-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
What are you reading? (January 2015)
- Thread starter Maklershed
- Start date
sparky2112
Member
When an author is going to sell in the millions, what's the point in working over the manuscript to any significant degree? Correct spelling and grammar and ship it! Certain genres (fantasy, primarily) have a built-in disincentive with regard to edits - readers expect/want/demand doorstops.
But, yes, I know what you're saying. Heck, authors who achieve a certain level of success can even get 'no edit' clauses in their contracts. Not coincidentally, that's when quality usually takes a permanent vacation (see: Tom Clancy, for instance).
Tragicomedy
Member
Guys, I found a picture of Mumei reading in the wild. Osmosis works.
Well, I do read quickly, but consistency is as important.
Have you read Sanderson's series before?
Finished reading the Proposed Roads to Freedom by Bertrand Russell which while incredibly outdated in light of the advancements we've made in society. The hard questions Russell asks about what a alternative world to capitalism would look like from a Syndicalist, Anarchist or Socialist perspective are still just as relevant today. What I particularly love about the book, is Russell never gives into a status quo despite his criticism, there's this sense of optimism pervading the text that a another world truly is possible, we just have to maintain some healthy skepticism towards the alternatives we do have envisioned yet not disregard them entirely but take them on their own merits and to improve upon where they falter.
Currently now reading A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn which is fucking great so far and every little piece is giving me a new perspective on American history. I'm also re-reading my favorite book of all-time A Tree Grows In Brooklyn by Betty Smith which is still as wonderful as ever.
Currently now reading A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn which is fucking great so far and every little piece is giving me a new perspective on American history. I'm also re-reading my favorite book of all-time A Tree Grows In Brooklyn by Betty Smith which is still as wonderful as ever.
Cracked out
and
The Wanting Seed drew a lot of parallels to 1984, especially the first section that I enjoyed the most. I wish it spent more time in the "population control" era, as I didn't find the rest as interesting. I couldn't tell if the main character repeatedly falling into these "wrong time wrong place" situations was some commentary on how the world can sweep you up regardless of your own actions, or just kind of lazy. It seemed a little too forced to me.
I really liked Annihilation a lot. I kept seeing it pop up in these threads, so I wanted to check it out but literally knew nothing about it and didn't even read the back of the book synopsis. Such a cool premise that actually delivered. I still have so many questions but didn't feel unsatisfied. Looking forward to the rest of the series!
and
The Wanting Seed drew a lot of parallels to 1984, especially the first section that I enjoyed the most. I wish it spent more time in the "population control" era, as I didn't find the rest as interesting. I couldn't tell if the main character repeatedly falling into these "wrong time wrong place" situations was some commentary on how the world can sweep you up regardless of your own actions, or just kind of lazy. It seemed a little too forced to me.
I really liked Annihilation a lot. I kept seeing it pop up in these threads, so I wanted to check it out but literally knew nothing about it and didn't even read the back of the book synopsis. Such a cool premise that actually delivered. I still have so many questions but didn't feel unsatisfied. Looking forward to the rest of the series!
I've heard in some places that The Hero of Ages has a pretty crazy ending, so I'm hoping it's like that GIF and a bunch of stuff builds on what previously happened to come to a good conclusion.
Also I think 850-1000 WPM is pretty fast. I think whenever I've taken a reading speed test it's around 500-600. I read from word to word rather than chunking things and I subvocalize too. From talking to a lot of other people though it seems like I still have a pretty above average reading speed.
But yes, reading consistently is really the only way you're going to read more books. Speed certainly has something to do with it, but it's not worth anything if you're not reading on a daily basis.
Also I think 850-1000 WPM is pretty fast. I think whenever I've taken a reading speed test it's around 500-600. I read from word to word rather than chunking things and I subvocalize too. From talking to a lot of other people though it seems like I still have a pretty above average reading speed.
But yes, reading consistently is really the only way you're going to read more books. Speed certainly has something to do with it, but it's not worth anything if you're not reading on a daily basis.
