I liked it as well. One of the better fantasy debuts, and next to Lies of Locke Lamora in terms of recent quality series.

Reading Anathem by Neal Stephenson. I can never get over what a freaking genius this guy is. The premise of this novel sounds so freaking boring, but it's amazing. It's also cool because it's like A Clockwork Orange in that the language of the novel is a creation of the author. At first it seems overwhelming to decipher, but it quickly becomes easy to read and understand.

I just finished Bright Shiny Morning by James Frey. He's the guy who made up a bunch of shit in his autobiography about his drug addiction and made Oprah cry. I hoped doing straight fiction that he'd really bring some respectability to liars! (jk) He does have a real knack for settings and details. Overall it was good, not a knockout.

Moving on to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

I am not actually reading anything right now but I recently finished this book.

IRA Wealth: Revolutionary IRA Strategies for Real Estate by Patrick Rice

So now I am taking advantage of some depressed Real Estate Markets.

Just finished "I hope they serve beer in hell"

Quite funny.

The Saving Life of Christ by Major Ian Thomas

I'm sorry, but I honestly thought that was the absolute worst book ever! It may have been funny in some places, but it was nothing but a bunch of egotistic BS lies from an elitist wanna-be party-animal. He came off as God's gift to women and I rolled my eyes more than I ever rolled over in laughter.

Oh, and I've got a hundred bucks that says I could drink little old Tucker Fake under the table.

The "rave" reviews he's received are from his spamming college buddies. Read the reviews from real people who read real books and most of them feel the same way I did- what a waste of time, money, and trees. The book is poorly written and in no way thought-provoking or riveting- it's just a classless drunken rambling of shit.

I'm glad you liked it though. :D

I just picked up Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. I didn't finish my last book "House of Good Hope" for a variety of reasons so I'm going to pick up this one and then try afterwards to return to House.

Anyone else read this classic?

Yep. Very enjoyable.

I own it, and I've started it like 3 times but for some reason I never can keep going. There's nothing I dislike about it, but I just never seem to want to finish it.

I read it. It was alright but it's been a long time ago and I remember having to force myself to finish it. I still have a couple of lasting memories from it though so it was probably worth it.

I read Zen two summers ago. It was fine, but nothing really life-changing by any means.

I have just read The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis and that is beautiful. I started reading it again immediately.

Evidently he made a movie, and the movie sucks, too.
http://gawker.com/5346223/tucker-maxs-movie-poop

DaKCMan AP: The Movie!

agreed on all points.

About 2/3rds through Victory of the West, about the Battle of Lepanto. Written by N. Capponi or something like that. Found it (hardcover in good shape) for five bucks at a local store that sells all kinds of used books, so no idea of its current availability.

Very well written, setting a solid foundation for the background of the political environment in which the battle occurred. A good read for those who are either interested in significant naval battles in history, or for late Middle Ages Mediterranean history.

I couldn't care less if none of the stories are true. The stories are funny. I laughed my ass off through most of the book. Have no intention of seeing the movie. I also have no intention of trying to drink anyone under the table. Did too much of that back in college.
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How the ***** did this book get a movie deal?

You know what though- ladies and gentlemen of the planet- THIS SHOULD BE YOUR INSPIRATION. If there was ever a classless rambling lying piece of shit ever penned and published- it is this book. And now that someone, quite possibly drugged and tied to a chair by midget hookers and given blowjobs until he was blue in the face so that he would agree to produce and sell the rights to a movie deal- this ought to tell every clueless slacker out there in this great world of ours that opportunities, as rare as they may seem, truly do exist.

If you have an idea, a story, a painting, a song, a handbasket you weaved, or anything of any intrinsic creative value sitting around with nothing to do- I can assure you it is worth far more than this dribbling pile of crapola from Tucker Fake. That fumbling Bic marker drawing you did of the horsie in the meadow should be hanging in the Metropolitan Museum of Art now that this book was ever published and made into a movie. That piano recital you did when you were sick as a dog in heat would have made Bach weep for joy compared to this book now turned movie.

