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Was Taters
Jul 30, 2004

Here comes a regular

Hoover Dam posted:

Jon Krakauer's Under the Banner of Heaven. First of his books I've read, and I'll be picking up the rest. It's the story of the fundamentalist (i.e. still practicing polygamy) Mormon sects and how they're keeping up the tradition of holding tight to church practices that Joseph Smith and Brigham Young and other church founders all just kinda made up.

I'm more a fan of his survival/adventure stuff.

I just finished Eliot Pattison's latest Tibetan mystery, Beautiful Ghosts. The guy writes about Tibet and China, mystery novels set in Tibet which are as much about the struggle to preserve the Buddhist culture of Tibet in the face of China's reforms, as they are about any mystery. I cannot recommend them highly enough, although I will say I always finish them feeling pretty melancholy.

His site can be found here: http://www.eliotpattison.com/

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wayfinder
Jul 7, 2003
I finished "Der Schwarm" by Frank Schätzing recently, which reaffirmed my dislike of German SciFi. I periodically give it a chance, and so far, it has always dissappointed me :( I'm gonna have to do this myself :mad:

Kapowski
Dec 21, 2000

HONK
I just finished The Enormous Room by E.E. Cummings. It was marvelous and I'd really like to read some more of his prose, if anyone has any suggestions?

Krinkle
Feb 9, 2003

Ah do believe Ah've got the vapors...
Ah mean the farts


wayfinder posted:

I finished "Der Schwarm" by Frank Sch�tzing recently, which reaffirmed my dislike of German SciFi. I periodically give it a chance, and so far, it has always dissappointed me :( I'm gonna have to do this myself :mad:

hey I've been on this book for about a year. I overestimated my ability to translate german run-on sentences, so, so far I know that he works in a bar, doesn't like his coworker erwin, it's his birthday, and he's about to meet a dog. Basically the first two and a half pages.

Painkiller
Jan 30, 2005

You think the truth will set you free...
I just finished Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle like 20 minutes ago. I'm still digesting the ending, Vonnegut's general cynicism over humanity is always a bit hard to swallow I find. The last few books I've read are Slaughterhouse Five, 1984, this and I'm going to read All Quiet on the Western Front next, I doubt I'm going be able to get past this month without becoming deeply depressed. :emo:

Iron Chef Nex
Jan 20, 2005
Serving up a hot buttered stabbing
I just wrapped up The Neptune File by Tom Standage. Pretty good history of the rivalries and personalities involved in finding the planet Neptune, as well as planet hunting in general from the time of Herschel to today.

Faderaven
Jan 21, 2003

Batman goes downtown
Just finished Dies the Fire by S.M. Stirling.

It's a book written by a geek about geeks for geeks. The main characters are some sort of special forces guy and a wiccan priestess!

Having said that I really liked it. I thought his characters were fairly well written but the main villain pretty much comes out of nowhere. I hear I have to slog thru a horrible second book and then a third book to find out how our heroes deal with him.

RAGE HOLE
Jun 7, 2006

Stendhal Stockholm
The Clan of the Cave Bear. Got it for free from a friend who moved away a while back. It was alright, though a lot of it seems like it was just copied out of a Paleolithic almanac. Lots of long passages describing ancient vegetation and animals, passages that seem to go on and on. Still, it's kind of neat to imagine what life and society was like back then.

Psion
Dec 13, 2002

eVeN I KnOw wHaT CoRnEr gAs iS
I'm a few pages from finishing David Weber's Off Armageddon Reef.

It's not stereotypical Weber, which is a bonus. Tor's editors did good work and his raw material was better. The story is nothing new - I probably first read something on relatively similar lines in Jannisaries, but it's actually very well executed compared to what I'd expected out of Weber. He does enough in developing the world and the machinations of politics without bogging it down to hell, which is a pleasant change from the monotonous droning of the internal politics in Manticore.

It's not going to break any records or gain a billion awards for being innovative, but it does prove the man can do more than Horatio Hornblower In Space, and do it pretty well.

Now if only he could take this quality and make the Honor series stop sucking :(

before that, I read Charles Stross' latest, Glasshouse. That man is like :psyduck: crossed with high tech. It's fun to read, but god does he mindfuck the reader with reckless abandon. If you want to read sci-fi that is not stereotypical sci-fi, pick up a copy of one of his books and give it a whirl. I'm a bigger fan of his future stuff like the Eschaton series or his standalones like Accelerando and Glasshouse instead of the rather weak Atrocity Archives.

