SPOILERS

not in the post body but many in the comments!

I'm not the target market. I shouldn't have picked it up. But I was curious about what all the hullabaloo was about especially since the casting announcements and I'm annoying like that. The moment I hear they are adapting something I have to read it and then I'm not watching it. 😆

I don't have it in me to pick apart instances that are spoilers but I'll just talk about the overarching annoyance.

I hate everyone in these book! All the main characters suck ass! I'm mid way through Iron Flame and it's my eyes and ears that are flaming! The oh he's so beautiful every 2 minutes and the asinine mindless arguments and just the sheer pigheadedness of the lead characters and just the lack of personal space and ability to keep private things private. I actually don't mind the world building too much but I abhor the love story and I quite dislike everything else. I will finish it because I have to. And I don't know if I'll pick Onyx Storm or not, (I will) arghhhh damn the completist in me!

A difficult slog to be sure; as difficult as slogging up and down the Congo River in a steam paddleship in 1899. A book constructed in LONG, uninterrupted stretches of dialogue from our primary narrator, Marlow, as conveyed to us by a younger man listening to an old man recount his days of adventure.

Even though I deliberately approached this book with a patient mindset, reading slowly, as if being spoken to, much of this work was still very difficult to follow. Yet something in the opening few dozen pages, something about the language, the wicked playfulness, the sinister air of slavery and death in the air, caught me and held me at least long enough to finish it. And know that English was a second language for Conrad, wow.

Of course, everyone knows the film, Apocalypse Now, was based on this novella, and it was pretty cool drawing the comparisons. The "harlequin" character I immediately pinned as Dennis Hopper's inspiration, transposed into a 60's psychedelic explorer.

A young adventure-seeker, bound to sew his wild oats, meets ways with a Belgian ivory company (yes, THAT Belgium, notorious for colonial cruelty in Africa under King Leopold II) and signs up as a crewman on a steamer. One name keeps coming up as he steams his way up the "dark" river: Kurtz. The various companymen he meets at the few "stations" positioned on the banks of the Congo always seem to speak of him with reverance. It's weird, honestly. The gusto with which he is regarded. "He was a remarkable man." Long stretches devolve--or evolve?--into really abstract, trippy language. And you have to imagine yourself as a young man listening to Marlow speak this language. You would be intrigued and impressed, as well.

Again, a difficult read. Fun to draw comparisons with Apocalypse Now, and a work to be contemplated as the lofty creation of a fellow human being. Impressive, yes. Difficult, also yes. Worth it? I think so. There were some parts, especially, towards the beginning, that were, like, woah. This is something special.

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Klara and the Sun felt like such a special book but I'm afraid I will never be able to read it again (spoilers)

I decided to pick up Klara and the Sun after seeing the trailer for the film and it seemed like a fun watch.

I've just finished this about 5 minutes ago and I absolutely loved the book! It was as though I was reading life observed through the eyes of an overly anxious, hypervigilant child. Which I'm sure a lot of us can relate to. It's amazing, throughout the book it feels as though Klara has a feeling of underlying dread that she can't quite grasp and is constantly searching for answers around it. Maybe that passed on to me a little as I spent the entire time hoping things would work out for her more than I did Josie, as messed up as that sounds.

As you can guess, the ending absolutely ripped my heart out! After all they went through together she spent her final years mostly ignored sitting in a cleaning cupboard looking out of a tiny window... Like an old vacuum cleaner

Then after a tiny glimpse of hope that Klara would at least spend her days in the place she loves she was discarded and left in a dump with nothing but her memories to sit with and the worst part of it all, she was at peace in her loneliness because Josie was happy and alive.

I can't believe how it all ended for Klara and even more so I can't believe I'm sat here so heartbroken over the ending of a fictional robot. What a beautifully devastating read.

I think I'm going to check out more work by Kazuo Ishiguro because I don't think I've felt this way over a book In a long while.

For those that have seen the film, is it worth the watch even after reading the book?

[The Author] spent a decade deep in research, resulting in the first scholarly biography of Biddy Mason.

The City Council’s recent move to rename Pershing Square for Mason has refocused public attention on her history. Yet we’re no closer to identifying the single figure behind her emancipation, a historic case that broke the back of slavery in Southern California.

