Books for those who can read

seeahill · Post by **seeahill** » Fri Dec 08, 2006 12:01 am

Maza wrote:Read Ubik by Philip K. Dick recently. Good mix of trash, humor, and thought provoking stuff. Highly recommended. Reading A Scanner Darkly now, after checking out that movie. The movie was pretty cool (especially Woody Harrelson), but the book is much funnier.

Years ago, when I was an editor at Rolling Stone, I assigned Phillip K. Dick a story. Deadline came and went. I called. He gave me the best writer's excuse ever. "My house burned down and I saved my metal filing cabinet, but it was hot and I burned my fingers and I can't type."

seeahill · Post by **seeahill** » Fri Dec 08, 2006 12:03 am

Also, I recommending Cormac McCathy's newest, No Country for Old Men. Spectacular language. Wonderful writing altogether, and, like a lot of McCarthy's work, the ending isn't at all what you expect and want.

beefheart · Post by **beefheart** » Fri Dec 08, 2006 12:26 am

seeahill wrote:
Maza wrote:Read Ubik by Philip K. Dick recently. Good mix of trash, humor, and thought provoking stuff. Highly recommended. Reading A Scanner Darkly now, after checking out that movie. The movie was pretty cool (especially Woody Harrelson), but the book is much funnier.
Years ago, when I was an editor at Rolling Stone, I assigned Phillip K. Dick a story. Deadline came and went. I called. He gave me the best writer's excuse ever. "My house burned down and I saved my metal filing cabinet, but it was hot and I burned my fingers and I can't type."

We can only hope your kids will make the kind of money off of you that PKD's are making off of him.

bill fox · Post by **bill fox** » Fri Dec 08, 2006 1:44 am

seeahill wrote:Also, I recommending Cormac McCathy's newest, No Country for Old Men. Spectacular language. Wonderful writing altogether, and, like a lot of McCarthy's work, the ending isn't at all what you expect and want.

Try to keep up author boy, No Country is not his latest. I already reviewed his latest, very bleak post apocalypse tale. No Country is a great book.

Read Eggers new one "What is the what"

Hagbard · Post by **Hagbard** » Fri Dec 08, 2006 2:25 pm

I'm about half way through the Leibniz-Clarke Correspondence, closest thing to an actual Leibniz-Newton showdown. The Big L was one wily fucker.

Lich · Post by **Lich** » Fri Dec 08, 2006 3:29 pm

I'd like to read O.J.'s book, but it's been banned by fucking FS squelching mouth breathers.

GoDogGo! · Post by **GoDogGo!** » Fri Dec 08, 2006 3:30 pm

Lich wrote:I'd like to read O.J.'s book, but it's been banned by fucking FS squelching mouth breathers.

Doan sweat it my man, someone will publish it.

Has anyone here read "World War Z?" It sounds like a hoot.

GDG!

Lich · Post by **Lich** » Fri Dec 08, 2006 3:32 pm

GoDogGo! wrote:
Lich wrote:I'd like to read O.J.'s book, but it's been banned by fucking FS squelching mouth breathers.
Doan sweat it my man, someone will publish it.

Has anyone here read "World War Z?" It sounds like a hoot.

GDG!

Well let me know ASAP if you see it released anywhere. It's actually still on Amazons list, but not available.

GoDogGo! · Post by **GoDogGo!** » Fri Dec 08, 2006 3:38 pm

Lich wrote:
GoDogGo! wrote:
Lich wrote:I'd like to read O.J.'s book, but it's been banned by fucking FS squelching mouth breathers.
Doan sweat it my man, someone will publish it.

Has anyone here read "World War Z?" It sounds like a hoot.

GDG!
Well let me know ASAP if you see it released anywhere. It's actually still on Amazons list, but not available.

Eh? Amazon says it's in stock.

GDG!

mrzero · Post by **mrzero** » Fri Dec 08, 2006 8:30 pm

The Alaskan Bootlegger's Bible by Leon Kania

beefheart · Post by **beefheart** » Sat Dec 16, 2006 10:50 pm

Read Cormac McCarthy's The Road in one sitting, that must be a sort of reccommendation of itself.

I'm suprised that a certain world class travel writer of our acquaintance champions McCarthy and dismisses Gene Wolfe. They have a very similar style-- latinate and convoluted; even an erudite dude like myself has to reread sections.

My only other experience w/ McCarthy was Blood Meridians. Blood seemed soaked in an older mystical tradition, or the clash of several; it seemed Catholic. The philosophical substrate of Road is more Protestant -- "amazing grace." The father and son protaganists's travels through the post apocalyptic Smokies and East Coast are --I like to believe-- ultimately life-affirming and redemptive because they are pred-destined.

