Wow, that’s a nice thought. I will definitely do that.
I’ve started reading Catch-22 for the first time. I avoided it for a long time because I don’t like war stories, but I figured since this was one of the capital-C Classics and lots of people I respect said good things about it I’d give it a shot.
And it’s a hoot. Why did no one tell me this was an absurd story? I love absurdity!
Cheers @ Khadaji and all y’all.
And with that, good night.
Just finished, As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of the Princess Bride. Fun book, with stories, well told from one of my favorite movies.
Just started LATER by Stephan King.
Pre-ordered King’s new novel today! If you liked the character of Holly Gibney from the Mr. Mercedes series, she’s got her own book now.
Finished The Rose Code.. What a smashing book, easily one of the best books I’ve ever read. Next in line is Winter Solstice by Rosamund Pilcher.
I’m kinda surprised he has written another book in this series. At some point I’ll have to read the series beginning to end.
Michaelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling Ross King
Long and wonderfully detailed account of the famous series of paintings. More than just the story of the art itself, it goes into the volatile personalities of Michelangelo and Pope Julius II, as well as how the pigments were made and how the walls were prepared.
Here’s to Khadaji, indeed! 
Finished Inspired: Understanding Creativity–A Journey Through Art, Science, and the Soul, by Matt Richtel, which was okay.
Now I’m reading The Player of Games, by Iain M. Banks.
I finished listening to The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid. I was surprisingly entertained by the book, as it’s in a genre that I generally don’t pursue. And it had an end-of-the-novel plot twist that I certainly didn’t see coming.
Next up: Desert Star by Michael Connelly
As will I!
zimaane, as to Michelangelo, you may also wish to read Irving Stone’s novel The Agony and the Ecstasy, or see the 1965 movie based on it, if you haven’t already.
Holly’s really had two stories of her own already – The Outsider (although she doesn’t appear until halfway in) and the novella If It Bleeds.
Yep, good point.
Tor newsletter this morning has announced a new Murderbot book the end of this year!
Woo hoo!
I finished A History of Fear, and though I really liked it at first, by the end I just felt it had dragged on long enough.
Currently reading Fragile Things, a short story collection by Neil Gaiman. I think I’ve read this before, but enough time has passed for me to enjoy these tales all over again, and they’re well worth reading twice.
Finished The Player of Games, by Iain M. Banks. Meh.
Now I’m reading Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard, by Chip Heath and Dan Heath.
Finished Renfield’s Journal by “George de Vein” (really), who’s really Sally Powers, and who dresses up as Queen Victoria to give readings. I bought it at Arisia two weeks ago from her and had her sign it (she signed as “George de Vein”). It’s a surprisingly good account told from Renfield’s point of view, and she develops quite a comprehensive backstory for Renfield as a failed clergyman and former missionary. Theater and Movie adaptations haven’t quite known what to do with the character. He has no obvious connection with Dracula, so howcum he’s his human gopher? In an effort to tie things together they’ve made Renfield the boss of Harker, or Harker’s predecessor, or Harker himself (as in the 1931 Universal versions). Because Bernard Jukes and later Dwight Frye played him as a young man, that was for a long time the default age, but Renfield is described by Stoker as about 60, and dee Vein/ Strong sticks to that. Renfield’s connection to Dracula is that he has psychic powers, as the book hints, so he’s a good receptor for Dracula. These abilities, though, convince people that he’s insane, which is how he ends up in the asylum. Of course, he really is somewhat bent, but also massively frustrated in being unable to convince people of danger, like Cassandra.
Aside from Dr. Seward, we don’t meet any of the other people from Dracula until halfway into the book. Dracula appears (and, unaccountably, writes in Renfield’s journal – in Cyrillic text, which Renfield can’t read. (The book, like Dracula, is an epistolary novel, which is a cute touch). Dracula himself is never named – he’s “The Master”
My main complaint is that what I was reading this for, was how familiar scenes from the book are depicted, as seen by Renfield. But I don’t think she ever gives us any such scenes. The characters are depicted, and interact (or are descriobed), but not in recognizable scenes from the book. That left me disappointed.
Now I’m reading Genghis Khan by Harold Lamb, a book originally published inn 1927. My mother was getting rid of a lot of her old books, and this one, along with a lot of other nicely bound books, had been sitting on her bookshelf forever. I never read it as a kid, so I’m reading it now. My parents (probably at the insistence of my mother) bought several nicely-bound “collector’s” editions, but I find that they’re actually not all that well bound. The bindings are cracking and the covers sometimes falling off. I had to glue the spine back on “Genghis Khan”. This one’s from the International Collector’s Library. I see these selling on the internet for between $10 and $40.
Just started it, but it’s pretty good.
My bedside reading is The Annotated American Gods by Neil Gaiman and with annotations by Leslie Klinger. I hadn’t read the novel before, and am enjoying it. It’s filled with pictures from the Starz adaptation. Most of the annotations appear to be telling me where the original editor cut out material to shorten the book, or where Gaiman later added material. Some annotations, I’ve been warned, include spoilers. I’ve already encountered one, but it’s not much of a spoiler.
On audio I’m halfway through Preston and Child’s Pendergast novel Two Graves. It’s precisely the kind of novel I don’t like, where you have one supercompetent character facing and even more supercompetent character, but it’s the climax of a trilogy, and I’m curious about how it ends.
I was underwhelmed by it a few years ago, too.
Thank you, Khadaji! And your little dog, which I remember died about the same time.
Finished The Judge’s List, by John Grisham. A sitting district judge in Florida is a serial killer, one with a very long memory. He keeps a list of everyone who has ever done him a wrong and waits years, even decades, before he strikes. The daughter of one of his victims has been tracking him for more than 20 years but is afraid to go to the police, so she files an anonymous complaint with the state’s Board on Judicial Conduct (a fictitious entity), where Lacy Stoltz picks it up to investigate. (She was the heroine of Grisham’s 2016 The Whistler.) Based on the actual life of real Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas (nah, just kidding … maybe). Very good. I enjoyed it a lot.
Have started The Thin Man, by Dashiell Hammitt.
Finished Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard, by Chip Heath and Dan Heath, which I enjoyed a lot.
Now I’m reading The Country of the Pointed Firs and Other Stories by Sarah Orne Jewett.