We're still working on a plan, but so far it involves being sent to prison and becoming somebody's bitch.

Fred ,'Just Rewards (2)'


Literary Buffistas 3: Don't Parse the Blurb, Dear.

There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."


Pix - Jun 19, 2008 9:40:13 am PDT #6423 of 28370
The status is NOT quo.

I love A Thousand Acres, though. I've been meaning to read Moo but haven't yet. If I get through the pile o'books I have to read this summer, maybe I'll get to Moo.


Fred Pete - Jun 19, 2008 10:26:35 am PDT #6424 of 28370
Ann, that's a ferret.

Kristin, Moo is a laugh riot. Especially for anyone familiar with academia.


Pix - Jun 19, 2008 10:36:29 am PDT #6425 of 28370
The status is NOT quo.

Thanks, Fred! ND owns it and said the same, so I'm very intrigued. I will add it to the pile.


Maysa - Jun 19, 2008 11:04:38 am PDT #6426 of 28370

Just finished Oscar Wao. I think I wanted to like it much more than I did. Which is a bummer.

Is the book as good as his short stories are? I love those, but I'm reluctant to read Oscar Wao, because sometimes good short story writers aren't such good novelists.


Volans - Jun 19, 2008 12:41:04 pm PDT #6427 of 28370
move out and draw fire

Question for the masses: If you were compiling a list of Must Read Cyberpunk / Metaverse Books (hi Sox), what would be on it? Nonfiction as well as fiction.

Signed, I can't get thru a Charles Stross book.


DavidS - Jun 19, 2008 12:45:03 pm PDT #6428 of 28370
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."

If you were compiling a list of Must Read Cyberpunk / Metaverse Books (hi Sox), what would be on it? Nonfiction as well as fiction.

The compilation Storming the Reality Studio is great. I love it because they have a critical bibliography of all the cyberpunk precursors which cites things like one particularly dark and cool short story by Fritz Leiber as well as all the usual Ballard and PKD.

Synners - Pat Cadigan

Queen of Angels - Greg Bear

Schismatrix - Bruce Sterling

Those Alec Effinger books which have recently been reprinted. What was the first one called? When Gravity Falls or something? Those were good.

Gibson, Stephenson etc.


DavidS - Jun 19, 2008 12:48:16 pm PDT #6429 of 28370
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."

Oh, and even before there was a World Wide Web I remember using FTP to download bits from Steve Shaviro's Doom Patrol. Which starts with the Grant Morrison comic but uses it as a springboard to pursue a lot then-trendy 90s notions of post-modernity.

Very cyberpunky.


DavidS - Jun 19, 2008 12:50:36 pm PDT #6430 of 28370
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."

Also in historical mode, Bruce Sterling's original rabble rousing, name-calling, icon shattering punk-as-fuck zine Cheap Truth is all available online.


DavidS - Jun 19, 2008 12:54:24 pm PDT #6431 of 28370
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."

Heh. Here Sterling calls out the weaknesses in Neuromancer to praise Greg Bear's Blood Music. What a snot!


Kat - Jun 19, 2008 1:51:09 pm PDT #6432 of 28370
"I keep to a strict diet of ill-advised enthusiasm and heartfelt regret." Leigh Bardugo

Is the book as good as his short stories are? I love those, but I'm reluctant to read Oscar Wao, because sometimes good short story writers aren't such good novelists.

I much preferred Drown. I think that Oscar Wao is episodic enough that it gets to some of his strengths as a short story writer. But Drown was so much better.