Book Hauls!

[HoopyFrood]

A lot of the 'classics' that I have read has been through force, if you will, seeing as it's mostly because of the crazy amount of literature-based education I have behind me now. However, that has never dampened my love of them. In fact, Othello is my favourite text ever, and it's completely through studying it at A Level (I also...er...one of based my university module choices on the fact that I'd get to study it again...) I don't actively choose to read classics, but seeing as I am very ominorvous they will get picked up now and then depending on my tastes.

Mostly, I am very aware that there are so many books in every genre and type that I still need and want to read!



In a side note, I dislike when people read classics for posing sake only. I had a friend like that. Gets old very fast.

 

[Hilarious Joke]

I always feel I should read more classics, but I echo D Davis' sentiments here:

Life is too short, and I have limited time to read as it is, so I'm going to hedge my bets and gravitate towards books and authors that I am more apt to enjoy

Still, I'm nearing the point where I feel I've read all the latest decent fantasy series that are easily available in your average bookstore. It's good being part of a community like the Chrons though for working out what else you'd like that you've yet to read.

 

[antiloquax]

I agree that there's no point reading the Classics unless you enjoy them. They are "classics" because lots of people have read and enjoyed them in the past, just like the books in the SF Masterworks list (many of which I would never have heard of if it wasn't for Gollanz's series).
Take Beowulf for example. Violence, mead, monsters and a dragon. What's not to like?

 

[D_Davis]

Picked up a lot of Pyramid SF book on ebay. All for $50 - not bad.

3 in 1 Pyramid Books F-899 1963 Sturgeon Simak Leinster
Brain Twister Mark Phillips Pyramid Books F-783 1962
Doctor To The Stars Murray Leinster Pyramid Books F-987 1964
First lensaman E.E. Smith Pyramid Books X-1456 1968
Hell Flower George O. Smith Pyramid Books G298 1957
Inheritors of Earth Gordon Eklund & Poul Anderson Pyramid V4068 1976
Islands Marta Randall Pyramid Books V3664 1976
Joyleg Ward Moore & Avram Davidson Pyramid Books F-805 1962
Masters of the Maze Avram Davidson Pyramid Books R-1208 1965
Options Robert Sheckley Pyramid Books V3688 1975
Out of Bounds Judith Merril Pyramid Books G499 1960
Raiders From The Rings Alan E. Nourse Pyramid Books F-933 1963
Space Lords Cordwainer Smith Pyramid Books X-1911 1968
Starshine Theodore Sturgeon Pyramid Books X-1543 1966
Supermind Mark Phillips Pyramid Books F-909 1963
The Cleft Paul Tabori Pyramid Books X-1940 1969
The Ghosts of Manacle Charles G. Finney Pyramid Books R-1042 1964
The Green Rain Paul Tabori Pyramid Books G624 1961
The Impossibles Phillips Pyramid Books F-875 1963
The Night Life of the Gods Thorne Smith Pyramid Books R630 1961
The Planet Buyer Cordwainer Smith Pyramid Books R-10841964
The Sound of Winter Byron Cover Pyramid Books V4017 1976
The Space Magicians Pyramid Books T2393 1971
The Underpeople Cordwainer Smith Pyramid Books X-1910 1968
The Wall Around the World Theodore R. Cogswell Pyramid Books F-703 1962
Venus Plus X Theodore Sturgeon Pyramid Books G544 1960

 

[JustPassingThrough]

Hmm, most of the stuff now that I have to buy when they come out are the new Wild Card books. Other than that I've found that with watching my pennies I can wait for some to go on sale or there have been times that I have been thinking of a book that I want and then go to a used place or garage sale and there is said book for half a buck!

 

[JustPassingThrough]

I have to admit it: The last classic that I tried to read was Earth Abides. I really tried. Honest. Got one hundred and something pages into it and just couldn't do it.

 

[antiloquax]

Hmm, I know the feeling JustPassingThrough. I tried to read "Last and First Men" some years ago and struggled. I think I would have a better chance if I tried again now.

