I just started it this week too! I’m about 60 pgs in, I like it. It reads like a conversation which is pretty cool. I didn’t realize it was described as a self-help book for artists, but I suppose it fits!
What are you reading?
thebalvenie
#303
i have never liked his writing or subject matter. sorry 
not enough baby killing in it for me!!!
bakamomo
#305
What are your favorite baby killing books? The genre is new to me. At least I think so.
thebalvenie
#307
every single book by cormac mccarthy. it’s a not so inside joke w/ saf and the rest of us mccarthy fans
thebalvenie
#308
so many babies, so few recipes.
my fave bumper sticker:
ask me about microwaving babies for fun and profit! by cormac mccarthy
saf
#309
I think the real irony here is that Ellis DID kill a baby in American Psycho, he just doesn’t make it a secret spicy ingredient in every goddamn book he’s ever written.
As an aside though, I’m having fun reading his new book, it has a ton of references to music and restaurants and places in LA. He went a little heavy on all the foreshadowing, but it’s been fun now that we’re getting into things instead of just hinting at them.
bakamomo
#310
Blood Meridian was the first thing that came to mind. Other than that, I seem to have a hard time coming up with strong candidates. I am obviously a squeamish reader.
Regardless, Baby killing books is a very nice term. One of its (many) qualities is that when you say it, it rolls right off the lounge and does not sound like a bad thing at all. (“I like horsies, gardening, organic food and baby killing books. Yes, those are nice too”.)
A bit like the Proust competition in Monty Python where one of the contestants are asked about his hobbies and politely replies “strangling animals, golf and masturbation”.
bakamomo
#312
Btw, if I would try to contribute a term to our dictionary it would be M.O.P., the acronym for “military over-interested person”.
M.O.P. covers a broad spectrum of primarily men with unhealthy interests in everything from guns, uniforms and military paraphernalia to armed conflicts, World War II (Nazi Germany, in particular) and special forces.
EDIT: As in “he is a M.O.P.” or preferably “no M.O.P.s allowed”.
thebalvenie
#314
hmmm
i’m not into either of those things… i mean i think they’re great and splendid…i did almost buy a set of plans to build my own smokehouse…does that count? i think not.
bakamomo
#317
M.O.P.s are on another level. It is the kind of (male) person that quickly makes any conversation about war crimes uncomfortable, demonstrates a surprisingly high level of theoretical knowledge about torture as interrogation (and is more than willing to share) or vacations at abandoned military bases. They can often be recognized by debatable fashion statements, creative interior decorating, vehicular preferences, boxy hair cuts, staring eyes and catastrophic dating records.
saf
#319
Hmmm, well, I finished the Shards and I have to say it’s (of course) not very good. Obviously someone pushing 60 isn’t going to have much of a grasp on being 17, and I’d say that I could spot that at 35 is a testament to how far off the mark he was.
Editing is apparently a dead art since whoever let him get away with making this book nearly 800 pages and almost every chapter ended with foreshadowing that never bore out. There were also issues with the constant name dropping of movies and songs, with a lot of them being technical errors for the year it was set in.
Does anyone know what happens if you slice a (natural) boob open? Why the hell would it deflate? Paging r/morbidquestions I guess.
Edit: He also falls into the trap of being unbelievably elaborate in the violence perpetrated by his fake serial killers. This is something that takes me right out of a narrative. There is no one killing people like they do in the stupid NBC show Hannibal or in the Grocery Store Murder Novel ™ The Boneman’s Daughter. Serial Killers just don’t exist like this. With someone like Israel Keyes merely existing, I’m not sure why you would have to push things so unbelievably far…
saf
#320
I just have to reiterate that you’d be hard pressed to find a better use for $.99 on your Kindle than this complete collection of John Galsworthy’s Forsyte books. This is the exact copy I’m reading from, don’t let the paltry price scare you off, it’s a good edition.