Distrust That Particular Flavor by William Gibson
Incomplete Nature: How Mind Emerged from Matter by Terrence W. Deacon
Constructing Reality: Quantum Theory and Particle Physics by John Marburger
Inside Apple: How America’s Most Admired–and Secretive–Company Really Works by Adam Lashinsky
How to Archer by “Sterling Archer”
Wow, I had no idea he’d written a book! Are you wearing your tactalneck as you read?
I have a mock tactalneck, a mocktalneck, if you will.
I finished “The Hunger Games.” I liked it enough to read the second (which I’ve been told is better than the first), and I’m looking forward to seeing the movie next month. I’m now putting my all into re-reading “Sense and Sensibility.”
Picked up Keeping it Real by Justina Robson from the library (forgot to note who recco’d it), and quite enjoyed the world & character building, the quick-moving plot and the touches of humour and romance. I’m more of a sci-fi than fantasy reader; but I’m intrigued enough by the world of Otopia and the other dimensions to continue with the series.
In one evening I read a book by Dyan Cannon about her relationship with Cary Grant called Dear Cary. I liked the first half of it, but the second half of it makes him out to be sullen and emotionally abusive. Which is as may be, but I was pretty happy not knowing that. It wasn’t in a “what a monster he was” way as much as an indictment of his parents who apparently really messed him up. If Cannon is to be believed Grant was even more into LSD than Esther Williams’ biography led me to believe, and she didn’t think it was so groovy.
I’ve also been dipping into an annotated edition of Pride & Prejudice. Last week I read a volume of glorified Darcy fanfiction and decided to revisit the book to floss the silliness out of my brain. (There’s also a tiny part of me that hopes I’ll be struck with a flash of inspiration to write 400 pages of tribute fiction that will be published, embraced by Janeites and therefore elevate me above my current humble circumstances).
The new mystery Death Comes to Pemberley by P.D. James has been getting very good reviews, from all I’ve seen.
I finished The Germanicus Mosaic by Rosemary Rowe. Not bad; very good plot twists, unexceptional characters. I stand by my earlier assessment that it’s decent genre fiction that’s not quite as good as Lindsay Davis, Ellis Peters or Steven Saylor. It was her first novel, so I’ll see if she improved over time or not.
Now on to the Confessions of St. Augustine, in the Garry Wills translation.
I haven’t heard of this, but T.H. White (best known for * The Sword in the Stones*, The Once and Future King and The Book of Merlin) wrote a mystery entitled Darkness at Pemberley.
It was an interesting aberration, but I hated it. The characters all seemed to have the attitude that “the villain can pick us off any time he wants, so we might as well do nothing”. At which point I simply want to abandon them to that fate.
Is it possible there’s a relatiionship, or do they simply share being mysteries and having the town of Pemberley in the title?
Angelmaker, the new one by Nick Harkaway, who wrote The Gone-Away World. It’s about a tinkerer who unknowingly starts up a doomsday machine. No ninja mimes yet.
Reading I Am Half-Sick of Shadows, the new Flavia de Luce mystery by Alan Bradley. They’re popcorn books.
HOW?!!! I need this!
I’m currently reading Dune: The Butlerian Jihad.
Once I finish it later on today, I’ll move on to Dune: The Machine Crusade.
I plan to read all 20 books in the Dune universe, despite how bad some people claim they are.
I remember when Cary Grant died. He was in the middle of of a tour around the US. “An Evening with Cary Grant” or something similar, where he would basically sit around and chat and share anecdotes with his audience. He died just before hitting St. Louis, so the St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran a big piece on him. I saw a copy at the time and remember it said he’d taken something like 100 LSD trips under controlled therapy in California while the drug was still legal. Apparently he swore by the stuff. Guess he kept using it.
I just finished Sara Gran’s** Claire DeWitt and the City of the Dead**, which I believe was recommended by someone on these boards. The only thing that disappointed me about this book was the fact there’s not a sequel to jump into immediately.
I started Stephen King’s 11/22/63 yesterday morning and may actually finish it by the end of the weekend, I find it so engrossing. Once done, I can’t wait to read through the thread about the book.
I enjoyed it.
Finished Spook and Bonk by Mary Roach. I really like her writing style, curiosity and sense of humor. I will look forward to more.
I got about halfway through Sagan’s Demon Haunted World before it lost my attention, but I’ll be back to finish it later. It’s depressing to think that the influence of pseudoscience has continued to rise - everything he said back in 1996 is even more true today.
Didn’t quite finish Michael Pollan’s Botany of Desire. He hasn’t sold me on any of his 4 theses in this book. There’s a sense of stretching to fit his findings to his ideas.
Nearly finished with a marathon reading of Cryptonomicon, one of my all time favorites (Neal Stephenson). Great characters, engaging plot, geekiness and some truly funny lines. I admit I skip over some of the math and wonder about the historical accuracy of the WW2 stuff, but for the most part I just enjoy the heck out of this book.
Just finished The Siege of Mecca: The Forgotten Uprising in Islam’s Holiest Shrine and the Birth of al-Qaeda by Yaroslav Trofimov. Excellent book and I highly recommend it.
I read Dune in November/December, just finished Dune Messiah a few days ago, and am a few pages into Children of Dune.
This is the first book series I’ve ever read. I immensely enjoyed the 1st, and felt like the 2nd was a good conclusion that really should be read right after the first. I think that, no matter how much I love Children, I’m going to stop. Unless someone here REALLY pushes me to reading 4, 5 and 6. No way am I ever going to read the ones done by his son and the other guy though.
I would have said stop at the first one. I loved the first one, but the rest kept getting worse and worse.
I’m glad to hear this. I also was very taken with this book.