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Whatcha readin now? (book, books, reading, read) (1 Viewer)

Tuesdays With Morrie by Mitch Albom is fantastic. Not a huge Albom fan, but this book is great.

Also read Why I Wore Lipstick To My Mastectomy - Probably the best read among the many cancer books given to us. (with Crazy, Sexy Cancer as the worst)

 
Finished Peter Straub's The Throat. Big :thumbup:

Now reading Fever Dream, the latest Pendergast novel from Child and Preston.

 
Just finishing With the Old Breed by E.B. Sledge. Sledge is one of the guys featured in the HBO mini series The Pacific. Good read. Not a hero; just a marine trying doing his job and trying to life another day.

 
Finished Pillars of the Earth. I thought it was good but went on a bit too long. I also didn't like the way his characters tended to recap in their mind things that we had just read about a little earlier in the story. Not sure I'll be able to work my way through the sequels unless someone tells me they are must reads.

 
I've recommended it in this thread before, and will mention it again because it won the National Book Critics Circle Award last week - "A Visit from the Goon Squad" by Jennifer Egan. It's a novel that features a series of chapters that are like an interlocking set of short stories, featuring different characters at different points in their lives, from different characters' points of view. And it's set in the music industry, from the punk era through today.Just a great, compulsively readable book. I liked it so much that it turned me on to her former book, "The Keep," which was a really cool piece of Gothic meta-fiction.
This is my last plug for this book - just won the Pulitzer Prize. It's a really good read that I am trying to get people interested in. Though maybe the Pulitzer will do a better job of that than I. Anyway, won't be a bore and flog it again after this, but it is an excellent book.
 
Liar's Poker is a great read. By Michael Lewis, who has numerous other good books.

I have way less time to read in college than before. Not something I like.

 
Knocked out Michael (So Cold The River) Kortya's The Cypress House. I liked it better than So Cold - seemed to have a more consistent voice & the characters had more depth. It's about a WW1 vet during the Depression named Arlen Wagner. In his travels to find work, he ends up in a mysterious fishing resort hotel near Tampa. There he runs into several people with vague motives, corruption, betrayal, the historic '35 hurricane, and death. As in So Cold, there's an element of the supernatural in this one - Arlen can sense when someone's about to die - but it's not heavy-handed and is just a small part of the story (though it IS the catalyst that sets everything in motion). It's a tad slow in the middle - lots of exposition - but the last 100 pages or so fly by and Kortya keeps the twists coming. His sense of time & place feels really genuine. There are a couple of characters that border on caricature - a fat Southern sherriff, for one - but all in all, an enjoyable read.
good review. i agree (except that the sheriff was from Cleveland). I liked the So Cold story better, but felt that Cypress was better executed.I did wish there had been more backstory on the McGrath family.

About to go back and read some of Kortya's earlier work.

 
Picked up Washington by Ron Chernow over the weekend. This may take awhile...
I've been reading that for awhile. I can see the light at the end -- less than 100 pages to go. Great book though.
I've just flipped through it a bit. Seems pretty good. Will be hard to live up to alex hamilton.
I definitely liked Hamilton more, but I think more because I had previously not read as much about Hamilton as I had read about Washington, so I felt like I was learning a lot more while I was reading. But I like Chernow as a writer, and it's a pretty comprehensive one-volume. Chernow quotes Washington's correspondence a lot, which is the newest information to me, and I think helps give a better insight into Washington.
 
Finished Pillars of the Earth. I thought it was good but went on a bit too long. I also didn't like the way his characters tended to recap in their mind things that we had just read about a little earlier in the story. Not sure I'll be able to work my way through the sequels unless someone tells me they are must reads.
They are not.
 
Currently, I'm reading "The Last Kid" about Mickey Mantle. I think I'd rather be reading a more straightfoward biography, but it is interesting none the less. I was a big baseball fan growing up, but I don't know that much about Mantle, other than the numbers and debauchery.

 
Picked up Washington by Ron Chernow over the weekend. This may take awhile...
I've been reading that for awhile. I can see the light at the end -- less than 100 pages to go. Great book though.
I've just flipped through it a bit. Seems pretty good. Will be hard to live up to alex hamilton.
I definitely liked Hamilton more, but I think more because I had previously not read as much about Hamilton as I had read about Washington, so I felt like I was learning a lot more while I was reading. But I like Chernow as a writer, and it's a pretty comprehensive one-volume. Chernow quotes Washington's correspondence a lot, which is the newest information to me, and I think helps give a better insight into Washington.
I am worried about this as well. Gonna start it this afternoon.
 
