Chris

The Idle Book Club 1: The Sense of an Ending

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I think they mentioned that the Sense of an Ending episode is actually going to be the first friday in September.

Yes they said that somewhere along the line - episode 1 should be this coming Friday September 7th.

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I think they mentioned that the Sense of an Ending episode is actually going to be the first friday in September.

YESSS Thanks to you and radaxian for digging that up! On the downside, looks like I'll have to re-read more quickly than planned.

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Wow this is pretty over my head as someone who came here for the Video games. I have basically zero knowledge about the world of books, and writing, people who write books and books with things written IN them.

I listened to this episode relating everything to an equivalent that I do know about; "Oh that's how I feel about Breaking Bad" and "That's what I thought about podcasts."

But maybe that's all the more reason I should listen to this cast, cos maybe I'm totally missing out. So I'll throw myself into it for episode 1 and see if I can follow along with what everyone's talking about.

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This! Tony had a really well fleshed-out voice and I never felt like I was reading the memoirs of a fictional character, it always felt very real to me. I thought the ending was very satisfying in that Barnes' tasks you with going back and re-evaluate a lot of what you'd read instead of spelling it out entirely.

I still am confused what Veronica meant when she replied

blood money. Is the implication that she blames her mother for Adrian's suicide?

To tie this to the "show don't tell" conversation, I think he does "show" you. Tony is unreliable. He's fuzzed out, and re-written parts of his past to paint himself as a victim, rather than an antagonist. There is no reason to believe that even his revelations are complete.

I think it's a fair assumption that Tony

is actually the father of Adrian jr. It was the thing Veronic wanted him to see, but he wouldn't, not necessarily that his letter made Adrian do it.

The "blood money" was money Tony gave the mother for an abortion she chose not to get. He then fled to the US where he had a jolly romp with some young lady, something light and fun, compared to what must be happening back home. Also, the incident where Tony meets the mother is largely framed around a scene of "broken eggs" which might be crass of me to say, but I think there is some symbolism with the older woman, plus Adrian Jr's disabilities.

The page from the surviving journal also, talks about how addition isn't always cumulative, where Tony + Adrian + Mother, adds up to less than the sum. If Adrian slept with the mother as well, maybe there is some doubt who the father is, and he couldn't cope with that disaster reality.

Not to get too bogged down strictly in the narrative, since I don't think that is the most important thing to take away. In general, Sense hit me like a ton of bricks, though I'd like to think I'm already aware of the situations in which I was the villain.

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Lastly, perhaps in an attempt not to scare away newcomers, or because the subject is books instead of video games, it seems this podcast is a lot more serious than the other. I'm not complaining! But is there a truth to it that you feel that you need to tackle this subject with a bit more severity than video games?

It's basically deliberate, yes. We don't want it to be dry, obviously (and I'm sure it'll take us a couple episode to fine-tune that stuff) but I think we also don't want it to veer into Idle Thumbs bonkers-land. I love Idle Thumbs bonkers-land but I don't know if I would even be personally able to maintain doing two podcasts in that style. It feels like there are certain brain muscles I need to exert to keep up with someone like Jake in the Idle Thumbs format (which don't even think I'm usually able to do), because he just has such a strong facility for the goofy shit we do, but at the current Thumbs release schedule I can basically hold it together. Adding another podcast like that would be hard for me.

That's a very self-absorbed answer, though. We did obviously talk about this pretty concretely among the three of us, and I think the conclusion we came to is that the Idle Book Club has an actual Topic in the way that Idle Thumbs doesn't, and so it makes sense to try and keep it a bit more on the rails. Idle Thumbs only has a topic insofar as it encompasses absolutely anything related to video games we'd ever want to talk about, including games themselves, the industry that surrounds them, the figures who populate that industry, and entirely made-up shit connected to games by only the thinnest thread. The Book Club I think really is more about what we love specifically about individual books or the experience of reading, and for the most part that experience is a somewhat more subdued one than playing a video game where you jump around like an insane person hitting everyone in sight with a massive hammer, or whatever. I think to some degree it's a matter of being true to that experience, rather than saying "We're Idle Thumbs and we're crazy!!!" regardless of whether the subject matter demands it.

Of course, we obviously have already demonstrated that we're willing to branch out into discussions of other media (which I'm sure will occasionally include games) in this episode, and I think that's because the actual experience of enjoying literature (or any kind of art or entertainment) involves flexing critical muscles that have been exercised by reflection on all the other stuff you've read, watched, listened to, or played.

