A New 'Now What are you Reading'

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Other thread was getting too long again, so I thought I would start a new one. I started 'The Basque History of the World' over the weekend. Good so far.

― bookdwarf (bookdwarf), Monday, 10 May 2004 14:56 (twenty-one years ago)

'Ripley's Game' by Patricia Highsmith.

― Michael White (Hereward), Monday, 10 May 2004 15:06 (twenty-one years ago)

I've read that Basque history. I take it you mean the Mark Kurlanksy one?

They speak the most impenetrable language.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Monday, 10 May 2004 15:23 (twenty-one years ago)

Squandering Aimlessly, by David Brancaccio

― yesabibliophile (yesabibliophile), Monday, 10 May 2004 15:28 (twenty-one years ago)

No Orchids for Miss Blandish, by James Hadley Chase

― Fred, Monday, 10 May 2004 16:02 (twenty-one years ago)

'Thinks' David Lodge; 'A wilderness so Immense', John Kukla; and 'Objectivity, Relativism, and Truth" by Richard Rorty

― Docpacey (docpacey), Monday, 10 May 2004 16:11 (twenty-one years ago)

Yes, I am reading the Kurlansky book. It's a good book, but I find it hard to keep all the names and places straight. The language does seem difficult, but maybe because they like X's and Z's and double consonants more.
Also started reading 'Queen of the South' by Arturo Perez-Reverte at lunch today as I forgot to bring the Kurlansky with me to work today.

― bookdwarf (bookdwarf), Monday, 10 May 2004 17:57 (twenty-one years ago)

The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell. Much reccomended.

― Chuck Tatum (Chuck Tatum), Monday, 10 May 2004 18:03 (twenty-one years ago)

Chuck- "The Tipping Point" is one of my favorites. Highly recommended.

― Rabin the Cat (Rabin the Cat), Monday, 10 May 2004 18:14 (twenty-one years ago)

A Box of Matches, by Nicholson Baker, and trying to decide whether to continue bothering. It feels really disjointed.

― Su (BoredInsomniac), Monday, 10 May 2004 18:35 (twenty-one years ago)

One Hundred Years of Solitude. It's slow, savor-the-prose type of book. If you're into that, you'll like it.

― SJ Lefty, Monday, 10 May 2004 22:17 (twenty-one years ago)

the moonstone, by wilkie collins.

― lauren (laurenp), Monday, 10 May 2004 22:41 (twenty-one years ago)

Still trying to find time to finish "La Religieuse" by Diderot -- man, what an amazing torture book, and yes all the juicy barely-not-graphic lesbo nun action you'd expect -- but yet again a package of review copies has landed on my desk today: Jim Munroe's Flyboy Action Figure Comes With Gasmask and Girls Who Bite Back, edited by the fabulous Emily Pohl-Weary, yeah, she's Frederik Pohl's granddaughter. So I have to trade girl-on-girl action for sci-fi in the blink of an eye. Oh well, could be very much worse... maybe there's some juicy stuff in these girl-vampire essays... how could there NOT be, actually? I'm also crawling through my first Italian easy reader, by Dario Fo.

― Ann Sterzinger (Ann Sterzinger), Monday, 10 May 2004 22:45 (twenty-one years ago)

(for those of you who envy those of us who get review copies, this be the darkside: as soon as they arrive, deadlines loom and you must drop whatever you were reading for simple fun.)

― Ann Sterzinger (Ann Sterzinger), Monday, 10 May 2004 22:59 (twenty-one years ago)

Ann writes: "for those of you who envy those of us who get review copies, this be the darkside" The darkside only for you writers- as an indy bookseller for years, my review copies were sweetly devoid of responsibility. Well, except for the whole vulgar commerce thing.

I am reading "Elegy for Iris" by John Bayley, pulled at random from a stack of unreads.

― Rabin the Cat (Rabin the Cat), Monday, 10 May 2004 23:52 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm reading _Reading Lolita in Tehran_ as well as _Eats, Shoots and Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation_. I'm also occasionally leafing through _The Highly Selective Thesaurus for the Extraordinarily Literate_ and _Raw Spirit: In Search of the Perfect Dram_.

