/lit/ - Literature

>>8776256
My recollection of Forever War was that it started well and then lost steam because of all the time dilation. There would be an interesting situation (like the small farm which has to be defended from marauders) but then there would be a time change with new characters. I realise this is due to the plot, but the book feels too wishy-washy and bitty.

I didn't really care for the protagonist either, which is a problem in a book written in the first-person. He is a stoic and even-handed feIlow, and while these are admirable qualities it does make the character uninteresting. I didn't like The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress for similar reasons.

It might also be the case that military SF isn't my thing, in which case disregard whatever I say. The lengthy passages about military hardware left me feeling bored, as did the battles.

>>8766490
Yes, the reported animal and child sacrifices, alongside more benign things like rain-making spells. The witch cult phenomenon is nonetheless a good well for genre fiction.

I maintain that the removal of a power model, where women had a strong role, was part of the motivation for eradicating witchcraft and paganism.

Institutional Christianity has admirable aspects, nevertheless it is misogynistic (this is despite the role models in the bible e.g. Phoebe, Mary Magdalene)

Organised Christianity did a number on witches just as they did the gnostics.

>>8766426
Siddhartha by Hesse

>>8764595
>the oppression of women throughout history was a ruse to to hide a magic ritual they were performing

This is an interesting premise which could bring in Margaret Murray's theories about the witch trials being a Christian conspiracy to remove a fairly unified religion (a fertility venerating a mother goddess) which threatened the hegemony, not least because it was an organisation where women had a strong role; her book 'The Witch-cult In Western Europe'.

>>8759445
I read it but my recollection isn't perfect - but now you mention it, I think the main character did bundle up with a shipmate, and outside of marriage no less! Most degenerate indeed. I thought the book was a boring one (not lurid enough for me.) I liked The City And The Stars better, and on reflection it is a better recommendation for homeboy here >>8759142 because it was a product of the 1950's, so I don't think there is anything too saucy or transgressive.

Not that I am shitting on the 1950's, there is plenty of good storytelling, even when writers had to be more mindful about matters of taste and decency. Earth Abides is a brilliant novel - but there is an interracial relationship, so I can't recommend that to Mr Redpill either.

>>8759142
So you want a book about extraterrestrials and exploration without degeneracy - so nothing featuring sex outside of marriage, homosexuality, incest, blasphemy, conspicuous consumption... and nothing by a Jewish man either.

Rendezvous With Rama by Arthur C Clarke should be boring enough for your strait-laced tastes, but he might have been a homosexual IRL, and he wasn't a God-fearing Christian either. If you're sensitive dear heart can live with that, go ahead.

>>8758630
Fathers and Sons, a short novel by Turgenev. A young graduate returns to his provincial family home with a friend who calls himself a nihilist. He ruffles some feathers.

>>8756197
FACILE

Ignoring the true complexities of an issue; superficial

SPECIOUS

Superficially plausible, but actually wrong. Misleading in appearance.

GLIB

(of words or a speaker) fluent but insincere and shallow.

>>8756179
Hard To Be A God by Strugatsky Bros. An extra-terrestrial society, still in the feudal stage, is observed by a small number of historians from Earth for research purposes. They have access to superior technology but must be covert.

>>8754561
Worn out spines are less of a problem in slimmer volumes, and not all used books have been read, either. As for covers, older ones are often better, this is particularly true for genre fiction.

But it's true that some books wear better than others. Those black Penguin classics that flake away to the white underneath.

>>8755167
I just read the plot summary, and the list of outsider characters is like something from a Theodore Sturgeon story: an albino, a midget, and an obese woman, uniting for one purpose.

576 pages?

>>8752665
Roadside Picnic, smugglers and black market traders of alien artifacts

>>8747166
If in doubt, go by the cover.

>>8747132
Even if this is not a copypasta, and it takes an imagination to believe so, what are you getting at by making this post - do you mean to express the idea that people read for escapism, and to identify this as a reason for reproach? If so, I should expect to find a similar post in /tv, /v, /hc, any board concerned with a medium or hobby. In any case, you're a shitter.

>>8743670
Well, any shoddy concept has the potential for good writing, if the writer is upto it. Theodore Sturgeon wrote all about brain evolution in More Than Human, which is a good book, but I prefer The Dreaming Jewels.