There you have it folks, we are now all artists. Splat your hand down on the piece of paper, trace your fingers, and give us your turkey- 'cause that hapless drawing is a work of art that deserves to be displayed in the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. This book in no way deserved to be published, and it sure as shit on my heels didn't need to be made into a movie.

I now shall retreat to my den, where I will doodle my masterpiece with crayons.

I agree.

I reading Daemon. It is amazing. I hope they make it into a movie.

It all begins when one man's obituary appears online. . .
Matthew Sobol was a legendary computer game designer—the architect behind half a dozen popular online games. His premature death from brain cancer depressed both gamers and his company’s stock price. But Sobol’s fans weren’t the only ones to note his passing. He left behind something that was scanning Internet obituaries, too—something that put in motion a whole series of programs upon his death. Programs that moved money. Programs that recruited people. Programs that killed.

Confronted with a killer from beyond the grave, Detective Peter Sebeck comes face-to-face with the full implications of our increasingly complex and interconnected world—one where the dead can read headlines, steal identities, and carry out far-reaching plans without fear of retribution. Sebeck must find a way to stop Sobol’s web of programs—his Daemon—before it achieves its ultimate purpose. And to do so, he must uncover what that purpose is . . .

Anybody pick up the new Dan Brown?

The thread title specifies the high brow crowd, keg.

I am currently reading "The Lost Symbol" It's off to a good start.

Even high brow people have guilty pleasures.

Still reading Neal Stephenson's Anathem. It's pretty badass and impressive.

Racism on Sports Chat Sites In The Midwest. Does it Exist?
By Sweet Dick Willie.
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Satan.
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So, I read it, or rather listened to it while I exercised/drove, and I was disappointed. Not that I was expecting a literary apotheosis of any kind, but the whole book felt flat to me.

I'm now giving the Illiad a go. I thought I'd break out of my science fiction/fantasy shell temporarily, just for a change of pace. It's been torturous so far, through the first two books, but I'd imagine having to sit through the Catalogue of Ships was a major part of that for me. Hopefully I'll gradually get into it.

Hah, yeah I think there are a lot of tribes it goes through at the beginning.

It gets really good. It just builds up and builds up and builds up. Achilles shield, his fight against Hector, his meeting with Priam. Ahh, I love the Iliad.

And the Aeneid is even better.

I don't think I'm going to get to the aeneid anytime soon. After the Illiad I have the Odyssey, and then I picked up Paradise Lost because I've always wanted to read it. I figure by that point I'll be literatured-out.

That is something that I have never been.

I'm reading Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead, by Tom Stoppard, and The Princess de Cleves, by Madame de Lafayette. They're both good so far. I usually have one book upstairs and one down.

"Big Sky" by A. B. Guthrie.
Mountain men kickin'ass.

Literature has always been litera-chore for me. At least anything pre-twentieth century. I was the same way with music, which probably sounds odd for a guy with a degree in (classical) music composition. I generally find anything from the 19th century or earlier to be incredibly boring. My tastes run to the modern, for whatever reason.

I hear you. Much of my reading is 20th century (or very, very late 19th).

Usually, I read non-fiction concerning religion, esoteric mysticism, or theoretical physics. But, I wanted some popcorn fiction for a change and stopped in the bookstore last night to see Dan Brown's new book, The Lost Symbol. Wow, talk about taking almost all my academic interests (I was a history major also) and wrapping them up into an enjoyable mystery! About 25 chapters into it, a real page turner so far.

-HH

I've had that book recommended to me by two different people so it's on my list (actually I have the ebook on my phone) but I still haven't started it because I know it's just the first book of a trilogy that isn't yet released.

George R. R. Martin (greatest fantasy author of all time) also recommended it on his blog and he had high praise for it iirc.


