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What would you guys recommend if I'm looking for books that are similar in theme/tone/atmosphere to the HBO series Carnivale? I've already read Bradbury's Something Wicked This Way Comes -- which I loving love and would recommend in turn to anybody interested in a tale of good and evil played out against a carnival backdrop in a small town in the 1950s -- and I've got Carl-Johan Vallgren's Horrific Sufferings of the Mind-Reading Monster Hercules Barefoot: His Wonderful Love and His Terrible Hatred ordered from Inter-Library Loan (more old time carnival/freakshow doings). Any more books like this, or (even better) dealing with the "evil preacher who quotes the Bible while being evil" side of the Carnivale story? I'm really interested in stories that treat this kind of character seriously (not cartoonishly). Like, a good example would be in Faulkner's Light in August: Joe Christmas' foster father, who was extremely ascetic, stern, abusive, and uses the Bible to justify his mistreatment of Joe. He's not a minister, but that's all right...he's got the "scary religious zealot" part down cold. (I've already read The Hunchback of Notre Dame, but a character like Claude Frollo would also fit the bill...just as long as he's not treated comically.) Thanks!
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Feb 10, 2010 00:19
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Rabbit Hill posted:Any more books like this, or (even better) dealing with the "evil preacher who quotes the Bible while being evil" side of the Carnivale story? I'm really interested in stories that treat this kind of character seriously (not cartoonishly). Like, a good example would be in Faulkner's Light in August: Joe Christmas' foster father, who was extremely ascetic, stern, abusive, and uses the Bible to justify his mistreatment of Joe. He's not a minister, but that's all right...he's got the "scary religious zealot" part down cold.
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Mar 8, 2010 17:07
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Facial Fracture posted:Matthew Lewis's The Monk and Aldous Huxley's Devils of Loudon seem obvious choices. He wasn't quite "evil" or fictional, but you might find Savonarola interesting--apocalypse talk, book burning, Borgias, pope troubles, execution, good stuff. 7 y.o. bitch posted:J K Huysmans' La Bas features an intense portrait of Catholic Satanism in late 19th-century Paris. It also features a psychological/theological biography of Bluebeard, the infamous feudal child murderer. There's also some great aesthetic discussions, the sorts that Huysmans is famous for. Awesome. I've read The Monk (and loved it  ), but none of the others -- thank you!
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Mar 8, 2010 21:53
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doctor iono posted:I've read a lot of the "Ask me about being/working in a mental institution" threads, and they were interesting, but what are some good non-fiction works on the subject? From the perspective of patient or worker, it doesn't matter to me, I'm just fascinated by the institutions themselves, and their operations. I read it years ago, so I can't tell you about it in more detail, I'm afraid, but it was really interesting, and there is quite a bit of info about what it was like to live (and work) in a mental hospital.
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Jun 6, 2010 02:06
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I'm looking for a good biography of George Washington, one that is heavy on the details regarding his personal life (and personality or psychology) and lighter on the "Washington as military strategist/politician" kind of stuff. For an example of what I don't want, this is taken from a review of Joseph Ellis' His Excellency: George Washington: quote:The book is fairly short and is written at a bird's-eye view, mostly lacking in the kind of human detail that I usually enjoy in a biography. It left me hungry for more details: I wanted to know more about his personal experience during that winter at Valley Forge; I wanted to know more about his relationship with Martha, and perhaps it's petty, but I wanted to know more about his teeth. An example of something that would fit my bill re: Washington is Horace Porter's Campaigning with Grant, which is (duh) about Ulysses S. Grant, written by his aide de camp. There's plenty of info about Grant's military decisions, but it's also a portrait of Grant as a man, with lots of detail about his relationships with his family and friends, what his personal habits and quirks were, the fact that he was tone deaf and could only recognize two songs (he said "One is 'Yankee Doodle' and the other isn't")...things of that nature. So, a book like that, but about Washington.
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Jul 5, 2010 00:00
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jimcunningham posted:Could someone recommend a good crime drama book? Not like 'Lovely Bones', something along the lines of HBO's 'The Wire'.
