The identify that story/book thread: Home of the gas pump boy

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > The identify that story/book thread: Home of the gas pump boy

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

Jeece posted:

Sure looks like it! I kinda remembered there was a woman in the car with him (girlfriend/mother), screaming endlessly before/during the crash.

I was able to track the book with the info you provided me (THANKS!), seems it's a French book with original stories as well as translated ones.

Les autos sauvages (Wild Cars)

Summary:
Theodore Lockard THOMAS, Test
Philippe COUSIN, La Loi loto
Ib MELCHIOR, The racer - story that spawned Death Race 2000! I don't remember such a story in this book, but I have to read it again more than ever.
Fritz LEIBER, X marks the pedwalk
Robert F. YOUNG, Sweet tooth
Claude-Fran�ois CHEINISSE, Juliette
Christine RENARD, Mark
Roger ZELAZNY, Devil Car
Michel JEURY, Maxima la kickaha
Dino BUZZATI, Suicide au parc
Richard MATHESON, Lemmings - (I like this author, but I haven't read much of him yet)

Man I had to look that one up too, remembered it from high school. In the USA it was called Car Sinister and published by HarperCollins

# ¿ Nov 27, 2009 09:45

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# ¿ Apr 24, 2024 12:01

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

Darth Brookz posted:

When I was younger there was this book in the comedy section at bookstores about a guy who would write fake letters to people/corporations and get a real response back. One page would feature the note he wrote the other would be like a photocopy and transcript of the one he would receive back.

I've tried goggling various parts of what I posted but haven't found any clues about an author or title.

Any help is greatly appreciated!

The original and best letter hoax - by Don Novello aka Father Guido Sarducci aka Lazlo Toth
The Lazlo Letters

# ¿ Feb 14, 2011 09:23

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

The Unlife Aquatic posted:

There's an academic text on the fall of the USSR from the perspective of the average citizen and how their culture made them blind to the possibility from one of the big academic presses and I'd really like to go over it again but I can't remember the name.

Everything Was Forever, Until it Was No More by Alexei Yurchak, maybe? I'm not especially deep on Soviet history but I really enjoyed it.

# ¿ Oct 24, 2018 05:45

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

The Unlife Aquatic posted:

YES! This is it exactly. Thank you so much.

You've no idea how long I've watched this thread hoping to get to answer one!

# ¿ Oct 24, 2018 06:39

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

Rand Brittain posted:

Before I ask a favor of someone who lives in this town, I want to actually read the book he gave me 15 years ago. Unfortunately, I have forgotten what it was!

I think it was by a sort of cult 20th-century essayist, and that hitchhiking was a major theme. Outdoorsy. I think one story ended with the narrator saying “gently caress you, I just wanted a ride to <somewhere or other>?”

Name might start with a K?

On The Road, Jack Kerouac? I'd have thought almost anyone would get that one, or don't people read Kerouac anymore?

# ¿ Feb 20, 2019 02:30

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

This is weird as hell, I was watching The Fifth Element and the weird critter that Zorg has in his desk made me remember a (golden age era or just after?) SF short story in which men are getting little pink toothless sucker-mouthed alien critters (which are obviously getting sexually abused) and women are disgusted by them. I also wonder if anyone else thinks the thing in the film is a reference to the story - there are definitely a number of what seem like fond references to classic SF stories.

# ¿ Nov 4, 2019 03:04

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

Unkempt posted:

Could be "All my darling daughters" by Connie Willis. If it isn't, I apologize for bringing it up.

Haha that's it! I was ready to say no because my initial search for it turned up some manga lol. I think I read it in Alien Sex or some other collection that also had Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex in it. I would have guessed it was published before 1985 though. Thanks!

# ¿ Nov 7, 2019 01:46

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

Fly Ricky posted:

So glad we have this thread. I've been desperately searching for a book I read.

Science fiction. It details a wide-variety of extraterrestrial life forms and their development throughout the universe (some of them are incredibly bizarre and not even what we would recognize as life). Begins with the author falling into a dream, and he then goes on to explain all of these fantastical civilizations. It's quite old; I want to say it was written in the 1940s? I may be off by a decade or two, but it's definitely not anything close to modern.

I am dying to re-read this as it was on my old Kindle and I didn't back it up. One of the best sci-fi books I've ever read and Google hasn't helped at all. Doesn't show up on any "best-of" lists I can find.

Sounds a bit like Star Maker by Olaf Stapledon, published in 1937. If that's it and you like it (or if it's not but looks interesting anyway) the same author's Last and First Men is good too.

# ¿ Sep 22, 2020 12:00

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

Fly Ricky posted:

OMG that's it! Thank you with every bit of my being.

Unbelievable. I had no idea about anything else he has written either. I will dive into Last and First Men immediately after I spend all night re-reading Star Maker.

edit: I�ve been wasting time on this site for ten years and this is bar-none the best thing that�s ever come out of it. Granted, it�s a small list, but this honestly is fantastic and I love you goons.

My pleasure, so many times the quickness of the responses in this thread have astounded me, it feels good to get one on rare occasions.

# ¿ Sep 23, 2020 01:39

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

Eason the Fifth posted:

Back in 4th grade (1990) I read a young adult book about Ulysses. It started with him fighting a boar as a young man and ended with him dying as an old man on a hillside years after killing Penelope's suitors with Telemachus. It wasn't Evslin's Adventures of Ulysses but it was similar. Any idea?

I can't find a book to match the date but that sounds like a Rosemary Sutcliff kind of book, maybe look her list up?

# ¿ Apr 7, 2021 00:40

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

Data Graham posted:

Holy poo poo I just randomly remembered the title of this one, "Veronica Ganz" by Marilyn Sachs

Just bubbled up from the depths of my subconscious while I was on a meeting, wtf

Veronica Ganz doesn't wear pants!

# ¿ Apr 15, 2021 01:21

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# ¿ Apr 24, 2024 12:01

Myron Baloney: Mar 19, 2002; Emitting dimensions are swallowing you

ToxicFrog posted:

This is extremely vague to the point that it may be unanswerable, but here goes.

I recent read a shitpost about D&D plot hooks and it included this line:

and it reminded me of reading something that had basically that as a plot point -- someone is hired to find and rescue the missing princess, but is in fact the princess herself in disguise.

Where it gets super vague is that I remember basically nothing else! It was fantasy, I read it in the last 10 years and it was probably published in the last 20, and that's it -- I don't remember if it was a short story or a novel, I don't remember if the princess was acting alone or part of a larger group of adventures, if the latter I don't remember if they were aware of her identity or if it turned out to be a horrible surprise, and I can't guarantee I'm not mis-remembering other, similar plot points like "princess fakes her own kidnapping to embark on a life of adventure".

It's very close to the plot of the story "The Armiger's Daughter" Foila tells for the contest in the Pelerine's hospital in The Citadel of the Autarch, but I'm sure the idea has been used lots of times.

# ¿ Nov 1, 2021 17:39

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