Born To Run: Very entertaining. The author put a little too much of his own running life in the book for my liking but it was a great read overall. It even had me wanting to go for a run... but that didn't last long.
 
Currently reading The Good Soldiers by David Finkel. About a battalion that went over specifically for the surge in Iraq and the ####hole they were dumped in to. Really good read. I just finished a the chapter where the Lieutenant Colonel in charge went back on leave to visit some of his wounded soldiers in the Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, TX. This is where a lot of the severely burned and multiple amputations go for recovery. Incredible part of the book.

The most severely wounded was Duncan Crookston. During September of 2008 he was riding in a humvee that was hit with an EFP (explosively formed projectile which are incredibly nasty devices designed solely to slice through armor). The EFP immediately severed both of his legs, his right arm, his left hand and the resulting fire took his lips, ears, eyelids and burned pretty much his entire body with 2nd and 3rd degree burns. To say it was a miracle that he survived the initial explosion is an understatement. Only 2 other personal, at the time, had ever survived with those kind of injuries. Crookston was not expected to live but after 30 surgeries the doctors simply quit telling his wife & mother what his chances were. They all agreed that he was a living miracle at that point and simply hoped for the best every time an operation happened. The chapter details the visit and what life was like for his new 19 year old wife and mother who had lived at the facility for the last 6 months 24/7 caring for Duncan. The Lieutenant Colonel returns to Iraq and two days in received an email from Duncan's mother that he had died. Duncan Crookston was 19 when he died, he got married 6 weeks before he left for Iraq.

I don't typically tear up reading a book but couldn't help it last night. One of the best chapters I've ever read.
Just finished this book. The entire book, and the chapter you referenced in particular, just turned me into an emotional wreck. What an incredible, yet horrifying book. I couldn't recommend this book highly enough.

Thank you to all of the solders who serve.

 
Finished "The Big Short" by Michael Lewis

Great read - essential for any American in my opinion if you're interested at all in the economy

 
I've recommended it in this thread before, and will mention it again because it won the National Book Critics Circle Award last week - "A Visit from the Goon Squad" by Jennifer Egan. It's a novel that features a series of chapters that are like an interlocking set of short stories, featuring different characters at different points in their lives, from different characters' points of view. And it's set in the music industry, from the punk era through today.Just a great, compulsively readable book. I liked it so much that it turned me on to her former book, "The Keep," which was a really cool piece of Gothic meta-fiction.
This is my last plug for this book - just won the Pulitzer Prize. It's a really good read that I am trying to get people interested in. Though maybe the Pulitzer will do a better job of that than I. Anyway, won't be a bore and flog it again after this, but it is an excellent book.
I tried to read this about six months ago and just couldn't get into it at all. Based on your recommending it so highly twice, I'll give it another shot.
 
Finished "The Big Short" by Michael LewisGreat read - essential for any American in my opinion if you're interested at all in the economy
:goodposting: Made complicated financial matters very easy to understand and made a book about the economy seem like an edge-of-your-seat thriller. I've never read a Michael Lewis book that wasn't top notch.
 
Just finishing up the last Chapter of Ulysses. If it weren't for sparknotes, I'm afraid that I would be fairly lost. It is a really difficult read.

 
Just finishing "Ender's Shadow" by Orson Scott Card.

I read Ender's Game years ago and liked it a lot. This is a lot more then a rehashing of the same story. There isn't as much overlap as I expected. It's not as good as the original but it certainly adds to it. It's a very quick read. You can finish it in a few days.

 
Just finishing "Ender's Shadow" by Orson Scott Card.I read Ender's Game years ago and liked it a lot. This is a lot more then a rehashing of the same story. There isn't as much overlap as I expected. It's not as good as the original but it certainly adds to it. It's a very quick read. You can finish it in a few days.
Both series that continue after those two books are really good as well. The Shadow ones are actually a bit better in my opinion. Some parts of the Game series get a little bit boring at times.
 
Just finishing "Ender's Shadow" by Orson Scott Card.I read Ender's Game years ago and liked it a lot. This is a lot more then a rehashing of the same story. There isn't as much overlap as I expected. It's not as good as the original but it certainly adds to it. It's a very quick read. You can finish it in a few days.
Both series that continue after those two books are really good as well. The Shadow ones are actually a bit better in my opinion. Some parts of the Game series get a little bit boring at times.
How many books are in each series?
 
