Time for a new book - any suggestions?

[detuned]

Raymond Chandler

would recommend The High Window and The Long Goodbye as well

Along the lines of noir, James M. Cain is a great writer of the genre including The Postman Always Rings Twice, Double Indemnity, and the classic Mildred Pierce. the latter of which i believe was made into an HBO miniseries

[dookeyXXX]

would recommend The High Window and The Long Goodbye as well

Along the lines of noir, James M. Cain is a great writer of the genre including The Postman Always Rings Twice, Double Indemnity, and the classic Mildred Pierce. the latter of which i believe was made into an HBO miniseries

Right on.

Have read TPART and have seen both film versions.

Just watched the first film version of The Big Sleep, which, interestingly enough, the screenplay was written by William Faulkner and Leigh Brackett..

On the continued Noir tip, may I recommend:
David Goodis
Jim Thompson
Charles Willeford

[dookeyXXX]

FYI to all the Neil Gaiman fans lurking about:

https://www.thebookseller.com/news/h...events-1250142

[Core Shot]

Skeletons of the Zahara

Great adventure tale. A retelling of an old true tale. Well written.

The first third is like “two years before the mast”

Then it’s shipwreck in Morocco. Survival in late eighteen hundreds. Get back to civilization and out of slavery.

Great read. Two nights and done. Highly recommended

[dookeyXXX]

I have enjoyed Alan Moore's comic book work.
Not sure about the quintet, but the short story collection has appeal...

https://amp.theguardian.com/books/20...e-fantasy-epic

[dookeyXXX]

And then there is John Steinbeck's "lost" werewolf novel...

https://www.theguardian.com/books/20...6jUMm_sI4YtmkA

[billyk]

I’m currently reading “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” by Julia Child.

[Benny Profane]

I picked this book up on my southwest NP tour when I saw it in the rack at Ruby's at Bryce.

https://www.amazon.com/Over-Edge-Dea.../dp/097009731X

What a morbid read. It inspires that same part of the brain that slows down for car wrecks. It attempts to describe what is known about almost every documented death in GC since the park opened. And does it in an easy to read and almost fun style. Both authors have quite the resume, and are extremely intimate with GC. I didnt realize it until after I bought the book, but, one of the authors, Michael Ghiglieri, was the leader on my commercial raft trip down the Colorado in 1986. He's a sardonic hard ass. I doubt he's guiding anymore, must be well into his seventies, but has over 120 river runs as a leader under his belt.

Great examples of how not to die in extreme heat, and don't be a fool close to the edge of 500 foot cliffs.

[dookeyXXX]

The Burnt Orange Heresy - Charles Willeford
This is a wonderfully biting noir centered around the elitism and conceit of the art world, specifically focusing on the hubris of the critic.
Streamlined and with a strangely self-redemptive ending.
Takes the piss out of the pretense surrounding artists, collectors, and critics by deftly melding the real with the fictional.

The Final Girl Support Group - Grady Hendrix
Similar to Willeford's wry take on the art world, here Mr. Hendix drops a proto-meta bomb on the slasher film, taking Scream's premise to the Nth degree x 100.
While a bit predictable and definitely set up for a sequel (like any good slasher franchise), it has a wealth of Easter Eggs aimed at horror geeks and succeeds thanks to whiplash inducing pacing.

Both of these novels do an incredibly convincing job of seamlessly integrating fictional characters into reality, which is half the fun of reading them; trying to figure out which characters are actually real people, which ones are based on real people, and which are based on other fictional characters.

Additionally, The Burnt Orange Heresy was turned into a film, which was released last year, and The Final Girl Support Group has already been optioned for HBOMax.

[dookeyXXX]

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke (who wrote Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell).

Like reading a jigsaw puzzle. Amazingly creative. I wasn’t truly sure what was going on but enjoyed the book very much.

just finished Piranesi. i thought it was incredible. the parallels to House of Leaves are striking - if you like Piranesi and enjoy horror, you should read HoL. HoL is like Piranesi but a million times scarier and weirder.

Finally got around to reading PIRANESI.
I really dug it.
It was a bit of a slow start, but I soon found myself mired (enthusiastically and enjoyably) in the journals of the debatably unreliable narrator, "Piranesi," whom I learned was an actual person (and not uncoincidentally an architect).
Clarke does a wonderful and wry job of mixing up the occult, portal fantasy, Robinson Crusoe, classic mythology, and mental illness, amongst other elements, into a story that sucks you in slowly and then messes with the labyrinth of your mind.
A slow burner that is worth taking the time to get lost in.

[tgapp]

Finally got around to reading PIRANESI.
I really dug it.
It was a bit of a slow start, but I soon found myself mired (enthusiastically and enjoyably) in the journals of the debatably unreliable narrator, "Piranesi," whom I learned was an actual person (and not uncoincidentally an architect).
Clarke does a wonderful and wry job of mixing up the occult, portal fantasy, Robinson Crusoe, and mental illness, amongst other elements, into a story that sucks you in slowly and then messes with the labyrinth of your mind.
A slow burner that is worth taking the time to get lost in.

Nice, yeah, it's a good one.

Now go read house of leaves.

