What are you reading?

[Tim]

I just picked up Gods, Memes, and Monsters and am working through it at a leisurely pace.

https://www.stoneskinpress.com/index.php/gods-memes-and-monsters/

Only about 1/3 of the way through and quality varies quite a bit but so far my standout is Agave by Arinn Dembo.

[PirateLawyer]

Been waiting on Sevenses on hold for digital loan from the library.  Heard bits and pieces of a teaser and super interested to give it a read through....

Stephenson is on my shortlist of authors I buy in hardback. Seveneves grabbed me from the first page and never let go (unlike the Baroque Cycle). You can always count on Stephenson to present big ideas.

[CADmonkey]

Oh yeah, last week I started reading, and almost immediately threw out* Mr. Gatling's Terrible Marvel: The Gun That Changed Everything and the Misunderstood Genius Who Invented It.  I'm usually not one to rant, but this was an awful book.  A couple of chapters in, and I had barely learned anything about Gatling or his gun, what I did learn was that Ms. Keller loves 19th Century America, especially the Patent Office, which is apparently The Thing That Made America Great and the envy of the world.  I quit reading when she started discussing the doctrine of Manifest Destiny, and began explaining that it was not a thinly-veiled excuse for genocidal imperialism.  In short, this is not a book about the Gatling Gun or it's inventor, it's a breathless love letter to 19th Century American capitalism and imperialism.

Currently, I'm reading The Last Lost World: Ice Ages, Human Origins, and the Invention of the Pleistocene.  Another wordy title, but I like this one.  It's mostly a history of the narrative of the Pleistocene and about how that has changed over the years as ideas about science have changed.

*As in: tossed it in a recycling bin.  Hopefully, it's been pulped by now.

[PirateLawyer]

I'm reading the entire DG canon of fiction...for reasons. So far, I've read Strange Authorities, Through a Glass Darkly, Tales from Failed Anatomies, and Denied to the Enemy.

And now the bonus reasons for doing so are clear. Good luck with the submission, Ross. I have one in the pipeline too. I hope the  powers that be actually want to see a published scenario using M-EPIC.

[Twisting H]

Late, but Ligotti is getting a Penguin Classics volume.

Sept 21st
http://www.wsj.com/articles/penguin-classics-to-publish-ligotti-stories-1442851513

Horror writer Thomas Ligotti is about to enter the American literary canon.

Next month Penguin Classics will publish a volume of Mr. Ligotti’s short stories, making him one of 10 living writers, including Thomas Pynchon and Don DeLillo, among the hundreds the imprint has published in the U.S.
...

Jeff VanderMeer, author of the acclaimed “Southern Reach” trilogy and writer of the foreword to the Penguin Classics book, said Mr. Ligotti gave him notes on some of his works in the late 1990s. “At the time he used a word processing system that put his missives in all-caps,” Mr. VanderMeer said. “So it was a little bit like getting a letter from some kind of remote deity, but that certainly wasn’t his intent.”

Ligotti interview: http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2015/09/21/thomas-ligotti-interview/

I've heard it will be released October 6th.

Apparently some of the stories in the Penguin edition have been edited by Ligotti and they are not the original SubPress versions.

[Alethea]

Finished Firewall and one of Terry Pratchett's early works - The Carpet People. It's a reasonably good story on it's own (I mean I tore through the book) but I found it most interesting as an early glimpse into lots of themes and ideas Sir Pratchett explored more in the rest of his career.

[Gorkamorka]

Jim Buthcers Aeronaut’s Windlass.
Only 1/4 in so far.  It's good.  Any chapter from the cats point of view is hilarious.

[trinite]

Late, but Ligotti is getting a Penguin Classics volume.

Sept 21st
http://www.wsj.com/articles/penguin-classics-to-publish-ligotti-stories-1442851513

Horror writer Thomas Ligotti is about to enter the American literary canon.

Next month Penguin Classics will publish a volume of Mr. Ligotti’s short stories, making him one of 10 living writers, including Thomas Pynchon and Don DeLillo, among the hundreds the imprint has published in the U.S.
...

Jeff VanderMeer, author of the acclaimed “Southern Reach” trilogy and writer of the foreword to the Penguin Classics book, said Mr. Ligotti gave him notes on some of his works in the late 1990s. “At the time he used a word processing system that put his missives in all-caps,” Mr. VanderMeer said. “So it was a little bit like getting a letter from some kind of remote deity, but that certainly wasn’t his intent.”

Ligotti interview: http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2015/09/21/thomas-ligotti-interview/

I've heard it will be released October 6th.

Apparently some of the stories in the Penguin edition have been edited by Ligotti and they are not the original SubPress versions.

Cool news! I'll have to pick up a copy.

[PirateLawyer]

Cool news! I'll have to pick up a copy.

A simple +1 from me.

[Teuthic]

I'll pick it up: I've never actually read any Ligotti, since his work's so hard to find.

[PirateLawyer]

I'll pick it up: I've never actually read any Ligotti, since his work's so hard to find.

His books are readily available through Amazon or Abe books online.

[Twisting H]

With regards to the Ligotti Penguin Classics I heard a couple of rumors on forum boards that I have not verified.

Supposedly Grimscribe and Ligotti's earlier work is not easy to get a hold of.

Also some people are unhappy that Penguin edition have been edited by Ligotti because they claim the original SubPress versions are superior.

[Henry Hankovitch]

For the first time, I've just read Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.  I was actually surprised by how readable it is.  I was a bit worried that it would be completely disjointed and anti-narrative like Naked Lunch or Gravity's Rainbow.  As crazy as the drug-crazed recollections are, they're delivered in an almost straightforward, journalist style.  Which was great.

[Twisting H]

I've been looking for ways to find new authors of Weird Fiction. Like people who are actually alive and writing in 2015.  Shocking I know.

I found The Outer Dark podcast.



It started at the end of June and currently has 15 interviews with authors of new Weird Horror.   This is a fairly academic podcast.  Basically it is two writers sitting down and talking about elements of the stories of the interviewee but there will be references to Steinbeck and Classical literature.  Anyone who enjoyed discussions of literature professors in grad school will be right at home. Some might find it dull and a bit dry at times (in part because of the tone of some of the people speaking). 

I do have to say though, after listening to how the interviewer reviews a particular story I have found my self very excited to read the story, with varying degrees of approval so he does make the listeners enthusiastic about the authors.

Give the John Langan interview a try. I enjoyed it the best.

Also there is a panel from Necronomicon addressing Racism in HPL's work and why it can be appreciated and still be literary despite those flaws.   

http://www.projectiradio.com/shows/the-outer-dark/

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-outer-dark/id1011456737?mt=2


Through this podcast I found the author Jayaprakash Satyamurthy who I am very excited to read more of.  Try his short story "Empty Dreams" here:

http://pratilipi.in/2011/11/empty-dreams-jayaprakash-satyamurthy/

He is a Bangladeshi native and seeks to build a mythology of Bangladesh somewhat in the vein of what Gaiman, China Melville and others have done to London.  When I read the short story above, I got the same feeling I did when I read Barron and Ligotti for the first time. I hope his other work is as good.

[clockworkjoe]

Extraordinary Renditions (new DG story anthology) is good and cool. It has a story set in the great depression dust bowl era that would make for a great No Security scenario.