Whats everyone reading?

[klute]

I have a few things im reading atm but im going to buy the game of throne books as recommended on here

Whilst im buying them can anyone recommend The Fionavar Tapestry by Guy Gavriel Kay???

My friend mentioned it in passing but knows little about it which is why i ask here as most of us share similar tastes

[SmallBlueThing]

Well, the dragon factory's okay so far. Yeah, it's missing its zombies and the 'bad guys' are so camp and clichéd it's untrue, but it's pretty high octane stuff.
Ive also just begun a reread of the complete nikolai dante (or at least, of the first seven volumes, all that i have without getting the progs out), and am up to the start of 'the gentleman thief'. It's easy to forget, after years of doom and gloom, how much fun this strip was at the start. I'd honestly urge anyone coming to dante afresh to start at the top; that way when the tragedy strikes, you feel it all the more. Some days i just think nikolai dante is probably the best thing 2000AD's ever run, and what halo jones could have been like with a better writer, a better artist and the space to breathe.

SBT

[Colin YNWA]

Once I've finished my Cerebus re-read (which seems to be expanding as time goes on!) a full Dante re-read is on the cards. I'm really looking forward to it, well aside from the fact that being tradeless it'll involve pulling all the progs from the shelves... which can only lead to distraction (after that Sinister Dexter I think)

[HOO-HAA]

Well, the dragon factory's okay so far. Yeah, it's missing its zombies and the 'bad guys' are so camp and clichéd it's untrue, but it's pretty high octane stuff.

So, do the zombies only appear in PATIENT ZERO?

[Definitely Not Mister Pops]

Just finished The Case of Charles Dexter Ward and The Dream in the Witch House by H.P sauce Lovecraft. Great imagination. The former was a tad predictable but no less enjoyable.

[SmallBlueThing]

So far, Wayne, so far... But im only a hundred or so pages in.
SBT

[Zarjazzer]

Just finished Journey to the centre of the Earth by that Jules Verne.How Hollywood has changed the original. Lidenbrocks a German, there's no women and no rival fighting the team in the depths.

On to The Lost Fleet- Dauntless, a sci-fi war story -i thought it would be a bit Trek but it's more like the Honour Harrington books but without the endless and boring political cook ups going on in the background-no messing straight into the action.

Weirdest of all is the Dragons Claws a Marvel uk late eighties book I got on a whim as Simon Furman who created Deaths head had written it. It's a -wait for it a futuristic post apocalypse gladiatorial team book-phew. Has strong elements of and pays tribute in the forward too 2000AD. yay!

[HOO-HAA]

Continuing my new love affair with HARD CASE CRIME (www.hardcasecrime.com), I'm reading SOMEBODY OWES ME MONEY by Donald E. Westlake.

Cracking read. Mob Noir type book - very amusing, even slapstick in places.

Expect a full review very soon. 

[Keef Monkey]

Just finished my re-read of Blade Runner 2: Edge of Human, and despite having read it before I was totally gripped! Pretty embarrassing really, as that shows how poor my memory must be. I still like it a lot, it does try too hard to cram the movie characters in and give them something to do, but it all feels very Blade Runner and comes across as how you would imagine a movie sequel to turn out. ie. A lot like the first movie but with bigger plot twists and massive explosions and action scenes. I'm ok with that, and glad it happened in print and not on film.

[HOO-HAA]

Just finished my re-read of Blade Runner 2: Edge of Human, and despite having read it before I was totally gripped! Pretty embarrassing really, as that shows how poor my memory must be. I still like it a lot, it does try too hard to cram the movie characters in and give them something to do, but it all feels very Blade Runner and comes across as how you would imagine a movie sequel to turn out. ie. A lot like the first movie but with bigger plot twists and massive explosions and action scenes. I'm ok with that, and glad it happened in print and not on film.

So, is it a sequel to the flim as opposed to PK Dick's novel?

[Keef Monkey]

Just finished my re-read of Blade Runner 2: Edge of Human, and despite having read it before I was totally gripped! Pretty embarrassing really, as that shows how poor my memory must be. I still like it a lot, it does try too hard to cram the movie characters in and give them something to do, but it all feels very Blade Runner and comes across as how you would imagine a movie sequel to turn out. ie. A lot like the first movie but with bigger plot twists and massive explosions and action scenes. I'm ok with that, and glad it happened in print and not on film.

So, is it a sequel to the flim as opposed to PK Dick's novel?

Weirdly I think it's both! I've never read the original (shameful I know) so I don't know how closely the movie followed it, but I'm told this has characters from the original novel in it and tries to reconcile the differences between the two. I remember someone telling me that the Sebastian character in the movie was based on a guy called Isidore, who appears in this book. Plus the blurb says Jeter was sanctioned by PK Dick's estate to 'continue his story', which gives the impression it's a follow up to the novel. Just reads like a sequel to the movie to me though.

[spireite68]

The Tim Vine joke book. Fantastic!

[Mardroid]

So, is it a sequel to the flim as opposed to PK Dick's novel?

Weirdly I think it's both! I've never read the original (shameful I know) so I don't know how closely the movie followed it, but I'm told this has characters from the original novel in it and tries to reconcile the differences between the two.

I'd say it's very much a sequel of the film rather than the book. It does play more on certain themes from the book though, [spoiler]i.e. the thread in which Deckard might be a replicant, etc.[/spoiler] That is suggested in the Director's/Final Cut of the film with the incorporation of [spoiler]the unicorn dream sequence[/spoiler], but in the original book it's speculated about outright. I'm pretty sure the book sequels were written before that scene was included into the film too.

