Books

[Eoin McLove]

No, I don't think I've seen it. Must see if it's on Netflix over here. There's a mini series of The Slap knocking about and the sun of a friend of my in-laws is in it. I'm famous, is what I'm saying.

[Thorn]

....a son of a friend of my inlaws eh  , man you're on easy street now 😆

[Carnage]

He must be a right star!

No, nothing?

Fuck.

OK - give me an Ian McEwan recommendation, I've seen the name being bandied about for decades, I've never known where to start.

[Eoin McLove]

He must be a right star!

No, nothing?

Fuck.

OK - give me an Ian McEwan recommendation, I've seen the name being bandied about for decades, I've never known where to start.

Two of his more recent masterpieces (in my opinion) are Nutshell and Machines Like Me. If either of those grab you, just dive right in. He had his own style and is pretty dam consistent in quality.

[Carnage]

Sold. I'll grab one or both of those. Thanks lad.

[Eoin McLove]

Sold. I'll grab one or both of those. Thanks lad.

No stress. I can't get enough of his stuff so I'll be interested in seeing what you make of them.

[Don Gately]

Atonement was great , Saturday wasnt.

[Pat Twisted Wrath]

Over the last couple of days I read a short work by Breandan Mac Suibhne on the Famine and the breakdown of morals in the face or starvation and deprivation. As you'd imagine its pretty harrowing stuff.

[Eoin McLove]

I'm now ploughing through Said The Dead by Doireann Ní Ghríofa at the minute, and quite enjoying it. It's strange- the perspectives of the protagonists is ambiguous. Or maybe I'm stupid. But it's oddball and eerie.

I finished this today. It caught my imagination at the start but lost me along the way. It felt aimless in a way. It was a pleasure to fucking close it by the end, to be brutally honest.

I've started into a short play by Martin McDonagh called A Skull In Connemara, which seems fun. It's short enough that he'll really have to make a mighty bollix of it to lose me before the end 

[Don Gately]

Madhouse at thr end of the world , by Julian Sancton, story of the Belgia expedition to the antartic

[Carnage]

Fantastic book, I read it a few years ago (from a recommendation here, I think). As gripping as any novel in places.

[Maggot Colony]

I recently finished The Dead Zone by Stephen King and moved on to Cujo over the weekend.

I was obsessed with King in my teens and flew through doorstoppers like It and The Stand, but I kind of dismissed him as I got older. Reading him again, I'm reminded what a great storyteller he is, and how fucking nasty some of his books can be.

[Carnage]

I read Cujo while I was an attendant for the Leaving Cert. at the end of fith year. A strange thing to remember, it was 33 years ago now. I enjoyed it, his early stuff was very consistently good but once the late '80s / early '90s arrived it became more variable.

[Born of Fire]

Madhouse at thr end of the world , by Julian Sancton, story of the Belgia expedition to the antartic

Loved that book. If you haven't already then read Endurance by Alfred Lansing. The story of Shackletons doomed Antarctic expedition. I'm amazed it hasn't been made into a blockbuster yet. Those early Antarctic explorers were hard as nails cunts.

[Eoin McLove]

They were mad men, and made of stuff we can't even imagine. A level of toughness, both physical and mental, that seems like it's from another species. I remember reading one of them a few years ago, can't remeber which one, but one particular image of them rowing in wet clothes that were covered in a thin layer of ice has stayed with me. The punishment of it.