jazzbo Posted February 26, 2012 Report Share Posted February 26, 2012 (edited) Yes. Re-reading this, after re-reading A Princess of Mars a few books back. Edited February 26, 2012 by jazzbo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rdavenport Posted March 1, 2012 Report Share Posted March 1, 2012 Nelson Algren - A Wall On The Wild Side Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul secor Posted March 1, 2012 Report Share Posted March 1, 2012 Nelson Algren - A Wall On The Wild Side Know what novel you meant, but the title you posted brings a very different scenario to mind. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rdavenport Posted March 1, 2012 Report Share Posted March 1, 2012 Nelson Algren - A Wall On The Wild Side Know what novel you meant, but the title you posted brings a very different scenario to mind. Oh yes - never noticed that! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jazzbo Posted March 2, 2012 Report Share Posted March 2, 2012 A bizarre book of interest to PKD nuts. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete C Posted March 2, 2012 Report Share Posted March 2, 2012 John Carter of Mars plays a mean Martian clarinet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Head Man Posted March 2, 2012 Report Share Posted March 2, 2012 It reads like it sounds....guaranteed NOT to cheer you up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ejp626 Posted March 5, 2012 Report Share Posted March 5, 2012 Ok, I finally wrapped up Ellison's Juneteenth (March 1, not Feb 29 as planned). I just found it really disappointing. In many ways, it is Ellison grappling with and perhaps trying to one-up Faulkner. Ok, you want stream-of-consciousness, I'll give you an entire book alternating between two characters' streams-of-consciousness (one of whom lies dying in a hospital bed). Almost nothing happens after the first chapter, they just delve into their separate pasts. Maybe, just maybe, I could excuse that, but we never get a plausible explanation for how the former child minister could have gone on to become an early film maker -- and then become a Senator from New England! Certainly the impression one has of New England is that it is relatively insular, particularly in regards to its politicians, and that a complete unknown with a checkered past is going to become a Senator? And that his entirely political platform was to engage in race-baiting? When New England (particularly in the early part of the 20th C) pretty much defined itself by its abolitionist past? Sorry, Ralph, this is weak-ass stuff that makes no sense at all. And then when we finally see a little bit of the story of how Hickman "inherits" Bliss, who will become the boy preacher, it also has no internal logic. To me this book failed on basically every level, though there were occasional passages of interesting writing. I don't really think Ellison could have salvaged it had he lived, since the basic premise and set-ups just don't make sense. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B. Goren. Posted March 10, 2012 Report Share Posted March 10, 2012 Milan Kundera - The Joke. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BillF Posted March 10, 2012 Report Share Posted March 10, 2012 Less impressed by this Le Carré from 1999. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jazzbo Posted March 10, 2012 Report Share Posted March 10, 2012 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Head Man Posted March 10, 2012 Report Share Posted March 10, 2012 Reading his obituary recently I realised that I'd never read anything by him. I'm really enjoying this: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BillF Posted March 12, 2012 Report Share Posted March 12, 2012 John Litweiler, Ornette Coleman: The Harmolodic Life Thank you, John, for inspiring me to get out my Contemporary and Atlantic Ornette vinyls again! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ejp626 Posted March 15, 2012 Report Share Posted March 15, 2012 (edited) I'm about 1/3 into Chester Himes Pinktoes, which is a comedy about Blacks and whites trying to get into each others' drawers up in Harlem. It is far more comic in tone than If He Hollers Let Him Go, which had some black humor, but overall was an intense, angry book. Interestingly, towards the end of his life, Himes had returned to a fairly dark, sardonic humor in the Harlem Cycle. This is perhaps the most relaxed Himes's novel I have read. I just wrapped up Martin Amis's The Rachel Papers (his first novel), which was basically about a callow, over-privileged lad trying to screw an older woman (about 2 months older ). SPOILER It shouldn't be that much of a surprise that he is taken at Oxford despite bungling his exams. It's a little hard to know just what Amis is getting at here -- that the so-called radicalism is just a front, at least among the upper class. That the smug Oxbridge class always looks after their own. That Charles (the narrator) is a pompous twit, but really no worse than anyone else. Somewhat recently Amis reread The Rachel Papers and found it pretty crude and poorly constructed, even for a first novel. I can't really argue with that. At least he had the decency to wrap it up in about 200 pages, unlike some of these 400+ page "masterpieces" that just don't know when to stop. Edited March 15, 2012 by ejp626 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jazzbo Posted March 15, 2012 Report Share Posted March 15, 2012 (edited) I've read Pinktoes, pretty interesting read. Edited March 15, 2012 by jazzbo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ejp626 Posted March 15, 2012 Report Share Posted March 15, 2012 I've read Pinktoes, pretty interesting read. I think it is the most purely entertaining Himes I have read, but it wouldn't really be a good introduction to him (for a novice), since it is so different from everything else he wrote (even The End of a Primative, which also foregrounds inter-racial relationships). That said, I also like The Harlem Cycle, but in a different way. I'll try to return to it in a few more years. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jazzbo Posted March 15, 2012 Report Share Posted March 15, 2012 Yes, it's not typical Himes. I've read a handful of novels, and a biography. Quite a character! Should revisit his work soon. I've read a lot of Amis, mainly in the 'eighties. Not sure if I've read The Rachel Papers. Sounds like I should check it out one of these days. I like his earlier stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ejp626 Posted March 15, 2012 Report Share Posted March 15, 2012 Yes, it's not typical Himes. I've read a handful of novels, and a biography. Quite a character! Should revisit his work soon. I've read a lot of Amis, mainly in the 'eighties. Not sure if I've read The Rachel Papers. Sounds like I should check it out one of these days. I like his earlier stuff. Worth reading once, I'd say. I think my favorite Amis remains London Fields, though I probably ought to give Money another spin. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BillF Posted March 15, 2012 Report Share Posted March 15, 2012 Yes, it's not typical Himes. I've read a handful of novels, and a biography. Quite a character! Should revisit his work soon. I've read a lot of Amis, mainly in the 'eighties. Not sure if I've read The Rachel Papers. Sounds like I should check it out one of these days. I like his earlier stuff. Never got anywhere with the younger Amis, as opposed to his Dad, Kingsley Amis. Amis père's reputation has sunk in these times of political correctness, but for me the author of Lucky Jim remains really something. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jazzbo Posted March 15, 2012 Report Share Posted March 15, 2012 I like them both. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AfricaBrass Posted March 15, 2012 Report Share Posted March 15, 2012 I've been reading an interesting biography of Jack Parsons. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlhoots Posted March 16, 2012 Report Share Posted March 16, 2012 Timothy Hallinan: Breathing Water Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B. Goren. Posted March 17, 2012 Report Share Posted March 17, 2012 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
medjuck Posted March 19, 2012 Report Share Posted March 19, 2012 Just finished two very different books about music: "Down that Lonesome Road" Mark Miller's book about Lonnie Johnsons's years in Toronto and Tommy James' "Me and the Mob and the Music". Both highly recommended. The main jazz connection in the James book is that Morris Levy, owner of Birdland and Roulette Records, is a major character in it. It's a great book for anyone interested in Rock even if they're not a fan of The Shondells Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave James Posted March 19, 2012 Report Share Posted March 19, 2012 (edited) Newly released James Brown bio by R.J. Smith: Edited March 19, 2012 by Dave James Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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