Inspired by Delphica’s thread needing a book rec for someone, I started thinking about conspiracy theories, which are always a good time and a great way to start a conversation with someone who is slightly left of center.
Are there any fictional reads ( or non-fiction, as it were) out there that are pretty decent. Any conspiracy will do. ( I’m slutty in that way, I’ll take anything!)
Them, by Jon Ronson, is fun. It’s really about extremists and conspiracy theorists and it’s hysterical.
Schweeet! I’ve added to my queue at the library!
I love the internets!
Illuminatus!, of course!
For a nonfictional survey of conspiracy theories and their role (the role of the theories and theorists, that is) in real-life history, see Conspiracy, by Daniel Pipes.
In the Country of the Blind, by Michael Flynn, features a secret society (several, actually) who have a real, reliable predictive science of history and society – sort of a steampunk version (origins in the early 19th Century) of Isaac Asimov’s psychohistory from the Foundation series – and make use of it for their own purposes.
For nonfiction, there’s The Hunt for Zero Point by Nick Cook: A *Jane’s *writer whose researches lead him to believe that various governments just might be on the tail of (or have already worked out) the secrets of antigravity propulsion.
An excellent “conspiracy omnibus,” covering the most notable ones pre-9/11, is The 70 Greatest Conspiracies of All Time. Vankin and Whalen were quite active at popularizing conspiracy scholarship through the '90s, but don’t seem to have done much since… Almost as if they’ve disappeared or something…
I read UFOs, JFK, and Elvis: Conspiracies You Don’t Have to Be Crazy to Believe by Richard Belzer in one sitting. It’s freakin’ funny.
Besides the above, there’s:
The Paradox Press Big Book of Conspiracies (if you can find it)
Foucalt’s Pendulum by Umberto Eco
Lots of the science fiction of Eric Frank Russell, like Sinister Barrier.
There’s no end of books on the JFK Assassination – look in the back of the Paradox Press book for lots of leads.
The Illuminoids by N. Wilgus
Seconded (and obligatory for me with my user name don’t you think?). It’s not just a conspiracy novel, it’s THE conspiracy novel.
What, no mention of Foucault’s Pendulum yet ?
EDIT : Gah, had skipped Cal’s post. Nevermind then.
I just finished Case Closed on the JFK assassination - it’s good in that it takes all the conspiracy theories and demonstrates how there’s little chance that they’re correct, and that Oswald acting alone is pretty much the only scenario that fits all the facts.
I liked the first half better. It discusses Oswald’s early life and possible motivations, and I found that really interesting. The latter third or so discusses Ruby and the Garrison trial, which is pretty much a horrible miscarriage of justice, but that I found less interesting. It’s definitely a good debunking non-fiction, though.
Foucault’s Pendulum was definitely a good read, but I got to the end of it and was very much “what the fuck was that all about?”. It almost felt like he was making it up as he went by the end.
A book that is quasi-conspiracy theoryish is the book I’m reading at the moment, The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters. Written in the victorian style (but without being dense and heavy going like a lot of actual victorian novels) it deals with a conspiracy plot/cabal/intrigue etc. It’s extremely good, much better than I was initially expecting when I picked it up.
No surprise that I’ve been beaten to Foucault’s Pendulum then.
Libra by Don DeLillo is an excellent interpretation of the Kennedy assassination, while being a bit more than just a “thriller”.
Whoooo.
I’ve loaded up my queue with all these titles.
If I end up living in a 12 x 12 shack in Montana writing Manifesto’s, I blame you all.
:dubious: Am I being whooshed ?
Little Green Men by Christopher Buckley is good.
No you’re really not. I’m not saying it isn’t a good book but as I said the way the book progressed really made me go :dubious: or even :rolleyes: a few times.
For example the group of friends start theorising about the Knights Templar and their great secret and how they had secret rendezvous planned after long periods of time to bring their knowledge “fragments” together. They’re hypothesising this and it’s all very much an intellectual exercise and then - suddenly it’s true! I just found the progression from a few nerds’ fantasies suddenly becoming reality a little strange, and like Eco liked the ideas they were having and decided “hey, wouldn’t it be a great twist if it all turned out to be true”. The later sections of the book just seem quite different to the earlier. I guess we got different things out of reading it, then. 