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It’s not the book’s fault that the internet modeled it’s idea of wit off of it.
For fiction I recommend LeGuin's Dispossessed, it's easily the clearest sci-fi argument for anarchism and yet isn't utopian in the slightest.
That or Kobayashi's Crab Cannery Ship for a starkly unromantic view of oppressed crab fishermen and their proletarian uprising.
For non-fiction, read Desert, it is a good reminder that climate collapse will continue given our current capitalist system, but humans can still survive in nomadic non-state communities because they already are (and the climate is already collapsing)
sorry you didn't like Hitchhiker's, I think it's style of cheeky british humor has been ruined by reddit and other things influenced by it (modern Doctor Who comes to mind)
For fiction I recommend LeGuin’s Dispossessed, it’s easily the clearest sci-fi argument for anarchism and yet isn’t utopian in the slightest.
Wanted to suggest the same. Though the audio book is also fine (after chapter 2-3). In my opinion it isn't such a clear cut case for anarchy, but a really good account of how in anarchism we could try to create a community that actually works.
In my opinion it isn’t such a clear cut case for anarchy, but a really good account of how in anarchism we could try to create a community that actually works.
Right, it's not saying that anarchy is best system, I just meant that it the book lays out how anarchism works with a believable set of examples and ties in to the story better than any other book I've read.
I've written a bunch of books. One I've been handing out here is a socialist take on the zombie invasion novel. I wrote it really fast when coronavirus was just getting going in the USA early last spring. Basically, zombies invade an island in Maine, but people on the island fight back and turn their community into a commune that conquers the universe.
If you're interested, let me know and I'll send you the dropbox link. I can't get it published and I'm sick of self-publishing on Amazon. edit: people can also PM me and I'll send them the link.
Sounds like you love novels. I just finished The Betrothed. It was super apt during the pandemic, and a little slow at first but picked up and was amazing and vivid about the plague at the end. Recommended if you're interested in dense historical fiction, and it's a classic - I wonder why there haven't been more film adaptations, but probably there have been in italian. If you just want to get lost in a book, I recommend 100 Years of Solitude.
I loved catch-22 as a kid (read it at about the same time as one flew over the cuckoo's nest) will check out something happened.
Solaris is good, but real Lem connoiseurs read The Futurological Congress
You mean Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy? I fucking love those books.
I got a lot out of “Shardik” by Richard Adams but if books with weird names in them bother you then you won’t like this book much either. I’m sorry but you sound like some kind of 4 year old picky eater but with books. No weird names or humor please, just more generic white guy shit like Jules Verne please. Kind of sad.
Hard disagree on all points. Sounds like most of it went over your head. If you think Jules Verne makes interesting literature then there is precious little we could ever agree on.
if you liked monte cristo, les miserables is really good! not 'fun' per se given the subject matter but despite the size and its reputation it's not that serious, as you say (it's actually pretty funny and the bits people complain about, like when hugo goes off on hundred-page-long tangents about the sewer system or the church or whatever, are some of the most interesting chapters imo). i haven't read it in a few years but iirc it's about the later socialist(? more left-wing anyway) french revolution, not the main liberal one. even if i'm wrong there it's still interesting
unrelated to anything you mentioned but one of my favourite non-heavy novels is the secret history by donna tartt (satire of new england academic elitism, very funny & beautifully written),
If you're into hard sci-fi and existential dread, try Peter Watts' Blindsight.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/48484.Blindsight
It is absolutely bonkers. Its far future sci-fi, with humanity having separated into two completely distinct factions that have to come together to fight an instellar war against souls possessing the living. There's lots of space opera stuff, battles, politics, mysterious alien civilization, pretty good world building.
