What are you reading?

[sophist]

The kid from Into The Wild went to my high school...

Thats cool.  Emory is about 25 miles from my house. 

[alcoholandcoffeebeans]

FYI

The book is called 'Pygmy', and it's already written!  Read on below for the plot:

I've just finished the first draft of a novel called "Pygmy," a dark comedy about terrorism and racism.  The lead character is a 13-year-old foreign exchange student sent to live with a suburban, white, middle-class family.  Oh, and they're Christians.  The visit is for six months, and he's one of a dozen similar kids, all shipped to America to live with typical families. 

The secret truth is that Pygmy is a terrorist, trained since infancy in martial arts, chemistry and radical hatred of the United States.  He has six months to build a prize-winning project for the National Science Fair.  If he succeeds, he and his project will go to Washington, D.C. for the finals competition -- where the project will explode, killing millions. 

So far, Gerry Howard says it's the best book I've done.  Fingers crossed for luck.

palahnuick's new, finished one...

[sophist]

So I finished this book over the weekend and all I can say is wow.  This is a new favorite for me.  Everything about it is incredible and very moving to me.  If you want a book that makes you think and has an incredible story, I'd recommend this to you.  It will get you thinking analytically about religion. 

[birdman]

^^^Read it a few years ago.
Richard Parker. The island.
Quality read.

[hoodie22]

Ok so i got a $40 gift cert for amazon and I'm trying to decide waht i want to get.
I know a lot of you have read palahniuk and i was wondering what book you'd recommend for a first time reader.
thanks!

[alcoholandcoffeebeans]

Ok so i got a $40 gift cert for amazon and I'm trying to decide waht i want to get.
I know a lot of you have read palahniuk and i was wondering what book you'd recommend for a first time reader.
thanks!

everyone's different...

i got turned onto fight club by a friend about 5 months before the movie came out....
that book is what hooked me.... but i really dug survivor and invisible monsters...

not to say that any of the others weren't good; they're all super.
those three are what did it for me...

[rowjimmy]

Ok so i got a $40 gift cert for amazon and I'm trying to decide waht i want to get.
I know a lot of you have read palahniuk and i was wondering what book you'd recommend for a first time reader.
thanks!

I just finished Diary which I liked a fair bit. Not my favorite but good.

[Igbo]

Just started "A Fighters Heart" by Sam Sheridan.

Its a non-fiction, this dude joins the Merchant Marines, and there he gets a taste for boxing and hand-to-hand combat. This dude gets a taste for fighting, and then makes a sort of journey to learn all types of fighting. He trains with muay thai fighters in Thailand, learns brazilian jiu jitsu, etc. Pretty interesting so far, bloody.

[rowjimmy]

Just finished Dead Man's Walk by Larry McMurtry.
Chronologically the first of the adventures of the fellows in Lonesome Dove.
I'm now reading the next (and fourth,) Comanche Moon.

[Hicks]

Just finished Dead Man's Walk by Larry McMurtry.
Chronologically the first of the adventures of the fellows in Lonesome Dove.
I'm now reading the next (and fourth,) Comanche Moon.

Nice, finishing up the Berrybender Narratives myself and would recommend them, more of a lighthearted farce than the Lonesome Dove books though. 

[JimmyWilson]

[sophist]

"My personal feeling is that citizens of the democratic societies should undertake a course of intellectual self-defense to protect themselves from manipulation and control, and to lay the basis for more meaningful democracy."-Noam Chomsky

"Exercising intellectual self-defense is an act of citizenship. It is what has motivated me to write this little book, which offers exactly this: an introduction to critical thinking."-Normand Baillargeon

What is the relationship between democracy and critical thinking? What must a citizen in a democracy know to make the word democracy meaningful? In A Short Course in Intellectual Self-Defense, radical pedagogue Normand Baillargeon trains readers to think, deconstruct, and ask the necessary questions to protect themselves from the manipulations of government, "authorities," and other elites. Whether the issue be the call to what we're told will be a bloodless war, the "debate" around Intelligent Design, understanding a government military expenditure, or simply reading the news, Baillargeon teaches readers to evaluate information and sort fact from official and media spin. In the spirit of advocates of critical thinking from every age, and including the famed late scientist Carl Sagan's "Baloney Detection Kit" and George Orwell's views on the political uses and abuses of language, this vivid, accessible primer empowers readers to take their education as citizens into their own hands.

Normand Baillargeon is a professor of education fundamentals at the University of Quebec in Montreal, where he teaches on the history of pedagogy and the philosophy of education.

I've read 120 pages so far, and its really good thus far.  I've especially enjoyed the logical and statistical arguments that are presented in this book. 

[Mr Minor]

Just read "The Great Gatsby" over the past few days.
Great book.  One of a few "holy grail" novels for English teachers.

I am also finishing up "Pillars of the Earth" and I am curious how is the book that follows it?  I really enjoyed Pillars and I am anxious to read the continuing story.

[sls.stormyrider]

^^
I don't remember there being a sequel.

"The Organic Lawn Care Manual" - Paul Tukey

[Hicks]

^^
I don't remember there being a sequel.

It just came out a few months ago, curious about it myself.