7 books you will psyche on and should totally read: What Youth

rule303 wrote:

goofyfoot wrote:

A Fortunate Life by A. B. Facey.
"Amasing" book about early Australia and the struggles people had to go through back then.

You must be trolling goofy I hated that book had to do it for HSC even tried to read it again later still hated it not someone who i would ever want to have a beer with

Definitely not trolling mate. What did you hate about it? And who wouldn't you want to have a beer with? Me or Mr Facey?!

Stephen King's previously undiscovered gems

http://www.thepoke.co.uk/2015/08/24/amazing-new-stephen-king-books-disco...

stunet -clicked on link but didn't open page..

Reading On The Road by Jack Kerouac at the mo'. One night I love it and then the next I'm ready to throw it in the fire! See how it goes tonight..

goofyfoot wrote:

. One night I love it and then the next I'm ready to throw it in the fire! See how it goes tonight..

Good on cold nights when you've ran out of wood then.

goofyfoot wrote:

Reading On The Road by Jack Kerouac at the mo'. One night I love it and then the next I'm ready to throw it in the fire! See how it goes tonight..

"It isn't writing at all. It's typing."

Truman Capote re; Kerouac

Just gave Bukowski another shot after loving , then hating him for years.

Ham on rye gots me in its grip.

Back alley 2nd hand bookshops will provide !

Do love a bookshop.

Blowin wrote:

Just gave Bukowski another shot after loving , then hating him for years.

Ham on rye gots me in its grip.

Back alley 2nd hand bookshops will provide !

Do love a bookshop.

Good score!

Some excellent recommendations in this thread...

Just going to chime in and reiterate the genius of Cormac McCarthy...

i don't believe there is any better living practitioner of the written word

Blood Meridian is an astonishing read, but the Border Trilogy - particularly The Crossing - is a book that I will never forget. Suttree is also quite incredible. I remember reading The Road while on a bit of a road trip around Tasmania in Spring. Beautiful rich lush landscaped during the day and then at night i would be hunkered down with one of the bleakest little tomes i had ever read. Quite the contrast!

A Pirate of Exquisite Mind , all about the life and travels of William Dampier, explorer, naturalist and buccaneer; the first Englishman to touch Australia,s coast among many and other incredible firsts ,keeping very detailed diary,s scripts and documenting everything he saw, one of the first to work out many of the ocean wind/ weather patterns that hold true still today,mindblowing stuff , written in an easy/enjoyable to read narrative put together by D and M Preston (authors) . If surfing had of existed he would have been onto it for sure his forcasting skills would have sent him in the right direction

If you like Cormac McCarthy you would probably enjoy Warlock by Oakley Hall and Butcher's Crossing by John Williams. You would be lucky to get a hard copy of either but both are available on Amazon.

"A Brief History Of Seven Killings" is probably the best thing I have read this year. It is a fictionalised account of Jamaican gangs, politics and drug dealing around the time Bob Marley got shot. He appears in the text only as "the singer".
The book starts with a Jamaican saying; " if it not go so, it go near so.". The inference is clear, this is as near the truth as makes no difference and the story has that indefinable ring of truth about,it. Be prepared to study the dialect and follow numerous twists and turns in the loyalties of the characters but the effort is well worth it. A great companion piece to the TV series The Wire.

...and it's only January too! Good to see this thread re-ignited.

Shatner'sBassoon wrote:

...and it's only January too! Good to see this thread re-ignited.

Well spotted! I meant the last 12 months.

...and a worthy Booker prize winner at that!

You probs already read this Stu.

http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2015/01/02/scare-tactics-michel-houel...

I concur with the Magda Szubanski selection. The woman can write!

I'd also recommend Tim Winton's coastal memoir ISLAND HOME. A way in to understanding the Australian landscape from a whitey/writerly perspective.

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/oct/13/tim-wintons-island-home-isn...

Just mowing through Jared Diamonds Third Chimpanzee which is a pretty plodding account of human evolution but I wanted to read it as a counterpoint to Zerzan's romantic vision of neanderthal/hunter gatherer life in Future Primitive.
Diamond is probably righter but Zerzan's by far the superior writer and his vision far more appealing.