And, ultimately, I think the most overriding and important explanation of the episode's tone is this: When we, as friends, talk about what we've been reading, this is basically what it sounds like, just as when we, as friends, talk about what we've been playing, it sounds like Idle Thumbs. SO THERE.

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Luckily, I think we can fill that hole with this YouTube clip I'm calling "The Sense of a Vending":

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I think it's a fair assumption that Tony

is actually the father of Adrian jr.

remember though that he only figures it out because he recognises adrian's posture and features.

i've been considering that central phrase about tony not 'getting it', and what 'it' might be. the first answer is the twist, and that he eventually does get it, and end of story.

but veronica also says 'and you never will'. tony from that point reflects and reconstructs and decides that he has got 'it' but considering the tone and theme of the book i think 'it' is something else - something that we as the reader will never get either because we only have tony's side of the story - we can't decode veronica's (or adrian's) reasoning or history because we don't have that information. veronica has her own internal version of truth that we are not privy to - something that makes her character so much more real.

the point for me is that tony thinks he has figured 'it' out by the end - and in a practical way he has - but it is only his version he understands.

i don't know if that makes any sense, and i feel absurdly uncomfortable referring to him as tony given how much know he hates it...

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I thought it was pretty clear why the book cast wasn't as crazy as the video game cast, because books aren't a monstrous avalanche of mind-boggling nonsense.

Nobody's developing a giant sensory-override hamster ball that you roll around in, and use bleeding edge rocket-guiding gyroscopics to simulate that you exist in a post-apocalyptic wasteland for books.

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And, ultimately, I think the most overriding and important explanation of the episode's tone is this: When we, as friends, talk about what we've been reading, this is basically what it sounds like, just as when we, as friends, talk about what we've been playing, it sounds like Idle Thumbs. SO THERE.

Yes, that's basically what I thought and it's super. The whole reason I'm interested in the book cast is that I do in fact expect some level of serious discussion, particularly since there's audience participation and we're all invested in, you know, (fuck this sound so horrible), elevating the thing.

I finished Thousand Autumns, by the way, and I have some stuff to say about it. But now I'm thinking I should keep it to myself in case there's ever a podcast about it. Thanks, Idle Thumbs.

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I should read Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.

The Spy Who Came in from the Cold is truly great (and has a terrific film adaptation starring Richard Burton). It's an antidote to Bond-style spy fiction in the same sense that a sharp kick to the groin is an antidote to one's sense of general well-being.

I didn't realize that George Smiley was a recurring hero character, which does undermine things a bit (he's a minor dude in this case). It's cool that le Carré realized this and moved away from it.

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I am intrigued by The Sense of an Ending and Cloud Atlas after listening to the first cast, but I am now desperate to read and watch Tinker, Tailor. I really wanted to see it in theaters when it came out and just didn't (I rarely watch movies anymore and even ones I want to see a ton are casualties), and the first thing I did when I got home after listening was look it up on Amazon and see if the film was available on instant play. I'm checking out the free book preview now to make sure I can get into it. I have read The Count of Monte Cristo, though. If you can get through that you can get through anything.

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Oh forgot to ask in the previous post and it's different enough I'll split it out.

It sounds like you're all reading physical copies of books, with specific discussions on colors and typography? I believe I've read Chris's opinion on physical vs digital in other places on the forums, but I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts.

I'm completely in favor of ebooks, and even being an avid reader I kind of lost the drive to read constantly within the last two years or so, but have read much more now that I have a kindle. The opportunity to have thousands of critical works forever for free on demand is an amazing resource, besides the convenience of the form factor itself. One big factor for me is that I have overwhelmingly been a paperback reader all my life, so the switch from cheap printed pages to cheap digital text is almost transparent to me.

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Oh forgot to ask in the previous post and it's different enough I'll split it out.

It sounds like you're all reading physical copies of books, with specific discussions on colors and typography? I believe I've read Chris's opinion on physical vs digital in other places on the forums, but I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts.

I'm completely in favor of ebooks, and even being an avid reader I kind of lost the drive to read constantly within the last two years or so, but have read much more now that I have a kindle. The opportunity to have thousands of critical works forever for free on demand is an amazing resource, besides the convenience of the form factor itself. One big factor for me is that I have overwhelmingly been a paperback reader all my life, so the switch from cheap printed pages to cheap digital text is almost transparent to me.

