| Author | Message | ||
     Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
This thus-titled thread is very popular on other boards, but I don't think we've ever had one up here. So, what are you reading, folks? Me: Killing The Shadows by Val McDermid. Rather good - readable and intriguing. Nothing unique, but solid enough. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
(In anticipation of the Joelmeister: It's nothing Hank Marvin has to worry about.) | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Doris Lessing, The Good Terrorist too soon to say anything really about the story but I'm struggling to get into it. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.177.5.39 |
The Five Quarters (again)... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Weber, astonishing: I have that book on my desk beside me. I was going to read it next. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.67.148.196 |
I is reading Timeless Stories for Today and Tomorrow edited by Ray Bradbury. Has some truly cracking stuff in it by many authors I've never heard of and some I most definatley have. Next up, Mother Night by Vonnegut. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.223.46 |
Jon, the John B.L. Goodwin story in that anthology is absolutely brilliant. Part creature feature, part psychological allegory. It chilled me thirty-odd years ago and still does. There are also two stories by Jonathan Carroll's father, BTW. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.223.46 |
I'm reading Trotsky's IN DEFENCE OF MARXISM. Letters and essays addressing some of his critics on the American left. Much of it resonates with what's happening now – specifically this decade and even this year. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.166.188.149 |
The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.110.243 |
The Haunter of the Ring and Other Tales by Robert E. Howard. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Now there's a title positively begging for the Lane treatment . . . | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
The Goodwin short story - The Coccoon - is one of my all time favourites, it scared the shit out of me when I first read it, and still does. I've got that collection at home. Who's Jonathan Carrolls dad? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Lewis. | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 12.165.240.116 |
Elect Mr. Robinson for a Better World by Donald Antrim. Everything and More by David Foster Wallace. Galatea 2.0 by Richard Powers. I haven't been in a horror mood lately. | ||
| Lincoln Brown (Lincoln_brown) Username: Lincoln_brown Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 121.219.159.45 |
Just finished - 'Rain', Conrad Williams. A staggering piece of fiction. Current - 'The Influence'(re-read, inspired by the arrival of the Centipede edition) Next - 'Rock Breaks, Scissors Cut', David Schow, or 'One', Conrad Williams. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
I am reading John Llewellyn Probert's 'The Faculty of Terror'. And its bloody good too. And I have a double feature to look forwards to. Hurrah! I have a lettered edition of Schow's 'Rock Breaks, Scissors Cut' Lincoln. And I agree about Rain. Magnificent. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
The sound of the Gala Mellon in Rain got to me. I can hear it still. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.6.180 |
Flannery O'Conner, The Violent Bear It Away. | ||
| Alansjf (Alansjf) Username: Alansjf Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 94.194.134.45 |
Just finished Bruce McAllister's staggeringly good Dream Baby (the novel based on the equally good novella of the same name), and lined up for the weekend are 3 new PS titles: Postscripts #18, Marly Youmans' Val/Orson and the new Zoran Zivkovic collection The Writer, The Book, The Reader. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.71 |
I'm reading King's new collection, Just After Sunset; Haruki Murakami's collection, Blind Willow, Sleeping Women; a sf collection of robot stories I've got a tale in, Robots Beyond; and Huckleberry Finn. Just finished John Harvey's Cold in Hand. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.192.191 |
John Harvey's always good, sometimes excellent – Wasted Years was incredible. What's the new one like, Mark? | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.165.182 |
A Dead Man In Deptford, by Anthony Burgess. And the Complete Plays Of Christopher Marlowe as a sort of side-order... | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.176 |
Latest Postscripts anthology, latest Best New Horror, Hater by David Moody. | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.176 |
Des, what is 'The Angel's Game' like? My sons are buying it for me for Father's Day, so I'll be reading it at the end of the month. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Angel's Game? There's absolutely no cheating. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.98.104 |
Jumping around between a few Theodore Sturgeon collections -- Visions and Venturers, Sturgeon in Orbit and A Way Home. Also reading The Uncanny X-Men: Beyond the Farthest Star which sees the X-Men fighting The Brood, a race of razor-toothed, long-tailed aliens who infect their prey with eggs and who are not ripped off from Alien in any way. (For any Whedonites out there it includes one of Joss Whedon's fave X-Men issues, #165 'Transfigurations!') | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.72 |
Harvey's very latest is Far Cry, Which I haven't read, Joel. Cold in Hand is a Resnick novel, a return to that character and Lynn Kellogg. I'd say it's the best of the Resnick books I've read, and packs a very hefty emotional punch midway through the book and on. Well worth seeking out. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Robots book finally came out, Mark - good stuff. Fine tale, that. I owe you an email - busy May just elapsed. Phew. | ||
| Gcw (Gcw) Username: Gcw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.155.105.181 |
Sidestepped into music biographies lately for a change...recently read a Brian Wilson bio & a superb book on the making of 'Pet Sounds'. Also reading Ally's 'Bull Running For Girls' (I can be a very slow reader-this is no reflection on Allys' works BTW..) Our holiday in Egypt is looming so I expect to clear some backlog prior to September when I will restock at Fanrasycon -yay! gcw | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.72 |
No sweat, Gary. Had the dog in for het vet's operation today. Spiralling costs throughout. His quote of 260 escalated to 580 in the end, and then £6 for special post-operative dog food. Vet's off to the Canary Islands tomorrow for two weeks... Hmm. Ta for Robot praise too. I sold that other tale we were talking about to Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, by the way. The revisions I made were accepted. a hit, not a near-miss for once! Just the contract to sort out apparently, though why that's tricky, I don't know. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.201.203 |
You wouldn't want your dog in the hands of a fag vet, would you? You sold a story to AHMM? And you mention this casually? Possibly the most prestigious crime fiction magazine there is. Well done! | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.156.195.99 |
The postie delivered my copy of Jeremy Dyson's new collection THE CRANES THAT BUILD THE CRANES this morning, so that's me sorted for the weekend. Not long finished Michel Faber's THE FIRE GOSPEL, which is an entertaining, fairly broad satire on Dan-Brownery, THE DA VINCI CODE, religious fundamentalism and Amazon reviewers; and I'd been planning to re-read Anne Billson's STIFF LIPS before the JD arrived. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.73 |
The Fire Gospel's a belter. Sticks its tongue out at Dan Brown with great fun. And the amazon reviews section had me laughing aloud. Suffered from one of my major complaints about modern novellas(ae) though, in that it read like a novel with a bunch of chapters ripped out, so that it was like you were reading at random toward the end of a book. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.73 |
And cheers for the congrats, Joel. I've had so many of these things go belly-up at the last minute, though, that I'll only believe it when the thing's in print. As for mentioning it casually, well I wouldn't want to threaten my image as a cool dude. You know how it is. | ||
| Simon Avery (Simonavery) Username: Simonavery Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 91.110.139.65 |
Just finished Sebastian Faulk's attempt at Bond (Devil May Care) which I found really, really tedious. Also finished Nick Royle's Mortality, which has some tremendous short stories that I'd not read before. And awaiting delivery of Robert Crais's recent Chasing Darkness. Elvis Cole is the best PI in fiction. Comparable to John D. McDonald's awesome sequence of Travis McGee novels. Well worth checking out if you enjoy US crime fiction. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.71 |
I tried Demolition Angel a few years ago but didn't get very far with it. Becuase I'd just read Elmore Leonard's Freaky Deaky, the Crais tale, covering similar ground, just didn't fly. Faulks's Bond novel is a sloppy work, I'm afraid. He wrote it in six weeks, as Fleming claimed to do with his novels (though Faulks admits to considerable pre-planning). A mistake on Faulks's part though: he should've taken as long as he needed. He's not Fleming. That way the fact Bond isn't even mildly curious as to why the Caspian Sea Monster's nuclear bomb didn't go off - and other such plotholes - may not have been in the book... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Wow, Mark. Delighted for ya. >>>and I'd been planning to re-read Anne Billson's STIFF LIPS before the JD arrived. Steve, can't you read when you're tanked up on whiskey? Me, neither. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Most recently Jim Herbert's The Fog - reread it, rather, before I wrote the introduction to the forthcoming Centipede Press edition. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.74 |
My girlfriend listened to the audiobook of James Herbert's The Magic Cottage with me recently. She was surprised, had been expecting a book suiting the gore-mongering reputation that, alas, still persists about his work today. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.74 |
The one thing I think Faulks got seriously right doing the Bond book was setting it in the sixties. Having done so, he may have secured that future Bond books are also set in that period, and so giving Bond his decade, as Sherlock Holmes's swirls with fog at the tail-end of the last but one century... | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.74 |
And going back to James Herbert and specifically The Fog. The last time I re-read it, I was struck by just how good his dialogue is in the book. Sure, some of it's exposition from the mad scientist type stuff, but the straight characters are distinctly people from the 70s talking. Odd, the things you take from a re-reading... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
From JD to Centipedes - from legless to quite the contrary. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy. | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.156.195.99 |
How are you liking BLOOD MERIDIAN, Gary? I think it's a proper honest-to-goodness modern-day American classic. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
So far...it's bloody brilliant. The language is so gorgeous that I'm forced to read it aloud. The wife thinks I'm insane. Which I probably am. | ||
| Michael_kelly (Michael_kelly) Username: Michael_kelly Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 174.88.168.249 |
Mark, Congrats on the sale to Hitchcock's! Well done! I re-read Cormac McCarthy's The Road. Devastated me again. I'll have to pick up Blood Meridian, by the sounds of it. | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.156.195.99 |
Yeah, Mark. Well done indeed! | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.72 |
Why, thank you, gentleburgers... I've still to get to The Road. I've the unabridged audio version on my mp3 player but for some reason whenever I try and make a start on it something comes along to prevent me. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.96.159 |
The Road was a wonderful read. | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.156.195.99 |
Couldn't agree more, Ally: THE ROAD was magnificent. Another Cormac McCarthy recommendation, closer still to the world of horror and the Gothic grotesque - CHILD OF GOD. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.98.179 |
I tried Blood Meridian years ago but couldn't get into it. Didn't help that I'd already read Outer Darkness and All the Pretty Horses and hadn't been overly impressed so my patience with McCarthy's work was already wearing thin. BM is on my TBR pile to try again at some point but when that'll actually be ... Anyway, recently read Conan and the Songs of the Dead, a graphic novel by Joe R Lansdale. Good fun. And All Star Superman Vol 2 by Grant Morrison. Quie disappointing. When it comes to updating Silver Age wackiness for modern day feelgood superheroics I think Morrison still hasn't surpassed his 90s run on Justice League of America. | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.161.226 |
"The Polish Officer," by Alan Furst "Glory" by Vladimir Nabokov "Ghost" by Katherine Ramsland (nonfiction research for my next novel). | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
"The Road" is possibly the best novel I have ever read. I wept like a baby at the end. Stu - I had the same problem with "Blood Meridian" when I tried it last year. This time I'm loving it. Oddly, reading it aloud was the key for me to get into it. | ||
| Simon Strantzas (Nomis) Username: Nomis Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 99.225.104.255 |
I wasn't as taken with "The Road", alas, and I've read "Blood Meridian" and it didn't do much for me. I guess I don't go in for McCarthyism. As for what I'm reading: I've been in writing mode for so long that I haven't had much time. I'm working through Richard Gavin's PRIMEVAL WOOD, which is fantastic, but deserves more attention than I've given it this week. :-( | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Damn you to hell, Strantzas. And bring me back some brimstone as a souvenier. | ||
| Simon Strantzas (Nomis) Username: Nomis Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 99.225.104.255 |
You already smell like you've plenty of it. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.177.5.39 |
Finished "The Five Quarters" for the second time yesterday, read Joel Lane's "The Witnesses Are Gone" last night and am about to start on Stephen King's "Just After Sunset". | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.156.195.99 |
Mick, you may be interested to know that I was chatting with Mr Rodwell earlier today. He reckons we have four usable plots for THE FIVE QUARTERS RIDE AGAIN... (working title) | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.177.5.39 |
Excellent stuff, Steve. When can I order a copy?  | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Currently reading: 'Obsession' (1985) by Ramsey Campbell - creepy as hell as ever. 'The White Bone' (1998) by Barbara Gowdy - an emotionally shattering anthropomorphic fantasy about elephants with a visceral edge that makes it most definitely NOT for children. 'The 12th Fontana Book Of Great Horror Stories' (1979) edited by Mary Danby. 'The Minority Report : The Complete Short Stories Of Philip K. Dick : Volume 4' (1987). | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Well, The McDermid was solid enough, though nowt special. Just started The Treatment by Mo Hayder - supposed to be scary . . . | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Just finished "Blood Meridian". Wow, what an amazing novel. I agree with the learned Mr. Duffy when he calls it an American classic. Just started re-reading "The Influence". I'd forgotten just how good this one is... | ||
| Laird Barron (Laird) Username: Laird Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 71.212.56.70 |
Yes, Blood Meridian stands shoulder to shoulder with any American classic. Probably the best horror story ever told, after the Old Testament. | ||
| Laird Barron (Laird) Username: Laird Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 71.212.61.110 |
And to address the thread topic: Of late I've read terrific collections by Barbara Roden & Cat Rambo; am in the middle of Jeff VanderMeer's upcoming collection, soon to be published novellas by John Langan, and a superb, but currently under wraps collection from an author we all know and love. In fact, everything I've read of late has arrived in manuscript format from tremendous authors. I'm honored to receive these advance screenings. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
"I sold that other tale we were talking about to Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, by the way. The revisions I made were accepted. a hit, not a near-miss for once! Just the contract to sort out apparently, though why that's tricky, I don't know." Many congratulations, Mark! Just make sure they don't buy all rights! (Sorry, I'm conflating two things, probably unfairly - an old friend of mine once sold a tale to London Mystery Magazine and much later realised they'd bought all rights, which meant they kept all the money when it was adapted for Alfred Hitchcock Presents.) | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.30.94 |
Hey Mark - you should have had your own thread for such a great sale! Congratulations! | ||
| Mark West (Mark_west) Username: Mark_west Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.39.177.173 |
Just finished "We All Fall Down" by Simon Wood and started "Hugger Mugger" by Robert B Parker. Seem to be on a bit of a crime/mystery kick at the moment. And congratulations, Mark! | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.73 |
Cheers, chaps and chapettes. As most of my stories sell for about the price of a five-pack of Mars bars, arguing about rights isn't particularly high on the agenda. But point taken, Ramsey. I've heard of such cases before. This tale in question is, I should think, not the most obviously filmable, so I doubt it's much of an issue. | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.176 |
You sly dog, Mark. Congratulations. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Good sale, Mark - well done! | ||
| Richard_gavin (Richard_gavin) Username: Richard_gavin Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 65.92.55.240 |
Read tremendous anthologised stories from our own Joel Lane ("Still Water") and Laird Barron ("The Forest") recently, in addition to a lot of non-fiction, which I've been reading both for research and pleasure. I've been enjoying some old Gold Key "Grimm's Ghost Stories" comics as well. On my lunch break today I began reading Cold Skin by Albert Sánchez Piñol. Ye gods! I might have to put all my projects aside for one day this week in order to read this novel cover-to-cover. Marvelous prose, and the opening scenes are blessed with near-perfect atmospherics. | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.176 |
Richard, this is a book that interests me a great deal. It looks incredibly intriguing. I'd love to hear your thoughts on it as you progress. | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.159.105.54 |
Brian Showers has been raving to me about how good COLD SKIN is for weeks now! Again, I'll be interested to hear your opinions, Richard. In other news related to the thread topic, I'n halfway through THE CRANES THAT BUILD THE CRANES, and liking it very much. Anyone who owns Jeremy Dyson's NEVER TRUST A RABBIT will be more than happy with this, his latest collection. | ||
| Simon Strantzas (Nomis) Username: Nomis Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 99.225.104.255 |
Just started "Madder Mysteries" a few days ago. It's hard to imagine anyone not falling in love immediately with Reggie Olivers work. | ||
| John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.253.174.81 |
I am reading John Llewellyn Probert's 'The Faculty of Terror'. And its bloody good too. And I have a double feature to look forwards to. Hurrah! Hurray! Good man - thanks Karim! Congrats on that sale Mark - that's extremely splendid news! I have just finished 'The Day It Rained Forever' by Ray Bradbury & have just started 'The Feaster From Afar' - Volume One of the collected stories of Joseph Payne Brennan | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
On my lunch break today I began reading Cold Skin by Albert Sánchez Piñol I read this last year and absolutely loved it. great set-up; superb execution; wonderfully uncompromising right up to the final page. Great stuff. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
I'm half way through my re-read of "The Influence". Sweet Jesus, how scary is this novel? I'd completely forgotten how brilliant it is...I was too disturbed by it to sleep last night, which hasn't happened to me in ages. | ||
| Richard_gavin (Richard_gavin) Username: Richard_gavin Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 65.110.174.71 |
I'm certainly enjoying Cold Skin thus far, Zed. I'm glad to hear that the novel maintains its integrity from start to finish. Ah, The Influence... I remember devouring most of that novel sitting in a lakeside park. An idyllic day, but I was so consumed by Ramsey's book that I didn't even notice my surroundings. My wife and I went on to name our daughter Rowan. Was it our choice, or were we being influenced by someone no longer incarnate? Ramsey might be the only writer, living or dead, who can still give me nightmares as well, Zed. The Grin of the Dark just about turned my brain to pablum. It nearly unravelled me. I had vivid and *horrific* dreams about Tubby for days afterward. Wonderful stuff... | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.72 |
You're not the only one who had Tubby nightmares, Richard! So did I. Mine involved a black and white Tubby scribbling furiously with a demented grin on a chalkboard, puffs of chalk powder billowing around. Then he was grinning at me from various crevices of my other dreams afterwards. I may re-read Influence shortly, a book which I reckon is Ramsey's most accessiable. Apparently it's James Herbert's favourite Ramsey novel too. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
That's the blurb on my copy, too. Although, to be fair, Herbert may have a new favourite Campbell novel these days. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.68 |
I wonder if he has kept up with Ramsey's work through the small press? that said, I think they've shared the same US publisher recently, so perhaps that way instead. Ramsey provided a cover quote for the US edition of Others. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
I'll ask him at World Horror next year. :-) | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.108.140 |
'The Seed from the Sepulchre' -- Clark Ashton Smith 'Home Away from Home' -- Robert Bloch 'You've Got to Have Brains' -- Robert Bloch 'The Graveyard Rats' -- Henry Kuttner Also read 'The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar' by Roald Dahl. Started this one in an English class way back when I was a nipper but for some reason we never got to read the end of it. Been bugging me for years and I finally got round to picking up a copy. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.60.106.5 |
I've been reading, 'How to take your ZX Spectrum +2 apart and give it an iphone interface.' And then an old copy of White Dwarf magazine- 'Hybrid Genestealer ranged combat for Space Hulk.' | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.230.36 |
Various essays and books on transhumanism - "Converging Technologies for Human Performance" by Roco and Bainbridge "A History of Transhumanist Thought" by Boström and a few others; also a German dissertation on Menschliche Erblichkeitslehre und Rassenhygiene by Bauer, Fischer and Lenz. Various sf stories by Poul Anderson, Heinlein etc. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.230.36 |
The German book is a standard text on anthropology from the early twenties which Hitler read while in jail; it provided him with a few thoughts . . . | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.104.245 |
Rereading The Comics Journal Library: The Writers . So far I've read the interviews with Chris Claremont, Denny O'Neil and Archie Goodwin (yes, Nero Wolfe fans, that really is his name). Will probably read the Harlan Ellison one next. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
The Treatment by Mo Hayder was incredibly grim. Can't believe it won the WH Smith Thumping Good Read award - it's right on the knuckle from start to end, and not the kind of thing I associate with Nanny Smith. Challenging and gripping book. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.32.39 |
George Orwell - Homage to Catalonia. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.67.168.225 |
Just finished Mother Night by Vonnegut, which was the bollocks. I love Vonnegut's hard-edged satire. His descriptions of Dresden in the introduction to the text will stay with me forever. Now reading George R. R. Martin's massive fantasy epic Game of Thrones, which is very good so far. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.230.36 |
Found a 3-volume set of Philip K. Dick's short stories in a bookshop yesterday and for some reason didn't buy it. Beginning to think I should have. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.32.39 |
...to be followed closely by reading again Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Big Brother did it... | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.244.196 |
MOTHER NIGHT is one of my favorite Vonneguts. The movie with Nick Nolte in the lead was an oddity, hardly to the novel's heights, but worth watching for its oddity-ness (same goes for BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS). | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.244.196 |
Ally, both 1984 films are worth catching - and the 1984 1984 has a killer soundtrack, too.... | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.32.39 |
Thanks Craig! I've seen both. The earlier one a long, long time ago - so I'll see it again. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.244.196 |
You can't. It's not available.  | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
1984 cluedo - It was Big brother in room 101 with a rat | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.159.105.54 |
I like the Michael Radford 1984. Lovely performance by the soon-to-be-late Richard Burton, and nice locations, including the old Beckton gasworks (which would later double as the city of Hue in Stanley Kubrick's FULL METAL JACKET). I don't know about the "last man in Europe", but John Hurt certainly looks like the poorliest man in Europe! | ||
| Alansjf (Alansjf) Username: Alansjf Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 94.194.134.45 |