Tragicomedy
Member
The "average" person reads in a band between 200-400 words per minute. Mumei's speed is very, very fast.
Freeza Under The Shower
Member
Guys, I found a picture of Mumei reading in the wild. Osmosis works.
Having the ability to absorb written knowledge through skin exposure would be a great, if somewhat trippy (fucking balls, man. How do they get so round? OH GOD THERE ARE BOOKS ON THAT. yaaaay), superpower.
I've read everything Sanderson has put out. I like his stuff.
RepairmanJack
Member
Jesus, I read maybe 200 WPM. :lol
InfiniteBento
Member
I'm thinking of finally picking up 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami.
Has anyone here read it already? I'd love some more reviews on it.
Has anyone here read it already? I'd love some more reviews on it.
sparky2112
Member
I read pretty slowly - I just read a lot. I have tried for years to divide each line in half and see each half all at once. In reality, when I shift to the next line, I CAN'T see half of it, so I always end up more like 1/3, 2/3, which depending on type size, either works or doesn't. In this regard, e-readers are a godsend simply for the fact that you can jack with font size to fit your habits. I am absolutely a faster reader when I'm not dealing with a physical copy of a book.
sparky2112
Member
Previous threads are your friend. Google is actually pretty good at searching GAF too.
But tons of folks here have read it, and it seems that people either find it tedious and still end up liking it or tedious and quit early.
Tragicomedy
Member
You are normal.
Also: http://www.spritzlet.com/
Use that for web page reading and you can easily hit 500-600.
It's actually one of my favorites by Murakami, but it's slow and reflective. Some fans find it too slow, but I loved the characters, as well as what they were willing to go through.
It's one of the books I'll re-read this year.
Again, that's just how fast I read on a reading test when I try to go fast, but I'm still actually reading it (as opposed to just skimming). If I look at how quickly I'm reading War and Peace, it's more like... 400 - 500-ish. There's ~460 words / page, and I'm reading about a little under a page a minute - but part of that has to do with regularly checking the list of Principal Characters because I can't remember how two characters are related to one another, or else I'm checking the historical footnotes in the background.
It also depends on the difficulty of the material. I read Wheel of Time a lot more quickly than I read Gravity's Rainbow, for instance. War and Peace is going more slowly than Wheel of Time, but more quickly than Gravity's Rainbow... if only because I'm not finding myself reading lines or passages because of comprehension issues so much, but still.
Ah. Well, LeadProtagonist got what I meant by it.
Really? What other Murakami books are your favorites?
I finished the first two books in the 1Q84 trilogy. The first book was fantastic, however the second book, while still having some great highs, felt tedious and needed some cutting down on the fat. I planned on reading the last book after I finished my Congo book, but I got mixed up into a book exchange with Mumei, thus that book will have to wait a little bit longer.
InfiniteBento
Member
I've been going back & forth on whether or not I should pick it up but I keep finding myself wanting to read it. I figured pacing might be an issue since it is a pretty hefty book but I think I'll order it any way and give it a shot. Even better, its only $9 on Amazon.
I didn't realize it was more than 1 book within it. I'm pretty stoked.
Any others by Murakami you guys might recommend?
Also, has anyone checked out Chuck Palahniuk's newest book "Doomed"? Is it worth bothering to read?
Japan released 1Q84 as three books over time. The US version just combines all three of them. The books are like The Lord of the Rings. It continues the story where the last book left off.
My recommendations are Norwegian Wood, and Kafka on the Shore.
Murakami's latest Colorless Tsukuru is definitely worth a read, doesn't break any new-ground in terms of his work but it's a breezy read.
Other recommendations would be Norwegian wood, Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the end of the world and his short story collections like The Elephant Vanishes and Blind Willow, Sleeping Willow. From my perspective I actually think his writing works best in the short story format.
Other recommendations would be Norwegian wood, Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the end of the world and his short story collections like The Elephant Vanishes and Blind Willow, Sleeping Willow. From my perspective I actually think his writing works best in the short story format.