And I really should be packing, since it's moving day on Saturday!

― Halsted (cygnoir), Tuesday, 11 May 2004 00:07 (twenty-one years ago)

I am reading Unlocking the Air and Other Stories. Ursula Le Guin. Also ( as above) enjoyed Eats, Shoots and Leaves. Has helped me with essay writing!

― kath (kath), Tuesday, 11 May 2004 00:11 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm reading "The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse" by Robert Rankin. I love the concept (and the title), but I am not sure if I like the book (I haven't read much of it yet).

― Sara L (Tara Too), Tuesday, 11 May 2004 05:08 (twenty-one years ago)

just started _baudolino_. and _kinder der toten_ by elfriede jelinek (austrian writer who is very much discussed and hated by austrias right wing party for her outspoken writing about austria´s history concerning nazi-germany.) baudolino is fun!

― jassi, Tuesday, 11 May 2004 05:15 (twenty-one years ago)

Eats Shoots and Leaves is really good.
I'm reading the third book in the Otori series, Brilliance of the Moon (cue jealous grumbles from people who don't get advance copies?) and just finished Secrets of the Jin Shei. That was soooo good!

― Rowie, Tuesday, 11 May 2004 08:10 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm now reading Get A Life, by the anti-TV organisation White Dot. Quite badly and hysterically written, but I cannot say them nay...

― Archel (Archel), Tuesday, 11 May 2004 09:29 (twenty-one years ago)

A case of curiousities by Allen Kurzwell. I am enjoying it so far. Descriptive and colourful.

― oblomov, Tuesday, 11 May 2004 10:55 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm reading Lars Saabye Christensen's The Half Brother in Norwegian (as God intended), and wondering how the English translation copes with a few things.

― SRH (Skrik), Tuesday, 11 May 2004 11:11 (twenty-one years ago)

I see (where) accentmonkey has... abandoned the colours.

― the finefox, Tuesday, 11 May 2004 13:06 (twenty-one years ago)

What's the Matter with Kansas by Thomas Frank and So I Am Glad by A. L. Kennedy.

― Jessa (Jessa), Tuesday, 11 May 2004 16:58 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm re-reading Ulysses

― Fred, Tuesday, 11 May 2004 17:55 (twenty-one years ago)

Cor.

I finished doing that 10 days ago.

― the finefox, Tuesday, 11 May 2004 19:53 (twenty-one years ago)

"I'm now reading Get A Life, by the anti-TV organisation White Dot. Quite badly and hysterically written, but I cannot say them nay...
-- Archel (dilettant...), May 11th, 2004."

This begs the question: if they aren't watching TV and yet they haven't spent enough time reading to become competent writers, what are they doing with their time? Trying to have a consensus vote? You can only make so much bad art out of smashed televisions... ha ha, obviously I have no life.

― Ann Sterzinger (Ann Sterzinger), Tuesday, 11 May 2004 21:53 (twenty-one years ago)

glued to Ann Garrels, Naked in Baghdad.

― slow learner (slow learner), Wednesday, 12 May 2004 02:08 (twenty-one years ago)

I am trying to remember if I am reading owt new since last time I answered this with an 8-post answer.

I finished Joyce. I have not gone back to Proust. I am still pressing my way through the tidy forest of Muldoon.

― the finefox, Wednesday, 12 May 2004 19:20 (twenty-one years ago)

I am reading Handling Sin by Michael Malone. It was given to me by a kind ILB poster to read. Enjoying it so far.

― scott seward (scott seward), Wednesday, 12 May 2004 20:13 (twenty-one years ago)

I just started I'll Take You There by Joyce Carol Oates
And just finished Oranges are Not the Only Fruit which I much enjoyed

I went to a big-city bookshop last weekend, it was very fulfilling.

― isadora (isadora), Wednesday, 12 May 2004 22:30 (twenty-one years ago)

We recently moved and are unpacking, so I am mostly reading titles as I put things on the shelving. We did finish reading The Great Gatsby aloud (most excellent - thanks for the suggestion) and have begun Vanity Fair (promising so far).

