What You're Reading the Week of 7 Apr 2007

Crickets and frogs; a fable Gabriela Mistral

Completed nothing this week - just a few chapters to go though . . .

I've started in on Wolfsong, an anthology of Elfquest short stories edited by Richard Pini et al, but I think I might take a break from it after I finish the first story. I'm finding that it's just not what I feel like right now. Instead, I think I'll read Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson.

I've just started The Tea Rose by Jennifer Donnelly, so I'll be continuing with that foir a little while as it's almost 800 pages long...

I've settled on sticking with The Book Thief. Evreything else will just have to wait....again!

Finished up Jailbird by Kurt Vonnegut. Just started rereading Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory cause I picked up a nice hardcover British edition from a street vendor a few days ago. I've got a soft-spot for Dahl.

I have had very little time to read this week. I hope to catch up this weekend! I should finish Elantris soon. I'm also reading Wings to the Kingdom by Cherie Priest. Wings is an easy reading southern ghost story. It's the sequel to Four and Twenty Blackbirds.

Finished The Historian, finally. Started reading Augustus : the life of Rome's first emperor.

I am voraciously devouring David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas. I started it last night and have been unable to put it down. It's delightful!

I am tackling the latest novel by Rutherfurd, The Rebels of Ireland. I am on page 479 of 863. For those of you who love sweeping historical fiction ala Michener....this is for you. It covers the history of Ireland from the 1600s on.....I am really enjoying it so far.

I've recently finished City of Bones by Cassandra Clare and The 37th Hour by Jodi Compton and I'm having terrible trouble settling on my next book. I feel as though I've been burning through books a little too quickly lately, so I'd like to find something that'll force me to slow down, demand a little more time and focus, but it has to be something I already own, since I'm under a self-imposed bookstore ban. The indecision is driving me a little crazy; I've been two days without a book now.

Meanwhile I've been dipping into Bertrand Russell's Why I Am Not a Christian and moving slowly through Understanding Comics, lent to me by a friend.

Presently getting through Albert Speer - His Battle with Truth by Gitta Sereny. I began reading this book back in the summer of 2005, but decided to put it down after the first 2 chapters to pursue some additional background reading on the topic. I find if I have a hard time getting into a non-fiction book like this (which accounts for much of my reading), reading some additional background material will help me to concentrate on the topic more.

Bears Discover Fire and Other Stories, by Terry Bisson. Science fiction and fantasy short stories. Great stuff, so far. Contains a number of famous stories (such as the title story), and "They're Made Out of Meat." I do love Bisson's stuff. He seems to have an unusually wide range of prose styles. "Bears Discover Fire" has a very different feel than, say, his "Billy and the {$SUPERNATURAL_CRITTER}" stories which have been appearing in F&SF over the past year.

Started Medusa the shipwreck, the scandal, the disgrace by Jonathan Miles and Herman by Lars Assbye Christensen.
I can truthfully say I bought the latter because of the cover! (I work with the mother of the child model on the front cover.)

I've just begun The Magician's Assistant by Ann Patchett. Really liked Bel Canto (her last book?) . Hope this one is good, too. Cover looks a bit trashy, however.

I finished Lords and Ladies by Terry Pratchett today. One of his more exciting books in my opinion, though there were at least two puns which caught me off guard and made me groan. It also messes with my ideas of cats, elves, unicorns and my two favorite Shakespeare plays. Humph. By the way, I recommend it for a pleasant read.

Also finished The Mark of the Christian by Francis Schaeffer. Very good, very short. Very to the point.

Now to finish Elantris.

#14, The Magician's Assistant is fantastic. It was the first book I read by Patchett, and it remains my favourite. I hope you enjoy it as well.

I'm sort of in the process of deciding whether I'll gowith Cryptonomicon, "The Dream Merchant" by Isabel Hoving or The Anubis Gates. So far I'm thinking The Anubis Gates, but we'll see. I'm not usually this indecisive, but these books are all I brought with me to my parents' place, and for some reason that makes it harder, not easier.

Well its my Birthday and am I celebrating? Nikki, my wife has gone to a funeral but not in black as the request is to be flamboyant so orange and Indian dress style it is. Sam my son is downstairs and I have just read his school report. They report they he is maturing into a sensible young man and his stropy teenage days are fading...news to us. Yet forecast to get 12 GCSE's mostly B's, A's and A*'s ...if he does the work. Oh well out to the pub and meal this evening with friends.

I have just finished Pelikan : love, redemption & felony theft : a novel of the French Quarter by David Martin. A variation on Carl Haasen stories for those who know. And about to finish Longitude by Dava Sobel an account of how this was solved in the 18th century . Given that on Holiday but have to write a research paper. I am going for fun rather then brain stuff this week.

