Anyone here read?

[nroberts]

Movies, movies, blah, blah, blah. Who actually reads anymore? Anyone else read The Forge of God by Greg Bear? Is that a mind numbingly tragic story or what?! The most disturbing part for me was the five year old niece at the end looking through the window with her dad and the helplesness of the uncle as he left with his family perhapse to be saved, but maybe not. All he knows is that NOTHING can be done to save that little girl or the billions of others like her.

Did you read the sequel, The Anvil of the Stars? About the young sons and daughters that travel on the ship of law to deal justice to the race that created the machines? That book was pretty good, and rather disturbing as well, but not nearly at the same level as its prequel. He focuses more on the nature of revenge and society than most anything else. An incredibly important book in its own rights if only for the questions it raises about the nature of our cultural conceptions; for instance how we would mature sexually without parental and sociological guidance.

I think authors like Greg Bear are rare finds. To be able to make you feel the terror and doom that the people who know what is happening in The Forge of God felt is just amazing to me. How the individual lives of so many people were described and you got to see it all happen from so many angles without loosing the detail of any of them. How it all tied together in ultimate destruction was awe inspiring. He really makes you understand the grand scale of total aniolation (sp?) ... EVERYONE dead. I really admire that author.

Don't worry...I didn't give away the ending if you haven't read it. You know how it ends from the very beginning. That is what makes the book so incredible. The characters know that the entire planet is doomed and nothing anyone does will stop it. The author takes you through the thoughts and feelings of these characters as they face this ultimate reality. All hope is lost about 1/2 way through, but it becomes obvious pretty quickly that the end of the book is the end of the world.

I also read his fantacy novels that are now sold as one in Songs of Earth and Power, which all musicians and artists should read. These books give music and other art the power to shape and destroy worlds...it is a really fascinating book.

The Forge of God would probably make an awesome movie. It would be filled with suspense, incredible effects, and catastrophe on a massive scale. However, it could never touch viewers in the same way it touches a reader. The thoughts and emotions it evokes are just not translatable onto film. I hope it is never done even though it would be fascinating to actually see all those things that happen in the end.

I started to write some lyrics but couldn't seem to put in words all that that book made me feel:

Find a place with an open view
Watch the Earth as she dies
The Forge of God has run us through
The end of a world and a billion lives

I stood at the heights of the world
Yesturday's found love in my arms as we fell
The skies burned red and the Earth cracked open
My stone is broken

Upon the day the machines arived
We finally knew we are not alone
Calling forth we invited destruction
The preditors have found their prey

Into the sea our doom crashed down
The smoking gun that shot our world in the head
A song of death as the bullets spin round
We are already dead.

Sometimes I read a LOT. I have a lot more to share in this regard. I watch movies also, but books are just so much more...just more of everything. Movies are like the surface of a deep lake that contains all sorts of nasties that can swallow you whole. The surface is safe and boring...

[nroberts]

Anyone read that one? It's been a while for me but I still remember a lot of what I envisioned? Do you think she was crazy or there really were ghosts? Were you expecting that end at all? I always took it at face value that there were ghosts and the children really were haunted. For one thing, I don't recall her ever seing the man, or any picture of him, before she saw him as a ghost. But she described him in detail enough that he was recognizable to whoever she told (something I have forgotten).

I think it is a scary ass story either way.

[nroberts]

Not withstanding the beginning of the book, which is an awesome beginning to a book describing the anger of a house...I think this chick was completely nuts. I don't even know that the house was haunted to begin with. I think the main character was just completly schitzo, was halucinating, and generally having grandious delusions of percecution.

The whole, "Why isn't anyone stopping me?" at the end made this pretty obvious. I frankly didn't care at that point either; I wouldn't have stopped her either.

On the other hand, there are times when there are manifestations that seem to have an effect on people with the main character at the time. Were these people seing these things also or did she just think they did?

Not sure how I felt about the book as a whole. I just know that I was pretty pissed off at the main character at the end because she was so stupid. The movie, "The haunting," which was loosely based on the book showed this aspect at least pretty well but made the assumption that the house was really haunted. SPOILER I guess nobody wants to watch a movie were some crazy chick runs around being terrified at a bunch of shit that isn't there and then being mad because nobody stops her when she drives her car full speed into a tree and blows her stupid self up.

[nroberts]

Anyone else into the vampire chronicles? This one and Queen of the Damned are probably my favorites so far. What did you make of this book? Do you think Memnoch was lying about his mission the whole time? Was anything he showed Lestat real? What about the story he gave Lestat, how did that make you feel?

For me the story attacked a lot of what I believe in but in ways that seemed totally reasonable. I guess if you really were to meet the Devil and hear his side of the story that is how it would be. What about it though? Could the Devil be on a devine mission? Could the path to heaven lead through hell? It makes a beutiful thought, one day hell will be empty.

