A little over a month ago, I went out in wind, snowing coming down sideways and scooped up the big Siamese my neighbor left behind when he moved and brought it in. We named him Ghost because in the dark the white patches on his face are all that’s visible. (Skeletor was also contemplated for a hot minute but discarded)
Nothing terribly profound to say about it, but I felt like sharing: Here’s the gent in all his glory: Ghost
Anway on topic! I am reading
The Gate to Women’s Country by Sheri S. Tepper. She was one of my favorite SF writers in the 90s so I was quite excited when my book club picked this one.
Khadaji was one of the earlier members of SDMB, and he was well-known as a kindly person who always had something encouraging to say, particularly in the self-improvement threads. He was also a voracious, omnivorous reader, who started these threads 'way back in the Stone Age of 2005. Consequently, when he suddenly and quite unexpectedly passed away in January 2013, we decided to rename this thread in his honor and to keep his memory, if not his ghost, alive.
Finished Antkind, by Charlie Kaufman. His first novel. Kaufman is mainly a screenwriter. You know his work. He is the genius behind such films as Synecdoche, New York (2008, named Best Film of the Decade by Roger Ebert), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (for which he won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay), Being John Malkovich (named by Ebert as the Best Film of 1999), Adaptation, Confessions of a Dangerous Mind and others. If you are familiar with his movies, then you know what to expect from this book. The neurotic and underappreciated film critic B. Rosenberger Rosenberg stumbles upon a stop-motion masterpiece that was 90 years in the making and takes three months to view. He is convinced this film will be the last great hope of mankind. But when it is accidentally destroyed except for just a single frame, Rosenberg must work to re-create the movie from memory. Kaufman is himself sort of a character, as Rosenberg constantly slams him for his amateurishness and lack of talent. This is a thoroughly enjoyable read, an educated read, and I look forward to what I hope will be a second novel from Kaufman.
Next up will be A Journal of the Plague Year, by Daniel Defoe.
And just to mention: I shall soon disappear from this Board for a few weeks while visiting Thailand. It’s been almost seven years now since we moved back to Hawaii for a planned 12-year sojourn, and while the wife has revisited several times, this will be my first time since 2016.
Just finished The Intruders by Brian Pinkerton. It’s a science fiction story along the lines of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. It wasn’t terribly well written, but good enough to keep me reading along. Very cinematic, and as I said, we all know this story.
Ooh, I am familiar with some of his movies, and a novel sounds enticing. I’ve added this to my to-read list.
I am most of the way through Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis by J.D. Vance. It’s a memoir written by a young man who grew up in Appalachia and is a self-proclaimed “hillbilly,” wound up going to Yale law school and becoming a lawyer and is now a senator. His is an interesting perspective, acknowledging factors that make it hard for economically disadvantaged people to succeed and also exploring some of the factors that enabled him to succeed.
I’m maybe a third of the way into The Happy Ever After Playlist by Abby Jimenez. It’s a romance, and I don’t read too many of those. Still trying to make up my mind about how I feel about this. On the one hand, the book seems to have no plot aside from two people falling in love, and I feel like it needs a little bit more. On the other hand, the author does an absolutely stellar job of writing believable chemistry between the two main characters, which is a complaint I’ve had about some of the other recent fiction books I’ve read. I feel all giddy and breathless right along with the main character, so maybe it takes reading a book where the romance is the focus of the novel rather than a side-plot for it to really meet my expectations and come across as believable.
Read the first 17 books in the Path of the Ranger books by Pedro Urvi. He’s a bit ploddy and a couple of characters don’t grow as much as they should but he at least resolves issues fairly quickly.
I started book #9 in The Case Files of Henri Davenforth series by Honor Raconteur- All in a Name.
Over the weekend I finished Apollo Remastered by Andy Saunders, a coffeetable book of digitally-enhanced photos from the Apollo missions, some of which I’d never seen before. Quite striking and beautiful, especially some of the foldout panoramas. Fun fact: what was photographed once and only once during the entire Apollo 11 mission? Astronaut Michael Collins.
I’m not far into Time Travel by James Gleick, a sort of pop culture/science/philosophy exploration of the concept. I’d say it’s OK but not great so far.
I’ve also begun I Pledge Allegiance to the Lamb by Tossie Wiley Jr., a slim volume by a Baptist lay preacher about how Democrats and Republicans need to focus less on their parties’ goals and much more on doing what God wants them to do.
Gave up on Harlow Giles Unger’s The Unexpected George Washington after a bit over 50 pages. Very little in it I didn’t already know.
Started this morning on Every Day by David Levithan. It’s a YA romance with a sci-fi twist, the twist being that our narrator is a person who wakes up every day in a different body. This isn’t my usual cup of tea, but I’m enjoying it so far. It was recommended by @Wendell_Wagner in a different thread.
Finished Behind Closed Doors by B.A. Paris. A surprisingly good psychological thriller, which certainly isn’t my favorite genre. The narrator/protagonist is an energetic and enterprising young English woman who has assumed the guardianship of her teenaged sister who’s afflicted with Down’s Syndrome. When the main character meets and marries a handsome lawyer, everything seems to be perfect, until she realizes she’s wedded to a psychopath who keeps her imprisoned inside their model home. His threats of harm to her sister render her incapable of retaliation. It’s a relatively short yet gripping tale of desperation.
Yesterday I started and finished Chef’s Kiss by Jarrett Mendoza. It’s a really cute graphic novel about finding what you want to do plus a bit of a meet-cute.
Not sure what I’m going to be reading this afternoon. Summer reading for my local library started yesterday, so I’m planning on getting ALL the reading done.
Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl is terrific; her Dark Places and Sharp Objects are pretty good but not quite as good, I’d say. If you like those kind of books, I also highly recommend Await Your Reply by Dan Chaon, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson, In the Lake of the Woods by Tim O’Brien, The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris and The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides.
Finished I Pledge Allegiance to the Lamb by Tossie Wiley Jr. I’m not sure I understood what he meant to say, given contemporary politics, and it left me with a lot of questions. Didn’t take long, though.
Next up: Kykuit, the Rockefeller Family Home by Ann Rockefeller Roberts, with photographs by Mary Louise Pierson, her daughter. It’s a beautifully-illustrated book about the Rockefeller estate, north of New York City, established by John D. himself. Someday I hope to visit there.
Finished Lev’s Violin: A Story of Music, Culture, and Italian Adventure, by Helena Attlee, which was excellent. I recommend it to anyone interested in music and/or European history.
Now I’m reading On a Red Station, Drifting, by Aliette de Bodard.
