What Are You Reading the Week of 6 December 2008

I am just sinking into The Feast of the Goat by Mario Vargas Llosa and I am thoroughly enjoying listening to The King's General by Daphne du Maurier.

I finished One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson last night, put it on BookMooch this morning, and it has already been spoken for! How's that for a quick turn around. The book was great, by the way.

Will likely be starting Idyll Banter by Chris Bohjalian today, unless something else reaches out from the cupboards as I walk by and jumps into my waiting, empty hands.

(edited for touchstones)

Finished Lords and Ladies last night, still need to finish Collected Fictions and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (reread), and Heat: An Amateur's Adventures...

Finished Special Topics in Calamity Physics - good overall though was pretty fed up by the style way before the end; also finished Le Fou de Bosch by Sergio Kokis and have started The Moon's a Balloon by David Niven.

As we're in the last few weeks of the year, I'll be reading shorter books to make sure I start the "999 challenge" January 1st...

Edited for typo...

I am reading An Imaginary Life by David Malouf
About the banishment to the Black Sea of the Poet Ovid during the 1st Century AD.

I finished 13 Things That Don't Make Sense: The Most Baffling Scientific Mysteries of Our Time by Michael Brooks this morning. I thought the book was fascinating and manages to conveys a lot of science in an easy to read manner for a non-scientist to understand.

I am continuing my non-fiction reading with The Numerati by Stephen Baker.

I'm reading The 99th Monkey by Eliezer Sobel. I decided to purchase his book after talking with him on LT's author chat this past year.

I didn't think I'd care for the book, but am happy to report I like it a lot. It's about his adventures with New Age experiences from the 1960's through the present. Very light and humorous, this book is turning out to be quite a fun read - one which I would especially recommend if you are involved in, or have any friends involved in, New Age experiences.

I'm still working through A Pirate of Exquisite Mind. I have learned so much from reading this book...it's great!

I'm still reading All too Human by George Stephanopoulos. It's like watching an extra series of West Wing!

I'm reading In Between: Memoir of an Integration Baby by Mark Morrison Reed because he's speaking and doing a signing at my church tomorrow. Then I'll be starting Twilight for a bookclub and to see what all the hype is about.

I finished A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, which I liked. Now I am reading The Riddle of the Sands and Beloved. I am thinking about maybe something for the holiday, too. Not sure what yet.
--BJ

I read Against Medical Advice by James Patterson which will go on a list of one of my top non-fiction books of the year. What that family went through was incredible!

I am now reading The Hour I First Believed by Wally Lamb.

And I am still reading 4 O'clock Murders by Scott Anderson. I am trying to get through my reserve library books that I can't renew, so I am only reading a few pages at a time of this.

I just finished I Will Marry When I Want by the Kenyan author and political activist Ngugi wa Thiong'o and Ngugi wa Mirii. This play was originally performed in 1977, and is a courageous and pointed satire of the different elements that were destroying the fabric of Kenyan society. This play led to his arrest later that year, and his ultimate decision to leave Kenya in 1982.

I'm also still reading 2666 by Roberto Bolaño.

I'm currently reading Faithless by Karin Slaughter. Usually I love her books and can't put them down but I've kinda lost my reading mojo half way through this one. I'm not sure if that's a reflection on the book though, but then I suppose you could say if it was that good I'd have finished it and been half way through something else by now.

Currently reading The World Without Us by Alan Weisman. Pretty interesting IMO.

I'm finishing up Promise at Dawn. It's the 4th book I've now read inspired by the 1001 Books You Should Read Before You Die. I've enjoyed them all and all were written with distinctive styles but each disappointed me a little too. I guess that I wanted masterpieces for the hype so that puts the problem in my expectations.

im reading Jane Eyre right now. it is reeally good! i really love the bronte sisters, they write such fascinating novels. i finished Rumors by Anna Godbersen a couple of weeks ago. its the secong book to The Luxe. the third one comes out next month, so im really excited about that!

So close to finishing Angels and Demons, it makes my brain freeze.

So far I like the book, the familiar Dan Brown suspence.

Still reading The King's Daughter by Sandra Worth, but I will finish it in the next day or so. Real life wasn't kind to me this week.

Just about to finish up A Prayer for Owen Meany, which I've enjoyed. Then I'm going to read The Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death--an Early Reviewer book--and probably The Last Temptation of Christ. I'm not sure if that'll make some trifecta of sorts, though I suspect it might.

Enjoying Elizabeth Peters's Crocodile on the Sandbank. Next up will be The Tales of the Beedle Bard, and various seasonal favorites. And, due to recent life changes/developments, I am also reading What to Expect When You're Expecting and What to Eat Before, During, and After Pregnancy.

Aw! I'm missing West Wing! I've got to read Stephanopoulous's book, especially with all the old Clintonites heading back into the White House.

Oops! I forgot to post what I'm reading: The Snowball: Warren Buffet and the Business of Life. NOT my usual fare at all, but surprisingly interesting!

I've finished Scapegallows early this morning and I'll be starting Paula by Isabel Allende on the plane home. It better be good ... because I've got a 13 hour flight! yikes

This week I'm reading...the latest issue of Poetry magazine, as well as:

Alphabet Juice by Roy Blount, Jr.
The Boat by Nam Le
How to Achieve True Greatness by Baldesar Castiglione
Droll Stories by Honore de Balzac
Boswell in Holland by James Boswell

Nam Le, by the way, is a phenomenal writer -- I don't recall another collection of stories of the same size with such wide-ranging scope, such agility, and such verve. One can see why he's been winning prizes left and right -- including the very lucrative Dylan Thomas prize -- for this book.

I miss West Wing too, but the good ones, not the last 2 years. I will have to put Stephanopoulous' book on my wish list.

Good luck with The Feast of the Goat Hemlockgang.

I was going to read Christine Falls, but The Wise Woman somehow managed to be in my hands when I opened a book today.

I read Stephanopoulous' book, it was quite good. .

Just finished Peripheral Vision by Patricia Ferguson, which was my October ER book. I enjoyed it very much, although I won't get to writing my review until tomorrow. Today I'm halfway through The Tale of Despereaux, which I'm reading to see if I can read it to my daughter/take her to the movie when it comes out.

I'm trying to read The Truth by Terry Pratchett, but I'm finding it hard to get started for some reason...

I also have a ten page paper due Thursday on modern Russian drama. Wish me luck!

