@Montaagge@kolektiva.social
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Montaagge

@[email protected]

They or Them, but never Theirs.

Up to date coverage of Minerva the Dog.

I'm a postmodern metaphysicist and social scientist. I mean the things I say.

Avi: A puppy sits in her favorite field of clover.

Cover pic: The Makhno flag. (Ukrainian words reading "Death to all who stand in the way of freedom for working people" and also there is a skull on a black background)

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Montaagge, to bookstodon
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The polity books are super good. The first series is a 5 book long spy drama about an agent in charge of hunting down humans who want to secede from AI rule, rogue AIs that turn to crime, and investigating aliens who dont make sense to anyone. The second series is a trilogy set on a planet that isnt ruled by the Polity AIs but the planet turns everyone into Davey Jones from Pirates of the Caribbean so the population decided they had to invest in sailboats and everyone wants to know about the virus that makes people into immortal sea creatures. #amReading @bookstodon

Likewise, to bookstodon
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Tell me a good book you’ve read this year that you’d recommend.

I’ll start: Crow Mary by Kathleen Grissom
@bookstodon

Montaagge,
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@Likewise @bookstodon Gridlinked by Neal Asher. It is a fun sci fi spy thriller about how well things go after the AIs take over.

Montaagge,
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@Likewise @bookstodon things could go better, many people dont like the AIs. Some of the AIs dont like people. They send spies after each other and do espionage thriller stuff.

dbsalk, to bookstodon
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I'm having a bit of a hard time with Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk. I knew going in that some of the short stories were going to be a bit "out there." A few are quite good, but most I think are not really my taste. I'm about 60% of the way through and hope to have it done this weekend. Really, the sooner, the better.

I know Palahniuk has written a bunch of books. This is the first of his that I've picked up.

@bookstodon

Montaagge,
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@dbsalk @bookstodon stylistically Haunted is probably his most significant contribution to literature. Most of his books are just edgelord shock jock nonsense and, frankly, so is Haunted, but the framing device and the individual stories in Haunted at least justify the edginess.

Montaagge,
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@dbsalk @bookstodon oh yeah, but its also the most artful example of it he ever did. Like, Pygmy is a book about a south asian refugee who carries out a campaign of vengance against the US and I can only describe it as tasteless. Snuff is about making a snuff film but its also a "oh boy Chuck, you have a lot of thoughts about feminism" sort of book.

DocCarms, to bookstodon
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There was a poll that stated—Rowling’s opening line in the HP series is one of best in the world. Someone posted about how there are a bunch of other opening statements that are better.

Here’s one of my personal favorites, from Gabriel Garcia Marquez (English translated):
“It is inevitable. The scent of bitter almonds always reminded him of the fate of unrequited love.”

What are some of your favorite opening lines in literature? 😊
@bookstodon

Montaagge,
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@DocCarms @bookstodon "We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold."

Montaagge,
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@bookstodon He was a newspaper guy, he knew how to grab you on the first line. There are better first lines than anything he wrote but at the core it gets to the problem of HP fans which is that they only read one book. Twenty years ago I used to argue with people who said "Harry Potter is getting kids to read" with "Then why havent any of them read a real book yet?"

Montaagge,
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@DarkMatterZine buddy, the Sorceror's Stone came out when I was in 7th grade and I read it because my beloved English Teacher gifted it to me but I never made it past Goblet because they were bad, boring books. I argued about them not being real literature while they were still coming out. Comics are cool, most comics are real literature. Harry Potter is not. Harry Potter was always a cynical, racist, bunch of trash from day one.

Montaagge,
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@DarkMatterZine @bookstodon but people didnt "keep reading." There is no world where David Foster Wallace, Amy Hempel and Lois Lowry are ignored in favor of the Hogwarts books where people read "other books"

I enjoyed the Hunger Games books, but no one, not even "YA fans" will talk to me about them. I hated Twiight but one of my exes got me to read those and I find each respective fandom less self important and full of shit than the HP fandom and the Twilight fandom produced EL James.

Montaagge,
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@Kay @negative12dollarbill @bookstodon will you please talk to me about the Hunger Games?

Montaagge,
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@shaedrich @negative12dollarbill @bookstodon when I was little and even today if I'm reading a series and the next book isnt out yet I read other books in the meanwhile but thanks for explaining why people are so mad about Winds of Winter. I cant imagine getting so tunnel visioned that I had to wait for George to finish before I reax anything else but I guess some people do live that way.