InfiniteBento
Member
Awesome. I will definitely check some of those out. I haven't read much this past year and definitely want to pick up on some new authors.
Share with me your favorites from this past year pls
Share with me your favorites from this past year pls
Christoff Yurievich
Member
Did you read "Damned"? Because you need to and it honestly depends on how much you liked the characters from that book. It also depends on how much you like reading blogs, because the entire book is set up as blog entries. I didn't care for it, or the characters, or really even the story itself and if I were to take it for a whole I'd give it 2.5 out of five stars. Not an impressive effort from Chuck given his past works.
And I also hate it because it's one more book that he worked on instead of a sequel to "Rant". Though maybe I don't want that, especially considering this is a sequel and isn't good.
InfiniteBento
Member
I own Damned and I couldn't finish it....I found it rather boring.
Doomed is set up like blog entries? Oh no. That sounds dreadful
I am a pretty slow reading. I'd imagine that I'd clock in somewhere between 200-300 WPM. I probably could go faster, but it just feels like I am rushing. I like slow down, read every word, and get absorbed.
Mumei, I would definitely put this on your to-read list. I am about 1/3rd of the way through and so far it is excellent. While it focuses on the new world, it also spends about 1/4th of the book discussing the historical developments of slavery and racism, mostly in the Western world, and these historical developments being actions as well as beliefs and ideas.
It is quite fascinating and the dude definitely knows his stuff. While I haven't gotten to Virginia yet, I feel that he is going to have a slightly different take than what you have said about American Freedom, American Slavery. That being, racism didnt develop out of that one act of turning poor whites against blacks, but it was a long historical process developed out of circumstances and ideas that allowed it to happen. Again, just a guess, but I have a feeling that that is where it is going.
Mumei, I would definitely put this on your to-read list. I am about 1/3rd of the way through and so far it is excellent. While it focuses on the new world, it also spends about 1/4th of the book discussing the historical developments of slavery and racism, mostly in the Western world, and these historical developments being actions as well as beliefs and ideas.
It is quite fascinating and the dude definitely knows his stuff. While I haven't gotten to Virginia yet, I feel that he is going to have a slightly different take than what you have said about American Freedom, American Slavery. That being, racism didnt develop out of that one act of turning poor whites against blacks, but it was a long historical process developed out of circumstances and ideas that allowed it to happen. Again, just a guess, but I have a feeling that that is where it is going.
But wait, that's how I'd characterize American Freedom, American Slavery. Actually, this Amazon review is a surprisingly helpful overview of the ideas in that book.
Anyway, that is actually on my list of things to read... somewhere.
Yea, I just took a wpm test to get a feel for what 400+ looks like. Mumei, I have no idea how you could read that fast and have time to reflect on what a character says, visualize an image the author is composing or just flat out get in the mood the book is conveying. That's dismissing the language impediment a translation of War and Peace must intrinsically bring along. If you told us you were blowing through Jack Reacher at that pace it would make much more sense. Not saying you read superficially, but enjoying something at that speed isn't viable for me.
But wait, that's how I'd characterize American Freedom, American Slavery. Actually, this Amazon review is a surprisingly helpful overview of the ideas in that book.
Anyway, that is actually on my list of things to read... somewhere.
Oh, I meant a historical process that has its roots in the Near East, Europe, and Africa that date back, well, since the beginning.
I am likely missing a few things, but a few key points he makes is that how slaves in America were dehumanized as child-like, beasts of burden, stupid, and content with their lot, but also vile, sexually depraved and dangerous, etc has its origins in Near East, and especially Greece (mostly Aristotle). After Islam conquered Africa, they started to penetrate Southern Africa and brought back millions of slaves. Due to previously held believes on the color black (by pretty much every culture it seems) Africans were regulated to the worst jobs for slaves. This eventually lead to the association of Africans as a group specifically suited to be slaves (due to Aristotle and the amount of slaves coming in from Africa, as well as their prejudice notions of the color black).
