What Are You Reading

[Vintage Betty]

The Fencing Master by Arturo Perez-Reverte

I'm about half way through and it's EXCELLENT so far.

Here's the synopsis, courtesy of Amazon:

The year is 1866 and revolution is brewing in Spain. The corrupt Bourbon queen, Isabella II, is slowly losing her grip on power as equally corrupt exiled politicians vie to be her successor in a new republic. Against this background of political upheaval, Don Jaime goes about his business, teaching a dying art to a dwindling number of students. This is a man who resists changing times; to a friend he explains, "I have spent my whole life trying to preserve a certain idea of myself, and that is all. You have to cling to a set of values that do not depreciate with time. Everything else is the fashion of the moment, fleeting, mutable. In a word, nonsense." But then Adela de Otero--a woman with a mysterious past and an amazing talent for swordplay--comes into his life, and Don Jaime's world is turned upside down. As always, P?©rez-Reverte offers literary excellence, a thumping good mystery, and fascinating insight into an arcane practice, in this case, fencing. Though the 19th-century politics in the book may resonate more with a Spanish audience than with English readers, the moral at the heart of The Fencing Master is universal: "to be honest, or at least honorable--anything, indeed, that has its roots in the word honor." In this, Don Jaime and Arturo P?©rez-Reverte both succeed

[blacklagoon]

I always have four books by my bedside,which i dip into regularily.they are mostly old books.here is my usual list:

1: bram stoker's dracula.
2: charles dickens - a christmas carol.
3: james malcolm rymer - varney the vampire: or the feast of blood.
4: film fun all star annual 1940 comic book.

The varney the vampire book is a modern printing,and complete.it is the thrift edition,and is massive and really heavy.i have to have a little table on my bed in order to read it.:)

[Martinis at 8]

The Fencing Master by Arturo Perez-Reverte

I'm about half way through and it's EXCELLENT so far...

All of his books are great! I've read them in both Spanish and English.

Cheers,

M8

[carebear]

The Fencing Master by Arturo Perez-Reverte

I'm about half way through and it's EXCELLENT so far.


All of his books are great! I've read them in both Spanish and English.

Cheers,

M8

I completely agree.

[Martinis at 8]

I've been reading and collecting the old series of pulp fiction novels known as The Saint by Leslie Charteris. These are really cool reads. The old TV series follows the novels fairly closely in most cases.

[Sunny]

I've been reading and collecting the old series of pulp fiction novels known as The Saint by Leslie Charteris. These are really cool reads. The old TV series follows the novels fairly closely in most cases.

Huzzah for the Saint! I haven't seen enough of the television show to offer much of an opinion, but there are some points that Roger Moore misses. George Sanders is closer... Enough of that, though - the books are fantastic. Check out the Saint_Fans (http://community.livejournal.com/saint_fans/) community for some more discussion, if you want. :eusa_clap

[LizzieMaine]

Revisiting another old favorite, "A Confederacy of Dunces," by John Kennedy Toole -- an epic of mid-20th-century New Orleans, stressing the advantages of theology, geometry, and a smoothly-functioning pyloric valve!

[Martinis at 8]

Huzzah for the Saint! I haven't seen enough of the television show to offer much of an opinion, but there are some points that Roger Moore misses. George Sanders is closer... Enough of that, though - the books are fantastic. Check out the Saint_Fans (http://community.livejournal.com/saint_fans/) community for some more discussion, if you want. :eusa_clap

Hey, thanks for the link.

I recently read The Last Playboy about Porfirio Rubirosa, so what's with Sanders knocking himself off in Barcelona? Sad.

M8

P.S. I'm in Houston.

[Vintage Betty]

Matinis and Saint:

What book of his should I read next?

Vintage Betty

[Martinis at 8]

Ma[r]tinis and Saint:

What book of his should I read next?

Vintage Betty

Here are the ones I have read over the years. I enjoyed them all, and have been a fan of The Saint since childhood.

Concerning the Saint
Saint Errant
The Saint in Europe
The Saint and Mr. Teal
The Saint and the Hapsburg Necklace*
The Saint and the Templar Treasure
Catch the Saint
Count on the Saint
Vendetta for the Saint.

I am currently reading The Saint to the Rescue. Keep in mind most of these books are compendiums.

I've recently completed all of Ian Fleming's Bond series. These are great also, but I rather prefer the work of Leslie Charteris.

Cheers,

M8

*P.S. Try this one if you have not read it yet.

[Vintage Betty]

Thanks Martinis! However, I just finished The Fencing Master by Arturo Perez-Reverte, and was wondering what book of that author you recommend I read next?

It was an excellent book.

Vintage Betty

[Martinis at 8]

Thanks Martinis! However, I just finished The Fencing Master by Arturo Perez-Reverte, and was wondering what book of that author you recommend I read next?

It was an excellent book.

Vintage Betty

The Club Dumas. This was made into a movie starring Johnny Depp, The Ninth Gate.

If you can't find The Club Dumas, then I would suggest The Flanders Panel.

Cheers,

M8

[vonwotan]

Couldn't agree more. The Club Dumas and The Flanders Panel are both terrific.


The Club Dumas. This was made into a movie starring Johnny Depp, The Ninth Gate.

If you can't find The Club Dumas, then I would suggest The Flanders Panel.

Cheers,

M8

[carebear]

"The Battle for Spain - The Spanish Civil War 1936-1939" Antony Beevor

Apparently translated from the Spanish and #1 on the bestseller list. Looks good.

[Orgetorix]

Leave it to Psmith, by P.G. Wodehouse.

[Sunny]

Here are the ones I have read over the years. I enjoyed them all, and have been a fan of The Saint since childhood.

Concerning the Saint
Saint Errant
The Saint in Europe
The Saint and Mr. Teal
The Saint and the Hapsburg Necklace*
The Saint and the Templar Treasure
Catch the Saint
Count on the Saint
Vendetta for the Saint.

I am currently reading The Saint to the Rescue. Keep in mind most of these books are compendiums.

I've recently completed all of Ian Fleming's Bond series. These are great also, but I rather prefer the work of Leslie Charteris.

Cheers,

M8

*P.S. Try this one if you have not read it yet.

Many of the later Saint books were written only partially by Mr. Charteris or wholly by someone else. The Hapsburg Necklace is one of these. It's a Saint story (which I read once many years ago), but not by Mr. Charteris. The wiki entry on Simon Templar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Templar) provides a wealth of very accurate information, including an exhaustive book list. Many of the books and collections have alternate titles.

I was introduced through the First Saint Omnibus, which has a excellent variety of all pre-war short stories and novellas. Enter the Saint has three excellent novellas, as does Featuring the Saint. I'm also very partial to The Saint Vs. Scotland Yard, or The Holy Terror. :eusa_clap

[LadyStardust]

Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman- I can't say I like his writing style, it just has no proper sense of "flow", and is very jumpy and all over the place. Hopefully it'll get better, seeing as everyone always raves about him. [huh]

[Helen Troy]

Leave it to Psmith, by P.G. Wodehouse.
Huzza for Wodehouse! It never gets old, allways makes me laugh!

[Martinis at 8]

...I'm also very partial to The Saint Vs. Scotland Yard, or The Holy Terror. :eusa_clap

I've been looking for that one. It's not in my collection yet. I've been getting various editions from used-book websites here in the US.

Next trip I make to London I will be scouring the bookshops at Charing Cross.

Cheers,

M8

[Orgetorix]

Huzza for Wodehouse! It never gets old, allways makes me laugh!

Here, here! I've read most or all of the Bertie Wooster stories, and I'm now working my way through his lesser-known works as I come across them.

[Sunny]

I've been looking for that one. It's not in my collection yet. I've been getting various editions from used-book websites here in the US.

Next trip I make to London I will be scouring the bookshops at Charing Cross.

Cheers,

M8

One of the three stories is in The First Saint Omnibus. The whole thing is the last "book" in the five-book volume of the Saint that was published in the early 1980s. A friend just picked it up for me at Half-Price Books. It's a very good introduction to the Saint, come to think of it, since they're all very early in the Saintly saga.

[Martinis at 8]

One of the three stories is in The First Saint Omnibus. The whole thing is the last "book" in the five-book volume of the Saint that was published in the early 1980s. A friend just picked it up for me at Half-Price Books. It's a very good introduction to the Saint, come to think of it, since they're all very early in the Saintly saga.

That's really cool we have some Saint fans here. I like to tell folks that I have patterned parts of my business model after him. I think the concepts of self-sovereignty that Simon Templar portrays are much more exciting than those of James Bond - a mere civil servant, who has a boss that berates him.

Cheers,

M8

[mikepara]

I'm reading 'A wodehouse Companion' by Richard Usborne it seems like it's going to be good.

I've got Cricket with the Kangaroo by C.F. Mc Cleary (Ashes) 1950 waiting in the wings.

I've never read any of the Saint books, the stupid TV show put me off I think. Though the Volvo he had was nice.

[Sunny]

That's really cool we have some Saint fans here. I like to tell folks that I have patterned parts of my business model after him. I think the concepts of self-sovereignty that Simon Templar portrays are much more exciting than those of James Bond - a mere civil servant, who has a boss that berates him.


All three of my brothers are now Saint fans, thanks to me. ;) The youngest one (just now 17, and quite mature and responsible) has really gotten into it, to the point of using the haloed stickman everywhere and telling all his friends how he himself IS the Saint. The scary thing is that he's perfectly capable of being just as Saintly as Simon Templar when he wants to be. :eusa_clap


I've never read any of the Saint books, the stupid TV show put me off I think. Though the Volvo he had was nice.

I haven't seen enough of the show to pass a blanket judgment on the whole thing. (I am WAY too critical by nature, and I'm making a big effort to be kind. :D) But in my opinion, the books are far far FAR better than the show. The George Sanders movies are pretty fantastic as well. Not perfectly on target, but very good.

[Martinis at 8]

...I've never read any of the Saint books, the stupid TV show put me off I think. Though the Volvo he had was nice.

Hey Para,

Airborne Ranger here (early 80's).

You are correct, the later series were a bit much. However, the early black & white shows were quite enjoyable. They are available now in DVD from A&E.

I find the pulp fiction crime genre quite enjoyable for my airplane reading. Much better than heavy reading stuff for inflight diversion.

Cheers,

M8

[Diamondback]

...James Bond - a mere civil servant, who has a boss that berates him.

Yeah, but if you read Fleming's novels, it seemed to me like M only rags on Bond because he's the best agent in the Service, and is like a son to him. (IIRC, Bond was one of M's--Admiral Sir Miles Messervy--Navy subordinates before joining the Dark Side...)

