Books: What are you reading tonight?
We have ongoing threads on t.v. and movies we're watching lately; it's time for one for books. daveT's thread on favorite books covers ones we've already read, but let's put ones we are reading/going to read soon or have just finished(i.e., let's make this thread more like a log than a resume) here.
Below is some stuff I've pulled from daveT's thread, where I felt compelled to talk about my recent book-buying craziness, with some new comments.
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I'm one of those guys who will often read many books at once. Right now I'm at various depths into:
Stephen King -- On Writing
textbook on real estate
Ode to Kirihito - supposedly best graphic novel ever done by Japan's best graphic novelist ever
American Splendor (second collection put out after the movie) -- Harvey Pekar, graphic short stories
various meditation books -- Mantak Chia
How to Cheat Your Friends at Poker -- Penn Jilette
Cosmicomics -- Italo Calvino -- another re-read of it
On the burner to read next:
From Hell -- Alan Moore, graphic novel
My Life in the Bush of Ghosts and The Palm Wine Drinkard -- some African dude won a Nobel prize for this I think; supposedly absolutely fantastic; the album by Brian Eno and David Byrne certainly was
God is Not Great -- Christopher Hitchens
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I'm reading the 48 Laws of Power, some good stuff in there, but some "laws" seem to just be padding the book or trying to be edgy.
i feel like all of his stuff is silly, nobody reading that stuff is going to become more successful etc
but i do intensely enjoy all the little historical snippets
however, whenever he gives an example anecdote about a subject i know very well, he always seems to miss out on some key aspects of it, like he interpreted it very differently than consensus, or that he missed a key detail that would make the example less powerful etc
but it's always an entertaining read
I just knocked out Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, it was fun but not very nourishing, shall we say. I'm glad I came to it fresh without prior knowledge. I doubt I'll ever spend time with the movie but I might watch a little of it if I ran across it on cable. Uh except that I don't have cable anymore hahaha.
Note: I'm all about the pop culture nostalgia, but this guy just had really bad taste in his. Some good stuff mixed in but overall a lot of total crap.
haven't read the book, but movie was at least interesting - wouldn't call it a great film by any means but definitely rewatchable
pop culture references seemed very forced imo
I confirm it's entertaining
I believe some of his stuff is useful to making life better/making you more powerful because I have done it already. Things like "think as you like but behave like others", for example when you have values too different from your community sometimes it's better to keep it to yourself and share it only with a few trusted friends
His historical examples are also solid, famous moments in history when figures like Napoleon made mistakes and what happened, with an interpretation of it
Every Tool's a Hammer by Adam Savage.
I thought this might be a bunch of fun tales from his MythBusters days.
There was some of that. But mostly, it is an encouragement to people new to the "making" world. Tips from his experiences, stories about things he did wrong or right over the years, that kind of thing.
While not what I was expecting, still a good read. I'm not into that world, so it didn't resonate with me, but some quite interesting bits.
Earlier this week I finally finished Ian Toll's outstanding trilogy of the Pacific Theater of WWII. I had previously read volume one before volumes two and three came out. I started by rereading volume one and going all the way through the next 2 volumes. Wow! I read a lot about this subject and this is easily the most comprehensive work I have read. It touches on everything from Washington, London, the JCS, Tokyo, the Japanese hierarchy and political motivations to detailed battles and campaigns. 4000+ pages later I am kinda exhausted from reading. Prior to this I had been banging out 2 - 3 crappy novels a week. But this read was both awesome and brutal. The hell that both sides went through on those islands and on those ships and in those airplanes was unbelieveable. **** the military industrial complex!
The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes - In the first part, the middle aged TOny Webster tells the story of his youthful days, his close group of friends and his difficult relationship with his girlfriend Veronica. The second part jumps forward to his present day, where events lead him to dig up the past and those relationships.
There's a decent story, told by a self-admittedly unreliable narrator, that's unfortunately buried under annoying pseudo-philosophical musings on the mundanity of most people's lives and the nature of memory. Those passages felt like it was the author lecturing the reader, not the narrator talking. I hate it when a book lectures the reader; it's the literary fiction genre's version of "telling" instead of "showing".
Some of the plotting and character's actions don't add up. In the present day, Veronica repeatedly tells Tony that he doesn't "get it" when he tries to . But what she's asking him to "get" would be one hell of a stretch of understanding. If Barnes wants us to be critical of Tony and sympathetic to Veronica, then Veronica's stance would need to be a lot more reasonable.
