KhaOS' Suggested
Reading List
- The Road To
Science Fiction Vol 3: From Heinlein To Here
- The Road To
Science Fiction Vol 4: From Here To Forever
- The Road To
Science Fiction Vol 5: The British Way
- The Road To
Science Fiction Vol 6: Around The World
edited by James
Gunn
Published by White
Wolf Publishing
If I ever got
around to teaching a class on Science Fiction, these books would be at the
core of the syllabus, along with Brian Aldiss' Trillion Year Spree.
James Gunn, more noted for his academic treatment of SF than what he's
actually written (of which "The Immortal", which was turned into
a TV series, is probably the most famous), puts together an incredible
collection of the best that SF has to offer. The first 2 volumes are out of
print, but White Wolf (bless 'em!) brought the 3rd back into print and
continued to publish Gunn's latest efforts into what started out as a
chronological exploration (the first two volumes covered Gilgamesh to Wells
to Heinlein) into a showcase of international takes on SF. He prefaces each
story with a short essay about its author, and the context which the
author's work appears in the framework he presents in each volume. If
you're a veteran SF reader you'll be delighted at getting some of the best
stories ever written under one cover. If you're new to SF, this is an
excellent introduction to the genre and the infinite possibilities of
it.
- Marvels
by Kurt Busiek and
Alex Ross
Published by Marvel
Comics
I gave up on
Marvel Comics in 1986, around the time of the infamous Mutant Massacre (in
my fantasies, I pray that everything that has happened in the X-Books since
then is a fever dream in Professor X's mind, but I digress). The writing
was horrible, the art grew more and more grotesque, and the stories just
weren't grabbing me anymore. In 1992, all that changed. I had never heard
of Alex Ross, the artist at that point, but a single look at his
photo-realistic painting and I knew the man was good. Kurt Busiek had been
a quiet, competent talent for years, but I had never really noticed him.
Marvels is, in a way, the history of the Marvel Universe, starting
in 1939 with the birth of the original Human Torch and the debut of the
Sub-Mariner, and ends with the traumatic death of Gwen Stacy, Spider-Man's
first true love, at the hands of the Green Goblin. These are events that
long-time readers know well, but Busiek gives us a perspective we've never
seen before - the man in the street.
Marvels
is also the story of Phil Sheldon, a photographer who witnesses these
cosmic events and relates to us what it's like to live in a world where
40-foot-tall men stride across skyscrapers, mutants and giant Sentinel
robots battle in the streets, and where super-heroes are like gods. By the
end of the series, I was feeling like a kid picking up my copies of the
Avengers and Spider-Man and Captain America for the first time, alternately
going 'Wow!' and 'Cool!'. The last few pages almost left me in tears as I
remembered what it had felt like to read Gwen's death for the first time.
It was then I really appreciated the adage that there were no bad
characters, just bad writing, and what a rich history the Marvel Universe
has. Since then, Marvel has been seeing a bit of a renaissance in its
story-telling, and is actually worth picking up again. Except for the
X-books, which still suck. Pfeh.
- Maus: A
Survivor's Tale Vol 1: My Father Bleeds History
- Maus: A
Survivor's Tale Vol 2: And Here My Troubles Began
by Art Spiegleman
Published by Pantheon Books
Art
Spiegleman was known for his highly expressionistic underground comics
work, particularly in the magazine RAW, which he produced with his wife,
Francoise Mouly. When he came up with Maus, the biographical tale of
his father's experiences during the Holocaust, it exploded upon the comic
world not because the art was complex, but because it was so simply, yet
lovingly rendered. Spiegleman tells the story straight, but portrays the
Jews as mice, the Germans as cats, Poles as pigs and Americans as dogs -
lending it a totaly separate layer of symbolism that resonates throughout
the entire piece. Maus is also the story of Art coming to terms with
the relationship with his father - and how he, too, survives him. A
resoundingly real story, moving, horrifying and touching at the same
time, that grabs you by the throat and doesn't let go, even after you've
put it down.
