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Revisiting older novels


Ser Not Appearing
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I posted awhile ago about revisiting The Belgariad for a podcast with childhood friends (we did release that episode earlier this year). We mainly just podcast as an excuse to chat, considering we all live in different states now, and don't tend to promote the show much ... I'm not promoting it now, so much as sharing what we're gonna do in case anyone else is interested in reading along.

We've decided to do an ongoing set of episodes revisiting other fantasy series that we read during formative years.

We're reading Dragonlance Chronicles now for an episode in February and have a number of other things on the list, such as the Shannara series, the Dark Elf Trilogy, Dark Sun, some stuff by Lawrence Watt-Evans and Piers Anthony and maybe The Complete Book of Swords by Fred Saberhagen.

If I remember (far from a guarantee) I'll try and post here when we're looking at reading a new series. Dragonlance Chronicles for now.

(podcast is Don't Ruin This For Me if you really care)

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Yes, please give us a specific update when you do a podcast of these re-reads.  It is always nice to hear someone else re-visit a book they appreciated in childhood, and to hear their adult impressions.

Lawrence Watt-Evans is of particular interest to me - will you be doing The Lords of Dûs or something else?

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22 hours ago, Wilbur said:

Yes, please give us a specific update when you do a podcast of these re-reads.  It is always nice to hear someone else re-visit a book they appreciated in childhood, and to hear their adult impressions.

Lawrence Watt-Evans is of particular interest to me - will you be doing The Lords of Dûs or something else?

 

I've always been partial to With A Single Spell, The Unwilling Warlord and The Misenchanted Sword. But The Lord's of Dûs is an option. I definitely read and enjoyed that series.

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2 hours ago, Ser Not Appearing said:

 

I've always been partial to With A Single Spell, The Unwilling Warlord and The Misenchanted Sword. But The Lord's of Dûs is an option. I definitely read and enjoyed that series.

All of those are classic LWE.   I look forward to whatever you discuss.

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  • 1 month later...

More than basically anything else we've covered, this really did break the podcast name for me ... which is why the podcast took so long to come out. I had trouble reading these and had even more trouble organizing my thoughts on why and how, which may have detracted from the episode.

Anyway, that's what you get when it's just a couple jokers like us discussing things. No, that's not a good sell of the podcast but ... that's never been the point.

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33 minutes ago, Wilbur said:

Come on, now, you recently reviewed Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and didn't announce it here.  Looking forward to that one.  Steve Martin's greatest role!

 

Oh, interesting. Most people seem not to remember this movie (though I'm only 42 and maybe you're older). Something of a forgotten gem, imo.

I'm interested in your thoughts on the episode but especially interested on your own thoughts on the movie itself if you've rewatched it recently.

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6 hours ago, Ser Not Appearing said:

 

Oh, interesting. Most people seem not to remember this movie (though I'm only 42 and maybe you're older). Something of a forgotten gem, imo.

I'm interested in your thoughts on the episode but especially interested on your own thoughts on the movie itself if you've rewatched it recently.

Yes, I am a decade and more older, and I saw this film when I went to visit my folks on Christmas break at the end of 1988.  But completely I agreed with you and your crews' thoughts on Steve Martin.  He isn't an actor I like to watch in anything else, and in the rest of the movie he isn't great either, but in this Ruprecht the Monkey Boy role, he is fantastic.

And I love this role for Michael Caine as well.  So delicious, probably the role I like him best in all of his career next to Without a Clue.  "Now Diana, as you were saying, you don't think the poor should be allowed in museums..."  He rips off these lines and others like them that just get better as I understand them better.

Again, though, you are correct about the contrast between the characters of Martin and Caine.  The contrast and rivalry works well.  It would have been an interestingly different film had Martin's role been played by Rowan Atkinson, Richard Dreyfuss or Leslie Nielsen, for instance.  None of them are as coarse or unrefined as the performance from Martin.

The humor works for people of a certain age, but probably less so for younger people.  Young people today are both more sensitive to disabilities, so unlikely to laugh at Martin's characters, and also less amused by social comedy, which this plot depends upon to work.  My daughter's view of some of his scenes were, "that is just mean", whereas I found it funny.

The plot has one foot in the world of P.G. Wodehouse and the comedy of manners, but that is so far away from the world younger people know that it just no longer works for them.  I am familiar with the manners expected of the characters in the movie, so when they transgress those manners, it is humorous.  Those manners, however, are just historical footnotes today, so several of the "bits" don't work AT ALL for my daughter, for instance.

I learned from your podcast that it is a remake of 1964's Bedtime Story, which we will now need to watch this weekend. 

Good podcast, I enjoyed it! (up until you started playing Chicago, though, which is when I had to tap out.  Just say no to Chicago.)

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4 hours ago, Wilbur said:

I enjoyed it! (up until you started playing Chicago, though, which is when I had to tap out.  Just say no to Chicago.)

 

Hahaha

Song of the day is always an adventure. We always pick whatever was #1 on the charts on the day the film released and I've come to the conclusion that the surest way to find a song that maxes out at just alright is to pick whatever was #1 on the charts. We've yet to hit a truly iconic song.

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By the way, the next series we're reading is the Legend of Drizzt series. We are tentatively shooting for recording in May, is anyone is interested in trying to read / share in the experience beforehand.

Might do Dark Sun after that.

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14 minutes ago, Gertrude said:

oof. Sure you wanna do that? Should be an interesting re-read.

My buddy is the one who read Piers Anthony. I never did. No idea what his stuff is like, tbh. But I used to give him crap about it, so this is our test to see if I was wrong.

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OK, this is a podcast I am interested in listening to!

Not that I'm not with some of the rest, it's just that I would love your take on his work. Can I ask what you'll be reading, if you know at this point? Xanth and Incarnations of Immortality are his most well known series. 

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On 2/17/2024 at 5:23 PM, Ser Not Appearing said:

By the way, the next series we're reading is the Legend of Drizzt series. We are tentatively shooting for recording in May, is anyone is interested in trying to read / share in the experience beforehand.

Might do Dark Sun after that.

Legend of Drizzt - isnt there like 34 books in that series? With the latest out last year

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On 2/20/2024 at 2:03 AM, Ser Not Appearing said:

My buddy is the one who read Piers Anthony. I never did. No idea what his stuff is like, tbh. But I used to give him crap about it, so this is our test to see if I was wrong.

Piers Anthony has something of a fixation with … “cross-generational relationships.”

I remember one reviewer described him as “ a rancid pervert, or at the least, a very dirty old man.”

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8 hours ago, SeanF said:

Piers Anthony has something of a fixation with … “cross-generational relationships.”

I remember one reviewer described him as “ a rancid pervert, or at the least, a very dirty old man.”

 

That's ... less than appealing.

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