Who's your favorite author??

[Guest]

a train wreck

Svenska-

I knew I shouldn't read your post, but, like a train wreck, couldn't not read it.

And now, thank you very much, I am sure to have nightmares if I ever sleep again.

b

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Re: a train wreck

Svenska-

I knew I shouldn't read your post, but, like a train wreck, couldn't not read it.

And now, thank you very much, I am sure to have nightmares if I ever sleep again.

b

Told you she was good.

 

[MathGirl]

Newly discovered author

Any Elmore Leonard fans out there. He's an old timer, but I love his books. Stuart Woods is good, but he uses the most ridiculous names for his characters.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

I can recommend Shock Waves by Clive Cussler.

 

[Couture]

Elmore Leonard is one of my faves. Other notables include Pratchett, Philip K Dick, Charles Sheffield, the guy that did Triggerfish Lane, Striptease, and Orange County something or another (don't mind me, I'm drunk), Piers Anthony (only his early stuff), Stephen King.

 

[SlickTony]

Striptease was a Hiaasen novel. They made it into a sucky movie with Demi Moore in it. It amazes me that someone would make a Carl Hiaasen novel into a movie without including any of the characters' incomparable, hilarious dialogues, but so they did.

 

[MathGirl]

Phillip K's Dick

Striptease was a Hiaasen novel. They made it into a sucky movie with Demi Moore in it. It amazes me that someone would make a Carl Hiaasen novel into a movie without including any of the characters' incomparable, hilarious dialogues, but so they did.

I have been disappointed so many times by movies made from novels that I usually avoid them. The movies, I mean.

Nice to hear from other Elmore Leonard fans. I'm reading Maskerade" by Terry Pratchett now. It's a great parody of "Phantom of the Opera," operas, and show business in general. Highly recommended. I'd give it four nipples up.

Diane the Critic

 

[Svenskaflicka]

While we're on the subject of great novels that stink as movies... "How Stella got her groove back", by Terry McMillan.

I fell in love with the book, I felt my skin tingle as I read the love scenes, and then I saw the film - and nearly puked.

Taye Diggs was OK, but just because he's pretty doesn't make him a good actor.
Angela what's-her-name as Stella? Puh-leeeeease??? If the book is about a 40 year old woman, could we please have someone actually LOOKING like a 40 year old playing her???
And what was up with that girlfriend Hollywood invented, and had Whopee Goldberg play? Now, if they had let Whopee play Stella, THEN it would have been interesting!

Damned Hollywood for always starring 60 year old men against 20 year old women, but never allowing any woman looking past 35 to play anything but "Driving Miss Daisy"!!!

More old women on screen!!!

 

[Sabledrake]

Svenskaflicka > I just finished listening to Shock Wave on audio tape. Pretty good; I liked it and Atlantis Found the best so far of Cussler's work. I thought there was maybe a little too much going on about what a wonder-stud Pitt is, but it's part of the genre. I was pleased that the ending wasn't the traditional villain-falls-from-a-high-place.

Sabledrake

 

[SlickTony]

More old women on screen!!!

Hear, hear!

 

[MathGirl]

Clive and Loren

Svenskaflicka > I just finished listening to Shock Wave on audio tape. Pretty good; I liked it and Atlantis Found the best so far of Cussler's work. I thought there was maybe a little too much going on about what a wonder-stud Pitt is, but it's part of the genre.Sabledrake

I like Clive C, but he tends to get a little too testosterone-driven at times. Good, unbelievable adventures. Clive C certainly likes himself, doesn't he? Dirk Pitt is WAY too studly to be true.

Any Loren D. Estleman fans? Okay, I'll admit it. I read westerns sometimes. Estleman is really very good. His private detectives are great.

Diane the Bibliophile

 

[SlickTony]

I don't read near as many books as I used to...what with writing, and hanging around in here.

 

[Sabledrake]

Yeah, ol' Dirk Pitt is a total Mary Sue ... and as if that wasn't enough, there's Cussler's little habit of making cameo appearances in each story. Somebody's very much in love with himself, methinks

Sabledrake

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Clive Cussler has writen lots of Dirk Pitt stories, and for a while he just had them running out of him without much effort, that's why some of them are really, REALLY bad. He writes his readers on the nose, so to speak. Shockwaves, on the other hand, took him many years to write, after a long pause, and it's obvious that he has actually put down some effort into that one. The only thing I didn't like was

• how come the woman didn't know that her sister was a shemale??? Is that really realistic?
• it's so typical to kill the hero's woman in the end. It's sort of a stereotype that the hero must always be getting a new woman in each book, he can't settle down with just one, or he won't be The Stud anymore.
  [/list=a]
  
  Only exception to the latter that I know is Tommy Lynley in the stories by Elizabeth George. He goes from getting dumped to coming home from his honeymoon and have his first fight with his wife. Is it a coincidence that this happens when it's a woman writer? I think not!