#22: grkmwk - congratulations of your life "change/development". If your books don't suit you, I would gently suggest The Anxious Parent's Guide to Pregnancy, which I found had a nice reasonable tone. Unfortunately, I don't think it's been updated since 2002.

My wife hated What to Expect When You're Expecting and told me not too read it, so I didn't. What she didn't like was that she felt the book basically said that "to have a healthy baby you must do exactly what we say." Of course, opinions vary and it might be perfect for you. Just thought I'd comment.

Oh, I'm still reading Mists of Avalon, which has gotten better, but no faster. I've got LASIK planned this week, and part of me is thinking that if it goes wrong, Mists could be the last book I read...which makes me want to pick up another book!

#31: ZanKnits - The Truth never really got my attention, although it's a great idea. I thought maybe it was just me.

#28 - Just finished Christine Falls, pretty good, not fantastic, but a promising new fairly literary mystery series.

But what is fantastic so far is The Likeness by Tana French -- I am just loving this author's mysteries! Her first In the Woods was one of my favorites this year. I hope she keeps them coming.

Still reading Fool by Christopher Moore, an ARC. It is a retelling of the King Lear story. I was so happy to get it because I absolutely love Lamb: the gospel according to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal.

Fool arrived with a warning that it was a "bawdy" tale. Well! Bawdy doesn't come close to describing it. I was thinking of putting it aside after I'd read about 100 pages when neither the story itself nor the characters had yet grabbed me (although the characters were sure busy "grabbing" each other, let me tell you!), when all of a sudden things started getting really interesting. Now I'm about 3/4 of the way though it and finding it pretty funny and even hilarious at times. Maybe it took that long for me to get used to the, um, bawdiness factor, or maybe it was just one of those slow starters.

I also started The Beginnings of Rome by Tim Cornell for my non-fiction read.

#15 -- mk4195421,

I saw a special on the History channel that dealt with that subject (of what would happen if there were no people on the earth). I thought it was interesting!

I tried for the second time to begin Idyll Banter by Chris Bohjalian and simply could not get beyond the first 20 pages. I'm giving up. mckait, get ready, here it comes!!! Maybe you'll have better luck than I.

Instead, I was overjoyed to find a book that has been on my Seek & Find list for a long time....By The Time You Read This by Giles Blunt was waiting for me at our small book shop today so I snatched it up and will eagerly begin devouring it tonight. I've heard good things about this author. Michael Connelly gives him high praise, and that's good enough for me!

Just finished Collected Fictions, which I loved. Am currently taking another stab at The Crimson Petal And The White, which is one of those books I love but never get beyond the first few chapters, and also reading Heat: An Amateur's (insert rest of long title which the touchstones never pick up), because I love reading about food, and the super-long title makes me miss Italy like whoa.

I'm reading The World Is What It Is a biography of V.S. Naipaul by Patrick French about 100 pages in, quite good.
I'm also finishing off The Rachel Papers by Martin Amis which has been quite a bit of fun.
My first Amis fiction, don't know why I put it off for so long. I really enjoyed Experience.

I'm reading Fatelessness by Imre Kertesz

So far this week I am reading Little,Big by John Crowley, The Likeness by Tana French and The Meaning of Night by Michael Cox.

#25 cameling - I hope you have your hankie with you! Paula is quite an emotional read.

I've started Little Face, so far, nothing wonderful. Past the halfway mark with both audios - The Unknown Terrorist and Landscape of Farewell - both very different, but both very good.

cmt, bonniebooks

Another good read is Locked in the Cabinet by Robert Reich, Clinton's Labor Secretary. I found the "x" factor of how things get done in Washington most interesting in this book.

Just finished McEwan's Amsterdam and now I'm reading an ER book, Honeymoon in Tehran by Azadeh Moaveni. It's about the work of an American journalist of Iranian descent. Interesting and most enjoyable so far.

Just finished The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo. I'm generally a big fan of "animal fantasies" but I thought this one was just a little too cutesy.

Just starting The Court of the Air by Stephen Hunt. I'm just a little ways into it, but so far it's great. It reminds me a bit of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell.

Just finishing up Everyman by Philip Roth, the first novel of his I've read... I've been meaning to read it for a while now, finally picked it up the other day for $5 (brand new!!). I enjoyed it, though I wasn't really blown away... next up is probably Corregidora by Gayl Jones.

I am reading Harm Done, Ruth Rendell and I think that I may like Ruth Rendell's stand alone novels rather than those featuring the Inspector.

When I am finished with that in the next day or so I will try to finish The Lady in the Lake so they can go back to the library.

I've just finished The Tales of Beedle the Bard (excellent) and Vanity Fair (mixed feelings, I posted a review on my journal).
I'll be starting The Tempest by Shakespeare as soon as I'm done with my homework, I can't wait !

By the way, I really really miss The West Wing too ! I keep thinking about it although it was cancelled such a long time ago... I keep quoting it to friends who have absolutely no idea what I'm talking about.

Another West Wing fan here... I believe they changed writers in the last two season... if I remember it right. Part of the beauty of the show was the ..cadence? the rhythm? .. of the writing by Aaron Sorkin. Sports Night was his too, and I watched it for the same reason. Good writing, good story...

anyway~ Why can't you get into Bohjalian's book porchy?
Don't send it too soon.. maybe give it another chance? Mood matters :)

Have I said what I am reading?? The Wise Woman. It is a pleasant easy read, just what I wanted right now.

Hi mckait....I'm up early with a stuffy nose ~ ahh the joys of a closed up house with the furnace on....happens every blasted year. ugg.

Regarding the Bohjalian book Idyll Banter....I don't know what the heck it is.....he starts out with a long foreword about this itty bitty town he moves to in Vermont, and all about the dairy farms, population, other general tidbits of info that I don't really care about. I just want him to start in with the stories....the book is made up of short chapters about various happenings in the small town.....maybe I should just skip over the parts that don't interest me, but it's a small book and I want to read it all. I did start the first chapter and it starts in talking about this dairy farmer and blah blah blah. Not grabbing me at all. I already started another book, and it looks like a winner, so I'll stick with this one.

You want me to send you Idyll Banter and then you can read it and send it back?? lol

Still reading The Earth Moved: on the Remarkable Achievments of Earthworms and listening to The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. Somewhere in the living room near my chair is a copy of Dave Barry is Not Making this Up that I have been "reading" for quite some time now, too.