Have just finished: John Crowley's Four Freedoms. Non-genre, but sublime. Am currently reading: Conjunctions 52: Betwixed the Between. Some good stuff in this so far, including Elizabeth Hand's 'Hungerford Bridge', which is easily going to be one of my favourite stories of the year. Next up: ... Not sure. Thinking of re-reading some Kathe Koja, although Jay Lake's new novel might show up in the post tomorrow. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.15.182 |
1984 cluedo - It was Big brother in room 101 with a rat ?!? - this sounds like a missive from the Malabar front.... | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.161.226 |
I just finished reading War and Peace a couple of weeks ago and just posted a review of it it at the Red Room: http://www.redroom.com/blog/thomas-burchfield/long-road-moscow} | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Great review, Thomas. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
I read W&P years ago, when I used to read what I thought I was supposed to read rather than what I wanted to read, but I do recall really enjoying it, especially some of the quiter moments in which the minutiae of everyday life rang true. Deceptive simplicity: getting the details so right. That's what makes him one of Shakespeare's few rivals. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.105.249 |
'Examination Day'-- Henry Slesar 'The Man From Glasgow' -- W Somerset Maugham 'The Pitch' -- Dennis Etchison They Shoot Horses, Don't They? -- Horace McCoy. Noir novel about the disillusioned contestants of a 1930s dance marathon. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.177.181.123 |
Stu - I've seen the film of THEY SHOOT HORSES... but never read the book. How is it? | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.230.36 |
Ha, "Examination Day"! I remember it well, for I first read it as a thirteen-year old who wasn't doing too well at school. Thematically it is very similar to Richard Matheson's "The Test". Another Slesar yarn that used to give me nightmares is about a hit man who goes to a hospital to kill an old potentate who has just had major surgery. To the killer's dismay his victim is only partly flesh and bone . . . I forget the title of this, it might have been "Run, murderer" or something in that vein. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Craig - We have a board game in the UK called Cluedo - the name of the game was shortened to Clue in America because of your short attention spans. I hope that explains the joke | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
This version of 1984 seems to be available - is it the one Ally means? http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/3296845/1984/Product.html | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.10.195 |
Thanks Ramsey! At a good price too. Thanks for posting the link Thomas - I'll read it soon. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.1.19 |
Well... I stand corrected... when did that become available? I do think that one's only available over there, not here in the U.S. CLUE started in the U.K.? I do know that game of course, grew up playing it. It still doesn't explain "cluedo" - clue is a word, but what's a "cluedo" that someone would name a game after it? | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.104.248 |
Mick, I remember seeing the film of They Shoot Horses late one night round my nan's when I was a nipper (I don't think my nan quite understood the concept of bedtime.) I was too young to understand what was going on in the film but the book makes perfect sense. Very short with a terse prose style. More like a novella really. Hubert, 'Examination Day' is the first Slesar I've read. I'll have to keep an eye out for the story you mentioned. Craig, I always assumed Cluedo was a play on Ludo. But I'm probably wrong. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
"CLUE started in the U.K.?" Of course it did. Typical ignorant bloody Yank attitude. You didn't invent everything and you didn't win the world wars (just joined in when you could see which way they were going so you'd be on the winner's side). You didn't capture the enigma machine etc etc. you just bloody assume that your country did everything don't you. We are the home of the polite country house murder mystery Cluedo's based on. And Stu's guess about a play on Ludo sounds right to me. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Hey, steady on. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.234.224 |
We invented the murder mystery, the detective mystery - remember Poe? We invented the best boardgame upon which all other boardgames derive their being - Monopoly. We invented SOLUTIONS for World Wars - you guys only seemed to invent exacerbating them. Your country invented and perfected puns, I'll give you that. A major, largely-overlooked reason many people left England and came to start a new life in America. I don't know what a "Ludo" is either - so there.  | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
should I have put in a  at the end of that? | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
Have just finished 'Obsession', which is Ramsey's finest novel I've read to date - he actually pulled off the trick of creating a seriously scary tale of the supernatural (along the lines of 'The Monkey's Paw') that is completely plausible even for arch sceptics (i.e. all down to psychology and coincidence). Reading this back-to-back with 'The Vodi' seemed almost too perfect a match. And I've just started - for the first time - 'The House On The Borderland' by William Hope Hodgson with RC's 'The Hungry Moon' lined up after that... | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.104.248 |
"Americans are far more remarkable than we give ourselves credit for. We've been so busy damning ourselves for years. We've done it all, and yet we don't take credit for it." Ray Bradbury Yes, such an unassuming nation.  Any idea if that's from one of his stories or if he actually said it? | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
I would hope that it was a quote from one of the more repulsive characters in his stories and not from the man himself. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.230.36 |
I don't think it's from any of his stories - and I've read most of them. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.104.248 |
Actually, to be fair, does anyone know if the quote's even genuine? After all, I got it off the internet ... | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.104.248 |
This Bradbury quote is even more disturbing. "Touch a scientist and you touch a child." Oh, I'm in a silly mood this afternoon ... | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.150.99 |
The first Bradbury quote sounds like something he could well have said in recent years. These days he's a card-carrying Republican who supported W, the invasion of Iraq, the whole thing. He also claimed recently that FAHRENHEIT 451 is about Communism. Horace McCoy is perhaps the most overtly left-wing of the great noir writers. THEY SHOOT HORSES, DON'T THEY is a classic, but it's also worth looking out for his darkly comic tale of small-town politics, NO POCKETS IN A SHROUD. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.104.248 |
I've not got NO POCKETS IN A SHROUD but I SHOULD HAVE STAYED HOME is on my TBR pile for some point in the (hopefully near) future. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
My next book is either Good to be God by Tibor Fisher or The City and the City by China Meiville or Snuff by Palahniuk or Dumas Key or a re-read of Pat highsmith's Glass Cell I can't decide | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Or possibly First among sequels by Jasper Fforde... | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Just been on Jasper Fforde's website. I love the Emergency Boss Approaching procedure button. Just follow the link below. http://www.jasperfforde.com/nextbook.html | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.14.132 |
I've only read the odd short-story by Patricia Highsmith, Weber. But I loved them, and the Ripley moves, and STRANGERS ON A TRAIN of course.... What's her best work? What would you recommend in her short-stories/novels? | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Bad Things by Michael marshall (minus the Smith). It's excellent so far. | ||
| Richard_gavin (Richard_gavin) Username: Richard_gavin Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.157.29.110 |
Joel wrote: "THEY SHOOT HORSES, DON'T THEY is a classic..." I second that. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.72 |
Bradbury has a new collection out, WE'LL ALWAYS HAVE PARIS. Ithink he has a poem at the end called 'America'. Don't know. Can't afford the book right now. Got a vet bill that's not far shy of a grand (English pounds). | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Weber: Tibor Fisher's: The Thought Gang and The Collector Collector are just brilliant.You laugh out loud and get weird side glances from people if you read those books in public spaces. Haven't read Good to be God and Under the Frog- which I must do soon. Mieville is blogging on omnivoracious all week in lieu of the City and the City which I enjoyed. http://www.omnivoracious.com/2009/06/there-and-back-again-five-reasons-tolkien-r ocks.html#more 'Tolkien gives good monster' | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Patricia Highsmith comes second only to Raymond Chandler as a crime writer for me. Everything she wrote is worth reading but my own personal favourite would be 'The Cry Of The Owl' (1962). One of the best psychological thrillers ever written imho - and borderline horror. | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.165.182 |
Stu, both NO POCKETS IN A SHROUD and I SHOULD HAVE STAYED HOME are brilliant. To my shame, I still haven't read THEY SHOOT HORSES, DON'T THEY? Gary F- you're absolutely right about Mo Hayder's THE TREATMENT. It's an absolutely devastating novel. The preceding novel, BIRDMAN, is damn good too, and her third novel, TOKYO- Jesus, that's disturbing. Some of the darkest mainstream crime fiction- the stuff that edges closest to the overlap with horror- is being written by women right now, it seems. Hayder, Denise Mina, Karin Slaughter, Cathi Unsworth, Joolz Denby... some truly staggering work. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.16.77.244 |
I know I saw the film version of CRY OF THE OWL... not even that long ago... but I can't remember a thing about it - it left, I guess, no impression on me. What did you think of the film, Stephen, in comparison to the novel? | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.176.5.91 |
I've raved on here before about Mo Hayder's stuff ever since getting Tokyo/The Devil of Nan King in my goody bag in Toronto; that book is still my favourite of hers. I have a copy of Hayder's RITUAL, her latest Jack Caffrey novel. Read once and in good condition, and free to anyone who wants it - first come, first served... | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.108.71 |
me please Mick.......... | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.69 |
Is that a statement, Ally? | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.108.71 |
It would be very kind of you to give the book to me. I would appreciate the generous offer and look forward to reading it :>) | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.177.29 |
I've only read a couple of Patricia Highsmith shorts. And I've got an omnibus of the Ripley novels to read at some point. Mo Hayder's TOKYO has been sitting on my shelves for a couple of years now; I really need to get around to reading it. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.230 |
John Connolly's Killing Kind was fun. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.177.29 |
Connolly's brilliant. It's a pity he doesn't get more coverage in horror circles but he always gets marketed as a crime novelist. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.150.111.93 |
David Copperfield - by Charles Dickens I treat Dickens as taking a holiday overlooking a view of fiction past. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
That's a nice thought, Des... | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.106.220.83 |
Hi Ally - email me your address and I'll put it in the post to you. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.108.71 |
Thanks Mick. I'll buy you a pint at Fantasycon! | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
I wasn't aware there was a movie version of 'The Cry Of The Owl'! It's such a subtle psychological novel, relying a lot on suggestion, that I imagine it would be difficult to translate effectively to film. Just checked online and see it's been filmed three times though!! Which version did you see Craig? | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.170.193 |
Finished "The Polish Officer" last night. I'm about to launch into "Death in Holy Orders." | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.4.9 |
I saw the '83 version, Stephen, directed by Claude Chabrol. I can't remember a damned thing about it!... Did you ever read THE BLUNDERER? Someone on imdb says it's a little seen older film based on her work, that's worth catching.... | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.176.6.105 |
Thanks Mick. I'll buy you a pint at Fantasycon! Ooh, just seen this! Whoo-hoo! Not that I drink, of course... | ||
| Mark West (Mark_west) Username: Mark_west Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.39.177.173 |
Just started "The Turtle Boy", by Kealan Patrick Burke. Coming to this very late... | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
The Blunderer is a great example of Highsmith's work. You never know in her books if the (relatively) innocent are going to be punished unfairly or if the extremely guilty are going to get away with it(except for the first 4 Ripley books -when you know there's another book in the series you know the central character's going to win through). I didn't know there was a film of the Blunderer but I can't recommend the book too highly. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
The Blunderer - a man is trapped in an unhappy marriage, there's a series of murders in the area and he's been collecting newspaper clippings about it. After an argument when his wife storms out he pretends to murder her and bury her body in the manner of the local murderer. His wife doesn't return home, her family report her missing, he's been seen acting suspiciously and digging at odd hours of the night... Very very good book and one of my personal favourites. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Highsmith, I like a great deal, though find her less gripping - and less melodramatic - than Rendell. Both, however, are outstanding psychologists. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
Ah but it's the stark realism, brilliant build-up of suspense by the most economic of means and more than anything the sheer cruelty and unpredictability of Highsmith's fiction that makes it so damn addictive - for me anyway. I would urge anyone who hasn't read her to avoid - at all costs - any film adaptations without first having read the source. Each and every time you're in for a treat. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
The first Ripley book is easily the most convincing portrait of a psychopath ever set to paper. She makes you empathise completely with Ripley and you fully agree with his reasoning when poor Dickie Greenleaf meets his maker. She has a cool detached prose style that perfectly suits the time and location and makes his actions, and your agreement to them, all the more disturbing. One of my favourite books of all time. | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 12.165.240.116 |
>> The first Ripley book is easily the most convincing portrait of a psychopath ever set to paper. Haven't read any Ripley books (although I've seen the Matt Damon film), so I can't say how accurate a portrayal of a psychopath the book offers. (And, to be fair, I have a limited knowledge of real psychopaths, unless my mother counts.) How does it compare to, say, Jim Thompson's "The Killer Inside Me"? Or Ramsey's "The Face That Must Die"? | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Not read the Thompson, better than the Campbell IMHO. It's not as much of a horror novel as Ramsey's but is more convincing for that. (if that makes sense which it probably doesn't and I'm about to get ripped to shreds) | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Let me try to retrieve that. Ramsey's FTMD is written as a horror novel. It's setting out to scare us and we know that. That automatically sets up more suspense of disbelief than the Highsmith. Ramsey's is written with his usual slightly skewed reality, highsmith's is written in a cool detached realistic style which makes hers more convincing again than Ramsey's. Does that make more sense now? Ramsey's is still an excellent novel, but it's not in my top ten like the Highsmith is. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Couldn't agree more Weber about 'The Talented Mr Ripley'. It was my introduction to Highsmith many moons ago and is one of the most gripping page-turners I've yet to encounter. Ripley is a unique fictional creation and probably the ultimate anti-hero. None of the many film adaptations - even at their very best - come anywhere near the brilliantly understated power of Highsmith's prose and the way she gets you right inside the mind of a monster (you can't help empathising with). I feel like re-reading the whole series now. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.73 |
Outstanding example of wearing out your spade when you're ina hole there, Webber! I'm onto Peter Straub's 5 Stories now, which I've had a while and not got around to. It's making me want to re-read his novel Mystery this summer. May try do that next week, as we've something of a heatwave due... | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.234.239 |
Halfway through The Influence. I'm consulting Google Earth from time to time, to see what the locations in Wales look like. It was fun to see that there actually is a St Winifred's Well, but I still haven't found the cemetary in Gronant. Stephen: you're reading The House on the Borderlandfor the first time ? How I envy you! Google Earthwise no luck here, for neither Kraighten or Ardrahan appear to be real locations. I wonder what part of 'the west of Ireland' Hodgson had in mind when he wrote this fabulous tale. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
David Ambrose's A Memory of Demons. Slight yet intriguing. | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.159.105.54 |
Hubert, here you go: http://www.yourlocalweb.co.uk/images/pictures/03/04/coed-bell-cemetery-29662.jpg That's the one. PS: I've stood on Prestatyn railway station on a cold, dark windy evening and heard that creaking sound... | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.203.11 |
Surely The Face That Must Die isn't a portrait of a psychopath: it's a portrait of someone having a psychotic breakdown that results in violence. Horridge has little of the functionality, the covering-up ability, of a psychopath – only his social isolation protects him from being found out. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.234.239 |
I'm always surprised by the difference between reality and what the mind is able to concoct. This is entirely different from what I'd imagined, but it could hardly have been otherwise . . . Thanks, Steve. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.181.220 |
The Mannikin -- Robert Bloch | ||
| Michael_kelly (Michael_kelly) Username: Michael_kelly Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 174.88.168.249 |
Stu, Have you read any Henning Mankell? | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.181.220 |
The bloke who does the Wallander books? No, I haven't. Why, was I supposed to? | ||
| Michael_kelly (Michael_kelly) Username: Michael_kelly Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 174.88.168.249 |
Stu, No, someone recommended them to me, but I've not gotten around to any. For some reason, I'd thought you read some. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.176.138 |
No, I haven't even seen the TV adap with Kenneth Branagh. Sorry. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
The Colour of Law by Mark Gimenez. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.71 |
I've read some Mankell. I understand he's highly regarded, but the one I tried didn't bowl me over. Maybe it was the translation, but stock phrases like 'for all the tea in China' and 'for all the world like' really don't work their way into my heart and linger ina good way... I can see his appeal, tho. Need to read more before forming a better idea of him. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.181.32 |
Taming a Sea-horse -- Robert B Parker. | ||
| Mark West (Mark_west) Username: Mark_west Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.39.177.173 |
Stu - I just finished "Hugger Mugger", which I really enjoyed and "Shrink Rap", which didn't really grab me. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.181.225 |
HUGGER MUGGER was the book that got me into reading Parker.* Not the best thing Parker's ever written but it's a pretty solid example of the wisecracking PI genre. And I was in a pretty miserable mood at the time so it was just the pick-me-up I needed. I devoured HUGGER MUGGER, HUSH MONEY and COLD SERVICE all in the course of a single weekend. As for SHRINK RAP I've listened to the audiobook but not read the actual novel. Still, it left me a little disappointed. Offhand I think PERISH TWICE is the best one I've read so far of the Sunny Randall series. But I've only read that one and BLUE SCREEN so I don't have a lot to compare it to. *I tried Early Autumn sometime around the mid-90s but didn't like it. Although when I reread it as part of my ongoing attempt to read all the Spenser novels in chronological order I thought it was okay. | ||
| Mark West (Mark_west) Username: Mark_west Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.39.177.173 |
I started with "Promised Land" and stopped around the time of "Double Deuce", back in the 90s, so I didn't even realise the series had continued on until recently (I think, in fact, it was you who told me). The Sunny Randall left me a bit cold - it felt, effectively, like Spenser transfered into an attractive, 30something woman. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
Finished 'The House On The Borderland' at the weekend and loved every word of it! More than worthy of its reputation. I can just imagine how it must have fired the imagination of the young Lovecraft - it's almost a template for his cosmic vein of supernatural horror. I imagine the setting would be somewhere to the south of Galway/north of Kerry. I'd read 'The Night Land' & 'Carnacki the Ghost Finder' before as well as some other short stories and there's just something about Hodgson's writing style - the way he mixes excitingly visceral action with almost psychedelic flights of pure fantasy - that I find utterly compelling. After M.R. James I think I'd rank him as my favourite "turn of the last century" horror writer. Must track down a copy of 'The Boats Of The Glen Carrig'. I've since started Ramsey's 'The Hungry Moon' and after several chapters am wondering if anyone else found the Peak District village of Moonwell unnervingly like a certain Royston Vasey??? | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
As it happens, Lovecraft didn't read Hodgson's THE HOUSE ON THE BORDERLAND until the 1930s, so it wasn't a formative influence. Surprising I know. But a lot of UK stuff was hard to find in the USA. What puzzles me more is that Lovecraft had read Wells – a critical influence on Hodgson – but no Lovecraft expert has considered Wells to be a major influence on Lovecraft. I find that almost incomprehensible. Wells invented 'cosmic horror'. Comparing Wells with Dunsany in that respect is like comparing Eric Cantona with Ricky Spragia. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.225.124 |
Stephen: "I imagine the setting would be somewhere to the south of Galway/north of Kerry." How come? Is it just that the country is sufficiently "bleak and inhospitable"? What about the chasm where the manuscript is found? It has such an air of verisimilitude about it . . . | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
It was the region known as The Burren I was thinking of in Co. Clare. See the link below and I think you'll agree it sounds quite an otherworldly landscape... http://www.clarelibrary.ie/eolas/coclare/places/the_burren/burren_karst.htm That's just my own impression though and Hodgson may have had somewhere entirely different in mind. Just remembered I also read 'The Ghost Pirates' as a teenager and loved it. Ripe for rereading. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.225.124 |
Yes, it sounds plausible. Practically everything in The House on the Borderland remains unexplained - the wereabouts of the chasm, who originally built the house and why (those cellars! - surely the builders must have known a thing or two), the origin and nature of the swine-things, why and how the house finally disappeared into the chasm . . . I remember first reading "The Derelict" and "The Voice in the Night". The world seemed entirely different after those two stories. Gawd, to be thirteen again. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
The swine-things are a Young Conservatives annual conference at 2am. A heavily censored account. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Did Joel really do a football joke? | ||
| Michael_kelly (Michael_kelly) Username: Michael_kelly Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 174.88.168.249 |
Mark, thanks for the heads up on Mankell. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.60.106.5 |
Someone buy that man a curry | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
My wife just read a couple of the Wallander books, after someone at work loaned her them. She wasn't impressed with the first one she rries, but thought the other one was very good indeed. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.184.76 |
Mark, if you started with PROMISED LAND did you read the first three Spenser novels? The first, THE GODWULF MANUSCRIPT, didn't really impress me much but it's interesting to contrast Parker's later portrayal of Spenser as a strict monogamist with a wide social network with this first outing where he's a lone wolf who shags anything with a pulse. As for Sunny Randall, yeah, she is kind of a female Spenser. Offhand I think all Parker's non-Spenser books still have protagonists who are pretty much variations on Spenser. Some of these variations are more interesting than others. For example, have you read WILDERNESS, a standalone thriller that Parker wrote back in the 70s? The three main characters are variations of Spenser, Susan and Hawk but with all the nobility and romanticism stripped away. "Spenser" is a wannabe tough guy with feelings of inadequacy, "Susan" is a ballbusting Lady Macbeth type and "Hawk" is an ageing adrenaline junkie who puts his own thrill-seeking ahead of his friends' safety. Kind of peters out towards the end but it's interesting to see Parker do something with a bit more edge to it. | ||