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Jul 25, 2010 04:47
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Magnetic North posted:I am looking for advice as for what books to read to shore up my literacy a bit. I'm looking for somewhat philosophical works, but preferably novels since I want this to be a leisure activity. Nothing too academic or dry though I can manage that, but also nothing too postmodern and intentionally obfuscating weak ideas with inanity. That drives me crazy.
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Aug 10, 2010 04:35
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Lamquin posted:I recently picked up and read The Deed of Paksenarrion by Elizabeth Moon. It is a story about how a young female joins a mercenary band in a fantasy setting. I really loved it.
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Jan 31, 2011 20:59
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Actie posted:I am taking a trip to Russia in a few weeks. This is a result not of some lifelong fascination with the country (though I happen to be of Russian extraction) but of opportunism—I have the vacation days, a friend to stay with, and a cheap ticket.
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Mar 29, 2011 17:13
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This is a long shot, but does anyone have any suggestions about where to start with the books of Iris Murdoch? Preferably not a book whose main plot is focused on a love triangle or more? I've already tried and given up on The Unicorn, so not that. 
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May 3, 2011 17:53
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Jesus H. Christ posted:So a friend has a birthday coming and she wants/needs books. Right now she's into...well, I guess post-apocalyptic. She just read The Hunger Games and Pretties, so that's the level of reading and setting she's into. She might like Meg Rosoff's How I Live Now -- a Young Adult novel set in a future England during a time when an unnamed power invades the UK and everyone has to kick into survival mode. Or Steven Amsterdam's Things We Didn't See Coming, a collection of related short stories about the apocalypse as caused by the Y2K bug, set from New Years Eve 1999 to ~30 years into the future, following a single narrator and his family as they survive. This one's not marketed as YA, but it's basically the same writing level.
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May 17, 2011 19:25
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PureRok posted:Does anyone know any good books about Abrahamic angels and demons? Basically books talking about/listing them all and going into detail about them. I find that stuff really interesting and I would love to have a collection of books on the subject. This is old, but PureRok, if you're still out there, Sophy Burnham's The Book of Angels, while being kind of new-agey in a lot of places, has a big section in which she lists and describes all the angels mentioned in Christian, Jewish, and Islamic scripture, and the beliefs involving them. Transistor Rhythm posted:I'm looking for what I'd describe as An adult version of Little House on the Prairie - that is, an engaging and even homey narrative that presents an accurate picture of frontier life but doesn't shy away from adult concerns. I could even live with obsessively accurate and researched fiction - I'd just like to see that whole thing from the adult perspective. While not nearly as large in scope as the Little House series, I recently read Molly Gloss' The Jump-Off Creek, which might fit your bill. It's set in Oregon during the pioneer days and is told in the form of the diary of a single pioneer woman managing her own homestead by herself. The author did a lot of research and used the journals from her own family members for a foundation of the story, and the writing style is very spare but puts a lot of detail into the day-to-day chores and such of eking out a living in harsh conditions. Edit: Some of the Amazon reviews make it sound like a romance novel, but it's not. Rabbit Hill fucked around with this message at 15:50 on Aug 18, 2011 |
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Aug 18, 2011 15:47
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Scrubber, you could also check out Stephen R. Donaldson's Mordant's Need series (there are only two books -- The Mirror of Her Dreams and A Man Rides Through). Lots of political maneuvering and the magic is limited to mirrors that take you to different worlds.
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Oct 20, 2011 14:40
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ShutteredIn posted:The New York trilogy is fantastic. Every other (2 or 3) Auster I've tried has been horrible. This is my take on Auster, too. The New York trilogy (esp. Ghosts) made me fall in love with him as an author. Other older works of his (say, written in the 1980s) aren't as good but are still worth reading -- In the Country of Last Things in particular is pretty good. But all of his newer stuff is dreck, and worse, repetitive dreck. I keep reading him because he's like an abusive boyfriend I can't quit (a really tedious abusive boyfriend who has the same fights over and over again), but don't be like me. Stick to his older work. And anyone who wants to read a novel set in England should take a look at Michel Faber's The Crimson Petal and the White.
