So hey. I’m not officially back on duty yet — I’ll be back sometime in the next couple of days — but I thought I’d seed a little discussion here with what I’m calling The Official We Hunted the Mammoth Book Recommendation Thread.
Which is pretty self-explanatory, so have at it! Any genre, old or new. I will probably gather up the various suggestions for a later post or page.
And, yep, the book in the pic up there is a real book that exists, written by a fella named Peter Cheyney, and which you can buy on Amazon for the low, low price of $2,986.69. No, really.
That’s for a new copy. If you’re some kind of cheapskate, you could pick up a used copy instead, for a relatively thrifty $86.90.
Here are the first couple of paragraphs of the book, courtesy of Amazon, so you can have some idea what you’ll be getting for your money:
Is it hot!
I aint never been in hell, but Im tellin you that I bet it aint any hotter than this Californian desert in July.
I am drivin along past Indio an I figure that soon I am goin to see the Palm Springs lights. An I am goin some the speedometer says eighty. If it wasnt so hot it would be a swell night; but there aint any air, an there was a baby sand storm this afternoon that caught me asleep an I gotta lump of the Mojave desert or whatever they call it stuck right at the back of my throat
I strongly urge you to go to Amazon and click on the “look inside” tab to read more of Mr. Cheyney’s hardboiled prose.
Within the few short pages available in Amazon’s preview, the book’s narrator (tough guy private dick Lemmy Caution) not only manages to eat a lump of sand; he also orders a hamburger (at a hot dog joint) and some ham and eggs (at a second joint). It’s not clear if he eats any of the hamburger before splitting, but you’ll be glad to know that he at least starts eating the ham and eggs.
Oh, he also calls a guy a “sissy” and gets his ass kicked.
I know the book sounds truly amazing, but before you click the “buy” button, let me make a little counteroffer: if you’re really intent on spending $2,986.69 on a book titled “Dames Don’t Care,” pay me that amount, and I will write an entire new book by that name in the style of the original, more or less. For $86.90, I will write a (very) short story in the same style.
Or you could post book recommendations in the comments below. That’s good, too.
Here’s the full cover for Dames.
I can’t recommend Catherynne M. Valente enough. I suppose I should especially shout out “Six-Gun Snow White” ( republished by Saga Press last year), “Deathless”, “Radiance”, and the two books of “The Orphan’s Tales”.
Recently I picked up and enjoyed Scott Hawkins’ “The Library at Mount Char” and Lauren Beukes “The Shining Girls”, and I reread Neal Stephenson’s “Zodiac” and enjoyed it possibly even more than on first read.
@podkayne, oh yeah, I have Deathless! It’s great. It’s really brooding.
I’ve read some appalling stuff lately. The last ones that left a favourable impression were ‘Gideon Mack’ by James Robertson, ‘The Owl’ by Bob Forward, which I glanced at in a second-hand shop 22 years ago and recently discovered again. ‘Old Man’s War’ by John Scalzi, which I only bought because I figured that if Vox Day hates something then it must be good (needless to say, it was), and the massive pile-up that is ‘The Taste of Fear’ by Jeremy Bates.
‘Dames Don’t Care’ was written by an Englishman who originally wrote in the American thriller style to win a private bet. If you are interested, it can be acquired on Amazon for as little as $11.95, or $7.19 electronically. The big price for that particular edition is down to Amazon having only a few copies in stock. See also the much joke-reviewed ‘How to Avoid Huge Ships’ by Captain Trimmer.
Currently reading “The Red Tent” which is an historical novel based on the Biblical story of Dinah. Pretty good.
http://t3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcT0uJ6kTK606K0C6kJAr7WGXQPhO26_XdSsGQO9BSfNV_9q8e2l
Recently read “Parable of the Talents” by Octavia Butler, one of my favorite science fiction authors.
http://t0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRMVeDwtJvcDoc8Y4PyoDa3yq45e97d0AH0aMAVgLtmd3MT1I73
For any Neil Gaiman fans, I would recommend “Anansi Boys” which is easy to read and pretty hilarious at times.
http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSzgCGrjmunT2HBKynBZkIKTLdmwKkTWUMYB3S_bv_PaFn-OWA2
I’m on a huge comic book kick so I’ll recommend:
Nimona by Noelle Stevenson
Lumberjanes by Noelle Stevenson and many others
Sisters/Smile by Raina Telgemeier
Unbeatable Squirrel Girl by Ryan North and Erica Henderson
Howard the Duck by Chip Zdarsky
Wayward by Jim Zub
Bitch Planet by Kelly Sue DeConnick
Jonesy by Sam Humphries
If you’re not into comics I highly recommend anything by Jasper Fforde.
I’m reading mostly nonfiction recently. Right now, it’s In the Sleep Room, about a Canadian mental-health institution’s involvement in CIA brainwashing experiments. Before that, it was another book on the subject: Father, Son and CIA.
Moving Mars by Greg Bear. It’s basically a story about interplanetary politics. Fantastic.
