Jack > Recent Status Updates

I hate this book!!! But importing it from the US cost, what, $90? Still unsure 'why' I'm reading it...

Having survived the first chapter, I'm changing my tune - this is fantastic. I can only stomach a few pages a day, but Gass is winning me over.

This might be one of the strangest books I've ever read. I don't like it at all, but every so often Gass has a brilliant passage...

First Le Carre and loving it. Feels nice to read a book that wants to pull you in, excite you, while respecting your intelligence.

I recall the Denny translation moved the Slang section to the back of the book as a footnote, presumably because he felt he couldn't do a good job translating it - Donougher's translation may be littered with footnotes, but the section in its rightful place makes sense - Hugo never goes on a tangent for no reason, and maybe on my 3rd reading of the book I'll take all of the "essay sections" and read them separately.

Not entirely sure if Marius is the model of a dedicated and honourable young man or if Hugo is suggesting wasting yourself on abstraction and wilfully living in poverty will give you an unhealthy interest in 15 year old girls. Perhaps both things are true?

Trying to get through 50 pages a day so I can finish mid-March. Nobody does it like Hugo!

Suetonius is wonderful. I love hearing about the random works Julius Caesar wrote that are now lost to history - how much more colour would Shakespeare's Caesar have if we could include scenes of him writing essays about the standardization of conjugations?

A brilliant and frustrating book. Every line seems to be either essential or pointless.

Hard to believe I first read this knowing so little about French history that I didn't know they had a Louis XVIII or more than one Napoleon. Loved the story despite being completely clueless about the politics, which is...a lot of the book. Going in this time more determined to seek secondary sources as I go. Such good storytelling.

If I read 100 pages per month, this will take most of the year... I wonder if it would be worthwhile or just ridiculous to take four or five long novels and read them all simultaneously like that.

Was hoping to finish this book this year, but that would be wasteful speed-reading at this point. Hopefully I can manage 100 pages a week.

Great read. I still don't really know why the author is putting himself, and others, into such dangerous situations. Could never imagine it myself.

Better than I had expected so far.

Great writing!

I might try Laxness another time, but this was undoubtedly a bad place to start - a political satire heavy on you-had-to-be-there bullshit. Maybe I've got to read the Sagas first.

Reading past the mark where I originally dropped this series. I wonder how much of that decision was rooted in the disappointment of Rand and Berelain not banging. She definitely left an impression on 16 year old Jack!

So much better than I remember it being as a teenager. Or has my taste worsened?

Struggling to enjoy this nearly as much as I would've liked. If there has been 50 characters introduced so far in this novel (and I think there's been more) I only really have a bead on about 20 of them.

when things started happening, i felt confused and afraid

Let's fucking go!!!!!
I'll never understand why prose like this has gone out of style, replaced by:
-Are you hungry, he said
-No
Well yeah, I guess a bit hungry
I'll eat. I'll have a nibble.
-Do you want pizza so, he said. Cavernous eyes. I yielded.

Tiring...I wish I'd read it 9 or 10 years ago!

The Stories of Jacob complete. Not sure what to make of it as a standalone book, but of course it isn't really.