Is Charteris' work still in print?

[DanielJones]

Currently working on the series of Dirk Pitt Adventures by Clive Cussler.

Cheers!

Dan

[Martinis at 8]

Yeah, but if you read Fleming's novels, it seemed to me like M only rags on Bond because he's the best agent in the Service, and is like a son to him. (IIRC, Bond was one of M's--Admiral Sir Miles Messervy--Navy subordinates before joining the Dark Side...)

Is Charteris' work still in print?

Yes, you are correct, and Bond is good, especially in the novels. My favorite is TSWLM. Though Fleming would probably say it was his least favorite. I also like Moonraker, where Bond DOES NOT get the girl. As for the movie franchise, I am very glad that CR is moving the franchise in the right direction.

No, Charteris' work is no longer in print. He started his Saint series in the early 30's. The Fleming novels, however, have just been released again by Penguin (originally from the early 50's). Nice art deco covers on the new release. I'll comment on why I like Simon Templar better from a business role model standpoint in a separate thread.

About your Avatar: We need to start another thread sometime on the merits of Mac versus Volckmann. Much to debate re PI.

I'm not really a vintage dresser, but it is so cool how people here are into literature and history.

Cheers,

M8

[farnham54]

Currently updated my poker library, and so I'm hacking my way though that:

Mike Caro's Book of Tells
Doyle Brunson's Super System 1 and 2

Cheers
Craig

[Harp]

Revisiting another old favorite, "A Confederacy of Dunces," by John Kennedy Toole -- an epic of mid-20th-century New Orleans, stressing the advantages of theology, geometry, and a smoothly-functioning pyloric valve!


An excellent book; all the more so because of its author's
unfortunate end.:(

[Harp]

I'm reading 'A wodehouse Companion' by Richard Usborne it seems like it's going to be good.

I've got Cricket with the Kangaroo by C.F. Mc Cleary (Ashes) 1950 waiting in the wings.

I've never read any of the Saint books, the stupid TV show put me off I think. Though the Volvo he had was nice.


...hey Mike, who's that Leg in your avatar? ;)

[mikepara]

...hey Mike, who's that Leg in your avatar? ;)

A right grouchy old get!:rolleyes: Oh I forgot! the off topic sign! grin

[Harp]

Columba Marmion; Maria Faustina Kowalska; and Boethius. :)

[Vintage Betty]

And the book is about????

[Mike1939]

I just started reading Officers and Gentlemen by Evelyn Waugh. Its the second in his trilogy set during WW2. I enjoyed the first book tremendously (Men at Arms) and this one seems just as good so far.

[Nathan Dodge]

Lee Server's Robert Mitchum bio, Baby, I Don't Care. What a fun read! Lots of hell-raising tales. Mitchum was one interesting guy, and quite possibly the coolest person who ever lived...(Duke Ellington would be second.)

[Sweet Polly Purebred]

Just finished John Fante's "Brotherhood Of The Grape" .. a fantastic read .. vivid and tender and still rough enough around the edges.

[Harp]

And the book is about????


Marmion's Christ, The Ideal of the Priest, is a theological
testament; while St Maria Faustina Kowalska's Diary is both
a personal narrative and mystical revelation; Boethius' tragic memoir,
The Consolation of Philosophy, falls toward mysticism. Both
Faustina Kowalska and Boethius adorn their respective texts with
beautiful elegiac poetry similar to the mystical verse of St John of the Cross.

[Helen Troy]

"East of Eden", Steinbeck. I have read it, or so i thought, about five times. The really embarrassing thing is that the edition I own is not clearly marked with "Volume 1" so I never knew it was in two volumes! (Yes, I know, stupid me!:eusa_doh: ) Well, now I have even more to look forward to than the other times i have re-read it: I really wonder what happens in volume two.

[RedPop4]

The Sanctuary Sparrow by Ellis Peters

[Joie DeVive]

"No, Why Kids -of All Ages- Need to Hear It and Ways Parents Can Say It"

I also recommend "Last Child in the Woods" to parents and teachers. It's about how children need nature and unstructured play time. Very interesting.

[Marc Chevalier]

A book called The Great Theft: Wrestling Islam from the Extremists. It's a warning about how the puritannical Wahabi sect of Islam has been messing things up in the Middle East and North Africa for more than two centuries ... and is now seriously messing up all of Islam, not to mention the world, by throwing nearly 1,500 years of Muslim legal/scholastic/theological debate into the trash ... and then claiming to be the source of all "true knowledge."


Interestingly, the book is written by Dr. Khaled Abou El Fadl, one of the world's foremost Islamic legal/theological scholars, the Muslim version of a "super rabbi." A law and theology professor at UCLA, Dr. El Fadl is also a staunch and outspoken moderate, which has earned him death threats (and worse) from extremist Muslims.


Here are some reader reviews of the book: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/customer-reviews/0060563397/ref=cm_cr_dp_2_1/002-9715995-3906431?ie=UTF8&customer-reviews.sort%5Fby=-SubmissionDate&n=283155


.

[warbird]

A book called The Great Theft. It's a warning about how the extremist Wahabi sect of Islam has been messing things up in the Middle East and North Africa for more than two centuries ... and is now seriously messing up all of Islam, not to mention the world.


Interestingly, the book is written by one of the world's foremost Islamic legal/theological scholars, the Muslim version of a "super rabbi." A law and theology professor at UCLA, he is also a staunch and outspoken moderate, which has earned him death threats (and worse) from extremist Muslims.


.


I will have to pick that up. I find the history of the middle east to be fascinating. I have read others' writings on this and would like to read his.

[Marc Chevalier]

I met him at a lecture once. His knowledge and bravery are really impressive. Dr. El Fadl has survived two assassination attempts (by extremist Muslims), has police protection, and is more outspoken than ever.


He's also a big supporter of eliminating Islam's suppression of women, pointing out that in the 13th century, some of the faith's most respected legal/theological treatises were written by women scholars, who had their own schools and followings. Dr. El Fadl argues that Muslim extremists conveniently ignore such historical facts, choosing instead to invent their own "history."


.

[Parallel Guy]

Reading Brainwash by Dominic Streatfeild. Really pretty disturbing. It follows the history of brainwashing from the 1950s on. Covers MI5, CIA, USSR, Korea, and even cults, subliminals (not too effective, apparently), and psychiatric treatments.

[Warlock]

The Lost and the Lurking, by Manly Wade Wellman. A tale of Silver John, a troubador who travels the mountains searching for the old songs. The time is shortly after the Korean War. John, a veteran of that conflict, travels the backwoods and deals with supernatural evil.

[Mike1939]

I'm about half way through Out of Africa by Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen). It contains a wealth of information about the the colonist, natives and envirorment in Kenya from 1914-1931. Unlike the movie, which I enjoyed, the book does not read like a romance but like a insightful journal of a excellent writer and adventuress who has a great passion for her surrondings.

[Pink Dahlia]

Ender's Game

[MrNewportCustom]

I'm currently reading, Cary Grant: A Celebration of Style.


Lee

[Jovan]

I need to look that up and see if my library has it.

[ScionPI2005]

I'm currently reading sue Grafton's S is for Silence. I'm a big fan of hers, and find some of the techniques in her books truly apply to real life.

For those on here, do you recommend the Dresden Files? I've heard of that series, and it does sound very intriguing...but I have yet to actually try myself.

[LadyStardust]

On a guilt trip with reading Confessions of a Shopaholic...a.ka. my autobiography!lol lol lol lol lol

[Gary Crumrine]

Friends,

I'm reading Against the Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk, by Peter L. Bernstein. As you probably know, it's the history of insurance and is actually more interesting than one might think.

Cordially,
Gary

[52Styleline]

Billy Boyle : A WWII Mystery
by: James R. Benn

Here is a review

Billy Boyle is a Boston cop, from a family of Boston cops, but a reluctant soldier who prefers walking the beat in Southie to fighting Nazis. Using her cousin by marriage, a certain General Eisenhower, Billy's mother lands her son a seemingly soft job with Ike's staff in London. But Ike wants Billy to use his investigative know-how to sniff out a possible spy in the Allies' inner circle. Young Billy, is definitely in over his head, especially when it turns out that the apparent suicide of a Norwegian dignitary may have been the work of the spy. Benn has a tantalizing premise here, but he doesn't quite deliver on it: his prose slips into wartime cliches a little too often, and the supporting love story reeks of WWII melodrama. Yet the action builds to a suspenseful climax, and there is even a hint of moral ambiguity in the wrap-up. A not entirely satisfactory debut, then, but Ken Follett fans will want to give Billy and his uncle a chance to develop.

[carebear]

Friends,

I'm reading Against the Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk, by Peter L. Bernstein. As you probably know, it's the history of insurance and is actually more interesting than one might think.

Cordially,
Gary

Fantastic book! :eusa_clap

[Martinis at 8]

I'm currently reading, Cary Grant: A Celebration of Style.


Lee

This is a good book. I watched To Catch a Thief and North by Northwest back-to-back immediately after finishing the book.

I am currently reading Empire Express. It is a history book about the transcontinental railroad. I find it much more in depth than Ambrose's version Nothing Like it in the World.

M8

[Dr Doran]

The Athenian Empire Restored by H. Mattingly. Extremely technical set of articles from about 40 years collected in one large 85 dollar volume. He is rewriting the history of the Athenian empire (478 - 404 BC) by redating extant inscriptions. His revisionist view makes the post-Periclean, Cleonic era one of a less kind, less gentle empire, as would be expected from reading Thucyides and Diodorus Siculus cross-referenced with passages from Aristophanes. It requires many cross-checkings of inscriptions. The older view is represented in the highly readable and still recommended (although it needs great revision in the light of these re-datings) The Athenian Empire by Russell Meiggs. Or just read at least the first of Donald Kagan's four-volume masterwork on the Peloponnesian War which is perfect for the (very interested and very hardworking) non-expert. (You'll become an expert by the time you get through the quartet.)

[Helen Troy]

"The pastures of heaven", John Steinbeck. I love Steinbeck, and have a personal project going right now to read all of his books I can find at the library.
After that, I'll do the same with Graham Green, my other favorite writer.

Oh, and "Death is a lonely business" by Ray Bradbury. Science fiction writer goes crime noir. I like it so far!

[Rosie]

Two Thousand Season by Ayi Kweh Armah

and

The Spirit of Intimacy: Ancient African Teachings in the Ways of Relationships by Sobonfu Some

[Lancealot]

For those on here, do you recommend the Dresden Files? I've heard of that series, and it does sound very intriguing...but I have yet to actually try myself.

