this how i felt with The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy book 1... did you watch the Starship Troopers movie before?

Finished Starship Troopers a while ago. It's very pro military which is kinda
But this really wasn't much of a sci-fi (which is what I was looking for), the sci-fi element really didn't matter that much. The characters are cardboard cut outs and It's all boot camp with Heinlein's philosophy/preaching. But I do like the main character not being white

5/10

Nah I haven't seen the movie yet. Heard it's hella different. Is it any good ?

Going though The Book Thief again

i haven't seen it in like 10-15 years lol but it's heavy 90s vibes, remember it being alright

Don't mind 90s cheese tbh lol

@Soupvillain

I just finished reading when rain clouds gather together with Maru since both stories were in one book. Initially I was a little disappointed with rain clouds as a whole, but once I put the story within the context of the time in which it was written I appreciated it more.

Whereas things fall apart was centred on showcasing African society before the Europeans arrived as a functioning society, I felt this book showcased how if we (separate tribes, Europeans) work together as one through the goodness of our hearts, we can still achieve success. I did enjoy the main protagonist and could relate to certain characteristics.

Favourite line If you loved people you had to allow a complete invasion by them of your life, and he wasn't built to face invasions of any kind

Initially I was liking Maru because it didn't have the same didactic prose as rain clouds, there was a lot more first person anecdotes from the characters which I like. But it didn't really leave a lasting impression on me. There's lots of great imagery especially towards classism, male/female relations, tribalism etc but the whole story just left a lot to be desired. One minute Maru says the girl is worthless next minute he wants to marry her? stalking her for weeks through his spy then running with her to another village? did she even want this? If i put it within the context of the time again I can appreciate it a likkle more.

This line stuck with me tho I might be lowkey sapiosexual tbh "He had talked straight to her heart. The effect of this had been to raise almost insurmountable barriers over the physical. It was as though some other person had to find her limbs and say: All right, proceed. You may love this woman's body as well"

Sorry for long write up! but thanks for the suggestion because I really did need a break from non-fiction books.

Just picked up J Dilla's Donuts (33 1/3) on Amazon for a tenner. Can't wait to read it

The movie is incredible. Verhoeven didn't even read the book iirc. He just had somebody explain it to him. He lampoons the fascism the book preaches. It's the movie that the society in Starship Troopers would make about itself. Critics at the time like Ebert didn't even get it which is weird considering how silly it is.

I've only read Heinlein's short story The Roads Must Roll. It evinced a common philosophy of "service guaranteeing citizenship". It's actually an entire story about militarized union busting. F*** Heinlein.

Lol damn, it went over Eberts head. Ayt Imma check it out.
If I remember correctly, Heinlein actually served in the military, isn't it? I gave the rah-rah military jingoism in Starship Troopers a pass because it was written before the fallout of 'Nam.

But I'm not touching any of his books after reading some excepts of "Stranger in a strange land" Awful stuff in that book

It was written 5 years after the CIA intervened in Guatemala at the behest of the United Fruit Company. Their newly elected leader wanted to redistribute land to the public. So the US had him deposed and bombed the s*** out of the country before installing a dictator. All over fruit.

I'm guessing the book centering around South Americans was related to our actions and presence in the region at the time.

I'll probably read something big of his just because he's important to the genre. I kind of like bad science fiction.

All this over some fruit ? Wtf

Read that about a year ago, ending is sad af

great write up! And the fact you touched on the same points that made me want to rec you this book real!

I haven't read Maru yet but I hope to get it someday. Would be nice to see a change in her writing approach. A Question of Power still my fave book by her.

The invasions line

any nonfiction recs?

Red Notice

Predictably Irrational

The Psychopath Test

Gucci Mane autobiography

Hyperbole and Half

For anyone in here interested in philosophy, strategy and psychology

I've started a new instagram account dedicated to posting relaxing (albeit s***ty) ms pain drawings surrounded by philosophical quotes. It's @msfati.net_

I know no one likes this s*** but hey worth a shot

finally read The Picture of Dorian Gray

amazing book

There are few of us who have not sometimes wakened before dawn, either after one of those dreamless nights that make us almost enamoured of death, or one of those nights of horror and misshapen joy, when through the chambers of the brain sweep phantoms more terrible than reality itself, and instinct with that vivid life that lurks in all grotesques, and that lends to Gothic art its enduring vitality, this art being, one might fancy, especially the art of those whose minds have been troubled with the malady of reverie. Gradually white fingers creep through the curtains, and they appear to tremble. In black fantastic shapes, dumb shadows crawl into the corners of the room and crouch there. Outside, there is the stirring of birds among the leaves, or the sound of men going forth to their work, or the sigh and sob of the wind coming down from the hills and wandering round the silent house, as though it feared to wake the sleepers and yet must needs call forth sleep from her purple cave. Veil after veil of thin dusky gauze is lifted, and by degrees the forms and colours of things are restored to them, and we watch the dawn remaking the world in its antique pattern. The wan mirrors get back their mimic life. The flameless tapers stand where we had left them, and beside them lies the half-cut book that we had been studying, or the wired flower that we had worn at the ball, or the letter that we had been afraid to read, or that we had read too often. Nothing seems to us changed. Out of the unreal shadows of the night comes back the real life that we had known. We have to resume it where we had left off, and there steals over us a terrible sense of the necessity for the continuance of energy in the same wearisome round of stereotyped habits, or a wild longing, it may be, that our eyelids might open some morning upon a world that had been refashioned anew in the darkness for our pleasure, a world in which things would have fresh shapes and colours, and be changed, or have other secrets, a world in which the past would have little or no place, or survive, at any rate, in no conscious form of obligation or regret, the remembrance even of joy having its bitterness and the memories of pleasure their pain.

Link some examples on here , sounds interesting

started autobiography of malcom x this week and just about 100 pages in. need to really knock some time out with it this weekend

its such a page turner im surprised. i was expecting to get sucked in but the prose and pacing is just addicting

it gets better each page too. Such a way with words

One of the best books I've read in my life, I sincerely believe that everyone needs to read it

I've been reading that too, it's incredible so far.

Also reading The Stand, which is amazing.