Reading the wonderfully enlightening, and full of gentle wisdom, Traditional Chinese Medicine for Women: Reflections of The Moon by Xiaolan Zhao, and Jane Austen's Persuasion. And finally finished Amrita Imroz A Love Story by Dr Uma Trilok, about the wonderful Punjabi poet & writer, Amrita Pritam and her life-long friendship with the artist Imroz. And relished the wonderfully erudite, Meatless Days by Sara Suleri, an interesting memoir recounting the turbulent years of Pakistan after Partition and up to Bhutto's martyrdom - that's Benazir's father, Zulfiqar.

I'm most of the way through Arthurian Romances, though somehow the translations fall a little short of what I might have wished for. (That said, the first one, Erec and Enide was translated by someone other than the person who did the rest -- and who did a slightly better job of it.)

I just received a copy of Shakespeare's Measure for Measure, which I think I'll try to get into as at-home reading.

Message 43: CEP

Honeymoon in Tehran by Azadeh Moaveni.

This book is supposed to be a follow up to her first book Lipstick Jihad about growing as an outsider in Iran and the USA. I have it but haven't read it yet. But I was reading something about it on-line and they say the book you are reading is a continuation of the story.

My three-day trip to NYC didn't allow for much reading, so I'm still reading British Baseball and the West Ham Club. It's an interesting read (for baseball fans).

Thanks FicusFan. Lipstick Jihad is promoted on the cover. I'm enjoying Moaveni's style as well as the content and expect to add the first work to the TBR collection.

I started Daisy Miller this morning, and expect to finish it today...so after that...um, probably finish John Keel's Our Haunted Planet. Still trying to wrap up some loose reading ends before the end of the year.

* pictures loose reading*

*ducks*

Just finished Michael Strogoff by Jules Verne. It was actually better than I had thought it would be. You just have to skim when the lists of Russian names & places begin.

Next up will be American Pie by Michael Lee West.

I'm going to be reading nineteen eighty-four. Else, I will be trying 2001. I think I have a special thing for numbers lately.

I just finished up reading The Light Fantastic. I think I'll be reading This I Believe II before it's due at the library and then I'll start up Equal Rites. Need to think of which book I actually own to read.

I just finished How To Talk About Books You Haven't Read by Pierre Bayard and not I'm starting Sandition by Jane Austen. It started it earlier but got barraged by school work. Now I'm back to my Jane Austen Binge with breaks for other stuff.

Another West Wing fan, here. Thanks cmt (and others) for the tip on All Too Human by George Stephanopoulos. Which reminds me, I need to find a copy of The Triumph of Politics to replace the one I gave away years ago.

Reading now: What is the What for a book club, The Lexus and the Olive Tree to catch up before getting Friedman's latest book, and The Book of Five Rings because I tripped across my husband's ratty marked up copy and it looked interesting.

But I just bought Inside Inside by James Lipton and flipping through it - I don't think I can wrap it for Christmas - looks too fun to wait!

Edited to add this note: the LT link brings up Inside Job instead of Inside Inside, which is an autobiography of James Lipton and stories about the TV show "Inside the Actors Studio."

#13, kidzdoc, I'm a big fan of Ngugi wa Thiong'o so I'll have to look at the play. I recently read his Petals of Blood, which was written around the same time and is also a courageous and pointed satire and also contributed to his arrest. They actually sound quite similar, and I wonder if one was based on the other. And I'm looking forward to reading 2666 also.

Not surprisingly, I'm still reading Doctor Faustus.

I am finishing La Traversée de la Mangrove by Maryse Condé; amazing new way of reading in French for me. Such a perfectly ninety degrees kind of syntax, concrete, and cohesent; yet soaked with Caribbean waters, kryol and West Indies passions... It is just amazing. Also started Pladoyer pour le Bonheur by Matthieu Ricard, and Buddha in your Mirror by Woody Hochswender. For some nostalgic reasons, I am looking forward to repeating East Wind, West Wind by Pearl S. Buck. The problem is that I cannot find the Spanish copy I used to have, and it is practically impossible to find this kind of literature in English down here in Venezuela. Any ideas about how to access full content books online?

Thanks, CEP! I'll add it to my 50-Book Challenge list that I'm typing up right now.
Bonnie

Highland65, Ha!Ha! That's MY favorite trick--to buy books for friends and family early so that I can read them first. I'm trying to decide who I can give Lipton's book to (Love that show, but don't get Bravo anymore, sob!), but I've already got What is the What going to my son-after I read it! :)

I'm reading Albanian author Ismail Kadare's Broken April. It's the story of highland people governed by the Konun. Many of the laws deal with death and avenging death. The story itself is about a man, Gjorg, who has avenged his brother's death and now has only 30 days to live himself. It's stark, bleak, and oddly fascinating.

#63 - Rebecca, you're right, Petals of Blood and I Will Marry When I Want were both published in 1977, from what I can tell, and the themes are very similar. I have the novel, but haven't read it yet. 2666 is quite good, so far.

I also started The Aftermath of War by Jean-Paul Sartre today, which is a collection of his essays about America, Negritude, post-WWII Europe, and other topics.

#57

No, not this week; haven't the time for any loose reading, hehehe...maybe some other activities, but not reading.

Anyway, finished Daisy Miller...dreadful novella...on to Our Haunted Planet

I finished An Imaginary Life by David Malouf.
It was set during the 1st century AD and dealt with the Roman Poet Ovid's exile from Rome by Augustus.

I thought it would be historical fiction, but it was more of a philosophical, navel gazing type of book. Ovid is sent to live with barbarians on the edge of the steppes, on the shore of the Black Sea. He can't speak the language so he is alone although there is a whole village of people there.

He muses about being, and words/language, nature and man and civilization. He spots a feral child, and it brings back his childhood memories and his family issues. He makes the child his project.

It was interesting, and short, but it didn't grab me. The author talked about the fact that Ovid's crime was a mystery, as was a lot of his life, so he made up a story (feral child).

However, I decided to read another book about Ovid. It is an historical mystery Ovid by David Wishart. It is the start of the Marcus Corvinus series. Wishart has Corvinus working to bring the ashes of the dead Ovid back to Rome at the request of his family.

Tiberius is now emperor, but the request is refused. There is a mystery about Ovid's crime, which Corvinus is trying to work out, so he can strong-arm someone into approving the request. I have just started it, but its terribly anachronistic. Corvinus goes around calling people 'sunshine' when he is pissed off.

Still finishing up New Moon. Enjoying it as a Goodread. Simplistic teenage thinking is taking me back to my late teens. Ahhh! The bad boys are define.

