Our booking thru Thursday question....
What was the most unusual (for you) book you ever read? Either because the book itself was completely from out in left field somewhere, or was a genre you never read, or was the only book available on a long flight. whatever? What (not counting school textbooks, though literature read for classes counts) was furthest outside your usual comfort zone/familiar territory? And, did you like it? Did it stretch your boundaries? Did you shut it with a shudder the instant you were done? Did it make you think? Have nightmares? Kick off a new obsession?
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When we first moved back to Winnemucca, eleven years ago, I didn't have a job right away, so I decided to take some classes, for fun, at our local community college. One was a Science Fiction class....Sci-Fi literary themes or something like that.
As an adult, I had never cared for Science Fiction, but I thought I'd get out of my box and see what it was all about. One of the first books we had to read was H.G. Wells, "The Time Machine". When the class discussion began, I was all ready to say that was the strangest book I had ever read....but then people started talking about politics and society and human rights and it just started going in a whole different direction than I had "seen" when I read the book.
That night and throughout the rest of the semester, I began to gain a new respect for Science Fiction books. Most of them, are very sophisticated and address social and political issues in a non-threatening way, but they make you THINK about things.
The Science-Fiction genre is still not my favorite, but I do have an appreciation for it now. Once in a great-great while I will pick up a sci-fi book.....which is completely different from a fantasy(I think).....and read it, but I haven't become obsessed with Sci-fi books.
By the way, did anyone see or read (I did both) "The Jane Austen Bookclub"? the character Grigg, kept wanting one of the female characters to read some Ursula Le Guin, who is notable for her Science Fiction. The female character resisted, because she LOVED AUSTEN, but at the end, of course, she did and really loved the new genre.
I've never read any of Le Guin's novels (short stories, yes in an anthology from the class), but I buy them once in awhile.
They sit in my "to be read" pile.
What was the most unusual (for you) book you ever read? Either because the book itself was completely from out in left field somewhere, or was a genre you never read, or was the only book available on a long flight. whatever? What (not counting school textbooks, though literature read for classes counts) was furthest outside your usual comfort zone/familiar territory? And, did you like it? Did it stretch your boundaries? Did you shut it with a shudder the instant you were done? Did it make you think? Have nightmares? Kick off a new obsession?
*************
When we first moved back to Winnemucca, eleven years ago, I didn't have a job right away, so I decided to take some classes, for fun, at our local community college. One was a Science Fiction class....Sci-Fi literary themes or something like that.
As an adult, I had never cared for Science Fiction, but I thought I'd get out of my box and see what it was all about. One of the first books we had to read was H.G. Wells, "The Time Machine". When the class discussion began, I was all ready to say that was the strangest book I had ever read....but then people started talking about politics and society and human rights and it just started going in a whole different direction than I had "seen" when I read the book.
That night and throughout the rest of the semester, I began to gain a new respect for Science Fiction books. Most of them, are very sophisticated and address social and political issues in a non-threatening way, but they make you THINK about things.
The Science-Fiction genre is still not my favorite, but I do have an appreciation for it now. Once in a great-great while I will pick up a sci-fi book.....which is completely different from a fantasy(I think).....and read it, but I haven't become obsessed with Sci-fi books.
By the way, did anyone see or read (I did both) "The Jane Austen Bookclub"? the character Grigg, kept wanting one of the female characters to read some Ursula Le Guin, who is notable for her Science Fiction. The female character resisted, because she LOVED AUSTEN, but at the end, of course, she did and really loved the new genre.
I've never read any of Le Guin's novels (short stories, yes in an anthology from the class), but I buy them once in awhile.
They sit in my "to be read" pile.
3 comments:
I loved Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. Have you read it? It's a classic sci-fi. I do not usually read sci-fi though. Come visit to see my answer. Happy BTT!
I have to say the strangest I ever read was Slaughterhouse 5 by Kurt Vonnegut.
Sometimes I like science fiction. Some of them can be really good. I want to see the Jane Austen movie and read the book, but haven't yet.
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