Psion fucked around with this message at 20:24 on Nov 22, 2006

54321breakdown
Nov 5, 2004
Just finished Angela's Ashes. It was a very moving story that painted a vivid picture of life in Ireland in the absolute pits of poverty. For me, it was the most unsettling depiction of truly being alcoholic (namely his father, then a few other characters) that I had ever read, and made me think hard about my family history and how lucky I've been. Also, it was a great coming to America type story near the end - I wish I worked that hard and had been that smart about money at his age. The writing style was very crisp and effective, but also deep and varied, very irish if you ask me. More like Roddy O'doyle than Joyce, but there were flavors of both throughout. Good stuff.

Wet Bandits Copycat
Apr 18, 2004

I just finished notes from the underground by Dostoevsky. I really, really, liked it. Though I had some trouble getting around the translation and then digesting the contents. I felt like I identified with the narrators need for misery a little too much. I think I'm going to keep going with Dostoevsky onward to his other books.

I also read Horatio Algers Ragged Dick. I don't really believe the ideas behind the novel, but the main characters name was Dick Hunter, which made my inner adolescent laugh.

Wet Bandits Copycat
Apr 18, 2004

Hoover Dam posted:

Jon Krakauer's Under the Banner of Heaven. First of his books I've read, and I'll be picking up the rest. It's the story of the fundamentalist (i.e. still practicing polygamy) Mormon sects and how they're keeping up the tradition of holding tight to church practices that Joseph Smith and Brigham Young and other church founders all just kinda made up.

Jon Krakauer also wrote a book called Into the wild which I loved reading in highschool. I haven't read his other books yet so I can't give you a recomendation, but into the wild rocks.

lindramine
May 4, 2006

Nectar is delicious!
I just finished "Interesting Times" by Terry Pratchett yesterday. I really enjoyed it a lot. I've just recently gotten into Discworld, and this is the fourth book I've read in it (the others being Thief of Time, The Light Fantastic and Monstrous Regiment) and Interesting Times is my favorite so far, I think. (A close contest with Thief of Time, though.) I asked for The Last Continent and Sourcery for my birthday, and hopefully I'll get them :) (I love Rincewind, yay. :))

Guilt Pixie
Nov 30, 2005
I should be working…
I just finished The Devil in Amber, by Mark Gatiss. It's the sequel to 'the Vesuvius club', set int the 20s, about an British assassin up against a fascist movement hell-bent on summoning the devil himself. It's no great classic, but it's a fast paced, funny action/adventure mystery thriller-type thing. I love it utterly, as much as it's predecessor.

JimmyJems
Aug 21, 2005
A "Rebel's Billionaire"
Will Aitken's Realia - a smarmy, gangly Canadian woman encroaches on the Japan of the 80s and falls for an androgynous pop star; they do all sorts of drugs and confront their pasts in oblique, unsatisfying ways. Far from the hokey chick-lit its premise implies, but nothing remarkable either.

Many moons ago, I basically forgot about it with a fourth left and picked it up again yesterday with the intent of finishing the unfinished in my collection so that I can move onto other things. Mostly big and easy to grasp, morbid and wry, but annoyingly glib in spots. Soggy end, too. That said, a fun read, though it's a book I probably never would've read had I not recognized the author as my History of Film teacher (who is among the coolest dudes I've ever met) and snatched it on impulse at a place where unsold books go to die.

Was Taters
Jul 30, 2004

Here comes a regular

Faderaven posted:

Just finished Dies the Fire by S.M. Stirling.

It's a book written by a geek about geeks for geeks. The main characters are some sort of special forces guy and a wiccan priestess!

Having said that I really liked it. I thought his characters were fairly well written but the main villain pretty much comes out of nowhere. I hear I have to slog thru a horrible second book and then a third book to find out how our heroes deal with him.

Heh I read the second book without reading the first book! Am relatively intrigued, may move on to the 3rd book.

Juxtaposed
Jan 14, 2005

Deal with it, Hitler.
Just last night I finished My Brain is Open by Bruce Schechter, a fantastic account of mathematician Paul Erdos' life. It's the most recent book in something of a math history binge, a topic which turns out to be either impossibly boring or incredibly interesting.

filthylilmudblood
Oct 27, 2005

Fuck Rex Grossman
I just finished One True Thing by Anna Quindlen. It was fantastic. It's about a family dealing with a dying mother, and I thought it would be difficult to read about but Quindlen really made it such a beautiful story. It's a great read.

