Karsa Orlong
-
Posts
7,149 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Events
Books
Posts posted by Karsa Orlong
-
-
American Hustle. Strangely uninvolving film. Was expecting more from it, tbh
Just added to my watch list.Have you seen it (Invasion of the Body Snatchers) before?
-
^^ Awesome song!
-
The Wire
The Shield
Band of Brothers
Farscape
Babylon 5
The X-Files (the first three seasons especially)
NYPD Blue
Star Trek (the original series)
Fringe
Buffy (the first three seasons but only selected episodes after that)
One that I may add in future if it maintains the quality of its first season: The Flash
-
The top three have been pretty much set in stone for years. After that it's a bit more fluid:
Aliens
LA Confidential
Star Wars (Episode IV: A New Hope to the heathens out there)
Ben-Hur
The Great Escape
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Tremors
Superman: The Movie
The Terminator
-
Two awesome movies, Steve! Except for the giant spider in the latter.
Yeah, we've been talking about that over in my thread
I found it scarier this time around than I did when I first saw the film years ago 
-
What crazy fool gave away their copy of Master & Commander?
It should be against the law. Have them hunted down and arrested. There is not a moment to be lost! 
-
Oh, God, I just Google imaged it and really wish I hadn't.
My arachnophobia is obviously getting worse cos I don't remember being half as freaked out by it when I saw the movie as kid compared to watching it the other night Oh wow!, great review Steve. I saw the film too, ages and ages ago. Now I really do have to read the book. Thanks!
Thanks! If you do get it, I'd recommend the Tor edition because it includes a few of his short stories, too, including 'Nightmare at 20,000 Feet' and 'Duel'
-
I'd like to go in the virtual hat, please. Not literally. You know what I mean
Tor have published some of my favourite books and authors (and have some of the best covers) but to pick just one author I'd have to go with Vernor Vinge. He's written two of my all-time favourite novels, A Fire Upon the Deep and its prequel-of-sorts A Deepness in the Sky, both of which won the Hugo Award for Best Novel.
They're big books, but I'd recommend them to anyone who may be interested in reading science fiction but wants a book that has both great ideas and great characters. A Fire Upon the Deep also has the feel of epic fantasy in parts, so anyone who likes fantasy but hasn't tried science fiction may feel more at home (even if the beginning makes their head hurt like it did mine
), and it's got a sense of fun about it, too. What I love about Vinge's books is that even though they are full of huge ideas and the stories have a real epic scope, this is just a backdrop to the human drama, rather than the focus. He's also created my favourite aliens. A Deepness in the Sky has an alien character at the heart of its story and he, and his family, are a joy to read about, full of humour and charm, and a sense of wonder and excitement.Every time I write about these books I end up wanting to read them again
Science fiction is my preferred genre
-
The Incredible Shrinking Man
-
This sounds fantastic (and terrifying)! Great review.
Yeah, I've heard black widows are notoriously difficult to work with. 
They're such divas!
I re-watched the film last night. Considering when it was made, it's astonishingly good. And the spider is still terrifying, black widow or not. It's HUGE
Great review! This sounds like a great book I'd like to read
.Well you've had two years since last time, what's keeping you?
Thanks for the plug! Great review, I really should read more Matheson as I have loved both the books of his I've read.
I'm going to get the three-volume collection of his short stories, I think. I had a trip round the usual bookshops in the West End today (Forbidden Planet, Foyles, Waterstone's, Hatchards) and could only find one of them, so I'll have to order online, I think
-
Maiden's Grave by Jeffery Deaver.
That's the one and only Deaver I've read so far - thought it was very good. Enjoy!
Finished The Shrinking Man. Now trying to decide what to read next
-
North by Northwest 50th Anniversary Edition blu-ray
-
I enjoyed it much more this week. I'm not sure why, it just felt a lot less disjointed than the first ep did
I do wish they'd made Marc Warren look less like a Thunderbirds puppet, though -
The Shrinking Man by Richard Matheson
1956 - Gollancz paperback - 201 pages
While on a boating holiday, Scott Carey is exposed to a cloud of radioactive spray. A few weeks later, following a series of medical examinations, he can no longer deny the extraordinary truth. Not only is he losing weight, he is also shorter than he was. Scott Carey has begun to shrink.
