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Post by MsMovieStar on Mar 4, 2020 21:59:15 GMT
This book sounds like it could be a marvelous film if it gets that far - I already have ideas for the skinematographer and headitor (or the head editor). I was sitting here slowly stroking my.........beard.......... imagining all the cross promotions. I could see fast food ties with McDonald's with french fries in the shape of small whips and also their REALLY REALLY happy meals advertising and also the t-shirt/bumper sticker market with WWKBD? product (Who Would Kristin Black do?).How about What Wouldn't Kristin Black Do?As for the kitten subplot - we might have to take Ann-Margret to court - altho the subplot could be transformed into a Kristin Black seminar class, Dog My Cats: No Pants or Pets Allowed Oh honey, I love it! You guys are geniuses! Are you sure you don't work for Pixar?
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Post by DanQuixote on Mar 9, 2020 23:59:16 GMT
Decided to try and finally tackle some Philip Roth. I’m starting out with Indignation since it’s the only Roth book my parents have.
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Post by jimmalone on Mar 10, 2020 10:10:36 GMT
Had to reread Jane Austen's Emma after watching the new adaptation. One of her two greatest masterpieces along with Pride and Prejudice.
Now on to Erich Maria Remarques Im Westen nichts Neues (All Quiet on the Western Front). The more I read of him the more I love him.
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Post by jimmalone on Mar 15, 2020 12:26:07 GMT
Dante Alighieri - La Divina Commedia
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Post by Mattsby on Mar 17, 2020 20:52:52 GMT
The Judges of the Secret Court (1961) by David Stacton, 3/5 “It was like finally getting into one’s own nightmares to punish one’s dreams.” Lincoln assassination, how a nation bends to tragedies, John Wilkes Booth’s pathetic flee, the Booth family’s artistic legacy (a ton of Shakespeare is quoted thru), the oppressive gov’t manhunt led by Edwin Stanton the Secretary of War (said to look like “a devil doll turned schoolteacher”) - David Stacton tangles a lot of characters together, maybe too many, and this becomes less compelling as it goes on - but there’s no denying Stacton is a solid writer and has a knack for detail such as creating a really haunting feeling around the scenes of Lincoln dying, the scratching and striking of matches to see him in the enveloping darkness. Stacton, an unknown writer mainly of historical-fiction, was listed by Time magazine Feb ’63 issue as one of the best emerging writers - next to John Updike, Philip Roth, and a few others.
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Post by stephen on Mar 18, 2020 12:22:56 GMT
The Judges of the Secret Court (1961) by David Stacton, 3/5 “It was like finally getting into one’s own nightmares to punish one’s dreams.” Lincoln assassination, how a nation bends to tragedies, John Wilkes Booth’s pathetic flee, the Booth family’s artistic legacy (a ton of Shakespeare is quoted thru), the oppressive gov’t manhunt led by Edwin Stanton the Secretary of War (said to look like “a devil doll turned schoolteacher”) - David Stacton tangles a lot of characters together, maybe too many, and this becomes less compelling as it goes on - but there’s no denying Stacton is a solid writer and has a knack for detail such as creating a really haunting feeling around the scenes of Lincoln dying, the scratching and striking of matches to see him in the enveloping darkness. Stacton, an unknown writer mainly of historical-fiction, was listed by Time magazine Feb ’63 issue as one of the best emerging writers - next to John Updike, Philip Roth, and a few others. I always thought that a miniseries dealing with the fallout of the assassination of Lincoln from the perspectives of both families (the Lincolns and the Booths) would be fantastic. If we could get Sally Field to reprise her role as Mary Todd . . .
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Post by TerryMontana on Mar 18, 2020 17:37:28 GMT
Ian Fleming's Dr. No.
I recently found out 4 or 5 of the James Bond novels have been translated in Greek (back in the 70s and 80s) so, having read Casino Royal, I decided to continue with this.
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Post by Mattsby on Mar 19, 2020 19:42:11 GMT
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Post by pacinoyes on Mar 19, 2020 19:55:50 GMT
Awesome - thanks for the tip Matts! I always say at the age of like ~ 19 to around 20 and 1/2 she was the sexiest female in Hollywood movies ever - and very shortly thereafter you can see her get really ugly from the booze. She is the saddest story in Hollywood history from the biggest star in the world to a forgotten Bowery waitress, but she'll always be this to me at ~19 - no one could make the word "Lubitsch" sound sexier (the 2nd time she says it especially!).......and oh Mr. Smearkase!"
