Old Paparbacks of Speculative Fiction

[malcore]

I've recently started to dig out a mountain of old sci-fi and fantasy paperbacks and magazines. I used to trawl every used bookstore in every city I went to collecting these books for next to nothing. Now a lot of them are actually quite valuable, which is why I'm having a look at this point.

Anyway, anyone else a fan? PK Dick, PJ Farmer, RA Lafferty, Heinlein, Lem, Brunner?

I started to read R.A. Lafferty's short story collection "Nine Hundred Grandmothers". He was quite a different writer than his contemporaries. Somewhat of a modern day Voltaire. The link below is to a story of his called "Hog-Belly Honey." A Russian site I believe, but the story is in English and only 3 pages, click the Следующая страница link to turn them.

If you want a good 10 min read, have a go.

http://www.rulit.net/books/hog-belly-honey-read-235209-1.html

 

[Crystallas]

You know this guy is a fan.

 

[malcore]

Any fan of Philip K. Dick is alright in my book.

 

[Crystallas]

I like all of the writers you mentioned. I actually LOVE PKD, and Robert Heinlein among my all-time favorites.
Do you like Orson Scott Card? Have you read the Unheavenly City by Banfield? Great stuff.

 

[malcore]

Dick is my all time favourite SF writer. I have everything of his, some in multiple languages. Even his mainstream stuff like Confessions of a Crap Artist.

I haven't read any Orson Scott Card, but you can be sure I soon will. Thanks for the suggestion.

 

[Crystallas]

Hey, I didn't read Ubik yet. I don't have it either. Was wondering if you think it's worthwhile hunting down?

 

[malcore]

Yeah, I would say it's worth it. Like any book by Dick, even the majority of pot-boilers, there is always something worthwhile in them.

I think Ubik is being adapted into movie form in the near future also.

 

[Crystallas]

Yeah, I would say it's worth it. Like any book by Dick, even the majority of pot-boilers, there is always something worthwhile in them.

I think Ubik is being adapted into movie form in the near future also.

No kidding. I have it in some ebook format, but not in print. I guess I should try and find a worthwhile copy on my bookstore/thrift shop rounds.

 

[nvanprooyen]

I like all of the writers you mentioned. I actually LOVE PKD, and Robert Heinlein among my all-time favorites.
Do you like Orson Scott Card? Have you read the Unheavenly City by Banfield? Great stuff.

Ender's Game FTW.

 

[ShiftyDevil]

PKD and Heinlein are amazing.

I actually really like Dick's shorter stories better than his longer stuff for the most part.

Ender's Game was good, but I hated pretty much everything else Card wrote, at least what I read of it.

 

[nvanprooyen]

Only thing I ever read from Card was that...so my frame of reference is pretty small.

 

[Crystallas]

I only like early Card. So that's fine LOL.

 

[Happy Human 1001]

I tried to read 'Stranger in a Strange Land', and it bored me silly. I've tried a few other times to read and enjoy stuff by Heinlein, and I always give it up quickly. I've never read anything by PKD, but I know what a few movies have been based off of his stories. Card is pretty good, I've read several novels by him that I liked- the Ender books and a few others. I'm a bigger fan of horror (Stephen King, Clive Barker, Lovecraft, etc.) than sci-fi.

There's a (now deceased) fantasy/sci-fi author named Roger Zelazney that I liked a lot, especially his short stories, although some of his novels (also pretty short) were good.

 

[malcore]

Zelazny was a decent writer. Larry Niven also.

I actually hadn't read a speculative fiction book in probably 15 years or more. I think the last one was Iain M.Banks' Feersum Endjinn.

This "undusting" of old paperbacks has brought back some memories. Some can be reread and others, well, their time has passed. R.A. Lafferty is still readable to me.

I just dug out a first edition paperback of Deus Irae, co-written by Zelazny and PK Dick.

 

[JosMin]

I really enjoy Thomas Pynchon. Although some people don't necessarily look at his entire collection of works as 'sci-fi', but I love how he incorporates elements of sci-fi with Menippean satire, historical fiction and other cool stuff. His perspectives are always really interesting. Also -- love Philip K. Dick, as well.

 

[malcore]

Pynchon and PKD go hand in hand. The existential angst of practitioners of low culture, lol.

The last book of Pynchon's I read was Vineland and I loved it. That leads us to authors like Borges, Eco and even Vonnegut.

How long have you spent with Gravity's Rainbow?

 

[JosMin]

Pynchon and PKD go hand in hand. The existential angst of practitioners of low culture, lol.

The last book of Pynchon's I read was Vineland and I loved it. That leads us to authors like Borges, Eco and even Vonnegut.

How long have you spent with Gravity's Rainbow?

I read it a twice in college -- I did a fairly lengthy comparison to Gravity's Rainbow and the book he wrote in 2006, Against the Day. I honestly like to crack it open every once in a while and just read little blurbs.

 

[malcore]

I read it a twice in college -- I did a fairly lengthy comparison to Gravity's Rainbow and the book he wrote in 2006, Against the Day. I honestly like to crack it open every once in a while and just read little blurbs.

I've given it two solid readings as well and I also go back to it from time to time, as I do with some of Dick's books, like a Scanner Darkly in particular. I howl with laughter every time I read the sections on bicycle gears, the black hash abominable snowman or the failed suicide attempt. Hilarious stuff.

 

[Crystallas]

I tried to read 'Stranger in a Strange Land', and it bored me silly. I've tried a few other times to read and enjoy stuff by Heinlein, and I always give it up quickly.

Stranger in a Strange Land is okay, but it's over-rated for his books. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress is also going to start off slow, but once he establishes the realm, the characters take off. The concepts that are strange to the characters, but concepts we take for granted, seem strange to the reader after his literary demonstrations. I don't want to spoil the book, but this is why the book is cited often, because Heinlein does one of the best jobs of pointing out certain paradoxes in real life, by using a fictional approach.

Also, I love King too, and he does write some Sci-Fi Usually under his alias, Richard Bachman.

 

[Crystallas]

Oh, and speaking of Bachman/King.

Has anyone ever read "Desperation" AND "The Regulators" ? I have the matching hardcovers, but have yet to read the books.