/hob/ - Hobbies

Virtue of Selfishness

Ayn Rand is so much more tolerable of a writer when she isn't trying to use a fictional narrative. Much better of a essayist over a storyteller. I actually enjoyed this, unlike Atlas Shrugged which was more of a challenge to get through then a pleasure.

It Works

The most foundational and influential booklet to the new thought and new age movement.
It's shadow still lingers to this day.

Overall it is funny how little self help wishful thinking woo woo has changed in all these years.
I wouldn't take it seriously but it's worth reading for it's history and cultural value.

Frankenstein

I have watched several movies and seen media related to Frankenstein all my life but never got around to the book until now.
It was unexpectedly one of the most melancholy, sorrowful, and depressed books I have ever read/listen to. Unbelievably well written and truly a fantastic book all around. I couldn't recommend it higher.
None of the movies or other media based on or inspired by Frankenstein that I have seen ever got even close to how good the original is.
My only regret is that it took me so long to get around to enjoying this tale.

There's some great stuff ITT, but for those of us who prefer using invidious instances over yt editing the url gets old fast. Here's a script that decorates embeds with an invidious link.

Array.from (document.querySelectorAll ('a.file[href^="https://youtu.be/"]')).forEach (a => { a.parentNode.innerHTML += ' <a href="https://iteroni.com/watch?v=' + a.getAttribute ("href").replace (/^.+\/([^\/]+)$/, "$1")  + '" target="_blank">invidious</a>'; })

Also a heads up that the site gives every lurker's IP address to google through the thumbnail img[src] which points directly to //img.youtube.com/ instead of a copy of the thumbnail on wizchan.

Of course this bug >>>/meta/60449 still exists despite the solution being provided since 08/24/21 so here's the script without code tags.

Array.from (document.querySelectorAll ('a.file[href^="https://youtu.be/"]')).forEach (a => { a.parentNode.innerHTML += ' <a href="https://iteroni.com/watch?v=' + a.getAttribute ("href").replace (/^.+\/([^\/]+)$/, "$1") + '" target="_blank">invidious</a>'; })

>>59918
>>59919

Are you sure you are posting in the right thread?

I don't know what you are talking about and your post looks kinda broken.

>>59920
>Are you sure you are posting in the right thread?
Yes, a tool to aid in accessing the audiobooks posted here, for those who would rather avoid the yt interface, belongs in the audiobook thread.

> I don't know what you are talking about
< Many such cases. Sad!

> and your post looks kinda broken.
As already stated in >>59919 it's a bug in wizchan >>>/meta/60449 with the solution provided since 08/24/21.

>>59923
If you are just going to post gibberish and meme post you can fuck off.

>>60136
Glad you enjoyed it too, lol.
>>55531

How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMx-QwNxTnN0cPgb6TPdW5IkpZSiqB7mv

While a little relivistic for my taste as a Objectivist, it is still a fantastic and suprisingly practical book. Though I got a laugh that the author is a literal non-meme cuck. Glad I didn't skip the relationship chapters as that gave me a good laugh and made the other boring bullshit worth wading through.

Anyway that aside the overall philophy of maximizing personal freedom through focusing on what is within ones control (yourself) while not letting all the bullshit other people try to put on you to control you, as well as the faulty thinking you can trap yourself with that messes up your freedom is at the very least pretty interesting.
I highly recommend the book for anyone even a little interested in liberty on the level of the individual. Especially if they prefer something practical and actionable rather then theory, utopian daydreaming, and naval gazing.

>>60720
I loved this book too. However, after a time I became disillusioned because…there's too much. There are too many 'traps.' It's like looking at a dashboard with a million blinking alarms, dials, and gauges.

>Glad I didn't skip the relationship chapters as that gave me a good laugh and made the other boring bullshit worth wading through.
I took the relationship chapters as saying, "Don't." Which…is pretty good relationship advice. Especially for a wizard.

Speaking of which…are you a wizard?

>>60721
Are you asking my age?
Yeah I am 30+ but I ain't given the exact number to maintain some mystery.
Where you going with this?

Notes from the Underground

I can sum it up as this:
Bitter crab in bucket failed normie whines the novel.
This book is highly overrated and I hated every minute of it.
Reminds me of the time I was forced to read catcher and the rye and everyone praised it but I found it insufferable.
Whine whine whine for hours.
Fuck this book and fuck who wrote it. What a pointless waste of time.