Just read this story/novelette and was gobsmacked -- I knew zilch about it going in (that's my preference when it comes to books or movies) so just bopped along with the plot and the characters and had that "tickling" in my brain wondering which girl was which and of course Morrison never affirms. Only afterward did I read the (protracted and annoying) analysis the New Yorker had published; only then did I realize the reader was the experiment. I wish I could take a poll; how many readers picked Twyla as .... I am still hankering to know the "correct" answer even though I know there IS no correct answer! Genius. Major props to Ms. Morrison

I really enjoyed the Good People by Patmeena Sabit! I finished in two days because I couldn’t put it down. Those of you that read it, what did you think about the ending?

My first reaction was disappointment that we don’t find out what happens, but after mulling over it, I think that is the point that the author was trying to make. In real life, we don’t find out what really happened in cases like these. I have my own theory on what happened, and would love to hear what others think of it. I don’t think the family did it. I could see just how much they loved Zorah despite their anger towards her.

While reading the later parts of the book, I could not shake the feeling that Zorah committed suicide and staged her death to make it look like a murder committed by her parents and brother. Over time, she had built up intense resentment toward them due to their strict rules. She was clearly struggling mentally in the year leading up to her death, and breaking up with her boyfriend pushed her over the edge. To start building a narrative against her family, she began telling others that her father had threatened to kill her. She also manipulated search histories to frame her brother and parents. She rolled down the window of the car before drowning herself to make it look like foul play. Given her behavior and psychological state over her final two years, planning something like this seems very plausible.

I would love to hear what others thought of the ending, and if you have any theories on what happened!

I've heard good things about Liane Moriarty. However, I've been disappointed by two of her books now, specifically how they ended, despite really enjoying them at the beginning. The books being Apples Never Fall and The Husband's Secret. I need to vent about the latter.

First, I wasn't really sure how Tess connected to the story. She really only plays a peripheral role, whereas I'd been hoping that she might play a more active role in helping either Cecilia or Rachel. I actually think she could have had her own book. Starting a business with your cousin, who you're in a codependent relationship with? That could have been quite interesting on its own. We wouldn't even necessarily need the affair storyline, to be honest.

I had other quibbles as well. But my biggest issue was Janie's storyline. Now, in the epilogue we learn that John Paul didn't actually murder her; she happened to have Marfan Syndrome. I guess this is to let him off the hook to us, if not to him. However, he was still violent towards her, and I don't like the implications that it was partly her fault for leading him on and laughing nervously, nor that he gets to be very sorry about it later. I don't believe he killed a woman out of spite once, and has never shown even slightly controlling tendencies since.

For those of you who've read her other books, are they worth reading? Someone on Goodreads claims that it's similar to Big Little Lies, but that the latter is better.

Hi all,

When looking up books on Amazon or when getting emails with book recommendations from Amazon, eReaderIQ, BookSirens etc. how can I tell if a book was created by AI and not a real human author?
Some of the books in those recommendations look AI generated either by their cover (yeah, yeah, I know I shouldn't judge a book by its cover :-) or by their synopsis but others aren't that obvious so how can I tell? Are there any giveaways? Are book stores supposed to mark such books?

Thanks

and now it changes how you feel about the chapter you just read and you re read it to see if you missed out where the gender pronoun is mentioned.

This happened to me with the book only one left by Riley Sager. I thought Kit was a dude and the beginning of the book was him feeling embrassed about him hooking up with the 20 year old neighbour. And then he goes to the rambling mansion where his job is assigned and thinks to himself that in other circumstances he d have found the gardner cute. So i liked how his sexuality is not highlighted or pointed out, its just mentioned casually that he was sleeping with the neighbour because of no other options and then found the gardener cute. No where does the narration spell out he is gay.

But then later i find out the pronoun ' she' is used . And now its all confusing. Suddenly i get more the embrassment she feels about hooking up with a 20 year old neighbour because there was no one else. I feel like in gay relationships , its a bit different ( of course the character has to be of age so at least 20) but its more common for a 31 year old man to have a casual relationship with a 20 year old and not be embrassed about it ? But maybe i'm mistaken.

Unrelated but im finding this book a bit of a drag but i bought so i have to read it. Anyone else finding it a drag ? It sure was hyped up on socials.