Great series. I have read all of them except White Night which just came out.

[ScionPI2005]

Thanks for the thumbs up Lacealot. I'll have to add those to my list of "to reads", assuming I ever get the time!

[Fleur De Guerre]

Batman: Year 100 by Paul Pope.

[Nick D]

"Medieval Europe: A Short History", 9th edition, by C. Warren Hollister and Judith M. Bennett. Rereading, actually.

[RIOT]

With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa by E.B. Sledge

[John in Covina]

Helen Troy: John Steinbeck. I love Steinbeck, and have a personal project going right now to read all of his books I can find at the library.

I like Steinbeck and favor "The Log of the Sea of Cortez" then "Cannery Row" and "Of Mice and Men" followed by Grapes and The Moon is Down.

He has a way with words that speak to my soul.

[Helen Troy]

I have not read "The Log of the Sea of Cortez" yet, I hope my library has it. "Of mice and men" is very good, but so sad I only read it once. I love his light-hearted books like "Cannery Row" and the one about the lazy men. (Can't remember the english name.) "The moon is down" is a strange one. Steinbeck is not familiar with Norway and does some basic faults in describing the community. But I think he understands the resistance in Norway better than most Norwegian writes!

Oh, I can't pick a favorite. Just love that writer, and his characters.

[DeeDub]

I'm about 5 chapters into The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisberger.

I wouldn't likely read a novel about a women's fashion magazine. While browsing through the bookstore, I picked this one up and just read a few paragraphs and was immediately engaged by the style and wit.

[K.D. Lightner]

Finished three Josephine Tey mysteries, The Man in the Queue, The Singing Sands, and Brat Farrar. The latter was such a good book. I enjoyed it so much that I actually miss it.

Taking a break from Tey (I have two more of hers to read) so am now reading Berendt's The City of Falling Angels, about Venice. He is the author of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, which was so good, I actually wanted to live in Savannah.

karol

[Miss Lucy June]

A Packaging Science text book. Yes, I am studying the science of boxes. Oh the joy.

[Harp]

Revisiting Augustine's City of God; and Plato's Republic.

[Diamondback]

A Packaging Science text book. Yes, I am studying the science of boxes. Oh the joy.

Oh, OUCH! At least my Global Business class let me focus more on the methods of getting containers (specifically, the big intermodal Conexes) from place to place, instead of sweating the small stuff inside the Conex.

Thank God I left my Business major behind years ago! My sympathies...

Right now, my read of choice is a swarm of Web printouts about the various ship designs built for the U.S. Maritime Commission during WWII... there's just something about a battered, rusty old tramp freighter...

[DavidVillaJr]

I really enjoy threads like these, I always discover new books to adventure through.

Currently I am re-re-reading Gavin Menzies' "1421 The Year China Discovered America".

From the back cover:

On March 8, 1421, the largest fleet the world had ever seen set sail from China. Its mission was "to proceed all teh way to the ends of the earth to collect tribute from the barbarians beyond the seas" and unite the whole world in Confucian harmony.

When it returned in October 1423, the emperor had fallen, leaving China in political and economic chaos. The great ships were left to rot at their moorings and the records of their journeys were destroyed. Lost in China's long, self-imposed isolation that followed was the knowledge that Chinese ships had reached America seventy years before Columbus and had circumnavigated the globe a century before Magellan. Also concealed was how the Chinese colonized America before the Europeans and transplanted in America and other countries the principal economic crops that have fed and clothed the world.

Unveiling incontrovertible evidence of these astonishing voyages, 1421 rewrites our understanding of history. Our knowledge of world exploration as it has been commonly accepted for centuries must now be reconceived due to this landmark work of historical investigation.


Me again - It is a really engaging and fascinating read. It gets you thinking about history, and offers some compelling evidence for his thesis.

Highly recommended:eusa_clap


website: http://www.1421.tv

[AlanC]

Commodore Hornblower, by C.S. Forester

[Jay]

I'm onto The Rum Diary again. It's by Hunter S. Thompson, but it was written when he was 22 almost in the style of Hemingway. I finished it in 3 days, my friend in 2 and I think I'll read it again by time summer is over.

Back Description:
Begun in 1959 by a then-twenty-two-year-old Hunter S. Thompson, The Rum Diary is a brilliantly tangled love story of jealousy, treachery and violent alcoholic lust in the Caribbean boomtown that was San Juan, Puerto Rico, in the late 1950s. Exuberant and mad, youthful and energetic, The Rum Diary is an outrageous, drunken romp in the spirit of Thompson's bestselling Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Hell's Angels.

[berrybuzz]

I'm about 5 chapters into The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisberger.

I wouldn't likely read a novel about a women's fashion magazine. While browsing through the bookstore, I picked this one up and just read a few paragraphs and was immediately engaged by the style and wit.

Same here! that's too funny. I remembered there was a movie (which I haven't seen) and so I picked up the book and started to read and had to buy it!

I'm also about halfway through Thank You for Smoking...book is in my car so I don't have the author's name right on hand.

[AlanC]

I'm also about halfway through Thank You for Smoking...book is in my car so I don't have the author's name right on hand.

Christopher Buckley, William F. Buckley's son.

[Baron Kurtz]

. . . the adult in me picks up the slack.

Approaching page 700 of Bleak House. As expected it's an amazing overview of London life circa 1850 and a powerful indictment of the justice system - which, sadly, hasn't changed much though it is a little better these days. And as expected it contains all the best (the ebullient, flamboyant, comic male characters approaching middle age) and all the worst - the faultless females and blameless poor - of Dickens's characterisation.

All in all a very satisfying read, though quite daunting to begin with.

bk

[Kimberly]

I am currently reading Angela's Ashes. I have never read it before because I heard what a depressing book it was and didn't think I could bear it. It is an excellent book but I have had to put it down a couple of times because some parts are so sad. I highly recommend it though.

[Kimberly]

Same here! that's too funny. I remembered there was a movie (which I haven't seen) and so I picked up the book and started to read and had to buy it!

I'm also about halfway through Thank You for Smoking...book is in my car so I don't have the author's name right on hand.

I loved the Devil Wears Prada. Another good series of books if you like humor are the Advertures of a Shopaholic books. They are so funny that I actually laugh out loud. lol . I think the reason I love them so much is because she rationalizes her purchases the same way I do. ;)

[LadyStardust]

. . . the adult in me picks up the slack.

Approaching page 700 of Bleak House. As expected it's an amazing overview of London life circa 1850 and a powerful indictment of the justice system - which, sadly, hasn't changed much though it is a little better these days. And as expected it contains all the best (the ebullient, flamboyant, comic male characters approaching middle age) and all the worst - the faultless females and blameless poor - of Dickens's characterisation.

All in all a very satisfying read, though quite daunting to begin with.

bk

I'm looking to line that one up after I get through with my own rather frightening undertaking, as I've heard nothing but raves about the mini-series adapted from it, and I want to get through the novel first so I can make a proper critique. My own task--no,it really is quite a pleasure, is George Eliot's Middlemarch. Oh, she has the most beautiful vocabulary I think I've ever encountered, and the scenes she weaves! :) It's a joy to go to.

[Harp]

Eliot's Daniel Deronda is worth a look. :)

[berrybuzz]

I loved the Devil Wears Prada. Another good series of books if you like humor are the Advertures of a Shopaholic books. They are so funny that I actually laugh out loud. lol . I think the reason I love them so much is because she rationalizes her purchases the same way I do. ;)

I've read her non-shopaholic book. Don't recall the name but I liked it (Undomesticated Goddess or something like that)
I would've read the shopaholic series but I could never figure out which book was the first book, but then I didn't take much time on the matter (I hate series that aren't clearly labeled as to their order).

[AlanC]

My wife loves the Shopaholic books.

[Barry]

I'm onto The Rum Diary again.

I read that a couple of years ago and I really enjoyed it. Like you, I read it quickly. It was hard to put down.

I usually don't keep up with new movie releases but it looks like it's in production....

Barry

[Kimberly]

I've read her non-shopaholic book. Don't recall the name but I liked it (Undomesticated Goddess or something like that)
I would've read the shopaholic series but I could never figure out which book was the first book, but then I didn't take much time on the matter (I hate series that aren't clearly labeled as to their order).

It goes like this

1. Confessions of a Shopaholic
2. Shopaholic Takes Manhattan
3. Shopaholic Ties the Knot
4. Shopaholic and Sister
6. Shopaholic and Baby (I have not reat this yet). I am too cheap to buy it in hardcover ;)

[Diamondback]

For some reason, right now I'm back to a childhood favorite of my own that ultimately inspired a college research-paper and an infiltration of Boeing Wichita to crash the B-52 50th Anniversary party, Dale Brown's Flight of the Old Dog.

[Harp]

Found a battered copy of Wuthering Heights this week. :)

[Lancealot]

I'm half way through The Rule Of Four. Kind of a cross between The DaVinci Code and The Name Of The Rose.

[Orgetorix]

I'm working through Paris 1919 by Margaret MacMillan, about the Paris Peace Conference that produced the Treaty of Versailles.

http://ap.grolier.com/images/cache/127/po003.jpg
The Big Four in Paris--British PM David Lloyd-George, Italian PM Vittorio Orlando, French PM Georges Clemenceau, and US president Woodrow Wilson.

[carebear]

I'm working through Paris 1919 by Margaret MacMillan, about the Paris Peace Conference that produced the Treaty of Versailles.

(riffing on beer commercial)

...AND World War Two. Can your Peace Conference do that? :D

Clemenceau looks like they put a walrus in a suit for the photo. :p

[Orgetorix]

(riffing on beer commercial)

...AND World War Two. Can your Peace Conference do that? :D


From the foreword by Richard Holbrooke:


In the headline version of history, the road from the Hall of Mirrors to the German invasion of Poland only twenty years later is usually presented as a straight line. But as MacMillan forcefully demonstrates, this widely accepted view of history distorts the nature of the decisions made in Paris and minimizes the importance of actions taken in the intervening years.


...MacMillan corrects the widely held view that thre reparations payments impose by the victors were so onerous as to have caused the wreck of the German economy that paved the way for Hitler.

Part of the reason I'm reading this book is that I completely, utterly, and totally botched a paper on Hitler's rise to power in a college Western History class. I think I got a C minus or a D. Since I apparently didn't understand the subject then, I thought it would be nice to try and remedy that situation now. :rolleyes:

[Jay]

I'm reading the latest issue of Weird NJ right now. There is a lot of strange stuff unique to New Jersey. Abandoned amusement parks, cold war missile silos filled with rocks with housing developments sitting on top of them, strange smells, caves, abandoned cars in the woods, Bigfoot sightings, everything. It's... weird.