Would like to have a crack at Infinite Jest this year too.

stunet wrote:

Sounds unreal BB.

I read George Megalogenis' follow up to 'The Australian Moment', this one called 'Australia's Second Chance'. When Annabel Crabb calls George "Australia's great explainer" she's spot on, I learnt more about Oz history, policy, and politics from those two books then any uni course I did. God help the person who sits next to me at the next dinner party I attend...

Highly recommend 'Reckoning' by Magda Szubanski also. Was never a fan of her comedy but lordy the woman can write, and she's got a knockout family story to boot. Her father was an assasin in the Polish Underground during the early years of WW2 and the methods he used to cope with what he saw cast an emotional shadow on his family. This book is Magda's catharsis and while it's written chronologically it's anything but predictable jumping through time and space - Poland 1939 one moment, Melbourne 1982 the next - and from real worlds to secret gardens. Fantastic stuff.

At 2am this morning I finished 'Submission' by Michel Houellebeacq and I can see Freeride smile from here. Read it all in one day - Australia Day no less. That it's a book concerning itself with a national response to immigration and encroaching Islam is purely coincidental. The scenario - an Islamic party sweeps to power in France - is a tad fanciful for my liking, political satire should be more subtle, though it's funny, brutally so at times.

Gonna start reading CLR James 'Beyond A Boundary' tonight upon a recommendation (given many years ago) from Lucky Al. 'Infinite Jest' is also sitting there staring. A quest I'm working myself up to.

I love this thread for this reason.

Yourself and Freeride have a couple of recommendations that are interesting.

PS Freeride - enjoyed the article from the Paris review.

BTW The interviewee misused the word crepuscular. Unless the protagonist he's referring to is a red necked wallaby.

I love this thread too.

I'm ashamed to say over the last ten years or so I'm reading fewer books and more crap on the internet. It's heartening to read of others who have a genuine passion for seeking out a good read and don't limit themselves to a 30 second bite.

mikehunt207 wrote:

A Pirate of Exquisite Mind , all about the life and travels of William Dampier, explorer, naturalist and buccaneer; the first Englishman to touch Australia,s coast among many and other incredible firsts ,keeping very detailed diary,s scripts and documenting everything he saw, one of the first to work out many of the ocean wind/ weather patterns that hold true still today,mindblowing stuff , written in an easy/enjoyable to read narrative put together by D and M Preston (authors) . If surfing had of existed he would have been onto it for sure his forcasting skills would have sent him in the right direction

dampier's journals, and the journals of many other australian explorers, are available at project gutenberg:
http://gutenberg.net.au/explorers-journals.html

chook wrote:

mikehunt207 wrote:

A Pirate of Exquisite Mind , all about the life and travels of William Dampier, explorer, naturalist and buccaneer; the first Englishman to touch Australia,s coast among many and other incredible firsts ,keeping very detailed diary,s scripts and documenting everything he saw, one of the first to work out many of the ocean wind/ weather patterns that hold true still today,mindblowing stuff , written in an easy/enjoyable to read narrative put together by D and M Preston (authors) . If surfing had of existed he would have been onto it for sure his forcasting skills would have sent him in the right direction

dampier's journals, and the journals of many other australian explorers, are available at project gutenberg:
http://gutenberg.net.au/explorers-journals.html

Nice link chook Project gutenberg has lots of great stuff.

Speaking of project Gutenberg, Would like to hear how many people have gone over to Ebooks rather than hard copy??

rule303 wrote:

Speaking of project Gutenberg, Would like to hear how many people have gone over to Ebooks rather than hard copy??

I still prefer a hard copy 303 but you can't beat the choice in ebooks and they are immediate so I am probably running about 50/50 at this point.

blindboy wrote:

rule303 wrote:

Speaking of project Gutenberg, Would like to hear how many people have gone over to Ebooks rather than hard copy??

I still prefer a hard copy 303 but you can't beat the choice in ebooks and they are immediate so I am probably running about 50/50 at this point.

Agree, actually prefer physical but ebooks are too convenient re access.

i spend enough time on the internet or looking at screens.

