Does everyone have these? For me it's travel literature: there's nothing wrong with it, but I'd rather read almost anything else. (There are exceptions, but they're very rare)I can't defend it, and I'm sure this blind spot makes other people as mad as people airily saying "Oh, I don't read sci-fi!" makes me.
― Mince Pramthwart (James Morrison), Tuesday, 6 March 2018 05:31 (six years ago) link
I'm with you on travel literature, although I enjoyed the Bruce Chatwin ones. For me it's the fantasy genre with whole created worlds. Nothing wrong with it but I just can't get into it.
― Zelda Zonk, Tuesday, 6 March 2018 05:41 (six years ago) link
And the Graham Greene Journey Without Maps was good too. Evelyn Waugh did a lot of it but I think he was less successful.
― Zelda Zonk, Tuesday, 6 March 2018 05:43 (six years ago) link
Biographies, by and large. The only unread one I know I own and intend to get to is Alan Turing: The Enigma, and it’s been waiting for me to get to it for a couple years now.
― valorous wokelord (silby), Tuesday, 6 March 2018 06:16 (six years ago) link
I'm generally indifferent to biographies, but most especially to biographies of literary figures.
I read books to know what authors thought worth writing about, not to know where they lived, who they hung out with, what personal travails they endured, spats they had with other writers, or awards they garnered. I know there must be fascinating biographies out there and even great literary bios. This knowledge fails to stir me.
As ILB already knows, I am notoriously uninspired by science fiction. I've read a few good sci-fi books now and again in my lifetime, but I seldom seek it out and do not feel deprived by its absence in my life. Popularized non-fic science books, otoh, I do seek out and read.
― A is for (Aimless), Tuesday, 6 March 2018 06:19 (six years ago) link
Foreign
― things you looked shockingly old when you wore (darraghmac), Tuesday, 6 March 2018 09:19 (six years ago) link
fiction
― bathed and ready for a snack (bizarro gazzara), Tuesday, 6 March 2018 09:53 (six years ago) link
Business, marketing, social science, pop-psych, self-improvement
― rb (soda), Tuesday, 6 March 2018 10:16 (six years ago) link
i'm not really a biographies person
― Under the influence of the Ranters (Noodle Vague), Tuesday, 6 March 2018 10:58 (six years ago) link
xxxp Aimless you might dig Crick's quizzical bio of Orwell, esp. re O. as maker-upper
― dow, Tuesday, 6 March 2018 20:00 (six years ago) link
It's not too reductive, but not Great Man either.
― dow, Tuesday, 6 March 2018 20:04 (six years ago) link
(he still comes off as pretty great I think)
― dow, Tuesday, 6 March 2018 20:05 (six years ago) link
mysteries/crime fiction
― sleeve, Tuesday, 6 March 2018 20:08 (six years ago) link
Definitely. I mean, I'm not a psychopath.
― Mince Pramthwart (James Morrison), Wednesday, 7 March 2018 01:08 (six years ago) link
I suppose I know that Gothic and even Horror are important, but I wouldn't read them, because they are too scary.
― the pinefox, Wednesday, 7 March 2018 13:03 (six years ago) link