| Mark West (Mark_west) Username: Mark_west Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.39.177.173 |
I remember starting with "Promised Land", but can't recall what order I read the rest in and it's been a while since I read the earlier ones - best part of ten years now, I think. It is noticeable how his approach changes though, especially going from "Stardust" to "Hugger Mugger", as I did this year. "Shrink Rap" is the only non-Spenser of his that I've read - I've never seen any of the other books available and haven't ever bothered to try to track them down. I did point my Dad in the direction of Parker's westerns though. After my less-than-enthusiastic reaction, I'm a bit hesitant about the Jesse Stone novels, though having them in 3rd person might make all the difference. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.187.239 |
Not up to STARDUST yet. But from what I've read of the later Spenser novels Spenser becomes pretty much infallible and the mistakes and emotional dificulties he used to endure in the earlier novels get dumped on the supporting cast instead. It's intersting that Parker has started writing Westerns as he wrote a doctoral thesis on the evolution of the American Hero where he traces gunslingers through to hardboiled private eyes. Anyway, APPALOOSA I enjoyed a lot. GUNSMAN'S RHAPSODY not quite so much although from what I gather Parker pretty much nails the historical details of the lead-up to the Gunfight at the OK Corral. Quite keen to see what Ed Harris did with APPALOOSA in his film adap. I've only read a couple of the Jesse Stone novels. They were okay. I know Jesse turns up in BACK STORY but I've not read it yet so I don't know how he fares being described from Spenser's POV. | ||
| Mark West (Mark_west) Username: Mark_west Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.39.177.173 |
I preferred the more wordy, early Spensers where you could see the character taking the knocks. The reason I stopped, around "Double Deuce", is because the books felt like padded novellas, with lots of white space on the pages and Spenser himself - as you point out - seemed to breeze through things. I haven't read any of his westerns. In fact, apart from stories in my dad's old Buffalo Bill annuals, I don't think I've ever read a western in my life. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Dearly devoted Dexter - book 2 of the series. So far very good indeed | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Weber - I enjoyed the first Dexter book, but haven't yet read any more (are there 3 now?). It was a light read considering the subject matter, but very entertaining. Not as good as the TV show, but still very much worth the time and effort. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
There's 4. The new one is still hardback only. Number 3 is Dexter in the Dark. I can't remember offhand the name of the new one. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Delhi-belly dexter? The story of a serial killer and his brush with a rotten vindaloo.  I'm reading King's DUMA KEY. Picked it up again after abandoning it after 80 pages (not because it's bad; I just wasn't in the mood at the time). The prose is wonderful, and the story now has me gripped. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Dexter Does Dallas... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Dexter By Design, isn't it? I'm reading Free To Trade by Michael Ridpath. Rather good. | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.166.101 |
Don't know about "Dexter." Not much for serial killer themes, myaelf. I am a big fan of "The Wire" (don't know if you guys got it across the Big Pond and wrote about it at my site at http://www.redroom.com/blog/thomas-burchfield/15-reasons-you-should-watch-the-wi re-all-true-and-unarguable | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.159.105.54 |
I was so relieved when I read DUMA KEY and found it didn't suck - not only that, it was actually pretty good. I was afraid of what it would mean if SK laid a third egg in a row... | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Whaaaaat? I absolutely adored LISEY'S STORY (the Long Boy...brrrr), and thought CELL was a decent pulp page-turner. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Both Lisey and Duma were great. They read a little like some of his books in the nineties, but better written now, even more confident somehow. Lisey is the only signed King I have- which was personally signed- other than the slipcased Postscripts 10. Just finished reading Alan Moore's new graphic novel installment of The league of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Excellent and very funny and brutal and filled with all the goodness you expect from the series. A character, Andrew Norton- his entrance into the story might be one of the funniest most memorable entrances I remember in any story.In one spread across ten panels. Really brilliant. There'll be two more installments that lead up to the present day I think. If you don't read comics, this is probably the series you want to spend your hard cash on. | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.159.105.54 |
Just sayin'! CELL I thought was perfunctory, and LISEY'S STORY had just the one scene (the possessed kid in the cellar) worthy of King at his best. Most of the rest I found self-indulgent and rambling. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
Still reading Martin's A Game of Thrones. Must be said that it's the absolute business. Probably the best epic fantasy I've read in a while. Beautifully handled plot and great characterisation. It does get a little camp in places but I think that this is deliberate to outline the ridiculousness of chivalry. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
A good friend of mine who reads a lot of epic fantasy reckons that in a typical GRR Martin 1500 page entry into any of his series, there's about 10 pages of actual plot. That's always put me off reading his fantasy although I do like his horror. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
I can assure you that with Game of Thrones that's not the case at all. It's all plot as far as I can see so far. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.176.32 |
Mark, the later, leaner Spensers seem a bit hit and miss. Sometimes it seems like Parker just isn't trying but sometimes he'll really nail a scene with Zen-like simplicity. When he does I'm just left staring at the page in awe -- "The entire chapter is only eight lines of dialogue and two lines of prose; how the hell does he make it so enjoyable?" On the downside the plots and characters tend to teeter on the verge of self-parody. Btw, picked up the DVD of APPALOOSA yesterday. Hopefully will get a chance to watch it soon. | ||
| Mark West (Mark_west) Username: Mark_west Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.39.177.173 |
Stu - agree, completely. Sometimes you get more out of him in a sentence than you get from some writers in a paragraph or two. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 89.168.219.160 |
i just read Ray Bradbury's NOW AND FOREVER. A couple of novella collected together. First one -- "Somewhere A Band is Playing" -- has the seeds of the great Bradburian novel it could've been in his heyday and is still worth a read, though it's slighter than it probably should be. The second is CS Lewis SF meets Moby Dick and less interesting. Not his greatest work, but I'd rather have it available than not. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 89.168.219.160 |
The third Dexter book -- DEXTER IN THE DARK, though I think it was called something else in the US (the fourth is indeed DEXTER BY DESIGN) -- takes a mistaken lurch toward the supernatural, thus abandoning any moral ambiguity: because the "demon" is to blame for the killings, etc, and not Dexter the person. Not sure how the books have gone from there. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
I agree, that is a very good book. However I read the America poem at the end of We'll always have Paris and it's worse than the quote we were discussing earlier. "We are the dream that others want to be" or words to that effect is the theme of the poem. Very very very bad and over zealous in it's admiration for the bad old US of A | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
my post was a response to the Bradbury message. The second Dexter book is very good so far. Some interesting themes popping up - I wonder if the TV show will have the guts to let Dexter start training Cody (Rita's 7 year old son) in the ways of the Dark passenger... | ||
| Gcw (Gcw) Username: Gcw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.150.109.19 |
"I'm reading King's DUMA KEY. Picked it up again after abandoning it after 80 pages (not because it's bad; I just wasn't in the mood at the time). The prose is wonderful, and the story now has me gripped." That bastard book, I found the first 100 pages or so a bit...irritating, then suddenly it kicked into gear. The Girl in the cellar in the totally great Lisey's Story was really something else wasn't it? gcw | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.176 |
I need to get back to reading Stephen King. Although I have every book he's written, I got derailed slightly during The Dark Tower phase. I think the last novel I read (not counting TDT series) was probably From A Buick 8 (although I did read Blaze and The Colorado Kid, but I didn't count them). I have to say, much as I love the man's voice and engaging plots, I tend not to think of him a writer to 'scar' or 'scare' (to use Zed's term) me anymore; other than The Shining, Salem's Lot and Pet Sematary, I can't think of any of his other work that is frightening. Having said that, I think the bloke's a genius in terms of writing readable prose. So, which of his recent novels should I read first, as a way of reintroducing myself to his work?} | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.176 |
Gary F, I know you're a fan of Barbara Vine. Have you read 'No Night is Too Long', and if so, should I bother with it? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
>>>I can't think of any of his other work that is frightening. Gerald's Game? Misery? Apt Pupil? The Mist? Rose Madder? Christine? 1408? All contained scenes that scared me. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
>>>Gary F, I know you're a fan of Barbara Vine. Have you read 'No Night is Too Long', and if so, should I bother with it? It's certainly RR's most uncharacteristic book. I know other fans think it's one of her best, but I wasn't as taken with it as, say, Dark Adapted Eye. The one Vine you MUST read is Brimstone Wedding. Terrifying. But you'll enjoy anything Rendell has written. But we're looking for those killer books, aren't we? So Brimstone and Sight For Sore Eyes are the ones you want. Bridesmaid, too. All up with Ramsey in terms of terror. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
I'm reading Philip Kerr's A Philosophical Investigation. Very interesting serial killer story. Albie would love it . . . There's such logic there . . . | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.176 |
"Gerald's Game? Misery? Apt Pupil? The Mist? Rose Madder? Christine? 1408?" I agree that all these contains elements of horror, but - with the exclusion of The Mist, which I'd forgot about - none of them scared me in the way, for example, certain scenes of Ramsey's does. I sometimes feel that King is the literary equivalent of a US teen horror film; his work reaches to such a broad audience, I'm not sure whether he could be as extreme as he once was. (Remember, I say this having not yet read any of his last handful of novels - I'm conscious of sounding too critical because without Stephen King I may not have ever stumbled into horror). Perhaps 'scare' was not the best word to use. Maybe 'unsettle' would suit the idea better. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
I recently listened to the Misery audiobook and found it almost unbearably disturbing. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
I do, however, sometimes wonder how the mind that once came up with The Shining and Misery can also write such garbage as, say, Sleepwalkers. In fact this phenomenon intrigues me greatly. John Sullivan is another writer thus afflicted: from genius to drivel in seemingly the same weekend. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
My theory is that King's prolifacy is often his worst enemy. He'll rattle something off - like the Sleepwalkers screenplay - and because he's King, it gets made. I actually liked that film, btw. :-) King has always had that broad appeal, btw: he's spent his career mixing mainstream literature with genre. He writes about the "common man" incredibly well. I've always found a lot of his stuff terrifying mainly because it's so firmly rooted in reality. Recently, the story "Stationary Bike" gave me some real shivers... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Stationary Bike was top stuff. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
King's metaphors are always intensely personal - if not to him, then to the characters. That's a big part of his magic, I think. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.177.236 |
I've not read a lot of King. He's written tons of books, many of which are so huge that each copy contains an entire Brazilian rainforest, and that it makes it difficult to wade through the crap and get to the good stuff. I keep meaning to "classic" King like The Shining but the mediocre nature of what I've read so far doesn't give me a lot of incentive. Even using his short stories as a quicker way to sample his work has left me dissatisfied. It was only last year that I actually read any of his stories that I thought were any good e.g. The Reach, The Last Rung on the Ladder and The Mist. And even then none of them really blew my socks off. He's not a bad writer but I find his prose flabby and unengaging. And I've yet to read anything by him that is even remotely scary. I'm probably being a bit harsh here but as he's one of the most successful writers ever I expect to come away from his stories going, "Wow!" not, "Well, it was all right I suppose." | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.233.72 |
I dropped him after Firestrater, which had about 80 pages of good stuff and then quickly lapsed into a remake of Carrie. I did enjoy The Shining, The Stand, The Dead Zone and (above all) his story collection Night Shift. Different Seasons is good, too. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
It's all about taste, I suppose, but I rate King very highly indeed. At his best, he's unmatchable IMHO. | ||
| Gcw (Gcw) Username: Gcw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.150.109.19 |
Agreed, He's also (fantasy?) Americana personified. He is Happy Days, Porkys,American Graffiti, Diner...The Beach Boys...And then the dark stuff underneath. gcw | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.233.72 |
Well, sometimes I think he should have stuck with the Americana. It's essentially that which keeps his readers turning all those pages, even if he ultimately fails to deliver. Needless to say if he were attacked by the 'righteous' squad I'd defend him. I like the guy. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
I'm one of those people who grew up idolising Stephen King in the late 70s/80s and reading every book as soon as it came out up until 'The Tommyknockers'. Then I sort of grew out of him and started getting into more classical literary horror and writers like Golding, Ballard, Dickens, Dostoevsky, etc... Dipped in again a few years back out of curiosity by reading 'From A Buick 8' which I enjoyed immensely as a story (he can still spin an engaging yarn like no other) but it didn't touch me on any deeper level than pure entertainment. He's a very good writer and a master storyteller but I can't see history judging him as one of the GREATS (i.e. Poe, de Maupassant, Lovecraft, Aickman, Campbell, etc). Then again that's only my opinion. | ||
| Richard_gavin (Richard_gavin) Username: Richard_gavin Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.157.24.204 |
Regarding Stephen King: I do think his "Americana" is unquestionably the root of his widespread and long-standing popularity. The die-hard King readers are usually not horror fans, they are Stephen King fans. His "thrill 'em, chill 'em, then send 'em home for apple pie on the front porch" is what most readers respond to, not the horrific elements per se. That being said, I think S.K. is a far better writer than some give him credit for. I can only speak for his earlier books because I've not read much of his output since Needful Things, but his prose is exquisite at times, and he has created some authentically chilling and frightening material. I think anyone with that large a canon of work is bound to have hits and misses, and not everything is going to appeal to a discerning reader. But when King is firing on all cylinders, he is a tremdendous author. | ||
| Simon Strantzas (Nomis) Username: Nomis Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 74.198.12.14 |
I think King is a deceptive writer. What he does looks so simple and effortless that many people mistakenly believe it IS simple and effortless, and thus he is a mediocre talent with undeserved fame. But all it takes a read of his many imitators to realise that what he does is NOT so simple and effortless, it's only his talent that makes it so. Stephen King's prose is designed to bypass the reader's natural filters and connect directly to the brain. One doesn't so much read a King story as become part of it. He's the only writer I know of that absorbs so completely. | ||
| Richard_gavin (Richard_gavin) Username: Richard_gavin Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 65.110.174.71 |
Agreed. Well put, Simon. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Stephen King deserves every ounce of his fame! He's a superb storyteller whose characters appear to live and breathe in the reader's mind - and that's certainly not a mediocre talent. I still don't think he ranks as one of the "great writers" though... | ||
| Lincoln Brown (Lincoln_brown) Username: Lincoln_brown Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 121.219.126.228 |
Finished 'The Influence', and it was even better than I remembered. Picked up a collection of short fiction, but after three stories put it back on the shelf - very disapointing. Will probably move onto 'Heart Shaped Box'(Hill), or 'Rock Breaks, Scissors Cut'(Schow), or 'Minful of Phantoms'(Fry). | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Picked up a collection of short fiction, but after three stories put it back on the shelf - very disapointing. What's the collection, Lincoln? | ||
| Lincoln Brown (Lincoln_brown) Username: Lincoln_brown Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 144.131.0.98 |
Wouldn't be fair of me to say - I have no right to be critical. It just wasn't for me, so I'll move on to something else. I don't think the author is a RC board member, but he is fairly well known in the genre. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.178.253 |
"I think King is a deceptive writer. What he does looks so simple and effortless that many people mistakenly believe it IS simple and effortless, and thus he is a mediocre talent with undeserved fame." I'm not basing my opinion of his work on whether his writing is simple and effortless, I'm basing it on whether it's any good. Most of the stuff I've read isn't. But as I said, I've not read that much of his work and I suspect most of what I have read is not topnotch King. And even though he isn't one of my favourite writers I do like him a lot more than I used to. Fingers crossed that when I finally get round to reading THE SHINING it'll live up to the hype and I can rush back over here shouting, "I've seen the light!" | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
So which of his novels have you read? | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.180.16 |
Ah, Stu, you must read "The Shining" ASAP! That is the one I unhesitatingly recommend to SK newcomers. I confess, I haven't read any of his novels (except for his Peter Straub collaborations) after "Pet Semetary," a novel that left me feeling that he'd never top that again. I've read some of his short stories since then and haven't thought much of them. His style wears on me after awhile--the prose seems leaden and I can only take so many pop cultural references (in fact, it's made me self-conscious about including too many of them in my own work; they can yank you out of the story and its world for one thing). BUT we all owe him millions of Big Hearty Thanks--especially me for how he led me to Peter Straub and this board's landlord and many other authors I might never have come to know. Now, having got that off my chest, I have new essay, this time on Monty Python, over at http://www.redroom.com/blog/thomas-burchfield/songs-of-the-big-blue-snake.} | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.178.110 |
I've only read one King novel so far. THE GREEN MILE. I was bedridden at the time so was glad of anything to read but it didn't entice me to rush out and read any more of his stuff. I read the first chapter or so of IT but without any real intention of finishing the book (I was staying somewhere overnight, fancied something to read and that was the only book available). Possibly because of the circumstances under which I read it the opening pages just didn't grab me at all and I was glad that I didn't have to wade through the rest of it. Also, IIRC the book started with a bunch of quotes which quite irritated me -- if you've got over 1000 pages to tell a story surely you've got enough space to get your ideas across without having to quote a whole bunch of other people to emphasise your themes and concerns. Most of my reading of King has been in the short form; I've read chunks of NIGHT SHIFT, SKELETON CREW, EVERYTHING'S EVENTUAL and stories from various anthologies. Unfortunately I seem to have a knack of homing in on King's worst short stories -- I'd read one, think, "God, that was awful!" and then take about eighteen months to convince myself to read another one, which would also be awful so I wouldn't read him for another eighteen months ... It's only recently that I've got to any of the decent stories in these collections and that's reawakened my interest in giving his novels another go. | ||
| Mark West (Mark_west) Username: Mark_west Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.39.177.173 |
I enjoyed "IT" but agree with Thomas B that "Pet Semetary" is hard to top. "Bag Of Bones" was very good, though I seem to remember it felt there was a fair bit of padding in it. I haven't read any of his more recent stuff. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
"Pet Semetary" is my favourite - probably my favourite modern horror novel, actually. Loved the ambition of "It". All those vintage Kings are great, IMHO. Stu - it sounds to me that you simply don't get on with King, so I'd guess that "The Shining" will also leave you unmoved. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
I think Pet Semetary is the first King I read and I loved it. Extraordinarily dark for King, I gather he was going through a very difficult period of his life at the time. IT I found too flabby, I think I would have liked it more if I'd read it in my youth. But yes, when King is on form he is astonishing. I thoroughly recommend his Dark Tower series, which I really think is his masterpiece. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
I think Simon's comment on King above is spot on. King's prose seems deceptivly simple. I think it also comes down to his natural storytelling voice. Which is also why I actually like his very long novels, all those digressions etc, are 'the meat' of his prose, it's what makes him so enjoyable to read I find. Books like IT and THE STAND have that quality. And from what I gather UNDER THE DOME will be something similar- it is supposed to have nearly a hundred characters. I reread Pet Sematary a couple of years ago, and I agree with Zed, it is certainly one of the best modern Horror novels out there. King apparently hesitated with releasing the novel. Thank God he did. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Having said that however, King and some others are the exception. Recently I have preferred spare and lean prose; nothing puts me off more than these big tomes which could have been executed in a 100 pages. And reading habits change- if I pass on something like Ghost story to friends who read lots of modern crime say, they won't be able to get past the first 100 pages. They want gratification in the first chapter, or by the third. Not patient enought. But authors like Campbell and Straub give their readers novels with complex characters which then allows for the suspense to mount and mount and be much more effective because you care for the characters- in a sense it is the author's gift to his reader, for sticking with him and the characters. I'm off to the Roskilde festival for some loud music and instant gratification, hour by hour... | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Finished Dearly devoted Dexter last night. Well recommended and better than Darkly Dreaming Dexter IMHO. I'm about to start the most famous novel by Davis Grubb. If you can guess which movie star's picture is on the front cover, award yourself two points, jump in the air (a little bit) and shout hurray quietly. It's not that difficult. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.190.97 |
Is it Adam Sandler? | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
subtract 50 points. Dig a hole in the ground and bury yourself in the corner for at least a week you dunderheaded oaf | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.191.136 |
Sorry, I don't know what I was thinking. I meant to say Will Smith. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Fill the hole with fresh cat poo before you burty yourself in it... | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
bury yourself d'oh! | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
Hmmm... I've read two Davis Grubb short stories: 'The Horsehair Trunk' & 'Where The Woodbine Twineth' so going by those clues I'd plump for a 50s/early 60s icon. Richard Burton? | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
I gasp, I weep. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
Robert Mitchum. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Hurrah! | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Award yourself two points joel and the rest. The book is of course Night of the Hunter for the benefit of Mr Walsh and is so far very very good (the 20 pages I read on my lunch break). If it continues as well as it began, I may need to track down some more of his books. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 67.116.103.241 |