Recently finished:

Mass Effect Ascension. Decent sci-fi. It's a tie-in novel with a video game series that I like so I can't recommend it to most people.

1984. Not as good as I would have thought. Good writing, but since I already know what "Orwellian" is I guess that took away from the books impact. Also, I didn't like the ending.
Orwell is a good writer but he's no Hemmingway or Fitzgerald who can make me enjoy what I'm reading even when I have no interest in the subject.

Fevre Dream. George R. R. Martin took a break a few years ago and wrote this. It's a vampire book set in the late 1800s and romanticizes the steam boats of that era. This is a great book.

I always preferred his Animal Farm to 1984.

I'm just about done with The Tender Bar, by J.R. Moehringer. It's an engaging read, and an inspiring one since I feel I share some of the same fates as Moehringer did in this memoir.

Next up is Rocket Boys, by Homer H. Hickam, Jr. This is the book that inspired the movie, October Sky. I've heard the book is a great read, so I'm looking forward to reading it.

Saul Bellow - Humboldt's Gift

Recently Finished:
Three Cups of Tea - Very Good, mostly for the educational value than the story. The story is so-so, and gets better as the book progresses, but I was shocked at how little I knew about Pakistan and Afgahnistan, and really feel that Greg Mortenson gives a great take on the situation over there.

Gang Leader for a Day - Great book. I've always been intrigued by Gangs and Gang Culture, so what better way to learn about it than to read about Sudhir Venkatesh and how he spend 6 years hanging out with the Black Kings of Chicago under the protection of a local gang leader. Very interesting read.

I've only read his short stories- never his novels. I don't really know why either. I should read one.

Is that the same guy discussed in the book Freakonomics?

Well, last time I said I was going to read Zen and the ARt of Motorcycle Maintenence but that got shelved for the time being.

Instead, I just finished The Lost Symbol by, yes I know, Dan Brown. I can't say it was terrible since I breezed through it and was entertained, but the twist sucked (called it a good 200 pages before it was revealed) and the actual Mystery - and therefore half of the plot catalyst - really stunk. It was like he wrote a book to appease all the religious people he "offended" with his last books. It wasn't that it was religious it just didn't have a point. And the Lost Symbol was laughable at best.

Now going to start James Rollins' The Doomsday Key - his are always more entertaining than Dan Brown's. And they're also more science oriented which may account for my liking them more.

Then to follow that I'm going to either:
1) Pick back up Zen & Motorcycles
2) Get Dawkins' The Greatest Show on Earth
3) Start Phillip Pullman's The Golden Compass series again after reading the first one a couple years ago but never continuing.

Speaking of Freakonomics, they have another one coming this November. Entitled: Superfreakonomics.

Well, it seems I'll have to read Superfreakonomics a bit more skeptically than I did Freakonomics. While the latter was pretty straightforward and logical, it seems that Superfreakonomics isn't. At least on the subject of Global Warming. The chapter has gotten shredded to peices by climate scientists all over the web. It's pretty scathing stuff. I'll probably still end up reading it but it did take a hit on my "I want to buy this book when it comes out" meter.


On another note, I finished James Rollins The Doomsday Key. (Does anyone read him?) I didn't care as much for the core scientific material as I did for his previous book which dealt with savants and autism. That said, it was as entertaining as ever with some character developments on a character given only a minor role in past. I'm hoping she stays in future installments. It did however have some interesting scientific tidbits. Indeed, the best part of the book might be the Notes following the epilogue where he details what is fact and fiction.

Yes.

I am 12 and WOT is this?

http://davebrendon.files.wordpress.c...ring-storm.jpg

I"m getting sarah palin book.

I'm re-reading Jon Ann Beard's The Boys of My Youth

After I sweep through The Gathering Storm, I will read Wolf Hall, of the 2009 Booker Award fame.

