Dangerously Funny: The Uncensored Story of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour by David Bianculli.
Travels with Charley, John Steinbeck. Ramblin’ around America circa 1960. It holds up quite well – nice little character descriptions, good insights that still apply today, plus a few observations that remind you of what* has* changed since then.
I finished the audiobook version of The Help, which I enjoyed quite a bit. I think it goes beyond the “chick lit” brush it’s been painted with. Admittedly, it’s also not the “change my life forever OMG OMG!” book that I’ve heard the Oprah crowd claim it to be, but it is engaging and moving.
I just started Harlan Ellison’s Strange Wine. It’s my first foray into Ellison.
I’m reading In This House of Brede, by Rumer Godden. It was recommended in a recent thread about “comfort reading”, and it does have that soothing feeling to it.
Still enjoying Scott Turow’s Ultimate Punishment. He has a calm, thoughtful, straightforward style that goes well with an emotional topic like the death penalty.
I really enjoyed Christopher Brookmyre’s Boiling a Frog - it’s my favorite of his books yet. I’ve ordered the next two books featuring the same protagonist, and then I’ll probably start reading his others.
While on vacation I read and enjoyed another Elizabeth George mystery (Deception on His Mind), and I also read an old favorite book from my childhood, Mrs. Mike. It made me cry on the beach, where I had no kleenex.
During our long drive we listened to most of The Fortune of War, by Patrick O’Brian, on audiobook. We’ll probably get through The Surgeon’s Mate during our Thanksgiving and Christmas driving. I have succeeded in sucking my husband into this series.
I just finished The Hippopotamus Pool, another Amelia Peabody mystery. It begins with their celebration of the new year of 1900. I’m enjoying Ramses (Amelia’s precocious son) as he grows up.
Just started World War Z.
Finished Joseph O’Connor’s Star of the Sea, which had been recommended by jjimm. A bunch of people on a ship in 1849, fleeing the Potato Famine. It’s marketed as a mystery, which it totally isn’t, although someone is murdered at the end.
Liked it a lot – gave it to a friend for his birthday on Saturday (since I’m *positive *he’s already acquired every other book I’ve ever recommended to him, I decided against English Passengers or Cloud Atlas, the books to which jjimm had compared it).
“Cutting for Stone” by Abraham Verghese. Fantastic. It’s like an all-you-can-eat international buffet. Would make a fabulous movie.
Just finished “True North” and started “The Last Stand”, by Nathaniel Philbrick (another Little Bighorn book).
Just finished Anne Frank: Her Life in Words and Pictures by Menno Metselaar and Ruud van der Rol, a wonderful little book about the diarist and her life and times, putting everything in context with World War II, and telling what happened after her death, including her father’s somewhat reluctant decision to publish her diary and the media sensation it became, as well as subsequent investigations into who might have betrayed those hiding in the “secret annex.” Highly recommended if you have any interest in Anne Frank.
Finished Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom. I rather enjoyed it! I wouldn’t hype it as much as it has–I’ve read a lot of similarly good books this year, but it’s got the Franzen style and is a perceptive meditation on the various interpretations of personal freedom. At some points I felt a bit like it should have been published two years ago for full effect, but it still works very well. Kudos to Franzen.
I’m not sure what I’ll take up next. I got myself a Kindle, so I have a couple of classics available for free now. I also still have a numbe of actual books to read…ah, decisions, decisions…
My wife and I went tonight to hear David Sedaris, one of my favorite humor writers, do a public reading, including one of the stories (about a Great Horned Owl who befriends a hippo) from his animal-themed new collection of short stories, Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk: A Modest Bestiary. Good stuff. There’s something about his offbeat sense of humor and reading style that always gets me.
Lost in the Forest by Sue Miller. A major plot point is the seduction/statutory rape/affair(?) between a 15-year-old girl and a 53-year-old man. Got into an interesting discussion with an Amazon reviewer who posits that Miller’s portrayal of their relationship means that Miller is advocating/excusing sexual abuse of minors.
My daughter gave me an Amazon gift certificate, which I used to buy the rest of the Aubrey-Maturin series (I needed the last nine). Happy camper here!
ThelmaLou, I read Cutting for Stone a few months back and agree that it’d make an excellent movie, or maybe even a mini-series.
I’m reading The Dirt on Clean: An Unsanitized History, by Katherine Ashenburg. It’s the history of personal cleanliness in the western world, beginning with the ancient Greeks and Romans. It’s pretty good so far. I knew that there was a period in the middle ages where baths were considered unhealthy and impious. (“Because the Moor was clean, the Spanish decided that Christians should be dirty.”) The 17th-century notion that frequent changes of underwear, instead of bathing, could make you clean is fascinating. I’m familiar with Beau Brummell from reading Regency fiction, but I didn’t realize that he was neurotic about cleanliness in addition to being a snappy dresser, and he helped to popularize bathing - the author considers this a finer legacy than his elaborate cravats.
I’ve also started Altered Carbon, by Richard K. Morgan. I forget who recommended this, but so far I like it. I think it’s going to be a science fiction hard-boiled detective kind of thing.
in honor of the month of october, i’ve begun re-reading jim butcher’s dresden files series. it’s been ages since i last cracked one. in fact, he’s added at least three books since.
i’ve read storm front, almost done with fool moon, and have grave peril waiting in the wings. nine more to go after that, i believe. gonna be doing some major reading thru the end of the month!
Plan to finish *Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue Sea *in the next day or so. The story of the sinking of the *SS Central America * which took 400+ men and over three tons of gold to the bottom of the Atlantic and the subsequent search for the treasure.
In Gary Jennings’s excellent historical novel Aztec, the Aztecs, who kept themselves quite clean, are appalled by how filthy the Spanish are. An Aztec diplomat orders several Spanish castaways forcibly bathed against their will, and their clothes burned to destroy the fleas, before he will even speak with them.
The Jesuit’s Guide to (Almost) Everything, finally something substantial after a couple of days with a fever reading time-travel fiction.
Just finished Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. It rocks. The ultimate wish fulfillment story.
Now: The Stand.