This thought influenced Europe through the interaction of the Moors and Spaniards. The Spaniards adopted the Moors views on slavery and race, but added a new one of their own, blood purity. Later on, Europe eventually decided that Western Europeans were not meant to be slaves. This basically meant that Europeans extended their inclusiveness and culture and shrunk the 'other' to the point where the only really viable candidate for slavery (in their eyes obviously) was the African.
Maklershed
Member
Finished The Explorer by the incomparable James Smythe! Very fun sci-fi tale. I enjoyed it quite a bit. I must know
Now starting The Little Sister
The Little Sister by Raymond Chandler
what does the anomaly number mean? And does it have a special meaning for you, whatevermort?
Now starting The Little Sister
The Little Sister by Raymond Chandler
Hard-Boiled Wonderland, Kafka on the Shore, Norwegian Wood. I like most of his stuff, though. Those are just standouts to me.
Hm. For me, it was The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Norwegian Wood, Hardboiled Wonderland, and Sputnik Sweetheart that stuck out for me. I should re-read Kafka this year. I haven't read it since 2007.
AngmarsKing701
Member
I wish I could load Kindle into this thing on my phone. Is there an app?
I havn't read Sputnik Sweetheart yet. I've got it and a few others I've missed on my "to read" list this year. 1Q84 came at a very particular time of my life, when its story of separated lovers struck a deep chord in me.
I just finished this book and it is excellent. Probably one of the best history books that I've read. It is both entertaining and extremely insightful. One of the most interesting insights was his views on the causes of the Great Depression
Kennedy states that there is actually no causal relationship between the stock market crash and The Great Depression. While it is likely a factor, several other factors are likely greater causal factors of the depression.
A significant factor was that the agricultural sector was already in deep depression during the 1920s and remained in depression until the entire economy picked back up again. This was directly a result of the war that caused a huge demand in agricultural goods that America supplied by developing previously uncultivated land and dramatically increasing the productivity of existing land by more mechanized equipment like the gasoline tractor. They achieved this by going into debt. However, after the war ended, production resumed in Europe, demand and prices drastically fell, and US farmers were left holding a gigantic surplus, huge debts, and crops that were worth a whole lot less. It created a vicious cycle of oversupply because individual farmers produced more goods to make up for the lower prices, which just caused the prices to go lower. Two decades of poverty ensued.
Banking failure was the next major factor, which surprisingly, the Stock market crash did not directly cause. The author states that this was likely a result of the rural depression and the stock market crash just kinda made it burn brighter. The main issue with the banking system was that it was a pile of shit. 500 banks failed annually during the 1920s. Thanks largely to Andrew Jackson's war on the National bank, American banking was a deregulated and spread out mess. The US had 25 thousand banks in 1929 overseen by 52 different regulatory agencies, which apparently sucked because many were extremely under capitalized since most of them were basically mom and pop stores that only had their own resources to rely on. Bank run anyone?
Apparently it is not quite known how it was started, but bank runs began to happen and they spread like wildfire. People scrambled to get their money out, and then banks scrambled to keep their liquidity by calling in loans and throwing their bond and stock porfolio on an already depressed market, which just made everything so much worse.
The next factor was the debt-repayment circle jerk caused by WWI. Basically, the Germans relied on American credit and loans to repay reparations back to England and France who then used those reparations money to pay back the United States for the loans that they took out during WWI. An easy way to fix this scenario would be for the US to forgive the war debt, but that was politically impossible. Well, the stock market crash dried up American credit, so that crucial link was broken and the whole circle-jerk ended.
Related to this was the Gold Standard, I am going to quote this since it is rather complex.
Long post, I know. I just wanted to engage with it and get it down in my own words since it is more difficult to recall what you've learned when listening to an audiobook. I'll probably do a segment on the impacts and consequences of the New Deal as well, since I think that bit was also fascinating.
Tragicomedy
Member
http://www.readmei.com
That's the "official" ePub reader for Android and iPhone, but it won't read Kindle format due to DRM. I'm going to try it out with some free classics off project Guttenberg.
