Whats everyone reading?

[Frank]

demonstrates how the relevance of books that deal with imagined realities can often be greater (and less tediously wanky) than those that describe life in Hampstead.

More honest too.

Correct. Martin Amis points out that religous nutters of one faith are just as dangerous as anyone who values adherence to an ideology over the rights of the individual, and he takes pelters from the same tossers who used to fawn over his every word.

If he'd written an episode of Doctor Who where the normalising, fascist zealots were the Cybermen, painfully sincere geeks would have listened to the substance of what he was saying, debated it endlessly on the internet, and financed his cosmetic dentistry for years to come with lucrative convention appearances.

Hay on Wye is Comic Con for Culture Show viewers.

[TordelBack]

The sequence before and after Donalmacintyredisguisedasabugdemon commits a small, selfish act of betrayal in saving himself before the Mariecolvinelephantalien that he loves is just heartbreaking and an effective metaphor for the cruelty of a construct such as Hell.

It's amazing that the sheer tinyness of that undetectable betrayal, just a slight shift in position in a moment of doubt, somehow forms the centre of a whole book that deals with interstellar ideological warfare on a massive scale (and miniature battleships).  Great stuff.

[Alski]

Just read Straczinski's "Silver Surfer: Requiem" for the first time. Absolutely brilliant.

[SmallBlueThing]

Finished 'Judge Dredd: Bad Moon Rising' last night. As I think I said before, while I've started a good few of these- I think I've only managed to finish this and one of the original Virgin range- also written by David Bishop, as it happens. It wasn't bad, Dredd seemed quite out of character towards the end and I still couldn't draw you a picture of an R'Qeen if my life depended on it, but hey-ho. There were enough elements from the strip included for me to feel reasonably at home. Shocking, absolutely bloody shocking, proof-reading (or whatever it is that they do to novels these days)- I stopped bothering to count the spelling/ grammar errors about halfway through. And the glossary at the back defines an Iso-Cube as "A block full of very small isolation cubes". Hmm.

But, on the whole, a pretty good story, pretty well told. I imagined this one drawn by Cam Kennedy, for some reason.

SBT

[JOE SOAP]

Only one I've read of the paperbacks is The Final Cut by Matt Smith. I think it's excellent and even though Dredd ain't the main character, his characterisation is fairly spot-on. Tightly plotted and well written.

[spoiler]The last image of Dredd in the Resyk, and the notion the main character leaves him with is a great send off.[/spoiler]

[TordelBack]

Gentlemen of the Road, by Michael Chabon.  Now just how this escaped my OMG-I-must-read-everything-this-man-has-ever-written frenzy that followed my 'discovery' of The Yiddish Policeman's Union a few years back I have no idea, but I'm glad it did!  It's basically the best Fahfrd and the Grey Mouser novel you've never read, only this time the adventurous duo are replaced by two Jewish scoundrels embroiled in swash-buckling schemes in a well-researched 10th C Khazakstan.  It's absolutely brilliant, but way too short! 

[shaolin_monkey]

I treated myself to this on Saturday. 

http://instagr.am/p/KkWPp-gSjx/

Tom Baker is my Doctor, and Dave Gibbons is in my top ten favourite artists, so this was an insta-buy.

Working my way through it at the mo - the Wagner/Mills stories are a hoot! They've really captured the quirky cheek of the 5th Doctor.

[Colin YNWA]

I treated myself to this on Saturday. 

http://instagr.am/p/KkWPp-gSjx/

Tom Baker is my Doctor, and Dave Gibbons is in my top ten favourite artists, so this was an insta-buy.

Working my way through it at the mo - the Wagner/Mills stories are a hoot! They've really captured the quirky cheek of the 5th Doctor.

I really lust after that as it looks bloody lovely. Since however I have all those strips in the Panini volumes and there's so much stuff out there I don't yet own I'm trying to be good and not get it. It does look absolutely great though.

[Judge_T]

Just picked up Dredd Case Files 6-18 so I'll be reading that for awhile 

[von Boom]

Just started Knots & Crosses by Ian Rankin. I've been reading a lot of sci fi lately and decided to switch to something else for a while. Enjoying it so far, but I have heard good things about Rankin already.

JvB

[mygrimmbrother]

Just finished Anno Dracula - The Bloody Red Baron. Ridiculously, riotously entertaining. Like its predecessor, it's teeming with cameos (both actual real life folk and fictional characters), but these never feel gimmicky and just make me grin. I consulted the wiki page though and was stunned to see Tolkien listed as a minor character - missed that one!

Was left feeling that - like the first book - they'd make wonderful TV. HBO - if you're looking for another genre-busting show, you could do worse than this.

[Alski]

I treated myself to this on Saturday. 

http://instagr.am/p/KkWPp-gSjx/

Tom Baker is my Doctor, and Dave Gibbons is in my top ten favourite artists, so this was an insta-buy.

Working my way through it at the mo - the Wagner/Mills stories are a hoot! They've really captured the quirky cheek of the 5th Doctor.

Bought this some montsh ago - Amazon stupidly cheaper than FP! Beautiful volume indeed.

[Roger Godpleton]

I foolhardishly attempted to re-read Gravity's Rainbow and quickly found myself in that familiar Pynchony quagmire. I was in no mood to just look at the pretty words as a set of vaguely related vignettes a second time so I decided to ease myself into the Thomist scheme of things by wrapping myself in my Vineland-shaped security blanket.

Cultural Detritus Trawlage is probably my favourite activity in fiction, and this is perhaps the greatest, or at least the most literary, example of such undertakings. I even sort of enjoyed Snow Crash, which is a blatant rip-off.

[JOE SOAP]

You should've defenestrated.

I foolhardishly attempted to re-read Gravity's Rainbow and quickly found myself in that familiar Pynchony quagmire. I was in no mood to just look at the pretty words as a set of vaguely related vignettes a second time so I decided to ease myself into the Thomist scheme of things by wrapping myself in my Vineland-shaped security blanket.

I defenestrated your mom.

[Roger Godpleton]

The line is "transfenestration".

Times go on, we never change, now Joe, you're no bar fighter, I can see the thirst for new experiences, but a man's better off sticking to a speciality, your own basically being mom-cuccoldedness.