[RedPop4]

Still Cadfael....An Excellent Mystery. Over the last week, I read Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban all for the very first time.

[Harp]

From the foreword by Richard Holbrooke:





Part of the reason I'm reading this book is that I completely, utterly, and totally botched a paper on Hitler's rise to power in a college Western History class. I think I got a C minus or a D. Since I apparently didn't understand the subject then, I thought it would be nice to try and remedy that situation now. :rolleyes:


...viel gluck mit dis mein freund. :)

[Orgetorix]

...viel gluck mit dis mein freund. :)

Danke sch??n.

[Marc Chevalier]

Und Gesundheit!

.

[LizzieMaine]

"The Lindbergh Case," by criminology professor/former FBI agent Jim Fisher -- a definitive study of the Crime of the Century, drawing on the full archive of evidence held by the New Jersey State Archives. An excellent counterweight to the slew of conspiracy-theory books about the case, and proof positive that my ex-brother-in-law's dad, despite his claims and despite his webbed toes, is *not* the Lindbergh Baby.

[Nick D]

Finished Hollister and Bennett, now I'm on "Western Europe in the Middle Ages: 300-1475" by Brian Tierney.

[Kimberly]

Ti's by Frank McCourt

[Harp]

Ti's by Frank McCourt



Ah, there's a good lass! :)

[pretty faythe]

I read a great deal, occasionally some how something with substance finds it way into my arms at the thrift store when I am picking up books. But I must confess usually its dime novel romance. Give me a historic, vampire, warewolf, time travel book any day. If I am in a grind my nails suspence scare me in a pyschotic mental way, I'll find a Koontz or King book to read.

But like I said, occasionally things with substance will find there way in my goody bag. Johnathon Livingston Seagul, The Freat Dialogs of Plato.

I also have a habit of reading a couple books at the same time.

[Harp]

My high school Alumni Review, which a nephew has gifted.
Nice to see I'm still the class black sheep-prodigal-rebel. lol

[Mike1939]

Just finished reading, Whose Body?, Dorothy L. Sayers first book published in 1923. I really enjoyed it. I may even like her detective Lord Peter Wimsey better than Agatha Christie's, Poirot. Although the jury still out on that one.

[Steve]

Kim, by Rudyard Kipling.

What an amazing book.

[Midnight Palace]

The last book I finished was "Howard Hughes: The Untold Story", which I thought was fantastic!!! I've started on "Desilu: The story of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz" but kind of put it down for awhile, not because it's bad, I'm just taking a break.

[Polka Dot]

North & South, by Elizabeth Gaskell

[woodyinnyc]

I just finished Abundance by Sena Jeter Naslund, an historical fiction of the life of Marie Antoinette, and have started The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy.

[Sunny]

Just finished reading, Whose Body?, Dorothy L. Sayers first book published in 1923. I really enjoyed it. I may even like her detective Lord Peter Wimsey better than Agatha Christie's, Poirot. Although the jury still out on that one.

Good job! Make sure you read them in order. Sayers and Christie are both experts. Christie's biggest skills were in plotting and revealing the mysteries themselves and in her terrific dialogue and character sketching. Sayers' mysteries are just as complicated and well-planned, but the action is more character-driven. As you'll know from reading Whose Body? her emphasis isn't on the who done it, but on how it comes untangled and the effects it has on the people concerned. Her characters are amazing. I have read all of their books many times - and there's just no comparing Poirot and Lord Peter. They're so different!

[Mike1939]

Good job! Make sure you read them in order. Sayers and Christie are both experts. Christie's biggest skills were in plotting and revealing the mysteries themselves and in her terrific dialogue and character sketching. Sayers' mysteries are just as complicated and well-planned, but the action is more character-driven. As you'll know from reading Whose Body? her emphasis isn't on the who done it, but on how it comes untangled and the effects it has on the people concerned. Her characters are amazing. I have read all of their books many times - and there's just no comparing Poirot and Lord Peter. They're so different!

I just got Sayers second book, Clouds of Witness in the mail today and can't wait to start it. The only thing keeping from doing so is that I'm in the middle of Christie's Murder on the Orient Express. :)

[Novella]

I just finished Nightmare Alley by William Lindsay Gresham (amazing! gripping!), and will probably be heading for a reread of Rider Haggard's King Solomon Mines next since it's part of a final exam I have Saturday.


North & South, by Elizabeth Gaskell

Oooo, I read that last year and really enjoyed it. How do you like it so far?

[Sunny]

I just got Sayers second book, Clouds of Witness in the mail today and can't wait to start it. The only thing keeping from doing so is that I'm in the middle of Christie's Murder on the Orient Express. :)

Ah, both very good. Clouds of Witnesses is one of my special favorites.

Thanks to PaperBackSwap.com (www.paperbackswap.com) I received four books by Alistair MacLean in yesterday's mail. Needless to say I spent several hours last night immersed in The Secret Ways, which hits the ground running :eek: , and read several more chapters on the way to work this morning.

[Parallel Guy]

Just finished Up Front by Bill Mauldin. If you want to know what the regular GI thought in WWII, you could do worse than read this. Plus it's short (228 pages). Plus his cartoons are wonderfully sardonic.

[thunderw21]

Animal Farm
My second time, I love that book.

I too finished Up Front recently, I have a 1946 first edition copy of it. :) Great read as well.

[brylcreem boy]

I need to stop messing around on the computer and read more books.[/QUOTE]

Amen to the above! I am actually reading a book for work right now. 1st book I've read in about a year. The Title is... "It's Your Ship" by Captain D. Michael Abrashoff, former commander of the USS Benfold. It's pretty good stuff so far. This guy clearly shows that the American Military understands leadership better than most business corporations, It's definitely all about grass-roots leadership. Something I think needs to be more commonplace in today's business.

[Harp]

Willa Cather's My Antonia.

[thunderw21]

Willa Cather's My Antonia.

Ah, I started that about a month ago but the going is slow. :o

[Polka Dot]

Oooo, I read that last year and really enjoyed it. How do you like it so far?

I love it, though it's making me procrastinate on two seminar papers I have yet to finish. The only thing I don't like, though quite common in books from the 19th century, is Gaskell's phonetic rendering of the Milton dialect. I just can't stand it when authors do this; I wish they'd content thsemselves with diction, rhythm, and the occasional apostrophe. On the other hand, Gaskell doesn't even approach Margaret Mitchell on this score, so I'm coping.

Overall, though, fantastic book. :)

[Harp]

Ah, I started that about a month ago but the going is slow. :o


Cather, like Crane, is an author who ventured too far past personal
experience to be embraced; yet her talent cannot be denied. She's not
at the level of the Bronte sisters, of course, but she has her moments,
and Antonia is rightly credited her masterpiece. :)

[Cousin Hepcat]

Been trying lots of new things recently; coworkers suggested I'd enjoy reading more classic mystery.

Found this page off Wikipedia's "Mystery Fiction" page to be a most promising guide: mainly because it identifies schools of different styles of mystery, for a broad sampling of every kind:

Guide to Classic Mystery and Detection (http://members.aol.com/MG4273/classics.htm) (don't know if this has already been posted)


Besides random samplings of whatever "feels good", starting with these, reccomended by coworkers:

- Poe's "Murders in the Rue Morgue" (1841)
- Ellery Queen (Dannay & Lee) "The Roman Hat Mystery" (1929)
- Georges Simenon: whichever I get my hands on first- Trois chambres ?† Manhattan, Maigret ?† New York, or Maigret se f?¢che (1946-47)

[Rosie]

Sacred Woman: A guide to Healing the Feminine Body, Mind and Spirit by Queen Afua

Sticks, Stones, Roots and Bones by Stephanie Bird (I began reading this earlier but put it down for another book)

Re-reading, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston

[Harp]

The Ghosts of Hopewell by James Fisher.

[Phil]

On The Road by Jack Kerouac

[K.D. Lightner]

Just finished Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking. A heavyweight, but I find her writing addictive.

After all that heavy grief stuff, think I will read an Evanovich mystery.

karol

[Harp]

Joanie strikes again, huh? lol

[Lotus Leroux]

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith

[Sunny]

I just finished four new-to-me Alistair MacLean books in three days:


The Secret Ways
Night Without End
The Black Shrike
Golden Rendezvous


That man could really spin a tale and write. Wow.

[Harp]

Moliere's The Misanthrope.

[Dutch McCoy]

I just finished Live and Let Die by Ian Flemming and I am about to start Moonraker. I am not sure why I am suddenly into the James Bond books but I am. Pretty good reads, too. I would suggest reading them in chronological order. There really is a lot of continuity.

[Dan G]

I just finished four new-to-me Alistair MacLean books in three days:


The Secret Ways
Night Without End
The Black Shrike
Golden Rendezvous


That man could really spin a tale and write. Wow.

Boy I love Alistair MacLean's books! What a storyteller! I wish he had been my story telling grandfather.lol

[Sunny]

Boy I love Alistair MacLean's books! What a storyteller! I wish he had been my story telling grandfather.lol

Dang, that would've been amazing! And I'm SO glad to know I'm not alone in this appreciation. I just wish his later stuff had been better.

[Harp]

Allan Bloom's The Closing of The American Mind.

[Zig2k143]

I'm reading all these posts on The Fedora Lounge.

[Dr Doran]

Allan Bloom's The Closing of The American Mind.

I found this book very accurate and very prescient. He wrote it in the late 1980s, I believe, and he correctly predicted a few trends that became absolutely huge in the subsequent years. Berkeley in the early 2000s is exactly the way he predicted down to every single detail without a single exception. I know a lot of people gave him a hard time for a couple of things. Some people said he was "hard on the brothers." I think this is complete nonsense. What he was pointing out is that blacks have self-segregated; he also opposed the idea that universities are "racist" (perhaps the most overused word in the American lexicon today). However, black intellectuals such as Thomas Sowell and John McWhorter agree with him in all his major points, as I read them. Some complete idiots call Bloom a sexist. I think this is absolutely nonsensical. In his point about whether men in today's world will be willing to marry feminists, he was quite precognizant. Marriage rates have gone down and have been low since the early 1970s. In some people's lights, any critique of orthodox feminism is tantamount to sexism. This is a dangerous point of view. An interesting side note is that he was gay; this is not mentioned in the book. He took his money from the book and spent it on the high life in Paris. I think the hatred this book generated is only due to the closed mind of many intellectuals in the mainstream of academia, the kind of people Bloom excoriates in this remarkable book. I don't agree with all of it; I am not a Friedmanite free market follower as Bloom seems to be. But I don't need to agree with a book to think it is important or to appreciate it. Bloom bucked a lot of trends in writing this and caught a lot of flak and he was brave to do this.

