Hey!! Let's get some action going! What are we reading?

[mcrow24]

Just finished The Cellar by Richard Laymon

Started The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Thanks for the suggestion! I'll certainly look into Nancy Fulda's short stories.

Yes, I find myself turning to the short-story format more and more. Mostly because I'm tired of the "franchise first" mentality of my favorite genres. I love endings. I love them so much that I want every book I read to have one (just coming to a stop at a convenient point doesn't count)... then I want the authors I enjoy reading to write something completely new and unrelated to what they just wrote.

But I'm obviously in a ridiculously, hopeless minority, there.

I'm pretty big on stand-alones myself--with endings. I detest cliff-hanger endings that make me feel as if I bought half a book...

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by covingtoncat73

I am completely with you, Diap. I don't think a series should be more than 3 books and my favorite author, Gaiman, doesn't do series (except for Sandman, which is a graphic novel, has different rules, and ended perfectly).

I have gone off mystery series for that very reason. It seems that every mystery series out there is umpteen books long and some I have really loved grew stale and I gave them up, even though books are still coming out. Also, as much as I enjoy Jasper Fforde, I groaned when I heard another Thursday book was coming out and am hoping that the "Shades of Grey" series won't be more than a triology. Don't get me started on G.R.R. Martin.

One of my favorite stand alone mysteries to this day is "Put a Lid on It" by Donald Westlake. (It's light--but funny, fun and fast-paced.) I don't care much for his series stuff--it's TOO light and not so funny, but tries to be. This stand alone was just awesome.

[orlok]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

One of my favorite stand alone mysteries to this day is "Put a Lid on It" by Donald Westlake. (It's light--but funny, fun and fast-paced.) I don't care much for his series stuff--it's TOO light and not so funny, but tries to be. This stand alone was just awesome.

I haven't read this, but will give it a go, thanks.

Have you read any of his Parker books, written under the pseudomyn of Richard Stark? I have been working my way throgh them since late last year, and am generally enjoing them, though so far there has been very little character development in terms of the lead character, Parker, and I'm hoping that eventually this is going to change.

[MickeyC]

Just finished Fer De Lance by Rex Stout. And, like W T Sharp, I never saw that ending coming!

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by orlok

I haven't read this, but will give it a go, thanks.

Have you read any of his Parker books, written under the pseudomyn of Richard Stark? I have been working my way throgh them since late last year, and am generally enjoing them, though so far there has been very little character development in terms of the lead character, Parker, and I'm hoping that eventually this is going to change.

I've read one (I've no idea if it was the first or not). It was a decent mystery; darker (as in not light-hearted) than his Dortmunder stuff. I liked it better overall from a plot stand point, but...yeah, maybe it was the character development that wasn't rounded enough. Or maybe I just intended to read another and never got around to it. I enjoyed it well-enough. The end got a little 'iffy" as far as plausible, but it wasn't a bad book by any means.

[ATDrake]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Yes, I find myself turning to the short-story format more and more. Mostly because I'm tired of the "franchise first" mentality of my favorite genres.

Personally, I like standalone novels that can be read on their own (in terms of the main storyline starting and wrapping up with plot/character closure within a single volume) but also tie into an established universe which have more and different stories in that setting in other similarly standalone but not directly connected novels (not necessarily with the same main characters, though bonus points if they're ones that I like).

I think those are technically termed "sidequels".

But it's rather rare to find authors who can resist the temptation to tell the umpteen tales of this one very special group who has all the good adventures which are to be continued in the next and the next and the next (and even rarer to find an author who's good at it). And so all the little character quirks and plot contrivances pile up until you can practically make a drinking game.

As for short stories, I think I've found 80% of my favourite sf/fantasy writers* by reading the shorts in various anthologies (especially those big Year's Best collections by Dozois and Windling/Datlow which the library has been pretty good about getting).

They're a great way to get acquainted with the works and skill sets of many authors without having to invest too much time (or money) in finding out that someone who wrote a zillion-page doorstopper novel happens to be a dud at long lengths†.

Anyway, currently flipping between the short story collection The Best of Frederik Pohl by Frederik Pohl, naturally, whose name it turns out I've been misspelling all this time on the impression that it included a "C", and his non-fiction memoir The Way the Future Was, which are both part of the 1st 10-book Frederik Pohl bundle which I went and bought from Baen this morning.

I've read about 20% into each one, and so far they're pretty good, even though I find I'm having to space out the short stories a bit since that old-school prose style takes some getting used to and the memoir is a bit more engaging.

But there were some pretty good stories in the collection, and I really liked the satire of how brand-name commercialism and advertising have taken over the futuristic worlds Pohl imagined in the pre-70s. Hilariously (and depressingly) prescient.

Well worth my $4 per book special-bundle-pricing-for-a-limited-time.

