Actually I think the Hunter S. Thompson's would attentively nod at the Castanedas, and then wander off in search of good booze and books that didn't take themselves quite so seriously, like hey those Tom Robbinses over there.

With the "Fear and Loathings"...

Actually, none of the other books like "Fear and Loathing," because it's completely indiscriminate with its drugs, happily taking combinations that would make even the most jaded books cringe. And then the "Fear and Loathings" either try to chatter incessantly about bookmarks and booklights and folded-down corners and people who write in books, or they start shooting at the sci-fi books, which never ever ends well, because the sci-fi books have all the good technology to fight back, and a few Michael Crichtons always end up as collateral damage.

I want to shop at Tep's bookstore...

Michael Crichtons

oh this reminds me. I think it was in Minearverse where he came up and some considered him science fiction and others very much did not. I just read in Book Lust where she classifies him as horror, as least she puts Jurrasic park there.

I just read in Book Lust where she classifies him as horror, as least she puts Jurrasic park there.

Buh? That's like counting Requiem for a Dream as horror (and it was, in a year with so few sci-fi/horror contenders).

My bookstore is not for the faint of heart. There are casualties all the time. For instance, many people have been clunked on the head when walking past the A section, from all the Jane Austens swooning and falling off the shelf. The problem was solved by putting them on a low shelf.

And don't even get me started on the Stephen King section....

That's like counting Requiem for a Dream as horror...

This is the result of smoking the bad crack.

The good crack would have revealed that Darren Aronofsky was a directing genius, and that Hubert Selby Jr., having no other connection to the world, was forced to communicate his perceptions of reality via a language that had no punctuation.

In the library in my brain, Michael Chricton does not get shelved with the sci-fi, in spite of every one of his books (that I have read) having fictional science as a major part of the premise.

I think part of the disconnect is that his writing style is very much best-sellerese, which my brain does not parse as sci-fi no matter how much fictional science there is.

I think part of the disconnect is that his writing style is very much best-sellerese, which my brain does not parse as sci-fi no matter how much fictional science there is.

I read a lot of Robin Cook medical thrillers back in the day. They call Dean Koontz the "Master of Suspense" and his books thrillers, despite many of them also having elements of science fiction and the paranormal. I think this "thriller" term may apply to sci-fi written in best-sellerese.

best-sellerese

I stare at this phrase.

It has meaning to me. I am sure of it.

"Michael Crichton" and "anything positive" surely do not reside in the same sentence. Possibly, they do.

This puts my world asunder.