Sent from my Pixel 4a (5G) using Tapatalk

[muted reborn]

RIP William Kittredge. He died Friday at age 88. I had a bunch of writing workshops with him at the University of Montana and also a few conversations in the bars around town. Good guy who had a lot of influence on a lot of Western writers.

https://missoulian.com/news/local/au...257b5ca44.html

What kind of bar guy was he? Just a great conversationalist who was intrigued by strangers and their stories, or just a drunk? Or a bit of both?

[yeahman]

What kind of bar guy was he? Just a great conversationalist who was intrigued by strangers and their stories, or just a drunk? Or a bit of both?

In his early years apparently a hard partier, trying to keep up with Richard Hugo and that crowd, but in his later years (50+) when I knew him he was a light drinker who would have a couple and head home. He seemed intent on working his tail off and writing as much as he could for as long as he could. Mellow guy to talk to. Didn't know him well, just enough to say hi and exchange small talk, mostly about whatever projects he was working on.

[muted reborn]

In his early years apparently a hard partier, trying to keep up with Richard Hugo and that crowd, but in his later years (50+) when I knew him he was a light drinker who would have a couple and head home. He seemed intent on working his tail off and writing as much as he could for as long as he could. Mellow guy to talk to. Didn't know him well, just enough to say hi and exchange small talk, mostly about whatever projects he was working on.

Cool that you got to share a beer or three with him. What a legend.

And another legend gone, David Roberts: https://www.adventure-journal.com/20...es-away-at-78/

[spanghew]

In his early years apparently a hard partier, trying to keep up with Richard Hugo and that crowd, but in his later years (50+) when I knew him he was a light drinker who would have a couple and head home. He seemed intent on working his tail off and writing as much as he could for as long as he could. Mellow guy to talk to. Didn't know him well, just enough to say hi and exchange small talk, mostly about whatever projects he was working on.

That's a mellower version than I knew. Office hours meant tracking him down to whatever bar he was in that night (usually Rusty's), coming up with some coke, and trying to keep his mind on the manuscript in question, deflecting his canned comments heard a million times, pointing out he hadn't actually read the revisions, then enjoying the ensuing bullshit session. He was an affable old faker and a good host at his cool house up on the Blackfoot.

[The AD]

I recently read The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead and enjoyed it.

[yeahman]

That's a mellower version than I knew. Office hours meant tracking him down to whatever bar he was in that night (usually Rusty's), coming up with some coke, and trying to keep his mind on the manuscript in question, deflecting his canned comments heard a million times, pointing out he hadn't actually read the revisions, then enjoying the ensuing bullshit session. He was an affable old faker and a good host at his cool house up on the Blackfoot.

Ha, well clearly you knew him better than I did! He always lived in the apartment on 6th (?) as long as I knew him. What time period are you talking about?

[abraham]

That's a mellower version than I knew. Office hours meant tracking him down to whatever bar he was in that night (usually Rusty's), coming up with some coke, and trying to keep his mind on the manuscript in question, deflecting his canned comments heard a million times, pointing out he hadn't actually read the revisions, then enjoying the ensuing bullshit session. He was an affable old faker and a good host at his cool house up on the Blackfoot.

You are consistently one of the few posters here where I read your posts and think I'd want to hear your life story.

[spanghew]

Ha, well clearly you knew him better than I did! He always lived in the apartment on 6th (?) as long as I knew him. What time period are you talking about?

Late 80s. It was Annick's house up the Bitterroot, but he was there most of the time.

There was a premier one time of a Custer movie Jim Welch wrote. Everyone was there, Louise Erdrich, Jim Harrison, Doig, and all the Missoula regulars. Before the show started, n the lobby of the Wilma, Kittredge, Harrison and Crumley were trying to talk, but it was loud, so they were having to bend their heads close . . . it looked like three men herding beach balls, their uts meeting in three tangents, and their skinny writers arms hanging useless by their sides. They're all dead now, of course.

[teledad]

And another legend gone, David Roberts: https://www.adventure-journal.com/20...es-away-at-78/

The Mountain of My Fear is a classic. I also really enjoyed his essay collections, Moments of Doubt and Escape Routes.

[dookeyXXX]

Just finished Willy Vlautin's 2018 novel DON'T SKIP OUT ON ME.
Sad, funny, frustrating, heartwarming, and heartbreaking all at once.
Vlautin has a deceptively simple, down home voice that seems to capture the nuances of blue collar folk well.
At times the novel feels a bit more YA inclined in style and character development than previous works such as Motel Life and The Free, but it deals nicely with the concept of loneliness as it pertains to the various characters in the story.

Check out the accompanying soundtrack, too: https://richmondfontaine.bandcamp.co...ip-out-on-me-2

[bagtagley]

Bomber Mafia by Malcolm Gladwell is solid. Worth listening to the audiobook version for the interviews.

[dookeyXXX]

I just finished The Bobby Gold Stories by Anthony Bourdain.
It's really a shame that Mr. Bourdain didn't write more fiction. This was a great modern noir/mob story. Highly recommended if you like hardboiled crime fiction with a wee bit of foodie/gourmet ambiance tossed in for good measure.
At 165 pages it's a quick read, really more of a novella...

[billyk]

I’ve just ordered “A Brief History of Time”. I’ll let you know if I can understand any of it.

[Johnny H]

I read that one a few years back. After about 30 pages I was having a tough time. Still, a fascinating read. Got thru to the end. Glad I finished it, though. Hawking was one smart guy.