Richard Matheson’s novel follows through its premise with remorseless logic, with Carey first attempting to continue some kind of normal life and later having left human contact behind, having to survive in a world where insects and spiders are giant adversaries. And even that is only a stage on his journey into the unknown.
The easiest way for me to review this would be to direct anyone reading to Tim's excellent review from a couple of years ago. But I'm not going to do that (oh, wait . . .
). It's a long, long time since I first read this book and, to be honest, I could until now much more easily recall scenes from the film. That movie, which is based upon the novel and for which Matheson also wrote the screenplay (and was also the first film to win a Hugo), is one I remember vividly from my childhood. I blame my arachnophobia on seeing that film at such an early age. Well, that and my mother jumping on a chair and screaming the house down every time a spider appeared. That was me scarred for life (Notice I haven't used a cover image that shows the spider from the story )Anyhoo, back to The Shrinking Man. I suppose, for any author, it would be quite difficult to maintain any air of mystery with a title like that, cos it gives the reader a fairly good idea about what's going to happen. It's not like with his (other) masterpiece, I Am Legend, where the whole point of that title doesn't become clear until it's magnificent final page.
So Matheson doesn't bother with mystery - he plonks you right into the (nearly) end of it. After a single page first chapter in which the titular character, Scott Carey, gets caught in a sudden mist whilst relaxing on his brother's boat we turn the page and are thrown straight into Scott's ongoing battle with a black widow spider in the basement of his once-home. He's now less than an inch tall and the spider's as big as he is. In the movie they didn't use a black widow (apparently they asked a few but they all wanted too much money to do the stunts) but a bog-standard tarantula. It doesn't really matter - they're both fecking terrifying (a damn sight more terrifying than Shelob ever was!). But, here in the book, it's most definitely a black widow, and it's been terrorising poor Scott for some time now, and serves for some of the most extreme tension I've experienced in a novel. I'm not even joking about this - there was a scene today where I reached its end and found that I had actually been holding my breath. I let it out in a long sigh and thought 'now that's bloody good writing'
The brilliance of Matheson's tale is in telling the story in a non-linear fashion. Flashbacks are interspersed with the present, each one using Scott's height at that time as a kind of morbid countdown. 68" the first heading proclaims, and onwards and downwards, and we're privy to Scott's innermost feelings, his frustrations, his outrage as his masculinity is slowly stripped away from him. It deals with his approach to what is effectively a terminal illness, his frustration at his inability to provide for his wife and daughter, at his inability to take his own life, and his sexual frustration as his marriage disintegrates before his eyes (which leads to one particularly disturbing chapter where he fantasises about the babysitter, perhaps the only misstep in the book). And all the while this is juxtaposed with scenes of him struggling to survive in the basement.
There's a quote on the cover of the book from Ray Bradbury, and it led me to compare. I love Bradbury's work and, whilst I'd say his writing style is better than Matheson's, I actually feel that Matheson has the bigger, bolder ideas. I Am Legend is not only the best vampire novel I've ever read, but one of my favourite novels full-stop. The Shrinking Man is only a hair's breadth behind it. It's a classic, and it's almost impossible for me to read that title and not automatically insert the word they used for the movie, because I really think it is . . .
Incredible.
-
I get the impression you don't intend to see the series out!
Um, no
Although I suppose it could be the bookish equivalent of self-flagellation or wearing a hair shirt I love it when you read crap books, Steve.
I don't!
Wasted over two days of my precious reading time on the blimmin' thing 
-
On a happier note, I have started The Curse of the House of Foskett.
