What are you reading?

[haleakalari]

Stranger in a Strange Land......i read this like once per season.  I wish i was Jubal Harshaw....

my teacher gave me that to read in 6th grade because i was bored with the book assigned to class. i still remember the book and it has always been one of my all time favorites, plus, it really got me passionate about reading.

last book i read was; Gods of Our Fathers: The Memory of Egypt in Judaism and Christianity by Professor Richard A. Gabriel. some recycled theories and inflammatory statements, plus the guy is a certified "egyptophile", but nonetheless the writing style is pretty engaging and it is a solid read. the book was very recently released and is a bit expensive, but the price should go down soon.

[alcoholandcoffeebeans]

still taking me a few times to get through the first 3 chapters.
reminds me of my first few attempts at invisible monsters.
a

give it time...
i thought the exact same thing.
but it gets better

[Caravan2001]

I don't know if this is already a topic, sorry if it is.  I just thought that with the Last Movie Seen thread and the Right Now I'm Listening To, we should (I should) add a book one too.  Even though everyone here probably spends all their time listening to music and posting on the net, reading might fit in there somewhere (maybe?).  Anyway, what are some recommendations, or what are you currently digging?  I am a music bio and true crime junkie, so this is what is on my nightstand currently:  Mr. Untouchable, the story of New Yorks biggest H dealer in the 70's, Nicky Barnes.  It rules obviously, given such a great subject and also the Elliot Smith bio which is pretty good too.  Worth getting from the library at least.  Stay tuned and I'll post my top 10 music bios soon...(Snoops "The Doggfather"? A modern classic...)

[Caravan2001]

Ytowndan just alerted me to the fact that, yes this thread already exists at http://week4paug.net/index.php/topic,4845.0.html

sorry for wasting you time....I'm new here  :-)

[cactusfan]

been reading a lot lately...

Oppenheimer - a recent biography, very good. he's the guy who lead the team that created the atom bomb in WWII, among many other fascinating endeavors. very complex guy. it was so interesting to read about all of these scientists predicting what would happen if we began a nuclear arms race. everything they feared came true. reading about the efforts people went to to avoid what became the cold war was really eye opening.

Notes From Underground - Dostoevsky. never read anything by him before, so i started with this, a very short book. great! written 150 years ago and like nothing else. it's basically a 130 page rant. funny and intense. feels very modern. i'm going to get around to the Brothers Karamazov soon.

Lucky Jim - Kingsley Amis. british, '60s, very funny story of a slacker vaguely trying to keep a teaching job at a college and deal with a variety of women while drinking way too much.

This Is Your Brain On Music - Daniel Levitin. recommended by phan003 in another thread somewhere. not bad, but i didn't get into it as much as phan did. some good stuff about the basics of music and how the brain deals with it, very much aimed at readers who've never thought about music before. for me there was too much focus on the details of his own research.

Einstein - Relativity. well i've read so many books that discuss relativity i thought i'd finally read the first book on it by the man himself. and i've gotta say, though he tries to explain it as plainly as possible, he's a little too far up in his own genius brain to get it across simply. but cool to read.

Team Of Rivals - Doris Goodwin. this is the big recent book about Lincoln and how once he very surprisingly became president, he appointed all of his rivals to all of the important positions in his government, so that he could hear the opposing opinions on every matter.  just started it, really good so far...

Jimmy Corrigan, The Smartest Kid on Earth - Chris Ware. a graphic novel. very good and very depressing. just started that one, too.

[Gumbo72203]

anything and everything by one Howard Philips LOVECRAFT.

the Cthulhu Mythos owns your soul.

[rowjimmy]

J.R.R. Tolkien - Children of Hurin
Good book. Basically an more detailed telling of the story of Turin which can be found in part in the Simarillion & the book of Lost tales (iirc) So, some of it was familiar, some was new. All was freshly told in a manner that is closer to that of LOTR than the Simarillion. (Less obtuse explication.)

[Red Sea Pedestrian]

J.R.R. Tolkien - Children of Hurin
Good book. Basically an more detailed telling of the story of Turin which can be found in part in the Simarillion & the book of Lost tales (iirc) So, some of it was familiar, some was new. All was freshly told in a manner that is closer to that of LOTR than the Simarillion. (Less obtuse explication.)

I never really got that into Tolkien, I can appreciate the impact he's had on fantasy literature, but I never really liked him as a writer. The ending of LotR is terrible, it's more dragged out then a disco biscuits concert, and about ten times more boring (ZING). The Silmarrilion was probably the most inaccesible piece of literature I hav ever picked up, every time I would read more then a page my brian would just shut off and I'd fall asleep.

The Hobbit KICKED ASS.

[rowjimmy]

You should get a new brian...

[fauxpaxfauxreal]

_The Scarlet Letter_  By Nathaniel Hawthorne

_Living Bill of Rights_

_The U.S. Governmental Operations Manual_

_God and Man in Washington_

[sophist]

This Is Your Brain On Music - Daniel Levitin. recommended by phan003 in another thread somewhere. not bad, but i didn't get into it as much as phan did. some good stuff about the basics of music and how the brain deals with it, very much aimed at readers who've never thought about music before. for me there was too much focus on the details of his own research.

That book really blew me away.  Thanks for taking the time to read it. 

edit to add:

Team Of Rivals - Doris Goodwin. this is the big recent book about Lincoln and how once he very surprisingly became president, he appointed all of his rivals to all of the important positions in his government, so that he could hear the opposing opinions on every matter.  just started it, really good so far...

I recently read, Lincoln on Democracy by Mario H. Cuomo & Harold Holzer.  It is a collection of his speeches throughout his career, and its a great read.  If you like Lincoln and want an in depth look into how he approached the major issues of his generation, this book details how intelligent Lincoln was and how great an orator he was as well. 

[Guyute]

That book really blew me away.  Thanks for taking the time to read it. 

edit to add:
I recently read, Lincoln on Democracy by Mario H. Cuomo & Harold Holzer.  It is a collection of his speeches throughout his career, and its a great read.  If you like Lincoln and want an in depth look into how he approached the major issues of his generation, this book details how intelligent Lincoln was and how great an orator he was as well. 

Thanks for the suggestion.  Team of Rivals is far and away the best written historical piece I have read, especially for that period in time.

[Jesso666]

Almost always Kurt Vonnegut and Hunter S Thompson (all three of the Fear and Loathing Letter collections are awesome) and the newspaper. I'm currently reading "Answer Me! the First Three" A collection of the first three editions of the magazine with the same title"Answer Me". "Answer Me" appeared in the early nineties , and only had 4 issues. It was created by the then Husband and Wife team of Jim and Debbie Goad

[birdman]

  I still have two of the original Answer Me zines. The "rape issue" and "suicide" issue.
Absolutely the most shocking and mind fucking reads ever!
The "Jimmy the Jail Punk" story has managed to keep me far away from prison. now THAT is some insightful reading

[sophist]

So I just started Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, which I've heard good things, and I'm about 100 pages into it and I like it so far.  It is over 1000 pages though, so my opinion is subject to change.  I know cactusfan and few other members are going to puke upon reading my post.   :-D
So I'm ready to be flamed for willingly reading this book. 

However, after Atlas I plan to read some Chomsky.  I picked up (in paperback) Hegemony or Survival, which I'm also looking forward to reading.