I finished Duma Key by who else but Stephen King today, it was actually pretty good. I also in the last week finished Skeleton Crew and reread Let The Right One In. I'm reading The Rose Labyrinth now by Titania Hardie, I was told that I'm not allowed to buy anymore books until after Christmas because a few people apparently bought me books that they're afraid I'll buy on my own. I can't keep that promise since with no computer I'm bored when home, so I decided to go for a cheap book that I normally wouldn't buy.

So far I don't like her style of writing, its not terrible but she doesn't really describe settings very well, I have no idea how to picture anything. Sometimes I don't even know where the character is supposed to be at all. Still I love puzzles and the book came in a box with papers with all of the riddles and each piece of paper is also a puzzle piece, so it'll keep me occupied. Not too bad for six dollars.

Scratch that about the writing not being terrible. It was horrendous, and I want to believe that she basically published the first draft because there was a lot of things that didn't make any sense. One minute they're inside a building, the next they're outside on a pier, then they look back on the incident and refer it to being on a boat. Two characters say they share a birthday in October but then one of them has another birthday in March? All the characters are beautiful and have no flaws, and all the women look like they are nineteen, and whats with books who try to be romantic make it so that the woman is a virgin but the man is older and has a lot of sexual experience?

And the setting description was not only terrible, but she was more interested in describing what they were wearing rather than where the fuck they were. Sex scenes were also terrible. Women can't handle having their clits touched, guys, so don't do it. They don't want pleasure, they just want to feel like they are one with you. The sentence "that would have appealed to my mother's gentle feminism" irritated me, and I gave up over HALF way through when they got to only ONE fricken puzzle. I also found out the author's only other books are books about witchcraft, and boy howdy does the pretentiousness seep through.

Feels good to rant about a shitty book, and nothing like something so terrible to put me in the mood to finish the more heady books I had started, finishing Dharma Rain: Sources Of Buddhist Environmentalism now.

well, let's see... half way through The Great Perhaps, by Joe Meno (sp?) , finished the Razor's Edge by Maugham yesterday, a short story collection from Alfred Bester the day before, went through Cannery Row and East of Eden about two weeks ago, (sadly, my education previous to this has not included Steinbeck, I am in awe), that's all i can remember at the moment. Looking for more GOOD old school science fiction, psychological thrillers, and also good examples of characterization and well crafted plot (any genre).

The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan (I cracked, but again I'm pretty sure no one would get it for me, pretty sure I'm getting fiction or Buddhist books.)

Its sad to read how much pressure was put on women to become wives and mothers and expect nothing more out of life, and I didn't know that it actually got worse after World War Two, before then employment outside the home and higher education was more common, the Emancipated Woman was more common as a character of fiction and an ideal. It talks about how housewives under this ideal became depressed and felt guilty for wanting more, and how it was the problem without a name. Its disgusting to read how people blamed them and their education for ever wanting more, saying it was their fault for not living up to their femininity, saying that career women emasculated their husbands and wrecked havoc on their families.

It was pretty revolutionary in its time (1963) but the preface she wrote in 1997 was depressing to read too. Since Clinton was in office she must have felt good about the state for women and basically said how wonderful women have it now, I stopped reading it when she said that abortion is now established as a protected right and will become a non issue very shortly (remember, 1997) since birth control is far more effective. Yeah, about that >.> Wonder what she thought of the Bush years, but sadly she died in 2006 so we can't ask what she thinks of Tillier's assassination or how **** victims were and still are charged for their **** kits.

Also she ignores women of minority and working class women a lot, who basically always had to work outside the home, but otherwise, still a really interesting read.

just started on Dead Man Walking, the one written by a nun trying to defend the life of a death row inmate in Louisiana. They made a movie about it a few years ago, never saw it though.

The Hellbound Heart by Clive Barker

Leslie Fiedler's Love and Death in the American Novel.

Excellent, excellent book IMO. I read it in 2007.

I'm currently reading The First Gothics: A Critical Guide To The English Gothic Novel by Fred Frank. It covers 500 gothic novels. I'm up to my armpits in trembling underage Adelines and Mirandas and they all have uncontrollable urges to explore dark damp caves at night.

The Damned (La-bas), by J.K. Huysmans.

Neil Gaiman's American Gods. I'm only on page 77 but it's pretty good thus far.

The Roots of Horror in the Fiction Of H.P. Lovecraft--Barton Levi St. Armand

Dark Entries: Bauhaus and Beyond--Ian Shirley

Have any of you peoples read any of the plays of Euripides ?????????


they are so
absolutely
a m a z i n g !!!!!!

Love that book.



Started reading Kiss Me, Judas by Will Christopher Baer

That was a fun book!

Poppy Z. Brite - Exquisite corpse ( It was a present. ), so far it's pretty shitty.

I thought it was a bit overpriced for its content, but I expect my brother (who gave it to me) paid for the packaging - glossy pages, photos, etc. Its not bad for DIY 101 on a budget, which it what I suppose its purpose is. The picture frame ideas were the only thing I'd consider doing, and yet I'd rather hunt down good deals on actual antique frames.

The Zombie Survival Guide

The Road--Cormac McCarthy

My mother bought this book shortly after it came out and I always wanted to borrow it. She died earlier this year, so now I own it. At least I can say I have a copy dating to before the movie...but it still has that crappy Oprah Book Club sticker on it.

Finished Kiss Me, Judas and now I'm reading Good Omens by Gaiman and Pratchett. Again.

Finished American Gods and now I'm reading Good Omens by Gaiman and Pratchett. For the record, I feel really cool because I'm reading the same book as Pineapple without meaning to.

the picture of dorian gray by oscar wilde. later today i'm going to buy some collections of poe, 1984 and something new by steven king.

Oh fuck was it awful. It was as if the author was permanently trying to get the reader to cringe and it wasn't working. It was pretty much a mixture of a book you could purchase in a sexshop and a second rate book that you find for 50 cents in a bargain bin. How she was ever successful is beyond me.

Stephen King. "The Stand." Complete & uncut edition.

My amazon order finally came through and I'm jumping into Hiding My Candy by the Lady Chablis....two tears in a bucket..