*What book are you reading ?

[Structaural]

Straw Dogs - John Gray (excellent thoughtful book)
Scaredy Cat - Mark Billingham (alright crime thriller - passes the time on the train)
Platform - Michel Houellebecq (cynical, whore obsessed, bigoted but strangely enjoyable)

and the latest Iain Banks but I haven't started that yet (Dead Air).

 

[mrkikiet]

i'm still reading Everything is Illuminated.

I have had a complete change of heart about it. I now think it is really good. Everyone, and i mean EVERYONE, should read it. It is both funny and poignant, like all good books should be.

 

[Orang Utan]

Originally posted by Hollis
I just started that 'Man and Boy' by Tony Parsons. I've got this feeling its not going to be very good?

You're very perceptive

 

[Power]

he knew you were going to say that.

 

[Orang Utan]

Border Crossing - Pat Barker - halfway through this and it is beautifully written and full of humanity, as you'd expect from the writer of the Regeneration Trilogy - after reading Gitta Sereny's Cries Unheard and Blake Morrison's As If as well, it makes my blood boil to learn how children who have commited despicable crimes are treated by the courts in this country.

I have just finished:
The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold - very well written but overly sentimental - not sure about the ending either
Life Of Pi - Yann Martel - very charming and quirky but certainly not deserving of the Booker Prize.
Y: The Descent Of Men - Steve Jopnes - anecdote strewn mess but very entertaining nonetheless
Vernon God Little - DBC Pierre - now THIS should win the Booker - Douglas Coupland meets JD Salinger on the Jerry Springer Show - a very frustrating read in many ways but ultimately very sweet and uplifting, and simulataneously, a cynical and searing satire.

Still on the shelf:
The Autograph Man - Zadie Smith
The Poisonwood Bible - Barbara Kingsolver
something else that's also very bookgroupy but I can't remember

 

[Masseuse]

The Accursed Share (vol 1)- Bataille.

Reading this makes me feel I have a wonderful secret. I don't know how to even begin describing it - but it's the first time I've found a study of economics so enthralling!

"If one has the courage to read my book....." starts the intro. I like that kind of hyperbole in a writer.

Trying to get to grips with the Coupland.... kind've enjoying it, but it's a bit "so what".

 

[J77]

Read 3/4 of The Cement Garden by Ian McEwan last night (had to sleep at one point ).

Slightly disturbing, yet strangely addictive.

Don't know how it's going to finish but I hope it doesn't just fade away...

 

[mentalchik]

Just finished "Neverwhere" by Neil Gaiman,




absolutely brill imo



already read American Gods, gonna go read some more of his books !

 

[Termite Man]

Originally posted by mentalchik
Just finished "Neverwhere" by Neil Gaiman,




absolutely brill imo



already read American Gods, gonna go read some more of his books !

I haven't got round to reading Neverwhere yet . American Gods is a great book and so are all the Sandman comics as well .

Neil Gaiman is just great

I'm currently reading a book called Nam - which real life accounts of incidents that happened to soldiers in Nam . I'm also reading The Sagas of the icelanders which is fairly self explanatory and the third book that I'm reading is Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury !

 

[Sooty]

Have just started "Guns, Germs and Steel" by Jared Diamond. Only on page 21 - and my head is in bits already!!!

 

[Orang Utan]

Originally posted by Sooty
Have just started "Guns, Germs and Steel" by Jared Diamond. Only on page 21 - and my head is in bits already!!!

Very good book - great ammunition against racists who like to argue that the West is more advanced because of the white race's superior intellect

 

[Dubversion]

i started that - possibly the only 'popular science' book i've ever read cos i'm a gimp when it comes to science, and i was really enjoying it but then i lost it.

maybe i should start again..

 

[Sooty]

Originally posted by Orang Utan
Very good book - great ammunition against racists who like to argue that the West is more advanced because of the white race's superior intellect

Yes it seems that it will be good for that. I just hope I can understand it enough to be able to use the points when I do have an arguement against a racist.

I'm use to reading books by Stephen King and Bill Bryson and this is my first "proper" book. I'm gonna have to carry a dictionary around with me I reckon. Wish me luck!

 

[Nina]

Originally posted by geordietim
i'm still reading Everything is Illuminated.

I have had a complete change of heart about it. I now think it is really good. Everyone, and i mean EVERYONE, should read it. It is both funny and poignant, like all good books should be.

*Phew*
glad you had a turn around. It's one of the best books I've read in ages.

Just finsihed Augusten Burroughs...Running with Scissors. Great story of homosexual boy growing up in psychotic dysfunctional family. If you like Franzen's Corrections or Coupland's slightly less inspriing 'All families are psychotic' you should give this a go.