Hope you enjoy it, bobbly, I thought it was even better than the first
-
Deathstalker by Simon R. Green (abandoned)
1995 - Roc paperback - 523 pages
The Iron Bitch-- her Imperial Majesty Lionstone XIV-- ruled the human Empire with fear. From peasants to masters of the galaxy's most powerful families, all were subject to the queen's unpredictable decrees of "outlawing" and death.
Owen Deathstalker, unwilling head of his clan, sought to avoid the perils of the Empire's warring factions but unexpectedly found a price on his head. He fled to Mistworld, where he began to build an unlikely force to topple the throne-- a broken hero, an outlawed Hadenman, a thief, and a bounty hunter. With their help, the Deathstalker took the first step of a far more dangerous journey to claim the role for which he'd been destined since before his birth...I'm used to science fiction novels having crap covers, so that didn't put me off. I read lots of reviews, some enthusiastic, occasionally glowing, but most insulting, and that didn't put me off. The first chapter of the book is almost a complete rip-off of the opening of Star Wars (pirate ship under attack by vast Imperial starcruiser, our plucky heroine uses an escape pod and heads for the planet below), but that didn't put me off. The main character's name, Owen Deathstalker, is too similar to Luke Skywalker for comfort. Even that didn't put me off.
I finally made it through nearly 250 pages of this book before deciding enough was enough. It wasn't that the writing is mind-numbingly repetitive (if I read the words 'lithely muscular' or heard about one character's 'buzzing, inhuman voice' just one more time . . .
) that did for me, it was the author's blatant disregard of his own 'world building'. He puts in the character in situations from which there should be no escape, then introduces an angle that had never been mentioned before to get them out of it. There's one point where a squad of marines is going into a situation that was faced previously by another squad who were wiped out by an alien force. This second squad goes in, they're on the brink of being wiped out, too, when one of the characters suddenly brings out a 'secret weapon' which saves the day. Why didn't he do that right at the start??? Oh, oh! And it starts with Owen Deathstalker being outlawed and a huge price put on his head, but the plucky heroine from the beginning doesn't bother to turn him in for the reward. They flee to an outlaw planet where criminals go as a last resort, because they can go there but never leave (nobody explains why, or why the Empire doesn't just let them all gather there and then arrest them all), and none of the criminals there decides to hand him in for a reward and, oh, maybe a pardon
And, needless to say, Owen and his motley crew (none of whom think to turn him in, either) just get in their ship and fly away from the planet that no-one leaves. What? How? Why? Oh wait, I no longer care
And it's the first in an eight book series. Dear God.
-
BBC three saved me from Eurovision purgatory last night by showing Muse live from the Radio 1 Big Weekend
-
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). Marvellous
-
The Body Snatchers by Jack Finney
1955 - Gollancz ebook - 237 pages
I warn you that what you're starting to read is full of loose ends and unanswered questions. It will not be neatly tied up at the end, everything resolved and satisfactorily explained. Not by me it won't, anyway. Because I can't say I really know exactly what happened, or why, or just how it began, how it ended, or if it has ended; and I've been right in the thick of it. Now if you don't like that kind of story, I'm sorry, and you'd better not read it. All I can do is tell what I know.
Rather than the blurb, that's the opening of the book. This SF Masterworks edition is the original version, not the revised version that came out when the 1978 movie remake starring Donald Sutherland arrived. I'm happy about that, because the original 1956 movie, starring Kevin McCarthy, is one of my all-time faves - and I'm doubly happy because that movie is by-and-large faithful to Finney's story, unlike the '78 version. If you've seen the original then you'll know that the story is told in voiceover by McCarthy's character, Dr Miles Bennell, and that is exactly what happens in the book.
Bennell is a doctor in the small Californian town of Santa Mira. The story begins when an old girlfriend, Beck Driscoll, turns up at his surgery. She is very worried about her sister, Wilma, who lives with her aunt and uncle. Wilma, apparently, has got it into her head that her Uncle Ira is no longer her Uncle Ira. Miles and Becky go to visit her and, unsurprisingly, come to the conclusion that Uncle Ira is very much Uncle Ira, but Wilma won't have it. Miles asks her if she'll see a psychiatrist friend of his to which she - surprisingly - agrees.