I finished The Beekeeper's Apprentice by Laurie R. King last night and started Captain's Fury by Jim Butcher.

I'm currently reading War of the Gods by Poul Anderson.

>64 argos79: argos79, have you visited the Project Gutenberg website yet? They do not have free access to any Pearl Buck works, but they have a lot of other stuff that might interest you.

The Divine Miss brought me a book that I delved into right away: The Road to Rescue by Mietek Pemper, about the Holocaust's least-known hero, the architect of the Schindler's List strategy. It's a memoir, and it's got something I haven't come to expect from memoirs...a point! I can't say it's cheery or seasonally apt, but it's very interesting so far.

I'm really enjoying The Brass Verdict by Michael Connelly 100 pages in. Which feels good because I was so excited about The Given Day and ended up skimming the last half because I only cared enough to skim not to read.

I really enjoyed The Lincoln Lawyer and I'm still finding Mickey Haller charming in this one. Harry Bosch is not as compelling to me, but, if you love him, he's here too.

I am reading Good to Great by Jim Collins and about to start Snow Flower and the Secret Fan: A Novel. I've also got a re-read of Dragonfly in Amber by Diana Gabaldon going.

Starting Tried By War and still reading The Alienist.

I am jumping into the rabbit hole with Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow.

Pretty much simultaneously reading:

Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich
Heart Shaped Box by Joe Hill
Don't Turn Out the Light - an anthology of horror
A Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson
Tales of Beedle the Bard by J.K. Rowling
and I'm also a couple of pages into
Toward the End of Time by John Updike

I normally only read one or two books at a time...but, this month has been a little off.

I have different books depending on where I'm going - bigger books go into my bag for the subway ride to work. Smaller paperbacks go with me when my wife and I take the subway somewhere (as we did twice this past week). Then the anthology is a 1st print signed..so I've been reading that little by little at home, while Bryson went on a business trip with me.

Finally, Rowling and Updike were both read a little because 1.) I picked up Rowling and had about 20 minutes of reading before we had to go out 2.) I didn't want to wake my wife by going back into our bedroom for the book I was currently reading and Updike was the next one on my "to read" list.

As if anyone cares ;P

I just finished Marie Phillips's Gods Behaving Badly last night, and I've moved on to Courtney Summers's Cracked Up To Be, my Early Reviewer book that just arrived. Looking forward to getting back to it after work!

I just finished The Mists of Avalon. I'm excited because - it's taken me almost a month; it's my 40th book of the year, a personal record; and the end was really good. If the whole book had been like the last 200 pages, I might have read it a bit faster.

I'm barely into Affinity by Sarah Waters. Haven't been reading much for the last few days since I hit my 100 reads for 2008 mark! Think I needed a little break. But Affinity is looking very promising - I've loved the other SW books I've read.

I'm rereading Lipstick Jihad in preparation for my ER book, Honeymoon in Tehran. Reading it is reminding me why I thought that asking for the author's new book from LTER would be a good bet.

I'm reading Into the Wild for school, and I just began Alison Weir's, The Lady Elizabeth.

I still can't get Weir's name touchstoned.

>85 lanaing:, miss_chievous
I'd love to hear what you think of The Lady Elizabeth. I enjoyed Innocent Traitor, but I've heard lackluster reviews of Elizabeth.

#80 Sean191

Of course we care! It's comforting to know that as quirky and compulsive readers we are not alone. And I think you were very considerate to not wake your wife--but what if you hadn't had another book close at hand to reach for? ;-)

I just finished another Nero Wolfe--Too Many Women. This is my preferred reading when I'm stressed and my second Wolfe book in two days. I'm trying to find another book for stressed out reading--the way this week is shaping up I will definitely need an easy read. Putting The Manila Rope on hold until next Monday when things will calm down a little bit. I want to enjoy that one and I will need to concentrate.

I'm wrapping up what has been a long journey into Under the Volcano. I've loved the book and am very glad a friend urged me to read it.

Finished Barchester Towers, which proved to be a nice balm to LOSING MY FREAKIN' JOB ON THURSDAY!!!! Right, the job that I thought I'd have forever - that's the one. Middle managers, just put a bullseye on your forehead right now; when the corporate animal doesn't have that much fat to begin with, your head is on the block.

Now reading: Monster.com, careerbuilder.com, etc...

>42 judylou:: judylou, OMG ... Paula is wonderful and yet terribly sad. I can't imagine what it must be like to sit through the hours at a hospital just waiting while you're child is in a coma. To be able to write as she did, capturing the joys, thrills, beauty, innocence, and sadness of her life during this time made want to stand up and applaud the strength of this woman.

Now that I'm emotionally wrung out, I need something completely light hearted and silly. I might re-read Winkie by Clifford Chase - the story of a teddy bear that gets arrested mistakenly as a terrorist.

#85 miss_chievous I read Into the Wild I thought it was a good read, although I have to say, I felt more annoyed than sympathetic about Christopher McCandless. I thought he was selfish to put his family through what he did...but that's just my opinion.

#87 MusicMom41 - fortunately, I have book cases in the spare bedroom and living room, so I'm well prepared!

#89 Mike - where do you live and what are you looking to do?

Started Murder on the Links today. This will be the first Christie I've read rather than listened to.

>90 cameling: cameling & judylou, I agree with you about Paula. I liked it a lot, and I admire Allende all the more for having written it (she was already one of my favorite authors). Such a difficult, tragic situation.

#89 mike

I will keep good thoughts going out that you will find something else soon.

#89 - me too!

I finished The Tale of Despereaux last night, and decided it was too dark for my soon-to-be six year old daughter. That will go back on the shelf for a couple more years. Now I'm going to pick up the seasonally appropriate Holidays on Ice by David Sedaris. Can't wait!!

Affinity is my second favorite SW book, tg

I have read it twice. I wish that one had a film, too....
maybe someday...

Still reading The Wise Woman and that is where I am headed right now.

Have a nice evening friends!

I'm reading Bitten by Kelley Armstrong it's my ER book for October, and I am really liking it. Werewolves not vampires and more adult than Twilight. Also reading Book of Negroes as it is short listed for Canada Reads.

And yes one more, Pride and Prejudice, how I have not read this awesome book before baffles my mind.