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Nov 1, 2011 01:48
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Mikaelomo posted:Haha she does love Jane Austen books, but her favorite book is Jane Eyre. I feel like an idiot. There are very similar right? She might like Valerie Martin's Mary Reilly, which is a retelling of the Jekyll and Hyde story from the point of view of his maid (much better book than it sounds), or Jonatha Ceely's Mina, about a young Irish girl during the Famine times who disguises herself as a boy and goes to work in the kitchen of a Great House. They both have a similar "young humble female protagonist who lives in repressive circumstances but has a rich inner life meets an older intriguing man" vibe to them that reminded me of the dynamic in Jane Eyre. Also, The Monk is a hilarious and worthy book in its own right but if someone loves Jane Eyre for the strong female protagonist and the romance, The Monk might disappoint since it doesn't have any of that. (What it does have is...hoo boy. Wiki summary)
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Feb 23, 2012 19:28
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Schofferhofer posted:Need good books on: Bloody Sunday -- Peter Pringle's and Philip Jacobson's Those Are Real Bullets is a good place to start. Don Mullan's Eyewitness Bloody Sunday is a collection of over 500 eyewitness statements that had been ignored by the original inquiry into the massacre, and is also worth reading as a reference. Don Mullan was 15 and present at the rally (he is the boy on the far right of this picture), and he co-produced the 2002 film Bloody Sunday (dir. Paul Greengrass), which you should see if you're interested in this topic and if you haven't already. Also, just FYI, a new inquiry was opened in 1998 and closed in 2010 (called the Saville Inquiry -- you can find the entire report online and see all the evidence and testimony here), and it determined that every victim had been innocent of wrongdoing and was shot unjustifiably. (Wiki article) Edit yet again: Actually, if you read the principle conclusions of the Saville Inquiry, you get a ton of great information not only on the massacre but on the political and social climate of the city at the time and the events leading up to the massacre, all laid out fairly clearly and succinctly, with maps and everything. I'd start there. Last edit: I wrote library resource guide on Bloody Sunday a couple of years ago (I work in a library), so if you want any more recommendations you're welcome to PM me. Rabbit Hill fucked around with this message at 20:37 on Feb 29, 2012 |
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Feb 29, 2012 20:14
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I'm looking for two specific books I had checked out from the library months ago without getting very far. 1) Set in medieval times, about a brother and sister who are traveling in a boat with the relics of a saint. The protagonist is possibly a monk traveling with them, and there's, like, a mysterious air of mystery around the siblings, like they're not who they say they are or something. 2) Set in Victorian London, the main character is a young prostitute who starts working for a mysterious man who may be robbing graves to steal corpses for his studies. It was published a few years before The Crimson Petal and the White, and just like The Crimson Petal, the first chapter of the book is narrated by the book itself, telling the reader to pay attention to this girl. The book was written by a woman with three names (like "Marion Zimmer Bradley"), and I think her last name begins with a G or H. Gillman? Hellman? Hiller? Something like that? These two books might be written by the same person.