I have got two genre novels that push the envelope out(as annoying management consultant say) for this week. The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fford and The Winter Queen by Boris Akunin. The first blends detective-sf and humour in a post modernist twist( means that story characters are real and real people can enter stories) and the second Victorian history detective in Russia.

LadyN - The book thief won't disappoint you! Enjoy! I finished another of his books this week, I am the messenger - another great read.

Currently, I am finishing up a YA book written by my sister-in-law, Wendy Van Horn, called The Fancy Files: The Mostly True Story of a Slightly Insane Girl. It's self-published, so the touchstones do not work. It's a quick and funny read.

After that, I am starting Ahab's Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund. This one looks like a big undertaking (LOTS of pages), but everyone tells me it's a good story. I enjoyed Naslund's latest book, Abundance, so I am optimistic that I'll enjoy this book too.

To those of you who celebrate the holiday, have a happy Easter!

I've not had a chance to see the US edition of Steven Hall's new novel The Raw Shark Texts, but the UK edition is just a knockout and an extremely cool item. There's no dustjacket, the nearly-square book itself is all white, featuring a large cover illustration of a shark's jaws done in an Escher-like style, with the title inside the shark's maw, really nothing but conspicuous eye-candy all very strikingly done. On the back cover there's only the text of a short type-written letter that's taken from the book, and the spine has not only the title and author's name, but both are highlighted within a long blurb printed from the spine's top to its bottom, an unusual spot for a blurb to say the least.

And it gets even more bizarre when you open the book: On the first title page there's an actual yellow post-it note stuck to it with a printed blurb from Mark Haddon that only says, "The bastard love-child of The Matrix, Jaws, and The DaVinci Code.", and "www.rawsharktexts.com" set at the bottom. I guess blurbs on spines and post-it notes will probably become de rigueur before very long, but this is the first I've seen like this and think it's all rather contextually inventive and very well done. Oh, and the book's a bit of terrific after 200 pages as well.

I didn't finish The Complete Idiot's Guide to Critical Reading as it was far too condescending and there was too much "memoir" about the authors for my tastes.

On the other end of the scale, I'm really enjoying Alaska by Michener. I was rather dreading starting it as I thought it would be dry and overwrought. Instead, I'm zipping through it. It's delightful.

>17 ablueidol: I think you mean Dava Sobel not David Sobel, she's a she not a he:-)

>19 LouisBranning: Marketing can be a wonderful thing...

hi everyone- i just started shopaholic and baby and its just as funny as the other books in the series

I'm just starting, The Memoirs of Lacenaire, featured in the movie Les Enfants du paradis and the model for Rashkelnikov.

Time for some crime fiction. It's The Man Who Smiled by Henning Mankell.

Working on deadlines for two projects, so not much reading (or LT-ing); still reading The Go-Between by L. P. Hartley and the John Lynch biography of Simon Bolivar.

Well, I *finally* finished The Crying of Lot 49, and then got into The Terracotta Dog by Andrea Camilleri for something a bit lighter! Yesterday I finished I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith after reading a lot of positive comments on LT - and it was well worth it. Not something I would normally have picked up, but a great read that I'll recommend to others. Now I'm into Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner, and will probably finish that tonight.

The Truth Will Out which purports to solve once and for all the riddle of who wrote Shakespeare's works (hint: it wasn't William Shakespeare of Stratford).

Interesting subject. I wanted desperately to give up about 50pp from the end. I wasn't able to convince myself to let go that close to the end. Fair warning: the book takes some stick-to-it-iveness, though in the long run I think the gist should suffice for most folks: Sir Henry Neville did it.

Saved y'all 200pp+ of dense prose. You're welcome.

I'm about halfway through Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls. I've been enjoying it too!

I gives a cultural reason to why girls are so hard to understand and why I'll never get them...which really stinks since I am a girl :)

I finished cocaine nights by J.G Ballard and found its premise interesting - that in order to have civilization and community spirit you must have crime to unify the people - interesting - this was a different book than what I expected - not one of the better boos off the 1001 books to read before you die

Next I will be reading Islands by Dan sleigh - a book set in my country of birth - its 700 pages - my longest book so far - wish me luck

I finally finished Ulysses -- good riddance; definately a slog for me with only a few enjoyable parts. I will give him an "A" for effort though; and I don't think I'll soon forget the experience.

Needed lighter fare, so I am about ~ 100 pgs into The Boleyn Inheritence. So far not as good as The Other Boleyn Girl. But I can follow the action and I can tell who is saying what and it appears to be all in English -- so that's a plus for me at this point.

