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*What book are you reading ?

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I finished 'Adventures in the Underground' last night, by CJ Stone.

Really enjoyed it. But need to read it again, and the Criminal Justice Act, to properly understand it.
 
Barking_Mad said:
The House of The Dead - Dostoevsky. Interesting 'fictional' tale of his 4 years in various Siberian prisons for 'political activities' as written from the viewpoint of someone else. Not as good as his other stuff, but better than most other peoples.
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and, crucial in understanding his ambivalent love/hate relationship with authority throughout his life. The daily visits to the hangman he endured broke his spirit, allowing it to be remade in fascinating (from a literary point of view) way. Must rush, the Grand Inquisitor wants me to answer some questions ;)
 
an old childhood favourite i found again :)

A Girl of the Limberlost - Gene Stratton-Porter.

i always assumed 'Gene' was a man but it must've been written at the time when women had to adopt male names to get published. cos she was a woman, and her real name was Geneva.
 
Larry O'Hara said:
and, crucial in understanding his ambivalent love/hate relationship with authority throughout his life. The daily visits to the hangman he endured broke his spirit, allowing it to be remade in fascinating (from a literary point of view) way. Must rush, the Grand Inquisitor wants me to answer some questions ;)
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Goodness that all sounds very interesting.........never read any Dostoevsky..........must do better! There's always so much to read isn't there!
 
Well, after having a bit of a fail episode a while back, I have started Rupert Thomson's 'Death of a Murderer' again and am really loving it. Seems like writing a more straightforward narrative has really allowed his prose to shine :)
 
Larry O'Hara said:
and, crucial in understanding his ambivalent love/hate relationship with authority throughout his life. The daily visits to the hangman he endured broke his spirit, allowing it to be remade in fascinating (from a literary point of view) way. Must rush, the Grand Inquisitor wants me to answer some questions ;)
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Ah, The Grand Inquisitor - I have The Bros. Kar. on my shelf, not got round to reading it yet but looking forward to all 900+ pages of it!
 
Honey said:
Goodness that all sounds very interesting.........never read any Dostoevsky..........must do better! There's always so much to read isn't there!
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Dosotevsky truly is brilliant. I heard people say that and either wasnt interested or went "yeah yeah yeah, whatever", but having read Crime & Punishment and a couple of others i came to see why. Amazing psychological insight and amazingly descriptive. I read C&P some 3 months ago and still cant get the scenes he described out of my head.

Tolstoy too is amazing but in a different way. Such wonderfully simplistic language yet he paints the most amazing scenes in your mind.

Resurrection is a great read.

*hearts Tolstoy*
 
Yeah I agree re Tolstoy - the opening scene in Anna Karenina is just fantastic.

I also learnt a lot about economics funny enough, from reading that - is that wierd of me, or would he be a good person to pay attention to as regards the economic development of Russia? A subject I am none too familar with, oddly enough........!!
 
Honey said:
Blimey.

Gotta say though - I always skip over the names and never enunciate them in my mind when reading them!!
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Yeah, Russian names can be a *skip quickly over* when you arent used to them. I regularly have to re-read them about 20 times.

I just love that part of the passage,

“Ask him how he thinks one should treat those who do not keep to the laws,” said the Englishman.

Nekhludoff translated the question. The old man laughed in a strange manner, showing his teeth.

“The laws?” he repeated with contempt. “He first robbed everybody, took all the earth, all the rights away from men, killed all those who were against him, and then wrote laws, forbidding robbery and murder. He should have written these laws before.”
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In the context of the rest of the book, that part comes along and is just :cool: Im still waiting for my copy of 'The Kingdom of God Is Within You' by Tolstoy, but it seems to have been lost in the postal strike. :(
 
I've just finished The Truth About Markets by John Kay. It's an interesting book and nicely written, but I don't feel as if I discovered 'the truth' about the market economy from it; more a few little truths that I half knew about anyway and he pulled together a little bit. And he'd missed out a few very big truths. Good book, but nothing world-shaking IMO.
 
Barking_Mad said:
Ah, The Grand Inquisitor - I have The Bros. Kar. on my shelf, not got round to reading it yet but looking forward to all 900+ pages of it!
Click to expand...

Implausibly enough I've read it twice. 'Demons' is also a fantastic read, a real slowburner which unfolds beautifully right near the end.

I'm still reading Arthur Miller's 'Big Sur'. I'd never heard of Miller before I found this book, but he's very very good. The opening section of the book had me on a high for days :eek: :)
 
Oooh I've read that Sojourner........ended up feeling quite propective over the little crocus. :(

I am now reading 'Your Body Never Lies' by Alice Miller, which is about how lots of people who were abused as kids store the memories in their bodies and they then manifest as illnesses. To avoid breaking confidentiality, she has used examples of famous authors to case study.

But the central message is - you don't have to love them. Their idea of love is fucked up, and it is normal if you have a lot of anger and resentment towards them. You are an adult now and can take care of yourself and if you never want to see them again, you don't have to. This is in direct contradiction to the 4th commandment - Honour thy father and thy mother, which has been passed down as a staple of our morality.

It feels great to read it.
 
I'm dipping in and out of 'Labyrinths' by Borges, which is proving to be fascinating, endearing, frustrating and thought provoking in equal measure.

BB:)
 
finished The Gum Thief. A middling Coupland IMO.

now reading The Amazing Adventures Kavalier & Klay by Michael Chabon, which is off to a cracking start
 
sojourner said:
Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides

Liking it
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Oh I love love love that book! Hope you enjoy it....he's definitely one of my favourite writers - the Virgin Suicides is fantastic too. Doesn't seem to have done anything for a while though :(
 
Finally reading "Midnight's Children" by Salman Rushdie. :cool: Had to wait ages for the library to get it in then they got 2 in at once! :confused:
Great so far!
 
Reading Cat's Cradle for school; I looove Kurt Vonnegut; he's a genius.....also reading Psychoanalysis and Shakespeare, which is proving to be really interesting, because the introduction to the book is about Freud's view on art, and more specifically, literature, and I find his theories very interesting.
 
I'm halfway through @the White Plague' by Frank Herbert

Initialy it threw me, being set in the eighties rather than in the future, but it soon falls back into that comfortable mixture of factional warfare and science he does so well.

Not sure about his going on about the Irish. All that 'tortured gaelic soul' stuff is a mite tedious and some of the bit's are borderline offensive. Still, not ad so far
 
i recently read the blind assasin by magaret atwood which i really enjoyed

i also just finished a niderlansk (...dutch) book called leo kaplan which i enjoyed

i started to read love, again by doris lessing. it s my first lessing ever and its up to a good start.

mah!
 
PieEye said:
Oh I love love love that book! Hope you enjoy it....he's definitely one of my favourite writers - the Virgin Suicides is fantastic too. Doesn't seem to have done anything for a while though :(
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absolute genius :)

i'm finishing off what a carve up! by jonathon coe :)
 
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