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Welcome goonlings to the Awful Book of the Month! In this thread, we choose one work of Resources: Project Gutenberg - http://www.gutenberg.org - A database of over 17000 books available online. If you can suggest books from here, that'd be the best. SparkNotes - http://www.sparknotes.com/ - A very helpful Cliffnotes-esque site, but much better, in my opinion. If you happen to come in late and need to catch-up, you can get great character/chapter/plot summaries here.  For recommendations on future material, suggestions on how to improve the club, or just a general rant, feel free to PM me. Past Books of the Month [for BOTM before 2014, refer to archives] 2014: January: Ursula K. LeGuin - The Left Hand of Darkness February: Mikhail Bulgalov - Master & Margarita March: Richard P. Feynman -- Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! April: James Joyce -- Dubliners May: Gabriel Garcia Marquez -- 100 Years of Solitude June: Howard Zinn -- A People's History of the United States July: Mary Renault -- The Last of the Wine August: Barbara Tuchtman -- The Guns of August September: Jane Austen -- Pride and Prejudice October: Roger Zelazny -- A Night in the Lonesome October November: John Gardner -- Grendel December: Christopher Moore -- The Stupidest Angel 2015: January: Italo Calvino -- Invisible Cities February: Karl Ove Knausgaard -- My Struggle: Book 1. March: Knut Hamsun -- Hunger April: Liu Cixin -- 三体 ( The Three-Body Problem) May: John Steinbeck -- Cannery Row June: Truman Capote -- In Cold Blood (Hiatus) August: Ta-Nehisi Coates -- Between the World and Me September: Wilkie Collins -- The Moonstone October:Seth Dickinson -- The Traitor Baru Cormorant November:Svetlana Alexievich -- Voices from Chernobyl December: Michael Chabon -- Gentlemen of the Road 2016: January: Three Men in a Boat (To say nothing of the Dog!) by Jerome K. Jerome February:The March Up Country (The Anabasis) of Xenophon March: The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco April: Plain Tales from the Hills by Rudyard Kipling May: Temple of the Golden Pavilion by Yukio Mishima June:The Vegetarian by Han Kang July:Lud-in-the-Mist by Hope Mirrlees August: Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov September:Siddhartha by Herman Hesse October:Right Ho, Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse November:Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain December: It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis 2017: January: Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut February: The Plague by Albert Camus March: The Dispossessed by Ursula K. LeGuin April: The Conference of the Birds (مقامات الطیور) by Farid ud-Din Attar May: I, Claudius by Robert Graves June: Salt: A World History by Mark Kurlansky July: Ficcionies by Jorge Luis Borges August: My Life and Hard Times by James Thurber September: The Peregrine by J.A. Baker Blackwater Vol. I: The Flood by Michael McDowell Current: Aquarium by David Vann Book available here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00OV9D9P4/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 About the book: quote:David Vann’s new novel, “Aquarium,” about a lonely young girl who meets an old man at the Seattle Aquarium, begins on a deceptively light note. Its cinematic quality is due largely to a series of lovely, well-curated fish photographs that accompany 12-year-old Caitlin’s observation of the exotic fauna. But the momentary lightness of these early pages soon unspools into psychological darkness — and the intricate, colorful pictures diminish — as Caitlin moves away from the tranquillity and beauty of the aquarium and into the more dangerous spaces of a world populated by humans. https://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/08/books/review/david-vanns-aquarium.html Mel Mudkiper posted:Aquarium by David Vann Mel Mudkiper posted:also why havent you read Aquarium by David Vann yet fridge corn posted:you won't understand the lit thread until you finally read aquarium just to shut mel up About the Author quote:Vann is a talented, Alaska-born writer whose professional success overseas has been extraordinary but who is, so far, a bit less known on his native soil. He has always written fiction about brutal violence — and always against a backdrop of the land, where men of strong character (albeit tragically flawed) know how to build boats and gut deer and haul in halibut, whereas men of weaker character tend to be, say, students or dentists. His frankly autobiographical novels and short stories return persistently to the subject of marital breakups, depression, suicide, murder and torture — to guns and to killing, of game animals, of bears and of wives, husbands and mothers. Themes quote:Next to these R-rated tales, “Aquarium” is almost PG-13, although it, too, ultimately returns to story lines of paternal abandonment and vicious mistreatment of children. To say any more about its revelations and tense climax would be to offer spoilers. But “Aquarium” has a vastly different feel from Vann’s other books, a tone and texture quite removed from the relentlessness of his Alaskan (and rural Californian) tales. It leaves more air and space for the reader, it dwells less on physical mechanics, and it has a softer touch, as befits its gentle child protagonist. Pacing Read as thou wilt is the whole of the law. Please bookmark the thread to encourage discussion. References and Further Reading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Fish_Called_Wanda Final Note: Thanks, and I hope everyone enjoys the book!
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Nov 7, 2017 20:23
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| # ¿ Apr 27, 2024 09:50 |
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USMC_Karl posted:Ah, so his other works are good, too? I'm guessing from the snippy comments at the start of this thread that he is a relatively well known author, but this was honestly my first exposure to him. I've only heard of him on this forum. He seems to be a nearing meme status in the lit thread though.
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Nov 10, 2017 05:42
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Need suggestions for next month
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Nov 21, 2017 04:09
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Mel Mudkiper posted:Chill dog you got ten days still how bout you read this book.and talk about it a little Takes five days to gather noms, then five days to do the poll, then it's time for the new one. also I am still slowly working through The Peregrine and will get to this one in order I skipped ahead for Blackwater because it had river monsters
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Nov 21, 2017 04:51
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pepperoni and keys posted:Literary Taste: How to Form It by Arnold Bennett typical western bias
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Nov 21, 2017 23:41
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| # ¿ Apr 27, 2024 09:50 |
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CestMoi posted:Gawain is the best English language narrative poem so yeah that one I was going to put up a poll but after consideration unless there's a storm of protest I think this is the route I'm going to go for next month's BOTM. I have a few different editions (Tolkien's ME critical edition, children's illustrated edition, etc.) so it'll give me an excuse to do some effortposting, and it's christmas themed so seasonally appropriate, and it will satisfy the poem-thirsty.
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Nov 28, 2017 05:02
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