Do you read?

[ender4]

Also an avid reader of Arthur C Clarke , the best proper sci fi author of the modern generation.

i like Isaac Azimov the best, does he count in "best proper sci fi author of the modern generation"?

[MrWeedMcGrass]

Also an avid reader of Arthur C Clarke , the best proper sci fi author of the modern generation.

i like Isaac Azimov the best, does he count in "best proper sci fi author of the modern generation"?

By 'proper' I used a colloquial slang for 'Hard Sci fi' or 'Scientific sci fi'. I am no big expert on the subject(My ideas on Horror fiction , both modern and gothic is much more expansive) , but Clarke had much more'science' in his works , if you get my drift. That is not to say that Asimov wasn't a hard sci fi author , it is just that Clarke was all about the science and very little to no character development, while Asimov was much more meticulous and detailed in his plotting and setting. Being from a science background , I am more intrigued by the elaborate scientific justifications for fantastic futuristic technologies portrayed in these rather good novels.

I appreciate both Authors but given a choice , I would take Clarke over Asimov. Many disagree , they are entitled to their opinion as I am to mine.

[mjmooney]

Also an avid reader of Arthur C Clarke , the best proper sci fi author of the modern generation.

i like Isaac Azimov the best, does he count in "best proper sci fi author of the modern generation"?

Depends what you mena by "the modern generation", I suppose.

The Golden Age

The period of the 1940s and 1950s is often referred to as the Golden Age of Science Fiction.

With the emergence in 1937 of a demanding editor, John W. Campbell, Jr., at Astounding Science Fiction, and with the publication of stories and novels by such writers as Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, and Robert A. Heinlein, science fiction began to gain status as serious fiction.

The New Wave and its aftermath

In Britain, the 1960s generation of writers, dubbed "The New Wave", were experimenting with different forms of science fiction, stretching the genre towards surrealism, psychological drama and mainstream currents.

Cyberpunk

By the early 1980s, the New Wave had faded out as an important presence in the science fiction landscape. As new personal computing technologies became an integral part of society, science fiction writers felt the urge to make statements about its influence on the cultural and political landscape.

Postcyberpunk

Contemporary science fiction has been marked by the spread of cyberpunk to other parts of the marketplace of ideas. No longer is cyberpunk a ghettoized tribe within science fiction, but an integral part of the field whose interactions with other parts have been the primary theme of science fiction at the turn of the century.

Wikipedia

[MrWeedMcGrass]

^^ While there is a good case for Asimov being the best of the lot, when it comes to Hard sci fi , Arthur C Clarke was influential in the genre.

[leviramsey]

So 'real' I have just finished Ozzy Osbournes biography. I'm a bit of a Sabbath fan and I always feel comfortable with books containing Birmingham references. Next up is Andrew Marr's 'History of Modern Britain'

I was chuffed when Ozzy said "I'm just a boy from Aston," on the Stern show, during the promotional tour for that book.

[leviramsey]

Did Asimov propose a development that revolutionized the world?

I rest my case.

[rjw63]

2 \frac {\sqrt{R^2+r^2-2 R r \cos\varphi}} c \approx253\,\mathrm{ms}

Yes, that makes perfect sense

[MrWeedMcGrass]

Did Asimov propose a development that revolutionized the world?

I rest my case.

It was a ground breaking paper by Asimov about Geo Stationary satellites but Clarke is much more meticulous and detailed in explaining the science behind his books, at least that is what I've felt.

We agree to disagree then!

[P3te]

almost finished reading the ultimate hitchhikers guide to the galaxy

been meant to read adams for years but never got round to it, its absolutely brilliant

Don't dismiss the often overlooked Dirk Gently books either. They are IMHO at least the equal of the HHGTTG series.

excellent! theyre next on the list so!

[Pelle]

I need to read for an hour at least before sleeping, its a habit since I was a kid. I am mostly into pop horror/scifi stuff, Stephen King being one of my favs. Incidentally, I am currently reading 'Insomnia' by King and it is far from his best , I must say.

'The Shining' and 'It' are still his best creations.

Also an avid reader of Arthur C Clarke , the best proper sci fi author of the modern generation.