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Post by Mattsby on Mar 20, 2020 2:13:45 GMT
The Kidnapping of the Coffee Pot (1974) "The Lawn Mower stood dreaming in mid-mow of the thick, thick lawns of years gone by..." Not worth the buy, it's pretty much Toy Story 2 in a junkyard, but hadda get for that title alone. It's one of the obscure left-field children's books from publisher Harlin Quist (He Was There From the Day We Moved In ('68) its masterpiece). Side note, who remembers Arsenic and Old Lace's last line - "I'm not a cab driver, I'm a coffeepot!"
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Post by DeepArcher on Apr 2, 2020 6:00:46 GMT
Really liked this one. The nerdy part of me is always drawn to fantasy and I really adored the world that Ishiguro creates here, and sort of bringing a sense of scope and imagination to tell this more small-scale character story. The characters themselves are great, Ishiguro's prose is really evocative and beautiful as always, and the narrative was incredibly engaging to me. This is only the second Ishiguro I've read but he definitely strikes me as a master of mood, and the way he blends the imaginative tone of fantasy with something more melancholy was really unique ... and I love the way he delves into these concepts of memory, the erasure of history and the repression of trauma... Quite a complex, poetic work that can also be read and enjoyed just as a story, too. It's a bit dialogue-heavy for my taste, there's some stale stretches here and there for sure, but overall this really, really impressed and moved me ... lived up to its cover (not the image I posted, a similar one that's light blue instead... but the artwork is simple and beautiful nonetheless).
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Post by jimmalone on Apr 2, 2020 8:18:16 GMT
Loved this. Probably my second favourite of Ishiguro behind Remains of the Day. I liked especially that theme and setting wise this was so different from the rest of his work.
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Post by jimmalone on Apr 2, 2020 8:27:34 GMT
I just re-read Charles Dickens' magnificent A Tale of Two Cities. I actually think that the build-up of the whole story is not as good as in some other works of the master, but therefore the last 50-like pages are among the greatest in literature.
Now I'm at Couples by John Updike.
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Post by stephen on Apr 2, 2020 15:34:23 GMT
Really liked this one. The nerdy part of me is always drawn to fantasy and I really adored the world that Ishiguro creates here, and sort of bringing a sense of scope and imagination to tell this more small-scale character story. The characters themselves are great, Ishiguro's prose is really evocative and beautiful as always, and the narrative was incredibly engaging to me. This is only the second Ishiguro I've read but he definitely strikes me as a master of mood, and the way he blends the imaginative tone of fantasy with something more melancholy was really unique ... and I love the way he delves into these concepts of memory, the erasure of history and the repression of trauma... Quite a complex, poetic work that can also be read and enjoyed just as a story, too. It's a bit dialogue-heavy for my taste, there's some stale stretches here and there for sure, but overall this really, really impressed and moved me ... lived up to its cover (not the image I posted, a similar one that's light blue instead... but the artwork is simple and beautiful nonetheless). I really dug it as well, but more for the mood he evoked and the atmosphere of that bygone era. The story itself was a wee bit slight for my liking, but there was great potential in it, and I was just reading it (or should I say, listening to it; I binged it on a week's worth of walks back and forth to work) while imagining Jim Broadbent and Imelda Staunton in the roles of Axel and Beatrice in a BBC miniseries.
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Post by DeepArcher on Apr 2, 2020 15:40:02 GMT
Really liked this one. The nerdy part of me is always drawn to fantasy and I really adored the world that Ishiguro creates here, and sort of bringing a sense of scope and imagination to tell this more small-scale character story. The characters themselves are great, Ishiguro's prose is really evocative and beautiful as always, and the narrative was incredibly engaging to me. This is only the second Ishiguro I've read but he definitely strikes me as a master of mood, and the way he blends the imaginative tone of fantasy with something more melancholy was really unique ... and I love the way he delves into these concepts of memory, the erasure of history and the repression of trauma... Quite a complex, poetic work that can also be read and enjoyed just as a story, too. It's a bit dialogue-heavy for my taste, there's some stale stretches here and there for sure, but overall this really, really impressed and moved me ... lived up to its cover (not the image I posted, a similar one that's light blue instead... but the artwork is simple and beautiful nonetheless). I really dug it as well, but more for the mood he evoked and the atmosphere of that bygone era. The story itself was a wee bit slight for my liking, but there was great potential in it, and I was just reading it (or should I say, listening to it; I binged it on a week's worth of walks back and forth to work) while imagining Jim Broadbent and Imelda Staunton in the roles of Axel and Beatrice in a BBC miniseries. Yeah, that'd be awesome casting ... I think I kept seeing Jim Broadbent in Axl as well. It honestly kinda amazes me this hasn't been adapted yet, it's so ripe for it, and it's not like fantasy's not marketable.