 

[MathGirl]

Clive loves Clive

Yeah, ol' Dirk Pitt is a total Mary Sue ... and as if that wasn't enough, there's Cussler's little habit of making cameo appearances in each story. Somebody's very much in love with himself, methinks

Okay, Clive. You have a very cool Pierce Arrow and a matching trailer. How nice for you. I don't know what a "Mary Sue" is, but if SD says he's one, that's good enough for me. Yes, Clive, we know that Dirk Pitt is extremely studly and collects airplanes and cars, just like you do. We down here on earth are all extremely impressed.

Diane the Worshipful

 

[SlickTony]

Mary Sue

You were asking about Mary Sue...http://www.merrycoz.org/papers/MARYSUE.HTM

 

[MathGirl]

Re: Mary Sue

You were asking about Mary Sue...http://www.merrycoz.org/papers/MARYSUE.HTM

Is Mary Sue's other name "This Page Cannot Be Displayed........?

 

[SlickTony]

Darn! No, it's not. I don't know what happened here. What the "Mary Sue" phenomenon is, is where an author creates characters who are projections of themselves as they would like to be. It's probably rampant in the milieu that we hang out in; I plead guilty to it myself; however, so-called mainstream authors are supposedly "above" that. Ha ha and ha.

 

[MathGirl]

Mary S.

Darn! No, it's not. I don't know what happened here. What the "Mary Sue" phenomenon is, is where an author creates characters who are projections of themselves as they would like to be. It's probably rampant in the milieu that we hang out in; I plead guilty to it myself; however, so-called mainstream authors are supposedly "above" that. Ha ha and ha.

I didn't understand the "Mary Sue" but I encounter the phenomenon in many books I read. Robert B. Parker comes to mind. Clive C is definitely the master of the genre.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

I picked up a novel by Ellis Peters yesterday afternoon, and I finished it about 5 in the morning. "The Leper of St Giles".

I'm going down to the library today to find more books by this author.

(Murder/detective stories in a medieval setting - realistic and well worked out!)

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

I'm a big fan of Peters and the good brother. To quote from "Strangers in a Strange Land" Brother Cadfael is a, "goodness."

There are a few related wedsites, check your search engine for "Ellis Peters" or "Brother Cadfael" and there have been a couple of made-for-TV type movies. In the "for what it's worth column, Ellis Peters was the pen name of, Edith Pargeter.

Rumple Foreskin

 

[SlickTony]

In the "for what it's worth column, Ellis Peters was the pen name of, Edith Pargeter.

Thanks for that bit of info; as I've said before, a day where you don't learn something new is a day wasted.

 

[MathGirl]

Brother Cadfael

I picked up a novel by Ellis Peters yesterday afternoon, and I finished it about 5 in the morning. "The Leper of St Giles".

I'm going down to the library today to find more books by this author.

(Murder/detective stories in a medieval setting - realistic and well worked out!)

Dear Svenska,
You've stumbled onto the "Brother Cadfael" series by Ellis Peters. I haven't read any of the books, but the BBC had a wonderful series of one hour dramas based on the books. "Leper of St Giles" is one of the best. They star a really fine actor named Derek Jacoby as Brother C. I've been able to get about ten of the videos from the library. I'd recommend them to anyone who likes a really good murder mystery. They're all set in about 1000AD in England. You can almost smell the horse manure and unwashed bodies. Excellent acting, stories, historical stuff, etc. Brother C is very cool.

Diane the Videophile

 

[MathGirl]

Ferrin tongues

Dear Svenska,

You know 4 or 5 languages. Do you read in Swedish, or can you read equally well in your other languages? Being linguistically challenged, I wonder about this.

Once I found an Elmore Leonard novel in Spanish. I got the English version and tried to improve my Spanish by reading them both, sentence by sentence. It helped my Spanish, but it sure was a slow way to read a book.

Diane the Sesquilingual

ps.. Why do they call it "Mary Sue?"

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Re: Ferrin tongues

Dear Svenska,

You know 4 or 5 languages. Do you read in Swedish, or can you read equally well in your other languages? Being linguistically challenged, I wonder about this.

Since Swedish is my mother tongue, this is beyond comparison the easiest language for me to read in. Though I can read ALMOST as good in English. I started learning that when I was 5. I had a very clever mother, who knew to encourage a little girl with a thirst for knowledge.
French and Spanish, well, I CAN read in these languages too, but it takes more time. I don't know all the words there is to know in those languages, so sometimes I need to check a dictionary, if I can't understand the meaning of the word from the context it's in. I didn't learn those languages until I was 13 and 16 respectively. I'm so jealous at kids today, who can start learning Spanish at 11!