Rate the last book you read

You are brainwashed

 

Saif cuz you really expected someone would read the full lesson which you types, unless its a success story or some serious topic. U applying just ilogical logics. I would explain it but am on mobile and cant write big paras on it cuz am a slow typer on mobile.

Keeping this debate aside, I am really excited to read 6th book as there is ******* death their. Wanna experience that emotion

 

And you're spoiling this why? Edit your comment man.

 

ARCEUS' post reminds me of when Deathly Hallows came out and people would drive past people waiting in line to buy the book and scream spoilers out the window. Asshole behavior for sure but the idea of a drive-by spoiling is kinda hilarious to me.

 

I must admit, my reasoning and wit are completely dismantled by insults and emojis. I am defeated. Excuse me while I commit seppuku.

Devastated, by this unique spelling and dismissive attitude. I am undone.

Hold on, so success stories are not serious? Never mind, that’s a side bar. Let’s see what my opening sentence was…

That, friend ARCEUS, is called a “thesis statement.” It is a truth claim that defines the entire post, and usually it’s the last sentence of the first paragraph but I made it the first thing you see because brevity is the soul of wit. The premise of the entire post is stories are a serious topic. I don’t know how you think I’m supposed to respond when your most articulate rebuttal is

Do elucidate, sir. Help me understand.

I am also typing on a mobile. I typed my original claim on a mobile. I agree, it’s not ideal, but we make it work.

Or I’ll just wait.

I don’t know what’s worse, spoilers or atrocious grammar. And as for experience that emotion… I thought stories didn’t matter?

 

I did that with my friends, constantly mixing in sorta plausible stuff with obviously ridiculous stuff. I clapped and wept when Morbius killed Galactus in the new Thor movie. Then when the post-credits scene introduced Seth Rogan as Dr Doom? Marvel just cant miss.

 

Sorry for my behavior guys, I actually live with so much depression and stress due to this addiction and which causes some unexpected behaviours
And when people start opposing me rather than accepting the fact that everyone has their own opinions and starts fighting, I really get a bit angry, when I read the point again, I suspect the starter of this unimportant debate is not me, there is someone else who had first disrespected my opinion, and for clarification, @Meshuga you can't point anyone for there "grammar" in this website as you should not expect everyone have English as there 1st language. And about grammar, I clarified but you don't even have the time to read someone's counter answer and just try reply him anything, I already clarified I don't write good in mobile keyboard as I have habit of a mechanical keyboard but you just wanna answer without thinking.
I see you are just replying without understanding my points like what you gave answer about the success story and of mobile, just counter answering without even thinking once, which forces me to empty my hands in this debate as I can't waste more of my words if someone is not even ready to understand what anyone has counter answered him and just try to defend himself.
And yeah, sorry for revealing about abt Dumbledore, cuz I didn't knew many don't like revealing cuz I live where I think I am the only person who reads harry potter in my entire town
I won't reply more...

 

I understand depression, and getting caught up in debates I don’t want to be part of. I also understand English as a secondary language. I can easily understand their/there from context, that isn’t a problem. What is a problem is that I did read your entire post, I even quoted much of your post, and it doesn’t come together with any intelligent rebuttal to my claim that stories matter.

I put forth several arguments to support my claim. I said people tell stories in multiple contexts. Stories make up multiple branches of the entertainment industry. People pay thousands of dollars to learn how to tell stories better, and some people dedicate their careers toward simply understanding great stories better. Some stories are so good, they last in the public consciousness and are repeated so often, they survive hundreds, even thousands of years. All of that suggests stories are deeply important to people. Your response was dismissive and rude. “That’s illogical. I’m not going to tell you how, though, because I’m working with limitations,” even though I am working with those same limitations.

You don’t get to do that, and expect to walk away without riling people up. My arguments are logical. You made fun of me, and it wasn’t thoughtful or respectful, but I made fun of you in return.

If you want to show me where my logic is flawed, I’m open to hearing that, or if you want to stop and walk away, I’m open to that as well. But you do not get to dish out insults, then take umbrage when you get them back. This is not how the game works.

 

What Happened to Lori: Revelation by J.A. Konrath.

The narrative went completely bonkers. Not right away. It’s well executed. And bonkers. It does get meta, it does get a little introspective, it does get weird. I got the sense, from what my wife said and from the tone of the first one, that it was a grand, intricate, ambitious plan. A passion project. Serious business. It was obviously leaving clues, and earnestly trying. Then, maybe it was project fatigue, maybe it’s me projecting my own cynicism, but as the twists piled on it grew increasingly difficult to take seriously and for the events inside the plot to mean anything to me. It’s the observations outside the plot that make me enjoy this novel.