Well, I read GC two years ago and liked it. Then lost the series and eventually picked it back up the other week. Breezed through the GC as I was already familiar with it and just needed to familiarize. Then I went straight into Subtle Knife.

I agree and disagree with you. I am with you in that I LOVED the world in GC and wish that there was a sort of Harry Potter like series based just in the world so as to explore it deeply. So many questions. I'm 3 chapters in The Amber Spyglass. So far, so good. That said, I noticed a seemingly contradictory point or a plot hole. Needless to say, it's minor, though. I'm hoping the rest is good. I love the intercut dream sequences between chapters.

I also feel that Pullman uses too much brevity. Whereas Rowling gets flack for expanding too much into the world, Pullman does the opposite. Characters killed purposefully, yes, but so much more could have been told about them. Its a classic example of what happens when you condense a story to the mere basics. AT least that's how I see it. I'll chime in when I finish it.

Ugh. I thought that was more aptly titled "The Lost Time" for obvious reasons. The twist was not like the other books and something I saw coming a good 100 or more pages before it happened. And the overall mystery felt, as keg says: flat. It never took off the way the other two books.

Obviously, I'm slightly biased when it comes to this next point but I thought this book reeked of being accomondationistic. In other words, I thought it was a book written simply to make up for his religious "controversies" of past. To make up for the "slamming" religions took in previous books.

Anyone else see that?






Finally, here's my updated schedule of books. And they're piling up left and right. Course, I don't read more than one book at a time because I feel it dilutes things.

Reading:
The Amber Spyglass.
Should finish that within a couple days.

On Deck:
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Racing
Food Matters (Rented from Library)

In the hole:
House of Good Hope


Waiting on the bench:
The Art of Racing in the Rain
The Greatest Show on Earth
Superfreakonomics (Maybe, and dwindling fast.)
World War Z


Wanting to read:
Catch 22
Child 44
iWoz
The Innocent Man
What's the Matter with Kansas



Any recommendations for another fantasy series in the vein of Golden Compass? And I don't think Wheel of Time will be adequate given the number of people not just on here but elsewhere who say it's a bit of a circle that doesn't go anywhere.

A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin is kind of fun, as far as fantasy goes, but it is not in the same vein as His Dark Materials.

How so?

Have you read Lord of the Rings, irish?

I haven't. I have the books and tried to read them years ago and found them boring. Thus, I didn't get very far.

Should I try again?

Even having after seen the movies?

Well, I'd say Martin's series is much more mature. Politics, sexuality, violence, etc. I'm not discounting the philosophy of His Dark Materials as immature, but the plot is.

They are also different sorts of high fantasy. A Song of Fire and Ice is Medieval High Fantasy and I'm not sure how to classify His Dark Materials.

I haven't read them. I just figured if you wanted some fantasy, that's the Godfather of them all.

Or maybe some H.G. Wells. Time Machine or War of the Worlds.

How about the seminal cyberpunk series instead? William Gibson's Neuromancer, Count Zero, and Mona Lisa Overdrive.

Let's see...on my night stand are the following that are in the various stages of getting read:

Even Brook Trout Get the Blues by John Gierach
The Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi
A Short History of the World by J.M. Roberts
Sexopedia by Anne Hooper
The Joy of Cooking by Irma Rombauer (and other less well know Rombauers)

Nothing too deep at the moment.

I'm going to get back on my goal of reading all of the Pulitzer prize fiction winners in January.

Mentioned earlier, The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss is quality with the second due out in the first half of 2010. The hard part is reading GRRM first, nothing quite compares afterward.

Like Gierach. Good fishing writer.

Read The Help by Kathryn Stockett. It's gotten something of a bad rap as an Oprah chick type book, but it's pretty damned good. Not anything terribly high brow, but definitely entertaining and moving. Think A Thousand Splendid Suns set in Jackson, Miss. in the sixties.

