# What are you reading right now? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 26, 2002, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054 "2002-06-26T16:07:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Belrix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed655f/32.png) [@Belrix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belrix)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/1 "2002-06-26T16:07:13Z")
What are you reading now, besides the SDMB of course. What’s on your bedside table or in your backpack. What’s next on your reading list? I just finished the “Year’s Best Science Fiction, 18th Annual Colection” (Gardner Dozois, Ed). I haven’t picked my next book yet. ---
**Author:** ![Racer1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ee59a6/32.png) [@Racer1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Racer1)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/2 "2002-06-26T16:33:53Z")
Well, since [this](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=122469) thread, I’m reading _Cosmos_ by Carl Sagan. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![zev\_steinhardt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/97f17d/32.png) [@zev\_steinhardt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zev_steinhardt)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/3 "2002-06-26T16:34:39Z")
“Blood & Iron” by Harry Turtledove. Zev Steinhardt ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/4 "2002-06-26T17:14:40Z")
The Thirteen Gun Salute Patrick O’Brian Aubrey-Maturin in 2004! ---
**Author:** ![Lao\_Tsu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e79b87/32.png) [@Lao\_Tsu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lao_Tsu)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/5 "2002-06-26T17:36:48Z")
_Guns, Germs, and Steel_ and _Colonization: Aftershocks_. ---
**Author:** ![manwithaplan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@manwithaplan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manwithaplan)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/6 "2002-06-26T17:45:19Z")
Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey. It’s the third of his books I’ve read recently and I couldn’t recommend him highly enough. I’m planning on reading something by William Faulkner next. He doesn’t seem to be as widely read here in Europe as Hemingway, Fitzgerald et al. - maybe because, unlike the others, he didn’t spend much time here and stuck to his home patch in setting his work. I read a couple of his short stories in college and enjoyed them and now I reckon I should check out his bigger works. Seeing as he’s required reading for you merkins, have you any recommendations on where to start? ---
**Author:** ![zweisamkeit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zweisamkeit/32/4360_2.png) [@zweisamkeit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zweisamkeit)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/7 "2002-06-26T17:57:00Z")
Reading now: Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoevsky (translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky) Lady with Lapdog and other stories – Anton Chekhov (translated by David Magarshack) Begrudgingly Reading now: Deitel and Deitel C++ How to Program – Deitel and Deitel Data Structures and Algorithm Analysis in C++ – Mark Weiss What’s Next: Doctor Zhivago – Boris Pasternak (don’t know the translator, it’s not in front of me) Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy (translated by David Magarshack) The Master and Margarita – Mikhail Bulgakov (translated by Diana Burgin and Katherine Tiernan O’Connor) After that Russian Lit jag I have: The Source – James A. Michener Emma – Jane Austen Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen Wuthering Heights – Emily Brontë Antigone – Sophocles (translated by Richard Emil Braun) This is the stack of books in my room. They will eventually be read, and replaced with other books as time goes on. It takes me a while to read books (other than class-related) now, since I’m a full-time student and work part time (and stupid enough to take on two big jobs and a summer class at the moment :smack: ), but I hope to be done with those in a year or so. ---
**Author:** ![Jenner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ac8455/32.png) [@Jenner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jenner)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/8 "2002-06-26T18:03:57Z")
_The Preserving Machine and Other Short Stories_ by Philip K. Dick _Breakfast of Champions_ by Kurt Vonnegut ---
**Author:** ![World\_Eater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f04885/32.png) [@World\_Eater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/World_Eater)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/9 "2002-06-26T18:09:53Z")
The Tin Drum. Kick ass book ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Carnage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/max_carnage/32/12775_2.png) [@Max\_Carnage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Carnage)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/10 "2002-06-26T18:16:27Z")
switching between: Lord of the Rings Trilogy (my first time) GI Joe Marvel Comics TPB A+ Certification for Dummies and then whatever copy of Stuff or Maxim is on top of the stack. Jeez, and I used to be proud that I liked to read. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Greywolf73](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d9b06d/32.png) [@Greywolf73](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greywolf73)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/11 "2002-06-26T18:33:42Z")
