Chic, IL What Book Are You Reading Right Now?

Never read it, Kosure.

For those you usually don't read non-fiction (like myself), Anderson Cooper's book, Dispatches from the Edge, was very good. I just finished it. There is even a very small reference to a classic Star Wars scene.

 

I'm working on Neil Gaiman's Stardust, the first 6 issues of the new Iron Fist series, and a book about the Wold Newton universe, which is some freaky weird stuff.

 

I haven't read any of the "Buffy Season 8" comics that have been trickling out the last several months. They may be good, they may be bad. Personally tho, despite some excellent episodes and a few interesting plotlines, I think "Buffy" sorta ended for me at the conclusion of season 3. The show was about a group of young friends, and the seasons after they graduated high school (even the good ones) suffered from split personality syndrome: plots and new characters based upon more mature experiences were awkwardly wrapped around a central group of players still acting like snarky teens even though they were driving company cars, getting engaged and dealing with household bill payments.

On the plus side, "Angel" was head and shoulders above "Buffy", starting up just as "Buffy" was winding down (for me, at least) and hitting the ground running. Here was a show that genuinely worked in its characters' growing maturity without losing its underlying sense of fun.

And now comes "Angel Season 6" this November. 5 pages is too little to really cast any judgment, but it's clear that no holds are being barred when it comes to the scope of the story. I wonder how many other (if any) characters made it past that fight in the alley a few years ago...

-Le Penguin,
hoping that we'll see Illyria again, even though Matt no likey.

 

I think there's enough good in seasons 4-7 to make them worthwhile, although if I were sticking my flag in the sand, I'd put the "end" of Buffy at the finale of season five, which puts the perfect cap on things and captures the also-excellent season four, with its avengers/vision riff.

The new Buffy comics are good, and I'm intrigued by the Angel comics, although I must confess I have to (gulp) catch up on my Angel as I stopped regularly watching around season...3? 4? somewhere in there.

I'm reading The Jesus Machine, a pretty decent and very chilling book about Focus on the Family and James Dobson. Anyone wanting to have nightmares about the Christian Right should read it. Also in the pile: Essential Defenders 1, Essential Marvel Two-In-One 1, Kirby's Devil Dinosaur HC, and Frank Miller's Daredevil vol. 2 (in trades).

 

The show had only two big speed bumps during its run: one was the too-far-gone plot set on Lorne's homeworld (end of season 2 I think?) The other was the awkward shoehorning of Spike into the regular cast once Buffy ended. If you can get past those, you'll be sure to enjoy several seasons of dark, dark television as vampires ponder eating their young, good characters do evil things for the wrong reasons, and evil characters do even worse things for the right reasons.

Oh, and the creator of The Tick joins the writing staff in the last season and proceeds to turn Angel into a puppet.

Seriously. It's awesome.

-Le Penguin
"My nose comes off."

 

We couldn't watch Buffy past the introduction of her little sister. We're slowly working our way through Angel Season One and so far it's awesome.

Back to the topic...reading a lot of economics in my economics classes (go figure). And reading lots of Plato,

D'

 

I did watch Angel off and on throughout, so I have seen the puppet show episode, but yeah. I need to get my first season DVDs out and watch them, especially since Ginna actually seemed to enjoy Angel in the past, as opposed to Buffy, where I think the Whedon dialogue tics were too much for her to handle.

 

Currently read the Dark Tower series by Stephen King. I'm on book 4 "Wizard and Glass", and I'm thinking of taking a break from the series after I've finished.

 

I'm rereading the final Harry Potter book. Realized that I missed or have at least forgotten some more salient points critical to exchanging potter talk.

Back off topic - Buffy and Angel are both awesome to own on DVD. Or at least borrow on DVD. Favorite Eps: The Silent One (Scream?), the dealing with death one, any of the evil willow ones; for angel - the puppet one, many of the "conner" story line episodes - i found the series finale to be a little too rushed (though less so then ROTS!) but with a great "dying" performance.

 

Just started Sourcery by Terry Pratchett one of the many Discworld novels. Love them.

 

harry potter and the sorcerers stone. well i'm listening to it on cd from the library. i've seen them all and have the movies. but i've never read them, so i'm starting now.

 

The Golden Compass, good recommendation Haz. Plus, April and I will be checking out the flick tomorrow night.

 

Working on Showcase Presents Batman and the Outsiders, decent early eighties superhero melodrama with exceptional Jim Aparo art. I love Jim Aparo's Batman.

 

For the holiday season, reading Hogfather by Terry Pratchett

 

"League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: The Black Dossier" by Alan Moore

It... I...

Fuc&.

The book is sorta a mish-mash of about fifty hundred dozen ideas that
Moore had, but found neither the time or patience to really flesh them
out. One of the little fun extras of the first two "League" books was
trying to recognize all the characters/events from Victorian-era
literature. Moore's gone absolutely bonkers now, not only cramming as
many book/play/film/poetry references as possible (mostly British),
he's also found it necessary to write entire chunks of the book in
their respective styles. There's a standard layout framing story,
broken up with the characters occasionally opening a dossier to read
entries (at which point the reader is also supposed to read the entry
as well... imagine if those addendum at the end of each issue of
"Watchmen" were compulsory and came in the middle of the action.)

