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Post by Mattsby on Dec 29, 2020 21:29:03 GMT
Top 10 First Reads of 2020 (out of about 40): The Big Goodbye, Sam Wasson A Judgement in Stone, Ruth Rendell The Sweet Flypaper of Life, Roy DeCarava/Langston Hughes Memory, Donald Westlake Stoner, John Williams Serenade, James Cain This Brilliant Darkness, Jeff Sharlet Green Shadows White Whale, Ray Bradbury The Machine in Ward Eleven, Charles Willeford The Judges of the Secret Court, David Stacton At least half of these were from pacinoyes and Viced recs - cheers and keep frisbeeing recs my way whydontcha. Second question: Looking forward to anything coming out in '21 yet??? William Greaves: Filmmaking as Mission comes out in June..... |
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Post by stephen on Dec 29, 2020 22:01:53 GMT
I spent 2020 basically going down the rabbit hole of Irish and Australian crime novels. The works of Adrian McKinty and Dervla McTiernan have been my personal favorites.
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Post by Viced on Dec 29, 2020 23:31:13 GMT
fiction
1. American Tabloid (James Ellroy)
2. L.A. Confidential (James Ellroy)
3. Stoner (John Williams)
--
(stone cold masterpieces^^)
4. Deliverance (James Dickey)
5. Butcher's Crossing (John Williams)
6. The Heavenly Table (Donald Ray Pollock)
7. The Nickel Boys (Colson Whitehead)
8. The Talented Mr. Ripley (Patricia Highsmith)
nonfiction
The Big Goodbye: Chinatown and the Last Years of Hollywood (Sam Wasson)
The Friedkin Connection: A Memoir (William Friedkin)
Public Enemies: America's Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-34 (Bryan Burrough)
If They Move . . . Kill 'Em!: The Life and Times of Sam Peckinpah (David Weddle)
Lee Marvin: Point Blank (Dwayne Epstein)
re-read
True Grit (Charles Portis) -- read this shortly before the Coens film came out... on revisit, probably bumped it into my all time top 10. Most authentic and wonderful voice of a narrator ever.
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Post by stephen on Dec 30, 2020 2:31:52 GMT
4. Deliverance (James Dickey) Have you read To the White Sea yet? For my money, that is Dickey's best literary offering. The Coens were wanting to adapt it a decade or so ago with Brad Pitt, and having read their script adaptation, it would've been monumental. I do still hold out hope that they do it in the future, but it's gonna require someone age-appropriate with gravitas and a real intense presence. |
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Post by DeepArcher on Dec 30, 2020 4:12:32 GMT
Don't keep track of my reading as much as I do other media and I didn't read as much as I would've liked this year, but off the top of my head:
East of Eden, Steinbeck
Moby-Dick, Melville
The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen
Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead, Olga Tokarczuk
The Buried Giant, Kazuo Ishiguro
The Dispossessed, Ursula Le Guin
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Post by Sharbs on Dec 30, 2020 4:18:55 GMT
loved
Underworld (Dom DeLillo)
Dune (Frank Herbert)
really liked
The Devil All the Time (Donald Ray Pollock)
The Shining Girls (Lauren Beukes)
The Turn of the Screw (Henry James)
Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI (David Grann)
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Post by notacrook on Dec 30, 2020 14:31:48 GMT
For an English Lit university student, my reading levels had shockingly deteriorated in the last few years. One of the few positives of the (many) lockdowns this year has been that I've really got back into my reading, and rediscovered why it was one of my greatest passions.
Top favourites in a rough order:
Carol, Patricia Highsmith
Wild, Cheryl Strayed
Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
Trainspotting, Irvine Welsh
Normal People & Conversations with Friends, Sally Rooney
Gifted, Nikita Lalwani
1984, George Orwell
The Devil All the Time, Donald Ray Pollock
I intend to continue the reading hot streak into next year. Priorities are to tackle Infinite Jest, Gravity's Rainbow, Wuthering Heights and whatever books are thrown my way in the next semesters of uni.