Started The Loveliest Woman in America last evening. I'm not very far into it but am looking forward to it. The writing may not be stellar but I'm guessing the story will be fascinating. This is the last book book on my TBR stack, not because I don't have lots of things I want to read but because I'm getting a KINDLE for Christmas. I feel a little disloyal to the printed book but our house can not hold any more books.

#89 mikeepatrick: that really sucks, all the best looking for work.

I have finished A Pirate of Exquisite Mind which was incredibly interesting.

I also finished Life of Pi, which was awesome. I had forgotten a lot of the hype about the book, and even what the story was about. I like that much better, just going along for the ride. There were 2 chapters in particular that were stunning. One in the middle of the book, and one at the end. Not so much the content, as the writing; it was beautiful and moving.

I've now started The Time Machine, which has caught my interest from the start.

For some reason, the three books that I was reading were not progressing- I stopped and read some others while the first books were sitting on the book pile. I finished The Secret River by Kate Grenville -very good- and Surfacing by Margaret Atwood-early Atwood-interesting!.
I am now still wrestling with a history book but have decided to start one of the following:
In The Image by Dara Horn-her second novel The World to Come was one of my favourites last year.
Can you Hear the Nightbird Call? by Anita Rau Badami and
Shakespeare's Kitchen by Lore Segal

#98 McKait, Affinity was adapted and it was quite good. I'll drop you a private message to explain it all ^^

Looking for input. I am reading, or trying to read, The Feast of the Goat by Mario Vargas Llosa. I t is about the decline and fall of Trujillo's dictatorship. My problem is that it reads like a fictionalized history book, and I think we have too many of those floating around. I am about 90 pages in. I really dislike quitting a book, but I am really tempted. Any thoughts? Wait a minute......Writing this has answered my question....Out with "The Goat". Thanks, LT, for just being here.

#89 Mike.. I am so sorry about your bad news. We have been there a few times ourselves though, and it is hard, it stinks.. but sooner or later it will be okay.

I am now deeply indebted to and BFF with Sibylle.Night as she has given me quite a gift of wonderful links. Thank you!!!!!

Thanks for the kind words on the job loss, everyone. I'm an IT project manager and have a lot of experience, so I'm bound to find something sooner or later. Here in Indianapolis, the IT crowd all seems to know one another, so I've got connections, and I'm already working the phones.

But getting laid off right before the holidays? LAME. To her credit though, my boss was pretty broken up as she was cutting me loose; she didn't have much choice.

Anyway, thanks for the support. Readers are good people. :)

#102, torontoc, I'm a Lore Segal fan, so I scooped up Shakespeare's Kitchen when it came out, but I was a little disappointed in it. Hope you enjoy it more than I do.

#106- good luck Mike- I'll keep my fingers crossed for you

I finished Abundance by Sena Jeter Naslund. This was a strong historical novel, told from Marie Antoniette's point of view. I just started The Reader by Bernhard Schlink. This is an LT recommendation and a film starring one of my favorites, Kate Winslet, which is coming out soon! Yessss!!

#106 All I can do is wish you luck Mike. I'm in NYC, so can't do much else I'm afraid.

Just finished All Shall Be Well; and All Shall Be Well; and All Manner of Things Shall Be Well. Still digesting it and having trouble writing a review. Also did a reread of Not a Creature Was Stirring for my library group. Last Night I started Memoir from Antproof Case, by one of my new favorites, Mark Helprin, whose Freddy and fredericka has been my favorite read this year.

I am rereading "Carry one Mr. Bowditch" which is a very good reread book!

Starting Origin by Diana Abu-Jaber and continuing to listen to The King's General by Daphne du Maurier.

I finished The King's Daughter by Sandra Worth on Sunday night, and started Let it Snow, a holiday story collection by John Green, Maureen Johnson, and Lauren Myracle last night. I'm nearly halfway through it already, so I anticipate finishing it tonight or tomorrow. I also started reading Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri last night.

My planned books for this week are:

The Bible: A Biography by Karen Armstrong
Black Boy by Richard Wright
The Ticket that Exploded by William S Burroughs

I have just discovered a gem by C. F. Ramuz called The Young Man from Savoy translated from the Swiss-French. It's not a long read, but I'm already engrossed by the language and the setting.

I've started The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell and since we're having some snowy weather with its subsequent traffic issues, I've started listening to Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World on my commute.

(Touchstones not happy with Dewey today)

>89 mikeepatrick: mikeepatrick, suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuckage. I am so empathetic you can't imagine. I hope you're one of the fortunates who gets something new right now.

One nice thing about the otherise wasted train trip into Manhattan for a job interview with no results (good or bad) was finding a copy of Against Nature at the Strand for a buck. Reading The Picture of Dorian Gray reminded me that this book, somewhere in all my boxes, is still awaiting good and close reading. And a few Graham Greene novels made it into the bag, I dunno how, I guess they levitated.

Joris-Karl Huysmans is a TRIP to read on the LIRR.

People of the Lie by M Scott Peck.

Very interesting and you cant help but agree with it as the pages go by.. very psychological too..

I finished The Tempest which was the strangest play I've ever read (I wrote down a few comments on my blog) and I'm starting Tom Jones

I just finished Keepers of the House by Shirley Ann Grau. It was so good and now I want to read all her other books. I especially liked the ending--bitter but satisfying. I highly recommend this book.

Today I started Gods Behaving Badly, which I am enjoying!

I'm reading Survivor by Chuck Palahniuk. I'm starting to get tired of his writing, although he started out by being one fo my favorite authors. His stories seems too formulaic to me now. Oh, well.

I'm reading The Model Occupation by Madeleine Bunting and Nation by Terry Pratchett, though I haven't read far in either title and will probably be reading them into next week. I'm also still listening to Birds of a Feather by Jacqueline Winspear.

I finished Tana French's second novel The Likeness. Fabulous mystery -- A little bit of The Secret History mixed with 'Homicide - Life on the Streets.' She is what the mystery/thriller genre has really needed - her prose is great.

Now trying to continue my way through Coleen McCullough's Masters of Rome series with The October Horse.

I'm reading The Christmas Train by David Baldacci. I'm only about 40 pages in, but so far so good!

I finished Broken April last night and am about one chapter into Unbowed, a memoir by Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai. I picked this up at a book sale earlier this year, without knowing much at all about the author. So far, so good ... interesting reading.

Finished Heat: An Amateur's last night, which I loved and made me hungry and want to run away to Italy and never come back. Almost done with The Crimson Petal and the White, and just started Men At Arms and The Tales of Beedle the Bard.

So much booky goodness!