I’m currently rereading A Natural History of Dragons by Marie Brennan. Even though it is a fantasy, the main character is a woman who is going against social norms to study dragons. I haven’t read the second book in the series yet, but I want to take it with me when I’m traveling in a few weeks (which is why I’m rereading the first one now).
$2,986.69? For that? Seriously? Why? Just… WHY? I…have temporarily lost the ability to even.
Anyway… I’m currently reading a sci-fi book called ”Sphere” by Michael Crichton. It’s very interesting so far. Really drew me in while also playing with my expections.
Since I’m going by PaganReader on here, I’m definitely going to have to recommend some books. For fantasy, I would recommend The Others series by Anne Bishop. It starts with Written in Red. Content warnings for self-harm, some racism analogies, and (implied) rape. It is not explicit, only mentioned in passing, but it is definitely there. I would also recommend The Incarnations by Susan Barker. Content warnings for pretty much everything with that one -rape, torture, incest, suicide, murder, cannabilism, racism, castration, starvation, genocide, and probably more stuff that I can’t remember.
For non-fiction, I would recommend Devil’s Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three, by Mara Leveritt.
I’m currently reading The Life and the Adventures of a Haunted Convict, by Austin Reed. It’s the prison memoir of a free African American man living in New York before the Civil War. It tells how from a young age he was bounced between one unpaid forced labor situation to another, (which wasn’t considered slavery for some reason), whether as an ‘apprentice’ or in prision.
If you like (cozy) mysteries, Joanne Fluke’s Hannah Swensen mysteries, starting with Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder, and Lillian Jackson Braun’s The Cat Who books come to mind. The first one is The Cat Who Could Read Backwards.
I can’t believe I forgot to mention Felines Of New York: A Glimpse into the Lives of New York’s Feline Inhabitants by Jim Tews. (Also check out felinesofnewyork.com) It’s full of adorable cats. I also like I Could Pee on This: and Other Poems by Cats by Franesco Marciuliano, a book of cat poetry. Cat Talk: What Your Cat is Trying to Tell You by Carole Wilbourn is another great cat book.
I tend to read two books at the same time – one non-fiction and one fiction. At the moment I’m on The Three Christs of Ypsilanti and I just finished Little, Big, and I haven’t been able to decide which fiction I’ll start next. I’m ahead of schedule on those, and I expected to finish that around the election conventions – I have a weird tradition of rereading Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail ’72 every election year since the first one I could vote in, when my uncle got me the book.
From this thread I looked up We Have Always Lived in the Castle, which I have somehow never read, and I’m kind of itching to now. It looks right up my alley.
In line with the original post though, there is a podcast I absolutely love called Tomefoolery. Description from the site: “Twice a month, comedian Cody Melcher invites a couple of funny friends over to talk about a really really weird book they’ve all just read. Funny people, crazy books.” He did an episode with the hosts of the Lady to Lady podcast on a book called Let’s Make Mary (“A gentleman’s guide to seduction in 8 easy lessons”), and sometimes he puts his copy of books they do up for sale, signed by the guests. I now own that book. It is hilariously ridiculous.
There are sellers on Amazon that use algorithms to set their prices, based partially on where other sellers have set their prices. This can have hilarious effects when no sellers are offering the book except ones that use auto-pricing. These are usually drop-shippers, too. If you look on the page that gives you the list of sellers and prices, you’ll see that there are four sellers, all with hundreds of reviews, and all priced within 2% of each other.
I’m reading Italo Calvino’s Cosmicomics (which includes “All At One Point”, which is utterly brilliant and one of my fave all-time microfictions), rereading Jane Eyre, and just finished Ordinary Wolves by Seth Kantner.
One of the twins just walked in brandishing a Tintin book, so I guess that’s next on the reading list.
I will always recommend Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. One of my favorites.
I forgot about the Cherie Priest books. I love her writing, and her Eden Moore series is very Southern Gothic. I have to get the ones after Boneshaker; haven’t read them yet, but I really want to.
Also, JoeB, thank you for mentioning Pickman’s Model. I didn’t know about it before, but it really fleshes out a reference in Fallout 4; there’s a Pickman’s Gallery, full of horrific paintings, and then the basement is full of additional nastiness. I especially liked that “Ghouls Feeding” was mentioned, and the Gallery is in the North End. (I love the Fallout series, as flawed as it can be. I hope they have more DLC like the Far Harbor one; the other two were ok, but I like content and stories, like the DLC for New Vegas.)
I’m rereading the Tiffany Aching series in Discworld, although slowly because there’s so much other stuff that takes my time. I recently read We’re All Damaged by Matthew Norman, which was pretty good, and Pamela Fagan Hutchins has an enjoyable cozy mystery series. Keeley Bates is another cozy mystery writer that I’ve enjoyed.