― Jaq (Jaq), Thursday, 13 May 2004 00:17 (twenty-one years ago)

Just finished Scandalmonger (duly reported on that last "Whatcha Readin' Now" thread).

Just started Vernon God Little.

Am reading Schott's Original Miscellany when in need of a fast fix.

Am about to start Eats, Shoots & Leaves and it looks like I'm in good company according to the above postings.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Thursday, 13 May 2004 05:19 (twenty-one years ago)

Just started Saddled With Darwin by Toby Green. A travelogue following Darwin's 1830's South American trip. He makes Uruguay sound like a great place to go. It's not often you hear that said.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Thursday, 13 May 2004 07:44 (twenty-one years ago)

All Hat by Brad Smith

― The Huckle-Buck (Horace Mann), Thursday, 13 May 2004 15:19 (twenty-one years ago)

My 3rd attempt to read "the book of the lost tales" by Tolkien, though I keep skipping the parts where Christopher starts analysing the story :)

― Docolero, Thursday, 13 May 2004 21:29 (twenty-one years ago)

Just finished Orwell's essays, vol 2, and plowed through Wodehouse's "Summer Moonshine" today. I'll probably read Orwell's essays, vol 3, or Twain's "Tramp Abroad", or perhaps that "Woman and Wheat" book by the woman who homesteaded in Saskatchewan 100 years ago. Don't know yet.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Thursday, 13 May 2004 23:46 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm reading The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahari. I've got Eats Shoots & Leaves on the shelf.

― Phastbuck, Friday, 14 May 2004 03:18 (twenty-one years ago)

I feel I should mention that my beloved, Maria, bought Eats Shoots & Leaves last week. It is on our shelf as well.

― scott seward (scott seward), Friday, 14 May 2004 10:35 (twenty-one years ago)

It would appear at Eats, Shoots & Leaves is the book for the in-crowd at ILB these days. I wonder how the author feels about that.

I just started the new young adult novel by Eoin Colfer (the Artmis Fowl series), titled The Supernaturalist. So far it's creepy and ominous. I'm pleased.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Friday, 14 May 2004 19:12 (twenty-one years ago)

Too under the weather to do owt much save reread Hugh Kenner's A Colder Eye for the first time in 7 years. 7 years ago I learned from it much I needed to know. Perhaps some was misleading. But one must begin somewhere.

One thing the book makes me think is: again, how wrong is anyone who attacks 'criticism' as merely secondary, a hindrance between us and literature. HK brings me much closer to Yeats than Yeats does.

― the finefox, Saturday, 15 May 2004 13:47 (twenty-one years ago)

I went with "A Tramp Abroad". It's basically a 19th Century blog!

― Casuistry (Chris P), Saturday, 15 May 2004 14:21 (twenty-one years ago)

The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes. this is what non-fiction is all about

― common_person (common_person), Saturday, 15 May 2004 14:52 (twenty-one years ago)

Dandelion clocks: their imperfect myth, an overabundance of inability.

― cozen (Cozen), Saturday, 15 May 2004 16:21 (twenty-one years ago)

Whipping through the reprint of Jim Munroe's first novel. It's as addictive as the best old sci-fi: I was in a noisy gay bar last night -- Friday -- and kept reading it even though I liked the people around me. Yum.

― Ann Sterzinger (Ann Sterzinger), Saturday, 15 May 2004 23:53 (twenty-one years ago)

about half way through Vernon God Little, i have to say it's mostly crap but occasionaly funny in a pretty forced way.

― jed_ (jed), Sunday, 16 May 2004 02:42 (twenty-one years ago)

I really liked Vernon God Little. Am I the only one?

Just back from holidays where I read Angels and Demons by Dan Brown, which was largely pants, and nowhere near as good as The Da Vinci Code. Somehow, despite the fact that the stakes are much higher in this one, it's just not as much fun. Also read The Dispossessed by Ursula LeGuin, which was great, and Losing Nelson by Barry Unsworth, which I particularly enjoyed, having just visited the Maritime Museum in Greenwich, where they really love their Nelson. I was a bit put out when we got there to realise that they have an entire room devoted to Nelson and only a tiny corner of a room for Cook, who was my particular hero.