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Post by Viced on Dec 30, 2020 15:11:26 GMT
4. Deliverance (James Dickey) Have you read To the White Sea yet? For my money, that is Dickey's best literary offering. The Coens were wanting to adapt it a decade or so ago with Brad Pitt, and having read their script adaptation, it would've been monumental. I do still hold out hope that they do it in the future, but it's gonna require someone age-appropriate with gravitas and a real intense presence. Not yet... but I put it pretty high on my list after finishing Deliverance. Will most likely tackle it in 2021. And I had no clue the Coens were interested in adapting it... now I'm even more intrigued. |
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Post by stephen on Dec 30, 2020 16:08:41 GMT
Have you read To the White Sea yet? For my money, that is Dickey's best literary offering. The Coens were wanting to adapt it a decade or so ago with Brad Pitt, and having read their script adaptation, it would've been monumental. I do still hold out hope that they do it in the future, but it's gonna require someone age-appropriate with gravitas and a real intense presence. Not yet... but I put it pretty high on my list after finishing Deliverance. Will most likely tackle it in 2021. And I had no clue the Coens were interested in adapting it... now I'm even more intrigued. The script is readily available online for comparison, if you get your hands on the novel. I think you're gonna love it. |
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Post by Mattsby on Dec 30, 2020 20:52:50 GMT
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Post by stephen on Dec 30, 2020 21:46:06 GMT
Some generous soul put together a list of upcoming horrors.... Haven't heard of these writers except Stephen King who has a new one called Later (by the great Hard Case Crime imprint) out March 2nd. J.F. Dubeau is an excellent writer. A God in the Shed was one of my favorite reads of 2019. And if you've never heard of Stephen Graham Jones, you need to do a deep dive -- the man is gifted. |
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Post by Tommen_Saperstein on Dec 30, 2020 23:04:08 GMT
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Betty Smith (this one really got me) Pride & Prejudice, Jane Austen Between the World and Me, Ta-Nehisi Coates Catch and Kill, Ronan Farrow Stamped from the Beginning, Ibram X. Kendi Front Row at the Trump Show, Jonathan Karl The Devil in the White City, Erik Larson (first read of the year) In Cold Blood, Truman Capote ReadListened to 24 books this year, and most of that was over the last 5 months (thanks Overdrive!). Next year I'm most looking forward to reading Outlander. Watched all five seasons of the show this past year and fell head over heels despite the flaws. I cannot wait to get into the books. The first one alone is pretty massive and I think there's 7 so that will be the first step in a long journey. Also looking forward to reading more Trump books, more Austen, and Obama's A Promised Land. as far as unreleased books, one that's caught my attention is Laurie Elizabeth Flynn's The Girls Are All So Nice Here, coming out in March. Described as a "shocking psychological thriller about ambition, toxic friendship, and deadly desire." Top Goodreads review: "Holy cow, there are mean girls and then there is this..." Color me intrigued! also lots of interesting nonfiction coming out next year. Could've sworn Kendi had another historical book coming out but can't find anything about it now. Anyways, there's that Bill Gates climate change book and a book about capital punishment (oft-overlooked topic) called Let the Lord Sort Them by journalist Maurice Chammah that I'm definitely keeping my eyes on.
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Post by Tommen_Saperstein on Dec 30, 2020 23:19:18 GMT
obviously can't wait for the inevitable tidal wave of post-election Trump books.
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Post by jimmalone on Dec 31, 2020 10:59:43 GMT
I've read about 70 books for the first time in 2020.
Those were my favourites (in no special order).
Top 5
Marcel Proust - A la recherche du Temps perdu
Jose Saramago - The Stone Raft
Jane Austen - Persuasion
John Steinbeck - East of Eden
Jaume Cabre - L'ombre de l'eunuque
Five more
Georges Simenon - Maigret Afraid
Kenzaburo Oe - The Tower of Treatment
Tad Williams - Empire of Grass
Ivo Andric - The Bridge on the Drina
Henryk Sienkiewicz - Quo Vadis?