Just Read

American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House

The Kennedy Assassination--24 Hours After : Lyndon B. Johnson's Pivotal First Day as President

Manhunt : The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer

So I finished the trilogy. Overall, the more I think about it, the more I love the philosophy, the story, and the creativity. In fact, the only thing I disliked was the ending. Not because of what happened to Lyra and Will but because there were so many loose-ends not tied up or forgotten. (ie. What happened with respect to the War? Was the Authority killed like his guardian Metatron?) Admittedly, it took me a good amount of reflection to find out how Mary played the serpent but I ended up liking the subtlety.

There's just so much I like about the world and the invention of the daemons and the philosophy behind the story that I can overlook some of the flaws I saw throughout the trilogy. (One was why Will's dad would automatically have a daemon when he enters Lyra's world but Will didn't. Or that the ending seemed rushed.)

Bottom-line: the more I think about it, the more I loved it.

I finished Food Matters by Mark Bittman. Ultimately, I felt that this was the book Michael Pollan should have turned in for In Defense of Food. Namely, the inclusion of a meal plan / recipes. IDoF was much more scholarly rather than journalistic than FM but FM makes up for it with the easy reading and meal plans.

Gotta copy the recipes before I return it to the library. :)


My reads:


Reading:
Going to decide soon.

On Deck:
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Racing

In the hole:
House of Good Hope


Waiting on the bench:
The Art of Racing in the Rain
The Greatest Show on Earth
Superfreakonomics (Maybe, and dwindling fast.)
World War Z


Wanting to read:
Catch 22
Child 44
iWoz
The Innocent Man
What's the Matter with Kansas

Finished:
His Dark Materials Trilogy by Phillip Pullman
Food Matters by Mark Bittman

Me too. My brother-in-law is a fulll blooded Creek and, understandably, absolutely hates Jackson and had convinced me that I should too. But after reading this I don't particularly hate him, but I don't like him either.
His times were more complicated than I had imagined and he was a product of his times.

Did some poking around with respect to the Amber Spyglass and the ending and definitely missed things. That's what I get when I read too fast and distractedly.

For example this Amazon review points out something I was confused about when I read it but makes perfect sense:

I just bought two books - the new Larry Bird/Magic Johnson When the Game Was Ours and that book about zombie wars that got boffo reviews in another thread. I should be able to finish both in about 3 months.

Highbrow? No, not exactly.

I finished 'Dispatches' by Michael Herr 2 weeks ago, the most stolen from & conceptualized for film, book about the Vietnam war.

Full Metal Jacket, Platoon, Apocalypse Now... each one its own take on that book. Herr's poetic prose is so immitated its crazy

In a different way every bit as insightful into the true & human cost of war as 'About Face' by Col. David Hackworth.

I thought FMJ was a retelling of "The Short Timers"?

I've never heard of that one & some of it may be as far as i know.

But entire scenes for FMJ were ripped straight from Dispatches... eliminate the basic training scenes, flip a war correspondent into a young recruit reporter for 'Stars & Stripes' like Modine & its basically the entire book.

'How do you kill women & children?'... 'Its easy, ya just dont lead'em sa much', that entire scene alone is completely ripped from Dispatches.

I think I should read this one. I am fascinated by stories about the avarage fighting man, but suspect of an author who attempts to give "true meaning" to war

I definitely agree that only those who fight wars can begin to understand them, but Herr really put himself out in the bush in remote firebases & all kinds of other tough spots to get the story. He really did live it with our soldiers at times, as much as any reporter has ever dared to anyway.

Pick it up at the library sometime, you'll see just how much of this book is blatantly ripped off by Hollywood. He doesnt have the truth, but its a good true story IMO.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Short-Timers

The Short-Timers is a semi-autobiographical novel by former Marine Gustav Hasford about his experience in the Vietnam War. It was later adapted into the film Full Metal Jacket by Hasford, Michael Herr, and Stanley Kubrick.
The book is now out of print, but Hasford's website contains the entire text.
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The book is divided into three sections, written in completely different styles of prose.