Just finishing "Ender's Shadow" by Orson Scott Card.I read Ender's Game years ago and liked it a lot. This is a lot more then a rehashing of the same story. There isn't as much overlap as I expected. It's not as good as the original but it certainly adds to it. It's a very quick read. You can finish it in a few days.
Both series that continue after those two books are really good as well. The Shadow ones are actually a bit better in my opinion. Some parts of the Game series get a little bit boring at times.
How many books are in each series?
I want to say about 5 each. Let's see which ones I can recall right away:Speaker for the DeadXenocideChildren of the MindThose three all follow Ender's Game, and I believe in that order. They're deeper, so less action sometimes. But you think more.Shadow of the HegemonShadow PuppetsShadow of the GiantThese all follow Ender's Shadow and involve Bean and Peter (I think Ender's older brother was Peter)That's what I remember. I liked them both a lot, but the Shadow ones had much more action.
 
Just finishing "Ender's Shadow" by Orson Scott Card.I read Ender's Game years ago and liked it a lot. This is a lot more then a rehashing of the same story. There isn't as much overlap as I expected. It's not as good as the original but it certainly adds to it. It's a very quick read. You can finish it in a few days.
Both series that continue after those two books are really good as well. The Shadow ones are actually a bit better in my opinion. Some parts of the Game series get a little bit boring at times.
How many books are in each series?
I want to say about 5 each. Let's see which ones I can recall right away:Speaker for the DeadXenocideChildren of the MindThose three all follow Ender's Game, and I believe in that order. They're deeper, so less action sometimes. But you think more.Shadow of the HegemonShadow PuppetsShadow of the GiantThese all follow Ender's Shadow and involve Bean and Peter (I think Ender's older brother was Peter)That's what I remember. I liked them both a lot, but the Shadow ones had much more action.
Cool. I'll check out Shadow of the Hegemon and keep going with the series if I like it. Thanks for the info. :thumbup:
 
Re-reading the GRRM books. Slowing to a crawl as I approach tRW. I've read this book at least 3x before and I still dread what's coming.

 
I've recommended it in this thread before, and will mention it again because it won the National Book Critics Circle Award last week - "A Visit from the Goon Squad" by Jennifer Egan. It's a novel that features a series of chapters that are like an interlocking set of short stories, featuring different characters at different points in their lives, from different characters' points of view. And it's set in the music industry, from the punk era through today.Just a great, compulsively readable book. I liked it so much that it turned me on to her former book, "The Keep," which was a really cool piece of Gothic meta-fiction.
This is my last plug for this book - just won the Pulitzer Prize. It's a really good read that I am trying to get people interested in. Though maybe the Pulitzer will do a better job of that than I. Anyway, won't be a bore and flog it again after this, but it is an excellent book.
Is this book really that great? they didn't have it at the particular library where i was the other day, so i decided to grab the invisible circus instead. 3 chapters in and I'm not all that excited. Decent story, but the writing seems very high school-ish. Does that book or later books improve?
 
I just flew through "Tuesdays With Morrie" by Mitch Albom. :) :cry: :thumbup:

I was given his "The Five People You Meet In Heaven" a couple of years ago as a gift and always wanted to pick this one up. Ted Koppel interview, PBS special, TV movie. I got it for a buck at a charity sale in the lobby of my building...

A potential life changer for anyone re-examining their prioities. :wub:

 
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Is there any reason not to buy B&N Classics?
All the books in the collection are in the public domain and since they are classics many of them are legally available for free in e-book format. But it's nice to have print editions, and I think the trade paperbacks are pretty high quality and are competitively priced with the offerings from the major publishing houses (penguin classics, oxford classics, etc.). B&N also tends to do a lot of buy two, get one free offers with their collection.Do check on translations as mentioned in the previous post, I believe that all of the Russian works they offer are the Garnett translations, which are adequate in some cases and considered sub-par compared to other more modern translations in other cases.
 
Finished "The Big Short" by Michael Lewis

Great read - essential for any American in my opinion if you're interested at all in the economy
:goodposting: Made complicated financial matters very easy to understand and made a book about the economy seem like an edge-of-your-seat thriller. I've never read a Michael Lewis book that wasn't top notch.
:blackdot: I am a finance/economy ninny.