The maddening part is that all those little Victorian-pop-culture
references in the earlier books were simply fun asides that enhanced a
story that stood up on its own. "Black Dossier", however, is built on
those references, and unless you and Alan Moore have the exact same
library, you're pretty much fuc&ed, both in the dossier entries and
the framing story. Instead of absorbing the reader with richly written
characters (or-for that matter-any semblance of a plot), Moore
just takes existing characters and throws them at the reader like
buckshot. I spent less time reading and more time asking questions
(sometimes out loud)... "who's that supposed to be? Why is SHE here?
Ok, now she's gone... was that it? Even if I knew who that is, why the
hell should I care? Why the fuc& are these pages in 3-D!?!?!!!!??"

Here's a fun game we can play: pick five (at least semi-popular) literary or film characters
from 1700-1958. For every one that isn't in this goddamn book, I'll
pay you five dollars, and you pay me for every one that is. I may not
come out ahead, but it'd be closer than you may think...

-Le Penguin
"There was no doctor."

 

I don't have the patience to go through the earlier pages of this thread, so I'll just ask: has anyone read Neil Gaiman's "American Gods"?

I'm about 100 pages in, and so far it's slow and self-indulgent; it feels like Gaiman got so obsessed with cramming in endless mythology references that he forgot about stuff like a strong narrative or rich characters (going down a checklist to see which character lines up with which old god does not make them rich or deep.) Does it get any better? At 600 pages, I'm skeptical about the narrative tightening up much...


-Le Penguin
(Maybe I've just been spoiled by Alan Moore's recent explorations of myth and heroes... Top Ten, Smax, Promethea, etc)

 

Pengy, I'm almost ready to read Black Dossier myself...hope I feel better about it than you did. I've been looking forward to it for so long, and I just this weekend read/re-read the first two volumes.

I sorta know what you mean, though; the Almanac in volume II feels like something I should read, but I can't get any enthusiasm worked up for it.

However, Gotham Central has been destroying me with its greatness since yesterday. I'm already almost halfway done with the run; I just can't stop. "Half A Life" has now become one of my favorite comics stories, ever.

I'm wondering if the concept would have any value for non-comics nerds; it's basically NYPD Blue set in Gotham City. Great read.

 

I hope so, too. My main problem is that the book really does nothing for the reader except provide a "Where's Waldo" list of literary cameos, as if Moore got paid per obscure reference. In essence, these are some of the same problems I have with Gaiman's "American Gods." Mild "referential" spoiler warning - Sure, it was kinda neat to see Moll Flanders dyke out in Black Dossier, but it served no other purpose. If all I'm looking for is colonial rug-munching porn, I'll do a web search for Christina Hendricks and Julie McNiven and pretend they're wearing tri-corner hats.** The only point the whole tome seems intent on making is the same one Moore made in the first three issues of Promethea almost a decade ago, and I didn't need to wear special headgear for that (that's not a joke.) The framing story is sorta interesting, especially since it puts a new spin on a much more recent British addition to pop/literary culture, but I still wish I'd borrowed the book from a friend instead of dropping thirty clams on it.

People speak well of Gotham Central. Has it been released in TPB yet? I was also impressed with the first six issues of Criminal, though I haven't read past that yet.

-Le Penguin
**Actually, I might go do that right now...

 

Gotham Central is completely out in TPB, although there are about five to six scattered issues that are left out of the trades, for no explicable reason. Here's hoping they do a catch-all to snap up these issues, although they would fit better in the trades; maybe a nice big set of hardcovers down the road?

Anyway, it is so worth your time. Think good NYPD Blue and stir in Batman and his wacky villains.

Walking Dead: Overrated. It's way overwritten.

 

Overwritten? Granted I'm only on the 5th TPB, but thus far I've thought its been pretty good. There are rough spots, where where zombies are concerned I'm willing to overlook certain things. Does it get worse later or do you think its already crappy by 5?

 

Just finished re-reading the Thrawn trilogy, though the most recent book I've read was Fury. I really enjoy the LOTF series and the Legacy comics.

 

I've read all The Walking Dead TPB that are out so far and I love it. My only problem to date is that a couple of times I think the series has gone a tad too far.

 

The Heroin Diaries - Basically the drug laden tale of Motley Crue as written by Nikki Sixx. It covers the recording and tour promoting their Girls Girls Girls album. It is astonishing even if you are not a big fan of the band. Some of the stuff they did was/is insane. The level that Sixx's addiction got to was amazing.

 

The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible (A.J. Jacobs) - So far it's mediocre at best and reads like a blog (and not a good one, if good blogs actually exist). It's about an Agnostic guy who wants to live by all the rules of the Bible for the sole purpose of writing a book. He tries to make it seem like he's actually on some spiritual quest, but it's obvious that his prime interest is in finding something to put to paper. So, it's ending up pretty disappointing.

D'

 

Let me know when he starts owning slaves.