[Serial Hero]

The Maltese Falcon

[Harp]

I don't agree with all of it; I am not a Friedmanite free market follower as Bloom seems to be. But I don't need to agree with a book to think it is important or to appreciate it. Bloom bucked a lot of trends in writing this and caught a lot of flak and he was brave to do this.

I first read Closing while in grad school. One of my philosophy
profs; whom I often antagonized, was a chief critic of Bloom's, so
I had a ringside seat around the snake pit.... I tried to catch Bloom on
campus and student dives in Hyde Park, but his peripatetic nature proved
too elusive. He was prescient and controversial, and perhaps overly
infatuated with Nobel laureate icons; yet his advice to the budding scholar
is without doubt, priceless.

[Dr Doran]

I first read Closing while in grad school. One of my philosophy
profs; whom I often antagonized, was a chief critic of Bloom's, so
I had a ringside seat around the snake pit.... I tried to catch Bloom on
campus and student dives in Hyde Park, but his peripatetic nature proved
too elusive. He was prescient and controversial, and perhaps overly
infatuated with Nobel laureate icons; yet his advice to the budding scholar
is without doubt, priceless.

It is the precognizant nature of his analysis of the trends of the academy that impresses me the most.

[Harp]

It is the precognizant nature of his analysis of the trends of the academy that impresses me the most.


The astigmatism that Bloom clearly perceived later focused upon campus
speech, which tore the more moderate progressive soul; while an interesting
facet to the baccalaureate core revision saw a deliberate trend toward
correcting this laxity, to construct admittance barrier against previous
affirmative entrance policy without issuing a more formal repeal.
At the University of Illinois-Chicago, this action was officially directed
toward the city public school system-which ideally was to have been a
feeder of properly prepared students. Bloom's critique of the "Cornell"
experiment, and resultant campus segregation was therefore proven valid.
A sad note to the Emersonian dictum about temporal give-and-take.

[Orgetorix]

I'm reading Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card.

[beaucaillou]

Just finished 'The Perks of Being a Wallflower,' by Stephen Chbosky.

It's a dead sweet book... really lovely and precious. In the vein of 'A Separate Peace,' and other coming of age books. A teriffically enjoyable, warm read.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Chbosky

[Harp]

Just finished 'The Perks of Being a Wallflower,' by Stephen Chbosky.

It's a dead sweet book... really lovely and precious. In the vein of 'A Separate Peace,' and other coming of age books. A teriffically enjoyable, warm read.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Chbosky


I thought Knowles' A Separate Peace a much better treatment of
adolescence than Sallinger's angst-filled The Catcher in the Rye.
I'll look for Wallflower. :)

[beaucaillou]

I thought Knowles' A Separate Peace a much better treatment of
adolescence than Sallinger's angst-filled The Catcher in the Rye.
I'll look for Walflower. :)

Hey Harp!

That's almost fightin' words for me, 'cause I'm such a Salinger obsessionist. ;) I actually think Knowles' effort is far more coming-of-age than Catcher, which to me is more about madness and depression than coming-of-age, but that's arguable. You can definitely survey the space between those two books by reading Perks/Wallflower. Another book I'd loosely throw into this category is Donna Tartt's, The Secret History, which is like Catcher with more intrigue. Some brilliant moments of writing though.

Please let me know if you read Wallflower. I do highly recommend it.

Cheers!

[Harp]

Hey Harp!

That's almost fightin' words for me, 'cause I'm such a Salinger obsessionist. ;) I actually think Knowles' effort is far more coming-of-age than Catcher, which to me is more about madness and depression than coming-of-age, but that's arguable. You can definitely survey the space between those two books by reading Perks/Wallflower. Another book I'd loosely throw into this category is Donna Tartt's, The Secret History, which is like Catcher with more intrigue. Some brilliant moments of writing though.

Please let me know if you read Wallflower. I do highly recommend it.

Cheers!

I agree that Catcher is a psychological study of a troubled adolescent,
and not simply a "coming of age;" however, beneath Knowles' mea culpa
is a studied confession of what the law terms depraved heart,
which lays open an individual act of assault through deliberate harmful conduct.
For this reason both Catcher and Peace are entwined,
at least to my school boy memory....:)

[Dr Doran]

I'm reading Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card.

That's where the kid thinks it's a video game but he's really killing the enemy? Everyone loved that one but me.

[Jack Scorpion]

That's where the kid thinks it's a video game but he's really killing the enemy? Everyone loved that one but me.

I took it or left it. And I never read any of the sequels.


That's almost fightin' words for me, 'cause I'm such a Salinger obsessionist.

I've had drunken arguments (read: almost fist fights) considering how much I hate J.D. Salinger. So, I think I'll go ahead and list you as another one of my mortal enemies, if that's okay with you, Beaucaillou. ;) Now, Bukowski's Ham on Rye? That book kills me.

Reading Savage Art, a biography of Jim Thompson. Crazy guy. Good book. So far, it is mostly about his family, but that's been pretty entertaining; Jimmie's father was a Wyatt Earp status Sheriff.

Just finished Homo Zapiens by Viktor Pelevin. A head hurter, but funny. Chalk that one up on the Why I Love Pelevin chalkboard.

--

I recently took a trip to the Bay Area and I spent over 100 dollars on used books. That is one thing I miss about that place. Los Angeles needs some new and better bookshops.

[beaucaillou]

I've had drunken arguments (read: almost fist fights) considering how much I hate J.D. Salinger. So, I think I'll go ahead and list you as another one of my mortal enemies, if that's okay with you, Beaucaillou. ;) Now, Bukowski's Ham on Rye? That book kills me.

Bring it, Jack!

Bukowski...???
You would.

;)

[carebear]

Reading Savage Art, a biography of Jim Thompson. Crazy guy. Good book. So far, it is mostly about his family, but that's been pretty entertaining; Jimmie's father was a Wyatt Earp status Sheriff.

Jim Thompson wrote some seriously off-kilter stuff.

[Polka Dot]

Michael Chabon, The Yiddish Policemen's Union. It has a splendid Art Deco-inspired dustjacket.

[Jack Scorpion]

Jim Thompson wrote some seriously off-kilter stuff.

He wrote some seriously oft-killer stuff.

[carebear]

He wrote some seriously oft-killer stuff.

:eusa_clap

[Polka Dot]

He wrote some seriously oft-killer stuff.

Thanks for a good laugh. :)

[Harp]

Hey Harp!
Please let me know if you read Wallflower. I do highly recommend it.
Cheers!


I mentioned Wallflower to a nephew today. He said it was a favorite read, but loaned his copy out at school.:eek:
The quest continues.... :)

[WH1]

just finished the Green Hills Of Africa by Hemingway. Great read for those in the adventurers thread elsewhere on this illustreous website it should be a required read. Enjoyed it immensely but I am a confirmed Hemingway fan. Best part was I enjoyed the final chapters with a good Padron cigar and a glass of jack daniels single barrel under the stars at home with the horses in the background. I think Papa would have approved

[gluegungeisha]

The Blind Assassin (I love Margaret Atwood!), and the Buddha graphic novels by Osamu Tezuka.

[Harp]

just finished the Green Hills Of Africa by Hemingway. Great read for those in the adventurers thread elsewhere on this illustreous website it should be a required read. Enjoyed it immensely but I am a confirmed Hemingway fan.


I believe that The Sun Also Rises is his best work, followed by The Old Man and The Sea.

[Jack Scorpion]

I believe that The Sun Also Rises is his best work, followed by The Old Man and The Sea.

When it comes to Ernest, I'm a firm The Old Man and The Sea Swear-Byer. Some of his other stuff that I've read has failed to turn my head. I've since passed him by. However, I've never read The Sun Also Rises. Maybe I'll give old Hem another shot.

[Feraud]

I am working my way through a book on gangster movies.
The next few titles in my reading queue are:
Citizen Soldiers, S. Ambrose
The Meinertzhagen Mystery, Garfield
The Few, Kershaw
The Battle of Alamein, Smith & Bierman
..among others. Too many books, too little time.

[Harp]

When it comes to Ernest, I'm a firm The Old Man and The Sea Swear-Byer. Some of his other stuff that I've read has failed to turn my head. I've since passed him by. However, I've never read The Sun Also Rises. Maybe I'll give old Hem another shot.

Peer beneath Hemingway's simple declarative prose; lift off his crisp,
tight construct, and therein lies a certain nihilism that neither France nor Spain
fully expunged; also an evident narcissism reflected in his personal life.
The Sun Also Rises speaks of a man crippled by war and seeking to
live a dignified life. A man capable of love but incapacitated from physical
intimacy. One suspects that Hemingway perhaps suffered an innate
deformity, capable of expessing Eros physically but somehow denied her
innate possession. Toward the end of his dissolute life; after his youth
and talent had fled, his narcissism remained, and Hemingway seems to
have collapsed within himself. I believe The Sun Also Rises to
be the best of Hemingway, and his most revealing work.

[Jack Scorpion]

Peer beneath Hemingway's simple declarative prose; lift off his crisp,
tight construct, and therein lies a certain nihilism that neither France nor Spain
fully expunged; also an evident narcissism reflected in his personal life.
The Sun Also Rises speaks of a man crippled by war and seeking to
live a dignified life. A man capable of love but incapacitated from physical
intimacy. One suspects that Hemingway perhaps suffered an innate
deformity, capable of expessing Eros physically but somehow denied her
innate possession. Toward the end of his dissolute life; after his youth
and talent had fled, his narcissism remained, and Hemingway seems to
have collapsed within himself. I believe The Sun Also Rises to
be the best of Hemingway, and his most revealing work.

Well then. Nicely played.

[ShooShooBaby]

The Blind Assassin (I love Margaret Atwood!), and the Buddha graphic novels by Osamu Tezuka.


i like margaret atwood too, but for some reason didn't get into blind assassin.

have you read joyce carol oates? she's wonderful as well!

[K.D. Lightner]

I read The Sun Also Rises when I was in college. I liked it then, but ought to re-read it, as I am sure it would be even more meaningful now. I thought then it would be neat to be called Lady Brett Ashley. Now, of course, there are so many Ashleys.