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Jul 3, 2012 19:26
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Rabbit Hill posted:I'm looking for two specific books I had checked out from the library months ago without getting very far. Quoting myself because I found the answer, in case anyone is curious. Book #1 was A Stolen Tongue, and #2 was The Dress Lodger, both by Sheri Holman. Edit: Wuxi, if you're down with reading YA novels, Kristin Cashore's Graceling and to some extent the next book in the series, Fire, fit your bill. Check out the YA thread here for synopses, etc. For God Mode, coincidentally, they're also both about strong female warrior women. Also, any book by Margaret Atwood. They're not about warrior women, but all of her protagonists are active, dynamic women who take care of themselves. The Robber Bride at one point explicitly addresses the "needs a man to rescue her" trope, since the book is a twist on the fairytale "The Robber Bridegroom." Rabbit Hill fucked around with this message at 21:19 on Jul 12, 2012 |
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Jul 11, 2012 13:13
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I'm looking for a good (substantive, well-researched) Western or pioneer novel with a woman as the main character. Something along the lines of Molly Gloss' The Jump Off Creek, Karen Fisher's A Sudden Country, Mildred Walker's The Curlew's Cry -- basically anything set in the West or during pioneer days or on a ranch in scrub-brush country, set during the horse-and-buggy days (be that 1710 or 1910), about a woman or women, that is not a Romance novel. My library seems to be full of Western novels about women, but they're all things like this, which is not my bag. (I mean, there can be romance involved, but I'd prefer it to be understated and in the background, not the main plot. And not lame.) Or think Louis L'Amour or Zane Grey, but about women. Riders of the Purple Sage actually would fit the bill, too, but...I've already read that. I haven't read all of Zane Grey's books, though -- maybe he has another with a woman at the forefront?
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Sep 28, 2012 13:52
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Rabbit Hill posted:I'm looking for a good (substantive, well-researched) Western or pioneer novel with a woman as the main character. Something along the lines of Molly Gloss' The Jump Off Creek, Karen Fisher's A Sudden Country, Mildred Walker's The Curlew's Cry -- basically anything set in the West or during pioneer days or on a ranch in scrub-brush country, set during the horse-and-buggy days (be that 1710 or 1910), about a woman or women, that is not a Romance novel. My library seems to be full of Western novels about women, but they're all things like this, which is not my bag. (I mean, there can be romance involved, but I'd prefer it to be understated and in the background, not the main plot. And not lame.) Bumping this because there have to be some decent Western novels with female protagonists. They can't all be Romance novels!
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Oct 8, 2012 20:02
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I'm looking for a book that's basically The Walking Dead without the zombies. I've been binging on the show lately and love the way the characters grow and change as they survive together, but don't really care about the zombie premise. So basically, a novel featuring a disparate group of strangers that are forced together by circumstance and have to band together for survival in a hostile environment. Post-apocalypse-era is cool but optional; they could also be stranded on an island, or pioneers across early America, or survivors of a concentration camp trying to walk home across war-torn Europe (like Primo Levi's La Tregua/The Reawakening, or the book/movie The Way Back about escapees from a Soviet gulag), or whatever. Scavenging for food, living in dire circumstances, dealing with each other's strengths and weaknesses as they keep death at bay, that sort of thing. Well-written female characters that aren't just love interests a big plus.
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Dec 7, 2012 03:22
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funkybottoms posted:I seem to bring this up a lot, but, Earth Abides. Heh, actually, I tried reading that book a couple of years ago and gave up after ~100 pages  (I wrote about my problems with it in the Books You Couldn't Get Through thread.)But that kind of story is along the lines of what I'm looking for!
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Dec 7, 2012 04:11
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dream owl posted:Off the top of my head, Mary Doria Russell's The Sparrow or Ann Patchett's Bel Canto (emphasis on the former). Also Watership Down is kinda like this, if you're into bunnies. Do Not Resuscitate posted:I highly recommend War Trash by Ha Jin. It's pretty much what you're looking for and it won the PEN/Faulkner Award and was a Pulitzer Prize finalist. Thanks, I'll check these out! Earth Abides had a great premise but lost a lot by having a cardboard protagonist who barely reacted to the devastation around him.
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Dec 7, 2012 14:28
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I'm looking for a fiction writer who writes consistently writes really good, really short (under 5 pages) short stories. I'm interested in seeing what talented writers can do in such a limited space. Genre doesn't really matter per se, but I'd rather read, uh, "literary" fiction than scifi or other genre work.
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Jun 26, 2015 19:15
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Thanks, that was fast! I'll look for all three.
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Jun 27, 2015 01:34
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mcustic posted:Try this one as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniil_Kharms Yessssss, that's what I'm looking for! Going to the library tonight. E: Wait, and he's Russian and a surrealist? I'm already in love.
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Jun 29, 2015 14:40
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