>>60872
I have read almost every novel by FD when I was 18-21 and I can barely remember any of them lol. My favourite is the one about his time in a Siberian prison camp… The whiny philosophical musings in the russian literature of that period is not my cup of tea.

Finally got around to listening to Rules for Radicals.
It puts a lot of radical leftist tactics and their overall lack of morals into perspective, as well as explains the activist investment problem that is causing so many culture war issues.

That said it's clearly a padded book and you are better off reading a summary of it then reading the whole thing.

Fantastic Beast and where to Find Them

Damn, I forgot that J.K. Rowling actually is a pretty good writer even if I stopped being into harry potter when I was like 12 or 13.
Fantastic Beast is just pure fantasy world building and lore concentrated, which is something I enjoy quite a bit even though I don't have interest in the actual Harry Potter series.
I wonder if there is book similar to this that does a deep lore breakdown of the magic system and history of magical development.

On a related note, also listened to this short story by H.G. Wells
Called "The Magic Shop"

I finished the portal war saga and it is fantastic.
7 books, each around 7 hours long, with all of it reasonably interesting.
Don't want to give too much away but it's about a young mage who just wants to study magic in peace and goes through world changing means to achieve that goal.
The coolest thing is the author actually was the one to put up all of his audiobooks on YouTube for free. And they are all high quality and professionally done.

I will probably check out his other novels next week.
Dude's name is James E. Wisher. Seriously worth a look.

I really have to find a reliable place to get modern free audiobooks other than YouTube and torrents.
Nether are actually reliable and most sites only offer public domain stuff.

I refuse to pay audible, especially not getting a subscription where I don't even own the books and the author only gets 25% of the cut for each book sell.

Finally off my fantasy book kick.
This one is Pig. Short but good.

>>63776
Myanonymouse is a private torrent site, they have interviews a few days a week where they check you have read the rules. They have a lot of audiobooks if you want.

Looks like this is the last of the early magic the gathering books that have any sort of audio book version. Pain in the butt to find digital copies for the other ice age books, so I might just have to be satisfied with plot summaries and skip a huge chunk until I get back to fan audios again.

Even the physical books beyond this point are rare and expensive.


Oh, and as a brief book review, The Gathering Dark was pretty good in my opinion. I enjoyed it more than both The Brothers War and The Thran.

>>63776
I personally have a library card at my local library and then get audiobooks via the Libby app. Not ideal as I don't get to keep them, but it gets the job done.

>>63776 You began this, but since I'm so sharing and caring, I'll share my scripts for dealing with audiobook, be it searching and downloading, or creating.

For files and plaintext from stdin, I use this script[1]. It's mostly commented. It expected voices [2,3] or the built-in kal16 in certain places (since the files are newer than what comes in my distribution's repository).

For searching audiobookbay I used [4] and for adding torrent therefrom [5].

Afterwards listen from whatever media player at whatever speed. Reading alongside from a pager or ebook reader, physical or digital, facilitates comprehension. I just like low voices.

I give y'all permission to use and or edit these. Save, shit expires in 30 days.

[1] https://termbin.com/ogo9
[2] https://www.festvox.org/flite/packed/flite-2.1/voices/cmu_us_fem.flitevox
[3] https://www.festvox.org/flite/packed/flite-2.1/voices/cmu_us_slt.flitevox
[4] https://termbin.com/4j5o
[5] https://termbin.com/s32d

Listened to a rather long one (3 parts) over the past 3 days.
Wizards First Rule (The Sword of Truth series) by Terry Goodkind
The naration of the version on youtube is pretty good, and it being up for years means it's unlikely to be randomly taken down. That said as a mini review of the book…I am conflict.
It's very derivative, to the point of near plagiarism at parts, has a lot of conveniences and the magic system is honestly pretty shit in it just does whatever it needs to for the plot to happen.
As for the good, I did mildly enjoy the writing style/prose and characterization. The plot beats, while predictable, were intresting, and the attention to detail made it easy to visualize exactly what was happening at any given time thus allowing me to lose myself in certain scenes.
All that said the book committed the cardinal sin of springing weird fetish shit out of nowhere for a solid 5th of the book once I was already too invested to leave.
Like ultra hardcore bdsm bullshit involving a "beautiful" succubi in a full tight leather outfit in the fantasy equivalent to a dominatrix cult spend pages and pages, chapters and chapters, sexually suggestively torturing the MC for like a month straight, breaking them in to falling in love with the torturer
Then because of him accidenting into magic bullshit he just nopes out of all that trauma and suffers literally no lasting effect of that torture besides a few bad dreams and dramatically increased pain tolerance. Whole part just made me feel dirty, as I wasn't expecting it and it doesn't tonally fit with the rest of the book.
Really, all the romance in the book felt weird and I didn't appreciate it, and I am not just saying that because I am a aromantic wizard. I can appreciate well written romance in fantasy stories, and even tolerate mediocre poorly developed love interest type plots if it raises the stakes, but in this book shit just made me uncomfortable. Not like physiological horror book uncomfortable, but more like I felt like the author has issues that they probably should see someone about rather than work through them in published book form.