Books only. One of life's great pleasures.

stunet wrote:

I'm gonna have to 'fess up here. I'm one of those wankers who comes over to your place, makes a beeline for the bookcase, then passes rapid judgement depending upon what I see.

In that thirty second assessment I know what sort of person you are. Yes I do.

And because I do this it means that when I read a book it must be a physical book, and if it's a good one, a profound book, one that's well considered by those who matter, then it's gets pride of place on the bookshelf. Which of course is the most obvious place when people walk in the door.

'Cause I know I'm not the only wanker who judges people on their books.

LOL Totally agree I do that as well. Still love the portability of ebooks and my friend who torrents
have bought hard copies after reading ebooks for the reason to add to library

I ran out of shelf space a few years ago Stu so now I have to make space for anything new. I just took a bag full to Vinnies the other day, not bad books just stuff I will probably never read again. My son is a reader too so he tends to raid my shelves and I have to chase up anything I want back. I need to go through some of the old paperbacks next as some of them probably wouldn't stand up to another reading.

Haha Stu. More reason for me to stay with ebooks now and keep people guessing.

I just bought my wife a Kindle for Christmas, she loves it as she's a voracious reader. I prefer the feel and smell of a real book. That being said I've had a look at her Kindle from time to time and like that you can read it in any light and you can adjust the size of the font. My eyesight is pretty terrible so that's a plus I suppose. We travel a lot and that was one of the main reasons she wanted one. Also, it's pretty hard to get books in English up here in the countryside so regrettably I don't read as much as I used to.

Stu, what if people just have a shelf of really cool books on display but have only read the synopsis?

Books only.

Except when they're not available.

Then it's a kindle .

Or a newspaper.

Or the back of a cereal box.

get in the frickin' sea

http://boatfire.tumblr.com/post/139424805652/death-ship-of-fools

stunet wrote:

I'm gonna have to 'fess up here. I'm one of those wankers who comes over to your place, makes a beeline for the bookcase, then passes rapid judgement depending upon what I see.

In that thirty second assessment I know what sort of person you are. Yes I do.

And because I do this it means that when I read a book it must be a physical book, and if it's a good one, a profound book, one that's well considered by those who matter, then it's gets pride of place on the bookshelf. Which of course is the most obvious place when people walk in the door.

'Cause I know I'm not the only wanker who judges people on their books.

A person's bookcase is a window to their soul Stu. There is no truer way to judge your fellow man than by the books that they have read and have in their collection at home. It tells a thousand stories.

When I'm not reading, I can often be found down in the garage making another bookshelf. The books multiply much faster than my woodwork.

OK, non-fiction!

If you are interested in how human beings work, how your mind works, or more appropriately how it really doesn't work and we are all pretty much fools to a largely ineffective thinking organ, try;

Everything is obvious once you know the answer. Duncan Watts

Freakonomics - already mentioned on this thread

Thinking, Fast and Slow - Daniel Kahnemann

And just finished the Nassim Nicholas Taleb trilogy, 'Fooled by Randomness', 'The Black Swan' and 'Antifragility'.

I grew another brain after reading these, although they were just the latest in a long line of books on this subject read over the last 35 years.

Enjoyable reading - non-fiction, anything by Bill Bryson, he is just so readable, funny, and you will be much smarter at the end than the beginning. Read his books about Oz, can't remember the title but it's been mentioned here, and you will learn more about Oz than you ever did at school.

How did I go through 13 years of schooling and never hear about the Myall Lakes massacre! Farking school, all formal education is a rort, a con. Books are your only education.

Enjoyable fiction - all Douglas Adams and Kurt Vonnegut books, think I've read them all. Thanks for that piece by Adams on Australia, pretty much nailed it, or what we were like.

Meditation fiction - Catcher in the rye, Brave New World, Breath. OK, haven't read much of Winton, but don't know any author who can describe Australia in such a way that brings you to a meditative state on this vast continent, particularly the west, which he captures like no other.

Have read quite a few of the books mentioned here, but so far no McCarthy, although I bought a batch of his works off Dinosaur from realsurf when he was selling up. There in the 'future reads' section, but I suspect he may be an overblown windbag. Sorry, just trolling, a little.