I've now started 1984 by George Orwell. This is my first time reading it and already I can begin to appreciate why it endures more than Animal Farm.

After that (I don't think it will take me long), I think I'll read Innocent Traitor by Alison Weir, despite its lukewarm reviews.

I am still reading Shadowplay: Shadowmarch Volume II by Tad Williams. Time has not been my friend the last few weeks.

I finished Peter and the Starcatchers by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson last night. It was a fast read, a prequel to Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie, apparently inspired by a question asked by Pearson's daughter at bedtime, "how did a certain boy come to meet a certain pirate"?
Lately I've been on a graphic novel kick, although I am a picky graphic novel reader and I like ones that aren't generally series, and that are more true to life stories. I brought home La Perdida , Box Office Poison, and BOP! More Box Office Poison from the library this week.
Also I volunteered for the Social Responsibilities Roundtable for the American Library Association to review the title, Virtually Obscene: The Case for an Uncensored Internet by Amy E. White (the touchstones won't load). And that should keep me busy for the week or longer.

I just finished In Cold Blood by Truman Capote. I normally do not read true crime, but the writing blew me away.

How did you like The Historian? I loved it. I thought she did a great job researching the area and folklore.

As of 0000H GMT of April 7, 2007 , I have so far completed 10% of the book Hoax by Clifford Irving. It is a true story of an author who created a fake autobiography of Howard Hughes. The story is very interesting

.

I have read the first two chapters of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce. It has required a careful read to catch all of it, but it has been enjoyable so far.

Chapter 1 sent me scurrying to Wikipedia to get a rough idea of who Charles Stewart Parnell was. I majored in history in college, and it is always fun to familiarize myself with historical figures who are knew to me. I will definitely have to study Irish national history at some point because I know very little about it.

.35:LeHack: what's the old phrase 'To each his own'? The Historian I found was an unreadable load of tosh that I couldn't read more than a quarter of. Too many coincidences, no characterisation, and an author on the look-out for scenarios that might impress Hollywood to take up some options.

Well, got that off my chest.

Having so many unread books on my shelf, I couldn't choose, so I got my hubby to pick one out for me. He did the whole "eyes closed, pointy finger" thing and picked out The Rosary Girls by Richard Montanari.

#37 -- fuzzy, I feel for you man; having just been pounded into submission by James Joyce myself (#30). Glad you're enjoying it though.

I finished Speak yesterday and am now back to Wolfsong.

Currently reading Tallgrass by Sandra Dallas.

I'm currently reading The Year of Pleasures by Elizabeth Berg. It's a short novel, so I anticipate reading two other books this week as well:

Cloud Atlas, by David Mitchell
and
The Space Between Us, by Thrity Umrigar

#21 oops should be Dava. Just finished in double quick time The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde. But had enough of escapist fiction for the moment so The Winter Queen by Boris Akunin goes back on the TBR pile. To be different its now going to be Memoirs of Hadrian by Marguerite Yourcenar.

Thanks for the birthday wishes. We and a bunch if friends of long standing(some of 30 years!) went to an basement Indian restaurant that invested wisely in the quality of the food rather then the décor-red velvet chairs and 1970's pub carpets. Then on to a pub I used to go to in the 1970's when it was a student dive, now upmarket and so the students. And Lots of conversations about books read, the mythic structure of the Bond Story, why we can't find decent schools for our kids, the evolutionary basis for higher thought, how we would have lived if we were the 50's in the 50's. Then home to a tolerant teenage son who eased his tired and emotional parents to bed without too much lecturing about the time and state we were in

Gave up on This Side of Paradise after about 100 pages. Moving on to Florence King's With Charity Toward None: A Fond Look at Misanthropy.

Enjoying the Isabel Dalhousie novels by Alexander McCall Smith: The Right Attitude to Rain. I find all his books full of wisdom, and the Edinburgh sets are full of gentle humour.

I started reading In the Beginning: The Story of the King James Bible and How It Changed a Nation, a Language, and a Culture by Alister McGrath last night, and am now about halfway through.

I'm not too thrilled with McGrath's writing style at the moment; not because it's bad, but something about it is pinging me the wrong way. However, my goal was to learn interesting factoids about Middle English linguistics and the differences among Bible translations, and the book is serving that purpose nicely.

I'm reading The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls which is a departure from my usual book fare. I'm happy to say I'm 1/3rd of the way through and it has been pretty good so far :-)

I'm going to finish Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino in a few minutes. I read sections of it last summer while sitting around a friend's studio, and finally picked up a copy earlier this week. It's been a very interesting read. After that, I think I'll be reading Confessions of a Mask by Yukio Mishima.