I quite liked the book sequels although there was thread later which I wasn't too sure about. I forget the specifics, and I won't spoil much here, but it was essentially [spoiler]another twist investigating the nature of humanity and the overlap between humans and replicants even further.[/spoiler] While it was interesting, I think it went too far and created more confusion than anything.

Okay, last book I read: Kick-Ass. (I mentioned I got it in an earlier post, but now I've actually read it.)

I largely liked it. The film is pretty faithful to it, isn't it? It's interesting to see the differences though. Actually the comic story seems a lot closer to the idea of 'heroes/vigilantes in the real world' than the film, although I think the film was largely better fun. By 'more fun' I'm not saying it was better, just different. Both are good in their own ways.

There were elements of extra nastiness in the comic which I thought wasn't really needed. (I don't mean the gore. That WAS nasty, but it's so outrageous it verges on comedy.) [spoiler]And his 'sort of girlfriend' was a nicer person in the film. I am glad they didn't end up together though. That's so much more believable. The 'photo' that was sent him, is an example of what I mean by nastiness though. She isn't interested. We get it. But I don't think a girl would do that. Assuming it was her.  [/spoiler]

I suppose Millar likes to go for the shock factor for the sake of it, but there's plenty of other stuff in the stripto prove he's capable of better than that.

[Keef Monkey]

After Blade Runner I've decided to stick with the dystopian cyberpunk theme and have started Jeff Somers' 'The Eternal Prison'.

Loved 'The Electric Church' and 'The Digital Plague' and only realized recently there were more! Nice. Think 'The Electric Church' is being made into a movie too if imdb is to be believed. Which it probably isn't.

[SmallBlueThing]

After finishing my reread of Dante (up to and including vol 7 of the trades), and having stalled on The Dragon Factory, I decided on a slight change of pace and went for:

The Buster Book 1976, which I picked up for £2.50 in a bookshop yesterday. Odd that an annual should be paperback, but that appeals to me somewhat I admit. I only read Buster as a kid from time to time, but some of the strips are familiar: FACEACHE especially; which even now disturbs me. I remember finding this terrifying as a child, and to be honest it's still deeply creepy. There's a genius to the designs of the monsters he scrunges into, and the way they always seem to be looking out of the page and into the reader's eye is utterly horrible. Some magnificent mid-seventies parental violence too- as Faceache rapidly scarpers from the house before his dad flies into one of his "uncontrollable rages". Anyone up for an analysis of the strip along the lines of it being about the impact of physical discipline on small boys and their inevitable journey from the abused to the abuser (Faceache's ability to turn into monsters proportional to his suffering of "whacks" from dad's slipper)? No, thought not.

There's a lot of great stuff between the pages- and a lot of stuff that just isn't funny, and I suspect wasn't funny even to eight year olds in 1975. But standout for me must be FISHBOY: DENIZEN OF THE DEEP. Briefly, a lad washed up on a desert island "learns to breathe underwater and develops webbed hands and feet". Finding his parents are English, he sets out to swim across the world to England, getting into all sorts of adventures along the way. Oh, and he can also talk to fish in their own language- and it's the dialogue for these exchanges that gives the most chuckles.

PAGE TWO, PANEL ONE:

A woman in a bathing costume lies on the ocean bed, surrounded by jellyfish. Fishboy approaches.

CAPTION: FISHBOY CIRCLED THE MASS Of STINGING JELLYFISH, AND ANGRILY SPOKE TO THEM IN THE STRANGE UNDERSEA LANGUAGE THEY UNDERSTOOD.

FISHBOY: ALGAN! SLORP!

JELLYFISH: ZZZZT!

PANEL TWO:

Fishboy punches a jellyfish as the woman floats to the surface.

FISHBOY: (Thought bubble) SO YOU WOULD ARGUE WITH FISHBOY, EH? WELL, TAKE THAT, SLIMY SCOURGES OF THE SEA!

JELLYFISH: CCCRP! CCCRP!

And there's more, and it's all brilliantly, delightfully mad. Written by Scott Goodall MBE, author of Captain Hurricane and Rat-Trap, amoungst others. Could be drawn by John Stokes, but I'm not sure. Fishboy is one of several adventure strips in the book, the others being SAMMY BREWSTER'S SECRET SKI-BOARD SQUAD (kids with motorised skateboards and masks help an inventor- and the British Government- reclaim secrets stolen by a spy in the Lake District), UNCLE IRONSIDES (Kid with a robot sent to him by his inventor uncle in Australia, stops thieves in a department store at Christmas), CHARLIE PEACE- ARCH ROGUE OF VICTORIAN LONDON (Gaw blimey guvner thief infiltrates a posh nobs masquerade party dressed as, er, himself, and almost makes off scott-free with jewels), PETE'S POCKET ARMY (Young Peter Parker has been adopted by six tiny aliens from the planet Liturnus who are stranded on Earth. With their help he stops thieves at a boot fair) and GALAXUS: THE THING FROM OUTER SPACE (Giant friendly apelike space creature who eats musrooms and can shrink to pocketsize befriends two kids on Earth and goes on the run from the US Army. And here, gets stuck in quick drying concrete). I'd love to see a collection of more of this stuff- it's all beautifully drawn, very funny in retrospect and a perfect example of why British comics of the time were much, much more fun than their American counterparts.

Two thumbs up from me!

SBT