Hello reader who is also a reader! Today marks the sad and glorious return of Booked for the Week, our reliably irregular Sunday column in which games people talk about books. It’s sad because the original creator of this column, arch word baron Nic Reuben, is no longer full time at RPS. It’s glorious because this is one of the best columns I’ve ever read, and I’m delighted Nic has given permission to keep it rolling. He’s now got a Patreon, by the way.
We’re starting afresh with some reccs from Pietro Righi Riva, co-founder of Mediterranea Inferno, Saturnalia and Horses developers Santa Ragione, who have been in the news a lot lately. Cheers Pietro! Mind if we have a nose at your bookshelf?
What are you currently reading?
Hi! I’m finishing Eureka Street by McLiam Wilson. It is a novel set in Belfast in the 90s, seen through the eyes of a group of friends before and after a terrorist attack.
I remember watching the news on TV about the IRA and terrorism in Northern Ireland in the 90s when I was in elementary school, and I’d only recently discovered the show Derry Girls by Lisa McGee (which I loved) and it’s been really interesting diving into these fictional slices of life of this particular time and place. I don’t know if I understand more about that history, but I now I know should definitely read more about the actual events and the witnesses’ accounts.
What did you last read?
A Man’s Place by Annie Ernaux, it is this very precise, short memoir about her father and class, written in a flat, almost neutral tone that somehow makes it even more violent emotionally. I loved how she turns this list of mundane anecdotes into an implicit analyisis of shame, ambition, and social mobility.
I have been thinking about “fathers” a lot in the last few years. I think you can see that especially in Saturnalia, where all of the characters’ stories are about relationships with fathers. I did not even realize that until I started talking about the game with my own father. Awkward!
What are you eyeing up next?
Incubus by Giuseppe Berto, 1964 Italian novel, long stream of consciousness about neurosis as the protagonist experiences it. My partner recommended this one, and I have not read too much about it yet to avoid forming any prejudice!
What quote or scene from a book sticks with you the most?
In King Kong Theory by Virginie Despentes: “Men love talking about women. At least then they don’t have to talk about themselves. How is it that in thirty years no man has produced the slightest innovative work on masculinity? They are so expert, so voluble when it comes to holding forth about women, so why this silence when it comes to themselves? We know that the more they speak, the less they say–of essentials, of what they really think. Perhaps they want us to talk about them instead? For example, perhaps they want to be told how their gang bangs look from the outside? Well, they look as if men want to see themselves fucking, as i they want to look at each other’s dicks, to be together with their hard-ons; as if they want to get fucked themselves. It looks as if what they’re scared to admit is what they really want: to fuck each other.”
What book do you find yourself bothering friends to read?
People will roll their eyes but… Permutation City by Greg Egan, a hard science fiction novel about simulated consciousness and weird versions of reality. I do not know why that one in particular. Maybe it is because the Italian edition is basically impossible to find. I find myself thinking about reality as a product of someone else’s imagination all the time. I like the idea of a perceived time continuum existing while reality randomly comes together for a split second once every million years. I want to talk about that with my friends and they need to read the book. Nobody read it, of course, they will not fall for my trap.
What book would you like to see someone adapt to a game?
My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh for sure, it is a book about a woman in New York who decides to sleep through a year of her life on prescription drugs, trying to reset herself and start again. I imagine it a bit like Assassin’s Creed when you get in and out of the Animus, except more mundane and with way more drugs.
Som extras from me: I’ve been reading Caitlin Starling’s The Starving Saints, which I think I learned about from an RPS comments thread – it’s a fun medieval horror about nuns and alchemists in a besieged fortress. Of Pietro’s suggestions, I’m most grabbed by King Kong Theory – written by the author of Baise-Moi, it’s billed elsewhere as a mixture of memoir and feminist manifesto.
If you have any thoughts on the direction of this column, now’s a good time to air them. I think we’ll struggle to keep it running weekly, given the shortage of hands at the tiller. I like the idea of it being a bit unpredictable, like an occult library whose door can’t always be found, but we could also experiment with more frequent placeholders if we don’t have an interviewee. Anyway, book for now!