"The Spirit of the Bayonet" chronicles Pvt. James T. "Joker" Davis' days in the Marine Corps boot camp, where a drill instructor (Gunnery Sergeant Gerheim) breaks the men's spirits and then rebuilds them as brutal killers. Here Joker befriends two privates nicknamed "Cowboy" and "Gomer Pyle." The latter, whose real name is Leonard Pratt, earns the wrath of both Gerheim and the rest of the platoon through his ineptitude and weak character. Though he eventually shows great improvement and wins honors at graduation, the constant abuse has unbalanced his mind. In a final act of madness, he kills Gerheim and then himself in front of the whole platoon. This section is written in a very simple, savage style.




"Body Count" shows some of Joker's life as a war correspondent for the Marines. He travels to Huế with Rafter Man, his photographer, and is reunited with Cowboy, now assistant squad leader in the Lusthog Squad. During a battle, Joker is "wounded" (actually only knocked out by an RPG concussion blast) and the book goes into a psychedelic dream sequence. After his quick recovery, Joker learns that the platoon lieutenant was killed by a friendly grenade, while the squad leader went insane and attacked an NVA position with a BB gun only to be shot down. Later, Joker and Rafter Man battle a sniper that killed another Lusthog soldier and an entire second squad; the battle ends with Rafter Man's first confirmed kill and Cowboy being wounded slightly. As Joker and Rafter Man head back to their base, Rafter Man panics and dashes into the path of an oncoming tank, which fatally crushes him. Joker is reassigned to Cowboy's squad as a rifleman (a grunt) for wearing an unauthorized peace button on his uniform. The writing style in "Body Count" is more complex than that in "The Spirit of the Bayonet."




"Grunts" takes place on a mission through the jungle with Cowboy's squad, outside of Khe Sanh. They encounter another sniper here, who wounds three of the men multiple times. After the company commander goes crazy and begins babbling nonsense over the radio, Cowboy decides to pull the squad back and retreat, rather than sacrifice everyone trying to save the wounded men. Animal Mother, the squad's M60 machine gun carrier, threatens Cowboy's life and refuses to retreat. Promoting Joker to squad leader, Cowboy runs in with his pistol and kills each victim with a shot to the head. However, he himself is repeatedly wounded in the process; before he can kill himself, the sniper shoots the gun out of his hand. Realizing his duty to Cowboy and the squad, Joker kills Cowboy and leads the rest of the men away. This section is written in a more complex style than the previous two, with more time spent on Joker's inner thoughts.

Just finished reading The Road by Cormac McCarthy. Good book. I guess it has been made into a movie and will be out in theatres later this month.

I finished The Gathering Storm several days ago, and I'm pretty mixed. I like that we're getting a conclusion, but sometimes the prose is so clearly not Robert Jordan's that it was distracting to me. I like Sanderson's writing in general, I've read many of his previously published novels, but I thought he really struggled to find some of the characters' voices, most notably the women (I thought he was off with all the female viewpoints for most of the book). Which struck me as odd, because Mistborn is told primarily from the perspective of a heroine, so it's not like a woman's perspective is something he hasn't done before.

But, all that said, it wasn't bad. It's pushing the series forward, and there's a clear sense for the first time in the Wheel of Time that the end is coming.

That''s great. Sounds like something I would like. I tend to think of war in human terms, and really don't think "true meaning" exists.

I hope that doesn't make people think I'm "soft", and I am not a liberal, but we're sent to enforce the reality of abstract ideals, but most of us are not cheerleaders, we just have a good job and don't really question what we have to do, plus we have an exceptional cameradery and our greatest loyalty is to our friends. Now that I am retired, that human connection between fighting men fascinates me, and I miss it.

I could be wrong but Weinstein Company has played musical chairs with their release dates so I think it got pushed back into February.


Not 100% positive.