Will not touch Joyce or Proust. Literature written with the intent of being seen to be a literary great is always so disappointing.

Neitzsche generally, and Thus Spake Zarathustra convinced me that his talent was in dense and interminable prose hiding what I found to be facile philosophical conjecture. I couldn't finish any of his books that I started, and it is a matter of personal pride that I rarely give up on a book. In fact, much of western philosophy is incredibly disappointing, dense prose hiding pond deep thinking. But I haven't read any Hume, and he may be the best of 'modern' western philosophers.

And shame on you all. I read through the entire forum, and as far as I could see no one has mentioned the two books I have read more than any others, The Iliad and The Odyssey.

Strange thing, but which one of those two is my favourite tends to change around each decade or so.

Carry, on, loving this thread, and by the way, will refuse as far as I can ever reading a book on an e-reader. If it isn't paper, it isn't a book.

I enjoyed reading your post Batfink.

I don't have a bookcase, I just have piles of books lying around. I wonder how that reflects on my soul?

Having never read Cormac McCarthy either I watched 'No Country for Old Men' the other night (good visual story tellers those Coen bros.) and have decided to dive into the Border Trilogy books. Think that would be a good place to start, but I believe Blood Meridian is a ripper and a must read as well.

Slight correction Batfink. The massacre was at Myall Creek nowhere near Myall Lakes. It is significant as the only massacre for which Europeans were tried and hanged. Not the ones who ordered it of course, just the ones who carried it out. My take on it from a few years ago now is here:

https://soundcloud.com/blndboy/kilministers-confession

Thanks Stu, I'm on to it.

Ashamed to say I haven't read a book in ages.

Damn stupid internet!

stunet wrote:

Oi BB!

Latest Knausgaard is out - Part 5, 'Some Rain Must Fall'. You on top of it?

I bought it on the weekend and dived right in. Fabulous stuff.

Thanks Stu, I missed that but will probably save it for the Samoa trip next month. I've been into some light hearted stuff lately Wodehouse and Gerald Durrell (well I was born in England!). Wodehouse is still one of the few writers who can make me laugh out loud consistently and all available free these days on Project Gutenberg.

Just getting stuck into " Barbarian Days" bu Bill Finnegan.

I'm a bit late to the party but it's proving Perfect for devouring hours at an airport and wishing I was somewhere else.

Thanks Blindboy. Will check your link in a minute. Yep, Myall Creek. Such a sad story, our history.

Barbarian Days is so readable. Saw it in a bookshop not too long after Stu reviewed it here (you did, didn't you Stu, just going off memory). Hugely enjoyable, and had me going through Google maps to find all these places he had visited and surfed, classic scary as fuck surf stories in there, those frightening moments where you're out in the surf at a 'difficult to get in' location and the swell is building and light is fading.

My wife even read it, she's not a surfer at all, but is a big-time reader. She enjoyed it too, but not as much as I did, I suspect.

No Country for Old Men, such a harrowing movie. I think 'All the Pretty horses' will be the first Cormac I dive into, when I do. Everyone seems to think it's a good read, so will be the best to get a guide on whether I like his writing or not. Haven't checked back, but didn't Mr Bowes say on this forum that some of his works are 'not so good'. I know Mr Bowes, via linked in and realsurf, not real knowing, and he fills up linked in with weird and puzzling stuff, mysteries of histories. Yes, just a wee bit of trolling there.

My wife picked up Jared Diamond's 'Collapse' the other day ($3 second hand) so I'll probably be into that after she finishes with it.

Will have to learn how to post a pic here. Made a bookcase a few years ago, was going to be one of a pair. The other is actually cut, just needs all the routing done, and that project stopped there, I'll pick it up again before I'm done.

I like to incorporate curves or anything into the woodwork when I can, just to avoid it being a box. Hadn't realised until I was looking at it the other day from below (it's upstairs) that it nicely resembles a 3' wave just before it breaks, painted in a deep blue of course. A surfer's bookcase.

Stu, want to direct me to instructions on uploading a photo?