I'd say that "Insomnia" is his worst. Remember reading that whilst doing my military service, or whatever it's called. Just boring. Salems Lot is his absolute best IMO. With Tommyknockers, The Stand and The shining as honourable joint 2nds.

[MrWeedMcGrass]

I need to read for an hour at least before sleeping, its a habit since I was a kid. I am mostly into pop horror/scifi stuff, Stephen King being one of my favs. Incidentally, I am currently reading 'Insomnia' by King and it is far from his best , I must say.

'The Shining' and 'It' are still his best creations.

Also an avid reader of Arthur C Clarke , the best proper sci fi author of the modern generation.

I'd say that "Insomnia" is his worst. Remember reading that whilst doing my military service, or whatever it's called. Just boring. Salems Lot is his absolute best IMO. With Tommyknockers, The Stand and The shining as honourable joint 2nds.

I concur , it is the second worst book i've read by King. The worst is 'Geralds game'. Its incredibly bad and reads more like a cheap sleaze paperback than a King book.

Tommyknockers was damn good though , it is very underrated. The characterization is superb and once the first quarter of the book is over , its fast all the way..

Have you read 'Needful Things'?. Very good read..

[Pelle]

I need to read for an hour at least before sleeping, its a habit since I was a kid. I am mostly into pop horror/scifi stuff, Stephen King being one of my favs. Incidentally, I am currently reading 'Insomnia' by King and it is far from his best , I must say.

'The Shining' and 'It' are still his best creations.

Also an avid reader of Arthur C Clarke , the best proper sci fi author of the modern generation.

I'd say that "Insomnia" is his worst. Remember reading that whilst doing my military service, or whatever it's called. Just boring. Salems Lot is his absolute best IMO. With Tommyknockers, The Stand and The shining as honourable joint 2nds.

I concur , it is the second worst book i've read by King. The worst is 'Geralds game'. Its incredibly bad and reads more like a cheap sleaze paperback than a King book.

Tommyknockers was damn good though , it is very underrated. The characterization is superb and once the first quarter of the book is over , its fast all the way..

Have you read 'Needful Things'?. Very good read..

Yes, I've read most of his books and I quite enjoy them. He's a very good writer, but not the one to ever get the Nobel prize. But I haven't read Gerald's game, actually, but it seems I haven't missed anything. Of his latest books I can highly recommend "Skeleton crew", I think it's called that in english.

And yes, I agree on Tommyknockers. Especially the last 100 pages were impossible to stop read.

[MrWeedMcGrass]

I need to read for an hour at least before sleeping, its a habit since I was a kid. I am mostly into pop horror/scifi stuff, Stephen King being one of my favs. Incidentally, I am currently reading 'Insomnia' by King and it is far from his best , I must say.

'The Shining' and 'It' are still his best creations.

Also an avid reader of Arthur C Clarke , the best proper sci fi author of the modern generation.

I'd say that "Insomnia" is his worst. Remember reading that whilst doing my military service, or whatever it's called. Just boring. Salems Lot is his absolute best IMO. With Tommyknockers, The Stand and The shining as honourable joint 2nds.

I concur , it is the second worst book i've read by King. The worst is 'Geralds game'. Its incredibly bad and reads more like a cheap sleaze paperback than a King book.

Tommyknockers was damn good though , it is very underrated. The characterization is superb and once the first quarter of the book is over , its fast all the way..

Have you read 'Needful Things'?. Very good read..

Yes, I've read most of his books and I quite enjoy them. He's a very good writer, but not the one to ever get the Nobel prize. But I haven't read Gerald's game, actually, but it seems I haven't missed anything. Of his latest books I can highly recommend "Skeleton crew", I think it's called that in english.

And yes, I agree on Tommyknockers. Especially the last 100 pages were impossible to stop read.

Yeah , the critics always hate what sells well! Skeleton crew is a collection of short stories, isnt it? Very good collection. There is another collection of short stories "Nightmares and dreamscapes" that is pretty good.

If you liked Skeleton Crew , I recommend 'October Country' by Ray Bradbury, quite possibly the best collection of short stories in that genre.It is a lot heavier than King but the stories are fantastic.