Ooh.. ellevee... do let us know how you get on with Beedle the Bard ... I'm curious to know if it's as interesting as the HP series.

I'm halfway through The Red Tent by Anita Diamant

Finished Fool: a novel by Christopher Moore, which, as advertised, was bawdy indeed, but which also turned out to be highly entertaining.

Started Chasing Darkness, Wolfbane and Mistletoe (an anthology of holiday tales of horror, featuring Sookie Stackhouse), and Gods Behaving Badly. Oh, yeah, and The Beginnings of Rome.

#32 dchaikin - Thanks for the book tip. I'm finding What to Expect... a good quick reference, but a tad heavy-handed with the "this could go wrong..." info.

#89 mike - Wishing you the best in your job search!

cameling~ curious to know what you think of Red Tent..

mckait ..... looooonnnnggggg going..... and more fictitious than I had expected. Some liberal liberties taken with what appears to have been Dinah's life as told in Genesis. I'm torn ... fascinated and yet inwardly cringing. Sort of like someone's morbid fascination at the site of a bloody and fatal accident

#127, lindsacl, I had the privilege of hearing Wangari Maathai speak when she was in NYC for her book tour. She has led a remarkable life, accomplished and endured a lot, and is an inspiring woman. In my opinion, the book was interesting because her life is interesting, but it was written in a somewhat pedestrian style.

cam~

Although I am not familiar with the bible version, the book drew me and drew me until finally I bought it. Read it. Hated it. It was, to me a terrible story. sad and unrelentingly so. an, as you say, long going...

A propos The Red Tent...don't forget overheated and overblown! One might venture to say this book was going through its menopause, if one were not afraid of the swift and painful death its fans whose names are, collectively, legion would mete out.

I've reached the halfway point of By The Time You Read This by Giles Blunt. So far it's good, keeping my interest....but I've already predicted the outcome as to who the villian is....I could be wrong, but I doubt it. It's fairly light reading, but that's just what I need right now.

I just happened to check out the author's picture on the inside cover.....hmmmm, not bad! :o) Isn't it funny when you have a preconceived idea about how an author looks, but then when you see a photo, he/she doesn't look at all like you thought?

Going to start reading Equal Rites eventually. I've enjoyed the first two Discworld books and hope this one goes well too.

Finished American Pie.

Now reading Hungry Ghosts.

Finished listening to Landscape of Farewell. The beautiful prose and difficult reader would make me suggest it is read, not listened to in the future! And started The Orange Girl, so far a good story.

#133
#135
#136
I liked The Red Tent. I probably know as much about the Bible as I do about quantum physics, so the details didn't get in my way when I read it. But I found it to be a rivetting read!

too busy to read... darnit. Still not finished with Wisewoman. I plan to make up for it very soon.relentlessly cleaning and painting.

Just finished P.D. James The Private Patient. I thought it very good. She is 88 and still writes wonderfully. I like the way she lets some of her characters reveal her own philosophy. Now, on to J. A. JanceDamage Control. The Arizona setting and good character development always make a good read. Found this hidden in my TBR pile.Wish I were in AZ now. It is TOO cold!

>131 grkmwk:: grkmwk, it's been 16 years, but I had a similar reaction to What to Expect.... And because of the "what could go wrong" tone, I would encourage you NOT to read chapters for months you haven't reached yet, or you'll drive yourself crazy with worry.

>134 rebeccanyc:: rebeccanyc, interesting comment and oddly enough I was having similar thoughts on my way to work today, about how the book is interesting because of her life ... not because it is well-written.

I want to share something with you because I think I can find a compassionate ear here.
I hid a few books I've just bought in my bag but a classmate saw them.

Classmate : Dear god, you're always carrying so many books ! You buy so many books !
Me : (thinking about some people here who have thousands of books when I barely have 200) Not that many, really.
Classmate : But you're always reading, where do you put them ? Do you have a library or something ?
Me : Well, no, actually, I buy them to decorate the room.
Classmate : You're so strange.

I'm doing a Master's in English Lit, and so is she. I find it surprising.
Starting Provincial Daughter by R.M. Dashwood, written by the daughter of the author of Diary of a Provincial Lady.

#129 So far, it's fun, but it's very simple stories. They remind me of the Grimm Tales, which I love, so I'm happy. And the notes after each story by Dumbledore are wonderful.

#138 Equal Rites was one of the lesser Discworld books in my opinion, but still worthwhile, if only for Granny Weatherwax. I'm reading them in order, so I've slogged through a couple that weren't quite the high standard I've come to expect.

Finished The Crimson Petal and the White, and added The Argumentative Indian to my Current Reading pile.

#144 I picked up my Master's in English Lit. as well. It is kind of strange to hear that from someone taking that route. It certainly doesn't seem to make sense.

#145 I thought the same about Tales of Beedle the Bard - it's Grimm's rehashed (not a bad thing at all), but the commentary by Dumbledore adds some fun to it.

Currently reading A Fraction of the Whole by Steve Toltz, Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill, and Dead as a Scone by Ron Benrey.
Glad to see some positive comments for Beedle the Bard. I snagged it off the shelf at the library yesterday for the kids to read, now I'll have to make sure I read it too.

I have just started Hogfather by Terry Pratchett and it's brilliant, as usual with Pratchett.

I finished The Brass Verdict by Michael Connelly and really enjoyed it.

Just one or two letters into The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society. I have a habit of disliking "nice" books. I'm trying to break it by reading some that are well-written. I hope this one helps me in my endeavor.

>>> #44

Follow-up to my post at #44. I'm still struggling through The Court of the Air. It seemed really good as I was starting it, but now it's really becoming tedious. Still, since I'm over half-way through, I want to try finishing it.

Just started The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, which I'm sure everyone else in the free world has probably already seen . . . but sometimes I'm slow on the uptake! It came from the same pile that contains The Kite Runner, another "popular" work I'm just getting around to starting!

How does this thread hide from me? I look for it and don't see it and then it has 150 hits!

I finished a book called Stupid History yesterday and started a Stars Wars novel Jedi Twilight soon after.

Yesterday I started The Given Day by Dennis Lehane...and, as usual my jaw dropped...and this is his "historical" novel,,,promises to be a good 'un...but it's only a 7-day book (from the Library) and at 700 pages...i better get cracking, eh??
;-p

Oh I can't wait to get The Given Day....but as I usually do, I must restrain myself until the paperback version arrives. Unless I can get the hardback version really really cheap. :o)

#144.....your classmate is obviously not.... "one of us"......strange, though, that a literary person would find your arm's full of books an odd thing. (??) Tell her you are struggling to overcome an addiction, and are scheduled to enter rehab very soon.....