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Post by stephen on Apr 2, 2020 15:41:44 GMT
I really dug it as well, but more for the mood he evoked and the atmosphere of that bygone era. The story itself was a wee bit slight for my liking, but there was great potential in it, and I was just reading it (or should I say, listening to it; I binged it on a week's worth of walks back and forth to work) while imagining Jim Broadbent and Imelda Staunton in the roles of Axel and Beatrice in a BBC miniseries. Yeah, that'd be awesome casting ... I think I kept seeing Jim Broadbent in Axl as well. It honestly kinda amazes me this hasn't been adapted yet, it's so ripe for it, and it's not like fantasy's not marketable. The only other person I'd accept is Mark Rylance, but Broadbent is right there.
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Post by DeepArcher on Apr 6, 2020 5:06:20 GMT
Not a novel but over the past month or so I've been reading Flannery O'Connor short stories for class. This has been my first experience with her, an author I've been intrigued with for a long time but never got around to on my own, and I have to say I've certainly been impressed. She has this very captivating and minimalist style that is such a page-turning pleasure to read, and even though her stories always follow the same clear formula, she's always twisting that formula in unique ways that adds a great deal of variety to her work. Obviously she's known as a Gothic writer of some grotesque shit, and the grotesque shit is great, but what really gets to me is her skill at examining her (often wonderfully cartoonish) characters and delving into some very real themes of the hypocrisy, close-mindedness, and lack of empathy of the types of people she writes about. Kinda futile and arbitrary, but an attempted ranking of the stuff I've read... 1. "Greenleaf" -- It's really hard to pick a "favorite" and this could probably change based on the day, but I think this is the one that stood out to me the most. Some of her best characters, some of her best humor, and one of her absolute best endings that's capped off with a nice grace note of ambiguity. It's one of her most punishing stories and Mrs. May is one of her most unpleasant main characters ... it's really just satisfying. 2. "The Lame Shall Enter First" -- One of the longer ones but so engrossing that it didn't at all feel like it. Also one of the most drastically different ones from her usual formula ... I think it's the only of the ones I read that entirely explored male characters, for instance. This might be her very best exploration of a character's hypocrisy and it's developed to perfection. The ending is absolutely haunting, and the last paragraph of this is easily among her most beautiful prose. 3. "Everything That Rises Must Converge" -- I sort of didn't like how direct some of her prose was here, but at the same time this is one of the stories that's stuck in my mind the most since reading it and I find myself constantly thinking about it. Obviously these criticisms of white Southern racism is pretty common territory for her and this might be my favorite of the ones to tackle that subject matter ... especially the critique she develops with that hypocritical tool Julian. Really great portrait of the familiar, traditional world disappearing around characters who cherish it too much. 4. "A Good Man is Hard to Find" -- Easy to see why this is often considered her best. The funny thing is, it's not even all that notable until the last few pages ... but man, those last few pages are insaaaanely good. It feels so simple in retrospect after reading so much of her other stuff, but The Misfit is easily one of the most menacing characters she ever developed and his disenchanted ruthlessness is utterly haunting. Captivating story with one knockout of a conclusion. 5. "A Circle in the Fire" -- Essentially the prototypical O'Connor story, but not at all a bad thing in this case. The boy Powell is one of O'Connor's most chilling antagonists ... great humor in this one and the ending as usual is powerful. 6. "The Displaced Person" -- Thought it was brilliant when I read it ... still do, but its impact has waned a bit and I find myself thinking about it a lot less than a lot of the others. Still, a lot of really memorable moments here, and the priest has got to be among her best characters. 7. "Revelation" -- Really unique scenario at the center of this one (sort of). Exploring her usual thematic territory but in a pretty different way ... the girl, with the wonderfully tongue-in-cheek name Mary Grace, is just such a great presence. Really potent & interesting ending too that's unlike any of her others. 8. "Good Country People" -- Like "A Circle in the Fire" it's purely prototypical O'Connor, but I don't think it lands quite as well. O'Connor's weird/surprising endings are basically always great ... and this is one of the weirdest and most shocking ones ... but I'm not sure any other part of it has stuck with me. 9. "The Artificial N-----" -- Really interesting at first with the dynamic between its characters, the ending is really powerful, but I barely remember anything in between. Love what the story's going for, but I think she did this type of thing better in "Everything That Rises..." tbh. 10. "A View of the Woods" -- Just kind of cruel and mean-spirited and really didn't work for me. I love the O'Connor shocks but this one was just ... a bit much. I know at least stephen is a fan -- I have this whole collection of short stories, anything else I didn't read for class that I should get to? I have a copy of Wise Blood too and will try to get to it ... when I get to it ...
