# Whatcha readin' December edition
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [November 30, 2007, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298 "2007-11-30T13:22:08Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/1 "2007-11-30T13:22:08Z")
We stayed steady enough in [this](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=442270) thread that I figure we can keep trying a monthly thread.
I know I’m a day early. I usually start these things the night before the new month, but I’m going to be out celebrating my Birthday tonight so I’m doing it now. (I’m 46 tomorrow, send cards! 😉 )
I am reading [Exit Strategy](http://www.amazon.com/Exit-Strategy-Nadia-Stafford-Book/dp/0553588192/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1196428728&sr=1-1) and although I’m not hating it, it is rather uninspired and slow moving. I probably won’t keep up with the series (if it becomes one.) I have several in the queue, and I don’t know what I’ll grab next.
I am also reading books on Game Programming and am thinking about taking another shot a games. Not the actual programming part - I already know how to program, but related fields like how to make the 3D models and stuff. It is slow going, especially because I’m not too artistic. But it is an interesting hobby and even if we’re not successful it will have been fun just to do.
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### Author:  [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/2 "2007-11-30T13:54:49Z")
[QUOTE=Dung Beetle]
Next book of any consequence will probably be Peter and the Secret of Rundoon, by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson. It’s the final book in their Peter Pan prequel series. I don’t expect it to be great, but solid.
[/QUOTE]
I still haven’t started this. My household’s been in an uproar this week and I can’t follow fiction well when I don’t have my wits about me.
Instead, I’ve been reading Quirkology: How we discover the big truths in small things, by Richard Wiseman. It’s about various experiments done in behavioral psychology. I kept stopping whichever family member was closest to tell them interesting little tidbits, like the (disputed) study that found suicide rates to be higher in areas where country music was popular. I also enjoyed reading about the study that was trying to find the funniest joke in the world, and Dave Barry’s readership sending in loads of jokes that all had the same punchline (“There’s a weasel chewing on his privates!”).
ETA: :smack: I forgot to tell you Happy Birthday, **Khadaji**!
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### Author:  [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/3 "2007-11-30T14:01:20Z")
_Retirement Plans: 401(k)s, IRAs, and Other Deferred Compensation Approaches_, tenth edition.
Why, yes, I’m studying for an exam, how did you guess?
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### Author:  [@Eleanor\_of\_Aquitaine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eleanor_of_Aquitaine)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/4 "2007-11-30T14:07:44Z")
[QUOTE=Khadaji]
I am reading [Exit Strategy](http://www.amazon.com/Exit-Strategy-Nadia-Stafford-Book/dp/0553588192/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1196428728&sr=1-1) and although I’m not hating it, it is rather uninspired and slow moving. I probably won’t keep up with the series (if it becomes one.) I have several in the queue, and I don’t know what I’ll grab next.
[/QUOTE]
I haven’t tried this one yet. I think her Otherworld series is uneven: I loved the first, third and fourth books, but the rest were not as good. She has a new one in that series coming out soon.
Oh, and happy birthday!
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### Author:  [@The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Chao_Goes_Mu)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/5 "2007-11-30T14:48:32Z")
After finishing \*Eye Of The Needle \* by Ken Follet, I just began Stephen King’s _Everthing’s Eventual_. I’m only 4 pages in to the first of several short stories so I have no opinion yet on whether or not I will be launching it across the room in disgust or rushing home every night to plop in my favorite chair to read more.
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### Author:  [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/6 "2007-11-30T14:55:26Z")
_Gracefully Insane,_ a history (more or less) of McLean Hospital.
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### Author:  [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/7 "2007-11-30T15:25:28Z")
[QUOTE=Shoshana]
_Gracefully Insane,_ a history (more or less) of McLean Hospital.
[/QUOTE]
I start this but didn’t finish it. I thought it was too gossipy, but I don’t know what I was expecting. How are you liking it?
I’m still reading _War and Peace_, the Maude translation, Inner Sanctum 1942 edition with the booklet/bookmark and everything. It’s not a rush home and flop in the chair kind of book (good way to describe a book, **The Chao Goes Mu**!), but when I’m reading it, I’m staying interested.