I'm totally in favor of ebooks existing and of people buying and reading them; I'm just in favor of hardcover books for myself. It's totally a preference thing, not a fundamental philosophy thing. I love physical typeset books with gorgeous covers that I can hold and look at up close and put on a bookshelf and notice while I walk by. But ultimately the physical object isn't what makes the book. Whatever way people want to read is great as far as I'm concerned.

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I realized I phrased it like a bad investigative journalist, so thanks for answering my actual question which is your personal preference on acquiring and reading books.

It would be a strange day to hear an avid reader decrying that there are too many ways to read books, or that someone is reading "wrong".

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I actually have all three books they discussed on my backlog shelf - so, should I wait until after reading them before I listen or should I listen first?

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I actually have all three books they discussed on my backlog shelf - so, should I wait until after reading them before I listen or should I listen first?

I don't think there were any huge spoilers really. It's probably not a big deal either way.

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I just bought a kindle yesterday. It's a cost issue for me. To buy a random paperback (eg The Sense of an Ending) from a retailer here in Australia is US$20-25. I can get them online cheaply from bookdepository but the month-ish delay isn't well suited to a monthly book club. I've also used an Amazon US account to get the normal US range/prices on eBooks rather than relying on the International AU Kindle store. I was already using this second account to access game download sales where they provide steam codes (otherwise you need to mess around with a VPN).

Another nice thing about the Kindle for me is that I now have a nice way of reading a bunch of long form articles/essays I've saved from the web over the years. They're in various formats (.txt .pdf .epub .doc .html etc) but have all been converted/formatted nicely for the Kindle using calibre - great open source software for managing your reading library for those with eBook readers.

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I loved The Sense of an Ending. What I found fascinating what Tony's description of his thought process that subtly changed over the years (or more accurately how he perceived it's changing). Having a philosophy minor I remember having the same inclinations to have the "right authors" on my bookshelf and pontificating with my friends about the most basic of philosophies like we were hot shit. Also trying to monopolize the time of the "smart kid" as if simple association added value to your own self-esteem high score.

In regards to the "Show don't tell" argument earlier in the thread I feel that this book succeeds. Barnes is showing a thought process rather than the action in and of themselves. The story is about the reminiscing itself. It would be very hard to explore that theme without presenting a character who explores his memories in a colloquial, conversational way rather than a literary flashback. You wouldn't see the holes in his memory with the latter and the novel would be weaker for it.

The twist at the end was secondary, but helped give the author an ending point that tied up the story in a neat little bow. I can understand if some of the readers thought it was a little too precious but it didn't bother me.

Looking forward to the discussion. Don't be intimidated by the posts in the thread as ultimately a book club is about how each book speaks to you personally. You can go into as deep or shallow of an analysis as you want. Just have fun.

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I'm completely in favor of ebooks, and even being an avid reader I kind of lost the drive to read constantly within the last two years or so, but have read much more now that I have a kindle. The opportunity to have thousands of critical works forever for free on demand is an amazing resource, besides the convenience of the form factor itself. One big factor for me is that I have overwhelmingly been a paperback reader all my life, so the switch from cheap printed pages to cheap digital text is almost transparent to me.

I got a kindle almost two years ago, and have also tried using a retina iPad for reading. That said, I've switched back to exclusively buying (trade) paperbacks. They're just easier to share between me and my wife, and I enjoy the reading experience more.

That said, I read The Sense of an Ending the first time on Kindle, and picking up a paperback for the second read, I was immediately envious of how the Kindle just drops you on the first page. The paperback has a few pages of blurbs to dig through, which seems absurdly excessive. I can understand that stuff to gird you for a lengthy book, but for such a pittance of pages it seems silly.

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I got a kindle almost two years ago, and have also tried using a retina iPad for reading. That said, I've switched back to exclusively buying (trade) paperbacks. They're just easier to share between me and my wife, and I enjoy the reading experience more.

That said, I read The Sense of an Ending the first time on Kindle, and picking up a paperback for the second read, I was immediately envious of how the Kindle just drops you on the first page. The paperback has a few pages of blurbs to dig through, which seems absurdly excessive. I can understand that stuff to gird you for a lengthy book, but for such a pittance of pages it seems silly.