Rug Monkey
Member
"God's Beard!"
Member
Reading Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer as recommended to me by Besada.
Honestly, it's pretty disappointing 2/3rds of the way in, and it gets harder to read as I go on. The character's actions and reactions don't line up with my expectations of rationality and it takes me out of the story. There's also a forced quality to the writing and it feels mired in redundancy and cliché, taking away a lot of the impact. Every page is "string of adjectives, EVENT, string of adjectives, internal monologue", and is so dry as to make the pages turn slower with every chapter.
Haruki Murakami fills his pages with dreamlike sensibility, and HP Lovecraft has stylistic confidence that places you right in the tension of the moment. All I get from Jeff Vandermeer tackling similar weirdness is a sense that he doesn't have a connection with his characters, and perhaps that he was tired of writing the story. It's so obvious as the story progresses that he has no idea what a biologist or a psychologist does, and that he's just making things up as he goes. It's really distracting, even for fantasy, to not have done your research. The central conceit of a story like this has to be surrounded by enough plausibility to not lose me instantly, and so far it's failed that test. But who knows, maybe the final act is great.
Honestly, it's pretty disappointing 2/3rds of the way in, and it gets harder to read as I go on. The character's actions and reactions don't line up with my expectations of rationality and it takes me out of the story. There's also a forced quality to the writing and it feels mired in redundancy and cliché, taking away a lot of the impact. Every page is "string of adjectives, EVENT, string of adjectives, internal monologue", and is so dry as to make the pages turn slower with every chapter.
Haruki Murakami fills his pages with dreamlike sensibility, and HP Lovecraft has stylistic confidence that places you right in the tension of the moment. All I get from Jeff Vandermeer tackling similar weirdness is a sense that he doesn't have a connection with his characters, and perhaps that he was tired of writing the story. It's so obvious as the story progresses that he has no idea what a biologist or a psychologist does, and that he's just making things up as he goes. It's really distracting, even for fantasy, to not have done your research. The central conceit of a story like this has to be surrounded by enough plausibility to not lose me instantly, and so far it's failed that test. But who knows, maybe the final act is great.
Finished reading Foundation and Empire. Didn't like it as much as the first book, but it's still Asimov so I enjoyed reading it. My main issue really is that in the first book it was mostly just space politics and trying to pit Asimov's idea of predicted future vs all the possible outcomes and so it had real exciting scenarios even if all of the outcomes always came down to "all according to plan" solutions.
This book on the other hand felt more like a space adventure for the second half at least. I mean the idea of unbeatable alien space mutant that can control humans emotions should pose an interesting challenge, but it just felt so lacklustre. Like an average Doctor Who episode. Still the last chapter did provide for a cool setup for the third Foundation book so that's something to look forward to.
On reading speed again but I find my reading speed really depends on the author and the type of book I'm reading. I find with some books, there just isn't much substance to the writing and it's more about getting the story across, so there isn't much to appreciate. And with other books I'll read a sentence, soak it in, re read it and move on. If it is that nice I'll get to the end of the page and come back to it again.
Then you get those books where speech is written in terms of accents/dialects.
Then you get those books where speech is written in terms of accents/dialects.
whatevermort
Member
I've spoken to a lot of editors who have told me about their "editor-proof" authors. People who submit and just say it's okay. It's a ridiculous practice. Nobody gets it right first time. Nobody.
Been doing a Wheel Of Time Re-read these past few months and I'm loving it as much as I was the first time although with the re-read I still enjoy this book and being a sort of cross between LOTR and ASOIAF Rand is still above and beyond my favorite character in the series with Perrin and close second.
Also knowing how everything ends is really making me dread getting to the middle of the book when the plot slows down and Robert Jordan felt to introduce 101 plot threads.
whatevermort
Member
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it. Re your spoiler:
The number doesn't mean anything as an actual number - it's more a classification. You'd have to read The Echo (which is the second book in the quartet) to learn more about what it means/stands for. (As for the number itself? It's my date of birth.)