* The other 20% were mostly found via novel-length works from the library having pictures of dragons on the cover or mentioned prominently in the title. My shelf-appeal tastes are very predictable sometimes.

† Mind you, some of my favourite sf writers who write excellent short stories and novellas have turned out to be far less impressive at novel length, and vice versa, so you can't really gauge overall quality this way. But at least it helps weed out the ones who are totally unappealing a lot faster.

[BearMountainBooks]

I've read two of Datlow's collections and some of the odds and ends when she was still running that online zine. I've yet to find a story that was more of passing interest. Too weird and too dark for the main part (well-written, of course). Just not my thing. Realms of Fantasy has a lot of that type of stuff too (but they do have a nice adventure story in there now and then.)

My favorite short magazine is still BlackGate. I can count on liking most of the stories there.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by cassidym

Just finished Fer De Lance by Rex Stout. And, like W T Sharp, I never saw that ending coming!

But once you read the ending, did it make sense? Could you go back and figure out the ending based on what was presented?

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

My favorite short magazine is still BlackGate. I can count on liking most of the stories there.

Speaking of Black Gate... the managing editor (Howard Andrew Jones) wrote an adventure novel (a la Arabian nights) that I just loved -- The Desert of Souls.

He also edited the Bison Books collections of Harold Lamb's historical adventure stories... for which I'm anxiously wishing the ebook prices to fall into my comfort zone.

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

But once you read the ending, did it make sense? Could you go back and figure out the ending based on what was presented?

Actually, yes. You just never expected it to go down that way.

Yes, Rex Stout played fair with the reader.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Speaking of Black Gate... the managing editor (Howard Andrew Jones) wrote an adventure novel (a la Arabian nights) that I just loved -- The Desert of Souls.

He also edited the Bison Books collections of Harold Lamb's historical adventure stories... for which I'm anxiously wishing the ebook prices to fall into my comfort zone.

OMGosh--I read that (Desert of Souls) It ROCKED. Totally excellent, I agree.

[ATDrake]

Finished a police-not-quite-procedural/crime thriller novel by Kenyan poet/political essayist Mũkoma wa Ngũgĩ, Nairobi Heat, published by Penguin's South African division.

This is apparently his first novel and he does a pretty decent job of it. It's fairly short, but compact and rather visceral, with prose like a gut-punch, or maybe a stabbing.

The basic premise is that a young blonde American woman is found mysteriously dead from an apparent overdose on the doorstep of a former-refugee and hero-of-the-Rwandan-genocide-turned-respected-university-professor and what if any connection is there to be found between them? And thus, the detective assigned to this case follows its trail to Nairobi, Kenya, where other former Rwandan genocide refugees have gathered, in search of what seems to be the truth.

In reality, this works out to be kind of a shoot-it-out meditation about the nature of relations between the US and Africa, the difference between available justice for the privileged and the disenfranchised, the outcome of modern media attention focus, and the separate-but-equal tensions between black Africans, black African-Americans, and whites of any background.

Plus it had bonus does-this-remind-you-of-anyone? cameos by some famous (or infamous) Kenyans, such as Patrick Shaw* and Thomas Cholmondeley†, descendant of the famous settler Lord Delamere whom you can see in the Out of Africa movie.

It's probably not for everyone, but I rather liked it and would read another by the same author. Though I think I ought to warn for language and violence, since this deals in part with the aftermath of genocide and is set in a considerably more lawless-via-corruption locale than most police procedurals tend to be. But it's not all that much worse than the average HBO show, most likely.

Moderate recommended if you're interested in this kind of grittily contemplative crime thriller or fiction set in Kenya (I picked it up from the library's New Books feature shelf for the latter reason).

* An ex-colonial police officer whom the criminal element of Nairobi lived in fear of for over three decades and would never really discuss. Apparently the first rule of Patrick Shaw is that you do not talk about Patrick Shaw.

† You pronounce it "chumly". And then weep with despair at how messed up the connection between orthography and phonetics is in the English language.

Or more likely, when you realize the man managed to kill two people in less than two years and got out of prison in only eight months for "good behaviour".

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Actually, yes. You just never expected it to go down that way.

Yes, Rex Stout played fair with the reader.

I did like the Nero Wolf TV series that A&E (I think) ran. Too bad it is no longer on.

I was hoping the books didn't lead the reading left when the solution went right.

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I did like the Nero Wolf TV series that A&E (I think) ran. Too bad it is no longer on.

I was hoping the books didn't lead the reading left when the solution went right.

I missed that series. I did catch the 1981 version from Paramount Television. It was enjoyable, but followed the old radio series in it's format far more than it did the books, complete with a moment just before the final commercial when Archie would say he now knew who the killer was, and then turn to the camera and tell the audience that if they'd been watching closely, they would also know.

I'll have to see if I can find the A&E series online somewhere.