 

[JustPassingThrough]

I do admit, antiloquax, that there are some books now that I think of that if I went back I could more or less get into them, per-say- however, there is another part of me that says the opportunity would be worse now because being older I wouldn't have the patience and the thought running through my head as I tried would be: There are so many books and not enough time.

 

[J-Sun]

Dozois, ed. - The Year's Best Science Fiction, 27th and 28th Annual (missed last year's)
de Camp - The Queen of Zamba (been looking for this for years under either title)

It's real cute what they're doing these days - the 28th is half the thickness of any of 1-27. At least it contains the same wordage/pageage, but it's on onion-skin paper, basically. I can see the damned paper shrinking into pixels right now. "We'll force you to read e-books whether you want to or not, by making the books so crappy they might as well be paperless nobacks! Mwahahaha!"

Anyway, glad to have these, even so.

-- Weird. I typed this up almost two hours ago and came back to my browser window and realized I'd never posted it. Anyway, I've now read the Summation and what does he talk about? The explosion of e-books.

And I now have a headache from seeing the backwards text on the other side of the page underlaying the text on the reading side of the page which is, itself, black on gray paper.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Just bought A Dance With Dragons!

Whoop-dee-damn-do.

 

[Connavar]

Collected Stories Vol. 1 by Richard Matheson
Journal of the Gun Years by Richard Matheson

 

[GOLLUM]

Journal of the Gun Years by Richard Matheson

Never heard of that one. What's it about?

OH yeh and I personally felt Incredible Shrinking Man was very good, not far off the excellence of I Am Legend in fact.....

Still need to get my copy of A Dance With Dragons...maybe this weekend.

 

[Connavar]

Never heard of that one. What's it about?

OH yeh and I personally felt Incredible Shrinking Man was very good, not far off the excellence of I Am Legend in fact.....

Still need to get my copy of A Dance With Dragons...maybe this weekend.

Its a dark western story as it takes a more real loon on the old west, take down myths.

About a young man who finds the journal of a murdered gunfighter who he saw as hero of his. The diary of the gunfighter shows how unromantic,poor the life of a gunfighter really is. He won big western award for it. One of my fav writers writing a western is ideal for me.

Shrinking Man was so weak because i read just days after I Am Legend. I cant believe its so weak that i didnt even finish it in hindsight. I should try it later after i read these books.

 

[elvet]

Dance with Dragons just arrived, along with:
Warriors anthology
The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson
The first 3 books of the Long Price Quartet by Daniel Abraham

 

[D_Davis]

Shrinking Man was so weak because i read just days after I Am Legend. I cant believe its so weak that i didnt even finish it in hindsight. I should try it later after i read these books.

I couldn't bring myself to finish it either. It's very poorly written.

 

[antiloquax]

I really enjoyed "The Shrinking Man". Maybe I read it before "I am Legend". Anyway, I have only read those two. Based on the films, I quite fancy reading "Stir of Echoes" and "What Dreams May Come". I am ignorant of his other work.
a

 

[J-Sun]

John Shirley - Eclipse Corona. I read the first in the trilogy a zillion years ago and it's taken me that long to find the second and third. Now I can finally read the whole thing - though I still won't get to it for awhile yet.

 

[D_Davis]

Yeah! It came today...

That may be my favorite cover yet.

 

[GOLLUM]

I really enjoyed "The Shrinking Man". Maybe I read it before "I am Legend". Anyway, I have only read those two. Based on the films, I quite fancy reading "Stir of Echoes" and "What Dreams May Come". I am ignorant of his other work.
a

Stir Of Echoes is definitely worth a read as is Hell House (both made into films) and as I understand it Bid Time Returns (Somewhere In Time) which I own but have not yet read. I haven't read What Dreams May Come, which the Robin Williams film was based on. A lot of Matheson's books have been made into films actually with varying results. You should also try his short stories antiloquax, many collections available e.g. Nightmare at 20,000 Feet , Duel etc.

We'll have you floating in a river of books and thoroughly penniless but with a permanent grin on your dial in no time...

 

[GOLLUM]

OOPS..I should have said today in my lunchbreak....

Dance of Dragons - George R.R. Martin *A lovely HB edn. at 50% discount. Yeh!