Am currently reading Nobel Prizewinner One Man's Bible and am really struggling with it. Maybe it's just because I'm a bit tired, but I keep having to go back and re-read bits because I can't quite follow what's going on. Also I know very little about Chinese history, so I'm not sure of the sequence of events. I feel like enjoying the book would require more information than I currently have.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Sunday, 16 May 2004 12:57 (twenty-one years ago)

Full Catastrophe Living by Jon Kabat-Zinn (therapy homework, meditation/zen guide) is taking up much of my time, but also still working on The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien and about to start my traditional summer project of re-reading all my Cortazar, starting with We All Love Glenda So Much and 62: A Model Kit.

― Begs2Differ (Begs2Differ), Sunday, 16 May 2004 13:10 (twenty-one years ago)

(oh also I have to re-read The View From Saturday by E.L. Konigsberg so my daughter and I can have Book Club)

― Begs2Differ (Begs2Differ), Sunday, 16 May 2004 13:11 (twenty-one years ago)

Skipping 143 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

I have started Bracewell's Crypto-Amnesia Club.

But look out for great footy reports all week, rather than books?

― the pomefox, Monday, 14 June 2004 21:07 (twenty-one years ago)

Just finished the Geoff Dyer. It was all very wistful and lovely and made me quite sad when it finished.

Now reading Anne Tyler's Earthly Possessions. It's the usual mix of bizarre characters and quirky small towns. Predictable, but pleasant.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Monday, 14 June 2004 21:18 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm re-reading "Catcher in the Rye"

― Tatiana Marzi (wondertati), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 05:45 (twenty-one years ago)

I've just finished the "Anne of..." series and jumped into Discworld...but i don't think I'm that much interested, I mean, after all I'm not on holiday yet, plus I want something to think about too when I read, and whereas the "Anne of..." had some sparkle of delight now and again, the Discworld book doesn't really look like it. As a matter of fact I can't even remember much of last night's first plunge into it.

― misshajim (strand), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 06:13 (twenty-one years ago)

Poor Things-Alasdair Gray (Now I must track down the Gray thread)

― Jocelyn (Jocelyn), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 12:04 (twenty-one years ago)

Mm I liked Poor Things. Need to read Lanark obv but the library NEVER has it in.

― Archel (Archel), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 12:44 (twenty-one years ago)

Halfway through Daren King's "Jim Giraffe" which is turning out to be a huge disappointment after "Boxy an' Star". Also got "Any human heart" by William Boyd on the go and enjoying that much more.

Pinefox, how's that Bracewell book? It's been recommended to me so many times but each time I start reading it there's something about the first copule of pages that send me to sleep and I give it up. Worth perservering?

― winterland, Tuesday, 15 June 2004 14:21 (twenty-one years ago)

Whee! I just finished my first Italian-language easy reader, which was by Dario Fo (adapted of course) and now I'm a just-add-water Fo fan and am salivating over my future in the great unknown of Italian literature! Also reading a ton of mystery novels as research. All at once. (And I wonder why I keep spacing out when I try to talk to people!)

― Ann Sterzinger (Ann Sterzinger), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 17:24 (twenty-one years ago)

Winterland: indeed. I shall get back to you about this.

Sterzinger: I know a bit of Fo - just major plays, I guess.

― the junefox, Tuesday, 15 June 2004 20:02 (twenty-one years ago)

To Have and Have Not - Headless Hemmingway

I haven't read Earnest for about ten years. Macho!

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Friday, 18 June 2004 14:20 (twenty-one years ago)

Arrah, winterland, why couldn't you have posted that a month ago? You would have saved me the price of Jim Giraffe. Feck. I've just finished me Anne Tyler and am moving on to the free book I got off Bookcrossing.

I've come over all Duberlin today.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Friday, 18 June 2004 15:03 (twenty-one years ago)

Books I got for my birthday:

Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer (I kind of missed all the hoohah when it came out, but am halfway through now and it's good isn't it?)

Two Thousand Streets Under the Sky by Patrick Hamilton, in its nice new edition (get the other books back in print NOW!)