>>8744854
Le Guin's Lathe Of Heaven is a standalone SF, which is why I chose to read that one first. I liked it a lot, imagine a feminine PKD with better prose. I can't speak for her other books.

>>8744808
Great short stories, several good novels, a puzzle stylistically and in terms of his influences (decoding these is his chief appeal), can be a clunky writer, but possessed of a good imagination, his bad points are redeemed by his humor

>>8744660
Long, Dostoevsky-esque outbursts which run for pages in effusive and fevered tones

>>8743612
two more interesting tidbits and the writers who treat them

THE SKULL IS A PRISON FOR THE CONSCIOUSNESS (Robert Silverberg)

PERCEPTION IS REALITY (Philip K Dick)

WE ARE WHO WE PRETEND TO BE (Vonnegut)

THE PEOPLE OF THE LONG PAST ARE NOT HUMAN (Strugatsky Bros)

THE DIVINE SPARK (as referred to in biblical texts. what is it? Is it the unconscious - is it the god within?)

Ok, no more, I promise.

>>8743508
It's probably better to deal with universal experiences and with the conventional trappings of the genre, and there are plenty of those to choose from, but, anyway, I will throw some word salads at you, because I have little else to do after eating a meal.

LIVING DEATH (in the sense of living wrongly, this turns up in Russian writing quite a bit, maybe try plugging it into a fantasy)

THE CAVE (metaphorical or not. womb? )

THE OTHER SIDE OF THE DOOR (metaphorical or not. what's in there, should we bother?)

THE HOLE IN THE GROUND (metaphorical or not. how deep, what depths [in man?])

FORBIDDEN KNOWLEDGE VS RESPONSIBILITY (a well worn trope but it's good enough for Shelley, HG Wells, Lovecraft)

THE NEXT STAGE OF EVOLUTION (is it purely psychological? Ties in with...

MAN'S HIDDEN POTENTIAL. What is holding it back?

IS MAN A VILLAIN? (standard ruminating of good vs evil)

You will probably have no use for this mulch, but there you have it. Ray Bradbury recommends compiling a random bunch of nouns, any that come to mind at the time, and then ruminating on them, thinking what they mean to you, and using that as a creative well. I am not a writer, but if I did bother, I think I would begin with an evocative concept of mine and treat it with a bunch of Jungian archetypes in there to start with (the hero, jester, the crone, the maid, etc.)

>>8740725
the gospel of john has a particularly dim view of jews

>>8740427
I'm not a gambler, but I read Dostoevsky's novel, The Gambler, Dostoy himself being a roulette player, so there is probably a lot of truth in here about the way people think at casinos.

Late in the novel, while the narrator is on a winning streak, he describes the compulsion to play on and on, rather than stop and bank his winnings. He says that the soul (or spirit) becomes so overstimulated and irritated by the thrill of winning that it is no longer able to feel satisfied, so people keep betting until they are ruined.

>>8739869
the deal with siddhartha is the poetic writing of universal experiences of the quest for meaning, identity, peace, work/materialism, father/son rebellion, and growing old

the extended river metaphor is of particular importance

>>8740379
Operation Yewtree + Midland, Elm Guest House scandal, Leon Britton's lost dossier, and the continued kicking into the long grass of any worthwhile investigation (several resignations of those appointed to head the independent inquiry into abuse by elites.) The upper echelons of celebrity and politics were full of fishy goings on, and while celebrities like Saville and Rolf Harris have been found out, the establishment is protecting themselves, until they die off (Cyril Smith, Lord Janner) or people are past caring.

>>8738912
Between the royal bootlicking, boarding school buggery, and state-sanctioned paedophilia, the opinions of the British establishment weren't/aren't worth a bean, so perhaps it wasn't difficult for Tolkein to pay them no mind, given their moral bankruptcy.

>>8740252
You pay too much mind to Reddit

>>8739796
SF/horror covers don't look like that any more, more's the pity

instead of waiting for a question, you could perhaps offer a colourful anecdote about a customer, or book.

although one thing i want to raise is, how often did you have to deal with book worms/lice/parasites in books?