So, I've been having trouble getting into anything I've started reading lately for a variety of reasons.

However, I am going to attempt to quickly read Freakonomics by Stephen Dubner and Steven Levitt. Once I'm done with that, I will return to either Everything is Illuminated or The Alienist.

jenstiens...I really liked The Magician's Assistant by Ann Patchett..but I think I am an oddity. Something about magicians and circus performers are just so wierd.

Just started Girls' Poker Night by Jill Davis yesterday.

I'm working my way through three books at the moment...

Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche
and An Enemy of the People by Henrik Ibsen (just the play)

I've kind of stalled at page 200 of Zarathustra, anyone have any thoughts on whether it's worth reading to the end? I love his philosophy but he's pretty much droning on at the moment.

Changed my mind and decided to read The Game of Kings by Dorothy Dunnett. I read in reviews that you know whether you'll love it or hate it by fifty pages, so I think I'm going to love it.

>>50 meghquinn: - oh how I wish I could read The Alienist for the first time again. What a great novel.

As for me, I'm still plowing through A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore. As with Lamb, I find the tone very uneven and I got bogged in that one as well. To break things up I read I, the Jury last week. What a ride! Hopefully will finish the Moore this week though.

About a third of the way through Doris Lessing's Shikasta ... interesting, although some of the preachiness is borderline annoying.

I've picked up Richard Ford's Independence Day so I can finally get through it. I zipped through I Feel Bad About My Neck by Nora Ephron after a melancholy time with A Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion this past week. I'm looking forward to Half a Yellow Sun next.

Thanks to all the LibraryThing energy (I'm a newbie of a few months) I've rediscovered my love of reading and have realized that time is finite--literature is not!

I have finished The Gravedigger's Daughter by Joyce Carol Oates which was excellent. The first half of the book is very bleak and brutal but essential to the story. The reader is rewarded for sticking with it. I have no doubts that Rebecca Schwart aka Hazel Jones will haunt my thoughts for many days to come.

I thought I might finish up many of the titles I've been picking away at. Several poetry collections, the short fiction of Angela Carter, a book on literary theory and The Cambridge Companion to Margaret Atwood....(all listed on my profile page, if you're interested).

While I love coming to this thread to read what everyone is reading, I'd also suggest listing one's current and recent reads on one's profile page. It allows for us nosey readers to checking out what you're reading (or what you've recently read) at any time. I love that.

I've been posting my 'Favorites of the Year' on my Profile page as I go, and I may be as nosey a reader as you are, avaland, think it's a great idea. I'm also looking forward to The Gravedigger's Daughter, just bought a copy over the weekend, but it won't arrive until next week.

I'm nearly done with Steven Hall's The Raw Shark Texts which, despite a couple of first-novel rough spots, is about as thrilling as anything I've read this year, and can easily see where a lot of people might like this one.

>58 avaland:: avaland wrote,
I'd also suggest listing one's current and recent reads on one's profile page.

Great idea & done! Nosey readers, unite! (Now, can I be sufficiently disciplined to keep it up to date? Time will tell ...)

I haven't posted for a couple of weeks. Finished Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Wonderful book. Finished Coonardoo by Katherine Susannah Prichard - an insight into life on an Australian cattle station c.1929 and the relations between blacks and whites.

Reading now A Thread of Grace by Mary Doria Russell, my first experience with this author. Also The Piano Teacher by Elfriede Jelinek (Nobel laureate).

#58 avaland - I love it when people do that. It's also one of the main attractions of the 50 Book Challenge group, as far as I'm concerned. I have a great time looking at everyone's lists.

I'm working my way through Reading like a Writer by Francine Prose and The Last Witchfinder by James Morrow.

Both are dense but good. Last week I read What My Mother Doesn't Know by Sonya Sones for a little YA break. I read it in a day. It's delightful.

I've been slowly working my way through two books for the past few weeks, as life keeps interrupting my reading time! Finished A Noble Radiance by Donna Leon over the weekend, and *should* finish Girl Sleuth: Nancy Drew and the Women Who Created Her by Melanie Rehak sometime this week...

Hi!

Well, I'm still (slowly) getting through Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko for AP American Lit. Not exactly liking it. Along with that, to keep me entertained, I've finished Peeps by Scott Westerfeld, and am reading The Last Days. I love this series, and I love Scott Westerfeld's writing (Although the Uglies/Pretties/Specials series wasn't exactly his best).

Next, I'm going to go through the books I got in Florida, particularly Emma by Jane Austen and Dancing on the Edge by Han Nolan.

