just finished reading " Blood Meridian" by Cormac Mccarthy. to me it was virtually plotless just a trek through towns and deserts but book has a downbeat depressing feel to it and keeps you interested and is full of cruel, violent moments and does not have a hero. proberly not for all tastes but keeps you intrested, didn’t like the ending much though.am reading " All The Pretty Horses" by the same author next.
Seriously, The road was the best book I’ve read last year. I picked it up at the library and then eventually gave a copy as a Christmas gift to my father… half because I knew he would have loved it (and he did) and half because I wanted to have a copy in the house, he he. Incidentally, I’m starting to read No country for old men now, although I agree that’s it’s hard not to think of the film while reading it.
“Blandins Castle” by P. G. Wodehouse. A excellent collection of short stories by the master English humourists.
Just finished Nick Cave’s new novel, The Death of Bunny Munro, written a mere 20 years after his first. The tale of a lowdown Lothario’s inexorable decline, it’s very much as you’d expect from Cave, simultaneously hilarious and horrifying.
Next up: More Than Night: Film Noir in its Contexts by James Naremore.
just finished reading " All The Pretty Horses" by Cormac Mccarthty. i have only read one other book by Mccarthy and that is " Blood Meridian". In my opinon " All the Pretty Horses" is the much better read. while the former is a savage, bloodthirsty novel it doesn’t have much of a plot and is a series of happenings, many of which are brillantly done but it does not have anyone you can sympathise with it does not have a real hero, whereas in " Pretty Horses" it grips from start to finish and in it’s two cowboy drifters John Grady Cole and Lacey Rawlings these are two characters you generally like and care about. a very good novel, and i certainly am going to read the two other novels in the trilogy " The Crossing" and " City of the plains".
You won’t catch me on this thread often but I’m reading…
I recently picked up a copy of Brett Halsey’s notorious The Magnificent Strangers, his semi-autobiographical novel charting the bed-hopping exploits of American expats in Rome during the Sixties.
I’m not expecting high art, but it should be a blast.
Robert Woods reckoned that Halsey’s central character was an amalgam of him and Gordon Scott.
finished the other two novels in " The Border Trilogy" by Cormac McCarthy. they were " The Crossing" which keeps you reading it but is much too long and the plot changes direction half way through and becomes something else entirely. Cormac McCarthy’s strength is creating characters you care about , and he certainly does in all three novels here. nowhere near as good as " All The Pretty Horses"in fact the worst of the three but still very readable. The last book " Cities Of The Plain" is very similar to "All The Pretty Horses"and combines the two main characters from the two previous books John Grady Cole and Billy Parham in this final part of the trilogy. this is slowly paced but builds to a shattering climax, which is a little spoilt by a unnecessacery long and rather pointless epilogue, but overall these books especially read together are a cracking read.next i shall be reading mcCarthy’s " The Road " next.
Halfway through “Kiss Me Deadly” by Mickey Spillane.
You seen the movie? One of the most daring and stylish Noirs of the 50’s. Or film in general for the 50’s.
Been reading a lot lately - finished off about 6 books over vacation:
Freak the Mighty
Gazza: My Story
Durruti in the Spanish Revolution
The Outsiders
Whirligig
Flowers for Algernon
currently reading George Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia.
Actually I haven’t seen the whole thing…I recall watching the beginning several years ago but never finished it.
Just finished the book and will likely watch the film tonight though! The book was great, gritty, brutal and thoroughly enjoyable.
“And I went. The rain took me back again, put its arms around me and held tight. I became part of the night, part of the wet, part of the noise and life that was the city. I could hear it laughing at me, a low, dull rumble with a sneer in it.”
i go through bouts of heavy reading and then sometimes it will take me a month to finish a book…i’m always trying to be reading something though
currently reading Diary of a Drug Fiend by Aleister Crowley
just finished " The Road" by Cormac McCarthy. very, very good although not as violent and nasty as i expected. having read 5 mccarthy novels now, one thing he does is create characters you like and care about and none more so than here with the man and the boy and their battle against impossible odds, the end of the world. a novel of doom and despair but also of love and courage. very moving at times and the ending while very sad also offers threads of hope. from what i’ve seen of the trailer of the film i’m not sure if it is going to follow the book that closely doubt if it will be able to capture the books intensity anyway, but still looking forward to it.
Just finished The Gunslinger, first of Stephen King’s Dark Tower series. I enjoyed it. Nice mix of sci fi, fantasy, horror and spaghetti western. Think I’ll try the next one when I get back from holiday.
Awesome Phil, I absolutely love that series of books… The Gunslinger is the only one I haven’t re-bought yet, and as soon as I do, I will be making my way through the series again. The next volume, The Drawing of the Three, is maybe the best of the series IMO
I’m also currently reading the graphic novel version, which there are 3 volumes available for… only read the first so far, because I ordered the third one thinking it was the second… doh
1974 by David Peace
Recommended by a friend. Let’s see.
I managed to sit through and enjoy the first three volumes … Then read number four which was badly written and just plain uninterestning and skipped the rest of the series…
I am a former King-fan by the way, having read (and collected) all of his stuff up until 94 or 95 … About the time he put out the Rose Madder and Dolores Claiborne novels which I both hated more or less and abandoned the collection. A sad and boring story 
American Psycho. Just on the side of writing my MAster thesis. Though it would be good to read something non-scientific, so that i wont turn mad. Guess should have choosen another novel for this purpose, hehe.
Anyway, so far not that great. The brand name-dropping gets on my nerves, and the only people described are his snobby co-workers and bums, very subtle social-criticism (This is my form of irony).
Panzer Leader - Heinz Guderian’s memoirs of creating and leading Germany’s tank divisions in WW2.