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New books twenty-five to thirty-one
Mar. 28th, 2009 01:23 pm(Also, I read the last couple of stories in (21) somewhere during this lot.)
25) The Mindworm (C.M. Kornbluth). Curiously enough, I'd never previously read "The Marching Morons". Having done so, I don't think it's Kornbluth's best work by some margin; not least, I'd say that he appears rather uncomfortable with the subject matter (which doesn't entirely surprise me - most of his other work shows a fairly positive attitude towards human nature). Overall, a good collection of stories by an excellent writer, of which the only one I'd read before was the (equally famous) "Little Black Bag".
26) Propaganda (Lindley Fraser). An interesting short discussion of the subject from a late 1950s viewpoint, including discussion of propaganda generally as well as some specific types (notably WW2, Stalinist Russia, and commercial advertising). The author takes the position that propaganda is inherently neutral because the only effective way to get people to believe you in the long term is to tell the truth, but doesn't always argue this convincingly.
27) The Best Democracy Money Can Buy (Greg Palast). An investigative journalist talks about who Bush and Blair (and, to a lesser extent, their predecessors) sold the US and UK to, and how (and how much) they were paid. With digressions on globalisation, the IMF, and other problems of the modern world.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
stripey_cat has wondered aloud why I read this sort of book, since I already know at least the general outline of what they're going to say, but nonetheless get worked up about it without actually going out and starting a political party that isn't in the pocket of the usual 'special interest groups'. (After all, who'd vote for us?)
28) The Family Trade (Charles Stross). Not bad, although for the present I prefer Charlie's other works. I'll certainly be continuing with the series, especially since this book is effectively only the first half of the first novel. Fun, but less to my taste than the Laundry books or something like Glasshouse.
29) Octagon (Fred Saberhagen). Annoying sexism, mediocre writing, moderately interesting plot idea (that was probably pretty new at the time, since it relied on knowledge of the internet and the book was published in 1981, but has been heavily revisited since) that's best expressed in a single chapter towards the end of the book. Meh.
30) The Best of Kuttner 2 (Henry Kuttner/C.L. Moore). A good collection of often rather weird stories by the excellent husband and wife team. I turned out to have read a good few of these before (I don't always catch the many pseudonyms they used), but most of those were worth rereading anyway. (As a general rule, I prefer the stories that tend more to her style than his; of their solo writing before they married, I definitely regard hers as superior from what I've read.)
31) Extinction is Forever (Louise Lawrence). A reasonable-but-not-brilliant collection of short stories by an author I'd never previously encountered, with general apocalyptic overtones (as you might guess from the title). Good enough that I'll probably keep an eye out for other works in the library and charity shops.
Which is me actually caught up with what I've read to date for once. If I keep up this rate (unlikely), I'll be on about 130 new books read in 2009 when the year ends.
25) The Mindworm (C.M. Kornbluth). Curiously enough, I'd never previously read "The Marching Morons". Having done so, I don't think it's Kornbluth's best work by some margin; not least, I'd say that he appears rather uncomfortable with the subject matter (which doesn't entirely surprise me - most of his other work shows a fairly positive attitude towards human nature). Overall, a good collection of stories by an excellent writer, of which the only one I'd read before was the (equally famous) "Little Black Bag".
26) Propaganda (Lindley Fraser). An interesting short discussion of the subject from a late 1950s viewpoint, including discussion of propaganda generally as well as some specific types (notably WW2, Stalinist Russia, and commercial advertising). The author takes the position that propaganda is inherently neutral because the only effective way to get people to believe you in the long term is to tell the truth, but doesn't always argue this convincingly.
27) The Best Democracy Money Can Buy (Greg Palast). An investigative journalist talks about who Bush and Blair (and, to a lesser extent, their predecessors) sold the US and UK to, and how (and how much) they were paid. With digressions on globalisation, the IMF, and other problems of the modern world.
stripey_cat has wondered aloud why I read this sort of book, since I already know at least the general outline of what they're going to say, but nonetheless get worked up about it without actually going out and starting a political party that isn't in the pocket of the usual 'special interest groups'. (After all, who'd vote for us?)28) The Family Trade (Charles Stross). Not bad, although for the present I prefer Charlie's other works. I'll certainly be continuing with the series, especially since this book is effectively only the first half of the first novel. Fun, but less to my taste than the Laundry books or something like Glasshouse.
29) Octagon (Fred Saberhagen). Annoying sexism, mediocre writing, moderately interesting plot idea (that was probably pretty new at the time, since it relied on knowledge of the internet and the book was published in 1981, but has been heavily revisited since) that's best expressed in a single chapter towards the end of the book. Meh.
30) The Best of Kuttner 2 (Henry Kuttner/C.L. Moore). A good collection of often rather weird stories by the excellent husband and wife team. I turned out to have read a good few of these before (I don't always catch the many pseudonyms they used), but most of those were worth rereading anyway. (As a general rule, I prefer the stories that tend more to her style than his; of their solo writing before they married, I definitely regard hers as superior from what I've read.)
31) Extinction is Forever (Louise Lawrence). A reasonable-but-not-brilliant collection of short stories by an author I'd never previously encountered, with general apocalyptic overtones (as you might guess from the title). Good enough that I'll probably keep an eye out for other works in the library and charity shops.
Which is me actually caught up with what I've read to date for once. If I keep up this rate (unlikely), I'll be on about 130 new books read in 2009 when the year ends.