>155 porchsitter55: Porchy...i, too, am trying to find The Given Day cheap-in-hardcover...if i do, i'll let you know!!!

>144 Sibylle.Night: I'm doing a Master's in English Lit, and so is she. I find it surprising.

Surprising?! Is that all?! What in the name of Blessed Oscar Wilde is this woman doing NEAR a Master's program in English with that 'tude?

>149 nancyewhite: nancy, I personally do not hold out a lot of hope for a conversion experience based on that book. Do let us all know, though; I'd love to be wrong about this....

>153 koalamom: to the space around the person called "koalamom" to whom I do not speak because she is so organized, when one is on one's home page, the forums that one frequents can be chosen by "Your Groups" or "Your Posts." I use "your posts" as the default because, once inside the group, I can look at all the new posts in all the threads. I would say I hope this helps, but that would mean speeaking directly to a person who has completed his or her Christmas decoration, and that simply will not do.

Lawsy law, what a dimwit...forgot to mention that I am slugging away at A Rebours by Joris-Karl Huysmans, which I got interested in again after reading The Picture of Dorian Gray. I am not enjoying this experience. It's a giant slog. I think Des Esseintes is a tedious little twirp who needs a good hiding and a boot in the bony little ass to get him outdoors.

>151 CurrerBell: Currer (love the reference, BTW, very nicely chosen!), The Court of the Air will have to overcome the awfulness of this line from a review before I can bring myself to buy it: "Almost too inventive - it's just one jaw-dropping page after another - with hypercomplicated, barely intelligible plotting set forth in a breathless style: Harry Potter mugs H.P. Lovecraft, and L. Ron Hubbard explains it all." Kirkus slashes...I mean, strikes...again.

And your response isn't exactly in the plus column....

Finished The Red Tent finally last night .... and I think I deserve a big huzzah for effort because a big herculean effort it was indeed for me to finish this. I almost gave up twice, but it wasn't as bad as some other books I actually had to give up. I definitely didn't like this book at all. I think it was the book that tried too hard and had me muttering disagreeably so often my husband begged me to give it up.

The Painted Kiss by Elizabeth Hickey, on the other hand, seems to be starting out quite promisingly.

And for a fast and entertaining read, I'm probably going to finish up Murder on the Ballarat Train by my dear Kerry Greenwood tonight.

Really?!!!!! The Painted Kiss by Elizabeth Hickey? Did she name herself just to be author of the book?

Robert

#159 THANK YOU. I agree with everything you said about The Red Tent. It's nice to know I'm not alone!

>160 Mr.Durick:
How about Reading Like a Writer by Francine Prose (touchstone not working)?

Anna Claire, thank you for the suggestion. I have read Reading Like a Writer (touchstone not loading) by Francine Prose (comes up red).

I think I have a history of the Goths to read, or I may get back to my Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance project (touchstone loaded). There are hours to go before I have to make a decision.

Robert

PS And I thought you were replying to a different post. I can be so dimwitted...prose...writer.

R

richardear... it makes me smile just to se you posting..

I have not read the books you mention.. but I expect someday I might come across one or two.or not.

as for the clearly faux english lit major who doesn't "get" reading...
May the goddess keep her from trying to teach something she has no passion for..and help her to find something more suitable.

I finished A Whole New Mind by Daniel Pink, which I enjoyed a lot. Certainly more than I expected to, I'm nearly finished reading A Christmas Carol aloud. As I work every day and every night this week, reading aloud is very slow going... my kids and I rarely cross paths.

Still going with the Time Machine, and since they were ready at the library have also started no logo and A suitable boy. Not sure if I haven't bitten off more than I can chew with the Christmas busy-ness coming my way. at least it's non-ratings season on TV, so that gives me a bit more reading time.

#133 cameling & #135 mckait

Thank you! I can now come out of the closet. I had to read Red Tent a few years ago for a RL book group and ended up skimming the last 2/3 of it because I couldn't stand it. (You don't know much of the Bible story about her because in the Bible there isn't much to her story!) At the meeting I just sat silently as most of the others gushed about how great it was. I was so quiet that my best friend asked me on the way home if I was feeling OK! As it turns out, she wasn't crazy abut it, either, but we kept our secret for years.

#144 Sibylle.Night

"Me : Well, no, actually, I buy them to decorate the room." LOL

You made my day!

I think she is the strange one--why take a degree in English Lit. if you aren't passionate about books?! I hope to heaven she isn't planning to teach--think how many potential readers could end up stunted with someone like that introducing them to literature. (I'm shuddering!)

richard - it's a curse - I hate untidy things - dusty doesn't bother me, but they must be neat - and I am cursed by a husband and two kids (in their late 20s) whose things stay where they land

but if you think I'm bad, you should meet my "little" brother (the retired cop) who doesn't even like the dust and my late sister had a "House Beautiful" and she had three young kids at the time

I'm disorganized compared to them!

we all have our cross to bear

One wonders aloud how the tidy persons end up bonded to the messy persons? I, for example, could not possibly care less about mess EXCEPT in the kitchen and bathroom. They must be neat AND clean or there is Trouble.

Everywhere else, ~meh~ if I'm bored I will...oh no I won't, no sense pretending, I wait for the cleaning laddie.

Almost done with More Information Than You Require. I love this book ever so much.

I just finished The Reader by Bernhard Schlink. Bad touchstones, good book! I'm back to the Civil War and will be starting Mr. Lincoln's Army by Bruce Catton.

I started Mudbound yesterday and can hardly put it down...

Just finished An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination by Elizabeth McCracken. It is heartbreaking, captivating, supremely well-written.

>160 Mr.Durick:: rdurick, Seeing her name on the cover under that title made me chuckle and was the very thing that made me pick up the book. It's turning out to be a really interesting story around Gustav Klimt and the woman who inspired his painting 'The Kiss'.

Zipped and tripped along most merrily with Murder on the Ballarat Train and it's put me back in good cheer again.