I just recently saw THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE, for the first time. Stars Robert Mitchum. A very subtle, but complex sort of... hmm - this may qualify as a portmanteau film, because it's not quite an ensemble, but not quite an antho, and not quite a single-protag either... the structure is fascinating, now that I think on it... a deeply cynical crime drama, bleak and hopeless... was put off at first viewing, it's so unconventional; but as I reflect in leisure, it's proved quite memorable... an effectively dismal film.... (The Criterion edition maddeningly refers to cut scenes and sequences, that *I* believe would have greatly enhanced the film, but that appear nowhere on the dvd - oh well, maybe next time....) | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.197.210 |
Night of the Hunter is superb. My Penguin paperback copy has an original colour illustration by Davis Grubb, who was a painter as well as a writer, on the inside of the front cover, depicting a famous scene from the book (I won't mention the title Grubb has given it, as it may spoil the book for Weber). It's very colourful and sinister (it really resembles Mitchum). Grubb's short fiction is well worth reading too, especially the collection Twelve Tales of Suspense and the Supernatural. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
I never knew he wrote that, or indeed that there was a novel of the film - can hear the gasps and gnashing of teeth from here. I hope you all admire my honesty! I'm going through a phase of wanting to read THE classic novels about psychopathic killers so that's another one for the list! Recently read 'Psycho', 'A Kiss Before Dying', 'The Face That Must Die' (of course) and have 'Brighton Rock' lined up next with a rereading of the Ripley series on the cards as well. Any more that might join that lot? | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Paul theroux's Chicago Loop | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Jim Thompson's The Killer Inside Me, Stephen. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
Bloch's THE SCARF. Thomas Harris's RED DRAGON and THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS. If you can find them, Cornell Woolrich's BLACK ALIBI and RENDEZVOUS IN BLACK. If you read the latter, send me an e-mail and I'll comfort you. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Ruth Rendell's A Sight For Sore Eyes. Crime and Punishment by Dostoevsky. Misery by some fella. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
THE COLLECTOR by John Fowles. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Indeed. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.78.15.218 |
Apocalypse Culture by Adam Parfrey. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
On the what are we reading front: Just finished George R. R. Martin's stunning A Game of Thrones. Easily one of the best fantasy novels I've read in the last few years with a genuinely exciting and exhilarating plot. Now reading a collection of Theodore Sturgeon stories called E Pluribus Unicorn. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
The Sturgeon collection is superb, Jon. 'Scars' will knock you sideways. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.131.110.233 |
The trailer for The Road looks like The Day After Tomorrow. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 88.110.77.18 |
I found THE PENGUIN HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA in a charity store, as new, for a quid. Had been donated by the publishers. Nice of them. So I'm browsing that. Not many penguins in it so far . . . I'm also re-reading an old favourite, Arthur C Clarke's THE SONGS OF DISTANT EARTH. There are, surprisingly, still a few people about (like Stu!) who haven't read Stephen King. I find it a bit astonishing, to be honest, because of his cultural impact (King's, not Stu's). His "invisible" style has affected a couple of generations of writers and modern popular fiction owes an enormous amount to his stuff, like, uh, Justin Timberlake does to Michael Jackson... or instance, Ian Rankin's only just started reading King, I believe: apparently Rankin's son gave him IT to start on, the cruel sod. And in case anyone's missed it, King on "manfiction": 20225323%2C00.html,http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20225323,00.html And a tongue-in-cheek, self-deprecating remark from Lee Child about his own work, issued when chatting to former talkSport Gob-Jay Jon Gaunt: "What I will say about my books is that they don't get any worse." | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Serial killer book - The Emerald germs of Ireland by patrick MacCabe | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.176.170 |
Craig, I've not seen THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE but I've read the novel. My memory of it is a bit blurred but I do recall the dialogue being rather good. Jonathan, I'm about halfway through E PLURIBUS UNICORN myself but have been sidetracked by Sturgeon's SOME OF YOUR BLOOD. Mark, I don't deny that King has had an impact on popular culture. As you know he's a big influence on John Connolly so he can't be all bad. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.184.113 |
I'm with Joel - E Pluribus Unicorn is a superb collection. The chronologically-ordered multi-volume set published by North Atlantic Books (I believe it's up to volume eleven or so by now) is well worth getting if you like Sturgeon's short fiction. As for the novels, aside from Some of Your Blood, I also liked More Than Human, The Dreaming Jewels and The Cosmic Rape. I need to reread Sturgeon (and about a hundred other writers). | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
Thanks for the suggestions all. 'Crime And Punishment' is one of the contenders for my all-time favourite novel and of course the pinnacle of the "inside the mind of a killer" genre. Also read 'The Collector' (big fan of John Fowles - love 'The Magus') as well as the first three Hannibal Lecter novels and of course 'Misery'. Half-way through 'The Hungry Moon' which surely must have been influenced by 'The Ceremonies'? Then it's 'Brighton Rock' and then the one I've been looking forward to: 'The Influence' - heard a lot of praise for this one! | ||
| Alansjf (Alansjf) Username: Alansjf Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 94.194.134.45 |
The North Atlantic Complete Short Stories of Theodore Sturgeon is indeed up to volume 11, with the 12th - and I believe final - volume due out later this year. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
Nearly finished with The Influence. Some magnificent imagery in Chapter 28. I'm intrigued by the 'procession' glimpsed by Rowan. Is that bit still 'real' or is she already in the halfworld (for want of a better term)? This whole sequence reminds me of a passage in Incarnate where a small group of people find themselves trapped in similarly unreal surroundings, one of the most powerful bits of literature I've ever read. "Where are we?" one of them asks at the end of the chapter. Actually, I haven't reread Incarnate in ages, so . . . | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.197.251 |
I know the sequences you're referring to, Hubert, and they are among my own favourites in all of weird literature. For sheer dream-like intensity, they are hard to top. I must go back and read Incarnate again - it's been twenty-five years or more. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Another serial killer story which seems to have been missed here is Secret seven and the Serial strangler by Enid Blyton, the hugely controversial last secret seven book in which the Five find-outers and dog invaded the secret seven series and hunted down and killed most of the secret seven. The trick would have worked except that Buster the dog, after a diet of fresh human flesh went mad and killed Daisy and Pip before being shot. Fatty (Frederick Algernon Trtterville) was so distraught that he gave himself up to the Inspector which only left 2 find-outers. As Two Find-outers isn't alliterative, the series was cancelled. Well worth tracking down if you can find it. The scene where Larry trapped Peter and Janet in a torture dungeon and killed them soooo slowly is easily the equal in horror to Stephen King at his best. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
I missed out the phrase "in an attempt to increase their popularity" after "Killed most of the secret seven" | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
After that last post I'm starting to wonder if 'The Emerald Germs Of Ireland' really exists or if I am indeed travelling through the Twilight Zone? | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
I made up the Emerald germs of Ireland but the Secret Seven one is real. It really is. Give me 10 minutes and then check wikipedia | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Hahahahahahahaha!!!!!!! What a briiiiiiiiilliant joke!!!!!!!!!! Ten minutes...check Wikipedia!!!!!!!!!! Fantastic, mate - you is da man. Hahahahahah, heee, heee, heee, ho...!!!!!!!!! | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Do i detect the faintest hint of the subtlest whiff of the slightest touch of sarcasm? | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
The merest hearsay. | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.166.30.24 |
I've just finished T.E.D Klein's short story 'Children of the Kingdom'. WOW ! I also have his 'The Ceremonies' waiting in the wings. I'm also re-reading Lovecraft and working my way through my collection of EC reprints. There were some cracking Ray Bradbury adaptations in those old comics. I'm convinced these comics were THE single inspiration for Hitchcock's 'Presents' series and 'The Twilight Zone' which followed mere months after the demise of the uncensored EC comics. Wonderful evocative artwork from Jack Davis and Graham Ingels. Pure joy. | ||
| Simon Avery (Simonavery) Username: Simonavery Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 91.110.223.128 |
I haven't read T.E.D. Klein's stuff in years, but unearthed them from my 'cupboard of lost books' recently, and feel the urge to reaquaint myself. I adored The Ceremonies when I read it years and years ago, so I'm curious to see if it still exerts the same kind of energy now. I also found my copy of Aickman's Wine Dark Sea, and have been re-reading the stories in there. I'm mid-way through writing a horror novella, and being exposed to Aickman makes me want to drop my pen, turn off my laptop and back slowly away from writing. The man was a bloody magician. Into The Wood: absolute genius... | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.188.237 |
All of the novellas in T.E.D. Klein's DARK GODS are brilliant. I need to find time to read my copy of THE CEREMONIES although I have read The Events at Poroth Farm. I think I've only read one of the EC Bradbury adaps -- Johnny Craig's take on The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl retitled as Touch And Go. I picked up the first season of ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS recently but I've only watched the first two episodes so far. Little disappointed in the quality but I'd actually seen the '80s remake of the first one so that lost a lot of its impact and with the second one I was distracted by the fact that it starred John 'DYNASTY' Forsythe before his hair turned blue. But thinking about Weber's serial killer/kiddie detective idea surely the ideal candidates would be The Three Investigators. The prefix to the stories was ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS so why not do one of the stories as a grownup Hitchcock story -- ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS THE THREE INVESTIGATORS AND THE MYSTERY OF THE ICE COLD BLONDE AND THE SEXUALLY DYSFUNCTIONAL PSYCHOPATH. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
But that goes against my grain. It's too logical. I prefer the juxtaposition inherent in something like Noddy goes to Cape Fear | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Noddy and The Toytown chainsaw massacre | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
"Children of the Kingdom" is a masterpiece, arguably the best thing Klein ever wrote. While in New York I strolled through the neighbourhood in question in the company of S.T. Joshi and Scott Briggs. Gave me the shivers. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.199.62 |
Good company you keep, Hubert! Simon, 'Into the Wood' is masterful, isn't it? I'll never be able to dislodge some of the images that have seeped into my mind after reading Aickman's fiction. The wandering insomniacs in 'Into the Wood', the encounter with the inhabitants of the house in 'The Inner Room', the hand scene in 'The Swords', the awful climax to 'Wood', several scenes in 'Marriage' and 'The School Friend'... he could conjure up more strangeness and dread in a simple line of dialogue than many writers can muster in a whole story. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
The Aickman stories I've read are: 'The Trains' (1951) 'Ringing The Changes' (1955) 'The Inner Room' (1965) 'No Stronger Than A Flower' (1966) 'The Visiting Star' (1966) 'The Cicerones' (1967) 'The Swords' (1968) 'Meeting Mr Millar' (1971) - all in the Pan & Fontana collections (currently on the 13th Fontana Ghost) and every one a masterpiece. 'Ringing The Changes' and 'The Inner Room' in particular are two of the most haunting tales I have ever read and, like all his stories, almost demand repeated rereadings to fathom their meaning. Has their ever been a more poetic writer in the entire field of weird fiction (or possibly a better one)? Is there a definitive collection of his stories and didn't he write a couple of novels as well? | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.199.62 |
Stephen, he wrote two novels: The Late Breakfasters and The Model (a short novel). Neither is as weird or horrific as his stories could be, but they are as well written as anything he did, and worth reading. His collected short fiction is available from Tartarus Press, in two volumes. He also wrote two volumes of autobiography: The Attempted Rescue and The River Runs Uphill, and a couple of books about the Inland Waterways. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.199.62 |
Walter de la Mare may be the closest thing to a predecessor of Aickman's style, and some of the stories of L.P. Hartley are somewhat 'Aickmanesque'. I don't think there has ever been a writer quite like him, though. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 88.109.170.221 |
Dirk Bogarde's non-fiction collection of journalism. One of those writers whose non-fiction is often a delight, while his fiction does nothing for me. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Only read the brilliant 'Seaton's Aunt' by Walter de la Mare and you're right it does have that Aickmanesque quality. Virtually nothing happens but a lot is hinted at and the almost claustrophobic atmosphere of dread is very powerful. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
'Seaton's Aunt'...wow. Now that's a scary story. It's extraordinary. | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.176 |
I'm zipping through an incredibly readable Jeffrey Deaver's 'The Coffin Dancer'. Mindless fun. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
To my mind "All Hallows" is even better. I never tire of reading it. Same with "A Recluse", which may be de la Mare at his most Aickmanesque. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.75.131 |
'Has their ever been a more poetic writer in the entire field of weird fiction (or possibly a better one)?' No. Actually - yes. Tuttle. | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.159.105.54 |
If the Tartarus/Durtro COLLECTED SHORT STORIES is too hard to get hold of, Stephen, you might want to check out the Faber Finds imprint, which not too long ago reprinted three volumes of Aickman's short stories, THE WINE-DARK SEA, THE UNSETTLED DUST and COLD HAND IN MINE. All unreservedly recommended. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Thanks for the info. How many short stories/collections did Aickman actually write? If possible at all I would like to collect everything of his including the two novels. From what I gather the man doesn't seem to have written anything that wasn't of the absolute highest quality. | ||
| Steveduffy (Steveduffy) Username: Steveduffy Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 86.159.105.54 |
Here you go, Stephen - the excellent Tartarus database to the rescue! http://freepages.pavilion.net/tartarus/a1.htm Good luck with that lot... | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
No. Actually - yes. Tuttle. She isn't in the same league, Ally. I've read several of her tales and can't remember a thing about any of them, whereas I'll never forget the tales I've read by de la Mare and Aickman. Is anyone else here a fan of de la Mare's "The Vats"? - perhaps Huw? I adore that story. Those Faber Finds Aickman books aren't cheap, btw, and one of them is already out of print. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
It seems that Aickman is now available, along with the others: http://www.faber.co.uk/work/cold-hand-in-mine/9780571244256/ | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Choke... just saw that 'Collected Strange Stories Of Robert Aickman' going for £1,500 on Amazon. What I wouldn't give to read his complete works - £1,500 is what I wouldn't give!! Still now I at least know he wrote 48 short stories and 2 novels in total. Which sounds gettable but maybe not... | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.189.117 |
Your best bet may be to hunt down copies of The Wine-Dark Sea, Painted Devils and Cold Hand in Mine. They are the easiest ones to find. There are usually quite a few copies on ABE and Ebay. If you have those three collections you'll have about half (or so) of his short stories. The original collections are: We Are for the Dark (1951, with E.J. Howard) Dark Entries (1964) Powers of Darkness (1966) Sub Rosa (1968) Cold Hand in Mine (1975) Tales of Love and Death (1977) Intrusions (1980) Night Visions was published posthumously, and contains some newer and previously uncollected stroies, including one of his absolute best, 'The Stains', as well as 'The Trains', for some reason). The collections The Wine-Dark Sea, Painted Devils and The Unsettled Dust are all 'best-of' type volumes. The hardest tales to find are: - 'The Insufficient Answer' (from We Are for the Dark - 'A Choice of Weapons' (from Dark Entries) - 'A Roman Question' (from Powers of Darkness) - 'Le Miroir', 'Compulsory Games', Raising the Wind', 'Residents Only' and 'Wood' (from Tales of Love and Death) - 'Hand in Glove', 'No Time is Passing', 'The Breakthrough', 'Letters to the Postman' (from Intrusions) There is another story, apparently unfinished, called 'The Fully-Conducted Tour', which was published in the journal Wormwood (I forget which issue). Zed, I've read 'The Vats' - it's a curious story, isn't it? Other de la Mare tales that I like (and which haven't yet been mentioned, I think) include 'Out of the Deep', 'Crewe', Mr. Kempe', 'Bad Company', The Quincunx', 'ABO', ' The Green Room', 'The House', 'An Anniversary, 'A Revenant', 'The Guardian' and 'Strangers and Pilgrims'. I rate Tuttle very highly indeed, but I wouldn't put her in quite the same class as de la Mare or Aickman. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Huw - I've been trying to read "Out of the Depths" for ages. Any idea in which anthology or collection I might find it? | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
"The Vats" always reminds me of the science fiction story (with horror elements) "Plenitude", by a Will Worthington. Anyone else read this? | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.66.74 |
'No. Actually - yes. Tuttle.' 'She isn't in the same league, Ally. I've read several of her tales and can't remember a thing about any of them, whereas I'll never forget the tales I've read by de la Mare and Aickman..' She is most definately in the same league. I can't get her stories out of my head. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Perhaps Tuttle is possibly even more powerful to a female reader...? I agree that a lot of her stuff is merely good, but at her best she's wonderful. Replacements, The Food Man, and numerous others - memorable. Not perhaps as resonant as Aickman (and that may be to do with my gender) but great nonetheless. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.66.74 |
'Perhaps Tuttle is possibly even more powerful to a female reader...?' If we looked at say... the short story, THE WINE DARK SEA and THE NEST, from NEST OF NIGHTMARES, both have an equally powerful effect on me. It's all subjective anyway. I just think of myself as a reader not a female reader, too. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
>>>It's all subjective anyway. If it was all subjective we couldn't even have this debate. We're arguing the case for relative quality and, uhm, poetic resonance. There's something in the text. It isn't all subjective. It's partly subjective, yes, but not wholly. That's why I brought gender into it. Tuttle strikes me as an explicitly feminist writer. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.66.74 |
Okay 'partly subjective then.' It might not be memorable for Gary M but it is for Craig (who sent Nest of Nightmares over to me from America when I couldn't get it)too, he must have thought it great or good. People are going to connect with stories differently and access their 'quality'. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Of course. And when we're dealing with two such outstandingly intimate talents, there will be these bifurcations of evaluation. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Tuttle's quality as a writer isn't really in question, I just don't think her stuff is as resonant as that of Aickman. But who's is? Ramsey Campbell, probably. (See what I did there? Eh? Eh?) :-) | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.66.74 |
'And when we're dealing with two such outstandingly intimate talents, there will be these bifurcations of evaluation.' Agreed. Zeddy. :>) | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
>>>Tuttle's quality as a writer isn't really in question, I just don't think her stuff is as resonant as that of Aickman. I don't get the feeling of existential dread from Tuttle that I get from Aickman. I was simply wondering whether Tuttle's texts work that way for women. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.189.117 |
Zed, the only anthology I can think of offhand that has 'Out of the Deep' is Great Tales of Terror & the Supernatural (edited by Wise and Fraser). It's in the recent Tartarus de la Mare collection too, of course. Some of Lisa Tuttle's stories have stuck in my mind since I first read them in the eighties (specifically the ones in A Nest of Nightmares) and I think that at her best she's as good as any other contemporary horror writer. I'm looking forward to the Ash Tree collection(s), as I'm curious to see if I'm missing anything by her. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Haven't read any Lisa Tuttle to my knowledge - though I know the name of course. I don't tend to think about the gender of a writer at all (except maybe subliminally) and am sometimes puzzled when a great horror tale - take 'The Yellow Wallpaper' for example - becomes labelled as an explicitly feminist text. One woman I would love to read more of (by happy coincidence) is Elizabeth Jane Howard who started her career in 'collaboration' with Robert Aickman. Only read the one story, 'Three Miles Up' (1951), and it most definitely has that same intensely haunting quality that draws you back to reread in an attempt to glean some comfort from what you think might be going on... but each time the tale just gets more and more unsettling. A masterpiece I haven't been able to get out of my head since reading it. Even tops 'The Trains' from the same collection - the way those reeds close in gives me the shivers! | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.166.29.192 |
'To my mind "All Hallows" is even better. I never tire of reading it. Same with "A Recluse", which may be de la Mare at his most Aickmanesque.' Just read 'All Hallows' Hubert. It's even better than 'Seaton's Aunt'. The descriptions of that cathedral and it's surroundings are poetic indeed. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.140.174 |
"I don't tend to think about the gender of a writer at all (except maybe subliminally) and am sometimes puzzled when a great horror tale - take 'The Yellow Wallpaper' for example - becomes labelled as an explicitly feminist text." This has to do with those biographical aspects Des doesn't belive in. It's a matter of record that Gilman wrote 'The Yellow Wallpaper' as a polemic about the impact on female mental health of the orthodox medical treatment of post-natal depression. It had nothing to do with the supernatural. It's 'feminist' in the sense that it relates to the impact on women of the male-dominated medical profession – but saying so isn't a matter of critical interpretation. It's a matter of verifiable fact. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
But isn't all the best weird fiction metaphor like this? It is to me. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.192.7 |
I think it can be, but a lot of it isn't. How many of the stories in, for example, Great Tales of Terror and the Supernatural are actually metaphors for some other issue outside the theme of the story itself? Very few, I'd wager. That's not to say that I don't find such stories powerful, when done well, but a story needn't have a message or pointed subtext (social, political, or whatever) to be successful. If I were to compile a list of my favourite weird stories, I doubt that many of them would be of the metaphorical type. Of course, one can find metaphors and hidden messages quite easily, if one wants to find them. Unless the author categorically stated that this was the case, I would try not to impose my own interpretation on it (at least as far as saying with certainty 'this story is really about this'). | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
>>>don't tend to think about the gender of a writer at all But how can you not when you're reading a Tuttle story about pregnancy, for instance? Or one about anorexia (ok, not an exclusive female phenomenon, but . . . )? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
>>>But isn't all the best weird fiction metaphor like this? I don't know if The Willows is, or if The Colour Out of Space is. As China Mieville says, why can't we just look at these things and ask, "How cool is that?" Maybe ascribing symbolic meaning to these visions is just a habit we've all got into in our post-Freudian age, an Enlightenment phenomenon, a latter-day anxiety ostensibly combated by knowing. And maybe those tales' elusiveness - the distress this causes - is exactly their point. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.159.145.202 |