Louis, I didn't realize the Oates was out yet. The back of the book says June, I believe but I saw a PW review recently so I suspected it might be released sooner.

>61 amandameale: amanda, A Thread of Grace will be an interesting follow-up to Half of a Yellow Sun, both being novels set in wartime. Russell's novel has a much bigger cast of characters though. The first 75-100 pages or so it slow going as she introduces us to all of those very interesting characters.

>63 jennynoel: I loved The Last Witchfinder, the idea that the narrator is not only a book and at war with another book, but also in love with the main character is a hoot!

lois, I got the ARC of the Oates book, you're correct about the June date, just another case of my not wanting to wait for the hardback.

Message 5: llamagirl "I've got a soft-spot for Dahl."
So do I, I think I'd read anything by him. Enjoy!

Message 45: cafepithecus
"Gave up on This Side of Paradise after about 100 pages."
I read that a month or so ago and didn't enjoy it. You're not missing anything. I love The Great Gatsby so I didn't give up on This side of Paradise but it never got better.

I started Middlesex which is surprisingly funny and really good so far.

I got sidestepped of Islands and instead completed Foe by J.M. Coetzee. My favourite Coetzee so far - which some people may find blasphemous if they liked Disgrace. I like how Coetzee puts his characters in with the author - great read.

I am now going to read The feast of the goat and then read Islands.

Ended up ditching With Charity Toward None. In high school I always thought of myself as a misanthrope and that has sort of carried over to the present without any re-evaluation. Now I'm not so sure that I consider myself misanthropic. And if I am, I don't have much desire to dwell on it or listen to anyone else dwell on it either. Some people suck. Some are complete idiots. But why waste any mental energy on them?

Three of the books I had requested from the library became available all at the same time, and two are 14-day loans, so I need to get cracking (of course I have a paper due this week...)

First up: The Road. And of course I have to be a snob and say that I had this on my to-read list before Oprah told everyone to read it.

I finished Wolfsong, my Elfquest short story anthology, earlier. It was disappointing. The last three stories were the best, but none of the pieces really sparked anything for me. Oh well.

Now I'm on to Test of the Twins by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, the last book in my current spate of junior high rereads.

After finishing Sepharad by Antonio Munoz Molina which I liked but found a quarter of the chapters not that interesting, I read The Year of Reading Proust- a memoir in real time by Phyllis Rose.I thought that her structure of relating her life and reading of Proust was very appropriate. Sepharad had a similar structure of inserting a number of different narratives into a contemporary storyline. It didn't work, however.
My next book that I am reading is Mortals by Norman Rush-touchstones aren't working here- I like the book but found it difficult to get through-so I took a break and read Riding in Cars with Boys by Beverly D'Onofrio- bad! real bad! and am now in the middle of The Great Fire by Shirley Hazzard- I'll have to get to Mortals soon.

I just finished The Talisman by Stephen King and Peter Straub, and I'm currently on Black House. I also just read Angela Carter's Heroes and Villains over the weekend.

I've finished Luftwaffe Victorious and Projekt Natter, now I'm reading South Pacific Destroyer and The Frost-Haired Vixen.

Well, my plan to start finishing up all the different poetry collections, literary criticism and short fiction I've been reading off and on is not going as well as I'd hoped. I did finish Lizzie Borden in Love, an excellent poetry collection from Julianna Baggott (who also writes witty, clever fiction); but I read a couple of stories from yet another short fiction collection, Red Spikes by Margo Lanagan...and this book of literary criticism on Angela Carter is also distracting me. Sigh. This is when I know I'm a obsessive compulsive reader...

Finished San Remo Drive by Leslie Epstein -- quite a disturbing book.

Last evening I finished Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian, and I don’t think I’ve ever read anything that’s included such an episodic, rampant kaleidoscope of violence told with such impersonal authority. Throughout my reading Flannery O’Connor’s stories immediately came to mind. McCarthy’s book resembles O’Connor’s in its violence, but he entirely lacks O’Connor’s penchant for theology and the symbolic plot resolutions that make theology seem plausible. The violence in Blood Meridian tends to be just that, and it is not a sign or symbol of something else. McCarthy refuses to bring in a moral verdict on the characters and actions, and there are surely no moments of “grace.”

But damn, not only is the violence barbarous on a level beyond any I’ve ever read, but I was struck by the lack of any human decency shown by any of the characters. The only ethical objection I can recall is made by Toadvine when the judge scalped the child – “Goddamn you, Holden.” But he never took any action or spoke for any decency. However, backtracking in my thoughts and reviewing the sections I highlighted, there are a few acts of human kindness – the kid giving Shelby his supply of water, the Yuma women taking care of the imbecile and the judge saving him from drowning, but I think that’s the extent of it. The dominant impression conveyed by the incessant violence is that no ethical, moral or civic sense is allowed to act upon the characters. It’s just there, take it for what it is.

