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The Counterfeiters - Andre Gide

It's a bit heavy going, but I am liking it, part 9 of the first section "Edouard and Laura" is very good. "The things that soonest appear out of date are those that at first strike us as most modern".

Moominland Midwinter - Tove Jansson

I don't want to finish this book because it's so good, and I'll feel a bit down when I finish it.

So, yeah what are you reading?

― jel -- (jel), Friday, 14 March 2003 19:04 (twenty-three years ago)

Nothing. Last night I finished Phillip K. Dick's Confessions of a Crap Artist.

― hstencil, Friday, 14 March 2003 19:07 (twenty-three years ago)

The Slynx, Tatyana Tolstaya

― mookieproof (mookieproof), Friday, 14 March 2003 19:11 (twenty-three years ago)

I recently tried to read Infinite Jest for the second time. Both times, I've gotten about eighty pages in and then given up. Oh well. So, last night I was happy to read Sarah Vowell's The Partly Cloudy Patriot all in one sitting. Good stuff, even if I'd already read/heard half of the essays elsewhere. She's definitely someone whose life I envy, and I don't say that often.

― jaymc (jaymc), Friday, 14 March 2003 19:54 (twenty-three years ago)

Oh, dear.

http://members.rott.chello.nl/e.visser25/LuciaVitrix1.jpg

I scanned my own copy. Yes, I bought it for the cover first. Didn't know anything about this English 20s cult novels.

"I'm half a mile out of town and I may be tipsy, for Major Benjy says you've got jolly good booze, "quai-hai", the King, God bless him! Good-bye."

― erik, Friday, 14 March 2003 20:04 (twenty-three years ago)

Im still working my way through the winter Big Takeover.

― Mr Noodles (Mr Noodles), Friday, 14 March 2003 20:05 (twenty-three years ago)

Motley Crue with Neil Strauss's The Dirt, which I finally bought last week in paperback. I figured if I did buy it I'd never be able to put it down, and I was right up till a couple days ago when (a) prior writing obligations kicked back in and (b) I finally couldn't fucking take anymore.

― M Matos (M Matos), Friday, 14 March 2003 20:07 (twenty-three years ago)

Still reading Mrs. Dalloway, since my SO is reaidng (or about to read) it. I don't like Woolf's (or the narrator's, but there's no identifiable narrator) superior and largely uncompassionate attitude toward her characters and what their real or imagined follies. I don't care about these people, except possibly for Septimus. Whatever I'm picking up on of what is happening stylistically is not enough to make me excited. I think this is the last time I commit to reading a novel my SO is reading, without first starting to read a chapter or two. I find it hard to make time for reading anyway, and there is so much else I want to get to. I don't think I'm going to find much more time for reading novels in the near future.

― Rockist Scientist, Friday, 14 March 2003 20:32 (twenty-three years ago)

-- jel -- what's The Counterfeiters about? I read Gide's Immoralist once, but didn't like it then.

― erik, Friday, 14 March 2003 20:35 (twenty-three years ago)

ilx, duh

― jess (dubplatestyle), Friday, 14 March 2003 20:39 (twenty-three years ago)

A history of the Byzantine empire. About finished.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 14 March 2003 20:41 (twenty-three years ago)

The Norwich one? All three? Dag.

― mookieproof (mookieproof), Friday, 14 March 2003 21:06 (twenty-three years ago)

An enormous book on sculpture, and Eco's Baudolino, which I will feel obliged to discuss here since it was to be the third book in our abortive Book Club.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Friday, 14 March 2003 21:56 (twenty-three years ago)

Just finished John Dominic Crossan's Dark Interval: Towards a Theology of Story, although I skimmed the introduction and will go back and reread that sometime soon.

Also read Ian Fleming's The Man With The Golden Gun, because I realized a few months ago I'd never read any of the actual Bond books.

On deck: Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, some research books for a story I'm working on, and Douglas Hofstadter's The Mind's I.

