/lit/ - Literature

This is my first time ever reading a book on recommendation from /lit/.

I don't regret reading it.

Brief review:

If you're looking for a "good" book, a read that is satisfying in most senses of the term, stoner does the trick. It's simultaneously a 'deep' work yet a very easy read. The prose style is basic in a way that COULD be described as simplistic, but I think it's appropriate for what the author was trying to do.

What makes this book is the description of the frailties of the characters and the hardships they endure. The author is a pretty good psychologist. He understands the nuances of what people go through in their struggle in life and the different personality types and how they cope with things.

> Pros

Effortless read.

Good description of characters.

Develops a subtle theme of "limitations" and how they chain us to the world that seems like it would resonate with almost everyone.

Anyone who has spent a long time in academics will get what Masters says in chapter 2 about academia and the types of people that go into it. I think that was my favorite part of the book because I got what was being said.

> Cons.

The prose style is very basic. The author isn't a rhetorical virtuoso.

The pacing seems a little too swift at times. I rarely make this criticism because I find in general authors tend to spend too much time describing the color of the grass and the smell of the sea and whatnot, but after reading page after page of, "then he did this, then he spent a few weeks doing that, then he ended up here," I felt the book overall could have used a bit more "adornment" if only to make it feel like the author wasn't rushing from scene to scene as much.

My wife is reading this with her book group. What should she expect?

Please help me /lit/.

This is more of a life story than anything else. I was one of the kids who never had a gf during high school or anything and lost my virginity to a girl who cheated on me aged 19. Lots of insecurity issues and in the end I got fed up of getting rejected. So I asked a 5/10 girl out and since then we have had 2-3 years together.

Being with someone is really comforting so I didn't mind that it wasn't very passionate. She has sex whenever I want and cooks and looks after me - it was nice. But she was also mad (in general, fits of rage and such), and mad about having children.

Long story short about a year in she got pregnant and like a decent man I said it's ok and got on with things. My daugher was born 22 months ago, her name is Skye and she's really great.

But at the back of it all I'm still an insecure fuck who got with a 5/10.

So now at work I fell for someone else, went on some dates with her, felt the old serotonin kicking in and made a move and cheated on my gf. I'm pretty sure she knows, but keeps quiet because hey, she's a great wife. She even saw my messages from her a few times and made slightly sarcastic comments but nothing directly confrontational.

Now, I read Stoner not too long after this happened. It's eery that my life is becoming so familiar to the book, and I am TERRIFIED of ending up sharing his fate of insignificance. Right now looking after my kid I don't get to write (and I have so many ideas).

I know this isn't a /lit/ thread, but I hang around this community and you're a smart group of guys. Please give me some clues as to what I should do. Right now my family life is full of arguments and pretty imprisoning and miserable, but I've also been alone and that sucks too. What's more important pleasure or doing the right thing?

Is this post-modernism?

well is it

>tfw math major

>tfw the passion which you once had for mathematics is still alive but slowly becoming untenable

>tfw you're pretty sure you amount to anything substantial in life

>tfw you'll never become a pierre deligne or a John Nash of your field

>tfw a mediocre life is staring at you in the face

>tfw you realize you're William Stoner

What do /lit/?

>>6322519
Stoner?

I just finished pic related, let's discuss this book.

Some of the things that struck me, were the fast pace of the book, that I havn't seen before, very fast paced, only 270 pages, yet it chronicles about 50 years. It jumps over pretty big chunks of time, but it didn't bother me, even though it normally would.

Also, what makes Dave Masters so special to Bill? Many times throughout the novel, Stoner mentions him and speaks fondly of him. He has a fond relationship to Finch as well, but it doesn't seem the same as with Masters.

Also,

>tfw you don't have qt3.14 gf like Katherine Driscoll

Discuss!

In order, starting from around New Years:

John Williams - Stoner
Thomas Pinecone - Inherent Vice (still havent seen the movie)
Remarque - All Quiet on the Western Front
Solzhenitsyn - Cancer Ward
Joseph Heller - Catch-22
DFW - Infinite Jest
Jamba Joose - Dubliners
Huxley - Brave New World
DFW - The Pale King
Nabokov - Lolita
Jamba Joose - Poems and a Play
Dostoevsky - Notes From Underground

Starting Pale Fire next since Lolita was my favourite after Stoner.
Recs are appreciated.

I've seen this book being posted more and more frequently. Is it good?

How in the fuck theres still no pdf version of this book anywhere on the god damn internet???

>>4438142

I hear you, Stoner.