I liked some of Hemingway's short stories, The Snows of Kilamanjaro being my favorite.

Right now I am doing some light reading, Sharon McCrumb's If I'd Killed Him When I Met Him. I enjoy her wit, her descriptions of the Appalachian mountains, her characters.

karol

[Smithy]

I've got two on the go at the moment...

"The Swarm" - had to see what all the fuss was about

and

"Marius: Skil??per, Jageress, Krigsfange" - the autobiography of Norwegian Marius Eriksen who was a Spitfire ace, international ski jumper and film actor. Great stuff!

[Fleur De Guerre]

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova. Enjoying it so far!

[Baron Kurtz]

I, Claudius . . .

bk

[poetman]

At the moment I have a few things going.

Confessions of St. Augustine.
The Imitation of Christ Thomas a Kempis
God in the Dock by C. S. Lewis
I've been struggling through some of these for a long time, now. Picking them up to read when I can draaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaag myself off of the Web.

I just started Undaunted Courage by Stephen Ambrose, I'm through four chapters, and I'm enthralled.


Augustine's Confessions are WONDEFUL!!!!! Don't miss it!!!!!

[Harp]

Augustine's Confessions are WONDEFUL!!!!! Don't miss it!!!!!

Quite the mea culpa, with as much historic as philosophical
content to recommend it.

[Sunny]

Over the weekend, a variety. Old school science fiction - A. E. Van Vogt, Leigh Brackett, and E. E. Smith - and Mickey Spillane (Mike Hammer).

[Ms. McGraw]

Bachelor Girl: The Secret History of Single Women in the Twentieth Century by Betsy Israel
I just stated it yesterday, but it's a great read so far!

[RedPop4]

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

[Orgetorix]

Quite the mea culpa, with as much historic as philosophical
content to recommend it.

A devil of a confusing read in the Latin, though.

[Orgetorix]

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Hey, me too!

Also reading (listening to) A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain.

[Harp]

A devil of a confusing read in the Latin, though.




Exegit monumentum aere perennius.
And Augie was a devil of a fellow....;)

[JazzBaby]

Just finished a book called Surreal Lives by Ruth Brandon. Never realised Salvador Dali was so, ahem, interesting. Just starting Hayden Harerra's bio of Frida Kahlo now, because I love the movie and it's mostly based on this book...

[Harp]

Just starting Hayden Harerra's bio of Frida Kahlo now, because I love the movie and it's mostly based on this book...

I stayed away from the flick since Selma H. reminds me of a past
mistake :o, but Frida herself is interesting. May read this. :)

[Haversack]

I've just started Wm. Dalrymple's _The Last Mughal_ which I picked up while in Edinbrugh a couple of weeks a go. While it is about the fall of the Mughal Dynasty in the conflagration that was the Great Mutiny of 1857, it is also about the City of Delhi that existed at that time. In the historiography, the author noted that although historians, both British and modern Indian, lament the lack of first hand accounts from Indians. he was amazed to find reams of first hand material in the Indian national archives. It was largely written in Urdu in an archaic court-script and that it had lain there untouched since at least 1921. This included complete collections of two Urdu language newspapers which continued printing entirely through the Rebellion and siege. I am really looking forward to reading this. Further back on this thread I mentioned I was reading an earlier book of Dalrymple's, _White Mughals_. Also recommended.

Haversack.

[WH1]

Peer beneath Hemingway's simple declarative prose; lift off his crisp,
tight construct, and therein lies a certain nihilism that neither France nor Spain
fully expunged; also an evident narcissism reflected in his personal life.
The Sun Also Rises speaks of a man crippled by war and seeking to
live a dignified life. A man capable of love but incapacitated from physical
intimacy. One suspects that Hemingway perhaps suffered an innate
deformity, capable of expessing Eros physically but somehow denied her
innate possession. Toward the end of his dissolute life; after his youth
and talent had fled, his narcissism remained, and Hemingway seems to
have collapsed within himself. I believe The Sun Also Rises to
be the best of Hemingway, and his most revealing work.

Well said, I believe his nihilistic themes surface heavily in most of his works particularly For Whom The Bell Tolls. It plays heavily in one of his best short stories, The Short Happy Life of Francis McComber, which may have been one of his most personal stories about his own life and loves.
Hemingway, the man was probably his greatest literary creation. Hunting subs off of Florida and Cuba, covering the war in Spain, serving in Italy in WW1, hunting Africa, etc. Many flaws but a hell of a character for any novel, living life in intense bursts, but that was common of most of the "lost generation" writers, perhaps the reason they are so highly esteemed.

[Nashoba]

I just finished a book called The Stupidest Angel (quite amusing) and I'm on and off reading one called Deathbird Stories (I think, I'd have to look) which is a complilation of rather disturbing short stories. that and my new tailoring books from the 40's...

[ShooShooBaby]

currently rereading me talk pretty one day by david sedaris, which is hilarious of course, and also the newest issue of BUST magazine. i've had a stressful month, so some light reading is definitely in order!

[LadyStardust]

Summers at Castle Auburn- I've been through it before, and loved it, but it's been several years, and I wanted to refresh my memory.:)

[Sunny]

Finished Mike Hammer this morning; on to Nero Wolfe.

[JazzBaby]

I stayed away from the flick since Selma H. reminds me of a past
mistake :o, but Frida herself is interesting. May read this. :)

From what I've read so far, I'd recommend it. It would be difficult to write a boring book about someone like Kahlo anyway!

[Technonut]

Lately I have been reading:

War Footing: 10 Steps America Must Take to Prevail in the War for the Free World.... Frank J. Gaffney and Colleagues

rebel: The life and Legend of James Dean... Donald Spoto

[JazzBaby]

rebel: The life and Legend of James Dean... Donald Spoto

Read Spoto's bio of Liz Taylor. It was a bit sketchy, but I enjoyed it.

[Technonut]

Read Spoto's bio of Liz Taylor. It was a bit sketchy, but I enjoyed it.

Thank you.... :) I may just pick it up.

[Harp]

Searching through the Chicago Public Library for LizzieMaine's
authoritative Amos n' Andy.

Also just read a review of Arabella Edge's The God of Spring,
a fictionalized account of Theodore Garicoult's Naufrage du Meduse,
which hooked me.

All I need to do now is settle the overdue fine bar tab. :eek:

[moustache]

Just finishing"A Celebration of Olives" by Carol Drinkwater.

JD

[Samsa]

Just finished Balzac's "The Wild Ass's Skin" and have started up with Dostoevsky's "The Adolescent."

[Polka Dot]

Hurrah for Balzac! :eusa_clap

I'm reading some Zola, myself.

[Harp]

I'm reading some Zola, myself.



An author to be admired as much for his courage as his work.

[RedPop4]

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

[LizzieMaine]

While I'm waiting for my lunch to cook, I'm reading the 8/31/1933 issue of the New York Daily News.

Among the headlines --

F. D. (Roosevelt) ORDERS NRA-FORD SHOWDOWN

FILM FOLK SCARED BY GANG KILLINGS ORDER MORE GUARDS.

AL WILLIAMS WONT ADMIT SOCKING HUEY (Long)

MACHINE GUN BANDITS KILL COP IN RAID

WALL STREET WOLF HELD ON $2500 BAIL AS RUBBER DEAL SWINDLER

STATE SENATE (of New Jersey) APPROVES BILL FIXING DEATH PENALTY FOR KIDNAPERS

EVANGELIST SHOOTS TWO HOODLUMS DISTURBING TENT REVIVAL

MONTHS OF SLEEPING SICKNESS RECORDS FORTY FIVE DEATHS AND 30 CASES

BLONDE TIGRESS DENIES KILLING

WOMEN PUT VANITY CASES ON BICYCLES

On the editorial page, the Inquiring Photographer asks "Do you think long hair is more attractive on a girl than the conventional bob?" J. E. Feder of Hicksville, Long Island isn't sure -- "That entirely depends on the appearance of the girl considered in the light of composition of features, makeup, and general carriage. Nothing is more attractive than long hair on the proper type of woman. The conventional bob is tiresome."

At the movies, "Gold Diggers of 1933" opens tomorrow for a week's run at Loew's State, boasting 12 stars and 300 girls. At the Roxy, a sneak preview tonight of Slim Summerville and Zasu Pitts in Universal's big laugh riot, "Her First Mate," accompanied by the latest episode in the New Adventures of Tarzan the Fearless, with Buster Crabbe, and Roxy's Miracle Stage Show, headlined by the Eight Singing Siberians. Matinee price, 25 cents, evening top is 55 cents. Kids, 15 cents always.

On sale at Bloomingdales, the big September Sale of China and Glass gets underway with a 32-piece service for 6 in the lovely China Rose pattern for $2.98. At Gimbel's Basement, women's shoes in assorted styles, regularly $3, now just $1.59 a pair. At Hearns, tailored men's shirts, just $1.09, women's silk hose just 49 cents a pair. Back to School savings at Macy's, with 2-piece boy's knicker suits just $7.44, girls' leather jackets, just $5.59. At Ludwig Baumann's, a genuine Philco radio just $15 complete. And at all A&P stores in greater New York, fancy smoked hams, just 16 cents a pound, and cigarettes, all popular brands, just $1.05 a carton.

In sports, the Giants come from behind in the 9th to beat the Cardinals 5-4. The Dodgers split a doubleheader with the Cubs, and the Yankees host the Red Sox this afternoon at the Stadium, as they seek to make up ground against the league-leading Washington Senators.

On the back page, Franklin D. Roosevelt Junior vacations on a bull ranch in Spain by dressing up as a matador and strumming the guitar.

All that for just two cents (in city limits!)

[Brian Sheridan]

I always more books going than I have time to read.

Right now:

The Four Hour Work Week by Tim Ferriss
Hard Rain by Barry Eisler
American Shaolin by Mattthew Polly

[RedPop4]

While I'm waiting for my lunch to cook, I'm reading the 8/31/1933 issue of the New York Daily News.

Among the headlines --

F. D. (Roosevelt) ORDERS NRA-FORD SHOWDOWN

FILM FOLK SCARED BY GANG KILLINGS ORDER MORE GUARDS.