DARTH · Post by **DARTH** » Sun Dec 17, 2006 7:15 pm

Beef,

I 've been curious about The Road.

beefheart · Post by **beefheart** » Sun Dec 17, 2006 8:24 pm

DartH:

I don't know where to rate it as a post-apocalypse survival manual, but it was certainly thought provoking-- spurring meditations on:

the parent/child, particularly father/son bond

survival as a metaphor for salvation, grace vs. acts

other existential crap

DARTH · Post by **DARTH** » Sun Dec 17, 2006 11:18 pm

The reviews seemed like the anti Mad Max.
Mad Max's world I could deal with, it be like a new start, but the discriptions of The Road sound like the kind of misery that the aftermath of a nuclear war would be.
That's why it pisses me of we have not put a few megatons on Terhan, fuckers like that should not have the means to turn the world dark.
10-100 million dead Iranians is better than 2-5 billion human beings.

Mickey O'neil · Post by **Mickey O'neil** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 1:58 am

BeefHeart wrote:Read Cormac McCarthy's The Road in one sitting, that must be a sort of reccommendation of itself.

I'm suprised that a certain world class travel writer of our acquaintance champions McCarthy and dismisses Gene Wolfe. They have a very similar style-- latinate and convoluted; even an erudite dude like myself has to reread sections.

My only other experience w/ McCarthy was Blood Meridians. Blood seemed soaked in an older mystical tradition, or the clash of several; it seemed Catholic. The philosophical substrate of Road is more Protestant -- "amazing grace." The father and son protaganists's travels through the post apocalyptic Smokies and East Coast are --I like to believe-- ultimately life-affirming and redemptive because they are pred-destined.

I'm reading Blood Meridian right now. So far it's fantastic.

Fat Cat · Post by **Fat Cat** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 4:46 pm

Thoughts Without a Thinker: Psychotherapy from a Buddhist Perspective by Mark Epstein.

Turdacious · Post by **Turdacious** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 10:53 pm

Heart of a Dog, by Mikhail Bulgakov. Funny as hell.

Skinny · Post by **Skinny** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 3:34 pm

Fooled by Randomness. The hidden Role of Chance in the Markets and Life. By Nassim Nicholas Taleb.

Great shit.
Whatever kind of fighter you are (markets, cage, ring, business, whatever) you should read that book to get the perspective right.
If you da bitch you can skip it.

Hagbard · Post by **Hagbard** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 3:51 pm

Skinny wrote:Fooled by Randomness. The hidden Role of Chance in the Markets and Life. By Nassim Nicholas Taleb.

Great shit.
Whatever kind of fighter you are (markets, cage, ring, business, whatever) you should read that book to get the perspective right.
If you da bitch you can skip it.

Great book, however as a philosophy of life or business it needs tempering.

Skinny · Post by **Skinny** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 3:55 pm

I agree but it makes you think and take a closer look and some stuff in your life.

nafod · Post by **nafod** » Fri Dec 22, 2006 6:13 pm

"The Evolution of Cooperation" by Robert Axelrod. Very cool book, easy to read but deep thoughts.

Talks about how cooperation emerges when two players play a game where the players can either Cooperate (C) or Defect (D) in the game. The payoff matrix is
- If one does D while the other sucker does C, D wins big (say, 5 points) and C wins nothing
- If both play D, they win little (1 point each)
- If both play C, both win 3 points
You keep playing the game over and over. The goal is to come up with a strategy that maximizes long term reward. The game provides the conditions under which fundamentally selfish agents will spontaneously cooperate. The game offers a long-term incentive for cooperation, even though there is a short-term incentive for defection (the opposite of cooperation).

The book talks about how this simple problem is common throughout, and how cooperation emerges naturally in these situations. The cool thing is, generally the best strategy is also just about the simplest, called tit-for-tat. In it you do whatever the other guy did on the last move, starting by assuming cooperation.

You can see it going on, on various forums.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Evolut ... ooperation

mrzero · Post by **mrzero** » Thu Dec 28, 2006 4:07 am

farmhouse ales by Phil Markowski[/u]

Fat Cat · Post by **Fat Cat** » Thu Dec 28, 2006 4:06 pm

Second Epistle to the Corinthians by St. Paul
Preparing for a Physique Contest by Chuck Sipes

bill fox · Post by **bill fox** » Wed Jan 03, 2007 8:53 pm

Hagbard Celine wrote:
Skinny wrote:Fooled by Randomness. The hidden Role of Chance in the Markets and Life. By Nassim Nicholas Taleb.

Great shit.
Whatever kind of fighter you are (markets, cage, ring, business, whatever) you should read that book to get the perspective right.
If you da bitch you can skip it.
Great book, however as a philosophy of life or business it needs tempering.

Just started reading it, surprised to see the shout out to DeVany in the intro.

Hagbard · Post by **Hagbard** » Wed Jan 03, 2007 10:04 pm

Devany is an accomplished academic in his field.