You can tell from the perturbed ranting taking up a significant portion of this thread page, fictional narratives are intensely important to me. I’ve spent an inordinate amount of time and money learning how to do it, reading it, analyzing it, and doing it. Or trying to do it effectively, anyway. At the same time, I am not stupid. I recognize how silly the whole thing is. I recognized how silly it is before I got involved with it. I discovered in University that I have little to no tolerance for studying math, chemistry, pharmacology, stuff that results in a degree with a decent paycheck attached, but I can spend hours without interruption studying narratives. Stories people make up. It makes no sense to me, the division still seems arbitrary to me and I don’t know why. I spent years being angry with God or the universe or whatever force or happenstance it is that made me unable to choose what to successfully focus on over the long term, because I was stubborn, man, I withdrew from chem twice, I struggled through multiple math courses, I went to classes day after day after day sitting in there and loathing every minute of the process and eager to go back because I wanted that useful degree, I needed it to validate who I wanted to be and who I was, and I could not make it work. And I’ve been angry over, of all the things to be endlessly fascinated by, why fiction? The value of narrative that I postulated up there in previous posts, that’s intellectualized back-end justification for something I was already doing. Maybe the reason I’m so adamant that stories matter is because I don’t actually believe it myself, and in a way, What Happened to Lori? reinforces that incredulity. There is a point where an author note declares one of the four main characters is not going to make it. One is going to die, and the note says I, the reader, already have an idea of which one, but I have to keep reading to learn if I am right. It wasn’t true. I believed that one would die, but I didn’t have a theory of which and I didn’t care. I wasn’t invested in any character because I know they don’t exist and what happens to them is at the whim of the author, and what the author does with them depends on what (s)he was feeling like doing to me, the reader, at the time. Now, 94% of the time (I am not basing this off real statistics) authors want to sell books, so they want to meet reader’s expectations. Most readers are basic, they want an HEA (happy ever after) or an HFN (happy for now) ending. In some genres they want noble sacrifice. They want sentimentality, they want good guys to win, so authors give it to them. When an author is feeling ornery, experimental, as my dad called it, “feeling froggy,” anything can happen. Rocks could fall on the characters and they all die and none of it means anything. Then they could all be brought to life again by a magical fairy, and it still doesn’t mean anything. Then they could all die of aneurysms again and all be brought back to life because the author says so. Nothing has to be logical, nothing has to make sense, fiction is stupid. In fact, fiction rarely does make sense, because it’s all biased toward making the reader happy. That’s why there’s good guys and bad guys, and the good guys always win. That’s why I love Noir; because there don’t have to be any good guys and there frequently aren’t any, because nobody has to win and they frequently all lose. It makes the good guys that much more valuable, and the victories much sweeter. And that is why A Game of Thrones blew everyone’s minds. George R.R. Martin started with a more gritty (incest? Oh my!) but still predictable classic fantasy (those incest-y people who throw kids off of roofs are definitely bad guys, but the terse patriarch that doesn’t lust for power but will take responsibility because it’s what his people need is definitely the good guy), and turned it on it’s head. The twist was effective in GoT, though, because nobody suspected GRRM was getting fancy with it. I already knew J.A. Konrath was getting fancy with it, so I didn’t know what the twists were but I knew they were coming so it wasn’t that interesting.
Roller coasters aren’t scary to me for the exact same reason. I know there will be a lot of up, down, twist and plunge and barrel roll, but we’re strapped in, the park would be liable if anyone got hurt, it’s not dangerous. It’s all an amusing mix of sensations that mess with my inner ear a bit, frankly not worth standing in line for 45 mins, but I yell anyway because I’m supposed to. I wasn’t even scared in Iraq, when they launched mortars over the wall. The bad guys couldn’t see, they couldn’t aim, it was arbitrary. What did scare me was when I was pulling rear security in the back of a 5 ton truck on convoy, and a car with one driver, one passenger wanted to pass. Did they have a bomb? Were they just civilians? I motioned for them to back off, but they didn’t want to. Suddenly anything could have happened and it was all in our choices. They could have had a bomb or not, if they chose to pass I could have shot them and been a hero for saving my convoy or a villain for killing two civilians who didn’t want to drive slow behind American trucks. There was no way to tell, and there was no author pulling the strings to tell a story and make a point.

That was scary.

Fiction is not scary. Fiction is a lie consumers knowingly, willingly suspend disbelief for, and it’s the author’s job to make them forget they are playing pretend even while they deliver everything the reader wants. It’s a manipulation game. It’s stupid.

The civilians chose not to risk it and backed off. I know now they were civilians because of what they chose. I was not forced into my choice, and that is a relief to me because protocol would have been to shoot them and I don’t know if I’d have tried to fire warning shots, disable the car, kill the driver, or let them go. Each choice had risks and it all came down to a split moment. I’m not sure how I would have handled the fact that I killed civilians. Would I have been able to justify it, because I was following orders? Would I have hardened? Or would I have been consumed with horror and regret? Fortunately, I don’t have to speculate.

What I liked about Konrath is that he also seems to be aware of all of this, how stupid fiction is while being helplessly drawn to it. I sense a kindred spirit, and that makes me happy.

5/5 stars.

 

Sages of the Underpass by Aaron Michael Ritchey.

On the surface it’s about MMA, where the first “M” stands for “magic” instead of “mixed.” People fight, and their magical abilities are supposed to be tied to their astrological sign. It’s a parallel universe. What it’s really about is the struggle with art, and how we produce it and why. 5/5, for the truth it spits.

 

I've gone deep into some Tom Clancy. He's known for the Jack Ryan series, my early intro was Patriot Games, Hunt For Red October, and the Sum of All Fears.

Happy to say with my new found free time, I finally find myself ready for enjoyment.