HM:
Kobo Abe - Woman in the Dunes
Jorge Semprun - Twenty Years and One Day
Michael Connelly - Late Show
As for 2021, I've about 20 novels in my bookshelf right now, waiting to be read. Some of my most anticipated among them to be read:
Joseph Conrad - The Shadow Line
two more Maigret novels by Georges Simenon
Walter Scott - Ivanhoe
Graham Greene - Ministry of Fear
George Eliot - Silas Marner
Philip Roth - The Plot Against America
Fyodor Dostoevsky - The Raw Youth
Yasunari Kawabata - Snow Country
Jonathan Franzens new novel "Crossroads" is said to come out this year. Highly anticipating this.
As well as Michael Connelly's "Night Team".
Also will continue to read Martha Grimes' Inspector Jury books.
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Post by wilcinema on Dec 31, 2020 11:39:07 GMT
Top 10 books I read in 2020:
1. A tale of poor lovers (Vasco Pratolini): A spellbinding tale of love and freedom in the backdrop of an increasingly fascist Florence in the late 1920s.
2. Accabadora (Michela Murgia): The unforgettable story of a post-war Sardinian town, where a woman helps people to their sweet deaths when they are beyond help.
3. And the band played on: politics, people and the AIDS epidemic (Randy Shilts): The investigation of what was and what was NOT done to avoid the most lethal epidemic of the 20th century. It is rightfully full of rage against the Reagan administration and the city of New York.
4. My name is Light (Elsa Osorio): A moving novel set during the years of the Argentine dictatorship, where political opponents were abducted and disappeared only to never be seen again. It is marvelous and full of magnificent characters.
5. The Color Purple (Alice Walker): Celie is one of the greatest characters I have ever encountered.
6. Of Mice And Men (John Steinbeck): I was crying like a baby during the ending.
7. Memories from the Underground (Fyodor Dostoevskij): Dostoevskij had the innate ability to fuck with your head by saying things no one ever even dared to think.
8. Ithaca forever - Penelope Speaks (Luigi Malerba): Remember Odyssey, when Ulysses is back in Ithaca and Penelope doesnt recognize him? Forget that, according to Malerba, she does, and she has A LOT to say to him. This is Penelope at her greatest.
9. The night in Lisbon (Erich Maria Remarque): What does it feel to love during the bloodiest war in the history of man? Let Mr. Schwarz tell you about it, and let him move you to tears.
10. Misery (Stephen King): 480 pages with only two characters, and they are engrossing, scary, endearing, entertaining. Stephen King has rarely been better than this.
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Post by jimmalone on Dec 31, 2020 12:49:33 GMT
Top 10 books I read in 2020: 1. A tale of poor lovers ( Vasco Pratolini): A spellbinding tale of love and freedom in the backdrop of an increasingly fascist Florence in the late 1920s. 2. Accabadora ( Michela Murgia): The unforgettable story of a post-war Sardinian town, where a woman helps people to their sweet deaths when they are beyond help. 3. And the band played on: politics, people and the AIDS epidemic ( Randy Shilts): The investigation of what was and what was NOT done to avoid the most lethal epidemic of the 20th century. It is rightfully full of rage against the Reagan administration and the city of New York. 4. My name is Light ( Elsa Osorio): A moving novel set during the years of the Argentine dictatorship, where political opponents were abducted and disappeared only to never be seen again. It is marvelous and full of magnificent characters. 5. The Color Purple ( Alice Walker): Celie is one of the greatest characters I have ever encountered. 6. Of Mice And Men ( John Steinbeck): I was crying like a baby during the ending. 7. Memories from the Underground ( Fyodor Dostoevskij): Dostoevskij had the innate ability to fuck with your head by saying things no one ever even dared to think. 8. Ithaca forever - Penelope Speaks ( Luigi Malerba): Remember Odyssey, when Ulysses is back in Ithaca and Penelope doesnt recognize him? Forget that, according to Malerba, she does, and she has A LOT to say to him. This is Penelope at her greatest. 9. The night in Lisbon ( Erich Maria Remarque): What does it feel to love during the bloodiest war in the history of man? Let Mr. Schwarz tell you about it, and let him move you to tears. 10. Misery ( Stephen King): 480 pages with only two characters, and they are engrossing, scary, endearing, entertaining. Stephen King has rarely been better than this. Those 2 novels at the top of your list as well as My Name is Light (I've heard about that one before) look very intriguing to me. Thanks for recommendation.