Cithen
Mar 6, 2002


Pillbug
I just finished Kurt Vonnegut's A Man Without a Country which was quite funny throughout. It's a short, but satisfying read, really only a few hours. Very curt, but poignant discussions on a variety of topics ranging from politics to the meaning of life. Some repetition occurs, but only a few times, that's the worst I have to say about it. I'm glad someone left it behind in the hotel courtyard.

fritz
Jul 26, 2003

Juxtaposed posted:

Just last night I finished My Brain is Open by Bruce Schechter, a fantastic account of mathematician Paul Erdos' life. It's the most recent book in something of a math history binge, a topic which turns out to be either impossibly boring or incredibly interesting.

I read that too. Paul Erdos is one of those people whom you can't make up because they're too unbelievable. (The 25 years of amphetamines don't help the plausibility either)

Pontius Pilate
Jul 25, 2006

Crucify, Whale, Crucify

Painkiller posted:

I just finished Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle like 20 minutes ago. I'm still digesting the ending, Vonnegut's general cynicism over humanity is always a bit hard to swallow I find. The last few books I've read are Slaughterhouse Five, 1984, this and I'm going to read All Quiet on the Western Front next, I doubt I'm going be able to get past this month without becoming deeply depressed. :emo:

Did you just recently stumble upon the world of literature? Those are all great reads but it seems like someone who just really began reading for pleasure. Perhaps I'm just thinking of myself?

calandryll
Apr 25, 2003

Ask me where I do my best drinking!



Pillbug
Right now I'm reading A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle. I read it as a child and seeing the thread about childhood books made me want to pick it up again. I'll finish it in tonight or tomorrow.

I just finished The Wind Up Bird Chronicle by Murakami. I found it to be an alright book, at times it seemed to wander a bit for me. But I really did enjoy is writing very flowing and easy to read.

Before that was East of Eden by Steinbeck. One of the best books I've ever read just something very compelling about it. I did take my time reading it and digusting most of what he said. One day I'll read Grapes of Wrath.

Charity CP
Jul 2, 2005

He helped sign a peace treaty between Russia and Japan. That helps a lot!
I just finished Jane Eyre, and it was decent. I'm working on Beloved by Toni Morrison right now.

mallratcal
Sep 10, 2003


World War Z. It took awhile before I started to get into the book but in the end it was a good read. I liked how the stories were interconnected. I hope Brooks writes a full novel on the zombie war.

Total Party Kill
Aug 25, 2005

mallratcal posted:

World War Z. It took awhile before I started to get into the book but in the end it was a good read. I liked how the stories were interconnected. I hope Brooks writes a full novel on the zombie war.

Do you know if there are plans to print a paperback? I would really like to read it.

Painkiller
Jan 30, 2005

You think the truth will set you free...

Pontius Pilate posted:

Did you just recently stumble upon the world of literature? Those are all great reads but it seems like someone who just really began reading for pleasure. Perhaps I'm just thinking of myself?

Pretty much. I used to read books alot when I was younger but I decided to finally read 1984 at the beginning of summer and it kind of kickstarted my interest in reading again.

Zero Karizma
Jul 8, 2004

It's ok now, just tell me what happened...

perceptual_set posted:

Do you know if there are plans to print a paperback? I would really like to read it.

That book had it's own stand at all the stores when it first came out and was a pretty good seller. I don't know for sure, but I'd be willing to bet a tremendous amount of money that it will. It certainly generated a lot of Internet interest at the very least.

mallratcal
Sep 10, 2003


perceptual_set posted:

Do you know if there are plans to print a paperback? I would really like to read it.

I can't say for sure but I agree with Zero Karizma. I'm willing to bet a paperback edition will be released.

filthylilmudblood
Oct 27, 2005

Fuck Rex Grossman
posting again! (I read alot)

I just finished Charms for the Easy Life by Kaye Gibbons. It was great and a really fun read.

Total Party Kill
Aug 25, 2005

Zero Karizma posted:

That book had it's own stand at all the stores when it first came out and was a pretty good seller. I don't know for sure, but I'd be willing to bet a tremendous amount of money that it will. It certainly generated a lot of Internet interest at the very least.

mallratcal posted:

I can't say for sure but I agree with Zero Karizma. I'm willing to bet a paperback edition will be released.

Great. I just can't handle hardback books. They look more like decorations than something I'm supposed to read. Plus, books usually look like they've gone through the laundry before I'm done with them.

clarion ravenwood
Aug 5, 2005

Blindness by Jose Saramago. I had't read anything by him before - I like the post-apocalyptic what-if vibe so thought it was pretty good.

I decided when I was looking for something to read last that I'd check out what the Nobel Prize for Literature winners had written, and so far I've tried Blindness and Beloved by Toni Morrison, and both I've enjoyed. I've got a few others to go yet. :dance:

Faded Mars
Jul 1, 2004

It is I, his chronicler, who alone can tell thee of his saga.
Just finished:

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. I enjoyed it and even went back several times to read some of Lord Henry's dialogs with various people (mostly Basil Hallward and Dorian Gray though). It's a pretty short book; less than 200 pages I believe.