#157 and #168
I think humour is the best way to approach that. You'd be surprised to know that this is the common attitude here : those people are here for a job, they care about books when they have to read them for school, other than that I'm by far the girl who reads the most here. It's very lonely because doing a Master's in English Lit I thought I'd find some like-minded people who enjoyed doing at least one thing I love doing : reading. And yet, I still rely on the Internet to discuss my books, so..

high fives music mom~

Finished up The King's General by Daphne du Maurier and have started Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens.

finished with Jedi Twilight and I have signed up for the 100 challenge and also the 999

will now read Bridges of Madison County

>>> 158

I finally finished The Court of the Air! I wasn't sure what to do with it. I thought I might get rid of it by donating it to my local library, but then I decided, what the heck, and I just threw it into the trash.

By the time I got to page 350 or 400, I'd finally decided to slog it all the way through to page 580 or whatever, but I wasn't going to inflict it on anyone else.

What had attracted me to it was that, from its cover blurbs, it looked something like Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell or the Bartimaeus trilogy. The problem was, it just didn't have any focus. It had two major characters (Molly and Oliver), but the way Pullman handled that situation in His Dark Materials was to give Lyra an entire book to herself, then introduce Will. In The Court of the Air, Hunt tries to do it all in one volume, flipping back and forth between two characters who don't even meet up together until nearly the end of the book.

It's also got too much use of the deus ex machina to get out of every plot complication. Introduce some new character, some new mechanical device, some new magical gimmick, whatever. And I never really could figure out just where this "court of the air" fit into the political mish-mash.

Oh well, enough of a rant. I think I'll get back to my planned re-read (after many years) of Jack Chalker's Four Lords of the Diamond. I know Chalker was a little weird and not to everyone's taste, but I always enjoyed him.

What are you reading the week of Dec. 13 -
I am currently reading MARLEY AND ME by John Grogan and loving every page!

I'm almost done with Ann Moura's New History of Witchcraft, and it's wonderful.

181 - I remember reading Four Lords of the Diamond and will now add it to my library if it isn't already there

#177 Sibylle.Night
Your tale is nightmarish. If English Lit majors don't love to read, who does? Does LT represent a forum for a beleaguered minority? Egads!
Another question--what job does an English Lit major think they're going to get? It's a major I would assume a person chose for the love of reading, not a job.
It's all a frightening scene. Sometimes I think it's good that I'm getting old. The world in another 50 years seems scary to envision.

Hemlockgang, sorry to hear you are not enjoying The Feast of The Goat. I found it a tough read, but worthwhile in the end. It did have problems which I discussed in my review. What kept me reading was the thread with Trujillo as the POV, I found that to be interesting.

I finished Ovid by David Wishart.
The first book in the Marcus Corvinus mystery series set in ancient imperial Rome.

The premise is the request by the relatives of Ovid to get permission to return his ashes to Rome. He was exiled by Augustus, who has died. Tiberius is now the emperor and refuses permission. Marcus starts investigating why Ovid is still so hated; his exile was for unspecified crimes. The Ovid angle leads to the mysteries of the fate of the Julian line of the imperial family (Posthumous, 2 Julias) and the loss of the 3 legions in the German forest by Varus.

In other words Wishart is covering the same ground as I, Claudius by Robert Graves It is all very disjointed in terms of plot, trying to connect everything. The writing is good, the characters and the setting are good, with one exception. Wishart makes Marcus talk and act like a modern person. Its quite annoying, and I am not sure I will continue with the series.

Then I read Ronnie by Ronnie Wood
An autobiography by Ron Wood of the Rolling Stones. In fact, I read it in one sitting, and was up all night.

I enjoyed it, the writing was good, and the story was interesting. My only quibble would be there is a lot of name dropping, and some items seem to be missing or painted with a suspiciously rosy glow. But it deals with Wood's life before the Stones, as well as his time with them, so its not just a biography, but also rock history.

Then I read Last Night at the Lobster by Stewart O'Nan
It is the story of a Red Lobster that is closing due to poor sales. It is located in a dying mall in a working class Connecticut town. The story revolves around the manager and the working stiffs who are losing their jobs. It is just before Christmas and there is a snow storm raging.

Its sad, and the setting, writing and characters are done well, but the story is rather aimless. I am sure the author wanted to depict real life rather than a 'story'. So at the end they all just leave, fading into the storm.

This appears to be a week where I do a book a day! Actually today I finished Bridges of Madison County, started and finished Teen- age Science fiction Stories which I may have to enter by hand, and I plan on starting Murder in Lamut.

The second book is a collection of short stories written in 1952. In one story they give the "future date" as 2007. We aren't anywhere near doing what the sci-fi author thought we'd be doing! Imagine hopping from Earth to Mars to Venus to Mercury to Jupiter - all in the space (no pun intended) of a couple of years. It was kind of like hopping on a plane and going to NYC to London to Paris...

#186 - Ficusfan - interesting about Ron Wood's bio, I read Stone Alone a long time ago about Bill Wyman which I thought was pretty good and gives you the low down on the how the Stones got together and their early years if you're interested.

Thanks KtLeyed. I have it and have read it.

My Stones books, all of which I have read except the Keith Richards book. Though I have read another on him, but can't seem to find it.

The True Adventures of the Rolling Stones by Stanley Booth
Nankering with the Rolling Stones by James Phelge
Rolling Stones David Dalton, Editor
Stoned by Andrew Loog Oldham
Stone Alone by Bill Wyman
Rolling With the Stones by Bill Wyman
Jagger Unauthorized by Christopher Anderson
Keith Richards: Satisfaction by Christopher Sandford
Faithfull by Marianne Faithfull
Exile on Main Street: A Season in Hell with the Rolling Stones by Robert Greenfield
Old Gods Almost Dead by Stephen Davis


Fiction:
The Man Who Killed Mick Jagger by David Littlejohn

#182 Marley and Me - I picked up a copy when it first hit the store and had my first print signed in person by Mr. Grogan. I remembered I had it on my shelf for a bit and then noticed he was doing a signing near me in a few days, so I had to stay up late to read it and finish (I would never go to get a book signed not having read the author). Worth it - and I have to admit I did get a little choked up. My wife made fun of me, but then she outright cried reading it. I think it's acceptable for guys to cry at the end of Old Yeller or when reading Marley and Me.

#186 I read Last Night at the lobster I'm not sure what my thoughts are on it to tell you the truth. I think I had expected something different. For some reason I thought it would be more comedic and I'm not sure where I got that impression. I'd probably read something else from the author to see how he evolves.

>138 andusir06: andusir06

I liked Equal Rites, although I think I liked some of the later witch-centric books more (like Maskerade and Witches Abroad). You'll love Granny Weatherwax :)