*What book are you reading ?

[Philbc03]

A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole


It is !


I reckon there's a fair few posters on here who are Ignatius P Reilly IRL. (Not naming names, like )

Glad to see ever greater numbers of Urbanites reaching for this book. It is utterly brilliant and deserves a wider readership!

I'm just starting HG Wells' 'The Shape of Things to Come'.

 

[dynamicbaddog]

Just finishing The Grave Tattoo by Val McDermid
s'quite good - not as good as some of her other books but worth reading.

 

[Dirty Martini]

The Moviegoer

The Moviegoer by Walker Percy

I loved large parts of it, a lot of it is breathtaking, very funny and supercool, great New Orleans at the end of the 50s setting, with many passages of superb writing. The characterisation is brilliant. But, as he gets towards the end, he becomes constrained by the need to wrap it up philosophically as well as plotwise, blabla, and I was left empty by the ending.

Percy spent years on the book and it is, apparently, heavily reliant on Kierkegaard's notions of the good life, how to overcome despair and all that existential stuff. I've not read the gloomy Dane, apart from the odd passage in a reader, so maybe I'm missing something essential.

It's still a great read, beautifully paced overall, moving, funny. Second reading required.

Anyone else read it?

Now halfway through The End of Alice by A M Homes.

 

[fractionMan]

I'm reading some terry pratchet book and I AM NOT ASHAMED!!!

 

[Dirty Martini]

Where have all the readers gone?

 

[May Kasahara]

I've just started 'Bowling Alone' by Robert Putnam - it's my book club book for this month. Despite being a sociology text, it's already very interesting indeed, about the fracturing of civil society in the USA over the last 50 years or so.

I only started it last night though, and the meeting is a week today, so I need to pull my finger out. That's why I'm going to be posting on Urban all day apart from lunchtime, instead of the other way round

 

[BadlyDrawnGirl]

'The Rare Record Price Guide 2007'.

 

[Orang Utan]

Where have all the readers gone?

I'm still here but I'm reading a poor detective novel that apparently I chose for book group

Will pick up We Need To Talk About Kevin tomorrow

 

[Biddlybee]

that apparently I chose for book group

Yes you did

I've heard We Need To Talk About Kevin is v.good though.

 

[Philbc03]

I'm still grinding my way through HG Wells' 'The Shape of Things To Come'. It's a very annoying book IMO - he clearly hasn't got a clue about Marx for instance but that doesn't stop him from pronouncing on his "failings".

I've been going through a couple of pamphlets too. These last two days I've read the Socialist Party's 'Muslims Under Siege' and Ted Grant's 'Menace of Fascism: What It Is and How To Fight It'. The latter is very good, and the introduction by Roger Silverman (written when the NF was at its height) is spot on. I think a reissue with a new introduction would be very welcome.

Right now I'm reading a piece by Andrew Chitty in an old edition of Historical Materialism on recognition and the social relations of production, and when that is done I'll be starting 'Durkheim Reconsidered' by Susan Stedman Jones.

 

[Poi E]

Fanny Hill.

A bit of a steamy one to read on the tube.

 

[foamy]

Tracy Emin 'Strangeland'

Took me a long time to decide if i liked Tracy Emin but now i know i do, i really do!

 

[Dr_Gonzo]

For Whom The Bell Tolls - Hemingway

 

[madamv]

Red Carpets and other banana skins - Rupert Everett.

Really funny so far, page 15! I do love him, he's such a luvvie.

 

[mrkikiet]

Fanny Hill.

A bit of a steamy one to read on the tube.

surprising with a name like that.

Just started the dream life of sukhanov by olga grushin today.

 

[sojourner]

Tracy Emin 'Strangeland'

Took me a long time to decide if i liked Tracy Emin but now i know i do, i really do!

Must read this.

I like Tracy

 

[Dirty Martini]

Finished The End of Alice.

Well, I like Homes a lot, she gives great sentence, pace and characters. I'm thinking about the book the whole two days it takes me to finish one. Matchless about suburbia, fearless with humour.

But I can't help feeling she fluffs this one. There's some thrilling stuff about the parallels between suburban and prison life, although she plays that out -- there's only much you can say I guess. What are you left with? The witterings of a morally insistent sick old man and batches of great, arresting prose. It niggles at you though. Good.

If you're going to have a book narrated by an incarcerated paedophile and childkiller, it might as well be AM Homes that writes it.

--

Now, I'm looking forward to starting The Killer Inside Me by Jim Thompson.

 

[HAL9000]

Syriana bloke

The film's character Bob Barnes (played by George Clooney) is loosely based on Robert Baer.

Robert Baer new book is "Blow the house down"

I thought it was quite good because its a fast paced thriller, pace helps hide one or two holes in the plot. The ending wasn't bad becuase it caught me by surprise even though I should have predicted the ending.

 

[bushphobia]

Just started reading Philip K dicks last novel, the divine invasion. I've had it for over a decade now, where it's been gathering dust, on my shelf. Quite brilliant so far. really hits the right buttons on human isolationalism, alienation, drug abuse, and, of course, future dystopia. It is Philip K Dick after all.

Also, bought at flops, Camden town, THE TRIALS OF LENNY BRUCE.
Three pound guys.
And has a cd of snippets of some of the material that caused him to be arrested.
Class.

 

[foamy]

Small Island - Andrea Levy

Orang - do read we need to talk about kevin, i thought it was amazing.

Soujourner - do read strangeland, i thought it was amazing.

 

[Pie 1]

Slow Man - JM Coetzee.
Excellent start, but it's just gone a bit weird. Probably will explain itself in time though.

 

[Markyd]

Love in the time of cholera. Fantastic book
And Hey ho let's go, the story of the Ramones: Everett True probably the most sycophantic Hagiograph I have ever read. Which is a shame cos I love the Ramones

 

[киноактриса]

Proletkult: Culture of the Future by Lynn Mally

 

[Orang Utan]

Orang - do read we need to talk about kevin, i thought it was amazing.

I have just started and it's great - Shriver is a very insigthful and skilled writer

 

[May Kasahara]

And Hey ho let's go, the story of the Ramones: Everett True probably the most sycophantic Hagiograph I have ever read. Which is a shame cos I love the Ramones

Sycophantic hagiography? From Everett True? Never!

 

[Shandril19]

Love in the time of cholera. Fantastic book

Great book. I think of it every time I eat asparagus.


Currently on Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro

And just finished Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.

 

[fear-n-loathing]

The Revolt of the Cockroach People by Oscar Zeta Acosta. Pretty good read about the chicano political movement in the 70's

 

[BadlyDrawnGirl]

'The Telephone Directory Of Hertford And Ware 1923'.

 

[sojourner]

The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things - JT LeRoy

Watched the film last week, and although I liked it, thought the book would be better. I'm pleased to report it is

 

[mrkikiet]

Currently on Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro

good choice. up there with remains of the day.