― Tep (ktepi), Friday, 14 March 2003 22:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Erik, from the back of the book: "From puberty through adolecence to death, the Counterfeiters is a rare encyclopedia of human disorder, weakness and despair".

But, really it jumps betweens charcters all of whom varying degress of problems and they just seem to make things worse. I'm figuring Edouard is the key character for linking everyone together.

I never finished the Immortalist.

― jel -- (jel), Friday, 14 March 2003 22:21 (twenty-three years ago)

Dirt Music, by Tim Winton. It's set in Western Australia, among fishing folk. Does anyone know if he's er, well-known? I'd never heard of him before but it's a great albeit thoroughly dispiriting read, about moving lisytlessly into middle-age...

― Richard Willmsen (rwillmsen), Friday, 14 March 2003 23:27 (twenty-three years ago)

i read jel's last sentence as "i never finished the internet"

― jess (dubplatestyle), Friday, 14 March 2003 23:30 (twenty-three years ago)

Steven T Rosenthal's Irreconcilable Differences? The Waning of the American Jewish Love Affair with Isreal
David Shipman's Judy Garland: The Secret Life of an American Legend
Yaffa Eliach's There Once Was a World: A 900 Year Chronicle of the Shtetl of Eishystok
Ed Sikov's Mr. Strangelove: A Biography of Peter Sellers

Magazines: new(ish) issues of Bitch, Bust, East Village Inky, Heeb, and Stay Free

― rosemary (rosemary), Friday, 14 March 2003 23:35 (twenty-three years ago)

"The Rings of Saturn" by WG Sebald and it's just the best.

― slutsky (slutsky), Saturday, 15 March 2003 00:29 (twenty-three years ago)

"The Name of the Rose" by Umberto Eco, not far into it so don't know what to think. Monks and the middle ages and murder all sound pretty cool though.

― Maria (Maria), Saturday, 15 March 2003 01:10 (twenty-three years ago)

read? *read*?! well, ok, recently I've started:

Michael Walzer, Spheres of Justice (semi-re-reading)
Frank Tenaille, Music is the Weapon of the Future

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Saturday, 15 March 2003 02:59 (twenty-three years ago)

"dog years" by Gunter Grass

― gabriel (gabe), Saturday, 15 March 2003 04:02 (twenty-three years ago)

The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagan--bought it a few months ago and have finally begun reading it in earnest.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Saturday, 15 March 2003 05:58 (twenty-three years ago)

can it be read in earnest?

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Saturday, 15 March 2003 06:05 (twenty-three years ago)

I've just finished Hard Boiled Wonderland And The End Of The World by Haruki Murukami. I've not really gone on to anything else yet; at the moment I'm rereading a book on the history of computing, in a dip-in-and-out way. I'm thinking of going out and buying a copy of Gogol's Dead Souls.

― caitlin (caitlin), Saturday, 15 March 2003 11:28 (twenty-three years ago)

franz kafka: america

(and I have started reading ulysses too and so far so good).

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Saturday, 15 March 2003 13:33 (twenty-three years ago)

Books currently on the go -

M R James' Collected Ghost Stories - beyond grebt but I've left my copy somewhere at Isabel's and it seems to have spookily vanished.

A book called Outside The Empire which is about the extent of Roman knowledge of the world beyond their borders. It's interesting and chatty and not written by a pro historian and all the better for it.

Yes Yes Y'All: An Oral History Of Hip Hop's First Decade - very interesting but a little padded out with "and then we had another party..." sections, plus it's a beautiful object but basically too big to be a tube/bus book.

The Uses Of Enchantment by Bruno Bettelheim, which is quite meaty stuff though I can make no judgement on its rightness.

― Tom (Groke), Saturday, 15 March 2003 14:35 (twenty-three years ago)

I'm reading a few Poirot novels I've not read before, inc. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, which was really innovative for its time. Poirot is a great character and these are easy reading -- which is okay, I don't need my mind stretching; it's sore enough already. :)

― ChristineSH (chrissie1068), Saturday, 15 March 2003 15:38 (twenty-three years ago)

M R James' Collected Ghost Stories - beyond grebt but I've left my copy somewhere at Isabel's and it seems to have spookily vanished.

