What book(s) have you read recently?

[Love Yuui]

Simply enough: Do you like to read?

While I generally read a lot, I don't take enjoyment in reading novels. It's a bit too passive of an experience. However, I was an avid reader as a teen, which probably explains why I don't take delight in it now. That tidbit is also the reason why I went from English to Journalism major, as I much more enjoy the creation rather than the observation. Although there are some bits of literature I do still enjoy, like those by Fyodor Dostoevsky, William Faulkner, Friedrich Nietzsche, Leo Tolstoy, and my beloved, William Shakespeare.

[Sepiraph]

Most recent read is Panzer Leader by Heinz Guderian.

[raikage]

Currently reading:

Strapped: Why America's 20- and 30-Somethings Can't Get Ahead and about to start on
How America Lost Iraq.

I really need to finish Freakanomics.

[hobobaggins]

I read Angel's Flight by Connely. Very good book, I highly suggest it. It may not have the same impact if you do not live in los angeles. The whole book seemed very real to me as I know the places that he writes about in his books.

Harry potter Audiobook while playing world of warcraft. Hermione is such a different character once I saw the movie. Or more specifically Emma Watson

[mellomarie]

Currently Reading: Shopaholic & Sister; Sophia Kinsella

Just Finished: The Cell; Stephen King

I absoultey adore Sophia Kinsella, a UK author with heaps of talent! All of her books are so addicting, I can finish one whole book on a good day

[monster]

I just recently finished reading the first three installments of a series called A Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin. They've been very entertaining and I can't wait to get my hands on the fourth book, A Feast for Crows.

[toot]

just read "The Little Prince" by Antoine de Saint-Exupery (sp?) in less than an hour out of boredom.
It was umm nice

[i0td]

I'm a fan of fiction dealing with alternative history.

I'm getting started on Harry Turtledove's Worldwar series
In this case, the thing that screws up the normal timeline is actually quite bizarre - an alien invasion during the second world war.

[[DOT].L]

Recently finished:
Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
Teeth of the Tiger - Tom Clancy

Currently reading:
The Secret Sharer - Joseph Conrad
Dark Tower V: Wolves of the Calla - Stephen King

[sorvani]

Originally Posted by i0td

I'm a fan of fiction dealing with alternative history.

I'm getting started on Harry Turtledove's Worldwar series
In this case, the thing that screws up the normal timeline is actually quite bizarre - an alien invasion during the second world war.

IMO Harry Turtledove has got to be the master of alternate history. both with aliens and without.

I'm currently reading my collection of Anne McCaffrey books again. I finished the Talented series last week, and started on the Pern novels this week. Right this moment i'm in the middle of "The White Dragon".

[raikage]

Originally Posted by raikage

Currently reading:

Strapped: Why America's 20- and 30-Somethings Can't Get Ahead.

Finished this book. Verdict? Not recommended.

(For one thing, it's about the American economy and job market as it relates to young adults, and there are a lot of Europeans on this forum.)

Spoiler for more detailed review:

The book is full of numbers, which by itself is not a problem -- she says that adjusted for inflation, college-educated people generally make about as much money now as they did in the 1970's, while the cost of tuition/housing has gone way up, and government benefits have gone down.

(It was something like $45,000 in the '70's and $48,000 now for college educated.
High school grads make -- adjusted for inflation -- much less now than then.)

So, people are graduating college, tens of thousands of dollars in debt, working jobs that don't really pay all that much and finding housing that's more expensive than it used to be. Honestly? That's a sh*tty deal. And sympathy is created for all those recent college grads who are placed in a situation where they start out their adult lives with essentially negative income.

The next chapter will start off with a story about a personal family's hardships -- they married young, they graduated with debt, are working to barely sustain themselves on the proportionately much smaller paycheck, don't own a car and are getting by living in a small one-bedroom apt, the whole bit...

And then they have to go to a friend's wedding across the country, and are forced to finance their trip on a credit card with an abysmally high APR. WTF? There goes my sympathy. I'm sorry, if you're all but broke you don't have to go to a friend's wedding.

There are many cases like that, where she has a good point and then buries it with a personal story that doesn't really help her cause.

Her facts are good, she has a solid case, but her antecdotes completely undermine her argument. I've heard Generation Debt is a much better read, but I don't know if I want to read another book about how my generation is f'ed.

[boneyjellyfish]

Reading for pleasure:
The Truth (with jokes) by Al Franken
Virgil's Aeneid

Reading for classes:
Enuma Elish & Gilgamesh

Almost done with The Truth (with jokes), and I can't wait to finish my school books so I can get back to reading the stack of classics sitting on my bookshelf.

