Along with books on music, my favourite genre of writing is travel, however I am out of ideas for new authors.

With this in mind I thought I would ask the most literate and knowledgable bunch of people I know, the Word Massive, to see if anyone has any suggestions.

Looking for something along the lines of Paul Theroux, Jonathan Raban and even Bill Bryson. Should be readable (not to dry), humourous is good as long as its not wacky (no travelling around Greece with a blow up doll etc.) and, more specifically, I am interested in eastern central Asia and westernmost China, but anywhere will do.

I have looked at Eric Newby, Jan Morris etc. but they dont seem my C of T for some reason.

Any suggestions greatly appreciated.

Hello, I'm new, long time lurker, first time poster. A comment about Douglas Coupland on the celebs/wankers thread (he wasn't BTW) made me think about the similarities between how I read and how I listen. Just like I buy every Moz album, no matter the quality of the previous one, I buy every Coupland book. Same for Carl Hiassen. Other authors I might just have one or two 'greatest hits', even if I love those books. Are there authors you will *always* read, just because you're a fan?

OK, while there seems to be a support group mentality (all of which is clearly very helpful to some people with some real issues) from the always thoughful massive at the moment i thought I would share with you my dirty little secret.

It occured to me a while ago, lets say about 18 months, that I now spend considerably more time reading about music than I do actually listening to it!

It seems I am increasingly happy to discuss and debate and 'study' popular culture, largely music, but, conversly, am less interested in actualy partaking of the stuff myself.

I will happily spend hours reading reviews for albums I will never own (or even listen to), read discussions on forums, with genuine interest, about bands of whom I know nothing, read and re-read books and memoirs relating to music, the music industry or band biogs (theres not a book by an ex NME/Sounds/RM etc. journo that I do not own for example) and yet I will probably go to 2 gigs max this year, buy 2 CD's and download about another 2 cd's worth of single tracks (not being a freetard keeps a check on that). Even copies of CD's that friends have given me, things that I am sure I would like, rarely make it out of the sleeve.

Even in the car my listening is 90% podcasts (ironically, mostly about music) except when the kids are in it, when I give in to Lilly , Florence and the rest of the gang.

What music I do buy seems to be largely (but not exclusively) copies of stuff I have on vinyl and older stuff that I liked but never bought in the past. I also find that I am genre shifting again, listening to lots more soul again after 15 years in the indie wilderness and albums that I loved 6 or 7 years ago (Flaming Lips, The Strokes etc.), I can barely, scratch that, cant listen to now)

A further confession is my lack of any facility to play vinyl. If I had a turntable again (I know, I know, its on my shopping list after selling the last one after a period of copying what I thought was my essential vinyl onto CD and moving to a high end micro) then maybe I would at least be playing some old Jean Carne albums! Perhaps its a temporary and cyclical thing while searching for inspiration?

I am I should add a regular music radio listener (Robert Elms and Baker on BBCLondon and some 6 music shows) and use Spotify quite a bit so maybe it is sheer boredom with my collection.

Anyway, I'm Art and I'm here because I love reading....

Some recent entries on this forum got me to thinking about the critics I most trust to point me in the right direction for new stuff, particularly films. Whilst I'd love to think that I'd find great new product all on my own, inevitably, with film at least where otherwise you'd rely on trailers or word of mouth, there are some critics I really trust.
For me, I look for a consensus between the BBC's Mark Kermode and Peter Bradshaw from the Guardian - both guilty occasionally of putting me off films I ended up enjoying or encouraging me to see stuff I didn't care for, but I usually find if both like something there's a strong chance I will too. Individually, if one really loves something I will probably give it a go. I also like Roger Ebert (although he has recommended some real drivel, he at least talks authoritively and with passion when he does), and historically the late, great Pauline Kael.
With that in mind, who are the critics you trust the most in the field of movies, TV, music and/or books?

Mr Hepworth asked this question on his own blog this morning...
http://whatsheonaboutnow.blogspot.com/2009/11/what-has-borders-ever-done...
... and he got me thinking because Borders did quite a lot for me.

I worked for Borders for over 10 years. There are a myriad of reasons behind them going into administration, some external and some internal (and most of those available to read in the comments field on thebookseller.com) but whatever happens in the future, there are plenty of good things I remember from the past...

1. Watching Ian Rankin & Hugh Cornwell duet on a karaoke machine at the General Manager conference on Brighton Pier.
2. Terry Pratchett stealing my lunch.
3. Meeting Richard "Pitch" Pitcciotto, a NYC firefighter trapped under the World Trade Centre on 9/11. He wrote a book about his experience and did a book tour. We took him out to dinner afterwards. He did magic tricks at the table and told some rum old tales...
4. Recommending books to people. No bigger thrill.
5. DInner with Ken Follett, when a colleague of mine compared his Pillars Of The Earth with Thackeray's Vanity Fair. I've never seen a man so thrilled. Or a colleague so wrong.
6. Our Kids departments. Not for nothing did Borders win Children's Bookseller Of The Year for 3 years in a row. On a bad day, you'd go help out in the kids department and see the young faces looking up in wonder at the rows of books, picking out something new and realise why you worked there. Not available on Amazon.
7. Hosting a week of Syd Barrett events in Cambridge. People travelled from all over the world to be there. It felt like an honour to host them.
8. The people I worked with. I realised today that two thirds of my friends on Facebook I know through Borders. As well as highlighting my poor social skills outside of the workplace, I hope this shows how close knit the teams were. Sure we employed the odd idiot, but that was part of the fun too.
9. Causing chaos on the launch night of the last Harry Potter book with a tannoy announcement that resulted in several hundred people leaving their place in the queue only to find they were right & I was wrong... the queue should have remained where it was. Oops.
10. Being able to pop my head into the instore Starbucks knowing my tall, black Americano would be sat there waiting. The modern equivalent of a local pub.
11. Catching people shoplifting erotic novels.
12. Opening a delivery and getting to see all the new stuff first.
13. Reading a whole pile of magazines without paying for them. See, not only the customers did that.
14. Choosing the instore playlist. Then somebody wanting to buy what was playing. My record was 3 copies of Donald Fagen's The Nightfly in one night.
15. Learning that, in a lot of cases, you actually can judge a book by its cover. And if one day you decide to fill a table with books that you just like the covers of, then that table will sell like hot cakes.