The Man in the High Castle Philip K. Dick's Hugo-winning alternate history novel. Also a very good book. If you haven't read any of his stuff before, this is the book to start with.

SLAUGHTERCLES
Feb 10, 2004

A PURSE IS NOT FOOD

uggy posted:

I just finished The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Private Ivan Chonkin. The Russian version of Catch-22, I think it's extremely well written and very funny. Voinovich was able to make me laugh more than I ever have for a book, which is awesome. Every single part of it was good, and now I want to read the sequel.

Agreed! I finished it over the summer, and am keeping an eye out every time I'm at used bookstores for the sequel. I've read a couple interviews with Voinovich, he returned to Russia in the 90's and spends a lot of time writing angry old man editorials about Putin, Solzhenitsyn, and the state of Russia in general.

I've just finished Waterland by Graham Swift for an English course. It was a pretty good book, and seemed to me in parts very much like a British counterpart to Midnight's Children. It's a strange narrative from the viewpoint of a history teacher who is fighting for control of his class with an angst-ridden 1980's goth, but spends a lot of time blending the story of a murder that the prof was connected with in his teenhood into the greater whole of history.

a-dogg
Sep 29, 2005

Weekend Warrior

Pontius Pilate posted:

For myself, I just finished Alice in Wonderland and I liked it a lot more than I was expecting. It's a very fun and short read.

I came in here to post that. Although for me it wasn't my first time or anything. I just love the book so much that I've read it a few times. I don't care if people think it's too childish a book, Carroll is brilliantly clever and I seem to catch new things each time. Did you get into Through the Looking Glass yet? It's worth it for the deciphering of the Jabberwocky poem alone.

As for other books I've finished, well, it's taking me a while to get through Swann's Way, what with school and all, but I hope to finish at least a good portion of it by the start of next semester.

Pontius Pilate
Jul 25, 2006

Crucify, Whale, Crucify

a-dogg posted:

I came in here to post that. Although for me it wasn't my first time or anything. I just love the book so much that I've read it a few times. I don't care if people think it's too childish a book, Carroll is brilliantly clever and I seem to catch new things each time. Did you get into Through the Looking Glass yet? It's worth it for the deciphering of the Jabberwocky poem alone.

As for other books I've finished, well, it's taking me a while to get through Swann's Way, what with school and all, but I hope to finish at least a good portion of it by the start of next semester.

I finished it right after, they came in the same book. I preferred Alice over Looking Glass, though they're both great books. And I did decipher the Jabberwocky poem, it was worth it.

I'm working on The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Private Ivan Chonkin, which has been mentioned above, and loving it so far.

Spidermonkey
Nov 3, 2006
I finished Brave New World recently, it was a really good read. It has seemed to bring back my love of reading as well, which is always good.

T-Bozz Factor
Apr 28, 2003
I just finished 'Cat's Cradle' by Kurt Vonnegut. It was both depressing and hilarious and was an amazingly easy read. I don't think I've ever read anything so sarcastic and biting, it was great.

fritz
Jul 26, 2003

Just finished two books:

The Evening Star by Henry Cooper, about the Magellan probe that orbited Venus for a few years in the earl 90s. It was a decent look at the scientists on the team and the science as it was practised. It might be a little too technical for a general audience as he spent a bit of time on how the various algorithms on the spacecraft screwed up.

Fluke, by Christopher Moore. I thought this was ok for the first 2/3 or so but then it just went off the rails at a key event. Not Moore's best.

silvurphlame
Nov 26, 2006
what do you like to play?
I just finished Matthew Kneale's English Passengers- a Manx rum smuggler, a minister looking for Eden in Tasmania, and an Aboriginie boy meet up in all out 19th century hilarity. The book is written entirely in first-person diary entries, which gives it a great natural pace and well-developed characters. Pick it up if you like high seas and tropical forests adventuring.

EDIT: I spell good.

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wodin
Jul 12, 2001

What do you do with a drunken Viking?

I downed Lois McMaster Bujold's The Sharing Knife, her latest work. While I pretty much adore her earlier works, I'm starting to get a bit worried. I realize she likes writing fantasty-romance, but the "old war-scarred veteran/worldly but innocent young girl" pairing is starting to get on my nerves. First Cazaril, now Dag. She also seems somewhat handicapped by the constraints of a fantasy universe, as if she really wants to paint a more bright picture but can't because of the mechanics she's established for herself.

Who knows, maybe I'm just projecting. I still found it decent enough to devour in one night.

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