>>>don't tend to think about the gender of a writer at all But how can you not when you're reading a Tuttle story about pregnancy, for instance? Or one about anorexia (ok, not an exclusive female phenomenon, but . . . )? ================================= As an 'Intentional Fallacy' purist, I'm not going to bore you with my thoughts on above! | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
As China Mieville says, why can't we just look at these things and ask, "How cool is that?" Because we're not 12 year-olds.  Personally, I couldn't engage with the genre if I took weird fiction on face value alone - it's too daft. In order to take the effects of, say, Lovecraft's cosmic monsters or James's ghosts, seriously I have to see them as a metaphor. But that's just me. I guess, once again, this is a subjecive decision I've made. I have to see things in these terms; it's how I think. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
I'm only talking about the best studd here, the serious stuff. I doubt that even I can say that something like "Drag me to Hell" is a metaphor for anything...it's just a big, daft ride. (I'm contradicting myself here, arn't I?) | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Unless the author categorically stated that this was the case, I would try not to impose my own interpretation on it I do all the time. Again, for me this is part of the enjoyment of weird fiction - that we can being our own interpretations to te table in a way that other genres don't allow. That's why certain stories speak to me so powerfully, because they seem to be about a certain theme (even if that wasn't the author's intention). It's also, I feel, why weird tales are so vital to us all. Like an escape valve for our fears and anxieties. | ||
| John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 62.31.153.8 |
Not at all Zed. I've been seeing metaphors in all weird fiction and film, ever since I watched Zombie Flesheaters aged 11 and though it was anti-communist. If you wanted to you could say that Drag Me to Hell was a metaphor for the horrors of responsibilty, and what can happen if we make the wrong decision (in others' eyes if not ours, in fact especially not ours). Horror's great isn't it? Of course everything can be read as a metaphor, from being scared of the dark to being scared of the universe. It tries to put in a bottle (or book or film) why we're scared of these things, and because it will never be able to do that entirely satisfactorily the genre will never die. Hooray!! | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
Metaphor is what you get when you start to (over-)analyze the thing. I expect something else entirely - a reaction on the instinctual plane, if you like. Also, sometimes the metaphor plainly doesn't work, as in "Oh, Whistle an I'll Come To You, My Lad". Homosexual panic?! Come on. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.189.170 |
Arguably Drag Me To Hell is a metaphor for the way bankers screwed up the economy (but the original story was written around the time of Darkman so it's debatable how much of that is intentional). It's also a metaphor for doing the right thing. If the heroine had done the right thing by the gypsy woman when she had the chance then she wouldn't have been cursed. The metaphor isn't particularly subtle or insightful but it's there and is intentional. Some stories require metaphor to make them more interesting, some stories don't. And different readers have different needs as regards metaphors; some will tear a story to pieces if it doesn't have a serious subtext while others simply don't care. Add to this readers sometimes adding in their own metaphors for the stories. Plus, as in the example of DMTH, just because a story contains metaphors doesn't necessarily mean the metaphors are are handled in a satisying manner, either aesthetically or intellectually. All these different factors overlap and create a bit of a mess and often lead to people contradicting themselves over what they claim to be the elements that make up a good story. And this is before we even consider factors such as the reader's mood before reading a story, external distractions, existing fondness or dislike for a particluar author or genre, whether the reader's cultural and academic background will allow them to pick up on references and allusions within the story etc, etc. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.189.170 |
Crap, how many posts were put up after I started mine? I really need to learn how to type. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.189.170 |
"Again, for me this is part of the enjoyment of weird fiction - that we can being our own interpretations to te table in a way that other genres don't allow." Zed, I don't understand why you feel other genres don't allow readers to bring in their own interpretations. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Of course the best supernatural/weird/uncanny fiction is metaphorical - that's why it is the best. Great authors will always put more of themselves into the text than even they realise and that's what makes their work so fascinating. Of course 'The Yellow Wallpaper' can be read as having a feminist message (though I didn't know that was the specific intention) but it can also - in and of itself - be read as a uniquely powerful depiction of a descent into madness. The feminist subtext does not negate the immediate and horrifying effect of the story. I try not to get hung up on the fact that a writer is male or female, gay or straight, black or white (making a conscious effort to shunt these definitions to the back of my mind) so that I can enjoy the story for what it is on a first reading. Only afterward when analysing the tale - if it merits further thought - do these factors come into play. That's all I meant. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
"Oh, Whistle an I'll Come To You, My Lad". Homosexual panic?! Come on. I see that story as being more about sexual repression. Zed, I don't understand why you feel other genres don't allow readers to bring in their own interpretations. Oh, I don't tink that - of course they do. I just think that weird fiction allows it more readily because of it's nature (ie. based around the imagery and symbolism of the fantastic. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.188.196 |
Obviously personal interpretations are natural, but metaphorical associations are not the reason I read fiction. What I read for is the pleasure of a well written tale, and the thrills and feelings of fright (and if I'm really lucky, awe) that good horror fiction can provide. The presence or absence of metaphor in a story does not enhance or diminish the piece. For me, some of the best stories are actually ambiguous ('The Trains', for example). Also, I find people often confuse basic themes, which every story has, with metaphor. I don't think that the best weird fiction is 'metaphorical' (some of it is, perhaps), unless that definition is given entirely as a personal, subjective reaction (as Zed describes above). I'd have to cross a lot of titles off my favourite horror story list if I were limited to including only stories in which the author was clearly writing about something other than what happens in the story. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.159.145.202 |
but saying so isn't a matter of critical interpretation. It's a matter of verifiable fact. ============ There are no verifiable facts in literature, biography, history etc - only viewpoints and hypotheses. All that is unknowable. The only knowable, safe thing is the text-in-question where anything crucial to itself should be included - self-evidently. Even if the intentions were verifiable, the intentions may have mis-fired and produced something else. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
>>>There are no verifiable facts in literature, biography, history etc - only viewpoints and hypotheses. Interesting hypothesis. Fascinating viewpoint. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.159.145.202 |
It's verifiable. The only one. Logically. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Vis a vis the above, all I know is this: when, say, those monsters showed up in Jurassic Park, I wasn't thinking about the message - about the film being a cautionary tale about the dangers of science trumping nature. I was thinking, how cool is that T-Rex? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
>>>It's verifiable. The only one. Logically. A postmodernist: someone who wants his cake and wants to eat it. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
In other words, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.188.196 |
I'm with you regarding the cool monsters, Gary. I think the metaphorical stuff or the subtext is something that, if the story is a good one, lingers with the reader (or viewer) after the experience. Both are rewarding, in different ways, but I don't need a story to contain metaphors in order for it to be successful (again, this is just me). | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
I never read M R James and thought about anything other than the fact that there's shit-scary ghosts here, either. Mind you, I guess my subconscious might have different ideas, but that all gets vague and murky, so I'll just say that I reckon a strong horror tale has to touch us at some existential level, though this needn't be in a metaphorical way. A big mother of a monster like in The Dunwich Horror can be scary simply be virtue of being a big mother of a monster, no? Forgive the jargon. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Am reading Kelly Link's collection 'Stranger Things Happen'. Her second story in the collection 'Water off a Black Dogs Back' is probably one of the best horror stories I've read this year, it is also wonderfully surreal and blackly comic at times. Also a magnificent and shocking opening tale. Whats wrong with just liking monsters at face value-so to speak- and then letting them have all sorts of mythic and symbolic values. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
There's nothing wrong with it, Karim...I'm simply stating my own preference for a personal, subjective reaction to weird fiction. It's simply how I read, and it's why I read the stuff I do. When I saw the T-Rex in Jurrasic Park I thought "God, that's it: the shape of the thing I was shit scared of as a little kid, the thing that led me here, to be watching stuff like this as an adult and loving it." Then I thought "How cool is that monster?" | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Sometimes a cigar is a combination of many things: the tobacco, the leaf, the brown-stained hands of the woman who rolled it, the tears of her children starving in a cuban slum... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Not a cock, then, Sigmund? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Incidentally, I've just done the thing I haven't done in nearly 20 years: started reading IT. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Your cock might look like a cigar, sir, but mine certainly doesn't. More like a chipolata sausage. I'm still struggling through "Duma Key". It's very good, but I just don't have the time these days to commit to such a doorstop. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Yes Zed a personal approach first and foremost,(is there any other way?) and then there is space for all sorts of polyphonic interpretations etc. Sometimes I just miss the creation of a sense of awe- as in the T-Rex ambling throgh the rain the first time in JP1 as mentioned above- or some science fiction works etc(which of course sometimes fails because that is all it attempts to do.) | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Over-analysing of the subtext in preference to the actual text of the piece spoils it. The number of people I know who think that (one of my favourite ever books) Lord of the Flies is one of the most boring books ever written because "All it is is boring subtext about society" etc is incredible. I read LOTF as a cracking adventure story about boys stuck on an island first and the subtext comes in a clear second place. I know the extra meaning is there. Golding wrote it as a response to Ballantyne's Coral island in order to point out what boys would really do in that situation so all the subtext is clearly there and deliberate... BUT... Golding got at least one aspect completely wrong. In an intro I he wrote to the book he states that he only put boys on the island so that sex would not rear it's ugly head. Hmmm... This is a group of middle class public school (and boarding school) boys mostly on the edge of their teens... I think he's right on the subject of violence and rules but completely off the mark on the rest of it which makes the search for subtext fairly pointless. Back to my original point, I always read a story for the story first and let any deeper meanings work their way naturally to the surface. To hammer home that you have to dig out all the deeper meanings of ever comma and full stop completely destroys a novel IMHO. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
I am in complete and utter agreement with you there Weber... as you'll see from my own posts. As for 'Lord Of The Flies' it is vying with 'Crime And Punishment' and Golding's own 'The Inheritors' as my favourite ever novel. Because it's the one I read first at such an early age, and the one I keep returning to most often, it probably has the edge. The torture and bondage sequences near the end - and specifically the psychopathic character of Roger - I find uncomfortably sexual which proves the point about the author putting in stuff he didn't even realise himself. Ever read 'Darkness Visible'? Now there's one heck of a sexually disturbing book!! Golding is hands down my fav author... though not for that reason I might add lol - it's the humanity. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
"This is a group of middle class public school (and boarding school) boys mostly on the edge of their teens... I think he's right on the subject of violence and rules but completely off the mark on the rest of it" Anyone who has been a Boy Scout will agree with you on that score. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
I was a boy scout for one day and thought fuck this for a game of marbles! Anything that tries to deny individuality (the whole point of Golding's novel - and incidentally the NASA space programme in the way it approached the wives and children of the astronauts involved) is anathema to me. Yet the single greatest achievement by humankind (note not mankind) is the landing of MEN (aww shucks) on the moon! Quid Pro Quo! | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
I used to be in the Sea Scouts. They taught me how to swim the hard way . . . Didn't enjoy it all that much since most of the boys had a penchant for cruelty. But the KSA (a Flemish youth movement similar to Scoutism) was fun because a great many of my classmates were in it. The other half of the class were in the Chiro, which was just as Catholic as the KSA; nevertheless genuine battles took place between both groups each Saturday, go figure. My position wasn't facilitated by the fact that my best friend was a member of the other group. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
I was in the sea scouts, but every time we went camping our tent sank! Mwha ha ha ha!!! I'll get me coat | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
IT is great. A great book. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
You mean King's It? | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.28.42 |
I joined the brownies for a day. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Or Algernon Blackwood's It? Although that's more of a short story than a book I suppose. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.185.39 |
Or Theodore Sturgeon's It. Or the issue of Justice League of America Grant Morrison wrote called It. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
Or FIVE CHILDREN AND IT by E. Nesbit. Which is not about a family's introduction to computer technology. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Da newbie Straub Borderlands novella-ella arriveth todayeth- so it flutters to da top of da reading pile and springs open to reveal itself- yes siree- Bob-eth. Clad in black leather and signed and filled with keys and knives and little pieces of string. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Nam-nam-tam-tam | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
King's IT. It's great, I tell yez. Forgotten how great it was. Haven't touched it for nearly 20 years. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
You'll float in the deadlights | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.28.42 |
I'm a bad mother. I let my daughter (then seven) watch IT three years ago. Now she had a healthy fear of clowns. Reinforced by taking her to a Cirque Du Soleil production of QUIDAM recently. Name five favourite stories, novels, films - besides Stephen King's IT with fearsome clowns in... | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
The Pilo Family Circus, Dread, Killer Clowns from Outer Space, | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Ally I literally had a conversation with a film producer today who was talking about King, and he mentioned the TV series. So many people over the years in some conversation or other, mention to me how they were very disturbed by Curry's portrayal of Pennywise- even people who don't read King or watch his stuff. Lots and lots of people, children and adults, are so disturbed by that clown, even when he's just standing there in daylight in the series. | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.176 |
I remember reading (it may be in a Glen Hirshberg short story - Safety Clowns, anyone?) that there are two types of people in the world - people who are scared of clowns, and clowns. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.28.42 |
'Curry's portrayal of Pennywise.' I still have nightmares about him, Karim. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Steve: the ice cream vans right? in the Hirshberg. The kid who gets the summer job delivering ice cream- great story. Ally: Shows how amazing Curry is, even though it's a decent series etc, being that scary with the production values: being so effective, just standing there in daylight. Have you seen him in Legend? Where he played the Devil with the huge black horns- great monster- almost as scary as Tom Cruise who is also in the film. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.28.42 |
In Legend...great monster? Curry? Oh so very yes!!! | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.176 |
Karim, that's the one. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.178.16 |
"Ally: Shows how amazing Curry is... " I'm sure Mr. Fry, for one, will agree with that! | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.131.110.233 |
We watched It the other week. It was ok till the adult actors took over and it became awful. And did anyone see Seth Green as a kid being troubled by the wolfman? Hilariously appropriate. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.176.12.179 |
Curry's monster is great, but LEGEND... Scott obviously read the Narnia books, Peter Pan and many others and ripped them off directly - the film is a waste of time in my opinion. Never liked it - saw Scott at the NFT when LEGEND was shown there before general release - the only interesting thing about the entire evening was when Scott admitted Deckard was a replicant, long before the second, voiceover-less version of BLADE RUNNER appeared. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
John Wayne Gacy... now there was one really scary clown. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
All these scary clowns in horror are doubtless based on Gacy. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.230 |
I think the TV series of IT has damaged the book's reputation. The clown is a much less domineering figure in the novel, and except for a brief appearance in the opening chapter, It doesn't appear until about halfway through the 1000-page novel. Curry's performance is memorable, yes, but to the degree that it robs the character of a good deal of Its ambiguity. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.230 |
It's a good adaptation, though, except for that piss-poor ending. Captures the King folksy vibe, even if it's all just a tad clinical-looking, lacking the mud and spit of King's prose (which in IT is truly wonderful). | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.230 |
The scene in which Richie tries to fleece his dad for a few bucks to go to the cinema and then the cinema trip itself are simply wonderful: what makes King great. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
"All these scary clowns in horror are doubtless based on Gacy." I don't think so, Hubert - remember Lon Chaney's dictum! | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.12.129.226 |
Clownhouse was a cracking good scary clown film. Shame about the story behind the making of it... I'm amazed Da Silva was allowed to make another film (although Jeepers Creepers 1 and 2 were pretty good - I'm not sure I would have been so keen to go see if I'd known about his history then). | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
"Bedlam In The Big Top" - Episode 10, Season 1 of 'Scooby Doo, Where Are You?' (1969). That was before Gacy and the clown bears a striking resemblance to Pennywise even down to the hypnotic powers! | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
"remember Lon Chaney's dictum!" I'm afraid you lost me there, Ramsey  | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.229 |
"A clown may be amusing in a circus ring, but what would be your reaction to opening you door and finding that same clown on your front step at midnight?" | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.42.193 |
Googledoo 'There is nothing funny about a clown in the moonlight.' | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.42.193 |
'Coulrophobia is an abnormal or exaggerated fear of clowns.' | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.42.193 |
Coulrophobia 'abnormal or exaggerated fear' Don't think so. Evil buggers, clowns are. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.77.197 |
The clown at midnight, a grin of the dark. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
There was a panic that swept parts of America in the early 80s that sinister clowns in white vans were hanging about outside schools trying to entice young children away. I believe this urban myth probably grew out of the ghoulish fascination with the facts of the Gacy case and that the panic may then have fed Stephen King's imagination when writing 'It'. All these things tend to be related. When reading 'Obsession' recently the similarities with King's weighty tome were quite striking. I prefer the subtlety of Campbell's novel - as much as I loved reading 'It' at the time. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.230 |
I have to admit that if there's one thing problematic with IT, it's its lengthy passages in which King seems to take countless pages to describe one scene. But when it's done so beautifully, who cares? Is the above the only line in history bearing the consecutive combo of words "IT, it's it"? | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
To me a clown has never been a figure of malevolence, more of sadness - the cloying, nauseating kind one sees so much in old Disney cartoons. But one look at that picture of Gacy in his clown outfit and you know you don't want to run into this guy. Ever. | ||
| Richard_gavin (Richard_gavin) Username: Richard_gavin Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 65.110.174.71 |
"There is nothing funny about a clown in the moonlight." This quote is yet another reason why I love the Man of a Thousand Faces. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
I always thought that line was Robert Bloch's. You live and learn... | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
I suppose The Joker (as in Batman) could be thought of as an evil clown as well. Which points backward to the hook-nosed court jester of mediaeval times... and reminds me of the scariest clown of them all, Mr Punch with his "that's the way to do it" (shudder). | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 89.168.165.44 |
>>Da newbie Straub Borderlands novella-ella arriveth todayeth- so it flutters to da top of da reading pile and springs open to reveal itself- yes siree- Bob-eth. Clad in black leather and signed and filled with keys and knives and little pieces of string. Argh! I've no money! Disaster . . . Looks like I won't be having one of them. I think Mr S must've watched Michael Jackson's funeral yesterday, as his latest "Twitter" post is: "I am not at all fond of Maya Angelou's poetry." Made me laugh. Anyone on here Twitter? I'm having a go in a strictly cautious capacity. It's fun so far. Haven't signed up to any network directories yet until I get the hang of it more, so I'm kind of invisible. But -- shh -- I'm here: https://twitter.com/markplynch | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
I wish I had the time for activities like that. I can barely spare a few minutes to get on here these days! | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 89.168.165.44 |
I got a new mobile phone on a great tarrif recently, Zed. Free light net access, a bunch of call minutes and 3000 texts a month, plus free Skype calls. All for £15 a month. So it seems silly not to dip my foot in. I don't do Facebook or MySpcae, but Twitter seems within my tech-know-ledgelessness . . . | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Mark the Straub novella is related to the forthcoming novel A Dark Matter. The way I understood it is that 200 pages were edited away from the mass market novel which will be called A Dark Matter and released in January 2010. The Subterranean release of the novel which will include the full text and published in October 09 is called the Skylark. So basically get the signed limited Subterranean edition for 50 dollars. And regards to book budgets: my book buying spree is over: I am going back to graduate school in September (if I get in- will know in three weeks) and then my book buying budget will be shaved down considerably. I already buy 80% less this year than last year. Lots of stuff I can't buy now- which means, and you can see this in the market, there is a smaller chance that I will buy something that I know nothing about-and this is how it will be in the foreseeable future... Actually I am taking the opportunity to read lots of older stuff inside and especially outside the genre, classics and what not, non-fiction stuff, some of it available in the public domain as well. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
"I always thought that line was Robert Bloch's." I did as well for a long time, Z! I think it's because Bob wrote an essay (didn't Forry Ackerman reprint it?) called "The Clown at Midnight", citing Chaney's dictum. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Aha! That must be it, Ramsey. For some reason I also thought "The Clown at Midnight" was the title of a Bloch tale. I'm daft' me.  | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.187.163 |