There are many, many more too... just thought today was the right time to record a few.

Robert Forster of the Go Betweens has put out a collection of his writings on rock'n'roll related topics. Reviews etc.

I understand he wrote also for the Sunday Times as well as Australian publications.

It is a good read.

http://theincblot.blogspot.com/2009/10/interview-with-robert-forster-aut...

Stuck for something to read over the weekend, tired, irritable, unable to concentrate and not fancying any of the dozens of books on the ‘to read’ shelf, I turned, yet again, to that old reliable Wodehouse. Within seconds I was laughing – ‘If he had a mind, there was something on it’- and all was well with the world and now I fancy reading again. Wodehouse is infallible like that.

Music-wise, in those increasingly common moments when excess choice and over-exposure leads to scrambled synapses and musical meltdown, the one guarantee, whatever the mood, is Gerry Love of Teenage Fanclub. A blast of Sparky’s Dream, Ain’t that Enough or Going Places works every single time. Job done, enthusiasm and love of music rediscovered.

So, what are your cultural palate cleansers?

A couple of years ago, I remember seeing a novel in Waterstones.

Something along the lines of - a man finds a note under his windscreen wiper, asking to decide which of 2 people should die. As he thinks it is a joke, he ignores it, and both die. He then gets another note...

Does this ring any bells ?

From The Wall Street Journal

"Sony Corp. unveiled Tuesday a wireless electronic book reader that could be the strongest competitor yet to Amazon.com Inc.'s Kindle reader this holiday season

Going to get one - or in the face of the endless tech wave do you wish life had, like, a pause, button?

http://bit.ly/1vpL5

Its the time of year when newspapers, magazines and even the Word massive on here are busily recommending books to be read on summer hols. I just don't get it. When I go on holiday I just don't have time to read - once I've paid my money and made the effort to get somewhere I want to be out there seeing what the place has to offer. Our holidays usually see us out of the hotel/B&B by 10.30am and not back in until after 8.30pm, exhausted with walking, sightseeing etc. I took the latest issues of Word and Vogue to keep me company on hols last week and still haven't finished them, never mind a book !

Maybe I just don't go on holiday to relax, or my idea of relaxation is different to other people's. Maybe I'm lucky to have a good work/life balance that gives me time to read at home. I can't be the only one can I ?

I really hate giving up on a book, but I'm really close at the moment. I really loved Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon, so when I saw a copy of his novel" The Yiddish Policemen's union" in my local Oxfam I snapped it up. Talk about tough going,I'm 60 or so pages in and I'm really about to throw the towel in.
What's made it worse is that (and this ties in with other threads) I've just easily rattled though three books on a weeks holiday in Dorset. So is life too short to struggle with a book? And is Chabon's latest worth sticking with?

Word has been pretty darn great at a sensible appreciation of comic books but as a bit of a nerd myself (yes, I do follow men in tights) I was wondering whether there were some pretty special books that I had missed over the past few years. I dont need more books- and my FPO wont tahnks me for this- but is there anything else I should be reading? Thoughts and insights very much appreciated around these parts

Off to LA next month on business. Managed to tack some free time on at the end - 4 whole days in fact. And no FPO to monitor how long I spend in the record shops. I'm giddy with excitement already.

I've been there a few times before, but not in the last 5 years or so. I've done all the obvious tourist stuff in the past so I wondered if the Massive had any recommendations for this trip. Not much on the to-do list so far -
- Amoeba Records
- Second Spin in Sherman Oaks
- Book Soup (I'm staying just up the road)
- A return visit to the Museum of Tolerance

Any other ideas? Any Massive members in the area fancy a beer one night?

I wondered if anyone who is familiar with the work of author and journalist Jonathan Rendall knows what he's currently up to.

I'm re-reading his book This Bloody Mary is the Last Thing I Own about his experiences managing boxer Colin McMillan and I'd really like read some more of his stuff. I've already got two of his other books Twelve Grand: the Gambler as Hero and Garden Hopping and would dearly love to read Scream: The Real Mike Tyson but I've no idea if it was ever actually published.

It has an ISBN number and depending on what site you look at was either published in Oct 2007 and is currently out of stock or is yet to be published. My local Borders reckon that an airport-only paperback edition existed at some point but only in Asia (!?) but the UK hardback was cancelled.

If anyone has the inside track on this I'd be very grateful to have this little mystery solved.

A couple of people commented recently that they've enjoyed Bill Bruford's recent book. This got me interested, even though I have zilch interest in most music he's been involved with.

Which books by musicians/producers about music are worthwhile? These work for me:

Joe Jackson's "A Cure for Gravity":
Love of music (plus its attendant curses), and growing up. Stops before "fame" (a good move).

Joe Boyd's "White Bicyles":
Music-lover's 60s/70s odyssey, producer has relationship with artists as sympathetic facilitator(in most cases).

Tony Visconti's "Bowie, Bolan and the Brooklyn Boy":
Ditto, producer has relationship with artists as technician.