morose code

MetaFilter discuses Fighting Fantasy. I used to love those books when I was younger, especially the huge Sorcery! series and the Titan! reference books.

I've been trying to remember the name of a sci fi/fantasy series for a while now. The protagonist is some sort of athlete that lives on a futuristic world. His job is to play the professional rocket sled circuit, where one races down labyrinthian tracks filled with deadly traps, occasionally jumping to a parallel track.

Plastic has not so much an article as a conversation of books people are looking forward to reading. Lots of good recommendations there. I've just finished James Ellroy's "My Dark Places" and moved on to "Catcher in the Rye". Currently my to read list includes:

Koushun Takami's novelization of "Battle Royale"
Toni Morrison's "Beloved"
Gabriel Garcia Marquez's "One Hundred Years of Solitude"
Michael Ondaatje's "Coming Through Slaughter"
Roddy Doyle's "A Star Called Henry"
M. G. Vassanji's "No New Land"
Cervantes' "Don Quixote"
Ovid's "Metamorphosis"

among others.

What book are you? My result:

You're The Catcher in the Rye!
by J.D. Salinger

You are surrounded by phonies, and boy are you sick of them! In an ongoing struggle to search for a land without phonies, you end up running away from everything, from school to consequences. In this process, you reveal that many people in your life have suffered torments and all you really want to do is catch them as they fall. Perhaps using a baseball mitt. Your biggest fans are infamous psychotics.

I've decided to give Quicksilver a rest and try something else. The only parts that really kept my interest were the ones that featured one of the Shaftoe boys and I seem to be through those pastures. Right now I'm going to try my hand at Chuck Palahniuk's Survivor.

After watching The Return of the King over the holidays, I remember the group of us were discussing it. Carvill had asked me what some of the differences between the books and the movies were. This site goes into the details in a way I never could.

Today I stopped off at Chapters to use up this $5 gift certificate that I have. I really didn't know what I was going to use it for. The only book that I've wanted for a while was the Bruce Campbell autobiography and I'd just gotten that a couple of weeks ago. There really wasn't anything that I could think of that I wanted or needed. So I was randomly typing in words into the computers they have there when I remembered this one book, "Good Omens" by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchet, that I was always looking for and never could find. The last time I was at Chapters their computers said they had it but for the life of me I couldn't find it. This one cute girl that worked there swore that she'd seen it recently and tried tracking it down in the back thinking that it was a new shipment that hadn't been put out to the shelves yet. No such luck then. This time, according to the computer, they had some in. So I went upstairs and imagine my suprise to see that they easily had over two dozen or so copies out. Strange how online it was one of those books availible by special order only and no bookstore I've been in Ottawa or Toronto had a copy and here's twenty just sitting on the shelf. When it rains, it pours I guess.

Right now I'm reading Bruce Campbell's new autobiography instead of Ernest Hemmingway's quasi biographical novel and I must say I'm enjoying it more. If you've ever wanted to be a big time Hollywood actor, do yourself a favour and don't read this book. It's a pretty frank (though very funny) look at Bruce growing up and trying to be an actor and the hardships your average joe will go through along the way.

I also picked up the Gorillaz's latest release, "G sides." It's pretty good. Definitely worth a listen if you liked the debut album.