I'm reading "Too Many Women" by Rex Stout and "California: A History" by Kevin Starr. I also have the Straub novella ready to roll (I didn't start right away because I was away and didn't want to take it with me and risk damaging or losing it.) | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
I'd like to ask Ramsey a question about 'The Hungry Moon' if he doesn't mind? This book has me gripped as ever but is such a departure from what I'm used to! Been reading your novels in chrono order and suddenly, after the brilliant psychological double-bluffs I've been used to (which you nailed most brilliantly in 'Obsession' for me) we are in the land of pure unequivocal horror/fantasy with no 'get out' clause... I'm finding the experience disconcerting and increasingly terrifying having just finished Chapter 35. It's like a cross between 'The Ceremonies' and 'Salem's Lot' so far and every bit as entertaining as that comparison implies! After this book I get the impression all bets are off... | ||
| Richard_gavin (Richard_gavin) Username: Richard_gavin Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 65.110.174.71 |
Zed: That quote certainly does sound like something Bloch would've said or written. His famous "I have the heart of a little boy" quip still makes me smile. | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.166.29.192 |
All this talk of scary Clowns. Did anyone else have the shit scared out of them by last weeks episode of 'Psychoville' ? The 'Clown Court' nightmare sequence ? It had the lot. Scary clowns AND Mr Punch with an Axe ! | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.166.29.192 |
I haven't come across one yet. But do any of Ramsey's novels contain a scary clown ? | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Sean - did you notice "Judge Pennywise"? A direct reference to King's "It". | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
>>>I haven't come across one yet. But do any of Ramsey's novels contain a scary clown ? Yes. The Grin of the Dark. Also, in a kind of oblique clowny sense, The Hungry Moon. The Count of Eleven is also clownish. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
'The Hungry Moon' is so surreal and impossible to rationalise I suppose it could rank as a very, very black comic fantasy. The various oddball characters in the town did remind me so much of Royston Vasey in the opening chapters before all Hell broke loose! The question I meant to ask, before getting carried away, is if this was a conscious decision to write something completely different or if the book just went that way of its own accord. Disconcertingly madcap is perhaps how I would describe it... and very disturbing. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.180.135 |
'The Desperate Hours' -- a Porridge Xmas special adapted into a short story. 'Guy Walks Into a Bar ... ' -- Lee Child's new Jack Reacher short story over at http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/07/opinion/07child.html?_r=4&ref=opinion. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Still on Night of the Hunter. I need to report how great this book is. The writing is fabulous. I think this is going to be one of my very rare ten out of ten books. there are sections where I find I'm forgetting to breathe while I'm reading, the sense of tension and dread he evokes is so powerful. this is a great great book. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Stephen, The Hungry Moon was very much a book that went its own way - too much so for its own good, I think. I believe several books were trying to get out of it - The Influence, for instance, and The Count of Eleven. | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.166.29.192 |
>>>Yes. The Grin of the Dark. Also, in a kind of oblique clowny sense, The Hungry Moon. The Count of Eleven is also clownish. Cheers Gary. I'll indulge my fears and read The Grin of the Dark next. Right after i'm done with Ancient Images which is reminding me very much of John Carpenter's 'Cigarette Burns' episode of Masters of Horror. Ramsey was there first of course ! | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.79.190.255 |
LITTLE DORRIT for me now. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.182.153 |
The Lovers by John Connolly. Good stuff. His Charlie Parker series is emphasising the supernatural elements more these days although it's still more rooted in the real world than a lot of supernatural-oriented PI series -- "I know, I'll make my PI a vampire! Nobody's EVER done that before!" | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.170.56.69 |
Saw that one's out, Stu. In Tesco, £8-49. Good deal.I glanced through. The writing looks lovely and poetic, as ever in the parker series. There's a new Robert Holdstock Mythago novel out this month, which to me is one of THE events in speculative fiction of the year. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Still reading IT. Page 692. Deep breath . . . and back to it. (It's a unparalleled delight, tho.) | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.170.56.69 |
Yeah, I re-read it about four years ago. Engulfs you. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.176.74 |
"In Tesco, £8-49." Damn, that's 50p less than I paid. Where's that receipt? | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.106 |
About to embark on Incarnate. Not my first reading, mind. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
I read THE KILLING KIND recently, Stu. It was fun. Do you know his favourite writer is your beloved . . . Stephen King. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.241.143 |
Just finished reading the first draft ms of my latest novel, and still slogging through the rather terrific "Duma Key". | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
I'm gonna go for Duma next. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Thanks Ramsey, I had a feeling as I was reading it that events were spiralling out of control in a nightmarish almost stream-of-consciousness way. Still enjoying the ride and the apocalyptic imagery (three quarters through) and look forward to my first reading of 'The Influence' next! | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.177.112.217 |
Duma Key's pretty good, I thought. Seem to recall gcw struggled with it though. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.69 |
--'His favourite writer is... Stephen King.' He puts a big shout in for James Lee Burke too, John MacDonald. And used to enjoy Ed McBain very much, thoygh McBain dropped from his affections when he threatened to sue him and then slagged him off in print in his novel The Last Dance. But he seems over that now. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.178.36 |
Gary, THE KILLING KIND is very good. First Connolly novel I ever read. And yeah, I did know about Connolly's affection for King; I mentioned it earlier in the thread. Connolly's actually one of the reasons I want to give King another chance. Mark, that's ROSS Macdonald not John MacDonald. And aside from the authors you mention there's his love for M R James, Cormac McCarthy, Charles Dickens, Robert B Parker, Ian Fleming and PG Wodehouse and probably a whole bunch of other people that I'm forgetting to mention. Anyway, I finished The Lovers. It's bloody good. | ||
| Martin Roberts (Martin_roberts) Username: Martin_roberts Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.5.239.91 |
I'm currently enjoying 'We Fade to Grey' as part of my attempt to read as many of the BFA short list as possible before the Aug 1st deadline. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.74 |
John D Macdonald's Travis McGee books, I was thinking, Stu. He likes them. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.183.222 |
Mark, you might be right but I've only ever seen him mention Ross Macdonald and his Lew Archer series. Of course Ross Macdonald was called John Macdonald and then John Ross Macdonald as he searched for a suitable pseudonym (his real name being Kenneth Millar). | ||
| Alansjf (Alansjf) Username: Alansjf Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 94.194.134.45 |
I've read lots and lots of great books recently, particularly collections: Simon Bestwick's Pictures of the Dark, Brian Evenson's Fugue State and Joel Lane's The Terrible Changes all belong on my best of year list, even though it is only July. In fact, I'm going to single out Bestwick's 'Jindivik' and 'The Loving of Ghosts' as two of my favourite stories of the year. Novels, too: Bestwick again, with Tide of Souls, Carlos Ruiz Zafon's The Angel's Game (which is almost even better than Shadow of the wind) and Bill Hussey's The Absence - there was a very positive review of this in the last Black Static, and while I'm not quite as enthusiastic as Pete Tennant, it's still well worth a look. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.190.53 |
Very Good, Jeeves! by PG Wodehouse. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.77.197 |
Page 846 of IT. It's still a delight. And I will not be beaten! | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Just about to start My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Reading the just released, (but originally created some 12 years ago, and thought lost, I think), The Age of Desire graphic novel by Clive Barker and adapted by P. Craige Russel with illustrations by Timothy Bradstreet. Wonderful B and W art- reminds me a little of the artwork done for the very brutal (and beautiful) Registry of Death. I really miss the Epic comic line, and here's hoping that the new Barker collection will be out halloween 2010. I miss some of the splatterpunks I realize, reading this energtic, imaginative and brutal piece-- starting to tire of all this suggestive, quiet horror- buts thats just me right now I suppose. This was like travelling back in time(mid nineties?), where there were Barker graphic novels in book stores- before the post Sandman wave etc- where it wasn't all that respectable to have graphic novels in bookstores- even in a Catholic book shop in Malta- where I found the Tapping the Vein Graphic novels originally, especially when Weaveworld hit big time...I am reminded of Ramsey's intro to BOB, how these stories were so clearly ripe for illustration... | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Christ I think it was done 20 years ago! | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.153.165.64 |
Yep! gettin' OLD Karim. But you're absolutely right. The Books of Blood are overflowing with originality and invention. I still have those Tapping the Vein and Hellraiser books in the attic somewhere. Bloody indeed. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.68 |
The Russia House by John le Carre, alongside the doorstep of a Dickens. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Yes Sean! I'm 32- so I was what 14-15 when I read Barkers BOB- Think of going from some King and some Bradbury and 'Ghost Stories for Boys' to the 'Inhuman Condition' and 'In the Hills The Cities.' That was pretty mind blowing at the time. I snuck into a Nightbreed screening around the same time I think- maybe it was before?- got freaked out after the scene where Dekker destroys the family in the beginning, left the theatre, and then came back the next day, snuck back into the theatre again and watched the whole movie to the end. That has never happened to me since. Must be said that the theatre which no longer exists, had carved faces in the woodwork along the edge of the screen with bulbs in the eyes, and red light seeped into the theatre, through the opague glass from the bathrooms. A really amazing theatre in a nearly 1000 year old mediterranean sandstone city. That probably had an effect as well. | ||
| Michael_kelly (Michael_kelly) Username: Michael_kelly Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 74.14.14.57 |
Bloodletting & Miraculous Cures, by Vincent Lam. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
My final word on Night of the Hunter. Books like this are why I love reading. The pleasure of finding a writer whos prose can move you or scare you or make you forget to breathe with the tension. Here's a couple of paragraphs I really loved She had brought them all gifts from the Chillicothe five and ten and after supper everyone opened her gift and screamed with joy and kissed the old woman until her lips pursed and pouted with impatience and she shoved them gruffly away and shook her shoulders angrily lest they discover in her face all the love that was there. and He obeyed, pounding down to the cellar, happy that she had kept him up after the others to make this a special time for him alone, to set him upon a chore whose fruits they would share. He clambered up the side of the great barren and stretched his fingers deep inside the chilly clustered heaps of last years McIntoshes. And when he had found two without rot or blemish he scampered back to the kitchen, washed them at the pump, and gave one to Rachel. Now she set her darning-gourd abrubtly aside, bit crisply into the fruit, and glared at him with that tart, twinkling grimness that he had come to recognize as all the world’s safety. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.187.64 |
Just read THE QUESTION: WELCOME TO OZ by Dennis O'Neil. Got a quote in there that goes back to the discussion earlier in the thread about clowns being scary. "Perhaps it's because they put the inside on the outside ... Inside we all feel like clumsy, garish madmen. Clowns make these feelings visible and that's why we laugh -- as a defense against the recognition of our own madness." | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
Still reading IT. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.61.140 |
MInd you, this thread is getting as long as King's book. | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.153.165.64 |
Just coming up to the climax of Ancient Images. <spoilers> Jeez, this has been a roller coaster ride of a book so far ! One of my favourite horror themes to boot. The stranger staying in an isolated english village with it's own strange customs. There's the graveyard with graphic inscriptions on the markers hinting at blood sacrifice. Then the fact that the villagers are all smiling and content. Not to mention the Tudor Manor on the hill with the all watchful Lord Redfield within lecturing about his family history and how it is connected to the all important wheat crop. And those SCARY FECKIN' SCARECROWS !! The parallels are obvious but Ramsey has put his own original spin on the theme and has left me gasping for breath several times already. The sense of Sandy being stalked all the way through this book has been unbearable. DON'T GO NEAR THE TOWER !! | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
One by Conrad Williams | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
which one? | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.188.235 |
The Willows -- Algernon Blackwood | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Let us know what you think, Stu. That's a great tale. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.179.9 |
Enjoyed The Willows. Been putting off reading it for ages as I didn't think it would be my cup of tea (plus I always get a bit resentful about classics; I hate being told I "must" read something). Anyway, yeah, enjoyed it a lot. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.118.211 |
The Willows is a great tale. I cycled from Vienna to Budapest and camped along the Danube. Hadn't read it before I went though. | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.187.163 |
Finished Rex Stout's "Too Many Women" (very good, as usual) last night and started the new Peter Straub Novella: "A Special Place." Read a very excellent story in this year's New Yorker" fiction issue: "The Tiger's Wife" by Tea Obecht; about the adventures of a Siberian tiger who escapes from a Russian zoo during WW II and the people he encounters. (You have to register/subscribe on their site, though). Highly recommended! | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
I'm having trouble getting into My Name is Red. I think I need to sit down when I've got a couple of hours spare to really get into it. I've only been reading it in 10 minute bursts here and there. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Page 978. I'm chugging. May need an oil change. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.118.211 |
No - just a curry, Gary. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Just had one of them, Ally. Lovely it was. Stuffed. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.190.198 |
I'm reading some MR James. Only read one or two of his stories before. | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.187.163 |
Good for you, Stu! I envy you coming to James for the first time. | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.176 |
Rough Cut by Gary McMahon. | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.153.165.64 |
'Petey' by T.E.D. Klein Amazing so far. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.182.162 |
Sean, 'Petey' is a great story. I keep meaning to find the time to reread it. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
I'm going to take the chance to link two comments and mention that I included "Petey" in the M. R. James book I edited for the British Library. I'd always regretted not using the tale in New Terrors, but Charlie Grant snapped it up. | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 82.38.75.85 |
>>I'm going to take the chance to link two comments and mention that I included "Petey" in the M. R. James book I edited for the British Library. I'd always regretted not using the tale in New Terrors, but Charlie Grant snapped it up.<< Funnily enough, I've just bought a copy of Grant's "Gallery of Horror" on eBay and I noticed "Petey" was in there. Someone on another board I frequent had mentioned what a great story it was. It looks like I'm going to have to try to find time to read it too. At the moment, I've no time to read anything which isn't connected to work. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Couple of chapters of 'The Hungry Moon' left and should be finished today. A cosmic fantasmagoria that works like a dark satire of religious fanaticism/small town parochialism. One of the most bizarre horror novels I've read in many a long year and marks a clear break with the 7 books that went before. Had planned to read 'Brighton Rock' (1938) next until I came across Graham Greene's hard to find forerunner 'A Gun For Sale' (1936). It's where he apparently sketched out the psychopathic character of Pinkie in the form of ice-hearted hired killer Raven. So gonna read both of them back-to-back. Then <gulp> it's 'The Influence'... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Page 1043. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Watch me have a fatal heart attack a few pages from the end . . . | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.28.249 |
Keep on going.....you'll never forgive yourself if you do :>) | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Only 47 pages to g-...to g-...to g-.... Ugh! Ah! Urrrrr . . . | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Even long books are going to seem short after this. I'll breeze through Duma Key. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.28.249 |
I was just thinking about books to take on holiday. Leaving genre aside - any recommended reads? | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.28.249 |
Finished it yet Gary? It is curry night for me tonight :>) | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.184.46 |
>>I'm going to take the chance to link two comments and mention that I included "Petey" in the M. R. James book I edited for the British Library. I'd always regretted not using the tale in New Terrors, but Charlie Grant snapped it up. That reminds me, I still haven't got round to reading my copy of MEDDLING WITH GHOSTS. Right, read Canon Alberic's Scrapbook, Lost Hearts, The Stalls of Barchester Cathedral, Number 13 and reread Oh, Whistle, And I'll Come To You, My Lad. All good stuff. Oh, and reading Number 13 made me wonder, is there any reference in Stephen King's 1408 to the fact that 1+4+0+8 = 13? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Yeah, that was the thing with the number. I got a new office recently: guess what number it is. 1408. I kid thee not. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Ally, read Mo Hayder's The Treatment. Stunning. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.28.249 |
Hey. I've got a Mo Hayder to take - The Ritual. Mick sent it to me! Anymore from anymore? Books that have blown you all away/ this year/ last year/ ever? Non genre. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Are you going for a year? How about IT? ;) | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.28.249 |
I need something that...when I sit in my campsite in the middle of Scotland, I can sit back and say - wow. Actually, perhaps more of Iain Banks is what I want. I've read The Mountains of Madness against the basalt mountains of Iceland - an incredible experience... | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.28.249 |
IT :>) Bloomin' restless is what I am. I'll be fine after a curry...no I won't... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Scotland? OK, read Philip Kerr. | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.79.95 |
Reading Straub's Ghost Story again, in order to write about it for The Black Glove horror magazine's August issue. | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.153.165.64 |
Allybird, you can't go wrong with Joseph O'Connor's Star of the Sea. | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.165.182 |
Ally, I'd recommend Trevanian's 'The Summer Of Katya'. Simply one of the best books I've ever read. Or virtually anything by Simon Louvish. 'The Therapy Of Avram Blok', 'City of Blok' and 'The Last Trump Of Avram Blok' are all brilliant, as is 'The Days Of Miracles And Wonders' | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.135.232 |
Gary, IT makes for very dull reading unless you're a serious techie. Oh, you mean the novel... | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Ally, if there was one book I would love you to read and give me your feedback on it would be 'The Inheritors' by William Golding - but it's kind of genre (as in prehistoric fantasy imagining the first meeting between Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon Man - the final chapter is the most emotionally devastating in all literature for me, I kid you not). If crime/psychological thriller doesn't count as genre then I'd say either 'The Talented Mr Ripley' or 'The Cry Of The Owl' by the goddess of literary black magic, Patricia Highsmith. But if it has to be strictly non-genre then I'd recommend 'The French Lieutenant's Woman' by John Fowles or if you want something more contemporary 'The Rules Of Attraction' by Bret Easton Ellis - assuming, of course, you've read none of the above before. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
Huzzah! I finished IT! A great read. Much better at 37 than at 18 years old, as you might expect. Rich, bloated and resonant. A real monster of a book with some inspired prose, neat philosophical musings and truly memorable characterisation. And the TV adaptation, it has to be said, loses a lot of the ghostliness of the novel; it's far too literal, and - quite a surprise, this - Pennywise is hardly in the book at all. The clown has about five scenes. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.234.192 |
Currently trying to come to grips with Hodgson's The Night Land. After that, Incarnate. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
I'm two thirds of the way through Conrad Williams's novel One, which I think is probably one of the very best things he's done- terrifying and really beautiful prose. Also having watched the films Knowing and 'Mum and Dad'- I don't think I can handle any more mass extinction events this week. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.16.78.199 |
I'm still coming to grips with Incarnate, Hubert - one month later, and but 1/4th of the way through. I'm reading this slower than anything I've ever read, I think.... In my defense, I do have lots of other reading on my plate right now, all of it dreadful (scripts). | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
>>>I do have lots of other reading on my plate right now, all of it dreadful (scripts). Can't you delegate to Michael Bay? | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.69 |
Left Dickens and le Carre for an affair with John Connolly's The Lovers, a fine thriller and only a fiver from Tesco (sorry, Stu: I had a money off vouch). Back to the older masters... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.170.178.214 |
Colorado Kid, King. I didn't like it initially but just suddenly started to love it. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
The Last Don by Mario Puzo. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.234.192 |
"I'm still coming to grips with Incarnate, Hubert - one month later, and but 1/4th of the way through." Unlike, say, The Influence this is not an easy read. It helps if you temporarily abandon all other literary activities. You really have to concentrate on the thing and try to hold the different threads together. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.27.129.86 |
It's like a half-wakeful dream. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.234.192 |
It certainly has some curious effects in store for the reader. The shifts from reality to the 'dreamworld' are so gradual you don't notice you're entering it. Suddenly you ask yourself "Good Lord, how did I get here?" | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.170.82 |
Finished the Straub novella last night-one of the most intense and scariest things he's ever written; it's interesting how he's taken a more spare approach in recent years. After all that (in 80 pages!), I need a little breather, probably Agatha Christie's "Body in the Library." Nothing like a cosy English murder to wash down an American serial killer's rampage! I also wrote about the apartment in San Francisco where Dashiell Hammett wrote "The Maltese Falcon," "Red Harvest," and "the Dain Curse" at my Red Room site at: http://www.redroom.com/articlestory/up-sam-spades-room | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.28.249 |
Interesting as always Thomas! I'll put it on my FB page to share but I'll take it off if you want me to. | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.170.82 |
Hi Ally: Thanks for that! What is "FB" page? Doesn't sound like anything you have to take down, but is it linked to my web page? If it is, that's very cool. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.86.67 |
Facebook - it gets you about a bit :>) | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.170.82 |
Facebook? Sure, I'm there already! Just look under my name! | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.153.165.64 |
Finished 'Petey'. A wonderfully constructed tale. I love the way hints are dropped in to the normal conversation between the house guests. I just cannot get that final scene out of my head ! Next up, Midnight Sun. | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.77.233 |