A Responsibility to Awe by Rebecca Elson (poetry)

― Archel (Archel), Monday, 21 June 2004 08:30 (twenty-one years ago)

Started Anna Karenina this morning. That's the way to kick off the week. Only 851 pages to go. I'm taking it with me to Transylvania on Wednesday. Had to jettison most of my underwear to find space for it in my rucksack.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Monday, 21 June 2004 08:54 (twenty-one years ago)

hardt and negri 'empire'.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Tuesday, 22 June 2004 10:02 (twenty-one years ago)

Just finished wandering through all of P.D. James again. It had been long enough I'd forgotten whodunnit. Her protagonist is a tormented poet. I have "Random Family" and an Alison Lurie in the offing. Sedaris always pimps someone else's book at his readings and he's on about "Random Family" now. It was the third recommendation I'd gotten, so I succumbed.

― Rabin the Cat (Rabin the Cat), Tuesday, 22 June 2004 19:56 (twenty-one years ago)

I started and finished "Goat:A Memoir" by Brad Land yesterday. Anyone else read it? I must like it to have read the whole thing at once. I got it at the library, but I was actually trying to find a book that has been highly recommended here....the title is..."The Traveller's Wife?" - or "Tales of...?" - does anyone know what I'm talking about? It's not on this thread (I just scrolled all the way through), but has received raves on other threads.

― aimurchie, Wednesday, 23 June 2004 01:16 (twenty-one years ago)

Junefox: is all of Fo absurd witty fun, or am I language-goggling?

― Ann Sterzinger (Ann Sterzinger), Wednesday, 23 June 2004 05:55 (twenty-one years ago)

Ainmurchie, d'you mean 'The Time Traveller's Wife'? I've seen good and bad things about it and was toying with buying it yesterday. If that's the one it's by the wonderfully named Audrey Niffenegger.

― winterland, Wednesday, 23 June 2004 07:30 (twenty-one years ago)

'Duberlin'!

There are about 2 big biographies of Fo. Terry Eagleton reviewed one, once. Has anyone seen a Fo play on stage?

― the junefox, Wednesday, 23 June 2004 10:53 (twenty-one years ago)

Just completed Picture This by Joseph Heller. It was wonderful.
Now started "Many Lives, Many Masters" by Dr. Brian Weiss.
Still reading Vernon God Little and The Occult by Colin Wilson.

― Fred (Fred), Wednesday, 23 June 2004 11:44 (twenty-one years ago)

About the Bracewell, *Crypto-Amnesia Club*: here's a para:

She was complete in that room, surrounded by her souvenirs and her relics, the epiphenomena of a life: the fluffy toys won for her by some former boyfriend at a coastal fair years ago, the strata of cosmetics (above the washstand) that dated back to the original Body Shop and then, finally, the bottom line - the row of twenty pairs of shoes, spread out like a crescendo on a creased piece of music. The spoils of a thousand shopping trips, the evidence of a thousand rainy afternoons in bad-tempered shops. From the plimsolls rebelliously worn to school, to the court shoes worn once to a friend's wedding, to the scuffed and despised work shoes, to the final sad lustre of the catalogue bridal slippers - white shells in a rockpool of tissue paper. Her fiancé was marrying a collection of shoes, scorched by hot pavements and frozen by bus stop sleet.

― the bellefox, Wednesday, 23 June 2004 11:59 (twenty-one years ago)

cryptomnesia.

― cozen (Cozen), Friday, 25 June 2004 20:38 (twenty-one years ago)

Just finished Many Lives, Many Masters and Vernon God Little.
Starting:
Selections from the complete works of Swami Vivekananda
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

― Fred (Fred), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 09:27 (twenty-one years ago)

A Good Man Is Hard To Find by Flannery O'Connor.

Plus, in the way of poetry, A Working Girl Can't Win by Deborah Garrison, An Awful Racket by Rita Ann Higgins, and 101 Sonnets ed. by Don Paterson.