AL WILLIAMS WONT ADMIT SOCKING HUEY (Long)

MACHINE GUN BANDITS KILL COP IN RAID

WALL STREET WOLF HELD ON $2500 BAIL AS RUBBER DEAL SWINDLER

STATE SENATE (of New Jersey) APPROVES BILL FIXING DEATH PENALTY FOR KIDNAPERS

EVANGELIST SHOOTS TWO HOODLUMS DISTURBING TENT REVIVAL

MONTHS OF SLEEPING SICKNESS RECORDS FORTY FIVE DEATHS AND 30 CASES

BLONDE TIGRESS DENIES KILLING

WOMEN PUT VANITY CASES ON BICYCLES

On the editorial page, the Inquiring Photographer asks "Do you think long hair is more attractive on a girl than the conventional bob?" J. E. Feder of Hicksville, Long Island isn't sure -- "That entirely depends on the appearance of the girl considered in the light of composition of features, makeup, and general carriage. Nothing is more attractive than long hair on the proper type of woman. The conventional bob is tiresome."

At the movies, "Gold Diggers of 1933" opens tomorrow for a week's run at Loew's State, boasting 12 stars and 300 girls. At the Roxy, a sneak preview tonight of Slim Summerville and Zasu Pitts in Universal's big laugh riot, "Her First Mate," accompanied by the latest episode in the New Adventures of Tarzan the Fearless, with Buster Crabbe, and Roxy's Miracle Stage Show, headlined by the Eight Singing Siberians. Matinee price, 25 cents, evening top is 55 cents. Kids, 15 cents always.

On sale at Bloomingdales, the big September Sale of China and Glass gets underway with a 32-piece service for 6 in the lovely China Rose pattern for $2.98. At Gimbel's Basement, women's shoes in assorted styles, regularly $3, now just $1.59 a pair. At Hearns, tailored men's shirts, just $1.09, women's silk hose just 49 cents a pair. Back to School savings at Macy's, with 2-piece boy's knicker suits just $7.44, girls' leather jackets, just $5.59. At Ludwig Baumann's, a genuine Philco radio just $15 complete. And at all A&P stores in greater New York, fancy smoked hams, just 16 cents a pound, and cigarettes, all popular brands, just $1.05 a carton.

In sports, the Giants come from behind in the 9th to beat the Cardinals 5-4. The Dodgers split a doubleheader with the Cubs, and the Yankees host the Red Sox this afternoon at the Stadium, as they seek to make up ground against the league-leading Washington Senators.

On the back page, Franklin D. Roosevelt Junior vacations on a bull ranch in Spain by dressing up as a matador and strumming the guitar.

All that for just two cents (in city limits!)Lizzie,
"verily, there is nothing new under the sun." Maybe the times haven't changed as much as we think they have.

[jake_fink]

A Heart So White by Javier Marias (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javier_Mar%C3%ADas)

Wow!

[pretty faythe]

Just picked this up for 50 cents,
Lady, Be Loved!. Kordel, Lelord. 1953

[huh]

[Barry]

Clyde Fans (a graphic novel) by Seth

http://media.torontolife.com/dynimages/features/seth06.jpg

(Btw, great lid if you are reading this)


Interview with Seth (http://www.ugo.com/ugo/html/gallery/?id=106&gallery=seth_comics)

[carebear]

Clyde Fans (a graphic novel) by Seth

http://media.torontolife.com/dynimages/features/seth06.jpg

(Btw, great lid if you are reading this)


Interview with Seth (http://www.ugo.com/ugo/html/gallery/?id=106&gallery=seth_comics)

What's in his pocket with the square? Pens? There are 5 of them.

[Barry]

What's in his pocket with the square? Pens? There are 5 of them.

I think they are pens or art pencils.

Someone copied the cover to his "Vernacular Drawings" book. Here's a link to the cover - definitely worth checking out...

http://www.laborderie.net/upload/Image/blog/vernacular_drawings.jpg

Also, a review by Alan Bisbort:

http://www.gadflyonline.com/04-08-02/art-seth.html

[Flivver]

I'm currently reading "Splendor Sailed The Sound" by Foster & Weiglin, a great book about the Fall River Line steamboats that operated from New England to New York City via Long Island Sound.

For anyone interested in this rather obscure topic, this is by far the best book on the subject, in my opinion.

[cgab1]

"The Secret Teachings of All Ages" by Manly P. Hall, 1923, and it is blowing me away!

cgab

[Bebop]

I am reading Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell. An interesting, non fictional look into how we decide about the most curcial aspects of our lives in a blink of a second yet believe we have made a well thought out desision. This book is full of info and double blind studies that I had never contemplated. A nice change from my beloved Bukowski and Brautigan novels that have kept me up at night.

[Son_of_Atropos]

Spirit of the Laws by Montesque

[Lincsong]

Watching Flower Drum Song got me interested in the book, so I bought a vintage 1958 paperback and am finishing it up.

[Jovan]

Star Trek Memories by William Shatner

But also Classic Style Magazine. :) Finally picked it up here.

[Feraud]

I found a perfect condition 1959 printing of The List of Adrian Messenger.
The '63 film (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057254/) was directed by John Huston and has a cool cast in cameo/heavily made up appearances.

[thebadmamajama]

Luncheon of the Boating Party by Tracy Chevalier

[Parallel Guy]

I am reading Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell. An interesting, non fictional look into how we decide about the most curcial aspects of our lives in a blink of a second yet believe we have made a well thought out desision. This book is full of info and double blind studies that I had never contemplated. A nice change from my beloved Bukowski and Brautigan novels that have kept me up at night.

Great book. His first book Tipping Point was also a thought-provoking read. It's so rare to have a writer who is readable tackle a sociological theory backed by scientific research. The guy who wrote Freakonomics is another Gladwell type. Wish there were more.

[Harp]

The Chicago Tribune sports section; Cubs are in fourth place
in the National League Central...:(

[Harp]

Searching for Germaine de Stael's (1807) Corinne, simply because she fascinates me. :)

[Lesvinyl]

I'm reading Wuthering Heights, as the version I read when I was 7 was a graphic novel, and a bad one at that. I've been inspired by my love of Kate Bush to read it.;)

[Sunny]

I finished the Nero Wolfe/Rex Stout books, and have moved on to Michael Shayne/Brett Halliday.

[thebadmamajama]

Someone just recommended a book (I'll have to dig for the title) about how redheads are an alien race. I *might* have to see what that's all about...

[carebear]

Someone just recommended a book (I'll have to dig for the title) about how redheads are an alien race. I *might* have to see what that's all about...

I, for one, welcome our new titian overlords. :D

[K.D. Lightner]

Just started reading Nelson DeMille's Wild Fire. So far, it is pretty good, a political intrigue thriller.

A couple of years ago, I read his book Up Country, about a veteran's return to Vietnam (on a secret mission to find someone) and thought the book was a pretty good read.

His main male characters are smart-a**es, funny and tough. I like that.

karol

[jake_fink]

Clyde Fans (a graphic novel) by Seth

http://media.torontolife.com/dynimages/features/seth06.jpg

(Btw, great lid if you are reading this)


Interview with Seth (http://www.ugo.com/ugo/html/gallery/?id=106&gallery=seth_comics)

http://www.drawnandquarterly.com/imagesProduct/a3e5660c3015e6.jpg

I absolutely loved It's a Good Life If You Don't Weaken, but the Clyde Fans narrative just hasn't gelled for me. He still isn't finished with it and perhaps he never will.

The Vernacular Drawings is a lot of fun and well packaged.

[JazzBaby]

Currently reading a very interesting book about courtesans in France in the 19th century. What's most fascinating is that most of them weren't even French, and very few of them are described as being attractive (one of them, who ended up becoming the richest, was even described as 'hideous').

[Harp]

Perhaps their benefactors fell in love, a mixture of innocence with sin,
since le coeur est un point d'appui. ;)

[Jovan]

On a bit of a Trek craze, as you can tell. Last year's 40th anniversary still hasn't worn off for me.

Get a Life! by William Shatner

[Devo]

I am currently reading 'The River of Doubt.'
It is about Teddy Roosevelt after he lost his third-party bid for the presidency against Taft and Wilson.

TR, always the adventurer, went on a scientific excursion into South America to navigate the River of Doubt.
That expidition was the first 'civilized' group to travel that deep into the Amazon rainforest and come out alive (well, most of them came out alive).

I love TR and presidential biographies.
I'm trying to read a biography about all of the presidents.

[Girl Friday]

Currently listening to Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen. It is pretty good so far, kind of reminds me of Carnivale (the show HBO decided to dump.)

1930's big top, who could ask for anything more!

[carebear]

I am currently reading 'The River of Doubt.'
It is about Teddy Roosevelt after he lost his third-party bid for the presidency against Taft and Wilson.

TR, always the adventurer, went on a scientific excursion into South America to navigate the River of Doubt.
That expidition was the first 'civilized' group to travel that deep into the Amazon rainforest and come out alive (well, most of them came out alive).

I love TR and presidential biographies.
I'm trying to read a biography about all of the presidents.

Excellent book. Really illustrates the dangers of poor planning.

[carebear]

Reread Stephen Hunter's Bob Lee Swagger books.

"Point of Impact" (basis for the recent movie "Shooter" but much better), "Black Light" and "Time to Hunt".

Getting ready to put in some time on the rifle and sniper stories inspire me.

Also L. Neil Smith's "The Probablility Broach" to fill in a hole in my libertarian sci-fi list.

[griffer]

Neal Stephenson kick, still.

Finishing Diamond Age.

In the middle of the Baroque cycle.

[Parallel Guy]

I am currently reading 'The River of Doubt.'
It is about Teddy Roosevelt after he lost his third-party bid for the presidency against Taft and Wilson.

TR, always the adventurer, went on a scientific excursion into South America to navigate the River of Doubt.
That expidition was the first 'civilized' group to travel that deep into the Amazon rainforest and come out alive (well, most of them came out alive).

I love TR and presidential biographies.
I'm trying to read a biography about all of the presidents.

I've been working my way through the presidents as well. If you find anything decent on Hoover let me know. Franklin Pierce and John Tyler are really tough gets, too.

[Harp]

East Wind, Rain. A prequel to a sequel thesis I scribbled once. :o

[SarahLouise]

I am currently finishing off Amaryllis Night and Day by Russell Hoban and will start The Call of Cthulhu And Other Weird Stories by H.P Lovecraft afterwards.

[Harp]

Thomas Mann's Dr. Faustus, a fugitive Teutonic tome from undergrad days. :)

[Devo]

Excellent book. Really illustrates the dangers of poor planning.

I am shocked at how little forethought went into the trip and really surprised TR would be involved with something so fumbled.

[Devo]

I've been working my way through the presidents as well. If you find anything decent on Hoover let me know. Franklin Pierce and John Tyler are really tough gets, too.

I think there's a new Hoover book out, but I'll double check for you.