I also own almost all King books. I'll post a pic of my collection in a short while! :winkold:

[mjmooney]

Seconded on Ray Bradbury - fantastic writer.

[MrWeedMcGrass]

Seconded on Ray Bradbury - fantastic writer.

Absolutely , people tend to think he was a science fiction writer but his short stories in the 'macabre' genre are in a class of their own. The 'twist' endings are reminiscent of the better works of Saki and Short stories by Roald Dahl(Not his kiddy books).

[mjmooney]

Seconded on Ray Bradbury - fantastic writer.

Absolutely , people tend to think he was a science fiction writer but his short stories in the 'macabre' genre are in a class of their own. The 'twist' endings are reminiscent of the better works of Saki and Short stories by Roald Dahl(Not his kiddy books).

Seconded on Saki too! WAY ahead of his time, and laugh-out-loud funny in places (well it tickles me, anyway).

Filboid Studge (1911)

"I want to marry your daughter," said Mark Spayley with faltering eagerness. "I am only an artist with an income of two hundred a year, and she is the daughter of an enormously wealthy man, so I suppose you will think my offer a piece of presumption."

Duncan Dullamy, the great company inflator, showed no outward sign of displeasure. As a matter of fact, he was secretly relieved at the prospect of finding even a two-hundred-a-year husband for his daughter Leonore. A crisis was rapidly rushing upon him, from which he knew he would emerge with neither money nor credit; all his recent ventures had fallen flat, and flattest of all had gone the wonderful new breakfast food, Pipenta, on the advertisement of which he had sunk such huge sums. It could scarcely be called a drug in the market; people bought drugs, but no one bought Pipenta.

"Would you marry Leonore if she were a poor man's daughter?" asked the man of phantom wealth.

"Yes," said Mark, wisely avoiding the error of over-protestation. And to his astonishment Leonore's father not only gave his consent, but suggested a fairly early date for the wedding.

"I wish I could show my gratitude in some way," said Mark with genuine emotion. "I'm afraid it's rather like the mouse proposing to help the lion."

"Get people to buy that beastly muck," said Dullamy, nodding savagely at a poster of the despised Pipenta, "and you'll have done more than any of my agents have been able to accomplish."

"It wants a better name," said Mark reflectively, "and something distinctive in the poster line. Anyway, I'll have a shot at it."

Three weeks later the world was advised of the coming of a new breakfast food, heralded under the resounding name of "Filboid Studge." Spayley put forth no pictures of massive babies springing up with fungus-like rapidity under its forcing influence, or of representatives of the leading nations of the world scrambling with fatuous eagerness for its possession. One huge sombre poster depicted the Damned in Hell suffering a new torment from their inability to get at the Filboid Studge which elegant young fiends held in transparent bowls just beyond their reach. The scene was rendered even more gruesome by a subtle suggestion of the features of leading men and women of the day in the portrayal of the Lost Souls; prominent individuals of both political parties, Society hostesses, well-known dramatic authors and novelists, and distinguished aeroplanists were dimly recognizable in that doomed throng; noted lights of the musical-comedy stage flickered wanly in the shades of the Inferno, smiling still from force of habit, but with the fearsome smiling rage of baffled effort. The poster bore no fulsome allusions to the merits of the new breakfast food, but a single grim statement ran in bold letters along its base: "They cannot buy it now."

Spayley had grasped the fact that people will do things from a sense of duty which they would never attempt as a pleasure. There are thousands of respectable middle-class men who, if you found them unexpectedly in a Turkish bath, would explain in all sincerity that a doctor had ordered them to take Turkish baths; if you told them in return that you went there because you liked it, they would stare in pained wonder at the frivolity of your motive. In the same way, whenever a massacre of Armenians is reported from Asia Minor, every one assumes that it has been carried out "under orders" from somewhere or another; no one seems to think that there are people who might like to kill their neighbours now and then.

