Finished Voice For Princess a quick easy and light fantasy. Even though I have a ton of books in the queue I went out and bought 6 more… You see, I had 5 dollars in Borders bucks that had to be used before the end of the month and a 40% off coupon and a long flight coming up and - well anyway all 6 only ended up costing me 15 dollars out of pocket.
Did you read “The Whisperer in Darkness” or “The Thing on the Doorstep”? I think those are two of his best.
I’m now more than halfway through Joseph J. Ellis’s American Creation and have really gotten into it. Still not as good as Founding Brothers, but pretty good. The chapter on Washington’s attempt to establish a mutually-beneficial treaty with the Creek Indians was quite interesting - I’d never heard about that before.
Nixonland: The Rise of a President and the Fracturing of America by Rick Perlstein. I’m a boomer, so this isn’t “history” to me. I was a wee twickster at the time of the 1960 election, but everything from 1968 on I definitely remember.
Anyway, it’s taking me a while to get into it – the author has a kind of Tom-Wolfe-esque vibe to his prose, which I’m not entirely sure I like – but the friend who loaned it to me recommended it highly, so I’m hanging in.
Finished The Time Traveler’s Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger. Enjoyed it very much. The wife will read it now; I told her I thought she would enjoy it.
Next up: Deception Point, by Dan Brown. This is last of Brown’s novels we have yet to read, not counting his new one coming out next month.
Read The Fountainhead earlier this summer. What a slog. Just finished Ender’s Game. Was ok, but I don’t get the hype. Now reading The Making of 2001, no not that one, this one. Starts out interesting, but I don’t need to reread The Sentinel, which, for some reason, is included as the second chapter.
Non fiction: PHP and MySQL for Dummies. Good treatment of the basics.
My favorite movie reviewer, Roger Ebert, didn’t really like the film version of The Time Traveler’s Wife that just came out. Review here. But he didn’t hate it, and it sounds like he never read the book. He would have “got it” more if he had, I think. It’s scheduled to come to Bangkok, so we’ll see it.
Finished Nation, by Terry Pratchett. I liked the narrator’s constant doubt and questioning of the gods, which I thought was pretty refreshing in a children’s book. The story itself was just okay.
I’m just starting on Pat Conroy’s South of Broad. I like Conroy’s melodramatic style, but so far I’m not feeling that this will be one of his best.
The Whiskey Rebels by David Liss. This was … eh, okay. Historical fiction/action/kind of a mystery set just after the American Revolution during the formation of Alexander Hamilton’s Bank of the United States. There wasn’t really anything wrong with it, but it doesn’t stand out, either.
In the Woods, by Tana French. This was great. It’s one of those books that is what it is, a police procedural mystery, but made even better by really sharp writing and interesting characters. Two detectives start investigating a young girl’s murder outside of Dublin, and then it turns out that the crime may be related to a cold case that one of the detectives had been a victim of as a child. The best part is that it’s often funny, which I wasn’t really expecting from a book about a child murder.
I’m sucked into another Robin Hobb trilogy, starting with Ship of Magic. I’ve been in an unusual mood for traditional fantasy this year, and something about her writing really mesmerizes me. Even the fact that very single character is utterly miserable doesn’t put me off them.
Almost forgot, I also got through the latest Darwin Awards book this weekend. It was rather forgettable, though.
Just finished Last Chance to See, written by Douglas Adams as he travels around the globe to see endangered species (Form about 20 years ago).
I just picked up Human Smoke, the author escapes me, but it is kind of a funky tapestry of events that lead up to and start WWII.
I’m reading Daniel Silva’s new Gabriel Allon book, The Defector. It’s a decent sequel to the last one, Moscow Rules, and I’m still fascinated by the Israeli spy/assassin/art restorer main character, but man, is it ever brutal.
I’m going to have to read something comic next. Or, at least something light on torture, kidnapping, insanity, murder and revenge.
My book club read that about five years ago, and it really stuck with me. The Chinese river dolphins were a particularly sad story - but Douglas can find humor even in environmental tragedy.
I’m reading *The Bernini Bust *by Iain Pears. It’s a unassuming little paperback that’s been sitting on my bookshelf forever. I’m really not sure where it came from, because mysteries aren’t my normal fare. But it’s fast-paced and cute and full of art references. I feel like I’ll finish it and then promptly forget everything about it.
Now I’m on Portrait of An Unknown Woman, about Thomas More told through the eyes of his ward. It’s a little too modern in its tone right now, but I’m interested in it.
I’m working my way through all the Lee Child-Jake Reacher books -just finished “Bad Luck and Trouble”. If you like action, and plot twists with a larger than life protagonist, the Reacher novels are hard to resist for beach reading.
L.
I’m reading Julia Child’s My Life in France, after seeing Julie and Julia and wishing it was all Julia all the time.
I read Relentless and was sorely disappointed. I’m wondering if Koontz is really a conspiracy theory nutjob, or if that’s what he writes because it sells.
StG
My wife’s book club just read My Life in France, and then saw Julie and Julia last night! When we were in Washington two weeks ago, we saw Julia’s recreated kitchen at the National Museum of American History, and then she was mentioned in an exhibit at the International Spy Museum. So this has been The Summer of Julia for us in many ways…
Yeah, sadly it seems that the Baiji is now “functionally extinct”. No confirmed sitings since 2002.
I did indeed read “The Thing on the Doorstep” – that was very good indeed. I picked the Omnibus up again just now for “The Whisperer in Darkness”.
Apart from that, I again got a little sidetracked. Over the weekend, I read C.S. Forester’s The Happy Return, which I enjoyed quite a bit. I also finished Naomi Novik’s Throne of Jade, the second Temeraire novel. Her writing could sustain that more intrigue-centered novel quite well, I have to say. Thirdly, I read Royqal Flash, the second Flashman novel. I wasn’t as thrilled with this as I was with the first one, but I liked it enough to put the third volume in my next batch of books.
I’m still moving slowly through The Pilot, and I’ll have to pick a book to take on holiday soon…