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+--- Thread: What are you reading? (/showthread.php?tid=6803)
What are you reading? - Sacred Jellybean - 23rd January 2015
I assume most if not everyone here reads. Share what you're digging through.
For me, it's the Chroncles of Narnia. It's great writing and appropriate for all ages. I'm not even a big fantasy guy, but I do like Lewis. I read the Screwtape Letters by him a few years ago. That one had great insights into humanity, and you can appreciate it even if you aren't religious. Even just looking through the lens of a religious person is interesting to me.
Chronicles of Narnia are more for entertainment, and it's fun to pick out the religious allegory. Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe was quite overt, yeah yeah, Lion dies for humanity, but the other books don't spell it out as much. Prince Caspian was just OK, but I loved Dawn Treader and Silverchair. I'm working through The Horse and his Boy now, and it's excellent as always.
I wish I had more time to read. I only do it on my lunch breaks now. After Narnia, I want to read Hacker, Hoaxer, Whistleblower, Spy: The Many Faces of Anonymous by Gabriella Coleman.
Weltall, if you post here, you also have to share what you're writing. ;) Okay, you're working on Thoughtful Maro World now, but if you're too busy to write now, what were you writing before? I gotta read one of your novels. What do you recommend? Which one are you most proud of?
What are you reading? - Dark Jaguar - 24th January 2015
It's a bit hard for me to read Chronicles much these days. Being on the "other side" of that faith makes me read all those horrible things those animals did to that uncle in a different light. He really didn't deserve all that just for the crime of "doubt". In fact, horrible fates await ANY character who has the gall to "doubt" things in that world, and the way he describes the terrible shallow existence of the kids who "forgot" Narnia when they grew up in later books is just insulting. The guy goes as far as to suggest even being an outright human sacrificing Satanist is better than being a nonbeliever, because at least they believe in SOMETHING. I still have some fondness for that series, having grown up on it, but these days I much prefer Lord of the Rings as it doesn't have nearly the "I hate doubters" tone of Narnia books.
...
Recently I've been reading those Game of Thrones books. Well, my mother bought the entire set for me as a gift a year ago. She INSISTED I read the whole lot and watch the series because she's just so caught up in it all now. She loves it all. I myself had planned on just skipping this particular cultural touchstone but at her insistence I've been slowly digesting these books over the course of a year (I'm near the end of the third one, I should be done with them all by the end of next year). Frankly, there's part I like and parts I don't like. Not being an avid fantasy reader, I've basically only got Lord of the Rings to compare it to.
What can I say? If the theme of Lord of the Rings was "most people are good at heart, always have hope and small things can change the whole world", the theme of Game of Thrones is "most people are petty and spiteful at heart, hope is irrational and small things don't matter and will die a dog's death". I mean, I think the end goal of the writer is to get everyone who reads his books to kill themselves or something, because frankly I don't know exactly what he intends his art to tell the world about life, exactly. It's not just "gritty" or "dark", it's bleak, like Russian level bleak. I can't find ANY hope at all for anyone in these books. The winners are the most cunning with the least scruples. Cruel people can die, but only if they are also stupid. Good people will die terribly because, hey, were you REALLY so foolish as to believe being a "good person" with principles could protect you from a sword? You moron! You naive foolish little moron! The universe itself will teach you how much of a lie you've been living! I hate you!
That said, there's things to like. I do enjoy reading about the descriptions of the world they're in (the world that most people are too petty to actually pay much attention to half the time), and reading the perspectives of characters to see exactly where they're coming from certainly breathes some life into this bleak hellscape of a world. It's not all as bad as I've implied above, but seriously, I just like a BIT of positivity in my stories, and I'm not really getting if there's a point to all this. From the looks of it, every single good character is going to die, and them zombies are going to rush over everything. Also dragons, they're slowly plodding along in some forgotten dessert.
Also, PLEASE stop using the descriptive form "It was x, and y, and z". Adding a third adjective to a form that normally has two isn't really THAT incredible, even when the third one doesn't match the first two. Yes yes, the city "smelled of blood and salt and DEATH". The guy uses that at EVERY POSSIBLE OPPORTUNITY. Also, while the books don't seem to have nearly as much sex as people tell me the show does, the sex is almost always pointless. I'm a bit unmoved by such things anyway, but generally I just sorta glaze over when I get to those parts waiting for the actual story to continue.
Dang, I really come off as hating these books don't I? It's not all that bad, I just have a hard time really defining what it is that keeps me reading them, that's all.
What are you reading? - Weltall - 24th January 2015
I was given a solid starting collection of Aldous Huxley novels for Christmas, and I'm currently reading "Brave New World" for the first time. The cover is amazing, because it's a Penguin Classic.
![[Image: 31817.JPG]](http://www.gdprice.com/j/31817.JPG)
I'm also reading "World War I" by S. L. A. Marshall.
Quote:Weltall, if you post here, you also have to share what you're writing. ;) Okay, you're working on Thoughtful Maro World now, but if you're too busy to write now, what were you writing before? I gotta read one of your novels. What do you recommend? Which one are you most proud of?
Well, lately I haven't had a lot going on writing, but there is a story I've been outlining about a retiring police chief who is a pedophile. I haven't published online in a long time, but I do have a few stories at various stages of completion. I have everything on hold until Thoughtful is done.
On that note, has anyone heard peeps from Grumbler anytime lately?
What are you reading? - A Black Falcon - 24th January 2015
Brave New World is amazing. Better than 1984, really.
Anyway, I really should move this to the correct forum...
What are you reading? - Sacred Jellybean - 25th January 2015