Topic: Nintendo Life Book Club

I read a book about the role of the plastic/chemical industry in East Germany as a means of propaganda, ideological pragmaticism, national pride, etc. It offered some decent food for thought but a lot of it is about as dry as one would expect. Still worth reading if you have the same kind of brain that draws me to these kind of niche cultural studies. I ordered a kitschy rooster-shaped plastic eggcup off ebay and, appropriately, it broke during transit because of how low quality and brittle their consumer goods tended to be.

Otherwise I'm reading White Noise for a third time, and just started Blackshirts and Reds. My new job has me back at graveyard shift hours (fulltime) so I'm trying to get back into the habit of reading instead of coming home to play PS2 games until I pass out. Everything in moderation.

reading a couple of books this month

the third book of the Shadow Trilogy the original sequel to the Willow movie
Murder of Willie Lincoln. an odd alternate history fiction book i got from the dollar tree store recently
and the new Star Wars Return of the Jedi From a Certain Point of View hardcover book

so I bought into the hype XD

I've had an on-and-off interest in trying out Scott Pilgrim for the longest while now, though never acted upon it for one reason or another (I was too young to properly appreciate them, I went off reading for a very long time; that kind of thing). However, with the recent trailer for the Netflix anime adaptation looking as fantastic as it is, my curiosity has been fully reignited and, after finding them for a great deal at a local bookstore, I finally took the plunge and grabbed as many as I could find.

Going to be starting Vol.1 either tomorrow or the day after and god: I absolutely cannot WAIT.

(also yes I'm aware I'm missing 2 and 4; the store I went to didn't have them in stock but I've already got another shop ready to go in a week's time 😁)

My backpack has junior novels based on "Luca", "Turning Red", "Raya and the Last Dragon" and "Elemental", plus a metal bookmark.

This is technically below my reading level but more so just for leisure because I still enjoy reading:

Tales Of A Sixth Grade Muppet. 4 part book series. Reading the first book downstairs~ 🤣

images upload

I'm also still reading the Mother Angelica book series~ 🤣👍 I'm between: Praying With Mother Angelica (Half way through) & Mother Angelica God, His Home & His Angels (On page 70)~ 🤷‍♀️✌️

@Moomin

I found a historical drama on China documented in the early 1900's. Look up on youtube: The Legendary Tavern. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLTB73Ibi_X3G5H4XSzrIG_Fy-3...

It's 46 episodes. I watched the whole drama a while back & loved it. Anything on history, documentaries, or the renaissance era for me~ 🤣 As for book reading that's a mix bag~ 🤷‍♀️✌️

Happy Reading! (^_^)

I might check that out, cheers. China is fascinating.

New stuff:
A Gathering of Old Men
The New Spirit of Capitalism
Living in the End Times
Emily Wilson's translation of Homer's Odyssey

@Fizza I can’t remember when exactly I started reading them (it was around volume 3-5 maybe) but it was described to me as an indie-punk guy plays video games and fights a lot so I picked them up and then having to wait a long year for the last volume to finally come out. It’s probably the best use “makes a lot of references” story going, you read something like Ready Player One and it’s just like it is vomiting references for the sake of it (and a lot of times uses them against the ideas they represent) whilst Scott Pilgrim feels like the bands and games that get mentioned are interwoven into the characters lives.

I’ve been thinking about double dipping and buying the coloured versions.

@jump I just finished the 1st one in a single day earlier this week and was instantly hooked; the artstyle is really nice, it establishes a ton of things in a very digestible way and the writing/characters so far has been top-notch. It definitely feels like it ended a bit too quickly for my taste (I was really starting to get into it right around the end of Vol. 1) but I suppose that's what the other books are for XD

but yeah: loved SP1 and I cannot WAIT to binge the rest of the series before the Netflix series comes out (bought the two books I was missing the nanosecond I finished Vol. 1 at that XD)

I'm really excited for the NYRB translation of Chevengur. Platonov is the non-antisemitic, antifascist version of Solzhenitsyn. The Foundation Pit comes highly recommended, if you don't mind relentless bleakness (but it;s in no way nihilistic).

I'm toying with the idea of reading every Don DeLillo novel. Part sunken cost fallacy, part because I think when DeLillo is good he's really good. I've already read White Noise (twice), Mao II, Cosmopolis, Underworld, Point Omega, End Zone, and some of Libra.

@moomin
I've only read White Noise, which I enjoyed, but found slight. Reminded me a bit of Tom McCarthy (or the other way round).
However, I remember a friend reading Underworld when it came out and it nearly drove her mad.
That's kind of put me off reading anything else by him.

I'm sure you've mentioned the Foundation Put before - will have to check that out.

One of the things that I find sad about late 19c / early 20c novels is the casual antisemitism, which is why I found Proust so surprising on that front, considering the milieu he writes about

There's an unfortunate number of otherwise intelligent modernist writers who endorsed fascism and/or antisemitism, Ezra Pound and TS Eliot among them iirc. Both were American expats so go figure. I guess it's to be expected from such a volatile historical era.

If anything it just makes writers like Fallada and Zweig more heroic.

I wish I could comment on this, I love reading but the most high society book I've read is Runaway Jury https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Runaway_Jury

@TheSaneInsanity don’t worry, it’s the book club, not the book snob society.

@TheSaneInsanity I think you’re using the term High Society wrong as reading thinky-wordy books isn’t confined to posh folk, the poor can read and write wordy-thinky books too.

In any case why not both? There’s plenty of room for both wordy-thinky books and dumb fun escapism. It’s boring to just confine yourself into one without indulging in the other. As with most things it’s about finding the authors that click with you so if Kafka doesn’t work out for you then try Margaret Atwood or Virginia Woolf, Thomas Mann or Haruki Murakami or Kurt Vonnegut etc.

@TheSaneInsanity You might like John le Carré if you're into Grisham. He sticks mostly to spy novels but they can enjoyed on multiple levels (casually or literary)

I often find myself disappointed rereading Vonnegut novels (Breakfast of Champions suuuuucks) but he got me into 'heavy' literature in high school so I'm very grateful for that.

I'm thinking about picking up one of the novels you recced, I've done nothing but read internet published stories for the past 5 years, and I think it's time for a change of pace.

Talking of fan fiction, there’s a book called For Love And Bylines. It started out as Star Wars fanfic of shipping Rey and Kyle Ren in a 90s romcom trope of Never Been Kissed but they have since scribbled out their names and setting to be an original work. I’m curious about it but don’t think I can be arsed to read it as I’ve got a long list of books to read as it is.

Anyway I’m reading A Night In The Lonesome October by Roger Zelazny at the moment. I would say I’m reading it for insight on the human condition or for it’s rich themes and subtext but really I picked it up as the protagonist is Jack The Ripper’s dog.