Can we have a new "What are you reading at the moment" thread?

I'm about to read a Larry McMurtry book (Sin Killer, iirc), and then I have books on human sacrifice and glossolalia to cruise through, creatively titled Human Sacrifice and Glossolalia.

Next up is To The Lighthouse by Ginny Woolf.

My backup book is In The Little World by John Richardson, which is about him going to the Little People of America convention to do a story and it became a book. It's both sympathethic and openly manipulative, which is a neat trick.

I am currently impatiently waiting for a box of goodies from Amazon, among which I am most looking forward to reading Janey's "Northanger Abbey" and "Albion: The Origins of the English Imagination" (or something like that) by Peter Ackroyd. Incidentally, has anyone else in the UK used their "free super saver over-£39" delivery thing, and did you have to wait over a fortnight too?

Amazon free delivery - yes, I've used it, got the stuff in a couple of days. Always check that the bundle of things you're getting are available in 24 hrs/2 days or something, because if they have to order even one item in, it'll delay the whole lot.

I also have a book of Buffy analysis lined up called FIGHTING THE FORCES: WHAT'S AT **STAKE** (do you see) in BTVS. Grand.

Hmph on Saturday I will make ATTEMPT TWO at picking up my Amazon packages from the post office (rot in hell). I have ordered the official sowpods Scrabble words book and er... a word lists book. CURSE YOU STEFAN FATSIS FOR WRITING WORD FREAK AND TURNING ME INSANE.

satine!

At work (during lunch): The Ambient Century by Mark Prendergast (sp?) which is awesome, mainly I think because I have read a lot of "rock" music books and feel like whenever I read those now it's mostly stuff I already know, but this book is mostly about music I know nothing about, so it's really interesting. I like reading about how when composers introduced challenging new works, people would riot. That's fucked up.

haha sinkah to smash yr skull to bits!

''Hmmm must read more Joyce - have only done Dubliners and some of his surprisingly twee poetry.''

have read 'Portrait' and found it surprisingly good.

but 'Ulysses' is something else and makes 'Portrait' very much 'normal' in comparison. It is imcromprehensible in places but I like that a lot.

CURSE YOU STEFAN FATSIS FOR WRITING WORD FREAK AND TURNING ME INSANE.

oh that book sent my girlfriend insane. Nothing has been the same since.

also am reading gibsons burning chrome, and some debord.

I just finished Carl Hiaasen's Basket Case, and started THEM, Jon Ronson's adventures with extremists.

At home: Just finished Fast Food Nation and am now returning, after a month-long break, to Joseph Mitchell's Up in the Old Hotel, which is beautiful (the book, I mean, not that I'm returning to it).

I finally started reading The Origins of Biblical Monotheism: Israel's Polytheistic Background and the Ugaritic Texts, which is actually quite good so far (not that I've gotten very far), though a little technical at times (as you might imagine).

I picked up a bunch of Walker Percy in Denver over Xmas. I am just about to get back into 'The Moviegoer', which I started back then, but got distracted from.

Of course, since my copy of Navigator is a hardcover, I don't drag it with on the subway. Instead, I've been going through the Raymond Chandler novels in chronological order. I'm now about 75% through The Long Goodbye.

And gareth, "City of Quartz" is amazing--I've read some of Mike Davis' other books (one about natural disasters in L.A. is interesting) and it's the best I know of.

Now reading

Twain, Pudd'nhead Wilson
Nabokov, Ada
Foote, The Civil War (volume one)
two books by Alma Guillermoprieto--Samba and The Heart That Bleeds
Boyle, Drop City

I love Nabokov--have read almost all his novels at this point--but find Ada difficult. Self-indulgent with some great passages. But then I found The Gift hard and re-read it, now I think it's up there with his best work. So I guess it's my job to work through Ada and see what tricks V.N. has up his sleeve for me.

The Sound of My Voice -- Ron Butlin

Zelda Fitzgerald: Her Voice in Paradise -- Sally Cline

Disgusting, but I can't put it down. Has the palliative effect of making me glad I am not in my apartment in NYC.

next: mishima confessions of a mask.

Revolution In The Head
A History Of God
Three Men In A Boat

haha! i just realized i'm not the only one!

I'm also finally getting around to reading Midnight's Children by Rushdie.

Every bit as funny as "Naked" and "Me Talk Pretty One Day".

started reading marc reisner's cadillac desert: the american west and its disappearing water today. great book, beautiful writing. i love the part about the first explorers ballsy enough to ride the scary-ass rapids on the colorado river.

the book was also a pbs miniseries.

i've got four books on the go:
the sportwriter - richard ford
journey to the end of the night - celine
hunters in the snow - tobias wolff
weep not, my wanton - maggie dubris

judith butler - gender trouble

in the bookbag & on the nightstand:

everyday zen - charlotte joko beck
things fall apart - chinua achebe
our band could be your life - michael azerrad
walden - hd thoreau

i didn't really like things fall apart. have you read 'joys of motherhood' (by buchi amechta [sp?]), it's a far more indepth study of the effects of european colonisation, and it's also kinda funny.

I have not, I'll have to follow up Achebe with that one.