Obviously I don’t have any new stuff to recommend, but my classic recommendation are the original Oz books. A surprising number of people, even fantasy fans never read them. As with many other old timey authors, Baum is problematic due to some racist viewpoints, but fortunately, they only occasionally show in the books. The series does have a lot of socialist, feminist, and anti-war stuff in it though! His take on the military in Ozma of Oz and Tik-Tok in Oz is particularly hilarious. Also, in Tik-Tok in Oz there’s a magical device that sounds a lot like a cell phone. It’s really charming to read. These days it’s much more popular for fantasy to be kind of dark, so I fear Oz will be doomed to fall even further out of favor. I’m fine with darker stories. I am after all a big ASOIAF fan, but it’s nice to have a series that’s light and positive without being self-righteous or cheesy too.
Maybe I should read those books again. They were a big part of what kicked off my love and reading. Maybe they’ll get me back into it again.
One of my other favorites would be Flannery O’Connor’s collected works. Not an obscure choice by any means, but I guess I’m boring!
My favorite horror story is The Willows by Algernon Blackwood. If you’re like me, a city person who finds the wilderness a bit intimidating, this one will really get to you. You can find it free online pretty easily.
I preferred Anansi Boys to American Gods for those same reasons. Ultimately it comes down to whether you prefer a big, epic story or a small, personal story, but for me, “guy finds out he’s the son of a god and has to save the world” feels pretty commonplace, whereas “guy finds out he’s the son of a god and has to deal with family drama” feels a lot more unique.
I read one of the Oz books to my son, back when he was still young enough to enjoy having me read to him (he was, what, 10? 11?), and it involved a character I believe called “Raggedy Man”, who possessed an object that, when brandished, would make everybody LOVE him. It was called the “Love Magnet”, and every time it showed up in the book, I dropped my voice like Barry White and said, “the Looooove Magnet”, and my son would go, “bowm chicka bow wow”. We were HILARIOUS. Lots more laughing than reading with that one.
That said, I’m reading “Pushout: The Criminalization of Black Girls in School” (I’m an educator) alternating with “For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood – And The Rest Of Y’all, Too”, and waiting eagerly for the most recent Ben Aaronovitch book (“The Hanging Tree” – if you haven’t read these, and you’re a fan of urban fantasy, you really should) to arrive in my library account.
Oh, damn, that’s what I get for jumping in before reading previous suggestions — Dalillama already mentioned the “Rivers of London” series (Triffic! Really!), and I was just reminded of one of my favorite semi-local authors (Portland OR), Brian Doyle. I read and loved “The Plover”, “Martin Marten”, and “Mink River”, and I’m eagerly awaiting the arrival of “Chicago” in my library. Lovely atmospheric straight-up fiction, human beings talking to each other, and above it all the beautiful Pacific Northwest.
My bluff has been called!
A generous soul has donated $86.90, so I will now be writing my own version of Dames Don’t Care in the form of a short story, which I will post here for you all as soon as I’m done.
I found an ebook version of the original over at archive.org:
https://archive.org/details/damesdontcare00cheyiala
So I’ll be reading that to get in the mood!
My offer to write a book-length version of Dames for $2,986.69 still stands.
@Catherwood
The Accidental Alchemist is also set in Portland (and the Sage Adair books). So is Greg Rucka’s thriller Fistful of Rain .
@general
If you’re look for a particular type of fantasy or sci fi, mention it and I can probably recommend you some.
But can anyone recommend a good romance novel about a violent Basque librarian disguised as a shepherd in Australia?
I love the Oz books! They’re, well, gentle, in a way that most children’s literature isn’t. The one where the Gales lose the farm and Ozma brings them all to Oz is my favorite. And Ozma had beautiful dark hair, just like my mother.
For other children’s books, I adore Tove Jansson’s Moomin books.
I’ve got my fingers in a number of proverbial pies (…or…actual books…) right now.
A friend of mine and I are reading The Heart of the Artichoke by Elena Poniatowska. It is a collection of short stories, originally in Spanish (the version my friend is reading). I’m reading the English for us to compare/contrast. A very good read.
I also recently finished Sun, Stone, and Shadows: 20 Great Mexican Short Stories. Also a wonderful collection, mostly of older stories, though.
I started, but need to get back into, Backlash by Susan Faludi.
Oh, and I’m finishing off a collection of John Steinbeck’s dispatches, written when he was in Vietnam and reflecting on the state of the country during the war (which his sons were in)
OK! My earlier comment on page 1 has been allowed through moderation (because of name change/last time I posted was like 2 years ago), but I would also like to add that I’m currently reading Inferno by Dan Brown because I want to complain about the changes in the movie when it comes out. Well, that and listen to more of Hans Zimmer’s soundtracks. At this point, I think it’s safe to say Dan Brown has a Robert Langdon Formula:
1) Guy dies dramatically in prologue
2) Robert Langdon + A Smart Woman Who Just Happens to Also Be Conventionally Attractive team up to solve mystery
3) Symbols and codes abound
4) Too many… ellipses… for… dramatic effect…
5) Mercenary villain following orders of shadowy overlord
6) Langdon + Woman discover Massive Revelation that Changes Everything but Not Really
P.S.: I figured out how to edit my avatar, so please ignore that part of my other comment.