And so it was with the new breakfast food. No one would have eaten Filboid Studge as a pleasure, but the grim austerity of its advertisement drove housewives in shoals to the grocers' shops to clamour for an immediate supply. In small kitchens solemn pig-tailed daughters helped depressed mothers to perform the primitive ritual of its preparation. On the breakfast-tables of cheerless parlours it was partaken of in silence. Once the womenfolk discovered that it was thoroughly unpalatable, their zeal in forcing it on their households knew no bounds. "You haven't eaten your Filboid Studge!" would be screamed at the appetiteless clerk as he turned weariedly from the breakfast-table, and his evening meal would be prefaced by a warmed-up mess which would be explained as "your Filboid Studge that you didn't eat this morning." Those strange fanatics who ostentatiously mortify themselves, inwardly and outwardly, with health biscuits and health garments, battened aggressively on the new food. Earnest spectacled young men devoured it on the steps of the National Liberal Club. A bishop who did not believe in a future state preached against the poster, and a peer's daughter died from eating too much of the compound. A further advertisement was obtained when an infantry regiment mutinied and shot its officers rather than eat the nauseous mess; fortunately, Lord Birrell of Blatherstone, who was War Minister at the moment, saved the situation by his happy epigram, that "Discipline to be effective must be optional."

Filboid Studge had become a household word, but Dullamy wisely realized that it was not necessarily the last word in breakfast dietary; its supremacy would be challenged as soon as some yet more unpalatable food should be put on the market. There might even be a reaction in favour of something tasty and appetizing, and the Puritan austerity of the moment might be banished from domestic cookery. At an opportune moment, therefore, he sold out his interests in the article which had brought him in colossal wealth at a critical juncture, and placed his financial reputation beyond the reach of cavil. As for Leonore, who was now an heiress on a far greater scale than ever before, he naturally found her something a vast deal higher in the husband market than a two-hundred- a-year poster designer. Mark Spayley, the brainmouse who had helped the financial lion with such untoward effect, was left to curse the day he produced the wonder-working poster.

"After all," said Clovis, meeting him shortly afterwards at his club, "you have this doubtful consolation, that 'tis not in mortals to countermand success."

Clicky

[MrWeedMcGrass]

Seconded on Ray Bradbury - fantastic writer.

Absolutely , people tend to think he was a science fiction writer but his short stories in the 'macabre' genre are in a class of their own. The 'twist' endings are reminiscent of the better works of Saki and Short stories by Roald Dahl(Not his kiddy books).

Seconded on Saki too! WAY ahead of his time, and laugh-out-loud funny in places.

Haha , I am a huge fan of Saki's works. I got interested in his works after reading 'The Open window' in high school as a part of our English literature course. His twist endings are like no other..

O Henry is another author who specialises in the twist ending. We had 'The gift of Magi' in our syllabus too, which got me into O Henry..

[leemond2008]

I always used 2 have my head stuck in a book but havent had a proper good read for quite a while now

last book i read was about 6 months ago called 'the absence' proper good little horror it was i cant remember the authors name now though

any one recomend any good horrors (aside from stephen king and james herbert cuz ive read all of them)

[MrWeedMcGrass]

I always used 2 have my head stuck in a book but havent had a proper good read for quite a while now

last book i read was about 6 months ago called 'the absence' proper good little horror it was i cant remember the authors name now though

any one recomend any good horrors (aside from stephen king and james herbert cuz ive read all of them)

Depends on what you like to read. Dean Koontz is easy to read and entertaining if not too deep.You can try 'sole survivor' as a first book by the author.

If you want classical ghost stories , some of the best ever written , I suggest you get yourself an M.R. James collection of short stories. Classic english ghost stories with great plot development.

[mjmooney]

I always used 2 have my head stuck in a book but havent had a proper good read for quite a while now

last book i read was about 6 months ago called 'the absence' proper good little horror it was i cant remember the authors name now though

any one recomend any good horrors (aside from stephen king and james herbert cuz ive read all of them)

Depends on what you like to read. Dean Koontz is easy to read and entertaining if not too deep.You can try 'sole survivor' as a first book by the author.

If you want classical ghost stories , some of the best ever written , I suggest you get yourself an M.R. James collection of short stories. Classic english ghost stories with great plot development.

You sir, are a man of consummate taste.

Only thing with M. R. James is that they start to get a bit samey after a while.