Just beware if some guy gives you back your copy and a small piece of paper falls out only to be destroyed.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Saturday, 15 March 2003 15:39 (twenty-three years ago)

franz kafka: america

Julio, that's Amerika!

― Rockist Scientist, Saturday, 15 March 2003 15:42 (twenty-three years ago)

Currently Reading:
The Natural History of Make-Believe, John Goldthwaite
Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie

Read recently:
V for Vendetta, Captain Britain, The League of Gentlemen, Vol. I and Top Ten, Vol. I, Alan Moore & Others
Good Omens, Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
His Dark Materials, Vols. I - III, Phillip Pullman

On Deck:
You Shall Know Our Velocity, Dave Eggers
The Cheese Monkeys, Chip Kidd
In the Hand of Dante, Nick Tosches
Buffy the Vampire Slayer & Philosophy: Fear and Trembling in Sunnydale, James B. South (ed.)

― J (Jay), Saturday, 15 March 2003 16:31 (twenty-three years ago)

just finished the new Dave Eggers, which was a lot less precious than I thought it was going to be, and actually rather good, I thought. It doesn't feel like Eggers is ever pushing himself for more than a couple dozen pages at a time ever, though.

Next up is Eco's Faucault's Pendulum, or possibly Wittgenstein.

― thom west (thom w), Saturday, 15 March 2003 16:33 (twenty-three years ago)

''Julio, that's Amerika!''

yes that's right. thanks ra-kist.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Saturday, 15 March 2003 16:46 (twenty-three years ago)

"So the Wind Won't Blow It All Away" by Richard Brautigan

― t\'\'t (t\'\'t), Saturday, 15 March 2003 18:55 (twenty-three years ago)

Caitlin, Dead Souls is a great book. I have a pal who for years claimed he was learning Russian so as to read it in the original (I don't think this amounted to much learning, in fact). I was on a date last year with a woman who had translated Russian professionally, and I mentioned this to her and she was mystified, as she couldn't see any great worth in Gogol's prose. Chekhov was the best prose stylist, she said.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Saturday, 15 March 2003 19:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Well, I went out and bought a copy this afternoon. I hope I'll really enjoy it; in the past I've sometimes tried to read "classic fiction" because of its status but not managed to get into it at all. This especially tends to apply to 19th-century novelists like Dickens and Thackerey, where I keep forgetting who all the characters are.

― caitlin (caitlin), Saturday, 15 March 2003 19:05 (twenty-three years ago)

I almost always have trouble keeping track of who all the characters are in any novel. (I tend to be the same way in real life, as well.) I remember that when we discussed the Golden Notebook in college, I said that I liked it, but I had trouble keeping track of who was who. The professor, giving me the benefit of the doubt, said something like, "Yeah, I think Lessing intentionally blurs the line between the two characters," but I was like, "No, no, I can never keep track of characters in novels." I never made it through Vanity Fair, which could almost represent everything I don't like in a novel, from what I remember.

― Rockist Scientist, Saturday, 15 March 2003 19:14 (twenty-three years ago)

Current: Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned, Walter Mosley

Most recent: Hollywood, Charles Bukowski
Harlot by the Side of the Road, Jonathan Kirsch

― Aimless, Saturday, 15 March 2003 19:23 (twenty-three years ago)

I'm reading this rather rubbish book called "One Love Lost" by Helen Holt. Not a good read. DON'T even attempt it people. Not advisable.

"Revolutionary Road" by Richard Yated, which I am enjoyinng muchly.

James Redfield's "The Celestine Prophesy" once again.

A relaxation book someone gave me as I am apparently doing too much.

A book called Gabriel's gift that I read during my train journeys.