About halfway through The Matrix, by Jonathan Aycliffe, a Wheatleyesque tale of black magic and secret societies. Despite the clichés, somehow I quite like its understated style. Not bad so far... | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.185.215 |
I loved The Matrix, particularly the scenes in Morocco and in that big mansion. Glad you are enjoying it, Steve. Have you read any of his other books? | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.185.215 |
Sean, I agree with you that 'Petey' is a superbly constructed story. Dark Gods could be used as a textbook to demonstrate to would-be writers how to craft a perfect weird tale. | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.77.233 |
No, Huw, I haven't. Next, I'd like to read Naomi's Room as it's so highly-rated by reviewers; have you read it? | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
I loved the Matrix, especially the bit where Neo's hanging off the helicopter | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.77.233 |
'I loved the Matrix, especially the bit where Neo's hanging off the helicopter' | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.184.90 |
Meditations on Violence by Rory Miller. US corrections officer offers his thoughts on violence and criminals based on his training, psychology degree and real life experiences. | ||
| Michael_kelly (Michael_kelly) Username: Michael_kelly Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 70.53.86.32 |
Ah, Stu, a little light summer reading, I see. :-) | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
Meditating on violence? Isn't that a bit like beating the fuck out of a Buddhist? | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.169 |
Started The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. About a third of the way in and it's truly brilliant, a real joy to read. Ally, you'd enjoy it - I think you like a bit of gothic mystery. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.86.67 |
I like gothic - Thanks Steve! | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.255.144 |
Incarnate's picking up, Hubert - it's lazy-easy pace is starting to accelerate.... | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.177.216 |
The Little Black Book of Violence by Lawrence A Kane and Kris Wilder. Similar to the Miller book so far but offering a slightly different perspective. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Finished Conrad Williams's One- it was very good, and had some magnificent writing. The chapter called 'The Farm' is hard to excise from the mind. Now I'm reading The Collector by John Fowles. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.183.67 |
Breakfast at Tiffany's by Truman Capote. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.170.178.214 |
Another Capote reader! How are you finding it? Don't you think already that he is the best author you will ever read (present board accepted)? | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.70.86.67 |
Funny - when I think of Truman Capote I always think of Hunter S Thompson. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.178.233 |
Tony, enjoyed the novella. Will probably try to read the accompanying short stories soon. Actually made me want to watch the film, which I know is a Hollywoodised rom-com version of the original story but I've never seen it all the way through and I'm curious to see which bits got left in and which bits got cut out. Anyway, currently about 3/4 of the way through Lee Child's Echo Burning. Started off slow but is now really gripping me. | ||
| John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 62.31.153.8 |
At bedtime I'm working through my Midnight House Fritz Leiber volumes (the second of which has an introduction by our landlord). Current restaurant reading is Charles Beaumont's slim paperback collection of quirky stories 'The Edge' | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
I am so enjoying 'A Gun For Sale'. It's a fast-paced, hard-boiled pulp crime thriller set in the Midlands with the threat of a second world war bubbling in the air. The plot is full of far-fetched immature contrivances (betraying Greene's youth and inexperience) but the humanity he puts into even the most monstrous characters is captivating and the sheer energy and suspense of the narrative makes it a compulsive page-turner. The first chapter has Raven committing the gruesome double murder of two people he doesn't even know without flinching. You're primed to hate the guy. Yet two thirds of the way through I care deeply about his welfare and really, really want him to get away. Graham Greene was already a wizard at making you empathise with his characters (good or bad) and this is one of his minor early works! | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.187.139 |
Steve, sorry to be late in replying. I haven't read Naomi's Room yet, but I enjoyed The Vanishment, The Lost, and The Talisman. I still have Naomi's Room, The Shadow on the Wall and Whisper in the Dark on my shelves, waiting to be read (hopefully before I expire). I enjoy Aycliffe's novels - I don't think he's on the same level as RC or Klein (for example), but he spins a good, creepy yarn. Strangely, he seems to have written hardly any short stories, at least that I know of (there's one in one of the Ash-Tree anthologies). He also writes thrillers under another name. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
Tommyknockers. | ||
| Skunsworth (Skunsworth) Username: Skunsworth Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 88.107.212.160 |
Just finished Finch's Ghost Realm - good stuff. Now starting in on Rakie Keig's Terror Island. S | ||
| John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 62.31.153.8 |
What did you think of Ghost Realm Simon? I've got it here to read. Is it as good as After Shocks? | ||
| Skunsworth (Skunsworth) Username: Skunsworth Registered: 05-2009 Posted From: 88.107.212.160 |
I have to admit that I've not read Aftershocks, but I enjoyed Ghost Realm. It's nice conceit, having stories linked to geographical regions, and none of the tales themselves are anything less than very good. S | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Just now, the tales of David Case. I meant to rush through them as a reminder before writing a piece about him for the Brighton World Horror Convention, but I'm enjoying them so much that I won't skim. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Coincidence!! I've read four of David Case's (long) short stories in the Pan books recently and very much enjoyed them, especially 'The Dead End' (1969). He seems to have a thing about werewolves and assorted other man-beasts and writes very entertainingly of them. The other three were 'The Cell' (1969), 'The Hunter' (1969) & 'Strange Roots' (1971). Also got 'Among The Wolves' & 'Neighbours' coming up soon... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
The Cell is superb. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Yes, is it about a real werewolf or someone who thinks he is one? A tale of madness or the supernatural? I would say 'The Dead End' is actually a short novel rather than a novella. I loved his description of the rundown settlement on Tierra del Fuego - populated by washed up alcoholics and "halfbreeds" - and the journey through the landscape when they travel into the mountains gave you a real feeling of being there. I wonder whatever became of him... | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
I'm dipping into Harlan Ellison's massive 'The Essential Ellison, a fifty-year retrospective' between and during other books. Has anyone seen the documentary about him? Released last year I think, 'Dreams with Sharp Teeth'? | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
He's at Brighton, Stephen - hence the tribute I'm writing. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Good to hear he's still going strong! I read those books before in my teens and just recently realised it was David Case's mini-epics that probably stuck most vividly in my mind from the Pan series. He spins a great yarn! | ||
| Matt_cowan (Matt_cowan) Username: Matt_cowan Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 68.79.171.196 |
Night of the Claw by some fellow named Ramsey Campbell | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
I prefer that title to plain old 'The Claw' which I read myself very recently. Is your copy by Jay Ramsey? | ||
| Matt_cowan (Matt_cowan) Username: Matt_cowan Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 68.79.171.196 |
"I prefer that title to plain old 'The Claw' which I read myself very recently. Is your copy by Jay Ramsey?" No. My copy must have been a later printing because it lists him as Ramsey Campbell. I'm only about half way through it so far and I keep thinking of the short story by Rudyard Kipling "The Mark of the Beast". It is a different story of coarse, but it has a similar feel to me. That's good because I enjoy both. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
I'm reading him in chronological order because I'm a bit anal that way. 'The Claw' (so far) seemed to mark an end to the unrelenting psychological terror, chiefly from one point-of-view, (in this case an adorably vulnerable child) horror that made his name. I'm glad for Ramsey that he got over that stage as it seemed like a purgative process to me. The two books that followed: 'Incarnate' & 'Obsession' show such a leap forward in confidence and imagination that both of them are the masterpieces he was always building up to - all in my humble opinion. The thing is - was he ever as raw and psychologically terrifying again? The debate will no doubt rage for generations to come... | ||
| Matt_cowan (Matt_cowan) Username: Matt_cowan Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 68.79.171.196 |
I think Incarnate was simply brilliant. It is my favorite Campbell novel and I would say The Grin of the Dark has a number of scenes in it that are as scary as any I have ever read. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.229.114 |
I think Incarnate was simply brilliant. It is my favorite Campbell novel Same here. Haven't read some of the later novels, mind. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.178.139 |
THE TURNAROUND by George Pelecanos. A bunch of white kids looking for kicks in '70s Washington go for a drunken drive in a black neighbourhood leading to a tragedy that has repercussions in the present day for all concerned. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
Not a comedy then. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.178.139 |
Actually, so far it's not as dark as I was expecting. Still enjoyable though. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
Finished 'A Gun For Sale' and it was brilliant. One of the best pulp crime thrillers I've read with resonances for the slasher genre as Raven becomes a gas-masked, white coated avenging angel dealing faceless death and destruction to his former paymasters - wonderful (and very, very sad...)! Couple of chapters in and already thoroughly gripped by 'Brighton Rock'. Only a questioning Catholic (like Greene) could get away with the line "a Catholic is more capable of evil than anyone" - still incendiary stuff. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.187.177 |
Stephen, a while back I watched the film version of A GUN FOR SALE starring Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake. Dunno how faithful it is to the book but it was good fun. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.71 |
All bets are off for my favourite read of the year. I'm halfway through Robert Holdstock's magnificent new novel, Avilion, a return to the mythago wood and the increasingly complex lives of the Huxley clan. It's not perfect - some of the events don't tally with the earlier books - but Holdstock's still the best fantasy writer in the UK, capable of rousing emotions like dread and love effortlessly,and so too the scent of the landscape he describes. Respect. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Stephen, a while back I watched the film version of A GUN FOR SALE starring Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake. Dunno how faithful it is to the book but it was good fun. Sounds like a great Hollywood film noir I would love to see - the plot couldn't miss. If they'd filmed the book accurately though it would have had the same grimy, working class Britishness of the Boulting's 'Brighton Rock'. Incidentally *** [SPOILER ALERT] *** both books are set in the same milieu and so far involve at least one character in common, while one of Raven's particularly gory murders has a direct impact on the 'making of' 18 year old Pinkie! I guess fantastic characterisation isn't the only thing Greene shares in common with Stephen King. I'm finding these books a true revelation... | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.169 |
Mark, I haven't read the Mythago Wood books, but The Fetch is one of the creepiest novels I've ever read. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
Mythago Wood is a beautiful, beautiful novel and I highly recommend it. At the moment I'm half way through Matheson's collection The Shores of Space, which is superb. All the stories are good so far, but The Test was the one that had me welling up. A finer story of coping with old age and caring for someone half crippled by senility and infirmity I have yet to read. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.121.214.11 |
Just finished my name is red. Not reccommended unless you're fascinated by 10th century arabic painting styles and techniques and the religious reasons they weren't supposed to use perspective or realism. He goes on and on and on and on about that and leaves about 50 to 60 pages about the whodunnit that the book is allegedly about. I've just started on Fairway to Hell - Carl Hiaasen's golf memoir... I nearly didn't buy this for the simple reason that it's about golf. Definitely ten steps below F1 on any scale of interesting sports. But it's actually very funny, extremely interesting and I'm guessing that very few golf books come with comparisons of the relative aerodynamics of golf balls and bufo toads. "Aerodynamically, your average toad travels through the air with substantially more drag than a golf ball. This is because golf balls are usually round, and legless. A toad won't carry as far, or roll more than once or twice when it lands." There is a very good reason why he's playing golf with toads which is explained in detail and isn't (all that) cruel the way he describes it. You need to read it to find out. This is one of the funniest books I've read for a while and I expect to finish it this weekend as it's also an extremely easy read. It possibly works better as a book to golf haters than golf lovers. | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.77.233 |
Ways of Seeing by John Berger. A little dated, perhaps, but brilliant nonetheless. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.23.40 |
Stalled at page 100+ of The Night Land. Thought it would be fun to reread ye Landlord's "The Inhabitant of the Lake" in order to restore my sanity, and fun it was! Ramsey, I'm endlessly fascinated by that row of six houses by the lake you describe. Was this based on a real location? | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
Stick with 'The Night Land'... it makes a lot more sense to me having read 'The House On The Borderland' so recently. I now view the events of TNL as in no way physically real but rather akin to the nightmare fantasies of THOTB. The whole thing is one vast poetic allegory on the nature of undying love - like a Divine Comedy or Paradise Lost for the 20th Century. At least that's what I now believe Hodgson intended. Compared to Lovecraft's attempts to do something similar in 'The Dream Quest Of Unknown Kadath', etc... it has to be seen as infinitely more successful. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.23.40 |
At least THOTB - one of my favourite books - is written in an thoroughly accessible and curiously modern no-nonsense language. While the imagery in TNL is very potent indeed - who can forget The Thing That Nods or the House of Silence, to name but a few 'obstacles' encountered by the narrator - the language sometimes gets in the way. I could give countless examples, but this one somehow stuck with me: " . . . and yet, because I was so taught to wisdom, I answered by no name; but sent the Master-Word through the night - sending it with my brain-elements, as I could, and as all may, much or little, as may be, if they be no clods." By the by, I don't think the cosmic happenings in THOTB are mere nightmare fantasies. Remember that the narrator, upon returning to the 'waking world', finds that his faithful dog has turned into a heap of dust. | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.170.82 |
I've just opened the pages on what looks like an interesting mystery set in Amsterdam during the mid-1960s: "Because of the Cats" by Nicholas Freeling. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
By the by, I don't think the cosmic happenings in THOTB are mere nightmare fantasies. Remember that the narrator, upon returning to the 'waking world', finds that his faithful dog has turned into a heap of dust. But curiously he, the narrator, is still alive along with his sister and all else that surrounds the house even though they went through the same process?! I think for some reason, perhaps its undying loyalty (i.e. love), the dog was somehow singled out for removal - who knows? Is the force that transports our hero across time and space even benign? Is his love for his dead partner portrayed as a positive thing? It certainly doesn't do him a lot of favours - like those poor damned souls in Dante's Second Circle! THOTB is indeed a brilliantly sustained masterpiece of atmospheric horror/fantasy while TNL is a grossly over-ambitious and highly spiritual dark fantasy epic that Hodgson doesn't quite have the writing ability to pull off. But if the book is ultimately a "failure" it's an unforgettably magnificent one! | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Hubert: no, it came from my adolescent head. The film of A Gun for Sale - as I recall Greene loathed it, and it certainly departs from him as soon as Veronica Lake does her routine. Me, I loved it (especially her), but it isn't Greene. His two Carol Reed films - The Third Man and The Fallen Idol are, though, and very impressively. There's a third - Our Man in Havana - which I must revisit, not having seen it for maybe forty years. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
I have sat all afternoon, in my office, every now and again gazing at what we call a "Daddy-Long-Legs" stuck to the outside of my window like a suction cup while a gale force wind and torrential rain is blowing the thing up, down, sideways, over and under like nobody's business - but yet it refuses to budge. This chimes chillingly with a passage I read in 'Brighton Rock' last night (seriously!) in which Pinkie slowly picks the legs and wings from a desperately buzzing "Leatherjacket" while intoning "she loves me, she loves me not..." about poor deluded Rose before flicking the denuded body onto his bed like some useless phallic symbol (I'm paraphrasing from memory here). Pinkie is the ultimate school bully who never grew up turning into your typical teenage psychopath we are all so terrified of these days - only more so. A virgin who never drinks, never smokes, never gambles, considers lying a weakness and sings half-remembered Latin phrases from his boyhood choir-singing at Mass while he indulges his only vice - the inflicting of pain. So why do I feel so sorry for the bloke... that's Graham Greene for you. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.121.214.11 |
Maybe it's because you're the type who superglues small insects to windows... | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
No, he's still there. In fact I wish I'd taken a video of the wee blighter's quite remarkable staying powers! | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.16.78.195 |
The Fallen Idol - I've not read the book, Ramsey, but I greatly like the film. However, I remember palpably thinking the ending of that film came out of left field - I assume it departs from the novel at that point, doesn't it?... I mean, this thing has a spiral straight down, and then, all of a sudden.... So much so, I thought at the time, that the film had been shot with some other ending and then changed, but maybe I'm wrong. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
'The Fallen Idol' is easily the equal of either of Carol Reed's other great noir thrillers from the period - the slow burning tension throughout is almost unbearable at times. Ralph Richardson has never been better if you ask me and the boy actor, Bobby Henrey, is so convincing in the central role it's a wonder (and perhaps a good thing for him) that he never acted again! I believe it's based on a short story that I haven't read - another form Greene excelled at, including the occasional stab at weird fiction. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.47.88.29 |
Totally agree with Mark and Jonathan about Mythago Wood. Beautiful work. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
Just finished Matheson's brilliant collection The Shores of Space and am now on the third book of Martin's Song of Ice and Fire epic. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
It's a long time since I read The Basement Room, Craig, but I think Reed did change the ending. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.234.133 |
Quite a few people here mentioned Lord of the Flies and I finally decided to read the book. I hadn't done so previously because I'd seen the films a number of times (the second one especially) and I didn't think the book could add much. But it definitely does. This novel is a delight, one of those yarns where you actually forget you're turning the pages of a physical book. | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.77.233 |
Finished reading The Absence. I can't believe this book has had so many superb reviews... | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
Friend of mine lent it to me. Is it really that bad? I know the back cover bills him as the new Ramsey Campbell. As we know, however, there is only one Ramsey. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
Hubert, the first time you read 'Lord Of The Flies' it's a wonderfully entertaining adventure/survival yarn with a surprisingly brutal streak. But on each subsequent reading (I've found anyway) you get more and more out of it, like peeling away the layers of an onion. It's my very favourite novel and the one I've read most often - discovering new things each time. A deceptively simple allegory that covers just about every aspect of the human condition. Golding's thematically linked follow-up 'The Inheritors' is at least as powerful and may even be better imo. | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.77.233 |
The Fens folklore is handled quite well, and is interesting. Otherwise, the novel is chock-full of dreadfully clumsy exposition, unbelievable dialogue, lazy 'homage'/theft (Don't Look Now, The Shining etc) and crude characterisation. To me, The Absence reads like early James Herbert. That said, it's obvious that Mr Hussey has story-telling ability...but I find it incredible that he should be compared to proven talents like Ramsey Campbell, MR James et al. But the above is just my opinion and, as an unpublished writer, probably doesn't count for much. Best to read it yourself, Jonathan. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.234.133 |
A deceptively simple allegory that covers just about every aspect of the human condition. Yes, I can see why it is always chosen for school assignments and such. The questions are obvious and set a chap thinking. Who would you follow and why? Why is everybody picking on Piggy? How come practically everybody turns away from the soft-spoken Ralph and decides to follow the aggressive Jack? The book also tells us things about the birth of religion (in the 1990 film Jack is seen to chisel a face out of a rock, a fascinating moment) etc. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Now imagine those same themes transposed to the dawn of civilization (whereas here we are witnessing the death of civilization) and that's why I see 'The Inheritors' as a natural continuation of the questions asked in 'Lord Of The Flies'. Kind of like humanity come full circle... but starting at the end and working backwards. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.177 |
I'll keep my eyes open for The Inheritors. Odd, isn't it, that the need of meat isn't challenged by anyone in TLOTF? | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.71 |
Steve, after Holdstock's mythago novel, The Fetch feels a much lighter piece of work. The whole of the mythago books must be the best novel series since Patrick O'Brian's Master & Commander books. I'm now on a bit of fun, with Will Storr vs The Supernatural, a surprisingly thoughtful (given the cover) nonfiction piece on spooks. And listening to the fantastic Master of the Delta by Thomas H Cook. | ||
| Martin Roberts (Martin_roberts) Username: Martin_roberts Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.5.239.91 |
Finally started Charles Beaumont: Selected Stories, which has been sitting on the shelf for far too long . | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Hubert, isn't there the implication though that they are so freaked out by the bloody but necessary taking of life for their own survival that they feel obligated to make an offering of the pig's head to the Beast as some kind of atonement. At least for some of them it is atonement, for others braggadocio - the dual nature of man! The whole idea of our being part of nature (and the point where we lose sight of that), the taking of animal life and the eating of flesh is explored in even greater depth in 'The Inheritors'. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Nearly finished 'Brighton Rock' and what a tour-de-force it is! So much more than just a brilliant character study of a pyschopathic mind. All of human life is in there and Pinkie's pathetic inability to connect or empathise is as stark a depiction of damnation as I have ever read. Utterly brilliant!! Carol Reed was faced with the same problem the Boulting's faced when filming Graham Greene. People then went to the movies for escapist entertainment first and foremost while Greene wrote gripping narratives but never pulled his punches or gave us pat happy endings. Both felt forced to change two of (apparently) his most bleak endings for the sake of their unsuspecting audiences sensitivities and for their own careers of course... shame but they were more innocent times and Greene was easily decades ahead of them. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.177 |