Was it just the absence of the portrayal of colonialism from most of Things Fall Apart that bothered you, or something else?

tbh, it was a while ago that i read it, so the specifics are eluding me. but i just remember that it was really dry, and i found it hard to find the characters 'real'. emecheta's (i just checked the spelling) was a lot easier for me to connect with. i felt like she was really able to lead me into her life and the life of her tribe. i read both books for a colonial/post-colonial lit paper i was doing.

haha I'm reading TFA cause I'm the sort of douchebag who reads post-colonial theory & lit for fun.

dude, nothing douchebag-y about that. have you read 'wide sargasso sea' by jean rhys? it's the story of of Mr Rochester's 'mad woman in the attic' wife. also 'foe' by j.m. coetzee (i really enjoyed both these books).

I've heard a lot about 'sargasso' from friends, but haven't picked it up yet. Worth a read, then?

Does anyone else know Denise Mina? I read a novel of hers for work, loved it so much we took her on as a client (to handle her film/TV rights), and have since read 4 and three quarters more of her books, and they're all fantastic. The Garnethill trilogy is probably my biggest recommendation, though really I don't think you can go wrong.

xpost

dude, nothing douchebag-y about that.

I think I've just become paranoid about kneejerk ILX cynicism and was trying to innoculate myself with a little self-depreciation. Lots around here like to pretend that the whole field of critical theory consists of stating the glaringly obvious ("omg you mean to say that this novel that was written in the early 20th century by a rich white man has POOR attitudes about race??"), but obviously I disagree.

lol that should be self-deprication obv

lol graveyard shift

against the day is still wot i'm reading, yo. ('ve got to page 704, since last xmas)

BIG HOOS, sargasso is definitely worth a read - it's one of the great modernist novels. it explores all aspects of what makes up the 'other' - not just race but also gender. the character of bertha is interesting because she is actually white (genetically) but has been raised carribean, which sets up all kinds of complications in the development of her character.

'foe' is an epistolary novel, and a nice short read - coetzee re-imagines the story of crusoe, but adds a woman also deserted on the island, who eventually escapes back to england with man friday. she contacts a writer called 'daniel foe' to write her story. the whole book consists entirely of her letters, except for this strange, dream-like ending. probably my favourite of the few coetzee novels i've read.

i think if you're interested in critical theory, you'd enjoy both.

And if you want to get into reimaginations of Crusoe, there is "Friday" by Michel Tournier. It's intensely dreary at times (at other times, rollickingly hilarious) , but if you're going to get all dreary and philosophical, you might as well set it in tropical paradise. Amazon.com only lists "Vendredi ou les Limbes du Pacifique" - in the original French - so I couldn't tell you where to get a copy, but it's out there in English somewhere.

On the subject of retelling classic stories through "the other" has anyone read "Mists of Avalon"? I read "Le Morte d'Arthur" last semester and a classmate recommended this. It frames the Arthurian legends through Morgan le Fey's P.O.V. It's at the top of my list, but I haven't picked it up yet.

I've seen the mini-series based on the book, not read the book though.

It was damn good on telly!

FYI guys I have no idea why but I just bought Ulysses.

i am too scared to even look at ulysses.

I believe the exact line of thought was "Man, Dubliners was really good. Hey look, Ulysses. 4 bucks? Fuck it."

I picked up Ulysses for fifty cents from a library book sale 7 years ago. It's remained uncracked on my bookshelf, although I've been through the actual Odyssey three times (once for kicks, twice for school). My dad has Finnegan's Wake on his shelf. I haven't asked him if he actually read it yet.

Orlando Figes' A People's Tragedy.

We have a really nice fun version of this thread over at ILBooks if anyone hasn't looked over there in a while.

That said, The Making of the Middle Ages by RW Southern.

Mulligan Stew by Gilbert Sorrentino.

Can I get a fuck yeah for Mulligan Stew by Gilbert Sorrentino??

Ulysses is really not that hard, and is incredibly funny in places. Finnegan's Wake, on the other hand, gives me the fear, although I may well try it this summer.

Currently re-reading all the B.S. Johnson novels, as I'm doing a dissertation on him next year, and I adore him, but will try to fit in The Journalist by Harry Mathews, 7 Types of Ambiguity by Empson and a few other random things as well.

I just finished Borges' Ficciones, which may be the best thing I've ever read.

With this wiki at hand, I'm going to start Pynchon's V. tomorrow, I think.

emil.y, have you read eliot perlman's '7 types of ambiguity'? australian author, fiction,

ZS, i just read 'the crying of lot 49', it was hilarious, and extremely prophetic with regards to the development of the internet. i loved the whole thing about 'informational entropy' - it took me ages to actually figure out what the hell that meant, but when i finally got it, i really *got* it.

Can I get a fuck yeah for Mulligan Stew by Gilbert Sorrentino??

You can, but only from Ken L.

Also, Finnegans Wake is a lot of fun. Or it was back when I was reading it. I don't think I could take it now, it requires a completely different headspace.

When I haven't been reading school-related stuff, for the past 6 months (!) I've been reading Gone with the Wind. A lot of it is hard going, although realistically I suppose that it represents the actual perspective that the South had during the Civil War. I have moments when I'm just enthralled with the story and then other moments when I'm so frustrated with the politics of the South from that era, and the implication that slaves looooooooved their "families."

I also just started an anthology - I think the title is Best Food Writing 2006. There's some fun stuff in there.