Just bought The Man in the Grey Flannel Skirt and hooked in spite of myself... and the book. Imagine a La Jolla born, NYC bred, muscle-bound but androgynous, heavily tattooed Woody Allen but without any fame or even a job, rife with sexual/pschological hangups he gleefully and hilariously shares in his memoir.

 
How does one download a book on tape from the library's website? Is it just a matter of burning the file onto a CD? For a six-hour reading, will I need more than one CD? TIA.

I have a much longer commute these days and would like to fill the time up with some good material.

 
Just finished When Asia Was the World. Each chapter was about a different trader between 700-1500AD with all the details coming directly from their journals or letters. Very interesting but a little too brief; kind of hard to sum up a persons life in 40~ pages.

 
I just flew through "Tuesdays With Morrie" by Mitch Albom. :) :cry: :thumbup: I was given his "The Five People You Meet In Heaven" a couple of years ago as a gift and always wanted to pick this one up. Ted Koppel interview, PBS special, TV movie. I got it for a buck at a charity sale in the lobby of my building... A potential life changer for anyone re-examining their prioities. :wub:
Excellent read. I'd follow it up with The Alchemist by Paolo Cuelho
 
Just finished all 3 of the Stieg Larson Millennium Trilogy, highly recommended. Also read Water for Elephants, pretty good as well.
I finished these not too long ago as well. The stories themselves were pretty good but I thought the writing left a little to be desired. My wife, who lived in Denmark and can speak swedish, said some of this is due to the translation and writing style than poor writing per se, but I tend to disagree. Either way, I still give the books an overall :thumbup:
 
Dead or Alive - Tom Clancy - another great Jack Ryan book and certainly leaves the way open for sequel #??????

 
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Going to be starting "Dancing in the Glory of Monsters" by Jason Stearns very shortly. It's a book about the wars that have been going on in the DRC, Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda since 1996 and the millions of civilians who have been murdered, raped and made refugees by the groups all fighting for the riches of the region.

I've also just seen that the sequel to "The Passage" won't be out until 2012 and will be called "The Twelve". Anybody who's a fan of that book should be aware of this.

 
The Last Good Kiss, by James Crumley. Dennis Lehane and George Pelecanos both recommended this novel as inspirations for their own crime novels. I've seen multiple descriptions of Crumley as a mix between Chandler and Huntler S. Thompson, and I think that's apt. The first line of this novel is renowned and gives some insight into what he's all about:

When I finally caught up with Abraham Trahearne, he was drinking beer with an alcoholic bulldog named Fireball Roberts in a ramshackle joint just outside of Sonoma, California, drinking the heart right out of a fine spring afternoon.
Basically boozy hardboiled detective fiction with a poetic bent set in the dusty American West. There are some killer lines in this book, and the book's anti-hero, C.W. Sughrue, is a memorable character. Highly recommended. :towelwave:
I recently read a couple more Crumley P.I. novels - The Wrong Case and Dancing Bear. I'd recommend both to fans of gritty, boozy crime fiction. The Wrong Case is so booze-soaked as to be depressing, it's one of the most bleak depictions of alcoholism I've come across. Think Leaving Las Vegas. There's one very memorable passage that I'll include here:
Son, never trust a man who doesn't drink because he's probably a self-righteous sort, a man who thinks he knows right from wrong all the time. Some of them are good men, but in the name of goodness, they cause most of the suffering in the world. They're the judges, the meddlers.

And, son, never trust a man who drinks but refuses to get drunk. They're usually afraid of something deep down inside, either that they're a coward or a fool or mean and violent. You can't trust a man who's afraid of himself.

But sometimes, son, you can trust a man who occasionally kneels before a toilet. The chances are that he is learning something about humility and his natural human foolishness, about how to survive himself. It's damned hard for a man to take himself too seriously when he's heaving his guts into a dirty toilet bowl.
 
Read through the last two pages after a break, also highly recommend Lewis's "Liar's Poker", one of my favorites. I ended up finishing Devil in the White City, which was sort of up and down for me, and disturbed me more than I would like to admit.

Anyway, have started Game of Thrones and am about halfway through, very solid and will work my way through the series as time and interest allows. I'm bouncing between reading that Strauss's "The Game", which is actually pretty good so far. A Canticle for Leibewitz by Walter Miller is in the on-deck circle for when I finish one of those two, based on recommendations here.

 

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