AND WE'RE DONE!
These should go out in a week or so, to be received some time thereafter depending on the vagaries of the various postal systems involved.
Previously on the #hubskiliterarything - Ideas! Revisions! Opt Ins! - Now read on...
The results are in and here are the first spokes in the great Hubski Literary Thing:
TheGreatAbider16 flagamuffin iammyownrushmore galen veen OftenBen kleinbl00 are all on the list.
SELECT
To avoid sending already read books to individuals, I'm going to list the top sixteen of the selection. In this thread, each of you pick one you want; first come first served. There are so many more in the longer list I'd selfishly want to send because I love them so but the rules is the rules.
SEND
I need addresses in order to send books. They don't have to be yours but make sure whoever's on the other end of the postal arc is expecting something.
I also need a name to put on the package. Hubski name or mystery super-secret spy name will do, as long as it doesn't frighten the postman and will ensure the book reaches you.
PM me these things.
By the end of this exciting exercise, there should be eight people with eight different books they actually want to read. I should be able to get them out in a week or so.
Here are your top choices, the literary taste of a new Hubski generation:
American Gods - Chosen by Galen
Foundation - Chosen by TheGreatAbider16
Neuromancer - Chosen by GorGorGorillaNeck
A Prayer For Owen Meany - Chosen by KB
A Song Of Fire And Ice
The Amazing Adventures Of Kavalier And Clay - Chosen by Veen
Flatland
The Hot Zone - Chosen by OftenBen
Jitterbug Perfume
The Road
Dune
East Of Eden - Chosen by iammyownrushmore
Brave New World
Candide - Chosen by flagamuffin
The City And The City - Refugee plays her centre table joker!I can't participate flags, my book shelves are too packed. However, I will accept any slim volume of poetry, in particular by my amazing new favourite poet, Marie Howe. I just heard her read aloud at this literary seminar where I am now. To compensate for my absence from this list I am sending postcards to all hubbies who pm me their addresses. So far 6 have been mailed and three are waiting to be written.
That's fair I suppose, hope your literary seminar -- wow fun -- is going wellest. I don't think, though, that bookshelves can be too packed. I am already anticipating which non-book possessions I will have to throw away in order to fit my belongings in my car when I next move, such has my collection swollen.
Comparatively, for my own shits & giggles, I have not read the following: - Foundation - Chosen by TheGreatAbider16
- Neuromancer - Chosen by GorGorGorillaNeck
- A Prayer For Owen Meany - Chosen by KB - The Amazing Adventures Of Kavalier And Clay - Chosen by Veen
- The Hot Zone - Chosen by OftenBen
- East Of Eden - Chosen by iammyownrushmore
- The City And The City
I can't believe you haven't read The Road. It's the worst book I've ever loved.
Yes, Blood Meridian. It's the only McCarthy I've ever attempted. I didn't finish. Even though his prose can be enjoyable, the violence just became tedious after 200 or so pages, and the diminishing returns began to mount. If it weren't for me being stuck in a jury sequester room with no other way to block out the morons whom I was jailed with, I doubt I would have even gotten that far.
You should at least give No Country for Old Men a try especially if you haven't seen the movie. It's a lot more compelling. The Road is great but gods is it a sorrow read. Don't feel bad, I couldn't finish Blood Meridian either. McCarthy is a great writer but when he writes a two page long sentence about a sunset my mind just vaporlocks.
fuggit if the spot is still open I'm in. I didn't jump for it at first because I'm bad at post and also reading promptly, but this is turning out way too cool. Although I admit I've read/own a fair number of these. Applaud the choice of Flatland, scold the choice of Jitterbug. Please let me know if I actually am in or if someone else got the spot already. edit: alas I am too late. (Really that is fine.) But update the damn OP, 'plex.
There's an empty spot on the table, to make nine souls. CHOOSE!
I'll take Owen Meany. Are you buying all these copies yourself? Some of these I can provide and would not miss, or would cherish if I ended up in permanent possession of the final marked-up copy. I definitely own BNW (and probably already lightly annotated), Flatland, The Road, American Gods, ASOF&I, maybe Jitterbug and maybe Owen, (funny story if I do, I got it on a first date with a polyamorous dude I never saw it again, I was supposed to be borrowing it along with Cider House Rules, which I definitely still have). Asking because we have considered cost of postage but cost of texts could be not insignificant too. Everyone let's buy Complexity a beer when this is finished (in a year or so...or never... - let's try and finish this, but patience). Nine for the erudite men, doomed to read.
Too late for Owen Meany, KB was in like lightning!
Curses I made a list of "taken" but skipped right by KB. I'll take the City & the City. When Jitterbug comes my way I may abscond with annotations and write a small note expressing my dislike, just to get it all out. Lance the boil and all that - but I don't know if I should be the first to take it and leave everyone else with such an intro. So the City & the City. Shanks, shanks, shanks.
Maybe it was of a time and age. I also loved Robbins' Still Life with Woodpecker but picked it up again 10 years or more after I first read it and was completely bored. People have insisted I read Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, saying that I'd love it - but I didn't get very far. Same thing with Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson, even though I tried and tried. Books have their moment in an individual life and it's hard to know when exactly that moment comes.
Books, like music, certainly have their moment. I loved both Still Life with Woodpecker and Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, but I read them around the same time in life. They were recommended to me by a girl I was smitten with, that probably helped my enjoyment.
East of Eden right here. Been putting that off for too long.
There's a seat open? I'll take it. What do I need to do? Read the book then send it to someone else? I bid on Neuromancer if I make the cut.
This post explains the plan. If you're up for it, the seat is yours!
Man, another one sitting on my shelf I need to get to. I read Yiddish Policemans Union a long time ago, but I loved it at the time, and was stoked when the Coen Bros bought the rights to it. It would've been a better project than them wasting their time writing Unbroken...