The one I didn't really get at all was why he would thank Lestat in the end? Obviously some trickery was afoot. How much of what happened was a trick and how much was honest? Were God and the Devil both playing Lestat?

This book really got me thinking. Anne Rice is like that. She questions religious and moral values in everything she writes it seems. The fact that the main hero is a mass murdering vampire is among the most obvious. A being that begged not to become what he is, but in the end loves it. "I am the vampire Lestat!" Is he guilty of murder when he feeds? Is he a damned soul?

[Plstrcast]

Originally Posted by nroberts

Anyone else into the vampire chronicles? This one and Queen of the Damned are probably my favorites so far. What did you make of this book? Do you think Memnoch was lying about his mission the whole time? Was anything he showed Lestat real? What about the story he gave Lestat, how did that make you feel?

For me the story attacked a lot of what I believe in but in ways that seemed totally reasonable. I guess if you really were to meet the Devil and hear his side of the story that is how it would be. What about it though? Could the Devil be on a devine mission? Could the path to heaven lead through hell? It makes a beutiful thought, one day hell will be empty.

The one I didn't really get at all was why he would thank Lestat in the end? Obviously some trickery was afoot. How much of what happened was a trick and how much was honest? Were God and the Devil both playing Lestat?

This book really got me thinking. Anne Rice is like that. She questions religious and moral values in everything she writes it seems. The fact that the main hero is a mass murdering vampire is among the most obvious. A being that begged not to become what he is, but in the end loves it. "I am the vampire Lestat!" Is he guilty of murder when he feeds? Is he a damned soul?

This book quickly became my fave "VC" so far..
Anyone read "Bad Omens"? THIS is one of the best sci-fi books to come down the pike in AGES! (Oh yeah, Terry Gilliam is making the movie... should be amazing"!

[Rid]

Tons of books, I read alot, far more than I watch movies, and that I also do alot.

[nroberts]

Originally Posted by Plstrcast

This book quickly became my fave "VC" so far..
Anyone read "Bad Omens"? THIS is one of the best sci-fi books to come down the pike in AGES! (Oh yeah, Terry Gilliam is making the movie... should be amazing"!

One they should and could make a great move out of is Ramses the Damned.

[El_jalepeno]

Old Man and the Sea is one of my all-time favs. Also The Great Gatsby. As for authors, Clive Barker used to be a favorite back when he was writing good material, and James Patterson is still currently a fave when I have time to read. I used to love King, but he sold out around the time of Gerald's Game. I stayed in touch with the Dark Tower series, and still need to finish that up.

I also used to really enjoy reading about different philosophies within different cultures... But that would take another bong hit to get me started :drunk:

[nroberts]

Originally Posted by El_jalepeno

Old Man and the Sea is one of my all-time favs. Also The Great Gatsby. As for authors, Clive Barker used to be a favorite back when he was writing good material, and James Patterson is still currently a fave when I have time to read. I used to love King, but he sold out around the time of Gerald's Game. I stayed in touch with the Dark Tower series, and still need to finish that up.

I also used to really enjoy reading about different philosophies within different cultures... But that would take another bong hit to get me started :drunk:

Yeah, philosophy and religion is one of my favorite topics of study also. I like fiction that tickles that need. I think both Bear and Rice do that and make me think about things like what conceptions I have are founded in my culture vs. are valid and escential truths.

I haven't read any of the authors or books you mention besides King.

[Mondy]

Originally Posted by El_jalepeno

Old Man and the Sea is one of my all-time favs. Also The Great Gatsby. As for authors, Clive Barker used to be a favorite back when he was writing good material, and James Patterson is still currently a fave when I have time to read. I used to love King, but he sold out around the time of Gerald's Game. I stayed in touch with the Dark Tower series, and still need to finish that up.

I also used to really enjoy reading about different philosophies within different cultures... But that would take another bong hit to get me started :drunk:

Yeah man,

I have got all of The Dark Tower books now, and it absolutely kills me that I have the last book sat there on the bookshelf. However, I really need to start reading from The Gunslinger once again, otherwise I will spoil it.

Pass the bong over and quiot hogging man. And stop eating all the crisps (chips) !!!

[Teleplayer324]

Bad Omens? Is that The Terry Prachett one about the end of the world? Great Book if it's the one I'm thinking of. If you enjoyed Bad Omens, I might suggest Pope Patrick by Peter De Rosa, I was up half the night laughing.

[FH]

lol I read comic-books!
I just don't have the time to read book-books anymore. I wish I did.

[Goport]

I read Forge and Anvil about 10 years ago (or thereabouts) good books and well written. I don't like Sci Fi too much but I did enjoy them. I mainly read books like Tom Sharpe or Biographies though.

[stingx]

My two favorite books...The Catcher in the Rye and A Confenderacy of Dunces.

[FH]

Originally Posted by stingx

The Catcher in the Rye

Don't be hanging around me.