Member: lil_ghostcrab

Hey Ghost, ages ago you asked for recommendations like China Mieville. I just started Gene Wolfe's "Book of the New Sun" (halfway through the second, there are four), and I reckon it might resonate.

Also: there's a new Mieville?! Oh... not yet. Right. Hanging out for May...

posted by tikitu at 5:31 am (EST) on Apr 1, 2009

I'd love to use it on my profile page, it so aptly describes building a library of books. I quoted LT member Kinch once before, it was something he said about Nabokov I think. I change my info pretty often so it might not be up for long, but thought it would be fun for now...

posted by themagiciansgirl at 11:09 am (EST) on Feb 23, 2009

I'm sorry to post such a tardy reply to your invitation; I haven't been on LT in ages. Unfortunate, as I now have a daunting stack of books to enter. What a lovely and interesting library--it's always nice to see Calvino, Chatwin and probably my favorite book from elementary school, The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, all in one place. Also, love that Albertus Seba book--gave it to my mom one Christmas, borrowed it, and haven't quite gotten around to returning it. Oops.

posted by gracie68 at 12:35 am (EST) on Feb 7, 2009

lil_ghostcrab, Sorry, I assumed you had The City & the City because it was listed in your library. The book does not come out until May of this year. I have a reader's copy given to me by a former boss from the bookstore where I worked for almost a decade. They know I love Mieville. This is why it shows up in both my library and my husband's (dukedom_enough). Best, Lois

posted by avaland at 7:58 am (EST) on Feb 3, 2009

lil_ghostcrab, one can add a member to one's list of 'interesting libraries' in addition to 'friending' them. When I first came on LT, there was no 'friends' - one could only mark someone as an interesting library. When you start messing around with your home page you will find that you can follow either your friends, your interesting libraries, or your 'private watch list' (like interesting libraries, but the list is not shown to others on your profile page) members as they add, review or rate books (I think you mouse over the upper right of each section, which will reveal some sort of icon (a pencil?) to click on to edit that section.

Great story above, btw! As I mentioned in my last message, I am reading The City & The City by Mieville. I don't know if you have read this yet, but the premise is a police procedural. I'm only about six chapters in but the prose style reminds me a little of the clipped sentences of "Jar City"'s English translation, but, I suspect, it is modeled after Chandler or Hammett (whom I have never read). I don't read a lot of mysteries these day but happened to start the Mankell's and get caught up in them. I have always used mysteries as literary palate cleansers of a sort between other kinds of books. Off the top of my head, I follow semi-religiously: Mankell, Indridason, Ian Rankin, Reginald Hill, P. D. James, but I am behind a book in most of them!

Best, Lois

posted by avaland at 7:04 am (EST) on Feb 2, 2009

I added you to my "interesting libraries" because we share "The City & The City", which I just read and loved. Will be interested to know what you think about it.

posted by dukedom_enough at 4:52 pm (EST) on Feb 1, 2009

I do not know if there is another book about Ted Serios, but he might be in that book The Perfect Medium: Spirit Photography and the Occult.

posted by honeyrococo at 2:54 am (EST) on Jan 29, 2009

NICE library!

posted by the_red_shoes at 3:41 pm (EST) on Jan 24, 2009

No I haven't read it yet (it arrived in the mail only today, along with 9 others - my first job is always to catalogue it before I forget or lose it in the ever-growing library). But I couldn't resist buying it with a title & sub-title like that!

posted by mfd101 at 1:54 am (EST) on Jan 22, 2009

Thanks for the comment and for the book suggestions. Two I already have, and love, the Field Guide to Little Peopke and The World Guide to Gnomes etc....I am going to check out those other two...

posted by malinablue at 10:08 am (EST) on Jan 21, 2009

Hi,

Looks like we have some books in common. I just started reading books by and about Native Americans. Gotta go, my son is here....

posted by jglassow at 9:16 pm (EST) on Jan 20, 2009

Hi. Thanks for your comment.

If you're looking for some more Swedish crime, you won't go far wrong with Soderberg's "Doctor Glas". Written 1905, it is a classic and a helluva good read.

posted by LizzySiddal at 12:57 pm (EST) on Jan 20, 2009

Hiya, yeah, we've got some overlap. (Not all of mine are really mine, alas, I've got my wishlist in there too.) Mieville is a tricky one to match, it's true. I've read people comparing Jeff VanderMeer, but I don't really agree: his Ambergris has none of the depth and richness that makes Mieville's world believable. John Crowley would be one possibility ("Little, Big"); it's not world-building like Mieville but he has some of the same richness of language. M John Harrison ("Light") if you don't mind cruelty and sf. Mervyn Peake maybe? Kelly Link maybe? Nobody quite matches, the man is in a class of his own.

(Russell Hoban's "Riddley Walker" is not very Mieville-ish but /very/ highly recommended.)

I haven't read any Helprin, I'll check it out, cheers.

oh yes, and try "Roadside Picnic" by the Strugatsky brothers. It amazes me that's not more well-known.

posted by tikitu at 11:52 am (EST) on Jan 20, 2009

Your library is delightful. I recommend trying to find a Codex Seraphinianus if you can; you can see some of it online, but the actual book is a real treat.

posted by superyeti at 3:43 am (EST) on Jan 18, 2009

Welcome to LibraryThing -- I see you're fairly new. You'll find it's addictive. Congratulations on guessing the Crambo! answer. Did anyone explain you're on the hook (pardon the expression, crab) to start the next one?

posted by Larxol at 4:18 pm (EST) on Jan 17, 2009

It is an interesting contrast, one all romanticism and the other dealing with harsh realities. Odd that the Halprin book takes it's title from a Shakespeare play and Malcolm X rejects Shakespeare's authorship of the plays at one point in his book.

posted by strangefate at 10:56 am (EST) on Jan 16, 2009

Hi lil_ghostcrab

Thanks for adding me to your friends. I see you really are into nature and geology. Maybe you'll be interested in some of my books I bought in South Africa about nature and indigenous animals. I still have to add them to my library though. All this work and no time !

By the way: great picture!

Greetings

posted by robbiedeclercq at 3:41 am (EST) on Jan 12, 2009