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May 28
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Mike
added:
Innocent When You Dream (Paperback)
by Mac Montadon
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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Mike
gave
to:
The Conquest of Morocco (Paperback)
by Douglas Porch
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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April 18
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Mike
is currently reading:
The Man with the Golden Arm (Paperback)
by Nelson Algren
bookshelves:
currently-reading
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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April 13
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Mike
gave
to:
Portnoy's Complaint (Paperback)
by Philip Roth
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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April 04
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Mike
marked as to-read:
The Wretched of the Earth (Paperback)
by Frantz Fanon
bookshelves:
to-read
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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Mike
gave
to:
Le Grand Meaulnes (Penguin Modern Classics)
by Henri Alain-Fournier
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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March 21
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Mike
gave
to:
Junky (Paperback)
by William S. Burroughs
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in September, 2006
Mike said:
"This was a teenage favourite of mine, that I re-read towards the end of last year.
It's a frank account of addiction, the highs and the lows, with no details spared (save Burrough's killing his common-law wife, which doesn't get a mention). I like...more
This was a teenage favourite of mine, that I re-read towards the end of last year.
It's a frank account of addiction, the highs and the lows, with no details spared (save Burrough's killing his common-law wife, which doesn't get a mention). I like the Raymond Chandler feel to it, and the bare prose. I also like the fact that the story meanders from place to place with the protagonist, and never really reaches a satisfactory conclusion. It's not a story, after all, it's an account, and Burrough's addiction continued. Spurred on by his association with the beats, I tried to read On The Road a view years back, but I really didn't take to it. Naked Lunch was a bit of a trial too!...less
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Mike
gave
to:
Jarhead (Paperback)
by Anthony Swofford
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in August, 2006
Mike said:
"I read this after watching the film. It was also spurred on by a general interest in war writing/war narratives.
I found it very interesting, particularly since the range of characters, and their involvement in various episodes, seemed to have bee...more
I read this after watching the film. It was also spurred on by a general interest in war writing/war narratives.
I found it very interesting, particularly since the range of characters, and their involvement in various episodes, seemed to have been slimmed down to allow for narrative ease on the screen. Indeed, the episode where the marine imitates the bugle did not even happen to Swofford. Nevertheless, this seemed to give a more nuanced view of the marine's perspective. Swofford, in his own voice, seems less the chained-up, testosterone-fuelled lout. In part, this is probably the inevitable consequence of his having grown up (I doubt he was as lucid as a 19 year old). Nevertheless, this marks him out as less of an everyman than the film would have us believe.
Regardless, I think this is a very interesting portrayal of the frustrations of the modern soldier - still effectively trained for the 'big show', by the time of the conflicts if the 1990s they're barely allowed to fire a gun(or in the 00s case of Iraq and Afghanistan they can't easily distinguish who the enemy is)....less
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Mike
gave
to:
Cat's Cradle (Paperback)
by Kurt Vonnegut
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in March, 2007
Mike said:
"Heading back to Vonnegut's early work, and I begin to feel a little irked by the lack of wackiness! Am I just too hard to please?
I don't have a huge amount to say about this one. I suppose I should say something about the cold war setting, mutual...more
Heading back to Vonnegut's early work, and I begin to feel a little irked by the lack of wackiness! Am I just too hard to please?
I don't have a huge amount to say about this one. I suppose I should say something about the cold war setting, mutually assured destruction yada yada, but I can't be bothered. I rolled along pretty nicely, was quite amusing, had that whole 'science and religion' vibe (very topical), which I thought was very interesting. I think that latter point was what I found most intriguing - it was a bit late to state that science had 'sin' in 1945, it seemed to be sinning for a long time before that - funny that it would take such an extreme of militarily-applied science to give that one wide currency. Indeed, with the Dresden episode, Vonnegut was also referred to sinning science, albeit of a less sophisticated variety....less
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Mike
gave
to:
Breakfast of Champions (Paperback)
by Kurt Vonnegut
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in March, 2007
Mike said:
"Very readable and amusing in parts. A little irritating in others. I wonder whether Vonnegut's eccentricity didn't get the better of him on this one. Don't get me wrong, I like that the author materializes himself into the action towards the end, gui...more
Very readable and amusing in parts. A little irritating in others. I wonder whether Vonnegut's eccentricity didn't get the better of him on this one. Don't get me wrong, I like that the author materializes himself into the action towards the end, guiding the reader through his decisions about the characters he's created. It provides a double-shot of irony since Dwayne Hoover comes to believe he's the only person in the world with free will right about the time Vonnegut puts himself in the scene.
Still, it does seem to want to go off on a tangent sometimes, and the constant references to vital statistics and appendages don't feel quite right to me as they only appear half way through the book. Or maybe I should just accept that it's 'experimental'. Hmmmm......less
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