they feel obligated to make an offering of the pig's head to the Beast as some kind of atonement Sounds plausible. They've taken some of the Beast's beastliness away from it and offer the pig's head in return lest the Beast become angry. An interpretation of reality which says more about themselves than it does about the nature of the Beast. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Finished reading Brian Evenson's Fugue State. Probably his best collection to date. Highlights were definatly: Mudder Tongue, An Accounting, Ninety-over Ninety, Alfons Kuylers, and The Adjudicator. All the stories were good, the last mentioned stories were really excellent. One of the best collections I have read this year. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.235.203 |
I've read "The Basement Room," and it indeed was changed, for the film. But it's not just that The Fallen Idol felt altered from the short-story: it's that the film itself has one trajectory, and at the close is so jarringly jerked in another direction, that you think it was changed mid-production, or after the movie was in the can. Another film that comes to mind that left this impression: the rather dark noir A Blueprint for Murder, starring Joseph Cotton. The movie is disturbing for its subject-matter, and clearly is headed straight down, one way... and then, blam! it veers off-course, right at the very end. Something was going on there, certainly.... | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.74 |
I'll have to reread Brighton Rock. Last read it in my early teens, thinking it a somewhat dated but ok serial killer thing. Plonkerdom of the young, eh? | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
And speaking of the serial killer thing, the new Straub novella 'A Special Place- the heart of a dark matter'- was also very good, and dark indeed. Shocking ending. Looking forward then to the Subterr. release of the full, unabridged version of the novel in November I think. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Well I've just finished 'Brighton Rock' and I'm not ashamed to admit that it's the first book in too many years that has brought a tear to mine eyes. I can't believe I'm leaving these characters behind... Pinkie, Rose, Ida, Dallow, Cubitt, etc. It's not so much a book you read as one you live. I want to post so many stand-out paragraphs on here I wouldn't even know where to start... But here's one: "The Boy said, with bitter and unhappy relish, 'It'll be no good going to confession ever again - as long as we're both alive.' He had graduated in pain: first the school dividers had been left behind, next the razor. He had a sense now that the murders of [*****] and [*****] were trivial acts, a boy's game, and he had put away childish things. Murder had only led up to this - this corruption. He was filled with awe at his own powers. 'We'd better be moving,' he said and touched her arm with next to tenderness. As once before he had a sense of needing her." What he does to that poor girl is the true definition of evil. | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.210.209.169 |
I read Brighton Rock many years ago. The one thing that struck me was how 'modern' it seemed. Incredible really, for a novel written in 1938. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.11.81 |
Stephen, Hubert, et.al. - I missed this on the tracking boards - it hasn't sold yet, but it's a spec script going around Hollywood.... (I wonder if this in the public domain?) ------------------ 9:30 am July 17th, 2009 HOUSE ON THE BORDERLANDS Representation: Jim Strader (Quatro Media) Written by: David Benullo PG-13 supernatural horror in the vein of POLTERGEIST. A young family relocates to their great uncle’s rural home and discovers it guards the border between our dimension and another, inhabited by a race of hostile creatures. Based on the classic, ground-breaking horror novel by William Hope Hodgson. Stuart Gordon (RE-ANIMATOR, STUCK) attached to direct. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
Coming up to my lunch break and at long last I'm about to start 'The Influence'... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
I envy you that first reading. Pretty much a flawless and definitely a frightening book. Not many of them around. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
They should still cast Helen Mirren as Queenie- without make-up soon- well if they wait much longer. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
I've always found Stuart Gordon's Lovecraft adaptations bloody frustrating. I enjoy them, despite myself, as broad horror comedies but wish to God someone else had taken the same material and done justice to the sheer horror of Lovecraft's vision. I suspect 'The House On The Borderland' adaptation (if it ever gets off the ground) will be similarly misjudged. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.67.244.42 |
I thought that Dagon was very good, bar some dodgy CGI and I adore the Re-Animator films. Apart from the most recent one which is shit | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.177 |
PG-13 supernatural horror in the vein of POLTERGEIST Well, POLTERGEIST is nowhere near The House on the Borderland. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Came across an old paperback today I've never heard of by Frank Belknap Long - whose Lovecraftian horror stories I've always enjoyed. 'Lest Earth Be Conquered' (1966) which is quite a short novel and I think I might read along with 'The Influence'... which has its hooks firmly into me after the first few chapters. Ramsey has a knack for making old women downright terrifying. I'm reminded not only of 'Incarnate' & 'Obsession' but the creepy as hell short story 'The Trick'. Great stuff!! | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
Now reading Stinger by Robert McCammon. Fun so far. | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.77.233 |
Reading (for the millionth time) In God's Name by David Yallop. It's a fascinating book about the alleged murder of Pope John Paul I. __________________________________ http://stevejensen.eu http://theblackglove.wordpress.com | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Read 'In God's Name' back in the 80s and would highly recommend as a counterbalance 'A Thief In The Night' (1989) by John Cornwell. He was called in as a Catholic investigative reporter by the Vatican to write a refutation of Yallop's allegations but what he discovered about the shadowy inner workings of the Holy See was, if anything, even more disturbing. I've also read his genuinely frightening and very well written investigation of extremist cult belief in the supernatural - both christian and satanic - called 'Powers Of Darkness, Powers Of Light' (1991). | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.77.233 |
Thanks for the tip, Stephen. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
And if you want to delve even deeper into the nest of vipers Yallop exposed: 'The Calvi Affair' (1983) by Larry Gurwin and Claire Sterling's masterful histories of the Mafia; 'The Mafia' (1990) & 'Crime Without Frontiers' (1994) make for a chilling accompaniment. Happy armchair sleuthing... | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.77.233 |
Excellent. Cheers, Stephen. The Sterling book in particular looks very interesting. _______________________________ http://stevejensen.eu/ http://theblackglove.wordpress.com/ | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.170.85 |
Graham Greene is one of the most lucid writers you can read. Don't you ever wish someone other than a genre director would tackle the likes of Hodgson? Or at the very least someone subtle? | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
Up until those two brilliant crime novels I had only read 'The Power And The Glory' in school before - no prizes for guessing why a Christian Brothers school put that on the curriculum rather than 'Brighton Rock'. Of the books I was "made to read" in school only two stuck with me - Greene's intensely moving, and still relevant, portrayal of sheer human decency overcoming the pitfalls of blind faith and William Golding's equally spellbinding 'Lord Of The Flies' - nuff said. Do you think they realised how ambiguous the message of both books actually were? I don't... | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.227.177 |
Finally got around to reading a few Shirley Jackson stories. I find she's best sampled in small doses - trifles like "Got a Letter from Jimmy" leave me totally bewildered. | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.77.233 |
Today, The Last Testament Of Oscar Wilde by Peter Ackroyd. Magnificent. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.170.85 |
Hubert - this happens with most authors for me. I even got bored with poor bloody Aickman once after reading him for weeks. It felt like I'd taken a clock apart. Oddly, when I read Ramsey's Ghosts and Grisly Things it didn't happen; I was left hungry. Rare that. Well done, Ramsey. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
Okay, 'The Influence' is really starting to creep me out... poor Lance. I think I know where this book is going and it ain't a pretty place. While 'Lest Earth Be Conquered' is turning into a bit of light relief tonic from Ramsey's fevered imaginings! Like a cross between the film 'Invaders From Mars' & John Wyndham's 'The Midwich Cuckoos' with a smidgen of 'Chocky' completing the wide-eyed sci-fi stew. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.233.141 |
Tony, it's not that I get bored; a story like "Of course" seems to be gradually working towards a climax of sorts which doesn't come, and I've experienced this with every story of hers I've read so far. It's weird fiction all right, albeit not in 'our' sense. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.170.85 |
Yes, I see that. Her stuff is eliptical, and it can be a strain trying to see all the way round. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.68 |
I'm reading crime writer Peter Robinson's short story collection Not Safe After Dark, cos it's my birthday the last day of next month and I've a feeling his new collection may be one of my gifts... | ||
| Lincoln Brown (Lincoln_brown) Username: Lincoln_brown Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 124.181.114.60 |
Picked up 'Black Leather Required', by David Schow, yesterday. Will be starting it tonight. Will probably have 'Pictures of the Dark' going at the same time. | ||
| Martin Roberts (Martin_roberts) Username: Martin_roberts Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.5.239.91 |
I hope you enjoy Black Leather Required Lincoln, David Schow is one my favourite writers... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.170.85 |
Just started Roseanna, the first in the Martin Beck series by this Swedish couple. It's FANTASTIC!! It feels like the ways to write. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.121.214.11 |
Music of Chance - Paul Auster - Opening chapter is almost hypnotically good. Depending on when I finish it, my next book will be either The Brief Wondrous Life of Ocar Wao by Junot Diaz or Blood Meridian by Cormac Macarthy. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.230.126 |
The Haunting was rubbish. Shirley Jackson isn't good. Except for when Owen Wilson got his head cut off. That was awesome. | ||
| Richard_gavin (Richard_gavin) Username: Richard_gavin Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.157.29.164 |
Martin wrote: "I hope you enjoy Black Leather Required Lincoln, David Schow is one my favourite writers..." I scrolled this thread from the bottom up today. When I read this line I thought the book Martin's referring to was Black Leather Required Lincoln. I honestly thought 'Huh? Is this some kind of alternate history exposé of the S&M scene during the American Civil war?' | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.170.85 |
Proto - is that a joke?!? I liked The Haunting book more second time. First I was after a horror book, second I found other things. Also, I'm striving to emulate Jackson (a bit) with the thing I'm working on, so your remark worries me... | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Why? Shirley Jackson is a fantastic writer. The Haunting of Hill House is arguably the best haunted house novel ever written. It certainly one of the few books ever to give me goosebumps. Even if Proto isn't joking (and I really hope he is) it doesn't change the excellence of that novel. "Whose hand was I holding?" | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
It is both the Mac Daddy and the Daddy Mac of supernatural literature. And the Robert Wise film is ace too. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
I really do think we need a symbol for irony on this board . . . | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.230.126 |
But it was rubbish! All big sets and stuff. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.230.126 |
I can't keep this up. A symbol for irony would sort of defeat the purpose of irony. On teletext subtitles, they put dialogue in parentheses. Two things weren't ironic though: - I do actually think the Lottery and THoHH are over-rated, though I know I'm virtually alone in that. - It WAS awesome when Owen Wilson had his head cut off. Well, funny at least. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.72.14.113 |
A symbol for irony would be a quizically blank face - perhaps a smiley only with a straight line mouth and one tentatively raised eyebrow? Or if you want to be really unequivocal what about a straight icon of an iron - as in the Monopoly piece (which I always took to represent irony anyway). Shirley Jackson rocks... psychological ambiguity is what makes supernatural fiction interesting in the first place. Just one reason why horror cinema can never hope to emulate horror literature. Having said that, what I'm loving most about 'The Influence' is the straightforwardness of the narrative, yet with all the psychological depth I've come to expect from Ramsey. It is in stark contrast to the stream-of-consciousness unpredictability of 'The Hungry Moon' and already a far superior novel. I'm just over half way through. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.230.126 |
This is the best film Shirley Jackson ever done ever. http://www.wimp.com/ghostfilm/ | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Claiming that something is over-rated if just a self-aggrandising way of admitting you're in the minority. | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.170.82 |
I just finished "Because of the Cats", by Nicholas Freeling, a mystery set in mid-1960s Amsterdam that was pretty good. I'm now reading "San Francisco Noir 2" a collection of short fiction by legendary writers from Ambrose Bierce to Hammett to Don Herron. Annnd, just posted another essay, this wrestling (perhaps clumsily) on whether novelists can be truly obsessed and get their novels done at the same time: http://www.redroom.com/articlestory/i-think-about-stupid-things | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.170.85 |
Sometimes being in a minority is right, sometimes wrong. I'm irked Proto's not keen on it but it's not the end of the world; maybe he'd like it more second time (or third). | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.170.85 |
And Weber, you dun't half try forcing folk to like the things you like! 'Foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds'. Er, that's not for you directly, just a great Ebertvation. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
"And Weber, you dun't half try forcing folk to like the things you like! " There are writers who, as much as I like them, I can understand why other people wouldn't. There are writers who I hate but understand why others like them. There are others who I think are so good, I cannot understand why anyone wouldn't like them. These are writers I will defend to the death. Shirley Jackson for me is one of the latter. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
I know what you mean. Like, anyone who has a go at, say, Shakespeare - it's just hard to understand that. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Yeah but Shakespeare's crap. All forsooth this and wherefore that. Can't he speak english for chrissake? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
Dude ain't got no idea bout talkin, innit. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.198.101 |
"These are writers I will defend to the death." Sweet baby marmalade, this is infantile. When does having an opinion that differs from yours constitute an attack? 1. I don't like spam. 2. You do. 3. Spam doesn't need to be defended because it's not being f-ing attacked. There's a stage in a baby's development when they learn that who they are ends at their feet and everything beyond there is not them and beyond their control. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
Er, well, I can't see Weber attacking anyone here. His first comment had a smiley-thing after it, and his second was just a general statement, not aimed at anyone. Not sure what babies have got to do with anything, either. Can we just move on? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
Thomas B: I didn't realise Don Herron wrote fiction. Is he any good? | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
"I will defend to the death" is a figure of speech. Not an attack on anyone. Makes a change lately for it not being me taking general statements personally. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
Besides which, do you really think any of us get permanently beyond this stage: >>>There's a stage in a baby's development when they learn that who they are ends at their feet and everything beyond there is not them and beyond their control. The boundaries are always shifting. Just add alcohol - that's one of way enforcing that. Stress, too. Or go on an Internet forum. | ||
| Steve Jensen (Stevej) Username: Stevej Registered: 07-2009 Posted From: 82.0.77.233 |
The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton. It's the first time I've read any of her work, and the writing is quite beautiful. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
It's just a phase you're going through. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
I think The Haunting of Hill House is the greatest of all haunted house novels - the one that most repays rereading. Jackson's delicate eeriness even beats M. R. James for me. Oddly enough, I didn't read it for many years, having liked the Wise film and assumed the book wouldn't have much more to offer. By gum, I was wrong. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
Agreed – while the film is good, it doesn't offer the same kind of layered and echo-ridden experience as the novel. The best moments in the film are not directly supernatural: Eleanor and Thea arguing, for example, with so much at stake in their words and reactions. I could have punched the young horror fan (no-one you know) who watched the film on DVD with me and a friend and didn't pay attention to anything non-spooky except to point once at Thea and declare "Gay subtext!" Ramsey, when Robert Aickman used 'Nell' as a pun in 'The Stains', do you think he was consciously paying tribute to Jackson's novel? | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Gosh, I don't know. I assume he must have read Jackson, but he never mentioned her to us. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.170.85 |
I dunno; maybe Proto has become weary of some - and we've all done it - over-defending loved things. Maybe it was a last straw. I love Haunting of Hill House. I'm busy emulating it no end but finding it impossible (I just feel like I'm saying nothing); I think it's a perfect book. Has anyone read The House Next Door? It's my next favourite 'haunted house' book. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.170.85 |
Btw there is a mild autism going about where people do feel close to their favourite things, and do think the world ends at their feet. I'm guilty of that all the time. Such folk are drawn to this world where it's easier to talk via a monitor. These disagreements are inevitable, with endless lines in the sand. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.170.85 |
Ramsey - did Aickman ever talk about ghosts, his beliefs? Would it warrant another thread if you had time? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
I loved The House Next Door, Tony. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
"Ramsey - did Aickman ever talk about ghosts, his beliefs? Would it warrant another thread if you had time?" You know, he never did to me that I recall. He did in his World Fantasy Award acceptance essay, though. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.4.153 |
"Ramsey - did Aickman ever talk about ghosts, his beliefs? Would it warrant another thread if you had time?" Have you, Ramsey...? (I've read lots of interviews, etc., on your views on writing and the horror genre and such, but...) I can answer the second question: Yes! | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.170.85 |
Gary; that is one of my favourite reads of the last ten years. It felt effortless, unselfconscious and unfussy. And honest. And yes, very frightening. An underrated classic. Craig; Ramsey has had a spooky experience or two these past few years. You should ask him. Nicely! | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.230.4 |
I have a read a couple more Jackson stories - on the beach, would you believe? - and have noticed a predilection for characters with some sort of compulsory behaviour disorder. Too early in the day to make definitive statements, though. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.240.106 |
Just back from a long break in Southern Italy, and I read some corkers: EVERY DEAD THING THE NAME OF THE ROSE LET THE RIGHT ONE IN THE SHADOW OF THE WIND (stunning: possibly the best novel I've read so far this year) | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
Listening to the audio version of The Shadow of the wind and enjoying it. I'll always buy the new Eco. His english translater William Weaver ( I think he translated most of Eco's stuff and some Calvino) was one of my professors in college in the US- He was such a nice gentleman. Foucault's Pendulum was really amazing as well. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.47.123.190 |
'You know, he never did to me that I recall. He did in his World Fantasy Award acceptance essay, though.' What did he say, Ramsey? Can I read that anywhere? I remember a few years back asking you about ghosts and spooky goings on too. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.153.232.46 |
I thought 'Shadow of the Wind' was Zafon. Still I may be confused. Anyway, I liked the sequel, too: 'The Angel's Game'. Welcome back, Zed. I hope you had a good time. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.163.6.13 |
If its my post Des, yes the Shadow of the Wind is by Zafón, and The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco, which was translated from the Italian by William Weaver. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
Ramsey Campbell has just terrified the wits out of me over four straight chapters of 'The Influence'. The first half of this book was the brilliantly orchestrated calm before the storm. He hasn't been this relentlessly intense since 'Incarnate' only this book is so much leaner and even more compulsively readable. Can't read anymore tonight - nerves won't take it - so I'm fleeing back to the relative comfort of 'Lest Earth Be Conquered' about another much put upon child. But somehow aliens among us in human form (a theme I've always found particularly creepy) can't match the terror of one innocent soul in jeopardy of being lost forever... gulp! | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.230.4 |
The name of the Rose is a masterpiece! | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.209.171 |
Zed, I'm gutted: I wanted to use 'Every Dead Thing' as the title of an article. May still use it – after all, it's a quote from a classic and brilliant poem that could serve as a manifesto for the weird fiction genre. Al Alvarez opens his classic study of suicide in literature, THE SAVAGE GOD, with a discussion of Donne's poem. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.240.106 |
The novel is pretty good, Joel - lots poetic references. And, yes, what a great title. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.71 |
Zed, if you like the poetic stuff in Every Dead Thing, give James Lee Burke a go. His books are lessy pacy than Connolly's, but stitched with a seam of dancing lyricism. Try In the Electric Mist With Confederate Dead. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.240.106 |
Cheers, Lynchy - I'll give him a go. I really enjoyed the Connolly. Currently 100 pages into CRIME AND PUNISHMENT: I'm on a classics kick. | ||
| Stephen Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
'Crime And Punishment' needs several readings to get all its nuances. It is one of the most frightening, psychologically insightful, truly tragic and just plain gripping novels ever written. Raskolnikov is arguably my favourite character in the entire pantheon of literature. But the book is about so much more than just him... Read it three times and wish I could experience it anew again. | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.170.82 |
Hi Gary: "Thomas B: I didn't realise Don Herron wrote fiction. Is he any good?" I haven't reached that story yet, but will let you know. All this talk about Shirley Jackson makes me want to throw "The Haunting . . ." on my TBR pile as part of my annual re-reading experience. I thought Proto was joking: one of those cultural mashup jokes like "Pride and Prejudice with Zombies" or "I liked 'Hamlet' especially when he pulled out the AK-47 and sprayed the crowd at the end. Boy that Shakespeare was sure a hard-boiled guy. Did he write anything else?" | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.26.90.161 |
Surely Proto was referring to the dodgy new film version of Jackson's novel. Yes, a joke. He was being all postmodern - lampooning the kind of person who thinks Romeo has Leonardo's face. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.252.35 |
Can I make a suggestion? As of this post, we now have 666 posts here - a good point to stop at, it's just getting too big and taking to long to launch this thread - now start "What are you reading... pt. 2" - over and out. | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.170.82 |
Of course, Craig, as the author of Post No. 666, you are clearly the Antichrist . . . and so we should now declare that this World has ended and start all over again. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.194.126 |
"the kind of person who thinks Romeo has Leonardo's face" e.g. me... and I've seen the Zeferelli film and two stage versions. Makes no difference. Leo is the true Romeo. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.95.247 |
Proto wasn't nuts on the book and threw the movie ref into the mix. It's OK not to like stuff. Sad for those who like it to hear, but OK. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 67.116.103.241 |
Dammit, you ruined it Thomas!  You are going right into the lake of fire - and I better hear some wailing and gnashing of teeth, mister! |