King Solomon’s Mines started the adventure genre that Indiana Jones belongs to. While it has a very interesting underlying premise, much of the book has not aged well. Sort of like Live and Let Die.
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I’m currently reading this, and it is very good. I stopped reading Stephen King for a long time. I’d been a faithful reader almost from the get-go, but I think it was after Gerald’s Game that I lost interest. Other than King’s book on writing, I hadn’t read anything of his before starting up with again with a book of his short stories, and then The Outsider (which turned out to be part of a series, though I didn’t know it at the time). So I’m glad my interest was rekindled.
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I’m hoping it’ll pick up when they reach the mines.
I just started re reading Burke series by Andrew Vachss when I heard of his passing. R.I.P. Warrior
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The Inheritance of Rome: Illuminating the Dark Ages by Chris Wickham. Starting a bit of a medieval history kick.
I’m currently enjoying a snarky little resource book I gifted to myself for Christmas, Paperbacks From Hell: The Twisted History of 70s and 80s Horror Fiction by Grady Hendrix. I was a big fan of this genre at the time the author covers, so his tongue in cheek reminisces about these books is quite a bit of nostalgic fun for me.
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No,it’s not a porn book!
It’s about world war two espionage! Nazi agents operating in Britain during world war two.
It was £2 in a January sale,but had gone down to £1 when I got to the counter!
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This resembles my own voyage through King’s œuvre, I went on an extended break after 1996 (after Desperation/Regulators) and only came back with Under the Dome. After which I caught up with some of the backlog.
Interestingly, King revisits many themes of his early work from a different angle, often giving them an extra dimension. It’s fascinating to see how an author I grew up with evolved and matured over time. There are some treasures to discover in the years since 1996.
Right now I’m reading Strings of Murder by Oscar de Muriel, The Craft by John Dickie and The Sleepwalkers by Christopher Clark.
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King really has grown as a writer since I first began reading back in the 1970s. I find that his characters have a lot more depth and complexity, and don’t feel as contrived as some (not all) did in his earlier work. Sometimes I felt like he was creating specific characters for plot, rather than the other way around. So some of the dialogue and reactions felt forced and unnatural. His plots were, and are, so good that often these deficiencies didn’t detract too much. But now his characters strike me as “real” people … even though obviously they are fictional characters. But I need that believability to be able to care about what happens to them.
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Very well put.
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How did you like it?
I am itching for some Le Carre and wondering what I should read next.
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My Word is my Bond by Sir Roger Moore. It’s a bit of cheating, I know, but it does have some interesting behind the scenes Bond references.
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Moonraker…Again. 
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I will let you know when I have finished it,been s bit busy lately
Thank you sir. Looking forward to your thoughts.
Civilwarland in Bad Decline by George Saunders. Beautifully stabbing stories of our increasingly dystopian, capitalist culture and the kindnesses we owe each other.
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I’ve been reading Fire and Blood by George R.R. Martin and Ian Fleming by Andrew Lycett. I’m really enjoying Fire and Blood but I must confess the Fleming biography is a bit dry. However I’ve only just now gotten to the section when he joins British Intelligence and that’s certainly going to be more interesting than Ian Fleming, failed stockbroker.
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Will read that!
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Finished For Special Services. I know people aren’t comfortable with the Cedar Leiter component, and I know where they’re coming from. But I can’t help but enjoy the story as a whole. Killing people with pythons. The elevator escape. The car race. Mind control via ice cream. One breasted Nena being Blofeld’s daughter. I had a good time with it - now on to Icebreaker.
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I always felt that For Special Services would make a good light hearted movie after Blofeld was defeated himself. Maybe EON should take note.
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