[NoSanninWa]

Originally Posted by boneyjellyfish

Reading for classes:
Enuma Elish & Gilgamesh

I read that for "fun" and learned that the Sumerians were awful writers. The basic plots, characters and themes are great, but they just wrote it sooo badly that I couldn't enjoy it. I suppose I can't blame them too much since it is basically the first book ever written and they didn't really know what they were doing yet.

[boneyjellyfish]

Originally Posted by NoSanninWa

I read that for "fun" and learned that the Sumerians were awful writers. The basic plots, characters and themes are great, but they just wrote it sooo badly that I couldn't enjoy it. I suppose I can't blame them too much since it is basically the first book ever written and they didn't really know what they were doing yet.

Gilgamesh has been favorite pre-Hellenistic work for years now, and I absolutely love the complexities of many of its themes despite the fact that it's the first "book" ever written. Enuma Elish, on the other hand, seems to have been written for the sole purpose of forcing unwitting students to drudge through unpreserved texts in which the only noticable theme is "just because they're noisy, you shouldn't try to kill your grandchildren".

A professor of mine, when I was in community college a couple years ago, introduced Gilgamesh to me during a lecture on cuneiform and Sumerian mythology. I read it shortly after that lecture (although at the time my local library only held an abridged version translated by John Gardner, who wrote a side-story book called Grendel), and I read it again last week for an assignment. If you enjoyed Gilgamesh, NoSanninWa, then I would have to recommend the Atrahasis. It details the story of a young man who gets caught up in the middle of a dispute between the gods and ends up building an ark in order to escape to escape the gods' wrath, which is manifested as a catastrophic flood. If you read it, and you get something out of it, then I would recommend re-reading Gilgamesh just to see the fate of Atrahasis after stepping off the ark as the only immortal human left on the face of the earth.

I still laugh every time I read how Enkidu becomes civilized by the denizens of Ur: they simply send him a priestess from the temple of fertility.

You know, I try to convince my friends that this field of study really isn't so bad, but some of them earlier this year caught glimpses of me with my earlier assignments, which consisted of me reading the Iliad and Odyssey in their original ancient greek, and most of them dropped any classes even remotely related to the classics.

Oh, and you should try to find a copy of Grendel at some point. If you enjoyed Beowulf, then you would absolutely love it. It tells the story from the perspective of Grendel, and focuses on how he is merely gentle and misunderstood, while Beowulf is a heartless savage who ruthlessly hunts him down.

[Aoie_Emesai]

I just recently read " The Hot Zone" by Richard Preston. It's a nice little book about him writing the experiences of people who have experienced the Marburg, The Ebola Sudan, and the Ebola Zaire. There's little diseases are quite nasty, and if you like reading on things such as a story telling book, this is a very good book to get. It's quite descriptive about how the Ebola kills and it may have orginated, but it never says.

I also read "The Color Purple" by Alice Walker. These book as the old grammar, where there aren't much grammar like no quotion marks, no parathenses so when my teacher told me to find quotes, yes I had a hard time. This book is about a Black woman who was raped in her early teens but never knew that she had kids till about her 30s, I believe. This book is a lot about women rights, so if you enjoy a book that is confusing and is told thru letters to god, then this book is for you.

[Aisu]

Well, I am sure that caught your attention. So, what was your reaction to the title? What did you think I was going to talk about? Let me tell you. This is merely an introduction. Yes, Hello to everyone. I never really hold expectations, but this time I hope that everyone make it worth a while. So let's see... a topic. Would anyone be interested to talk about any kind of books? I am actually looking foward to hear some abnormal titles.

[alone07]

What's your favorite book or novel? What have you been reading lately? Any recommendations? got no specific genre...

[Eric the Grey]

If you'd like something that will make you laugh, I'd suggest Good Omens by Neil Gainman and Terry Pratchett.

Eric the Grey

[jedinat]

Couple books I've liked recently:
A Brother's Price by Wen Spencer
-Due to the the incredibly low men-to-women ratio, guys marry a generation of "sisters" instead of just one girl ...An adventure/romance story
Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris
-Vampire book. The main character is a southern telepathic waitress

[Gaiarth]

Currently half-way through Hark, an Ed Mcbain 87th Precinct book. It's the return of the Deaf Man!

McBain probably did the best police procedurals ever. Some of the earliest are pretty dated, as stuff like forensic techniques and technology have improved rapidly since he began writing them, but the actual police work is still pretty much the same. Plus, the cast come across as real people.