Black Cat Bone

A panoramic, Tom Wolfe/Dickens kind of thing, taking place in NYC 1976/77. I recalled a good review, so I grabbed it at half-price.

I see that one critic called it "the kind of exuberant, Zeitgeisty New York novel, like The Bonfire of the Vanities or The Goldfinch, that you’ll either love, hate, or pretend to have read," while another called it "overhyped" and "a steaming pile of literary dung." LOL

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_on_F ... berg_novel)

Deeper and deeper into the rabbit hole …

Diamond Dog wrote:A few of you on here may be interested in this crowdfunded book, entitled "A Guide To Modernism In Metro-Land" by Joshua Abbott.
It's halfway to being fully funded so please take a look and sign up if you fancy a copy of the book.



Modernism in Metro-Land started as a website in 2011 and has grown to explore modernist buildings throughout suburban London. Inspired by John Betjeman’s Metro-Land (1973) television programme and the architectural books by Ian Nairn, the website examines the growth of the suburbs from the 1920s to the present day through its modernist designs. Featuring architects such as Charles Holden, Erno Goldfinger and Norman Foster, Modernism in Metro-Land also shows the development of modernist architecture in Britain from its introduction in the 1920s right up to the brink of the 21st century. As well as the website, Modernism in Metro-Land also hosts tours of the modernist stations of the Piccadilly and Central Lines, as well as being a fixture of the annual Open House London weekend with its Stanmore Art Deco house walking tour.

And, no, I'm not on commission.

I'm still not, but it's only 71% funded and I want my copy!

So.... take a look and see if it's something you'd be interested in.

I'd think John Coan and maybe The Modernist would be interested in it.

For an airport novel, this is a bit of a doorstop at well over 600 pages long. So far, it's rollicking away at quite a pace, but it's not convincing me that it wants to be anything but a miniseries on Sky Atlantic or somefink.

Darkness_Fish wrote:

For an airport novel, this is a bit of a doorstop at well over 600 pages long. So far, it's rollicking away at quite a pace, but it's not convincing me that it wants to be anything but a miniseries on Sky Atlantic or somefink.

Isn’t A G Riddle Lord Voldemort’s real name?

Before he got ideas above his station. I reckon A. G. Riddle also batted at 4 for Slytherin, and had quite a handy off-break.

Hey lawdy mama, that's a good book!

Did anyone here read ‘A little Life’ ?

Interested about opinions

Diamond Dog wrote:

echolalia wrote:

Great review from you there Echo... I bought this on the back of it and it lives up to all you posted.

A really good overview of the subject (consumerism from 53-65) which, if you have any love of the subject, you really ought to get hold of.

I’m glad you liked it Pete. Strangely enough I was looking at other Thomas Hine titles recently and a typo threw up a different author, Thomas Hines, and now I’ve ordered:



Neutra appears in Populuxe of course. I was reading the other day that the house (on the cover) he designed for the director Josef von Sternberg was later rented by Ayn Rand while she was in Hollywood stalking King Vidor to make sure no changes were made to the ideologically-approved script of The Fountainhead, which he was filming at the time. She wrote Atlas Shrugged there too – the house has since been knocked down. I find the Rand associations rather unsettling but maybe that’s unfair on Neutra… we shall see. I’m certainly looking forward to reading it, anyway.

echolalia wrote:

Neutra appears in Populuxe of course. I was reading the other day that the house (on the cover) he designed for the director Josef von Sternberg was later rented by Ayn Rand while she was in Hollywood stalking King Vidor to make sure no changes were made to the ideologically-approved script of The Fountainhead, which he was filming at the time. She wrote Atlas Shrugged there too – the house has since been knocked down. I find the Rand associations rather unsettling but maybe that’s unfair on Neutra… we shall see. I’m certainly looking forward to reading it, anyway.

I guess if you wrote The Fountainhead and you were in Hollywood stalking King Vidor to make sure no changes were made to your ideologically-approved script, that would be the house to live in.

Speaking of which,

Snarfyguy wrote:Speaking of which,

Neutra claimed it was based on him!

echolalia wrote:I’m glad you liked it Pete. Strangely enough I was looking at other Thomas Hine titles recently and a typo threw up a different author, Thomas Hines, and now I’ve ordered:



Neutra appears in Populuxe of course. I was reading the other day that the house (on the cover) he designed for the director Josef von Sternberg was later rented by Ayn Rand while she was in Hollywood stalking King Vidor to make sure no changes were made to the ideologically-approved script of The Fountainhead, which he was filming at the time. She wrote Atlas Shrugged there too – the house has since been knocked down. I find the Rand associations rather unsettling but maybe that’s unfair on Neutra… we shall see. I’m certainly looking forward to reading it, anyway.

Serendipity!

That looks interesting... I may take a look myself!

Never saw the film, and after McQueen's tedious art-house hackery in Hunger, I'm not really minded to. This is pretty good so far though.

First in a fantasy trilogy by the renowned QC Andrew Caldecott.

The Reunion by Simone van der Vlugt.

Continuing my selection of European crime fiction, this Dutch thriller starts in an unconventional way. Narrated in the first person by 23-year-old Amsterdam resident Sabine, it so far has not featured any real crime elements at all. We learn that Sabine had a stormy teenage relationship with Isobel, her one-time best friend turned deadly enemy, but Isobel disappeared at age 15, and the mystery was never solved. Now Sabine is haunted by flashbacks as she suffers a miserable life, bullied at work and drinking too much. It's so far been a very downbeat character study, and hints are dropped that perhaps Sabine killed Isobel, and has mentally blocked this traumatic memory out. However, I understand there is a surprising twist at the end, so this may be a red herring.

Roberto Calasso - The Ruin of Kasch

Calasso might be one of my favourite authors. This is dense and impenetrable at times, but like "The Marriage of Cadmus & Harmony" he elucidates such wonderful, unique truths and wisdom that it is worth the slog of around 4-5 pages that I can manage in one sitting.

Darkness_Fish wrote:Never saw the film, and after McQueen's tedious art-house hackery in Hunger, I'm not really minded to. This is pretty good so far though.

You should try it, the film is a fairly conventional narrative. No tedious hackery.

Friedman’s work is most often considered as a contribution to the emergence of “black humor” in American fiction, but his first novel, Stern (1962), could at the time have easily enough been regarded as absurdist, an existential comedy about the angst of Jewish assimilation. The novel’s title character finds himself in alien territory—the American suburbs—confused and beset by a series of humiliations he struggles to understand. The story of his misadventures is funny, but in the way the plays of Beckett and Ionesco are funny, in a detached and deadpan manner that can also be disconcerting.

http://quarterlyconversation.com/the-co ... y-friedman

I came to this entirely via coincidence: I'd confused the author with Josh Alan Friedman (Tales of Times Square, various collaborations with his brother, the cartoonist Drew Friedman). I grabbed a copy of About Harry Townes out of the laundry room -- funny what you find there sometimes -- and it turned out to be great.

Then recently, beloved cartoonist Roz Chast put Stern in a list of her ten favorite books. How could I resist?

http://www.vulture.com/2018/04/roz-chas ... books.html