~Take a look, It's in a BOOK, Back She Goes~

by **CalvinBall** » Mon Feb 06, 2017 01:16:48

Would anyone be interested in starting a book club? A book a month. Post thoughts every week. Maybe we discussion questions.

by **jamiethekiller** » Mon Feb 06, 2017 01:40:28

Only if I can listen

by **drsmooth** » Mon Feb 06, 2017 01:51:34

Youseff wrote:
(that's a pic of me for the BSG detectives on the board)

You're much taller than I would have guessed

by **The Dude** » Mon Feb 06, 2017 09:42:01

im in calvin

by **Bucky** » Mon Feb 06, 2017 10:01:41

there's a bizarre side effect of audiobooks. With a printed book, when a denoument occurs and you physically can tell there's only a few pages left, you know the resolution of the plot is imminent. With an audiobook, you don't know if this is just another milepost and the story will go on for many more hours or if this is the end. (Sure, you could hunt through menus for the table of contents and looks for total length remaining on some menu, but it's not the same as that unavoidable 'pages remaingin' thing with physical books).

by **jamiethekiller** » Mon Feb 06, 2017 10:06:26

Bucky wrote:there's a bizarre side effect of audiobooks. With a printed book, when a denoument occurs and you physically can tell there's only a few pages left, you know the resolution of the plot is imminent. With an audiobook, you don't know if this is just another milepost and the story will go on for many more hours or if this is the end. (Sure, you could hunt through menus for the table of contents and looks for total length remaining on some menu, but it's not the same as that unavoidable 'pages remaingin' thing with physical books).

i know how many chapters are in a book. The one i'm on now has 180 chapters and i'm on 68. so i know i still have a ways to go and i'm probably approaching one of the main plot arcs. most books announce every chapter.

by **Bucky** » Mon Feb 06, 2017 10:10:12

but you had to seek out the # of chapters somehow. At least with the audible android app it doesn't show you that by default.

by **jamiethekiller** » Mon Feb 06, 2017 11:10:05

Bucky wrote:but you had to seek out the # of chapters somehow. At least with the audible android app it doesn't show you that by default.

swipe right and it brings up all the chapters that you can scroll through.

by **Werthless** » Mon Feb 06, 2017 11:29:46

CalvinBall wrote:Would anyone be interested in starting a book club? A book a month. Post thoughts every week. Maybe we discussion questions.

Sure.

by **Bill McNeal** » Mon Feb 06, 2017 17:47:31

CalvinBall wrote:Would anyone be interested in starting a book club? A book a month. Post thoughts every week. Maybe we discussion questions.

Yeah. I'd be down

by **Bucky** » Mon Feb 06, 2017 17:56:33

jamiethekiller wrote:
Bucky wrote:but you had to seek out the # of chapters somehow. At least with the audible android app it doesn't show you that by default.

swipe right and it brings up all the chapters that you can scroll through.

yeah, but you have to make an active effort to determine that. With a physical book, you have no choice but to know. If I ever look to see when an audiobook is ending that means it's a pretty lousy book.

by **Werthless** » Mon Feb 13, 2017 10:44:15

CalvinBall wrote:Would anyone be interested in starting a book club? A book a month. Post thoughts every week. Maybe we discussion questions.

Have any book recs?

I just finished reading A Brave New World. It's a piece of social satire, a warning, on progress and social conditioning. Huxley sets up what he calls a "negative utopia," where the society is deprived of wants and is brainwashed from birth to fall in line. Character driven over plot driven. Good book, but probably wouldn't read again. I prefer 1984, from this genre.

by **CalvinBall** » Mon Feb 13, 2017 10:49:00

Werthless wrote:
CalvinBall wrote:Would anyone be interested in starting a book club? A book a month. Post thoughts every week. Maybe we discussion questions.

Have any book recs?

I just finished reading A Brave New World. It's a piece of social satire, a warning, on progress and social conditioning. Huxley sets up what he calls a "negative utopia," where the society is deprived of wants and is brainwashed from birth to fall in line. Character driven over plot driven. Good book, but probably wouldn't read again. I prefer 1984, from this genre.

sorry. suggested this and then dropped the ball. busy few weeks.

could probably aim to start march 1. gives us time to decide on a book.

maybe need a breakout thread.

by **Werthless** » Mon Feb 13, 2017 10:50:16

Werthless wrote:
CalvinBall wrote:Would anyone be interested in starting a book club? A book a month. Post thoughts every week. Maybe we discussion questions.

Have any book recs?

I just finished reading A Brave New World. It's a piece of social satire, a warning, on progress and social conditioning. Huxley sets up what he calls a "negative utopia," where the society is deprived of wants and is brainwashed from birth to fall in line. Character driven over plot driven. Good book, but probably wouldn't read again. I prefer 1984, from this genre.

Good summary from wikipedia:

wiki wrote:Social critic Neil Postman contrasted the worlds of Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World in the foreword of his 1985 book Amusing Ourselves to Death.

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egotism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions." In 1984, Orwell added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that our fear will ruin us. Huxley feared that our desire will ruin us.

by **TenuredVulture** » Mon Feb 13, 2017 10:59:41

Huxley was more prophetic than Orwell.

I'm reading the Bruce Springsteen autobiography. It's pretty good, and it appears that Bruce's editor was not all that heavy handed (which I guess has its pros and cons) but it isn't nearly as self-satisfied as Keith Richard's book. Given that Bruce's memory is not surprisingly a lot better than Keith's that makes sense. I am a bit surprised to learn that even in his youth, Bruce neither drank nor used drugs.

by **RichmondPhilsFan** » Mon Feb 13, 2017 11:08:05

TenuredVulture wrote:Huxley was more prophetic than Orwell.

I wouldn't go that far. I'm re-reading 1984 (probably my 6th time reading it, but the first time in at least 15 years), and the similarities between the "Two Minutes Hate" and a Trump campaign rally when he'd get the crowd worked into a frenzy--and the obvious comparison between the demonization of HRC and Emmanuel Goldstein--was terrifying.

Orwell could never have predicted the internet though. That's the thing that keeps us from going too far down that rabbithole, but what if a Trump had come to power in the 1950s and prevented that type of knowledge sharing?

by **Youseff** » Mon Feb 13, 2017 11:13:13

Bill McNeal wrote:
CalvinBall wrote:Would anyone be interested in starting a book club? A book a month. Post thoughts every week. Maybe we discussion questions.

Yeah. I'd be down

yeah, lets do it!

by **Napalm** » Mon Feb 13, 2017 11:14:43

Youseff wrote:
Bill McNeal wrote:
CalvinBall wrote:Would anyone be interested in starting a book club? A book a month. Post thoughts every week. Maybe we discussion questions.

Yeah. I'd be down

yeah, lets do it!

this could be neat

by **Youseff** » Mon Feb 13, 2017 11:16:11

my favorite Aldous Huxley book is Island, and really it's one of my favorite books in general. it's about a society built convergence of technology with Eastern philosophy. I read it in the 90s before all the insane Steve Jobs idolatry so I'm not sure I'd love it as much since Tech folks kinda repell me now.

my favorite Orwell books are Down and Out in Paris and London about being homeless and a bum, and Homage to Catalonia about fighting in the Spanish Civil War.

by **Napalm** » Mon Feb 13, 2017 11:30:51

i haven't read much Orwell, but I will take a peek at those upon your recommendation. Huxley's Doors of Perception/Heaven and Hell was big for me back in the early 20's

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