― ali (ali), Sunday, 16 March 2003 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

A relaxation book someone gave me as I am apparently doing too much.

Maybe you are just relaxing incorrectly.

― Rockist Scientist, Sunday, 16 March 2003 09:10 (twenty-three years ago)

Just finished 'Hope to Die' by Lawrence Block - not one of his best, w/ a formally rather 'daring' (for crime fic, anyway) ending that makes the whole thing feel strangely pointless.

Have also been reading 'The Trouble With Money' by Ian Hamilton, an entertaining collection of literary etc. essays - Hamilton is esp. gd on Larkin.

― Andrew L (Andrew L), Sunday, 16 March 2003 09:22 (twenty-three years ago)

Good point Rockist Scientist. Cheers.

― ali (ali), Sunday, 16 March 2003 12:08 (twenty-three years ago)

four months pass...

A General History of the Pyrates -- Daniel Defoe

― Mary (Mary), Monday, 28 July 2003 19:29 (twenty-two years ago)

Just started both of these:
At home - Volume One (the Russian Years) of the 2-volume Nabakov biography I bought a couple of weeks ago.
At work during lunch - Tristam Shandy.

― NA (Nick A.), Monday, 28 July 2003 19:51 (twenty-two years ago)

The revised/expanded edition of The Gunslinger.
The Physics of Baseball.
Julio Cortazar's Hopscotch.

― Tep (ktepi), Monday, 28 July 2003 19:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Rather belatedly, No Logo by Naomi Klein. Confirms what I thought.

― Jamie Conway (Jamie Conway), Monday, 28 July 2003 19:54 (twenty-two years ago)

I've nearly finished the Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.

Next, I'm reading "A Wanderer Plays On Muted Strings" by good old Knut Hamsun.

― jel -- (jel), Monday, 28 July 2003 20:00 (twenty-two years ago)

camus, the plague

― anthony kyle monday (akmonday), Monday, 28 July 2003 20:09 (twenty-two years ago)

The Synaptic Self by Joseph E. LeDoux

― bnw (bnw), Monday, 28 July 2003 20:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Heligoland by Sheena Mackay.

― Tag (Tag), Monday, 28 July 2003 20:43 (twenty-two years ago)

philip k dick: three stigmata of palmer eldrich/ game players of titan, sam delany: the einstein intersection and reread pynchon's 'crying of lot 49'.

I'll start on some ursula le guin tomorrow.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Monday, 28 July 2003 20:53 (twenty-two years ago)

Finished a book on Louis XVII, still plugging away on The Mysteries of New Orleans.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 28 July 2003 20:55 (twenty-two years ago)

ooh I love the Plague.

I just bought:

War Is A Force That Gives Us Meaning by Chris Hedges
Reefer Madness by Eric Schlosser
The Devil Wears Prada by whothefuckcares

― teeny (teeny), Monday, 28 July 2003 20:56 (twenty-two years ago)

Just finished "Wind-Up Bird Chronicle" (good) and "Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom" (great).

130 pages in to "You Shall Know our Velocity" by Eggers.

next: "Great Mambo Chicken and the Transhuman Condition".

― Dale the Titled (cprek), Monday, 28 July 2003 20:58 (twenty-two years ago)

Just finished Faulkner's Intruder In The Dust, hardly one of his most titanic but tremendous anyway. Just started Lawrence Block's Ariel: first 20 pages has three appearances to a woman by a scary ghost, a meeting with a strange old woman who claims all the houses around there are haunted, and the sinister death of the first woman's baby son - it's a spectacular start to a horror/ghost story, and I hope he can keep it up. Also reading the fourth collection of Osamu Tezuka's Astro Boy.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Monday, 28 July 2003 21:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Hurlyburly, a play by David Rabe

― Mary (Mary), Saturday, 2 August 2003 06:22 (twenty-two years ago)

lorrie moore's 'birds of america'.

― RJG (RJG), Saturday, 2 August 2003 06:29 (twenty-two years ago)

Th September Atlantic.

