2012 what are you reading thread

kevin h is unstoppable, best of his generation IMO

his stream of consciousness stuff is so ballsy and clever

What the hell is Dungeon Quest *googles furiously*

it's so good! get it asap. fantographics publishes it

I can't I'm reading "everything Bolano ever wrote" right now

2666 is pretty sweet too, i must admit

new huizenga is unsurprisingly brilliant.

wait what's the new huizenga?

gloriana

lol, that is 11 years old

(first time in hardcover tho)

yes.

ordered dungeon quest

"2666" is not pretty sweet. I was liking it until it got to the fourth part. I figured it'd go in this direction, with the "Bouvard et Pecuchet" references in the previous chapters, but this is some Bret Easton Ellis-level grinding and I feel like I'm wasting my time. Also I'm annoyed that everybody read it already four years ago. And b/c I loved "The Savage Detectives" and "Amulet".

So annoyed that I forgot why I came to this thread, which wasn't to bitch about 2666 but to talk about how happy I was to start reading 60s Incredible Hulk last night

First and last parts of 2666 were alright.

The part about the murders was all time tedium.

To tie it into comics, the only other time I felt so bogged down by a book was Reads.

Funny! I just finished "Women" a month ago and haven't gone any further

then you'll LOOOOOVE Are You My Mother?

xp

I've been reading King City but put it down for a bit. Probably picking it up this weekend.

http://www.comicsbeat.com/2012/05/07/preview-dungeon-quest-book-three-by-joe-daly/

xxxpost There's some good stuff here and there after Women but yeah it's pretty rough for the most part.

I avoided this problem entirely by just skipping Reads. at this point the only other volume I haven't read and am curious about is Minds.

In hindsight that is the way to go but at that point I had convinced myself I was going to read the whole thing (the actual breaking point was the first half of The Last Day, where the cumulative effect of Reads, Rick's Story, the goddamn Woody Allen character etc etc, caused me to say "fuck it" and skip to the end).

Minds was OK, though.

owenp, what 60s hulks? have always found the v early issues by lee and kirby p rough going (not helped by leaden dick ayers inking) but once the roy thomas/herb trimpe were established (i'm guessing late 60s) its a really consistent marvel comic bk w/ some near-classic issues ("Heaven is a Very Small Hulk"!) i esp like the way that thomas (and the ppl who followed him like steve englehart and len wein) couldn't just write 'The Hulk' in a caption - he always had to be 'the emerald man-beast' or 'the jade goliath' or whateves

or have i said too much abt dopey old marvel shit

No I am feeling yr prose on this, Ward. I need to get one of those Hulk Essentials one o' these days.

agree w Ward - Hulk doesn't get interesting til the late 60s/early 70s

I'd like to get another look at the issues John Severin inked.

i had a friend in high school who was a serious hulk nerd and he had (in reprint or original) basically every issue of the hulk and any appearance in marvel books. this was before there was a broader mass market audience for this stuff so as you might imagine he spent a lot of cash on it. i read most all of it and i found the hulk, more or less until peter david, to be kind of a not very good character

well, it is always difficult to write the adventures of an inarticulate monster-simpleton every month for years and years - didn't p david 'solve' that by turning hulk super-brainy? - but he can also function as the focal point around which an amusing supporting cast can orbit (a bit like tomb of dracula, maybe)? some writers solve it by being geniuses - eg steve gerber had v merry fun w/ the hulk in his defenders issues.

yeah WmC, trimpe/sev was well tasty - kirbyesque dynamism in the pencils, meticulous rendering in the inking. sev was also performing miracles over dick ayers on sgt fury round abt the same time.

think essential hulk #3 is the one to go for - hulk 118-142, and you even get captain marvel #20-21 - stunning gil kane/dan adkins artwork - and avengers #88 thrown in too. really gd clean repro on the black and white a/work (which i know is not to shakey's tastes, but sure suits severin's linework...)

yeah, i like the defenders run too

well, it is always difficult to write the adventures of an inarticulate monster-simpleton every month for years and years

convo reminds me of my wife's hatred of Man-Thing. Every time I get out the essential man thing phonebook she gets enraged.

"What's the deal with Man-Thing? Does he even have a mind?"

"No"

"That's fucking stupid!"

those with no mind BURN at your wife's touch

lol

I think the joy as a kid and even in hindsight on the old Hulk comics was really the solution to every problem was pretty much "HULK SMASH" and "LEAVE ME ALONE". And who in this world would not like to some points just do that. The setup of the Hulk series did lead it to get completely weird with his villans, as most of the time he would just wander into some alien invasion, circus, military test or criminal plot and just smash it up.

I always think one thing they screw up in the Hulk movies and TV is that he doesn't talk at all. I think that leaves out quite a bit of the fun you can do with the character.

Just finished Dan Epstein's Big Hair and Plastic Grass: A Funky Ride Through Baseball and America in the Swinging '70s. Still working on Rob Kirkpatrick's 1969: The Year Everything Changed and Ed Sanders' Fug You: An Informal History of the Peace Eye Bookstore, the Fuck You Press, the Fugs, and Counterculture in the Lower East Side. Just started David Browne's Fire and Rain: The Beatles, Simon and Garfunkel, James Taylor, CSNY, and the Lost Story of 1970.

I might need to expand my window on the world.

Sorry! 1) Read thread title--check. 2) Read board name--oops.

I have to buy a new printer tonight (power outage/surge fried my current one) and am going to toss the Margaret DVD/Blu and a couple of strip collections and/or graphic novels into my Amazon cart while I'm splashing money around. Quick! Give me recommendations. I'm thinking about a Roy Crane volume...what else?

What would be the first Lynda Barry book I should get?

did u get the dungeon quest books already?

No -- remind me what they are again?

OK, looked upthread. Looks interesting, but I may hold off until next order.

Did you get Pogo yet?

Don't have Pogo. This may make me an apostate among comics literati, but...I don't really like Pogo.

Oh. (Insert sad face)

o shit, krazy & ignatz

there you go!

I think I want to get those directly from Fantagraphics -- they have the 1st and 3rd of the enormous bricks (600 pp) of complete Sundays for $57 each.

No Lynda Barry recs?

Freddie Stories is my favorite Lynda.