― Archel (Archel), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 09:46 (twenty-one years ago)

Rereading various Straight Dope books. About to consider starting either a history of the Roman Republic or a discussion of Dublin pubs.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 16:05 (twenty-one years ago)

Just finished An Almost Perfect Moment by Binnie Kirshenbaum, now reading The Wreck of the William Brown: A True Tale of Overcrowded Lifeboats and Murder at Sea by Tom Koch and The Winshaw Legacy by Jonathan Coe.

― Jessa (Jessa), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 16:35 (twenty-one years ago)

Jessa, are you getting into the mood for the movie Open Water?

I'm reading The Story of O.

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Tuesday, 29 June 2004 16:39 (twenty-one years ago)

I am 451/851's through Anna Karenina.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 10:16 (twenty-one years ago)

mikeyG, I think that's as far as I am thorugh the pasolini biography. (it' s easier here to skip whole parts about italian politics)

― erik, Wednesday, 30 June 2004 10:52 (twenty-one years ago)

I am loving Anna Karenina. It's just so...dense. Every character has 97 names, but the Penguin edition clarifies and is consistent throughout.

Even the agriculture discussion are interesting! Not something I say too often.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 10:56 (twenty-one years ago)

I've had a wee science fiction kick recently, after a year's sabbatical due to the rather atrocious "Snowcrash" ruining my appetite.

Karel Capek - War with the newts (wow, this was wonderful!)
China Miéville - Perdido Street Station (didn't expect to like this one, as it was a recommended scifi book, but turned out to be a fantasy thing, something I usually don't care for. Nonetheless, it was quite entertaining)
William Faulkner - The Sound And The Fury (It was tempting to just start re-reading right after finishing it, as chapter three and four really opened up the first one. I have to admit that I had some trouble with it at times, but it was a joy to read, and while it felt a bit obscure at first, it really cleared up in an exhilerating and fascinating manner. Must read more Faulkner!)

Started, but gave up on after 100 pages: Larry Niven - Ringworld. Yeech. I don't really like the way he writes, and the story was far from my kind of thing. Too much of a "what ho! Adventurin' time! O look at the strange creatures" plot.

I now have today to pack up a nice collection of books to read over the next two weeks, not sure what to bring yet, except "The French lieutenant's woman" and "Moby Dick", neither of which I've read before. I have tons of books here that I've yet to read, so it's fun to spend time browsing to figure out what I want to read next.

― Øystein H-O (Øystein H-O), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 11:38 (twenty-one years ago)

russian character names, aaah talk of gloom

― erik, Wednesday, 30 June 2004 12:11 (twenty-one years ago)

"So Prince Sherterbaksy, Vronsky is in Petersberg I hear?"

"Yes, the Count is there, Betsy."

You get used to it.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 12:21 (twenty-one years ago)

Jarhead - that autobiography from the sniper in Desert Storm. It's good when it sticks to the biography part, but almost unreadable/laughable when you hit one of his over the top metaphors.

― bnw (bnw), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 12:36 (twenty-one years ago)

"So, Misha, how was your trip to Romania?"

― jocelyn (Jocelyn), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 12:46 (twenty-one years ago)

I hated wronksy as much as I hated " her". I never finished AK.

― erik, Wednesday, 30 June 2004 12:53 (twenty-one years ago)

Romania:
Really cheap. Pizza and wine meal for about $4. Beautiful countryside. Tenuous Dracula connections. Had a cracking time.

Anna K:
My loyalties to the characters keep shifting. Although Levin (for whom read Tolstoy) is the most consistent and charming.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 12:58 (twenty-one years ago)

I once visited a lecture about AK film-adaptations it started with greta garbo and ended with jaqueline bisset.

― erik, Wednesday, 30 June 2004 13:19 (twenty-one years ago)

I started 'Snow' by Orhan Pamuk last night.
It's the fifth Pamuk book I've read. There's something about his writing that makes me a bit obsessive, even though only one of the 4 I've read so far was completely satisfying ('The New Life').
But this is very promising. It seems to be written in a more straightforward style than his other books, and directly tackles political/religious issues in modern Turkey. (A quote from Stendhal at the beginning promises discussion of 'ugly matters')

― Joe Kay (feethurt), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 14:07 (twenty-one years ago)

I just finished Monica Ali's Brick Lane. I really wanted to like it, but I simply can't muster any enthusiasm for it. I've been slogging through it for a month, and while there isn't anything particularly bad about it, there isn't anything remarkable about it either. The Islamic female fate/agency issues are somewhat interesting, but could've been handled well in fewer pages (and could've been treated with more subtlety). Maybe I've just read too many Indian/Bangladeshi/Desi novels lately to approach it with a fresh eye, and maybe I'm not ready to find fictional treatments of 9/11 anything more than gimmicky, but I have to say that in my opinion this is just mediocre litfic. I don't understand what all the fuss was about.