Finished Ecology of a Cracker Childhood by Janisse Ray

Reading The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind by Mark Noll. Won't finish until next month.

Reading The Communist Manifesto by Marx and Engels

Reading The State and Revolution by V. I. Lenin

(Edited for Touchstones)

Finished Herman, which proved to be a touching, quirky and humane book about a small Norwegian boy with alopecia. Short but very sweet.

Reminded me of the film "My life as a dog"...

I'm still reading Consuelo and Alva Vanderbilt. I picked this up after reading Time and Again set partially in the Gilded Age. I don't know much about this time period. It is slow going so far. I'm busy finishing up a knitting project, so my reading time is cut down right now.

I'm reading another paranormal fantasy about gargoyles called Carved in Stone by Vickie Taylor. I'm enjoying it so far.

I've started The Time Machine which I've oddly never read, and am loving Middlesex so far.

#77 -- I totally agree with you Sean; which is why, although I admire the prose and incredible imagery I can't really wholeheartedly endorse the book. My best guess is his thesis is blood sacrifice, destruction, death is what it all comes down to in life -- and I just can't hold with that. Maybe because I am a woman, I don't know . . .

I am still reading The Boleyn Inheritence -- I submit that it is really no more than medieval chick lit. It is like reading Mary Poppins or The Pokey Little Puppy compared to my recent experience with Ulysses or Blood Meridian. For that reason alone, I am enjoying it.

Llamagirl - Ever read Dahl's memoirs? The first is "Boy," and it's fantastic. The second follows his time during WWII as a pilot.

Also, his adult short stories are amazing.

I read the new Everyman's edition of Dahl's collected stories earlier this year, all wonderfully twisted things, and noticed that Joyce Carol Oates reviews it in this month's NYRB too. I thought Dahl's memoirs were pretty entertaining, if just a little sketchy at times, but I recommend Jeremy Treglown's Roald Dahl: A Biography instead, a mostly sympathetic and well-rounded look at Dahl's fabulous career and tragic personal life.

Finished The Road. Absolutely disturbing and amazing. I got it from the library and finished it in about four hours. Had to force myself to put it down last night and go to sleep since I had to work in the morning -- then couldn't get to sleep because I was freaked out!

Moving on to something lighter: And Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris.

I'm reading Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore, and it's great. Hilarious. I'd like to go on The 700 Club and read from it.

Oh I'm in a grim spot!! You are all reading such luxurious books and I'm reading journals trying desperately to complete my term paper on postmodernism. Dull stuff compared to your fodder!

For storytime this week we read, Skip to My Lou by Nadine Bernard Westcott, The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter, The Pigeon Finds a Hotdog by Mo Willems and But no Elephants by Jerry Smath.

The Pigeon Finds a Hotdog went over fairly well especially since it was about sharing. The teachers especially liked that one, and the kids seem to like pigeon. We've read almost all of the books by Mo Willems. And the kids seemed to enjoy yelling But no elephants at me as we read that story. And they sang along to Skip to My Lou.. All in all, a good storytime this week.

Moving on to Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen now...

ShannonMDE (#90): In all seriousness, Skip to my lou is great! I love reading that one to my girls ... maybe even more than they like hearing it.

Still bogged in A Dirty Job and so have begun Unnatural Causes by PD James. Reading her work always makes me feel better and I can't wait to get into it again. She is one of few writers who can transport me to another time and place and make me feel like I know what it would be like to actually be there with her characters.

I gave up on The Game of Kings for now. I just couldn't get into it. I liked it for a while, but then realized I was dreading reading it because I just wasn't interested in what happened. I think it was the many foreign language bits, if I spoke French and understood the allusions I may have enjoyed it a lot more.

I read One Knight Stands by Jocelyn Kelley as a sort of break for my brain, and now I've decided to read Innocent Traitor by Alison Weir, which I wanted to do and should have done in the first place.

i've started shopaholic and baby - the series has been really fun- and then i start on harry potter

I have just started reading The Poisonwood Bible. It was a birthday present last year and I still haven't got round to it. Heard good things about it from friends although I haven't yet got into it.

Just finished Mustangs by J. Frank Dobie, part of my attempt to read up on Texas. It took awhile for whatever reason (distractions include kids, sick kids, travelling with kids...well, and LT). I don't think I ever read more than maybe 30 pages in one sitting. Next is another Dobie, Rattlesnakes which was published posthumously.