Earlier this week I finally finished Ian Toll's outstanding trilogy of the Pacific Theater of WWII. I had previously read volume one before volumes two and three came out. I started by rereading volume one and going all the way through the next 2 volumes. Wow! I read a lot about this subject and this is easily the most comprehensive work I have read. It touches on everything from Washington, London, the JCS, Tokyo, the Japanese hierarchy and political motivations to detailed battles and cam
I highly recommend for you Churchill's 6 volume memoirs of WW2 then, there's a 1k abridged version but I read the whole thing it totally worth it.
He won the Nobel Prize for them.
Earlier this week I finally finished Ian Toll's outstanding trilogy of the Pacific Theater of WWII. I had previously read volume one before volumes two and three came out. I started by rereading volume one and going all the way through the next 2 volumes. Wow! I read a lot about this subject and this is easily the most comprehensive work I have read. It touches on everything from Washington, London, the JCS, Tokyo, the Japanese hierarchy and political motivations to detailed battles and cam
This is probably the best series I've read about the Pacific war. I assume it's because of the research into the personal details that makes it so riveting.
getting that pacific series, thank you
Big Deal by Anthony Holden.
This is the story of Holden spending the year from the 1998 Main Event to 1999's as a professional poker player.
Now, it's not as if he's coming out of nowhere, doing this completely on a lark. Indeed, he satellited in to both of those Main Events, and was a regular in a home game in England which included another famous poker author, A. Alvarez. I guess I'd put him in a 'serious amateur' category.
Of course, the descriptions of hands and strategy are lolbad by today's standards. The writing is quite good (that's his real profession). He tells a nice story. Recommend, but not as a poker book, but as a book about his experiences.
Agree with the above, it was a fun read and he's a real author.
Bonus point (almost) for the name too
This Is Happiness, by famed Irish writer Niall Williams.
A tale of a 17yr old boy sent to live with his grandparents in very small-town Ireland, as told ~70 years later by the narrator. The town has no electricity when he arrives, etc.
It's brilliant. The 'story' loosely revolves around an adult friend who comes to live with them and that man's searching for his lost love who lives in the town, as well as the young man's journey into adulthood.
First book of his I've read, man, this dude can write.
Yes, one of several great Irish writers publishing right now! History of the Rain also very good. I'm looking forward to getting to his newest.
My new hobby is to read a book and then immediately watch the movie that I either haven't seen or haven't seen in ages.
Recent reads/watches have been:
Jurassic Park
Alive
Misery
The Shining
All books have been good. Misery was the best movie with The Shining being the worst.
If anyone has any recommendations......FYI I'm not a fan of the supernatural.
Not everyone's cup of tea, but Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
Was going through some old stuff and found a copy of the book, so might do a read/watch too as not seen or read it for years.
thx, maybe i'll add it to the queue.
I was gonna do Silence of the Lambs next. Other considerations:
First Blood
The Drop (The Lehane one, not Connelly)
Mystic River
The Rainmaker
Silence of the Lambs.....great book. I hadn't seen the movie in YEARS but as I was reading it I kept thinking "yeah, this sounds familiar." I then watched the movie and it's very true to the book. Success on both counts.
Not everyone's cup of tea, but Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
Was going through some old stuff and found a copy of the book, so might do a read/watch too as not seen or read it for years.
I'm 50 pages in and have no idea where it's going. I don't see how these two guys can function at all with the amount of drugs/drinking they are doing.
My new hobby is to read a book and then immediately watch the movie that I either haven't seen or haven't seen in ages. Recent reads/watches have been:
Jurassic Park
Alive
Misery
The Shining
All books have been good. Misery was the best movie with The Shining being the worst.
Two older books that pair interestingly with their (very watchable) movies:
The Maltese Falcon
To Have and Have Not
Two older books that pair interestingly with their (very watchable) movies:
The Maltese Falcon
To Have and Have Not
Speaking of The Maltese Falcon...
Also...
Spoiler
The book of Silver Linings Playbook is quite a bit better than the movie, also quite a bit darker. It sure ain't great literature but it surprised me how much I liked it, and this was after having seen the movie.
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: Good, just not my cup of tea.
Definitely some funny parts (the girl from Montana, the lawyer puking in his shoes when the maid arrived, the stop when Duke was waiting for the CHPman and didn't realize he had a beer in his hand, and the overall state of their room at, I think, the Flamingo).
And only 200 pages which was refreshing.
You should read The Great Gatsby and then watch all 4 versions of it and wonder why they ever tried to make a movie out of it in the first place.
