BOTM POLL: OCTOBER -- VOTE FAST

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > BOTM POLL: OCTOBER -- VOTE FAST

Vote early, vote often!
	[edit: nothing to see here, move along]
	The Traitor Baru Cormorant
	The Confessions of Nat Turner
	High Spirits

Hieronymous Alloy: Jan 30, 2009; Why! Why!! Why must you refuse to accept that Dr. Hieronymous Alloy's Genetically Enhanced Cream Corn Is Superior to the Leading Brand on the Market!?!; Morbid Hound

1) The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

Seasonal! And a female author! This was a runner up last year I think?

quote:

Eleanor Vance has always been a loner--shy, vulnerable, and bitterly resentful of the 11 years she lost while nursing her dying mother. "She had spent so long alone, with no one to love, that it was difficult for her to talk, even casually, to another person without self-consciousness and an awkward inability to find words." Eleanor has always sensed that one day something big would happen, and one day it does. She receives an unusual invitation from Dr. John Montague, a man fascinated by "supernatural manifestations." He organizes a ghost watch, inviting people who have been touched by otherworldly events. A paranormal incident from Eleanor's childhood qualifies her to be a part of Montague's bizarre study--along with headstrong Theodora, his assistant, and Luke, a well-to-do aristocrat. They meet at Hill House--a notorious estate in New England.

Hill House is a foreboding structure of towers, buttresses, Gothic spires, gargoyles, strange angles, and rooms within rooms--a place "without kindness, never meant to be lived in...."

Although Eleanor's initial reaction is to flee, the house has a mesmerizing effect, and she begins to feel a strange kind of bliss that entices her to stay. Eleanor is a magnet for the supernatural--she hears deathly wails, feels terrible chills, and sees ghostly apparitions. Once again she feels isolated and alone--neither Theo nor Luke attract so much eerie company. But the physical horror of Hill House is always subtle; more disturbing is the emotional torment Eleanor endures. Intense, literary, and harrowing, The Haunting of Hill House belongs in the same dark league as Henry James's classic ghost story, The Turn of the Screw.

2) The Traitor Baru Cormorant by a dude who posts in this forum (General Battuta)

Lowly posted:

Tor.com has an excerpt from The Traitor Baru Cormorant up now.

I am really impressed ... I didn't know anything about this book except it was written by someone from this thread, but I'm pretty hooked after reading the excerpt.

Because it's apparently not poo poo? And we have the author right here?

General Battuta posted:

That's me! If you liked Locke Lamora I hope you'd like Baru too; I'm told they're faintly similar.

At least they redesigned the British cover. It's pretty good-looking now, even with the truncated title on the spine.

3) The Confession of Nat Turner by William Styron

quote:

The Confessions of Nat Turner is a 1967 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by U.S. writer William Styron. Presented as a first-person narrative by historical figure Nat Turner, the novel concerns the slave revolt in Virginia in 1831. It is based on The Confessions of Nat Turner: The Leader of the Late Insurrection in Southampton, Virginia, a first-hand account of Turner's confessions published by a local lawyer, Thomas Ruffin Gray, in 1831.[1]

Despite defenses by notable African-American authors Ralph Ellison and James Baldwin, the novel was strongly criticised by many black Americans. Styron's portrayal of a legendary black resistance leader as a reluctant warrior who bumbles every attack and fumbles his way to total defeat generated enormous resentment. No less offensive to many black readers was the narrator's flattering portrayal of many of the novel's slaveowners, such as the "saintly" Samuel Turner .. . .

Despite protests against the novel, Styron's work won critical acclaim and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1968..[2]

Since it's Banned Books Week and to foster discussion

4) High Spirits by Robertson Davies

As suggested, and also, ghost stories! Seasonal.

quote:

Robertson Davies first hit upon the notion of writing ghost stories when he joined the University of Toronto's Massey College as a Master. Wishing to provide entertainment at the College's Gaudy Night, the annual Christmas party, Professor Davies created a "spooky story," which he read aloud to the gathering. That story, "Revelation from a Smoky Fire," is the first in this wonderful, haunting collection. A tradition quickly became established and, for eighteen years, Davies delighted and amused the Gaudy Night guests with his tales of the supernatural. Here, gathered together in one volume, are those eighteen stories, just as Davies first read them.

Hieronymous Alloy fucked around with this message at 05:58 on Sep 29, 2015

# ? Sep 29, 2015 05:46

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# ? Apr 25, 2024 22:18

Crashbee: May 15, 2007; Stupid people are great at winning arguments, because they're too stupid to realize they've lost.

The Haunting of Hill House was ABotM in October 2013.

http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3572837

# ? Sep 29, 2015 10:20

Hieronymous Alloy: Jan 30, 2009; Why! Why!! Why must you refuse to accept that Dr. Hieronymous Alloy's Genetically Enhanced Cream Corn Is Superior to the Leading Brand on the Market!?!; Morbid Hound

Crashbee posted:

The Haunting of Hill House was ABotM in October 2013.

http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3572837

That's what I get for only checking back two years! Thanks for catching that. Ok, we're down to three options.

# ? Sep 29, 2015 13:03

Mel Mudkiper: Jan 19, 2012; At this point, Mudman abruptly ends the conversation. He usually insists on the last word.

I won't read it so I won't vote, but doing a TBB author would be cool

# ? Sep 29, 2015 14:33

Stravinsky: May 31, 2011

Mel Mudkiper posted:

I won't read it so I won't vote, but doing a TBB author would be cool

that means we can read Pynchon or Tao Lin then.

# ? Oct 4, 2015 05:42

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > BOTM POLL: OCTOBER -- VOTE FAST