Starting Pretties by Scott Westerfeld today.

Still working my way thru Mad Ship by Robin Hobb. Should finish up today or tomorrow. I own the third installment Ship of Destiny but will probably read something lighter (and shorter!) before I get started with it. Maybe Dangerous Games by Keri Arthur (the 4th in her Riley Jensen series).

>96 lhuggins:: lhuggins, I loved The Poisonwood Bible. Hope you enjoy it!

I finished Cloud Atlas on Monday and am now on to Beasts of no Nation.

Now reading A Comedy of Errors : or the marriage records of England and Wales, 1837-1899 by Foster, Michael Whitfield and about to start Daisy Miller for one of my reading groups. (This is follow up reading from earlier reads which included,Colm Toibin's The Master and David Lodge's Author! Author

Just booked a trip to Ireland, so decided to try Lake of Sorrows by Erin Hart to "get in the mood"...hopefully I won't end up as a bog body though.

Anyone have any Ireland-related suggestions?

*TS not working, sorry.

I'm just about to start Magician: Apprentice by Raymond E. Feist. I'm looking forward to it; I read another of Feist's books several years ago and remember it as quite enjoyable. I picked this one up partly because of that and party because it was on the BBC's list of 200 Books To Read Before You Die.

Finished up reading Tallgrass by Sandra Dallas and just started reading on Mockingbird: A Portrait of Harper Lee by Charles J. Shields, really great reading so far.

#96 I loved the poisonwood bible - dont give up - it gets very gripping and heart breaking

I finished the feast of the goat which I enjoyed and raced through - truly intense

I will now read islands by dan sleigh

In the middle of Cold Flat Junction. Strange series featuring a 12 y/o girl as the protagonist. Also started Two Degrees West.

Half way through A Woman of Substance by Barbara Taylor Bradford. At first I thought it was going to be really boring, but it's turned out to be pretty exceptional.

Was currently reading Memoirs of Hadrian by Marguerite Yourcenar which turned into my 2nd Turkey of the year. Its in affect a monologue which would work as a audio book read by a good actor but given its essentially a working through of classical philosophical ideas not exactly a page turner. Perhaps read I Claudius by Robert Gravesfor how this approach can work.

So turned to a very different monologue! This was A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers and polished that off. One great book but not for the conventional. To me the key question of any book does it allow me to live in the fictive imagination if yes then well on the way to being a good book. How this is achieved is then a matter of the writer's art. But dear reader our imaginations work differently... so is the art poor or not speaking to our condition?

Edited because I for to mention that I am now reading The Rough Guide to Cult Fiction edited by Paul Simpson and now discovering that I do like books by walkers on the wild side such as, genre benders, beats, gurus, drunks, junkies, sinners etc as well as more conventional books. This was a Birthday book.

I also had 1001 books you must read before you die edited by Peter Boxall. Sadly went through yesterday and put a blue(removal) sticker dot to each book I have which was a lot more then I expected but less then one should hop for. But now lots of great books to explore that I have never heard of. Shame it is so western-centric and puts in multi entries for authors, they should have restricted it one per author. And also got The Salon.com Reader's Guide to Contemporary Authors by Laura Miller

Already seeking to swap and mooch books discovered but then sigh I do have 438 books on my TBR pile with some 30 more travelling towards me. But now I should be writing a report so work rather then imagined worlds call.

I'm reading What Good Are the Arts? by John Carey. Would write 'thought-provoking' but know it's a cliche!

I can be rather a harsh critic of first-novels, but despite a few rough spots, Steven Hall's The Raw Shark Texts kept me glued to the page all the way through. It's very smart, very inventive and somehow I didn't even mind the sappy love story so much, but all quibbles aside, it's still first-rate entertainment and highly recommended.

>105 keren7: I will interested to hear what you have to say about Islands. I have an old reader's copy here that I requested from the publisher but never got to....

Reading "Arrogance" by Joanna Scott. This is the fourth novel I've read by Joanna Scott. They have all been outstanding, "Manikin" being my favorite.

#102 kfl1227: Have a look at SeanLong's library - he has loads of Irish novels.

What Amanda said, kfl. There are so many choices I wouldn't know where to start. Have a look my library and feel free to contact me with any questions.

And I envy your trip to Eire. Unfortunately I won't be able to make it back there this year.

Bah.. Gave up on La Perdida and am thinking about giving up on Box Office Poison. Have I really run out of graphic novels that appeal to me? I liked Maus, Pedro and Me, The Graphic Adaptation of the 9/11 Report, and Blankets. And in general had been on a graphic novel kick, but these last few I've picked up have been a struggle. Any suggestions?

