Five books...

[lyorn]

flederkatz has to present a book to her intermediate level English class (don't ask why on earth she is taking that class). Wisely, she has chosen Neil Gaiman's Graveyard Book, which is as close to perfect as it comes for the occasion.

Then, she and I were considering books that would be the diametrical opposite of "perfect for the occasion".

1. C.J. Cherryh's "Foreigner". Great book, but not for that skill level. It took me two years of SCA (on top of nine years of English in school) before I could enjoy Cherryh.

2. Charles Stross' "Atrocity Archives". Having read a book about cultist Nazis using human sacrifices to summon Cthulhu would probably get you kicked out of the class (and out of any group not made up of fluently-English-reading geeks) for bad taste, impiety, and being an enemy of the state.

3. Whatever is the latest Battletech tie-in novel. Especially if you present it in a way that assumes everyone knows the universe, and make it sound like a soap opera. (I don't have Flederkatz' brilliant synopsis, maybe she'll post it in the comments.)

4. Jenna Black's "The Devil Inside". It is a not-too-bad paranormal romance with an interesting concept of demons, but has heaps of smut tacked onto it like a fanfic that needs to go into a kink archive.

5. Dirk Gently's Galactic Holistic Detective Agency, by Douglas Adams. Because it will take you ten minutes to explain the setup for the plot, and when you're done everyone will think that you are on drugs.

(We had more, but I don't remember, and five is such a nice number.)

***

Also, Some links

Neil Gaiman rules. Again. Scroll down to the final letter he answers (letters are in bold print).

stackcats has written a Torchwood/American Gods crossover.

helen_keeble notices some uncommon points about "Twilight" and teenaged girls' agency

tencrush rants about Gay kissing, Torchwood and Hollywood.

Didn't I link this before? Doesn't matter: The LOLCat bible. [9] Has happen? Gunna be agin. Nuthing new undur teh sunz. [10] Kitteh can not sez "OMFGZ sumthing new!" is jus REPOST!.

And while we're LOLing, celebrity LOLs. Especially this one. (HP. Twilight. Kind of.)

Comments

Leaving comment as ordered

[flederkatz.livejournal.com]

Let me sort through yesterdays e-mail ping-pong.

1. Illunimatus and Cryptonomicon: I would not even recommend to an advanced class. As far as I heard those are even hard for native speakers.

2. World War Z: I love that book, but most of the people in that course mightnot apreciate the sheer marvelous geekyness of Max Brooks masterpiece. The lyorn recomended to present it as the documnetary that never was. It might work...

3. Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrel: *I* Had a hard time reading *that* one! Not only you don't care about the Characters, but also because the language tries to sound 19 century-ish and fails. And it is too long, in a bad way.

4. The Reality Dysfunction: Too far out...

5.*** Some Battletech Tie-in?

Of course the speaker would have to assume everyone knows the universe and is talking about book x of... uuh... many.

"Hi i want to present this book by Michael Stagpole. I'll give you a short synopsis of the story: Victor is facing a though decision - what do do about Katherina. Finally we will discover if Marik is really a clone. A assassin, yes the same that killed Freddy Steiner, is getting closer to Omi Kurita. And Kai Allard-Liao flees the political jungle of the Ligas court to participate in the Solaris VII games. Any questions?"