Oh man, I love stuff like that. Or maybe I'm thinking of a different thing. If you mean stuff like laudatory blurbs, that's not so much what I like. I buy mainly hardbound books, which less commonly have that sort of thing. I love flipping through the initial buffer of copyright/colophon/title pages.

(Also I bought an iPad a few months ago and I think it's a pretty nice piece of technology but at this point 90% of its use for me is the New York Times Crosswords app. Hmm.)

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I finally finished this book! Only 108 pages on my Nook (at smallest font settings, which aren't really all that small to me, but that's neither here NOR there) and it took me several months. This hour long commute is the greatest thing. I finally have time to read without being distracted by computers.

Anyway, I have nothing to really say about the book. I'm always envious of people who can actually get something from reading a book or watching a movie or whatever. I generally... don't. It was a fun read, but maybe I'm just too young to appreciate a lot of what the book has to say? (I'm 25.) I don't really know. I think I just suck at reading books in this way.

But that's also part of why I'm excited about the bookcast. I'm hoping that reading books along with people who clearly do have these kinds of reactions, and listening to these reactions, and identifying with or disagreeing with them will better put me in that mindset over time. I have already purchased Cloud Atlas, but haven't started reading it, yet.

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Oh man, I love stuff like that. Or maybe I'm thinking of a different thing. If you mean stuff like laudatory blurbs, that's not so much what I like. I buy mainly hardbound books, which less commonly have that sort of thing. I love flipping through the initial buffer of copyright/colophon/title pages.

I enjoy that initial buffer—like, SHITTY METAPHOR ALERT, an orchestra warming up—but the laudatory blurbs can sometimes sort of pre-contextualize my read in a way that sort of flattens the work down into one interpretation. I'm much more OK with non-fiction works sporting that stuff, especially when it's needed to give you the initial push to get through a 600+ page monster, but for such a short fiction work it's like these quotes aren't really going to convince anyone. I can't remember the last time I picked up a book because of the jacket/inside blurbs, though. (I also despise certain serial blurbers, but that's another subject.)

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I've got so many not very rational reason to love physical books:

  • In public places, it's fascinating to be able to tell whether people are reading new or second hand books, hardback or paperback, how far or early they are into them, how fast they read, if they are very absorbed or not, what's the title or at least the general look of the cover... it's like having a peek into their personality. You definitely loose that with Kindle.
  • just like Chris, I like to have books around where I live or work, for the awesome moment when my gaze randomly drop on one and suddenly, memories and 'challenging' thoughts that were linked to that book spring back.
  • With posters and cultural event tickets, books are the only 'decoration' items I can really relate to and understand (not games, not figurines, photos...). I'd probably buy a paperback simply because I think it'd look nice in my room.
  • I love having "currently being read", "just finished' or "on-hold" books lying around so I can pick them up when I'm idling: right now, Could Atlas is on my sofa for a second attempt at finishing it, Balzac's Le Père Goriot is next to the kitchen oven and Penguin's The Wind in the Willows is next to my PC.
  • I don't know why, but I love turning pages and the sensory experience of real paper.

Those are very personal reasons, but - and that's gong to sound sappy - it's why encountering physical books usually makes any day a better one.

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Anyway, I have nothing to really say about the book. I'm always envious of people who can actually get something from reading a book or watching a movie or whatever. I generally... don't. It was a fun read, but maybe I'm just too young to appreciate a lot of what the book has to say? (I'm 25.) I don't really know. I think I just suck at reading books in this way.

I always detested reading with a goal of specifically thinking critically about it. High school English class is the worst place to learn about loving books. In my high school, Catch 22 was always on the curriculum for your senior year. I was so interested and excited about it that I read it during the summer before the school year. I love it, it's one of my favorite books. I even read Heller's sequel. When it rolled around to spring and it came time to read the book in class, it was horrible. The discussions were trite, the messages were forced, I couldn't just READ. I didn't even finish the book.

I think reading something and knowing you'll have someone to talk about it with is fun and exciting. Reading with an eye on specifically dissecting a book, taking notes, crunching it up, studying certain passages, and sucking all the messaging marrow out of it sounds like one of the most joyless activities on earth.

Not thinking specifically about the inclusion of a character like Chief Halfoat or Lt. Scheisskopf doesn't mean I didn't get anything out of those characters.

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