jim Dale's Jobs?

You Monster!

 

Assuming you managed to aquire goods not for resale in the USA 

Comedian Stephen Fry Plays Not My Job On 'Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me!' https://www.npr.org/transcripts/1022827299

 

 

Edited March 24, 20224 yr by Grahame

Just Finished

Just as you would expect some stories of tragic losses (most recent not included) and rocking. 

Now:

Off of the internet archive

https://archive.org/details/JohnRackhamAlienVirus1955/mode/1up

Edit: The only problem is that it is part for of the Space Puppet series, so I am at a little disadvantage not reading the others first.

Edited April 4, 20224 yr by mikeymad

"Tit-Bits" Science Fiction Library

Spoiler

This is me, getting distracted by the (deliberate?) misspelling of "Tidbits".

 

Endurance - Alfred Lansing

I was inspired to pick this up after they found the Endurance preserved under the ice.

What. A. Story. I knew the broad outlines of the Shackleton expedition, but this takes you day by day through the gauntlet. It is an incredible tale of survival that I wouldn't believe if it wasn't true.

Chilled me to the bones and I can't get the smell of burning seal flesh out of my nose.

Highly recommended.

 

I'm going to read that next. Thanks for putting it back on my radar. 

Enjoying it so far, although not nearly as much as A Gentleman in Moscow, which I loved.