And boy, you were not the only one crying at Of Mice and Men. Such a heartbreaking book.
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Post by wilcinema on Dec 31, 2020 13:14:48 GMT
Top 10 books I read in 2020: 1. A tale of poor lovers ( Vasco Pratolini): A spellbinding tale of love and freedom in the backdrop of an increasingly fascist Florence in the late 1920s. 2. Accabadora ( Michela Murgia): The unforgettable story of a post-war Sardinian town, where a woman helps people to their sweet deaths when they are beyond help. 3. And the band played on: politics, people and the AIDS epidemic ( Randy Shilts): The investigation of what was and what was NOT done to avoid the most lethal epidemic of the 20th century. It is rightfully full of rage against the Reagan administration and the city of New York. 4. My name is Light ( Elsa Osorio): A moving novel set during the years of the Argentine dictatorship, where political opponents were abducted and disappeared only to never be seen again. It is marvelous and full of magnificent characters. 5. The Color Purple ( Alice Walker): Celie is one of the greatest characters I have ever encountered. 6. Of Mice And Men ( John Steinbeck): I was crying like a baby during the ending. 7. Memories from the Underground ( Fyodor Dostoevskij): Dostoevskij had the innate ability to fuck with your head by saying things no one ever even dared to think. 8. Ithaca forever - Penelope Speaks ( Luigi Malerba): Remember Odyssey, when Ulysses is back in Ithaca and Penelope doesnt recognize him? Forget that, according to Malerba, she does, and she has A LOT to say to him. This is Penelope at her greatest. 9. The night in Lisbon ( Erich Maria Remarque): What does it feel to love during the bloodiest war in the history of man? Let Mr. Schwarz tell you about it, and let him move you to tears. 10. Misery ( Stephen King): 480 pages with only two characters, and they are engrossing, scary, endearing, entertaining. Stephen King has rarely been better than this. Those 2 novels at the top of your list as well as My Name is Light look very intriguing to me. Thanks for recommendation.
And boy, you were not the only one crying at Of Mice and Men. Such a heartbreaking book.
I read Accabadora in one sitting (it helps that its only 170 pages). It really transports you to 1950s Sardinia. |
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Post by Mattsby on Feb 2, 2021 19:01:39 GMT
www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/ethan-hawke-narrates-a-bright-ray-of-darkness-exclusive A Bright Ray of Darkness by Ethan Hawke, out today Feb 2. He also did the audiobook. It's about a movie star working on a theater production of Henry IV amid a highly publicized affair that's already ruined his marriage. Sounds very Hawke-ish. Can't say Hawke doesn't stay busy... He finished shooting the Abel Ferrara a few weeks ago, is mid rehearsals of a zoom show of Waiting for Godot, press-tour for the book, and starts shooting a horror this month too. What the !
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Post by Mattsby on Jul 19, 2021 19:45:00 GMT
Brand new edition of The Total Filmmaker by Jerry Lewis available to buy now at an affordable price and with a preface by Nicolas Cage (!!!), it's a very beloved book by some/many that's been forever hard to find or just too expensive, but not anymore baby! Also coming out sometime this fall, for the Columbo of us, a deeply researched book that takes you thru the production of, apparently, every single episode....   |
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Post by Tommen_Saperstein on Jul 19, 2021 22:07:39 GMT
obviously can't wait for the inevitable tidal wave of post-election Trump books. annnd right on cue...  |
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