Montaagge, to random
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Sometimes I get harry potter adults asking if Minnie is named after the hogwarts teacher and I think to myself "if I was going to name her after a YA novel character her name would be Katniss"

Montaagge,
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Hunger Games is better, fight me. We experienced a legit renneissance of YA lit in the last 30 years and there are people out here sleeping on Redwall and the Outsiders. I dont even mind that they read at the same level as a 12 year old. @bookstodon

Montaagge, to bookstodon
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@karabaic @bookstodon so, like, my point of view on it is this. I own the Library of America Hainish Cycle collection and I bought it because I wanted to read the Dispossessed and there was a very persuasive bookseller in the shop. I did not want to read the Dispossessed because of its science fiction, that was not my motive.

The Collection edition starts with Rocannon's World, then Planet of Exile, then City of Illusions but even in Rocannon's world they have the ansible and the Dispossessed is the story of him inventing the ansible. That story comes first and it is a really good one but I dont think its a fair introduction to the Hainish Cycle so much as it is a very long anarchist zine.

The Word for World is Forest is set earlier or around the same time but, honestly, I wouldnt recommend starting on that one either.

But with City of Illusions, its fun to go into it with the background of Rocannon's World and Planet of Exile, but its also a story about being lost and confused, so entering it with no background strikes me as appropriate.

Montaagge, to bookstodon
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@karabaic @bookstodon I like the disposessed but chronologically its the first hainish book, it is a fun book about anarchism but I dont know if I would recommend it on its science fiction merits.

Montaagge, to bookstodon
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@bookstodon I think that Jurrasic Park is a passable introduction. I think the Expanse novels are quite good if you want to be all serious about #sciFi but honestly if I had to name my favorite book it would be City of Illusions by Le Guin.

Montaagge,
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@bookstodon and I would just drop people in the middle of the hainish cycle and say "find your way out." City of Illusions is perfect for that.

Montaagge, to random
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I love my puppy so much

Montaagge,
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Peter David, I think, used to write this book series called PSI Man where this telekinetic Quaker Aikido master teamed up with a telepathic German Shepherd to take on the CIA and stuff and I always thought it sounded like a good idea even though Rommel was a cringe name for the dog and, frankly, the dog was kinda cringe to balance out Simon (a quaker aikido master who definitely evaded cringe to the best of his ability).

Anyways now I look at Minnie and think "one day we will fight the CIA and maybe even the antichrist" (in the last book they fought the antichrist). @bookstodon

Private
Montaagge,
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@lunalein @bookstodon the Lord of the Rings is insufferably dry and C.S. Lewis was more correct than Tolkien about metaphor and meaning in literature.

Montaagge,
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@Hawkwinter @lunalein @bookstodon The Screwtape Letters is quite charming and Mere Christianity is a fascinating attempt at a Universalist manifesto.

I did like the hobbit.

Montaagge,
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@mloxton @lunalein @bookstodon I mean, neither is a favorite of mine, its just my spiciest take.

kenthompson, to bookstodon
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Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley. You live 600 years in the future, as imagined 100 years ago, which is still racist and sexist, but especially classist by design through genetic and social engineering, so that everyone is happy in their assigned caste, yet you are still somehow vaguely unhappy. 2 of 5 library cats 🐈 🐈


@bookstodon

Montaagge,
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@TrismegistusMx @kenthompson @bookstodon Island is a fun book about cultural fusion but it is kind of colonial in nature and it does not exactly have a happy ending.

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Montaagge,
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@SteveClough @agt @bookstodon I like my nook, but its also very frustrating. The power cord is propreitary and they change which type of power cord you need with every model of nook. B&N also, allegedly, lets you preview books if you use their in store wifi but actually I have never got that feature to work. In terms of having a device that can store lots of books and has great readability (the pages look great, it doesnt give you tablet style sore eyes, epubs are formatted excellently and pdfs... work) it is excellent, in terms of actual support from the company its not as good as the Kindle though.

Montaagge,
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@SteveClough @agt @bookstodon I keep seeing people talk about DRMs and I don't know if it is true for all models of Nook but for mine I find that the flip side of there being no support is that DRMs are very easy to circumvent

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