Anyway, I don't think I will keep going in the series, as I heard this was the peak of the Sword of Truth books, and if this one is the peak then I remain unimpressed. I might consider going on if the books weren't obnoxiously long for no good reason.
Anyway, links if you want them.
part 1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tufLvmjU3ZU&list=LL&index=4&pp=gAQBiAQB
part 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-DbCi039qs&list=LL&index=2&pp=gAQBiAQB
part 3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtLoR2CK-cQ&list=LL&index=1&pp=gAQBiAQB

>>51296
Anyone ever read The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand? I found a copy of it in a box by the side of the road along with A Clockwork Orange.

>>66371
It's on my to read/listen to list, but no I haven't yet gotten around to it.

>>66371
I listened to Ayn's Anthem on cassette tape and We the Living on mp3. While I don't agree with her ideas, I'm so desperate for any kind of utopian escapism from our current society, that even the darkest dystopias relax me as something different.

i'll take the devil i dont know, over the 1 i do.

Tried getting through Man in High Castle but gave up because it's really really boring.

It also is unrealistic and has a dozen little things that are annoying or off about it.
I get that during the time it was written information wasn't as available and alternative history basically had zero standards, but even with that in mind it was bad alternative history.
How it won awards is beyond me.

Anthem by Ayn Rand

Each book I read/listen to by Rand convinces me more an more that she was indeed autistic.
That said I liked the last few chapters. Made sitting through the rest of the book up until that point almost worth it.

Also the narration on this particular version is great. Pro level reading despite him doing it for free.

>>66415
If I ever wrote a novel, I imagine it would be in her style, of just having characters as stand-ins for philosophical ideals, and their monologues being prose essays shoved into their mouths

>>66416
The funny thing is I really don't mind the monologs.
I mean I am sure they are much for fustrating when reading, but in audiobook form they are probably my favorate parts of her books.

It's just that Rand's writing of basically everything else is fan fic level, only with a better editor so less grammar mistakes and typos.
Basically she is a better esayist than a story teller, but she tries anyway with no respect for the craft.
She cares more about getting the point across than crafting a well made story and it shows in all of her fictional work that I have seen so far.

That said I still haven't gotten around to The Fountainhead, which many claim is her best fictional work.

>>66421
That reminds me even the great Plato, his early dialogues are heated debates of the historic Socrates with a lot of back and forth. By the time you get to the Laws and Timeous, it's just a long essay with the interlocuter saying I agree.

I tried to get through The Witching Hour (first book of the Lives of the Mayfair Witches trilogy) by Anne Rice.

While I liked most of her vampire books I couldn't even make it past the 3rd chapter of The Witching Hour. It is frustratingly boring, meandering, and felt the need to give the birth to death life story of basically every plot relevant character even though it has very little to do with the current plot and just drags everything to a painfully dull crawl where nothing of consequence happens for hours.
Hated it.
Do not recommend. Boring to the extreme.

Shadow Magic, Book 1 of The Divine Key Trilogy

From the same writer of (so far) my favorite fantasy series, The Portal War Saga, James E Wisher.
I enjoyed it very much. Action, adventure, planing, scheming, failures and complications, hard won victories that feel earned.

I enjoyed it a great deal and will probably listen to part two of the trilogy tonight.
I just wish the magic system was as fleshed out as it was in Portal War Saga. It feels like it's happening in the same universe with a similar magic system but different planet with different culture and slightly different approach to magic.

What Maisie Knew by Henry James

The reading of this version is quite good. The book however…

The 3rd person narration has excellent prose and a delightfully extended vocabulary aiding in precise descriptive use of the English language. However that starkly contrast with the abominable state of the dialog. The contrast of which makes the dialog bordering on intolerable in it's vague repetitive simplistic irritating way of poorly getting things across. While naturalistic in approach it doesn't make for pleasant reading/listening. To put it plainly I quite dislike the dialog.

