Dagger Forum

peng wrote: ↑

Wed Apr 24, 2019 9:50 pm

don wrote: ↑

Wed Apr 24, 2019 7:38 pm

I'm glad you like it! I love those old action books from the 70s and 80s. The market for that kind of escapist but masculine action lit is pretty much dead and I can't figure out why. Do people not want to read about karate battles and mysterious deaths anymore?

im by no means an expert but i have to imagine publishers and editors really forced authors into the Young Adult genre. gotta have everything nice and watered down as much as possible and broad enough to sell to a 4 quadrant readerbase, and if we're lucky we might even get a movie or TV adaptation!

>movie or TV adaptation
there's the rub: nobody wants to read... period.
they would rather watch fanciful CGI Avengers battle sequences than to have to imagine action for themselves from words on a page.
I don't have anything against film itself, but you can't deny the deleterious effect this sort of transformation has had upon the imagination of the public mind.

btw for the Strugatsky fans....read Stanislaw Lem, especially Solaris and the Ijon Tichy books. good shit.

I just started reading "seriously" a couple years ago so I'm playing catch-up by reading the classics. Right now I'm reading The Fountainhead which is great. Robert Blake's autography is crazy, lots of stories from old Hollywood and his legal woes. It's called Tales of a Rascal: What I Did For Love.

ColtonGray wrote: ↑

Thu Apr 25, 2019 2:15 am

I just started reading "seriously" a couple years ago so I'm playing catch-up by reading the classics.

Same!!!! What classics have you read/do you have on your list?

ldar wrote: ↑

Thu Apr 25, 2019 4:59 am

ColtonGray wrote: ↑

Thu Apr 25, 2019 2:15 am

I just started reading "seriously" a couple years ago so I'm playing catch-up by reading the classics.

Same!!!! What classics have you read/do you have on your list?

Hmmm off the top of my head I’ve read The Old Man & The Sea, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Dune, Infinite Jest, Revolutionary Road, The French Liuetenant’s Woman, The Magus, Mere Christianity, The Hunt for Red October, Giovanni’s Room, The Denial of Death. I guess some of those are classics ahaha. I’m kinda trying to read all genres and just see what I like. John Fowles is my fave right now. I have Moby Dick and The Catcher & The Rye on my to-read pile. What about you? The feel a little intellectually stunted compared to some of the big-brains here! (edit: that sounded sarcastic but I mean it, I spent the teen years playing Pokémon Crystal over & over again like a retard with no regard for learning or literature)

I'll shill my own:

A novella dedicated to the memory of the r/mde sub.

North America, 2080. Air toxification and global warming have forced the two hundred million citizens who survived the Civil War into comfortable but oppressive underground cities. A small techno-elite living under town-sized domes rules over them from above. The Chinese Empire allied with the Silicon Valley leftist authoritarians in the 2040s to defeat the America First opposition, form the Corporate Coalition of North America and replace the constitutional government with an AI-assisted dictatorship. AI speech sensors across the underground cities detect breaches of the Offense & Criticism Act of 2064, which forbids male speech and actions “intended for unauthorized humorous effect” and ‘harmful' criticism. The Coalition renamed male laughter ‘manic oppression’. All underground men except a small percentage of specialized Alphas must take Posimasc medication, which severely dulls their masculine instincts. The Toxic Masculinity Act of 2065 prohibits men from behaviour defined as such by the Coalition, such as anger, aggression and lust. Under-Toronto citizen Caleb Thompson is growing frustrated with the drudgery and absurdity of life underground. Meanwhile, former comedian Alexavier White, now a Corporate Coalition late night talk show host who lives under the Los Angeles dome, is becoming disillusioned with his role as a shill for the elites. This story of dystopian surveillance, censorship and control echoes many of our present-day worries but leaves behind a glimmer of hope for those who celebrate the free and independent American spirit.


I've just read both of the Alan Partridge books - comfy reads if anyone is a fan of the character.
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5 ... _Partridge

Roadside Picnic is my go-to book recommendation. It's Soviet lit so feelings of hopelessness and existential dread abound. (arm yourself with cuties) The book has a pretty interesting backstory too. It was originally blocked from publication by the Soviet censors as they feared it's message was anti-communist. The authors later managed to get it published in a collection of stories by explaining that it was meant as a condemnation of the capitalist systems treatment of the working class. Personally I've read it a few times and I think the entire capitalist/communist issue around the book was constructed entirely because of when and where it was published. The ideas it touches on are human issues and will be present in any economic political structure. It's also the inspiration for the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. game franchise so, y'know, its lit.

https://www.scribd.com/doc/181267852/Ar ... Picnic-pdf

Also anyone read Metro 2033? I've heard its good but never got around to reading it.

Kobold wrote: ↑

Thu Apr 25, 2019 5:15 pm

Roadside Picnic is my go-to book recommendation. It's Soviet lit so feelings of hopelessness and existential dread abound. (arm yourself with cuties) The book has a pretty interesting backstory too. It was originally blocked from publication by the Soviet censors as they feared it's message was anti-communist. The authors later managed to get it published in a collection of stories by explaining that it was meant as a condemnation of the capitalist systems treatment of the working class. Personally I've read it a few times and I think the entire capitalist/communist issue around the book was constructed entirely because of when and where it was published. The ideas it touches on are human issues and will be present in any economic political structure. It's also the inspiration for the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. game franchise so, y'know, its lit.

https://www.scribd.com/doc/181267852/Ar ... Picnic-pdf

Also anyone read Metro 2033? I've heard its good but never got around to reading it.

And the Tarkovsky film Stalker

Kobold wrote: ↑

Thu Apr 25, 2019 5:15 pm

Roadside Picnic is my go-to book recommendation. It's Soviet lit so feelings of hopelessness and existential dread abound. (arm yourself with cuties) The book has a pretty interesting backstory too. It was originally blocked from publication by the Soviet censors as they feared it's message was anti-communist. The authors later managed to get it published in a collection of stories by explaining that it was meant as a condemnation of the capitalist systems treatment of the working class. Personally I've read it a few times and I think the entire capitalist/communist issue around the book was constructed entirely because of when and where it was published. The ideas it touches on are human issues and will be present in any economic political structure. It's also the inspiration for the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. game franchise so, y'know, its lit.

https://www.scribd.com/doc/181267852/Ar ... Picnic-pdf

Also anyone read Metro 2033? I've heard its good but never got around to reading it.

All of the Strugatskys' books are great, read 'em all.
Metro 2033's pretty fun, post-apoc picaresque adventure that you can blow through in a weekend.

ColtonGray wrote: ↑

Thu Apr 25, 2019 2:15 am

Right now I'm reading The Fountainhead which is great.

I hope you don’t have friends who recommend Ayn Rand to you. The fiction of Ayn Rand is as low as you can get re fiction. I hope you picked it up off the floor of the subway and threw it in the nearest garbage pail. She makes Mickey Spillane look like Dostoevsky.