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Mr. Chimp wrote:In good news, I just finished reading "House of Leaves" by Mark Z. Danielewski. Has anyone read this? Recommended.

yes

meh

The Fortress Of Solitude was excellent, by the way. I'm now reading The Celling Of America, a collection of articles reprinted from a newsletter written by inmates about prison life. So far, so good.

Dylan wrote:Jonathan Franzen (The Corrections, one of the best of the new fiction).

Strong Motion is so much better. Kind of like Confusion is Sex versus Daydream Nation. But Jonathan Franzen and Sonic Youth can both kiss my ass generally speaking.

Has anyone read "Cool Rules"?

Just started Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut. This is my fourth time. There's something about that one that I love. Anybody else have any opinions on him?

Vonnegut never lets you down, all the classics merit re-reading every few years, Player Piano, Breakfast Of Champions, Sirens Of Titan- God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater is one that isn't mentioned enough by his fans.

Some recommendations:

James Ellroy- American Tabloid or Cold Six Thousand

Earlier Don DeLillo, like Great Jones Street ( about rock n' roll, sort of ) and White Noise. Libra is really good.

Madison Smart Bell- Waiting For The End Of The World

Nick Tosches- Trinities

I've always loved john Kennedy Toole's "A Confederacy of Dunces."
Utterly laugh out loud in public and get sidelong stares funny. Too bad the dumbass killed himself even before this book was published (his mom got it published post-mortem) and it won the pulitzer, so other than the Neon Bible (written when 16) it's all we'll have of this selfish, hilarious bastard.

Rushdie's 'the Ground beneath her feet' is a lovely and sprawling rock epic.
You will believe that VTO was the greatest pop band ever. I was sad cause I couldn't buy any of their records, them being fictional and all.

I prefer his 'Midnight's Children', however. once you get past the "look at me I'm a GREAT writer' aspect of his best, you start to realized. Christ, He's a GREAT writer, really. Satanic Versus is half-assed. Don't believe the hype.

Katherine Dunne's 'Geek Love' about a circus family is eerie, creepy and touching. That kinda sounds gross, but it does rule. Telekinesis, albino hunchback dwarves, siamese whores, flipperbabies--This book has it all!

Faiz

Just read Murakami's A Wild Sheep Chase which was quite excellent. A friend has been recommending his works - pointedly Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World - to me for months without loaning me a single text. So I picked up that one and was very pleased.

Have I mentioned Tibor Fischer? Read The Thought Gang, and will admit that I dove for the thesaurus more than a dozen times, but it's written to be that way. Once you have an understanding of the language ceiling, his writing keeps a smile on your face as the words pass your eyes. Am currently reading The Collector Collector which is great from a unique angle.


On deck:

Murakami's Dance Dance Dance

Nick Tosches's The Last Opium Den

Nabokov's Pale Fire

the new Stephenson book The Confusion (when available).

Oh yes, I meant to heartily endorse Kurt Vonnegut to anyone who hasn't read one of his books in the past 6 months.

My faves are still Cat's Cradle, and Timequake / Breakfast of Champions.

But, recently, I've re-read Timequake more often than any other.

Mr. Chimp wrote:Oh yes, I meant to heartily endorse Kurt Vonnegut to anyone who hasn't read one of his books in the past 6 months.

My faves are still Cat's Cradle, and Timequake / Breakfast of Champions.

But, recently, I've re-read Timequake more often than any other.

Everybody's so down with Cat's Cradle and Breakfast of Champions. I really dig 'em all (Welcome to the Monkey House didn't really send me).But why these two kind of eludes me. I'd go with Hocus Pocus and Slapstick and of course him showing up at Rodney Dangerfield's dorm room. I was also kind of surprised how good he his at reviewing, he did great reviews of Heller and Buckley, what was the name of the book that had that stuff in it? The Slaughter house movie and the Mother Night movie kicked ass. I haven't seen the Breakfast of Champions movie, Bruce Willis seems like such a fucking choad that I've resisted paying to rent it.

(Welcome to the Monkey House didn't really send me)

Welcome to the Monkey House is a collection of shorts he wrote for magazines and whatnot. he even says they're slick crap. but you have to admitt, even the sentimental stuff is distinctly vonnegut.
i like WTTMH...but i'm a pussy girl that gets a tear in my eye everytime i read DP

God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater and The sirens of Titan are my favs.