Overall, it's a very character driven book wholly focused on character relations with a lack of focus or direction when it comes to plot. I would say this book is basically old fashioned chick-lit or the precursor to it.
Overall the book isn't bad, but it's very much not for me. That said I was able to get through the whole thing, though at times my focused was strained. Mainly due to the dialog heavy portions being painfully vague and repetitive with all parties in the conversation stalling because they don't want to say what they mean and don't mean what they say, but not in a interesting or clever way.

I don't know what my next book will be but I need a palate cleanser.
Something plot driven with lots of action and masculine values.

An audiobook biography of Hotwheels and the history of Wizardchan is coming out soon!

https://www.audible.com/pd/Black-Pill-Audiobook/B0CLGW7P6C?

>>66629
Who's the author?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

>>66630
a female from cnn who is obsessed with in cels, white supremacists and its links to chan culture. She looks like a disabled subhuman so your typical cnn journalist.

>>66631
how download.

>>66629
I ain't paying money to listen to propaganda.
Audible can suck a dill pickle and choke on it.

Matilda by Mary Shelley

I was curious on what her other writings were besides Frankenstein and this was short so I gave it a shot.

It is a work of art, plain and simple. I can scarcely remember ever seeing/hearing prose expertly crafted to such a high level. I was enthralled and awed by how each line was elegantly crafted.
This reader (some libervox rando) reading and sound quality did proper justness to such a masterwork.
Simply beautiful. Never has the depths of sorrow and death ever been so appealing through labor of words.

I think you will also find that the running theme through out, or at least my interpretation of it, is quite wizardly. I was dubious of this, it being label and listed in many descriptions as "erotic" but consistently all romance depicted does nothing but transmute happiness into the deepest and darkest of pains.
The author also understand the beauty and healing powers of solitude better then most.
Oh how this book fed my soul.

5 out of 5. Probably the best thing I have heard/read all year. I can think of no flaws and can give only praise.

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
Abridged version.

Supposedly it's considered "Modern Gothic Literature".
Honestly felt very YA to me. It's not that it's bad, but the word choice and bluntness felt like it was made for ether children or dumb people.
While it has some intresting ideas and I liked the tone of the story, it overall didn't impress me and I will likely not remember or think of this story a year or two from now.

Because it's a abridged version it's only a hour, so it's well worth the time investment. And the reading is decent too.
So I give it a soft recommend.
3 out of 5.

Demon DIY
Not sure how long it's going to stay up at the current link but figured I embed it anyway.

Anyway, it's a cheesy campy low class book that was quite enjoyable and put a big goofy smile on my face.
It's trashy but in a fun way that doesn't really aim to be more then what it is.

Some of Cioran's books are now on Audible, although strangely not Heights of Despair

AI TTS has a bright future. If they can do celeb voices so good, just doing a generic narrator should be even easier.

>>67288
I was hopeful when some stuff started coming out with AI voice but the reality of it has set in.
99.9% of it is lazy low quality junk that the uploaded didn't bother to do even basic audio editing of.

Pretty clear VA and other such people still will have job security for the foreseeable future.
Sort of like how AI art is hyped to the moon but without skillful editing 99.9% of it is garbage.

Could be a game changer for the skillful few willing to put the work in to polish the stuff generated, thus saving time and money allowing solo and small team to metaphorically punch way above their weight. But ai mainly attracts the incompetent, the lazy, and the scammers/hustlers who just want a quick buck without providing any value to anyone.

I now don't even bother to deal with ai generated content. It sucks. Partly because the tech ain't ready for prime time yet and partially because most who use it suck.

What a fucking let down.

>>67295
https://www.businessinsider.com/publish-books-amazon-kindle-reviews-2019-2

I listened ton an entire AI read audiobook by this Ukraine company without realizing it was fake, they even made a fake Linkedin for a narrator. on another book it was more obvious and i did more digging.

idk if AI readers can sometimes pass "the turing test" on me, we're getting there.

Eaters of the Dead
Was alright. I think this is the abridged version though.

Doc Savage and the Fortress of Solitude.

Don't quite make them like they used to. Full cast for the audio which was a treat, though there were a couple of dead air gaps from the upload.

If you are in the mood for a straight forward action adventure story then this will scratch that itch. That said it does way too much tell not show for the main bad guy so it made confrontations involving him feel pretty hollow imo.