Freedomland by Richard Price. Just finished American Gods by Neil Gaiman. I am also struggling through Shelters of Stone by Jean Auel, which is so appallingly dull that my brain hurts when I read it. (I am so disappointed because I really enjoyed the previous books in the series) But, I sort of feel obligated to finish it since it was a birthday gift from my husband. Damn him! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![ForgottenLore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5e9695/32.png) [@ForgottenLore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ForgottenLore)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/12 "2002-06-26T19:52:03Z")
I’m kind of swapping back and forth between _Black Holes and Time Warps_ by Kip Thorne and _The Origin of Species._ Fortunately they’re not books with a lot of overlapping material so I don’t tend to confuse them. 😉 Waiting in the wings I have a complete set of _The Harvard Classics_ which I received from my aunt. I was helping her move into a new house and she said “you want 'em? Take 'em! Otherwise they’re going on the auction.” Woo hoo! 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/13 "2002-06-26T20:21:59Z")
I am sitting amidst a pile of books I’ve ordered online or bought at second-hand shops: **The American Stage of To-Day** (a huge 1910 coffee-table book, loaded with lovely portraits), an 1874 sex and marriage manual, and an illustrated booklet on 1930s German actress Renate Müller, so I can finally do an article on her. I just finished, and forwarded to my Mom, **Mrs. Miniver** and **Glittering Sham** (a 1932 Hollywood novel, just as trashy as it sounds), and just finished **Mrs. Caudle’s Curtain Lectures** , an _hilarious_ 1844 book by Douglas Jerrold. The sex manual ( **Chastity, or, Our Secret Sins** ) is a howl. My favorite chapter is on “Vicious Servants.” The author relates that a friend hired an Irish woman as nursemaid to his children, and “in the four weeks she was with them she ruined all his boys and girls, and left the family wrecked for life. Mr. J. says, in speaking of it, ‘I would rather have laid all my children in the grave.’” _Well_—what a month _that_ must have been! I hope Biddie didn’t ask for a reference. . . ---
**Author:** ![Politzania](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3ab097/32.png) [@Politzania](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Politzania)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/14 "2002-06-26T20:37:13Z")
Just finished “Love Among the Chickens” - PG Wodehouse as an e-book on the Handspring. Now I need to dig out my _Jeeves_ again! I still can’t decide whether I like Wilde or Wodehouse better - but I have to be in the mood to read them. Slogging through _Green Mars_ by Kim Stanley Robinson - the middle part of a trilogy & I don’t think I’m going to make it. Very dense story, lots of characters & more politicking than I prefer. Halfway through _Salmon of Doubt_ Douglas Adams’ posthumous collection of odd bits. Wonderful read so far, if bittersweet. ---
**Author:** ![Regina](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d78d45/32.png) [@Regina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Regina)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/15 "2002-06-26T21:00:09Z")
The Chronoliths by Robert Charles Wilson. Not bad so far. Politzania, I too have tried to read those darn Robinson _Mars_ books and just can’t do it! Next up: Blood Music by Greg Bear ---
**Author:** ![Skewbald](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/49beb7/32.png) [@Skewbald](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skewbald)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/16 "2002-06-26T21:20:41Z")
I’m reading **A Princess of Mars** by **Edgar Rice Burroughs**. I’m really into it, I love old adventure novels. I picked up the book because there is a pretty cool poster that goes by the name of **John Carter of Mars**. The english section in the library had about eight or nine titles in this series. I hope the rest are as entertaining. ---
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/17 "2002-06-26T21:25:23Z")
_The allegory of love_ by C S Lewis _The golden bough_, Fraser _Fear less_ that De Becker guy next up: some mysteries that I checked out and that have been sitting around \*The Oxford history of Eng. lit, v 3 (16th century), C S Lewis _Lancelot_, Chretien de Troyes _The crock of gold_, Stephens ---
**Author:** ![Nortia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Nortia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nortia)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/18 "2002-06-26T22:25:22Z")
I’ve just finished **Sea of Silver Light** the last volume of the Otherland series by Tad Williams. Currently reading **Hogfather** by Terry Pratchett again. ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/19 "2002-06-26T22:32:03Z")
**Life After Death** , fiction by Carol Muske Dukes. I saw her speak at a local college a few months ago. ---
**Author:** ![kore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b5a626/32.png) [@kore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kore)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2002, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054/20 "2002-06-26T22:56:42Z")
**Joan of Arc and Richard II: Sex, Saints and Government in the Middle Ages** by Charles Wood. Very nifty stuff. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-you-reading-right-now/116054.md?page=2)