Now reading Cormac McCarthy's The Road, and can't put it down.

Alison Weir - Innocent Traitor; Novel of Lady Jane Grey, so far very good lots of historical detail but still easy to read.

>115 ShannonMDE: ShannonMDE, I just read Promethea by Alan Moore and thought it was delightful...I'd suggest that one as a possible new find!

#117 - I finished Innocent Traitor this morning and did really like it, so I hope you do too!

I've decided to start Elantris by Brandon Sanderson. Not enough pages in to decide how I feel, but I'm looking forward to getting deeper based on the many good reviews.

> 102: kfl1227
I thought Ireland was really interesting.

>120bookworm12
I just mooched Ireland...Really looking forward to reading it!

>113 amandameale:,114 amandameale, SeanLong,
Thank you for the suggestion to dig through SeanLong's/your library...looks like the Boston Public Library will be busy for a few months.

#111
I am a former South African and so this book is interesting - I have now put it off three times for other books lol

the cover is really south african looking - with table mountain in the background and ships in the harbor - and the book was originally written in Afrikaans - so I think I am experiencing transference towards it lol

I'm still working my way through Lolita.

Currently reading On Beauty: A Novel by Zadie Smith. My book group read it last month but I didn't get it done.

I've also started Dominion: The Power of Man, the Suffering of Animals, and the Call to Mercy by Matthew Scully but haven't gotten very far yet.

Also listening to Hoot by Carl Hiaasen.

>122 keren7: Well, my cover is a boring solid blue, no picture; but I seem to remember the one in the pub catalog, and certainly the book must've interested me because I asked specifically for it. I might have avoided it because of the size:-) Still, now I'm even more interested in what you think of it!

I finished Splendid Solution by Jeffrey Kluger.
I am now reading Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns. I heard so many good things about it on the Fiction-L list. I am really enjoying it.

Cold Sassy Tree's a keeper, dara, I liked it very much too.

It took me nearly 50 pages to get into Arthur Phillips' new novel Angelica, but once I did, I could hardly stop reading till I finished. It comes billed as a Victorian ghost story, which it certainly is, but one that's more in the vein of The Turn of the Screw, where the suspense arises not from the threat posed by any malevolent spirits, but instead from the characters' disassociation from each other, their splintering relationships, and ever-increasing paranoia. This is not the kind of story I'm usually drawn to, but never having read anything by Phillips before, was curious about his work, and wound up quite impressed by what a meticulous writer he seems, as well as a very elegant stylist. And while I'll admit that I wasn't entirely satisfied with his ending, I was never less than enthralled with Angelica nearly all the way through, really an exceptional new book.

Louis, glad to hear that about Angelica; there was a really great review in Publishers Weekly for it evoking The Turn of the Screw and I noted it down to check out later on in the store...

Finally got me a copy of The Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill. Very creepy book...............

The Girls by Lori Lansens for a book group. Really enjoying it.

My concentration is shot because I have a cold, so I've been trying to read what I thought was going to be a thriller of sorts but is turning out to be a little too grim for my mood at the moment: The Good German by Joseph Kanon. It was lent by a friend, not a book I necessarily would have picked up on my own.

eagle's cry by david nevin. starts w/dec 1799 (death of g. washington), & ends in 1803 w/louisiana purchase. birth of 2-party system; 5 new england states talking about seceding; napoleon lands troops in louisiana, etc. lots of info about andrew jackson i didn't know, how he had to fight for command of militia...

#53 I loved Lolita...I was repulsed and yet drawn at the same time. As for Thus spoke Zarathustra even though I didn't read it per se, I went through alot of it for a philosophy paper involving him and Dostoyevsky. Personally, I think if you just skim a couple of places, you'll be fine.

#131 I bought The Good German with the intention of reading it, but haven't gotten there yet. It just doesn't seem to call to me.

So, currently I'm reading Natural Born Charmer by Susan Elizabeth Phillips. Kudos to her for some how getting me to read a contemporary romance book. I didn't think I'd finish it, thought I'd get repulsed too quickly...but oddly enough I've gotten too deep into the story that I can't stop. Hurrah!!

I tried to start Faith in Nation, but about twenty pages in I decided that the author was so prolix that he was wasting my time and aborted the whole enterprise. It was one of those moments when I had to remind myself that it's been almost twenty years since I've been a grad student and don't have to read books that are "good" for me.

Apart from that I read South Pacific Destroyer and "The Forts of the Meuse in World War I," and will probably finish up The Frost-Haired Vixen this evening.

I'm reading Notes From The Underground. Anyone else?