- The
Essential Ellison: A 35-Year Retrospective
by Harlan Ellison
Published by
Morpheus Books
No list of mine
would be complete without a mention of whom I consider one of the greatest
living writers today, and a literary role model of mine. Like or dislike
Harlan the man, you have to admit that his writing kicks some serious ass.
He's won more awards for his writing than anybody else I've heard of, and
still does. The Essential Ellison is a good place to start, from his first
stories, written when he was a teenager, which are almost embarassing, yet
you got to admire the man for the honesty to publish them, to classics like
'Repent Harlequin! Said The Ticktockman' and 'I Have No Mouth, And I Must
Scream', to stories from the early 80s. This collection doesn't have all my
favorite work, but it has most of them, abd everyone has his own idea of a
perfect Ellison collection anyway. My idea of one is to have 'em all (and
White Wolf, bless 'em again, is bringing his backlist back into print).
Ellison writes
of mortal dreads, unforgettable stuff, using words like a scapel cutting in
at the eye, writing of terrors that grip the human soul, of the horrible
ugliness of the human experience, and yet somehow, in them you manage to
sense that he still believes in the ultimate goodness of mankind, and the
ability of each and every one of us to find redemption, mired in the muck
as we are. His are cautionary tales, angry tales, stories that make you sit
up and go 'No!'. And just maybe, if you get angry enough, if you get as
angry as him, things can change.
- The 60
Greatest Conspiracies Of All Time
by Johnathan Vankin
and John Whalen
published by
Citadel Press
I love
conspiracy theories. I buy very little of them, ultimately, but I just love
seeing the way theorists piece together the most incredible of tapestries
from the smallest of threads. 60 Greatest Conspiracies is basically
the Idiot's Guide to Conspiracies, giving you a quick rundown on the best
stuff from the CIA mind control experiments and LSD to the faked Moon
landings, the Jonestown Massacre, and of course the classics like Jack the
Ripper, JFK, the King assassination, RFK, and Marilyn Monroe. This updated
edition includes more recent X-Files like the HAARP microwave project and
the Alien Autopsy footage by Ray Santelli. Great bathroom reader stuff. Get
through this and you'll finally begin to understand what the paranoid down
the block is mumbling about as he wraps aluminum foil around his head.
- From Hell:
being a melodrama in sixteen parts
By Alan Moore and
Eddie Campbell
published by
Kitchen Sink Press in ten volumes and one epilogue
These days,
people rave about Neil Gaiman, but not many remember that the person who
paved the way for stories like the Sandman, set in DC Comics' supernatural
realm, was the one, the only Alan Moore. Moore revitalized the horror comic
genre when he took over Swamp Thing in 1983, and was responsible for
drawing together the threads that made Cain and Abel inhabitants of the
Dreamlands, for fleshing out concepts of Heaven and Hell, for creating
characters like John Constantine and dragging tired old concepts out to the
light and breathing them new life. Gaiman, to me, will always be
deriviative, walking in the shadow of the true master.
Nowhere is Alan
Moore's mastery of the macabre and the almost insane attention to detail
his mind works in more apparent than in From Hell, his retelling of
the Jack the Ripper murders. Taking the Masonic Ripper conspiracy theories
of Stephen Knight as his starting point, Moore connects the serial killers
of today with the one that started it all, raising issues of synchronicity,
of the architecture of history, the secret occult patterns written in the
streets and places of London, and much more, ably assisted by the
atmospheric art of Mr. Eddie Campbell. Fully annotated with his research
notes, which are an education in itself (I've used them to retrace Moore's
own journeys in London's secret places), you come out from this not wholly
convinced that it is, after all, fiction. As one of the characters says in
the first chapter, and echoed by Moore himself in the epilogue, "I
made it all up, and it all came true anyway. That's the funny part."
Disturbing stuff of the best kind.
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