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Congrats!

Congratulations! Welcome to the club

Thanks, guys.

Hah, I knew it was only a matter of time! Big congratulations, have fun with the wee one. It will change your life, and for the better!

Has anyone else read Ready Player One? It is an 80s geek culture extravaganza, but the story is entertaining too, and a quick read. I'm almost to the end.

Never heard of it, will check it out.

Just finished Goodbye 20th Century, a biography of Sonic Youth. Started Eden by Stanislav Lem.

if you read it backwards, you find all of their stolen gear.

TC wrote:have already started on the next trilogy with House Atriedes. these books lead directly to the events of dune, a much more recent prequel if you will. pretty cool so far, 100 pages in.

just finished this. of all of the son's books i've read so far, this is by far the best. it is actually a very nicely done book. sure, he's filling in gaps in the general historical outline put forth in the original dune saga, but he's doing it in such a creative way that it just rolls. relationships are well played, events - even if you know how they end - are suspenseful, etc. it's extremely interesting seeing how a young leto the first takes the mantle and goes with it. starting the next one - house harkonnen - immediately. if that and corrino are as good as this one, i'm actually going to recommend this trilogy of sorts to any dune fan and not just consider this plowing through every known dune-iverse book an experiment in masochism. this one was rewarding.

My wife bullied me into reading The Hunger Games. Finished the first, which was actually pretty solid for what it was, and am starting the second, which my wife tells me is the best of the three but so far I'm a bit meh. Also reading some old Alan Moore Swamp Things for the first time, what a happy fellow Alan Moore is

finished house harkonnen last week. it was better than the first. filling in lots of blanks, adding some nice twists to some backstory, etc. the story of duncan idaho is awesome. the story of leto's first concubine and son is also awesome and tragic. the interplay among the harkonnen is great. enjoyed this one. started corrino immediately, haven't gotten very far yet.

So, hope y'all are still reading. I've rediscovered the art somewhat as of late, read Pynchon's Inherent Vice in advance of the PTA filmed version and it's a stoned 70's take on Raymond Chandler, which is to say, a new version of Altman's The Long Goodbye. Lots of funny dialogue so I expect a good period comedy with tons of weed. After enjoying Joe "Stephen King's son" Hill's Locke And Key comic series (highly recommended, look at your local library) I started to read his novels and had a great time. Heart Shaped Box and NOS4A2 do a pretty damn good job of reminding you of King's glory days. Dark tales well told, with interesting protagonists and good, nasty villains. And I just finished Ready Player One today! The writer understands exposition much more than character, the universe imagined is given much more text than the humans who ultimately drive the narrative, but it's a fun story with boatloads of references we will all appreciate having come up in the 80's.

nice! i've been plowing through the game of thrones books. i think i'm something like halfway through all five, i have a "bundle" that doesn't clearly designate books.

Have to admit I was never one for high fantasy in book form, I got about 70 pages into the first one and decided to just stick with the show. Hopefully RR gets the thing finished before he croaks.

Should also mention I read Galveston, the novel written by True Detective's Nick Pizzolato, it was solid and put some good perspective on the show. It casts some light on what he's about and, perhaps more importantly to those who thought the TD finale was a letdown because it didn't have a bunch of labyrinth plot lines and clues sewn up neatly--dude cares about character, dialogue, atmosphere and darkness. That's about it. And if you're in the mood for noir, then you're in good hands with him.

holy crap, new harper lee - http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/ ... TE=DEFAULT

Will have to check that out, although by 'new' it sounds more like 'unpublished early work without her regular editor,' so who knows what the quality will be. I just finished Charles Burns' X'd Out/The Hive/Sugar Skull trilogy of comics, he's a recent favorite of mine who combines fairly classic, almost Archie-esque 50s era visual stylings with some very fucked up and dark surrealism. This collection is basically his take on the 50s romance soap opera comics. Things go well for nobody.

Also read Chuck Pahlaniuk's "Damned," which is a funny take on hell featuring an uber-rich 13 year old girl who died of a marijuana overdose and starts each chapter with the Judy Blume-esque "Are you there, Satan? It's me, Madison." Picked up a book on Jackson Pollack and Dostoyevsky's Notes from the Underground/The Double at the library.

Marijuana overdose, what's that?

fiction.

*drumroll*