I'm also reading The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, which was a gift and is my second Murakami--it's just what I expected, which is a good thing (and a good palate cleanser just now).

― mck (mck), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 14:14 (twenty-one years ago)

mck, I totally agree about Brick Lane...overrated, I thought. Unless I'm missing something? Why did people love it so much?

And bnw, OTM re: Jarhead. I got really sick of it by about 1/2way through.

I'm reading Jane Eyre for the first time. I haven't read anything non-contemporary in (I think) years, and I'm enjoying it immensely.

I had a high school teacher recommend once that, in order to keep track of potentially-confusing names in Russian novels, we mentally replace the Russian name with a common American one. I always thought this was funny advice. I mean, it just doesn't have the same ring to it.

"Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.
"Everything was in confusion in the Smith household."

― nory (nory), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 15:15 (twenty-one years ago)

Anna, Al, Katie and Dino be hangin' out in Russia.

― jocelyn (Jocelyn), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 15:34 (twenty-one years ago)

Any recommendations? I don't know what it is, but I have been in this rut lately where I haven't seen any books that have piqued my interest.

― Leon Czolgosz (Nicole), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 16:08 (twenty-one years ago)

re: nory

"aaah, anna karenina, you know, that book about the smiths."

― erik, Wednesday, 30 June 2004 16:10 (twenty-one years ago)

Just to register my disappointment on another reading misadveture since I'm such an very unforgiving reader lately.... Matt Ruff's "Fool on the Hill" i.e. "it's Tolkein but on a college campus!" Cliches + faeries + swords are still cliches. And using metafiction to show that "there's this guy and he's a writing a story and you're reading it! and i'm the writing guy!" is really not that clever at all, so spare us.

― bnw (bnw), Wednesday, 30 June 2004 17:23 (twenty-one years ago)

Let's see, I'm opening the box from Powells....

War of Words: Language, Politics and 9/11 -Sandra Silberstein
Don't Tell the Grown-ups: Subversive Children's Literature- Alison Lurie
The Book on Bush: How George W. (Mis)leads America-Eric Alterman and Mark Green
Reason: Why Liberals will win the battle for America-Robert Reich
Random Family: Love, Drugs, Trouble and Coming of Age in the Bronx -Adrian Nicole LeBlanc
Boys and Girls Forever: Children's Classics from Cinderella to Harry Potter- Alison Lurie

You can tell my politics and my profession from that bunch! Thank God I have a long weekend forthcoming.

― Rabin the Cat (Rabin the Cat), Thursday, 1 July 2004 02:56 (twenty-one years ago)

Evelyn Waugh - A Handful of Dust. His best, I think. It's a bookclub read, so I've had to take a break from Anna Karenina. Many similarities between the plots anyway.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Thursday, 1 July 2004 12:45 (twenty-one years ago)

I am reading THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE DOG IN THE NIGHT-TIME which an ilxor kindly gave me.

― the fairfox, Thursday, 1 July 2004 12:51 (twenty-one years ago)

Still Flannery O'Connor (all the Carson McCullers books were out of the library but a worthy substitute I thought), and also Watching The English by Kate Fox. At the extreme 'pop' end of pop soc-anth but interesting nevertheless.

― Archel (Archel), Thursday, 1 July 2004 12:58 (twenty-one years ago)

Hmmm. Perhaps I will read "The Curious Incident..." next, since I have finished Poor Things, am bookless, and have heard much praise for this one.

― jocelyn (Jocelyn), Thursday, 1 July 2004 13:31 (twenty-one years ago)

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