― Kenan Hebert (kenan), Saturday, 2 August 2003 06:51 (twenty-two years ago)

'a bit of singing & dancing', susan hill

― duane, Saturday, 2 August 2003 07:37 (twenty-two years ago)

'the ticket that exploded' william burroughs.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Saturday, 2 August 2003 08:06 (twenty-two years ago)

I've almost finished An Evening Of Long Goodbyes by Paul Murray and am probably going to read Andrew Loog Oldham's 60s memoir next.

― N. (nickdastoor), Saturday, 2 August 2003 10:13 (twenty-two years ago)

'glamorama', bret easton ellis

― Michael B, Saturday, 2 August 2003 12:53 (twenty-two years ago)

RJG, how is "birds of america"? It's something I've been considering picking up....

I just finished a silly novel called 'The Pursuit of Alice Thrift'. It was okay, funny in places, and light reading.

I just returned 'Polar', by TR Pearson. It was hilarious, but just not what my summer brane was in the mood for, unfortunately. The beginning was talking about a guy with no social graces who was obsessed with the plotlines of porn, and how he'd describe his favorite scenes to anyone and everyone he encountered in the checkout line at the grocery store. The writing oozes with sardonic humor.

Recently read: 'Waiting', by Ha Jin (slow moving, but worth sticking with), 'Atonement', by Ian McEwan (very engaging), and 'The Crimson Petal and the Rose' (thanks for the recommendation Miss Laura--I loved it!)

― JuliaA (j_bdules), Saturday, 2 August 2003 13:54 (twenty-two years ago)

'Birds of America' is great, Julia. More on Moore here: Lorrie Moore

I am reading 'The Ambassadors' by Henry James and 'Truth and Progress: Philosophical Papers III' by Richard Rorty. Am I turning into a young fogey?

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Saturday, 2 August 2003 14:43 (twenty-two years ago)

'birds of america' is goofy and patchy and very nice.

― RJG (RJG), Saturday, 2 August 2003 15:11 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm reading Henry Miller's Cosmological Eye and a book of interviews with Brian DePalma. Oh, and flipping through Henry Rollins's Black Flag tour journals a bit, again. I'm physically incapable of not having SOME rock book to peruse for the 888th time in my room.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Saturday, 2 August 2003 16:22 (twenty-two years ago)

Finished Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser, and now I'm on Italo Calvino's If on a winter's night a traveler.

― o. nate (onate), Saturday, 2 August 2003 16:32 (twenty-two years ago)

the story of o :(
the picture of dorian gray (i have read it once before, when i was 11. it makes a bit more sense now)

― minna (minna), Saturday, 2 August 2003 18:30 (twenty-two years ago)

who will tell the people and the edge of the bed by lisa palac
and the last wired
and the new res which is almost a great mag

― hector (hector), Monday, 4 August 2003 00:29 (twenty-two years ago)

proofreading and rewrites

― Matt (Matt), Monday, 4 August 2003 01:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Um...something. It's around here.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 4 August 2003 01:51 (twenty-two years ago)

And now you know how Ned had managed to get to 200,000 posts!

On my way through Not Wanted on the Voyage by Timothy Findley...have been on a bit of a Findley kick lately (have gone through The Telling of Lies, Last of the Crazy People and Headhunter, all fairly recently). Just finished the new Coupland, Hey Nostradamus, which is at about the same level (pretty good if you like his writing style, but still not really mindblowingly great). Also just picked up Schlosser's Reefer Madness, and have a couple of Murakamis in the pile (South of the Border... and Sputnik Sweetheart).

― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Monday, 4 August 2003 02:09 (twenty-two years ago)

And now you know how Ned had managed to get to 200,000 posts!

Ya punk!

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 4 August 2003 02:24 (twenty-two years ago)

Nothing to read... withering away...

― luna (luna.c), Monday, 4 August 2003 02:26 (twenty-two years ago)

200,001?

― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Monday, 4 August 2003 02:28 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, you have your fun. Shouldn't you be out making beaver jerky stocks to plan ahead for your winter? That starts in three weeks, right?

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 4 August 2003 02:32 (twenty-two years ago)

Hey Ned! What're you reading these days? ;)

― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Monday, 4 August 2003 02:37 (twenty-two years ago)

YOUR SPURIOUS COMPLAINTS. ;-)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 4 August 2003 02:49 (twenty-two years ago)

I just finished two books that I loved:

Middlesex by Eugenedies (spelling? Of The Virgin Suicides fame) - a story of gender and being intersexed, but more about an immigrant family. Absolutely brilliant and enjoyable.

AND

Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs (I think?) - hillarious and painful - not brilliant, but extremely enjoyable. Blurb on the back said it best: 'David Sedaris writing The Hotel New Hampshire. Delightful escapism.

Next will likely be that one about Bringing Home Mother's Body, I think, though I am not 100% certain of that title.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Monday, 4 August 2003 04:03 (twenty-two years ago)

three years pass...

I finally finished "The Old Capital" by Kawabata, it was good, typically sad. Will start "Piercing" by Ryu Murkami, but will probably read a ton of comics before that.

― jel --, Thursday, 22 February 2007 20:47 (nineteen years ago)

The Wicked Pavillion by Dawn Powell and The Story of French by Jean-Benoît Nadeau and Julie Barlow.

― Michael White, Thursday, 22 February 2007 20:54 (nineteen years ago)

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/1594865728.01.THUMBZZZ.jpg

― gabbneb, Thursday, 22 February 2007 21:05 (nineteen years ago)

Madame Bovary by Flaubert

― Gaia1981, Thursday, 22 February 2007 21:39 (nineteen years ago)

Gone With the Wind - re-reading to see what the deal is with Belle Watling,
Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach - very interesting (and suggested somewhere on ILX), and also my physiology book (more staring at that one than reading it, though).

― Sara R-C, Thursday, 22 February 2007 21:48 (nineteen years ago)

Poor Belle!

― Michael White, Thursday, 22 February 2007 21:54 (nineteen years ago)

May have been based on this madam.

― Michael White, Thursday, 22 February 2007 22:00 (nineteen years ago)

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks. Super fascinating if you're into that sort of thing, which I very much am.

― lindseykai, Thursday, 22 February 2007 22:16 (nineteen years ago)

Just finished Their Eyes Were Watching God for the first time since high school. I'm teaching it on Monday--let's see if I can put together a 2-hour seminar in two days!

― G00blar, Thursday, 22 February 2007 22:22 (nineteen years ago)

Notes of a Hanging Judge - Stanley Crouch
Hiroshima - Hersey
Dispatches - Jonathan Kerr

All for literary journalism classes.
Also - Fools Rush In - Bill Carter.

(I'm actually re-reading Hiroshima and Dispatches - and they are both worthy of the second go!)

― aimurchie, Friday, 23 February 2007 01:20 (nineteen years ago)

The Osama Bin Laden I Know by Peter Bergen

― Oilyrags, Friday, 23 February 2007 01:29 (nineteen years ago)

just finished The Spy Who Came In From The Cold John LeCarre gripping up until the very last sentence, one of the best thriller/genre-type novels I've ever read

― m coleman, Friday, 23 February 2007 01:29 (nineteen years ago)

The Accursed Share by Georges Bataille and I just finished Oroonoko by Aphra Behn.

― max, Friday, 23 February 2007 01:35 (nineteen years ago)

m coleman, have you read a lot of LeCarre? I remember picking up Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy from the library and basically going through his entire bibliography in three or four weeks, reading a book every couple days. At some point they begin to blend together, but they're so well-plotted and cunningly smart that it's hard to avoid getting sucked in.

― max, Friday, 23 February 2007 01:37 (nineteen years ago)

The Counterfeiters - Andre Gide

Huh? You're not my russian friend are you? Cause she's reading that as well.