I am finding it hard to find decent biographies on the group of presidents between Andrew Jackson to Lincoln.

[BegintheBeguine]

I, for one, welcome our new titian overlords. :D
Thank you, but it's overladies to you.

[Mildred]

I am reading 'For Whom the Bell Tolls" by Ernest Hemingway. Second time I read this book because I like it so much.

[cooncatbob]

I've just started reading "The Fall of the House of Habsburg" it's about the ruling family of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
I'm a life long amateur military historian and I've recently begun reading and watching DVDs about WW1 but most sources are about either about the war in the west or east and gloss over Austria-Hungary, which is kinda strange since the trigger for the war was the assassination of the Arch-Duke by a Serbian radical.
Bob.

[Harp]

I've just started reading "The Fall of the House of Habsburg" it's about the ruling family of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
I'm a life long amateur military historian and I've recently begun reading and watching DVDs about WW1 but most sources are about either about the war in the west or east and gloss over Austria-Hungary, which is kinda strange since the trigger for the war was the assassination of the Arch-Duke by a Serbian radical.
Bob.

The Balkan proscenium is a flashpoint for Europe, and the Serb, Croat,
and Muslim rivalry dates back to the Ottoman Era. I'd like to read Fall
when you've finished it. ;)

[Rafter]

I just finished reading
Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami.

There ought to be a name for the genre Murakami has invented, and it might be the "literary pyrotechno-thriller".

The plot here is so elaborate that about 100 pages, one-fourth of the book, elapse before its various elements begin to fit together, but Murakami's lightning prose more than sustains the reader. Embellished with witticisms, wordplay and allusions to such figures as Stendhal heroes and Lauren Bacall, the tale is set in a Tokyo of the near future.

Thanks to a wonderland of technology, an intelligence agent has had his brain implanted with a "profoundly personal drama" that allows him to "launder" and "shuffle" classified data, and all that he knows of the drama is its password, The End of the World. But after interference from a scientist and from the Semiotecs, a rival intelligence unit, the subconscious story is about to replace the agent's own perceptions of reality.

Intertwined with the agent's attempts to understand his plight are scenes from The End of the World. Murakami's ingenuity and inventiveness grabs you every step of the journey and doe not fail to intoxicate the reader.

[Jack Scorpion]

I just finished reading
Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami.

There ought to be a name for the genre Murakami has invented, and it might be the "literary pyrotechno-thriller".

The plot here is so elaborate that about 100 pages, one-fourth of the book, elapse before its various elements begin to fit together, but Murakami's lightning prose more than sustains the reader. Embellished with witticisms, wordplay and allusions to such figures as Stendhal heroes and Lauren Bacall, the tale is set in a Tokyo of the near future.

Thanks to a wonderland of technology, an intelligence agent has had his brain implanted with a "profoundly personal drama" that allows him to "launder" and "shuffle" classified data, and all that he knows of the drama is its password, The End of the World. But after interference from a scientist and from the Semiotecs, a rival intelligence unit, the subconscious story is about to replace the agent's own perceptions of reality.

Intertwined with the agent's attempts to understand his plight are scenes from The End of the World. Murakami's ingenuity and inventiveness grabs you every step of the journey and doe not fail to intoxicate the reader.

Been on my list for some time. Murakami is an institution.

[Jefferson Smith]

I just finished The Way You Wear Your Hat: Frank Sinatra and the Lost Art of Livin' by Bill Zehme and I'm about to start on The Geography of Nowhere by James Howard Kunstler.

[beaucaillou]

"Blood Meridian or The Evening Redness in the West," Cormac McCarthy.
Cormac McCarthy pretty much starts and finishes modern literature these days (with some help from Ben Marcus, Gary Lutz, and Joan Didion) so I'm an elated, humbled, shaken, and transformed reader.

Rafter: Murakami has been urged toward me time and again, and you'd think I'd take that as the sign it is, yet I haven't. I'm extremely skeptical. As a writer I'll subconsciously adopt the nuances and habits of any given writer I happen to read that resonates with me, and I always think I'll disdain Murakami's nuances as mundane and therefore disdain my own work for that time. But you are a fan thus far? And would also recommend him?

[Harp]

Nobody's reading Mishima? :)

[RedPop4]

The Confession of Brother Haluin the Sixteenth Chronicle of Brother Cadfael and the Abbey of Saint Peter and St. Paul, Shrewsbury.

[Dr Doran]

"Blood Meridian or The Evening Redness in the West," Cormac McCarthy.
Cormac McCarthy pretty much starts and finishes modern literature these days (with some help from Ben Marcus, Gary Lutz, and Joan Didion) so I'm an elated, humbled, shaken, and transformed reader.

Rafter: Murakami has been urged toward me time and again, and you'd think I'd take that as the sign it is, yet I haven't. I'm extremely skeptical. As a writer I'll subconsciously adopt the nuances and habits of any given writer I happen to read that resonates with me, and I always think I'll disdain Murakami's nuances as mundane and therefore disdain my own work for that time. But you are a fan thus far? And would also recommend him?

I am a huge fan of McCarthy, my good Beaucaillou. Have been for many many years. I am one of the only people I know who equally appreciated both Blood Meridian and All the Pretty Horses. I also loved Stonemason without which, I believe, McCarthy cannot be appreciated in his full glory (not to be too multiculturally Berkeley chic, but it is also the only work of his that has a black protagonist, which is at least somewhat interesting in its own right). In my opinion those three are the best of his works. I cannot say that I am a fan of The Road. Why? Because I have been a fan of post-apocalyptic literature as well as film since about 1980 and I did not think The Road was a standout in the genre if one takes that as a genre and judges The Road AGAINST that genre and not against the McCarthy's oeuvre by itself (in which case it may indeed stand well against e.g. Suttree which I have not yet read).
I have many many favorite parts of Blood Meridian and can quote some of it verbatim. I must contend that The Judge is one of the most remarkable characters in all of human literature and as a classicist I go back as far as Homer (and even to Gilgamesh).

[beaucaillou]

Doran, very interesting. I haven't read Stonemason, but now I'm supremely interested. McCarthy's work is at times astounding. He's such a melding of so many writers, but also always remains outside of everyone at the same time. Yet I can't help but conjure Twain, O'Connor, Faulkner, and especially Nick Cave.

And what are you reading right now?

[Dr Doran]

I am currently finishing off Amaryllis Night and Day by Russell Hoban and will start The Call of Cthulhu And Other Weird Stories by H.P Lovecraft afterwards.

Am a huge fan of Lovecraft ... please keep me posted on your reactions.

[Dr Doran]

Nobody's reading Mishima? :)

I have, indeed, read Yukio. If it is he who wrote The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With The Sea. I am not ready to write about him yet, though. My thoughts about it are still disorganized.

[Dr Doran]

Doran, very interesting. I haven't read Stonemason, but now I'm supremely interested. McCarthy's work is at times astounding. He's such a melding of so many writers, but also always remains outside of everyone at the same time. Yet I can't help but conjure Twain, O'Connor, Faulkner, and especially Nick Cave.

And what are you reading right now?

Thucydides, Thucydides, Thucydides. In Greek. A little Xenophon thrown in. In Greek. (I am studying for my PhD exams.)

[carebear]

Am a huge fan of Lovecraft ... please keep me posted on your reactions.

Yes, keep a journal of your descent into eldritch-fueled madness and gibbering despair...


:D

[Harp]

I have, indeed, read Yukio. If it is he who wrote The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With The Sea. I am not ready to write about him yet, though. My thoughts about it are still disorganized.

Hai. Wakarimas, Doransama!
(In my wild reckless dumba.. youth, I was a Kyokushinkai stylist. My sensei
turned me on to Mishima. An extraordinarily interesting but deeply flawed
and troubled psyche.) Grab some warm saki and delve deeply inward;
Mishima is a memorable tragic writer, but one of Japanese Lit's best.

[jamespowers]

Thucydides, Thucydides, Thucydides. In Greek. A little Xenophon thrown in. In Greek. (I am studying for my PhD exams.)

History of the Peloponnesian War eh? Much to be learned from the account that still applies today.

Regards,

J

[Dr Doran]

Hai. Wakarimas, Doransama!
(In my wild reckless dumba.. youth, I was a Kyokushinkai stylist. My sensei
turned me on to Mishima. An extraordinarily interesting but deeply flawed
and troubled psyche.) Grab some warm saki and delve deeply inward;
Mishima is a memorable tragic writer, but one of Japanese Lit's best.

The fascist homosexual angle has always interested me ... although I am completely straight, I did enjoy reading Jean Genet. i am also a great lover of the musical ensembles Death in June and Current 93, who tie all these strings together in a glorious death rock/industrial/gothic soundscape of menace and sinister noise.

As to Mishima's language: I have not studied Japanese, alas. Only ancient Greek, Latin, French, Italian, and depressingly little German. Polish is next for my wife.

[Dr Doran]

Yes, keep a journal of your descent into eldritch-fueled madness and gibbering despair...


:D

ONLY A SMALL BAND OF BRAVE MEN AND WOMEN STAND BETWEEN THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT AND THE UNUTTERABLE EVIL OF THE GREAT OLD ONES, WHOSE MINIONS PLOT THE RETURN AND RULE OF THEIR MIGHT LORD, GREAT CTHULHU.

iaaaa ... shub-nigurath ... the black goat of the wood with a thousand young .... nyarlathotep ... the abomination of abominations .... a huge, formless white polyplous thing with luminous eyes ... Mister Randy! Mister Randy! Wharbe ye? ... Haint she tuld ye to keep nigh the place in the arternoon an' git back afur dark?

(Luc Sante a few months ago wrote a marvelous Lovecraft piece in the New York Review of Books. He also wrote Evidence, a gruesome collection of NYPD Golden Era murder photography. A must-see is the 2006 film call of cthulhu which imitates silent films ...)

[Dr Doran]

History of the Peloponnesian War eh? Much to be learned from the account that still applies today.

Regards,

J

Hideously complex, utterly fascinating.

[HungaryTom]

History of the Peloponnesian War eh? Much to be learned from the account that still applies today.

Regards,

J
I saw that thread too. I posted today there and mentioned the Trojan war....not by chance. I felt the tensions raising a few hours ago just like before a volcano erupts.

Than I went off to post at WWII.

Returning from there I saw all that war going on.

Too much beauty is very delicate: it started real life wars.

I can only say again: hats down to all the Ladies.

Regards

P.S. My fate took me already quite often to places where a few days/minutes hours later some kind of that thing happened.