Am now half way in to Brian Keenan's An Evil Cradling about him being a hostage in Beirut. Wanted to read this book for the last 9 years and finally got my hands on it. So far, it's excellent and kept me entertained on my 10 hour train journey yesterday.

 

[Perillous]

Originally posted by J77
Read 3/4 of The Cement Garden by Ian McEwan last night (had to sleep at one point ).

Slightly disturbing, yet strangely addictive.

Don't know how it's going to finish but I hope it doesn't just fade away...

I've just read 2 of his books in a row, Atonement and Child Out of Time (or Child In Time?) and I know what you mean about him fading away. Although really engrossing, but they both had rather strange endings, which I wasn't quite happy with. Still glad I read em though.

 

[Dubversion]

Owning Up - The Collected George Melly autobiographies.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

I read one of the Melly biogs and Revolt Into Style and thought they were pretty groovy, dub.

Just finished:

"Sex Pistols" by Fred and Judy Vermorel

Very good indeed. More on this soon.

Just started:

"The Origins of Modern Leftism" by Richard Gombin

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Originally posted by NVP
Just started 'Scepticism Inc.' by Bo Fowler.

I got into a massive argument about this when I took it as holiday reading one year because we went with a load of mates and it turned out that one of them had just finished the C of E's Alpha Course and another of them had started going to church as well, which was news to everyone else.

Anyway, no prisoners were taken.

 

[Calva dosser]

Just finished High Society. (Ben Elton)

Bollocks from start to finish. At least we now know he failed to shag Julie Burchill at some stage in his meteoric plunge into ill-researched sloppy shite.

 

[foo]

I'm in the middle of three books right now. Bloody irritating habit - & I don't know why I do it. Does anyone else do this?

Douglas Coupland - Life After God. Ok so far.

Jenette Winterson - The Power Book. Odd so far.

Siri Hustvedt - What I loved. Dull so far.

P'raps none of the books are gripping me particularly, so I keep dipping into them at different times - consequently getting a bit confused....

 

[Lollybelle]

Noooo...! I just read What I Loved and thought it was brilliant! Properly chock-full of ideas and a really 'wide' read - loads of detail and yet spanning an entire lifetime.

And the Power Book - well, I've never read anything of Jeanette Winterson's and not been really moved by it, I think she's got an amazing skill for drawing the reader in.

Hope both of them start to appeal a bit more...

I also just finished Life of Pi - I really liked that. It passed the test of getting me to take it on the tube rather than have my walkman on.

Currently I'm reading 'Memoirs of a Survivor' by Doris Lessing, apparently it was also a Julie Christie film but I haven't seen it. It's very weird so far, but I think there's some dark secrets yet to be revealed.

 

[foo]

Hello Lolls. xx

I loved Life of Pi too. I'll give the What I've Loved a bit longer. I think I've got to decide on one to read - and leave the others alone. I was wondering where a character had gone earlier, until I remembered it was in a different book!

The Jenette Winterson is going to win for now I think. I can't see where she's going with the it....and I'm intrigued.

ooh Memoirs of a Survivor. An excellent book Lolly! I'd forgotten all about it.

 

[Lollybelle]

hello back foo! xx

 

[marty21]

full dark house - christopher fowler - british gothic stuff

and will shortly read

a question of blood - ian rankin

Politics - Adam Thirlwell

 

[Blagsta]

Simon Schama - A History of Britain 3000BC - 1603AD

 

[chez]

Timeless Simplicity- Creative living in consumer society- John Lane

 

[sparkling]

I seem to have a few books on the go all at once. The Seals wife which is a bit slow and gentle at the moment.
I picked up a copy of the all the Adrian Mole diaries from the Oxam book shop in Saffron Walden so am reading that to make me laugh.

A couple of poetry books and the Robber wife by watshername you know the Canandian author who writes good books?

 

[xerxes quisada]

I'm reading the Count of Monte Cristo.

Not really the sort of book I'd normally read but a classic tale of drug abuse, fighting and subtefuge.

Much better than I thought it'd be.

An Evil Cradling is a must read book. Though it did give me an irrational fear of foreign teaching jobs and cupboards.

 

[J77]

Just read 'The Cement Garden' by Ian McEwan.

Very short book and my initial reaction was, what was the point?

Nowhere near the same league as some of his other books.

 

[WasGeri]

I'm reading an excellent book at the moment, it's called 'Travelling Light' by Katrina Kittle. It's written from the perspective of a woman whose brother is dying from Aids. My mum lent it to me and warned me I would cry all the way through. I haven't yet though.