A book on Japanese personalities. I'm having a hard time reading it since the translation is so... weird. I can tell it's *loaded* and translated from Japanese. Not a bad translation, just difficult to read.

― nathalie, Friday, 23 February 2007 08:16 (nineteen years ago)

dark spring by unica zurn.

― GOTT PUNCH II HAWKWINDZ, Friday, 23 February 2007 09:44 (nineteen years ago)

Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens.

― braveclub, Friday, 23 February 2007 09:53 (nineteen years ago)

Cormac McCarthy - All The Pretty Horses

― Matt DC, Friday, 23 February 2007 12:19 (nineteen years ago)

m coleman, have you read a lot of LeCarre?

not as much as you have! I read T/T/S/S and Smiley's People back in the early 80s when PBS was running an excellent mini-series based on the latter. Tried one of his recent books a couple years ago and really didn't like it. But I'm in a cold war phase now, so I want to go back and see what I've missed. If you like LeCarre, Max, try Eric Ambler if you haven't already he's the master of espionage/political thrillers.

― m coleman, Friday, 23 February 2007 15:51 (nineteen years ago)

three weeks pass...

http://images.barnesandnoble.com/images/12460000/12464591.jpg

The first two or three chapters are horribly depressing. The rise of a right-wing Christian billionaire family, ugh.

― milo z, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 23:48 (nineteen years ago)

the chocolate war by robert cormier

always meant to read it as a kid. ran across it the other day. good young adult lit.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Thursday, 22 March 2007 00:00 (nineteen years ago)

Been meaning to read some LeCarre myself at some point as I've been watching the re-run of "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy" on BBC4. If Eric Ambler is in the same ballpark it should be great.

― xyzzzz__, Thursday, 22 March 2007 10:01 (nineteen years ago)

Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell. I just got to the part with the randy musician and it seems to be picking up after a rather draggy start.

― Roz, Thursday, 22 March 2007 10:10 (nineteen years ago)

last five or so:
iain m banks: the algebraist
alistair reynolds: zima blue (shorts)
alistair reynolds: galactic north (shorts)
iain m banks: use of weapons (reread)
iain m banks: state of the art (reread)

next up when i get around to pre-ordering from amazon:
alistair reynolds: the prefect

can you see a pattern?

― koogs, Thursday, 22 March 2007 11:16 (nineteen years ago)

Just finished Ron Jeremy's biography and now started Bulgakov's Master and Margarita which is very good.

― nathalie, Friday, 23 March 2007 12:22 (nineteen years ago)

At home: City of Quartz: Excavating the Future in Los Angeles by Mike Davis

On the train: The Reformation by Diarmud MacCulloch

― Masonic Boom, Friday, 23 March 2007 12:27 (nineteen years ago)

City of Quartz is great! Mike Davis has a new one out, called Planet of Slums that I'd like to read.

I'm reading Unspeak by Steven Poole, and Never let me go by Kazuo Ishiguro.

― Neil S, Friday, 23 March 2007 12:50 (nineteen years ago)

Yeah, Elvis Telecom of these parts told me to read it AGES ago, but I'm only getting around to it now. Really intersting American take on psychogeography.

― Masonic Boom, Friday, 23 March 2007 12:52 (nineteen years ago)

He's more explicitly politically engaged than British psychogeographers, iirc.

― Neil S, Friday, 23 March 2007 12:54 (nineteen years ago)

I'm reading The Day Lasts More than a Hundred Years by Chingiz Aitmatov and a history of whaling (Whaling Will Never Do For Me, I forget the author).

― Maria, Friday, 23 March 2007 15:12 (nineteen years ago)

"Medieval Ghost Stories" it's an anthology.

― jel --, Friday, 23 March 2007 16:18 (nineteen years ago)

guys,please participate in the poll:
"poo:yr favourite book ever" in the I Love Books board.thank you.

― Zeno, Friday, 23 March 2007 18:43 (nineteen years ago)

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