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Post by Martin Stett on Apr 6, 2020 11:26:11 GMT
Yeah, that'd be awesome casting ... I think I kept seeing Jim Broadbent in Axl as well. It honestly kinda amazes me this hasn't been adapted yet, it's so ripe for it, and it's not like fantasy's not marketable. The only other person I'd accept is Mark Rylance, but Broadbent is right there.I immediately imagined Terence Stamp as Sir Gawain, and I won't accept anyone else for that role.
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Post by Tommen_Saperstein on Apr 9, 2020 20:13:31 GMT
finally listening to Larson's Devil in the White City, which has been sitting cozily in my Audible library for months. Love the language, love Scott Brick's narration, and I love how Larson interweaves Holmes' activities with Daniel Burnham's efforts to develop and construct the Chicago World's Fair. I wasn't aware of that second aspect of the book, only that this was a truecrime narrative about Holmes, but the rigorous nuts and bolts details of this monumental undertaking (which created a feeding ground for Holmes) it's just as engrossing. Really enjoying it!
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Post by Mattsby on Apr 9, 2020 20:15:30 GMT
"Any man who is willing to accept responsibility is always loaded down with more and more of it."The Shark Infested Custard by Charles Willeford - published posthumously in '93 but completed in '75. Willeford had a little leg in the movie biz around then, so if he couldn't get it out as a book, he should've adapted it! There's a movie in here somewhere and I had a good time picturing the four leads as Gene Hackman, Elliott Gould, Stacy Keach, & Harry Dean Stanton - also Cassavetes, Gazzara, Cassel, & Falk would've worked. Split into four parts, the first part (50 pages) is excellent. About four friends (an ex cop, a ladies man, a religious silverware salesman, and a dreary veteran in real estate) in a singles apartment complex who bet one of them couldn't pick up a girl at a horror drive-in movie... the girl he picks up winds up accidentally dead, they have to deal with that, and then - the rest of the book - they return to their mundane lives of one-sided romances. One of them interviews his dates so he can tax write-off the dinner bills; another writes down all of his gf's possessions so they can be analyzed by "experts" - etc. Some interesting elements - and refs to Pinter, Bogart, Last Tango in Paris - but a bleak, shapeless book that sputs out halfway.
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Post by stephen on Apr 9, 2020 22:24:28 GMT
Been feeling like a good detective story, and I'd heard great things about Irish-Australian author Dervla McTiernan, so I picked up the first book in her Cormac Reilly series, The Ruin. It played out magnificently, and I could envision it as a BBC series as I was reading it. I tore through that one in a three-day spree. I've got the rest of her catalogue ahead of me, plus I'm gonna continue the Irish noir genre with Adrian McKinty afterward.
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Post by cheesecake on Apr 15, 2020 19:59:00 GMT
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Post by TerryMontana on Apr 15, 2020 20:17:17 GMT
Just started Jo Nesbo's Knife.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 15, 2020 21:16:34 GMT
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Post by DeepArcher on Apr 17, 2020 5:01:35 GMT
This was awesome ... think I enjoyed it even more than The Devil All the Time. Great characters, concise and evocative prose, and all-around wonderful storytelling that layered one bizarre vignette atop another to decorate the background of its already captivating central narrative and it was just a delight to read. Such an impeccable streak of black humor throughout this thing. Felt like reading a great Coen Brothers flick.
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