I like a lot of detail in historicals, and W&P has it. Some of the dialogue is clunky, but I’ll lay that to the translation.
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### Author:  [@Unauthorized\_Cinnamon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unauthorized_Cinnamon)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/8 "2007-11-30T17:15:50Z")
Currently reading _Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon_, as well as _Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell_, which frankly I’m having trouble reading both because it is kind of slow to start, and I can’t hold the frickin’ thing in one hand while my daughter sits on my lap, which is the way I get my reading done these days.
Later this month I’ll be starting _The Great Gatsby_ for my library reading group. I think I read it in middle school, and I’m looking forward to reading it with a mature perspective. The thing that I remember from my first read is that “the billboard is a symbol - _syyyym-bolll_; can you say that, kids?” 😃
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### Author:  [@Spit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spit)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/9 "2007-11-30T17:42:22Z")
I’m a few pages from completing _The Civil War: A Narrative- Fort Sumter to Perryville Vol.1_ for the umpteenth time. I made a pact with myself when I was a teenager that I would read the trilogy every year during the holidays. (Definitely not a flop-in-the-chair either!) Unfortunately, last year I was only able to complete vol. 2 before life got in the way, so I started a couple of weeks early on my birthday.
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### Author:  [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/10 "2007-11-30T17:50:23Z")
> [@](#):
>
> I start this but didn’t finish it. I thought it was too gossipy, but I don’t know what I was expecting. How are you liking it?
Eh. I’m about 70 pages in and I can’t quite figure out the tone. It didn’t really help that the author just launched in without an adequate introduction, so I don’t have a good sense of the intent (i.e., why does this book exist?).
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### Author:  [@Gulo\_gulo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gulo_gulo)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/11 "2007-11-30T17:59:31Z")
[QUOTE=Khadaji]
I know I’m a day early. I usually start these things the night before the new month, but I’m going to be out celebrating my Birthday tonight so I’m doing it now. (I’m 46 tomorrow, send cards! 😉 )
[/QUOTE]
Happy birthday!
Presently half-way through [Day Watch](http://www.amazon.com/Day-Watch-Sergei-Lukyanenko/dp/1401360203) by Sergei Lukyanenko. I really enjoyed the first book in the trilogy ([Night Watch](http://www.amazon.com/Night-Watch-Sergei-Lukyanenko/dp/1401359795)) & this book takes the perspective of the Dark “Others”. Oh, and the two movies based on these books are fun if you like this sort of thing: [Nochnoy Dozor](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0403358/) & [Dnevnoy Dozor](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0409904/), the latter having the most enjoyable subtitles I’ve ever seen in a foreign film and I hope that the DVD release retained them.
I’m also reading [Owls of the World](http://www.amazon.com/Owls-World-Their-Behavior-Survival/dp/1552978451) that I got for my b-day a couple of weeks ago. 🙂
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### Author:  [@Just\_Some\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Some_Guy)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/12 "2007-11-30T18:05:56Z")
I just finished reading _Smoke and Mirrors_ (a collection of Neil Gaiman’s short stories and poetry) My Amazon order that I just placed included _World War Z_ and Brian Aldiss’s _Hothouse_ (the cheapest hardcover edition of that was leather bound :mad: ; even if I compromised on that book and went with a paperback it was expensive). My book to read while I wait for those is probably going to be _The Void Captain’s Tale_ which I’ve had sitting around for months waiting for me to read it…
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### Author:  [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/13 "2007-11-30T19:07:56Z")
[QUOTE=Unauthorized Cinnamon]
Currently reading _Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon_, as well as _Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell_, which frankly I’m having trouble reading both because it is kind of slow to start, and I can’t hold the frickin’ thing in one hand while my daughter sits on my lap, which is the way I get my reading done these days.
\
[/QUOTE]
I never finished Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. I tried it twice and just couldn’t find any interest.
Thanks all for the well-wishes!
