August Books
Mumbo Jumbo - Ishmael Reed. The Harlem Renaissance as literary Urban Fantasy. Pretty much a wow (and thanks for sending it my way.)
As a Man Thinketh - James Allen. Early 20th century “positive mind” pop-psychology. Is to philosophy what a D&D manual is to history, which is not a bad thing, and you can download it from Gutenberg and sift the bad from the good.
Merchanter’s Luck - CJ Cherryh. Psychologically disturbed ship captain tries to keep his shit together while dealing with a new crew. Pretty cool and makes me miss 60,000 word stand-alone spec-fiction novels.
A Voice from the Attic - Robertson Davies. This is a great book. It's Davies talking about his love of reading for 300 pages. By the end it makes you want to raise your fist to the sky and shout, "F**K YEAH! BOOKS!"
Andreas Vesalius the Anatomist - Petrus Borel. Gothic novella about an abusive husband, his young adulteress wife, and the wacky shenanigans that ensue when the Inquisition starts investigating necromancy. I recommend it if you're into that sort of thing. I downloaded it from somewhere online. I don't think it was Gutenberg.
Nocturnes - Kazuo Ishiguro - Five bittersweet love stories about music and nightfall. Some greatness mitigated by overwhelming bittersweetness, ends on a fade-out, instead of a bang.
City of Endless Night - Milo Hastings - Written in 1920, parts of this are quite prescient (such as the rise of a Totalitarian post-WW1 Germany), but Hastings had no way of knowing the horrors of actual Totalitarianism, so parts are quite quaint, and the Germans crumble because of good ole’ American pluck and ingenuity. Chapters have titles like: “IN BLACK UTOPIA THE BLOND HORDE BREEDS AND SWARMS” and “I GO PLEASURING ON THE LEVEL OF FREE WOMEN AND DRINK SYNTHETIC BEER”. Another curiosity available from Gutenberg.
As a Man Thinketh - James Allen. Early 20th century “positive mind” pop-psychology. Is to philosophy what a D&D manual is to history, which is not a bad thing, and you can download it from Gutenberg and sift the bad from the good.
Merchanter’s Luck - CJ Cherryh. Psychologically disturbed ship captain tries to keep his shit together while dealing with a new crew. Pretty cool and makes me miss 60,000 word stand-alone spec-fiction novels.
A Voice from the Attic - Robertson Davies. This is a great book. It's Davies talking about his love of reading for 300 pages. By the end it makes you want to raise your fist to the sky and shout, "F**K YEAH! BOOKS!"
Andreas Vesalius the Anatomist - Petrus Borel. Gothic novella about an abusive husband, his young adulteress wife, and the wacky shenanigans that ensue when the Inquisition starts investigating necromancy. I recommend it if you're into that sort of thing. I downloaded it from somewhere online. I don't think it was Gutenberg.
Nocturnes - Kazuo Ishiguro - Five bittersweet love stories about music and nightfall. Some greatness mitigated by overwhelming bittersweetness, ends on a fade-out, instead of a bang.
City of Endless Night - Milo Hastings - Written in 1920, parts of this are quite prescient (such as the rise of a Totalitarian post-WW1 Germany), but Hastings had no way of knowing the horrors of actual Totalitarianism, so parts are quite quaint, and the Germans crumble because of good ole’ American pluck and ingenuity. Chapters have titles like: “IN BLACK UTOPIA THE BLOND HORDE BREEDS AND SWARMS” and “I GO PLEASURING ON THE LEVEL OF FREE WOMEN AND DRINK SYNTHETIC BEER”. Another curiosity available from Gutenberg.