If you've seen the film then you'll know what happens next: cases of this strange condition multiply, people all over the town saying their loved ones are no longer their loved ones. And then Jack is called out of a cinema to investigate a body - a body that is strangely featureless and yet humanoid, and developing before his eyes, ready to take on the life of its target when that target goes to sleep.
The Body Snatchers is a brilliant exercise in escalating paranoia, as Miles begins to doubt everything and everyone around him. I remember the first time I saw the 1956 film, late one Saturday night on BBC2. As it ended, the announcer said something to the effect of 'And I think all that remains to say is good night, sleep well'. Um, yeah okay - you try! It's a brilliant film and a brilliant book. That the story on the page deviates in places from the film is unsurprising - particularly at the end (the end of the film is better, imo, even though the studio asked director Don Siegel to add framing scenes to add a hint of optimism) - but in many ways its remarkable how closely they match. I've often seen it mentioned that the story is actually about McCarthyism, or the second 'Red Scare' of early 50s America, but I think there's more to it than that. It preys on a primal fear: do we really know the person next to us as well as we think they do? Are they really who we think they are?
Ultimately I think The Body Snatchers falls just short of the greatness of I Am Legend or The Shrinking Man (which I really must re-read soon!), but it's only by a smidgeon. It is phenomenally fast-moving and tense and exciting, and some scenes are downright terrifying. Just remember: they're here already - you're next. I loved it.
Memorable Quote:
It wasn't a guess, but a sudden stab of direct, intuitive knowledge - I knew, that's all - and I swung in my chair to stare across the room at Miss Wyandotte. She stood motionless behind the desk, her eyes fastened on us, and in the instant I swung to look at her, her face was wooden, devoid of any expression, and the eyes were bright, achingly intent, and as inhumanly cold as the eyes of a shark. The moment was less than a moment - the flick of an eyelash - because instantly she smiled, pleasantly, inquiringly, her brows lifting in polite question. 'Anything I can do?' she said with the calm, interested eagerness typical of her in all the years I had known her.
-
Nice review of Random Acts of Senseless Violence. I have a copy sitting on my bookshelf. I tried reading it about 15 years ago, and couldn't get on with it at all. About the only thing I remembered was that Lola's sister was called Boob.
Mind you, it's been a while so I may even be wrong about that. No you're not wrong - that was her sister's nickname
And Lola's was Booz Some familiar titles on your list! I hope you enjoy all your new books
.Thanks
-
^^ Go for it!
Been on a bit of a Kindle spending spree recently:
The Many-Coloured Land (Saga of the Exiles Bk 1) by Julian May (actually a re-buy because I fancied re-reading it and had managed to give away my old paperback copy at some point )
The Body Snatchers by Jack Finney
Necroscope by Brian Lumley
Alex Benedict Collection: A Talent for War / Polaris / Seeker by Jack McDevitt (had my eye on these books for ages, and this is the first three books for £4.99, couldn't resist . . . )
Gridlinked by Neal Asher
Snowblind by Ragnar Jónasson
The Wanderer by Fritz Leiber
Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein (finally out on Kindle!)
HMS Ulysses by Alistair McLean (99p . . . )To Ride Hell's Chasm by Janny Wurts (£2.99)
Curse of the Mistwraith (The Wars of Light and Shadow Bk 1) by Janny Wurts (£1.99)
and a couple of second-hand paperbacks:
Cyteen and Rimrunners by C J Cherryh -
Would you read a book called Normal Throne.
Yes
-
Finished Random Acts of Senseless Violence last night after all (review here). Started Jack Finney's The Body Snatchers this morning and already quarter of the way through it. The original 1956 film version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers is one of my all-time faves, so I've no idea why it's taken me so long to get around to reading it, despite owning it for years
What Are You Watching Now? - 2015
in Music / TV / Films
Posted
The Flash 1x23. No no no no no nooooooooooo!
When does season 2 start??? 