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### Author:  [@Knowed\_Out](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knowed_Out)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/14 "2007-11-30T19:18:24Z")
I’m reading \*Friday \*again by Robert Heinlein. I think I last read it in college.
It’s so ludicrous, but that’s Heinlein. The heroine gets kidnapped, tortured, and raped at the start of the book, but dismisses her captors as amateurs, and thinks the rapes are “silly.” She’s obviously too intelligent, highly trained, and broadly cultured to let something like rape and torture cause her any stress. Afterwards, she goes to New Zealand to have sex with her commune.
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### Author:  [@koeeoaddi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/koeeoaddi)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2007, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/15 "2007-11-30T19:38:02Z")
'tis the season to be reading the most depressing bunch of books, ever:
_Maus I_, by Art Spiegelman
_Maus II_, by Art Spiegelman
_The Laramie Project_, by Moises Kaufman
_The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes_, by Janet Malcolm
_Babi Yar_, by Anatoly Kuznettsov
_The Face of Battle_, by John Keegan
☹
I should just take them all back to the library, put them on hold again for later and re-read _The Joyous Season_, by Patrick Dennis.
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### Author:  [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2007, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/16 "2007-12-01T04:41:03Z")
[QUOTE=koeeoaddi]
'tis the season to be reading the most depressing bunch of books, ever:
_Maus I_, by Art Spiegelman
_Maus II_, by Art Spiegelman
_The Laramie Project_, by Moises Kaufman
_The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes_, by Janet Malcolm
_Babi Yar_, by Anatoly Kuznettsov
_The Face of Battle_, by John Keegan
☹
I should just take them all back to the library, put them on hold again for later and re-read _The Joyous Season_, by Patrick Dennis.
[/QUOTE]
Fa la la la la. Let me know if you want some Khmer Rouge recommendations.
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### Author:  [@LavenderBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LavenderBlue)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2007, 5:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/17 "2007-12-01T05:09:09Z")
_Heat (An Amature’s Adventures As Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker and Apprentice to a Dante Quoting Butcher in Tuscany)_ by Bill Buford. So far so very good.
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### Author:  [@Enterprise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enterprise)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2007, 10:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/18 "2007-12-01T10:34:35Z")
I’m also reading _Face of Battle_ by John Keegan (on and off … since his _Price of Admiralty_, I’m a bit careful about things that Keegan wrote, good Lord what a turd that was). I don’t find it so depressing, rather, it’s been rather illuminating so far. I’m also still at _Moby Dick_, which is hi-la-ri-ous, and _Canterbury Tales_, which is not, unless you enjoy fart jokes…it may pick up yet, I guess. My entirely non-fun reading these days is _Physical Geography_ by Strahler & Strahler and _Human Geography_ by whoever for an exam. Well, not entirely unfun, actually, I learn a lot, but it could be better.
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### Author:  [@Catamount](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Catamount)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2007, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/19 "2007-12-02T03:40:56Z")
[QUOTE=Unauthorized Cinnamon]
Later this month I’ll be starting _The Great Gatsby_ for my library reading group. I think I read it in middle school, and I’m looking forward to reading it with a mature perspective. The thing that I remember from my first read is that “the billboard is a symbol - _syyyym-bolll_; can you say that, kids?” 😃
[/QUOTE]
Everything in that flippin’ book is a symbol.
My current reading pile contains:
**Sunshine** by Robin McKinley–a baker is kidnapped by a group of vampires who lock her in an abandoned house with a starving vampire. And that’s just the first 50 pages.
**A Handbook to Luck** by Christina Garcia–her latest book. I’m only a chapter in, but according to the jacket it’s about three people from around the world whose lives intertwine over twenty years. The first chapter about the magician’s son is pretty good.
**Black Elk Speaks** by John G. Neihardt–It’s been a while since I’ve read this.
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### Author:  [@eenerms](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eenerms)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2007, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whatcha-readin-december-edition/428298/20 "2007-12-02T03:48:51Z")
\*\*900 Days: The Seige of Leningrad \*\* by Harrision Salisbury. Well written translation. Not an easy read though.
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