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PaperclipPerfector  25d ago (text post)   2848 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for October 27, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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So, what are you reading?

Still on Future Shock and Galactic Patrol. Rereading Bernays’ Crystallizing Public Opinion. Bernays has been on my mind often while watching the US election unfold. I think he would have disapproved of the Harris campaign's choices.

Howard Marks' books. He's not as funny as Lynch, but he's pretty good too.

I read The Andromeda Strain. It was somewhat interesting but I definitely wouldn't recommend it; the plot and character development are almost nonexistent.

Now catching up on 12 Miles Below which is just such a fun story.

Andromeda Strain is pretty boring. Crichton was just starting to figure out how to write novels with that one.

Haven't read Andromeda but completely agree on 12 Miles Below. I read the first one and ended up devouring the entire series several months back and I'm hoping there's more soon!

I having been chewing my way through William Hope Hodgson's The Night Land. It is incredibly repetitive and an excellent soporific. Given to a vicious editor I expect 2/3rds of it would end up on the cutting room floor, and be better for it. Whilst incredibly boring it is refreshing to read something so sincere and unselfconscious.

In my quest through Plato I've gotten through the Euthypro, the Apology, the Crito, and I'm now on the Phaedo. Good hospital bedside reading.

On audio I just finished Moby Dick. A truly universal work, it feels like an allegory for the presidential election 175 years early. I've now started lonesome dove, which I recall someone here recommending, and Lord in heaven is it amazing. After reading a lot of non fiction and literary fiction, lonesome dove is like a firehose of content. Just action on action on allegory on allegory on setpiece on setpiece. The book just GOES. I'm totally digging it.

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